Chapter 109
Chapter 109
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Translator: Vine
Chapter: 109
Chapter Title: Growing Pains (2)
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Yeon-ho said nothing.
He simply led A-yun to his car and drove in silence.
They arrived at Han River Park.
Even then, A-yun kept her head bowed low as if she were a sinner.
She was ashamed.
Ashamed of running away because she couldn’t do her job right, of making him come all the way to her house, and finally, of sniffling because she still couldn’t find a solution.
Before blaming anyone else, A-yun felt a deep sense of shame in herself.
In contrast, the park was warm.
The early summer riverside, bathed in the glow of the setting sun, scattered a gentle light, oblivious to A-yun’s inner turmoil. The sound of people’s laughter tickling her ears held not a trace of gloom.
“Are you feeling a little better now?”
Those were Yeon-ho’s first words.
A-yun flinched, then slowly nodded.
Nothing had really improved.
Yet, she felt better, perhaps because escaping that suffocating space had cleared a corner of her heart.
Seeing the river carry the sunset made her frown again for no reason.
Just then, Yeon-ho placed a hat on her head.
“Your eyes are all puffy.”
Her face grew hot.
A-yun pulled the brim down low, her lips trembling.
The words that came out were:
“…I’m sorry.”
Of all the things she could have said, that was the only one that escaped her lips.
A-yun felt sorry to Yeon-ho for this whole situation.
The thought of having disappointed someone who trusted her left no room for any other excuse.
Yeon-ho replied.
“What are you sorry for?”
“…Pardon?”
“There’s nothing to be sorry about. Apologies are for people who’ve done something wrong.”
A-yun looked up.
Yeon-ho was hugging his knees, quietly watching the river.
“You haven’t done anything wrong.”
“My work…”
“Is that something that gets done just by rushing it? Seo-rim misses her deadlines all the time, too. She’ll keep revising until she’s satisfied, no matter how many people she burns out in the process.”
A-yun mumbled her lips together.
‘But at least she gets along well with people.’
She didn’t say the words out loud.
If only she could be as ruthless as Seo-rim, pushing others around to get things done her way.
That was the most recent realization A-yun had come to.
The people she had always worked with—Yeon-ho, Seo-rim, even Myeong-gyu—were all exceptionally skilled at handling people.
They were all incredible people who did things she couldn't, as if it were the most natural thing in the world.
That was probably another reason why this was so hard.
A-yun had thought that if she had her own team, she would be able to take care of them and delegate tasks just like everyone else.
She thought she would be an exemplary team leader.
But reality was different.
A sense of self-loathing ambushed her every time she realized it, tormenting her.
A-yun spoke of such things.
“…I don’t know what other people are thinking.”
“Neither do I.”
“They all seem less capable than me…”
“They probably are.”
“Th-that’s…”
Yeon-ho offered no reprimand, only quiet affirmations to A-yun’s complaints.
Perhaps because of that, A-yun felt the words flowing out more easily.
“…Actually, they all worked hard. I feel like it could be better, but… I can’t bring myself to say it.”
“Why not?”
“…Because it feels like I’m dismissing their efforts.”
That was the problem.
A-yun knew the shortcomings of her three team members.
She knew how to correct them, how to compensate for their lacking skills, and even had the words to express it.
Yet she couldn’t say it.
Because they were all older and more experienced than her.
She was afraid that if she said anything, they would think she was just an arrogant kid with a high opinion of herself.
It was embarrassing to reveal her inner thoughts.
Fortunately, Yeon-ho didn’t provoke that embarrassment.
Just then.
*Bbababam!*
The sound of a speaker echoed from a distance.
It was a busker.
A crowd gathered a short distance from where the two were sitting.
The noise broke the silence.
Around then, through a gap in the clamor that filled the space, Yeon-ho spoke softly.
“You know, I…”
A-yun looked at Yeon-ho.
“Yes?”
“I was worse than you. I’m still pretty bad, actually. I’m not good at handling people.”
“N-no, you’re not…”
“I am. I’m a tyrannical person.”
Yeon-ho’s gaze deepened.
Whether it was because the sky was darkening, A-yun felt his eyes were not in the present but submerged in the distant past, like those of a man adrift in his memories.
