I'm Going to ■■

Vrooooom—!

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Mystic's van hurried down the road. They had only just pulled away from Director Go Taemin's studio, and Sua's haul had not ended with landing the role of Kim Sohee.

Kim Iseo, who had been turning her curiosity over and over, finally parted her lips.

"Sua."

"Yes."

"First of all, congratulations on securing the role of Kim Sohee. And you did it by your own ability, which makes it all the more remarkable. There are, however, a few things I'm curious about."

Sua gave a small, quiet nod. If you're curious, just ask — that was all it meant.

"First, Ham A-yoon. Was there a reason you proposed the role of Park Min-seo? It seemed rather proactive, coming from you."

"Hmm."

The reason she had offered Ham A-yoon the role of Park Min-seo? Sua quietly looked over her Special Privilege window.

The reason lay in how well the role fit.

Park Min-seo's grade wasn't even showing before.

She could confirm Park Min-seo's grade now, but the startling part was that what the Privilege indicated was not a letter of the alphabet at all. It was a person's name. Ham A-yoon's, no less.

Even Sua, slow as she could be to catch on, understood the situation at once. The role of Park Min-seo had to be played by Ham A-yoon. It had to. So she had suggested it, and after thinking it over, Ham A-yoon accepted.

Thanks to that, Starting Tomorrow, Crescendo currently sat at a grade of no less than 1.5. As a beginning, that was excellent. Better still, the project would let her graduate the Musician trait — a more dutiful child you could not ask for.

She was curious about something else, too. Maybe, just maybe, she might even get to see Ham A-yoon's Yeoncheongyeong.

That was when it happened.

"And, Sua."

"Yes."

"That thing you said you wanted. Were you serious?"

The thing Kim Iseo meant was the reward Go Taemin had promised out of nowhere. The production team's factions had split and been at each other's throats, and the headache of it had been cleanly resolved thanks to Sua. He wanted to pay what he owed.

So Sua had simply told him what she wanted.

Kim Iseo gave a small shrug.

"...Well. That's fine. Raise it with care."

The thing Sua had announced she wanted.

It was an arctic fox.

Meanwhile, in Gangnam, Seoul. Up on a pedestrian overpass.

Click—!

Two travelers were capturing corners of the city through a camera. The camera looked expensive even at a glance, and their clothes sat just a little off from what Koreans were wearing that season. Only natural. The two of them were Japanese.

Toward the man fiddling with the camera like a handheld game, checking the photo he had just taken, the one beside him — who had been cautiously testing the air — finally spoke. The words came out in Japanese, and his voice was exceedingly careful.

"There's one thing, though, Director."

The man holding the camera and the man who had just spoken wore exactly opposite expressions. The owner of the voice, if anything, did not seem particularly interested in the Korean scenery. Boredom sat thick on his face.

"Honestly, Korea and Japan aren't all that different anymore."

"In what way?"

From there, the two went on in Japanese.

"It's not like it used to be. The internet has developed far too much. Korea or Japan, people's trends have gotten similar. You can tell just by looking at the people walking the streets."

"And your conclusion?"

"Do we really have to find the inspiration for the next film in Korea, specifically? Japan has plenty of good places too. Coming here isn't exactly making anything leap to mind."

"Hmm."

At that, Director Yusaku, who had been looking down at the camera, lifted his gaze for the first time. What he addressed was no longer the photograph he had taken, but the view spread out beneath the overpass.

"Well. Even if inspiration were not the issue, we were bound to come to Korea regardless. I was invited as a special juror. That schedule has to be honored."

"The Busan International Short Film Festival.... I can't believe you actually accepted."

The man shrugged.

"And Director, please don't lie. The juror post is just an excuse. You came because you simply like Korea. I don't understand why you're so fond of this country."

"Hahaha. Was it that obvious?"

Suzuki Yusaku. Japan had no shortage of directors with considerable names, but Yusaku was fairly well known in Korea as well, and that was thanks to an uncommon love of the country. A Japanese director with a respectable Korean following, you might say. He had been invited as a special juror for this edition of the Busan International Short Film Festival.

"You saw the recent one, The Carp and the Goblin, didn't you?"

"Of course I did."

