Chapter 36
Chapter 36
[MC: Trainee Seo Cha-gyeom.]
─Huh?
─?
─Lol nice lie
─They probably mean son-in-law material
The communities watching the ranking announcement ceremony instantly went cold.
This reaction was shared by Home Master, who was shoveling dry, homemade pasta into his mouth at home.
"What are they saying."
Even in the fake spoilers that existed purely to draw aggro, there had never been a case where Seo Cha-gyeom wasn't ranked 1st.
To the point where even reactions calling it a PD pick got replies like 'a PD who doesn't pick him has no sense.'
Homma assumed it was just a simple bluff and stuffed pasta into his mouth again. Han Neuti's results were already out, and the top rankings were always within the expected range, so his interest wasn't particularly piqued.
[MC: And Trainee An Jiwon, Trainee Baek Gyeonwoo, Trainee Song Se-ho. Please come forward.]
'I knew this would happen.'
The MC, who had been silent for a moment, called out all the other top-ranking trainees in succession.
The four trainees walked out with expressions of utter bewilderment and stood side by side on the platform.
When Home Master discovered the soul of the 42nd-ranked trainee damply imprinted on Seo Cha-gyeom's chest, he let out a snicker without realizing it.
And then immediately went stone-faced.
[MC: I will now explain a special rule unique to Season 7.]
[MC: This season, at every ranking announcement ceremony held before the finale... rankings from 4th place onwards will not be revealed.]
Because the production team had started doing dumb shit again.
Home Master quickly tossed aside the pasta he was about to put in his mouth.
'Why?'
Since he belonged to the type who thought 'whatever the ranking, just debuting is enough,' he had little interest in the top-rankers' rankings.
But even that Home Master knew that the top-ranking competition contributed enormously to the show's buzzworthiness.
Not announcing the rankings meant giving up all of that buzz. Wasn't this a plan that no sensible production team would ever commit to?
─Did they decide to tank the show? lololol
─Should I take this as them declaring they'll never do a next season?
When he logged onto the community, he found that posts with the exact same opinion as Homma's were flooding the boards.
Nodding, he scrolled down and clicked on a post with an intriguing title.
[Summarizing the rank blind rule for you, come on in]
Simply put
'Stable within the top 4' and
'Declining within the top 4' are clearly different things but
The blind rule merges these two into one
You thought it was the former but it was the latter?
That means your ultimate bias could get eliminated because of that damn biased vote saving
Let me give an example
The only fully revealed ranking chart from Episode 1 right now
Seo Cha-gyeom is 1st, right?
And An Jiwon, Baek Gyeonwoo, Lee Jae-young, Jeong Hyeon-i, Han Neuti, Hwang Jae-hyeon, etc. who get a lot of biased votes from Seo Cha-gyeom fans... Except for the first two, the rest are all in the Jeong Byeong-jon zone
What if Seo Cha-gyeom keeps maintaining top 4 like this?
At the finale, since he's 1st anyway, there'll definitely be people who think they need to save their biased picks first
And that's how the possibility of Seo Cha-gyeom's debut team spot getting nuked skyrockets yep
So conclusion. Please just vote for your ultimate bias
That damn relationship chemistry means nothing if your ultimate bias can't debut
Remember this, you'll always find another biased pick anyway
"Hmm."
Theoretically, it was all correct.
However, Homma thought a little differently.
'No matter what, I don't think Seo Cha-gyeom would fail to debut.'
Unlike the fans who were anxious about everything, Homma, whose ultimate bias was Han Neuti, could observe the situation from a more objective perspective.
Just look right now. He said one acceptance speech and completely devoured all the mentions of the others, didn't he?
'Does it even make sense that he wouldn't debut.'
Shrugging his shoulders, Homma pressed the TV power button to turn it off. Then he seriously started community lurking.
The community topic had already shifted by then.
[2nd Competition Spoilers]
Since the ranking announcement filming was last Saturday, today was roughly one week since the training camp began.
That meant the 2nd competition stage was just two days away.
Originally, <MAKE100%> was famous for having non-stop content every single day of the week—Mon, Tue, Wed, Thu, Fri, Sat, Sun—due to the fake spoilers that popped up weekly and the legit spoilers occasionally mixed in.