“When I first got a subordinate, I only gave them menial tasks. To be honest, their work ability wasn’t that different from mine, but because I thought of them as having joined after me, I didn’t trust them.”
Was he talking about Seo-rim?
“So I made them get coffee… and, well, one time I saw something they did on their own. They did it better than me. Do you know what I thought then?”
“…That you had been wrong?”
“No. It was, ‘Who does this punk think he is, doing better than me? How annoying.’”
A-yun was horrified.
She suddenly felt she understood why Seo-rim was always nagging Yeon-ho.
“I’m still like that, actually.”
The rumors of a feud between Yeon-ho and Seo-rim began to swell in A-yun’s mind.
“I don’t fully trust the employees I manage. There are times I think I would have done a better job myself. Same goes for Myeong-gyu. Seo-rim is probably the worst. Gil-sang? That man’s a bit different. He’s the type to suck his subordinates’ abilities dry to the bone. In a way, he might be the most mature one among us.”
Yeon-ho was talking behind their backs.
These were stories A-yun had never heard.
Even as she wondered if it was okay to be having this conversation, a subtle change stirred within her.
“Did you know? The programming team calls Myeong-gyu ‘Perverted Slime.’ He melts like a slime whenever Yu-mi and Hye-ji come by.”
“Heehee…”
“Gil-sang’s secretaries are betting on when the highway on his head will be completed. I put down fifty thousand won on three years. Did you know his nickname among the secretaries is Octopus Broth?”
“The ‘old bachelor’ part gets added to it…”
“What, you knew?”
Her heart felt lighter.
It felt as if the knot in her chest was slowly melting away.
Yeon-ho met A-yun’s eyes.
“There’s no such thing as a good boss. In reality, no one does their job perfectly. If they seem like they do… it’s probably because they’ve learned how to fake it to look perfect.”
Yeon-ho placed a hand on A-yun’s head.
“It’s okay to not be good at it. If you keep at it, you’ll at least learn how to pretend you’re good. If that doesn’t work, come to me. I’ll either switch out your team members or create an environment where you can work alone.”
*Ah, he’s comforting me.*
The moment she realized that, her insides churned.
“Is that really okay…?”
“Why wouldn’t it be? I’m the president.”
“I feel bad for the team members…”
“We can move them to Team 2, or give them a generous severance package.”
Then, Yeon-ho added jokingly.
“But you can’t quit. You’re Rewind’s lead sound director.”
She felt a lump in her throat for no reason, and Yeon-ho’s words pricked the ballooning emotion, popping it.
“Do whatever you want. No matter what anyone says, I’ll be on your side.”
*Because that’s what you did for me.*
…There was no way for A-yun to know the unspoken words that followed.
There was only one thing A-yun could know.
The music was still loud, and the cheers of the crowd beat against her ears even harder.
And yet, Yeon-ho’s words pierced through it all, engraving themselves clearly in her mind.
Even though they were as soft as a whisper.
Not everyone knew how to stand on their own.
Some people could only get up with someone else’s encouragement.
A-yun was one of those people, and she had felt many times since joining the company that she was lucky in that regard.
As she had said on Yeon-ho’s birthday, there had always been someone by her side, taking her corner since she was a nobody.
A-yun still didn’t know why.
So she allowed herself to think whatever she wanted.
Just then.
—*Hmmmm~*
The man who was busking started to hum.
The clamor and cheers formed a backdrop of noise, and Yeon-ho spoke.
“Should we get going now?”
A-yun’s eyes flew wide open.
“Ah.”
A short gasp escaped her.
Yeon-ho tilted his head.
“What’s wrong?”
“No…”
Her answer didn’t continue.
But a smile curved her lips.
“It’s nothing…”
There was no need to tell him that a melody had just struck her.
She would just show him with the result.
“Let’s go.”
“Alright?”
“Yes…!”
For some reason, A-yun felt like she could do anything.
* * *
The next day, the sound team clocked in amidst the same silence.
The employees were awkward with one another.
A-yun could finally see the scene for what it was.
‘I made it this way.’
It was a silence born from her not giving any orders, not trusting them with anything, and not providing any direction.