The Carp and the Goblin took Japan's organized crime — the yakuza — as its subject and wove together several of their stories. A noir thick with a man's idea of romance. That kind of film.

"Calling a thing like that Japan's great ambitious work — that is the reality we are living in. A man who played a gangster in another film plays a gangster in this one too, then goes to yet another film and plays a gangster again...."

"Ah, that is definitely a thing. But what can you do? People like famous actors, and there are only so many famous actors. It's not even as if the new faces act any better."

"In any case, Japan's actors have gone stagnant. We gather the familiar faces and repeat the same cartoonish staging, over and over. That is the reality of J-content. So spare me the grumbling, and pay attention."

Director Yusaku's eyes were unusually serious.

"Wherever you go, there is something to learn. Korea is no exception."

The conference room of the Busan International Short Film Festival was as busy as ever. The chairman, who bore overall responsibility, and the people who had previously sat down to discuss how to drum up interest in the short film festival were gathered in one place again. Even so, their faces were far brighter than before.

The chairman spoke.

"So spending a little money wasn't for nothing after all? The articles are pouring in."

"Yes. Fortunately, the response has been quite positive. Cutting the criminal Director Kim Jungi loose so quickly seems to have done its part, and the lineup of invited actors and directors is solid."

What the staff member said was true. The moment something gets treated like spam advertising, it no longer matters how many articles there are — they mean nothing. But for now, fortunately, the pieces tied to the Busan International Short Film Festival were meeting with a generally warm response.

Even narrowing the field to articles journalists had written in an official capacity, there were already more than could be sorted through, and the reactions netizens were showing across the communities could not be counted at all. On-site photographs, in particular, were drawing ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠a fair amount of love.

The more they went through it all, the better the mood in the conference room became.

"How are the invited actors' socials looking. Is it underway?"

"Yes. The ads have gone in, using the hashtag."

The method was simple enough. When famous actors uploaded posts, they attached something like #BusanInternationalShortFilmFestival alongside them, and that did the promoting. Their fans, naturally, were taking an interest in droves.

And last of all....

The chairman's eyes drifted to the employee who was forever nodding off.

"...That VTuber thing, or whatever it is. Did you get that ad placed?"

"Yes, sir. Leave it to me."

The fellow who ordinarily did nothing but bob his head in sleep would, the moment VTubers came up, rearrange his face like some grim hero marching to war, and it was somehow intensely annoying. But there was nothing to be said about it. Fine — if this was the one time he worked hard, wasn't that something? Better than being useless his entire life. And so the chairman sighed at the sheer patheticness of it and asked.

"Mind if I ask which VTuber you commissioned?"

"We placed the order with NeoLive. Shikarin, in particular."

"Shikarin? Wait — what. The name is Shikarin?"

"Yes. Rindo Shikarin."

"Why? I don't recall anyone saying we were commissioning a Japanese person."

"Pardon? What do you mean, sir? She's Korean!"

"...?"

For a moment the chairman was simply dumbfounded. It wasn't that he meant to belittle or disparage what the other man was saying. He simply could not make sense of it with the head he had. After thinking for a long while about what any of it was supposed to mean, he spoke again.

"Don't take it the wrong way. Just listen. It's something I think even when I watch what my own daughter gets up to — I cannot, for the life of me, understand the world these days...."

"You don't know Rindo Shikarin of NeoLive. Since you don't seem familiar, I'll explain and then we can move on. She's the most popular VTuber on NeoLive, and she is seriously, insanely—"

"...Enough, enough. You handle it."

The next morning.

Perhaps it was thanks to the organizers' efforts(?). Through the promotion, a great many people had begun to take an interest in the short film festival, and Sua's group chat was no exception. Wonsung-ing, especially.

There had been talk of holding a regular meetup for some time, but getting everyone into one place was, as ever, not easy in practice. They were all busy with their own lives. And this was hardly the first time a meetup had come up in the chat. It came up every time, and every time it petered out in the end. This time would probably be no different.

As if to prove that none of them had been wrong, the read receipts kept climbing while hardly anyone actually joined the conversation. They all figured the subject would die on its own.

But.

Then.

A single sentence turned the tide of the war.