[Baek Gyeonwoo Seo Cha-gyeom one team]
Yep
└For real?
└Whoa finally finally
[I'm a real staffer and Baek Gyeonwoo Seo Cha-gyeom one team is true]
You can look forward to it hehe
└Heogyu ㅠㅠㅠ
└I'll trust only you unnie
[Choi Jun-bin is rapping this time]
Saw Seo Cha-gyeom and got Hyeon-ta and changed his path he said
└Lie
[Han Neuti singing softly softly]
Picked a cute song to change his image he said
└Stop it
└This one's alright though
It went like this.
The production team seemed aware that these spoilers filled the program's content gaps, and their management didn't appear particularly strict.
'If it weren't so, there's no way the real stuff pops up every time.'
Home Master scrolled all the way down, pondering which among this flood of spoilers were real.
[Believe it or not]
Seo Cha-gyeom Lee Jae-young Choi Jun-bin Kim Han-ul - Strong Boy
Baek Gyeonwoo Han Neuti - the things
Comments
―lololol Strong Boy lolol
―If you're gonna pull a staged leak, at least know something you idiot Has there ever been any clueless production crew on Seoba that put Strong Boy as a competition song
└Living Tip: The production crew are indeed clueless
―If this is legit and they picked the song themselves it's gonna be hella fun yes lol fans better stock up on hair loss meds in advance
"Oh."
'Tibaekz on one team?'
There was a combination called Chateebaek.
It was a new combination gradually growing in some communities, formed when Kkam-gyeom's faction, who flowed in during the 1st competition, merged with the existing Airplane-z combo.
Homma, who privately liked them, copied the link to that post and sent it to Woomjjalgye.
[Unnie what do you think of this (link)]
[Hyelin: Whoa it's total chaos incoming Cha-gyeom fans and Choi Jun-bin fans fight every day anyway omg]
[Hyelin: No wait that's not the problem what's with this out-of-nowhere Strong Boy???]
[Hyelin: If this turns out real I'm going to QTen to start a fire]
[Neuti and Gyeon-woo are on the same team]
[Hyelin: You think that's what's important right now?]
[Hyelin: They said Cha-gyeom is doing the song of the abyss...]
So, one week ago,
What on earth had happened.
* * *
Immediately after the 1st Ranking Announcement Ceremony, the surviving trainees were assembled in the auditorium without a moment to collect themselves.
"The theme of this 2nd competition is <2%>."
Even though the MC had been standing all day to host, he continued his explanation with a smile showing no signs of fatigue.
"It is a mission where you add your 2% to the songs of your seniors that have already been released, to create a 102% stage."
To explain simply.......
It was a creation mission where you had to pick two out of three: lyric writing, arrangement, and choreography creation, to put together a novel stage.
Since arrangement would be mandatory, it essentially meant choosing between lyric writing and choreography creation.
In other words, this mission split into vocals and dance.
"Trainee Choi Jun-bin, do you have a type of stage you'd like to do?"
"Ah, I......."
Choi Jun-bin, holding the mic, glanced over at me.
"I want to... properly show my singing."
"Oh, really. I'm looking forward to it."
They're asking the obvious.
Anyway, I was also considering vocals.
I wasn't particularly good at writing lyrics, but that was the direction I needed right now.
For every season, it was mostly the dance side that recorded the highest buzz, but now, when the production team was persistently trying to distort my image, buzz alone wasn't what I needed.
A chance to directly convey my message to the audience.
'Nothing beats a song for selling sincerity.'
Besides, considering the ending of this program, staging a performance with a long-lasting resonance rather than aiming for short-term buzz would be the right direction in many ways.
But if possible, I'd avoid being on the same team as Choi Jun-bin. Since it'd be a guaranteed ticket to evil editing.
Originally I'd intended to snag a bit more screen time through a rivalry narrative... but I'd already eaten way too much. I was on the verge of overeating.
"For this team selection, just one moment before that."
The MC paused briefly and then immediately continued.
"Trainees Song Se-ho, An Jiwon, Seo Cha-gyeom, Baek Gyeonwoo, Mun Jeong-jin, Lee Hyo-woon! Could you please come forward?"
