Recruiting the Youngest Son of the Namgung Clan
Personally, the scene had felt a bit stifling to play, but Director Bang was absolutely delighted with it.
Nam Hyunho, who was not a man to coast through a performance, had swung the plastic axe prepared as a prop like a man possessed.
He heaped praise on me afterward, saying that even with an axe slicing through the air inches from my face, I'd responded without losing my composure for a second — that it looked exactly like Lee Myeong, the sword master himself.
For my part, I'd simply acted as I always do, resting on the absolute certainty that an axe like that could never touch me. But apparently, no matter how seasoned an actor is in action work, an axe (a plastic prop, granted) suddenly swooping past your face is enough to rattle anyone.
And if that tension gets captured on camera, it tarnishes the character of Lee Myeong, who's supposed to be a sword master.
I mean, what kind of sword master flinches at an opponent's weapon during a choreographed sparring scene?
"Come to think of it, Hyunho-hyung, didn't that axe swing come in deeper than the blocking called for?"
"Huh? Ah... um... no, it didn't?"
"...So you did slip up."
"I told you, I did exactly what we agreed on."
So that was him refusing to take the blame for the ad-lib, then.
Turns out this guy was a bit of a lunatic weasel too.
Had it been anyone but me, that earlier scene probably would've ended in an NG.
"GO!"
"The mine, you say? Laying rails through a mine is perfectly simple work. Of course I can do it."
"Ah, Unsan... that place. They say the monsters have all but overrun it..."
"Very well, fine. If you slay the beast, bring me its bones. Do that, and I'll join you."
"Ahh yes, from its skeleton I shall build a colossal steam robot. Colossal! Even MORE colossal!!"
"OK, good. Rion, we're going again for a bust shot."
Convincing Nam Hyunho had taken an actual drawn sword, but persuading the mad scientist Bison Choi required nothing more than words.
Hearing that a giant monster had occupied the mine, Bison Choi promised to cooperate with the mine's development on the condition that the monster's bones be handed over to him.
The colossal steam robot Bison Choi was developing appears only briefly at the end of this drama. While Lee Myeong and Violet are away for a time, Qing dynasty soldiers launch a surprise attack on the mine — and it's Bison Choi's colossal steam robot that holds them off.
Colossal steam robot, sure — in truth it was little more than a piloted tin-can scrap heap, and after blocking the mine entrance through sheer mass alone, it was eventually blown apart under a ferocious volley of rifle fire.
It wasn't exactly powerful, but it bought time, and when Lee Myeong and Violet belatedly returned and swept the Qing soldiers away, peace returned to the mine at last.
"Honestly, the kid's not bad at acting."
"Ah, Rion-hyung, you mean?"
"Yeah. Idol or whatever, if you act that well, who's going to complain?"
Rion, playing Bison Choi in this drama, was delivering his usual solid performance.
Watching him chew through the role of Bison Choi — a lunatic so flagrant no one could miss it — made me half suspect that might actually be his real personality.
Well, Rion's at least a decent sort.
Despite Jo Yooshin constantly posturing at him, he'd settled things with nothing more than a staring contest, so his temperament didn't look bad at all.
The only real problem was that, after whatever he experienced on our last drama, he wouldn't come within a ten-meter radius of my side of the set.
If he gave this much focus to his acting, though, I could laugh off a trifle like that.
On set, good acting is all that matters, after all.
"Hm. And this is all thanks to it being a Flame Entertainment production, I take it?"
"What's that supposed to... ah, well, yes, I suppose it is."
I watched Rion's retreating back as he vanished again after filming his one scene.
Nam Hyunho, who'd been searching something on his smartphone, then showed me a few articles.
My school bullying scandal, Moon Sooyeon's transfer story, and even the lawsuit hammer that had put a definitive end to Luna fandom's atrocities — a tidy compilation of all the media play Flame had pulled off.
"No question about it, they really do get things done."
"You think so?"
"Honestly, I'd felt it for a while. There was all sorts of noise around Cheon-hoobae too, but it all got cleaned up so neatly. The person running Cheon Entertainment back then — that's Flame Entertainment's current CEO, right?"
"Wasn't Cheon Entertainment's CEO Yua-hoobae herself?"
"Oh, please. Actors are just the face of the company. The CEO's the one actually running it."
Um, no — Cheon Yua is the one actually running it.
"Well, let's go with that. The person who was an executive back then is indeed Representative Ju of Flame Entertainment."
"That's the one."
I let the conversation trail off there, figuring there was no need to dig any deeper. Whether it was Representative Ju or Cheon Yua running the company, all I cared about was that they did it well.
But right now, more than that, I wanted to know why he was bringing any of this up in the first place.
He wasn't the type to spout nonsense over an expensive meal, so there had to be something to it.
"Why are you bringing that up all of a sudden?"
"Ah, well... the truth is, I've been thinking about Flame myself. Moon Sooyeon's with Flame now too, right?"
"You, hyung?"
"Yeah. Why? Can't I?"
"...Nothing stopping you... but aren't you currently signed somewhere?"
"I'm freelance. I'm my own one-man agency."
"Oh, that's right."
Nam Hyunho, of course.
There's no denying this man is capable. His acting, his looks — all of it.
If his family being too well-off is a flaw, it's a flaw, but he never flaunts it, and it seemed like his family had essentially let him off the leash, so no issues there.
No — if anything, it might actually be a plus.
As the youngest son of Changcheon Group, wouldn't he shield us from any pointless outside pressure?