They were the top 6 trainees.
Walking out with a clueless look, I thought to myself.
'Are they going to let us pick our team members?'
However, instead of the words I had expected, the MC handed us name tags with each of our names written on them.
And told us to stick them on our backs.
Of all people, the one standing next to me was Baek Gyeonwoo, so we had to put them on each other. Thanks to Baek Gyeonwoo's hand, which struck me several times even after the name tag was on, my back stung.
"......Gyeon-woo, you don't have a grudge against me, right?"
I couldn't hear his reply and got hit one more time.
The MC, who had been watching our friendly scene with satisfaction, made a V sign with his fingers and shouted loudly once everyone was done.
"From this moment! We will have exactly 2 minutes of tag."
Tag?
"The 36 trainees, excluding these 6 here, will all become the taggers and aim for your name tags. Then, after 2 minutes, the final 6 trainees holding name tags will gain the right to pick their desired team members for this mission."
It was the name tag ripping game I'd seen many times somewhere before.
But telling us to dodge 36 people in this not very wide space just meant go get your tag taken, didn't it?
Well, even if I went all-out to protect it from the start, I'd just get comments like 'he's already top rank and yet so greedy.'
I'll just dodge moderately and let someone catch me at the end.
"Then start!"
The start was lukewarm.
Since the targets were all top-ranking, many trainees seemed worried they might accidentally draw fire if they touched the wrong person.
Because of that, the ones actively stepping up were mostly mid-to-upper-ranking trainees or higher, who could defend their public image.
I slowly moved my feet, pondering who among them it would be best to get caught by.
I could try aiming to be on the same team as Han Neuti again.......
Thwack!
Crash!
"......."
A stinging sensation rose from my knees.
It was because I'd launched myself straight forward with zero resistance, solely determined to prevent an injury situation.
Onto a hard floor.
My knees.
'What kind of situation is this?'
As I assessed the situation in my tragically fallen posture, I turned my head to check the identity of the obstacle first.
"......Are you okay?"
Clearly I'd meant to ask 'Why are you lying down?', but out of habit, the socially acceptable words came out instead.
Baek Gyeonwoo, who hadn't budged an inch even after getting his side kicked by my foot, merely glanced down at me despite my concern.
'He's so difficult, seriously.'
Just what kind of thought process operates that kid's brain?
'Anyway, what I just did probably looked pretty pathetic.'
It was just as I recalled the memory of moments ago when I'd been struggling not to step on him and belatedly worried about my dignity while trying to stand up.
Riiip—!
"......!"
I immediately spun my body around at the sensation of my shirt being yanked.
Instantly reaching back to check, luckily the name tag was still safely hanging on with only a bit of the edge torn.
I raised my eyes to identify the attempted perpetrator.
"......Why you?"
Surprisingly, it was An Jiwon.
But An Jiwon said nothing. They must have collectively agreed to boycott talking to me today.
An Jiwon grabbed the back of my neck and pushed me down firmly, then reached for my name tag once more.
Of course, I was currently making eye contact with the floor, so I was only guessing based on the sensation of my back being torn at.
It was hard to escape because my center of gravity had collapsed....... No, wait, is it okay to be this rough? On a program like this?
"No, Jiwon, hey! You have your own name tag!"
"Ah, just hold still......!"
Riiip!
The sound of a name tag being torn off echoed hollowly.
Riiiip—!
And then one more right after.
For reference, the sound heard after was the sound of my name tag being ripped off.
As I raised my head while rubbing my neck which had already grown stiff, Lee Jae-young was holding An Jiwon's name tag, smiling brightly.
"Wow, I'll make good use of it?"
And then, smoothly dodging the other taggers, he vanished somewhere.
An Jiwon, holding my name tag dangling in her hand, glared daggers at Lee Jae-young's retreating figure with a reproachful expression but quickly relaxed her face.
Then, radiating a cheerful vibe, she ran over to the camera director. It seemed she was off to boast about her trophy.
Beside me, suddenly tattered, Baek Gyeonwoo, who was still lying sprawled out, quietly muttered.
"Are you stupid? Even though I stuck it on so firmly for you."