In sheer scale, S&M dwarfs Changcheon, but S&M is a foreign company and its movements are often painfully awkward to navigate.
Watching Cheon Yua get kept circling on the outside, something seemed to be amiss there too.
And frankly, our agency's actor roster quietly tilting into a female majority was starting to weigh on me.
By time-honored law, the lone woman among men is treated like a princess everywhere, but the lone man is always reduced to a servant.
Moon Sooyeon, Cheon Yua, and Yang Yuri on top of that — even the little one is a girl, you know?
Having our resident sucker Nam in the middle — no, sorry, Nam Hyunho — would balance things out a bit.
And on a slightly different note: Nam Hyunho joining Flame would mean the youngest son of the Namgung clan entering the Demonic Cult, wouldn't it?
That's a feat worthy of being called an achievement even the First Heavenly Demon never managed.
The direct bloodline of the Namgung clan, joining the Demonic Cult? Come on. How could anyone resist that?
That said, I did need to confirm at least one thing first: why exactly Nam Hyunho wanted into our company.
If he harbored private feelings for Moon Sooyeon or Cheon Yua, things could get a little awkward.
Given our company's atmosphere, where joining the roster apparently came bundled with moving into the office building itself, romance troubles were a genuine possibility.
Workplace romance always ends in hell, so it had to be stopped at all costs.
"Eh? What do you mean by that...?"
Just to be safe, I asked about it, and he looked at me with eyes that said, why on earth would you even ask that?
So I decided to hit him with a few more facts. He'd said it with his own mouth once, after all — that he loved women to death.
"Hyung, didn't you say you loved women?"
"I do love them. It's just... Cheon-hoobae or Luna-ssi, they're a bit..."
"Sorry? Why?"
"I like the petite type. And those two are... honestly, if I had to choose, Writer Yang is more my type than either of them."
"...Is that so."
The way he talked, you'd think Nam Hyunho was short, but the man is actually quite tall.
His profile lists 181 centimeters; reality is 179. A hair under 180, but that's plenty respectable.
Plenty of male actors are shorter than Nam Hyunho, after all.
Still, if petite is his declared type, then neither Cheon Yua nor Moon Sooyeon fits the bill.
Cheon Yua, 170 centimeters (169 on paper), and Moon Sooyeon, 168 centimeters (169 on paper), both count as tall for women.
That reminds me — on paper, the two of them are the same height. What do they coat that number with, honey? Why are they both 169?
In any case, unlike those two towers, the Yang Yuri he mentioned last is the petite kind, hovering just around 160.
It only sounds odd because the comparison group is Cheon Yua and Moon Sooyeon; objectively speaking, Yang Yuri is a fairly cute girl in her own right.
In Murim she spent her days scowling while spouting things like "annihilate the orthodox sects" and "destroy them all," but over here she's comparatively normal, which makes her far easier on the eyes.
Not my type, granted — but the level where I could admit she's decent enough.
"So to be clear, that's not what this is about."
"It's not. Why'd you even ask? Even at the same company, wouldn't you not really run into them?"
"If everything stays normal, that's true."
Well, he'd find out eventually anyway, so there was no need to spell it out.
Truthfully, I'd asked only out of worry for the worst case — I didn't actually expect Nam Hyunho to move into our company building.
It was Moon Sooyeon barging into the company out of nowhere who was the strange one; for someone of Nam Hyunho's standing, moving into the office would be abnormal.
As I've mentioned before, every celebrity wants to be free of their agency. The company was, at most, a place you dropped by to check a script.
Unless someone had special circumstances like me or Moon Sooyeon, you could assume it wouldn't happen.
"So to sum up — Flame does good work, and that's why you want in."
"Close enough. Honestly, working solo gets surprisingly exhausting. But watching how Flame handles their business, it hit me just right."
"Then start by setting up a meeting with our company people first."
"That's the plan. So — you won't object to me joining your company?"
"What would I even object to? If you want to come, you come. I can't speak for Yua-hoobae, though."
I doubted Cheon Yua would object either.
Flame's motto was a small elite, but someone of Nam Hyunho's caliber easily counted as elite.
Frankly, actors as good-natured as him are rare.
Of course, he's got his own subtle streak of lunacy, but it's not the bad kind of lunacy, so it should be fine.
"Oh, look who's arriving. Yua-hoobae and Sooyeon-hoobae."
"Oh, so it is. Probably for the night shoot later. But that...?"
"A coffee truck? It's Sooyeon-hoobae's."
As I chatted with Nam Hyunho, Cheon Yua and Moon Sooyeon came into view on that side of the set. And one coffee truck with them.
(˵¯͒〰¯͒˵) Sorry for everything until now! (˵¯͒〰¯͒˵)
The truck bore that rather adorable banner — apparently Moon Sooyeon had decided to send one as an apology for the Mun Entertainment turmoil that had raged from the start of filming until just recently.
Fair enough. We weren't some trash-fire Mun Entertainment, after all — you settle the lawsuit, offer your apologies, and move on.
Of course, every actor and staff member on set had almost certainly seen the articles detonated when Moon Sooyeon moved to Flame.
It was the kind of incident that would have put every last crew member and cast member on high alert the moment that noisy article dropped.
But because the matter was resolved so quickly, and because the investor was on Flame's side, everyone was quietly letting it slide — though make no mistake, it was a colossal nuisance.
Typical of Flame, though, which had spent years backing Cheon Yua: do what needed doing, and sweep the rest under the rug with class.