So, if it was to change, she had to be the one to change it.
“Ah…!”
The words caught in her throat.
At the small sound, her team members’ gazes turned to her.
Her legs felt shaky for some reason.
It felt as if her stomach had dropped.
A-yun clenched her fists, shaking off the feeling.
Only then did the words follow.
“Good morning…!”
It wasn’t a loud greeting.
But her team members smiled and returned it without fail.
“Good morning.”
“Good morning, Team Leader.”
Only then did A-yun realize that her team had been waiting for her.
Her heart warmed, and motivation surged within her.
Now A-yun knew.
If a team wasn’t functioning, it was the team leader’s fault.
If the team members didn’t know what to do, it was because the team leader hadn’t assigned them anything.
Of course, not everyone could be good at it from the start.
In that case, the right thing to do was to try, one step at a time.
A-yun recalled Yeon-ho’s words.
‘There’s no such thing as a good boss.’
She had to humbly accept that.
Which meant she had to become a boss who could at least be trusted.
“S-Su-min…!”
“Yes?”
“I’ve revised the file you gave me before…! There’s a feedback file, so please do the final edit…!”
“Ah, okay!”
“Jeong-hun…! This one’s for you…!”
In creative work, editing someone else’s creation without permission is rude.
However, it was different in a workplace.
They needed their boss’s instructions.
Especially if it affected the work the company was producing.
“Ah, got it!”
The sound team was finally taking its first step as a team.
A-yun felt her heart pound as she watched her team members start working at their respective desks.
She was so overwhelmed by the feeling that she couldn’t get any of her own work done all morning.
It was more than an hour after lunch when A-yun finally started her own work.
“E-everyone…!”
The task assigned to A-yun was the BGM and sound effects for the final boss.
It was the music for which she couldn’t find an answer during her slump, the solution she had only discovered yesterday.
And to create it, she needed her team members’ help.
“Yes?”
“P-please follow me to the recording studio…!”
The key point was humming.
A-yun would use their humming to create noise.
The recording studio was packed with people.
Not just the sound team, but the best screamers from all of Rewind—Team 1, Team 2, and even the administrative staff—were gathered.
“Hmm, hmm, hmm~.”
With their humming as the background, A-yun smiled brightly and said…
…It was an act that would reawaken a horror Rewind had long forgotten.
“Again.”
There is a ghost story at Rewind.
“Again.”
The recording studio ghost story.
A strange tale that if you ever screamed, even once, after joining the company, you would be locked up in the recording studio.
“Again.”
For about three hours, no one could leave the studio.
When all the recording was finally over, the employees muttered in small groups as they escaped the studio.
“Is she a psycho?”
“I think so.”
Psycho Jo A-yun.
Following in the footsteps of Myeong-gyu’s ‘Perverted Slime,’ Gil-sang’s ‘Octopus Broth Old Bachelor,’ Seo-rim’s ‘Hysterical Online Addict,’ and finally, Yeon-ho’s ‘Fucking Bastard,’ A-yun had earned herself a nickname.
A-yun had finally become a boss.
* * *
With all the sound sources acquired, A-yun sat down and put on her headphones.
The composition software was open before her.
Untouched, it was like a writer’s manuscript paper or a painter’s canvas.
She was to paint an image on the pure white page.
‘The final battle is Miso.’
What was needed was emotional immersion.
Like painting an abstract piece, or delivering a letter, she had to know Miso to compose music befitting of her, the music’s owner.
It was an easy task.
For some strange reason, A-yun felt an inexplicable sense of kinship with the character Miso.
A-yun didn’t know that she herself was the character’s motif.
So she simply thought.
‘Miso waited a long time for someone to save her.’
Because there was nothing she could do on her own, her life was so painful that she desperately wished for someone.
A-yun understood Miso’s heart as she looked at E-40.
‘The moment they met would have been happy. The moment they parted would have been painful. And above all, guilt.’
What stimulates that is the history of the empire, expressed through time.
‘The moment she reaches out to harm E-40 in the final battle…’
Wouldn’t there have been noise?
The clock’s voice telling her to kill him would surely be noise.
If she lost focus for a moment, E-40 would die.
She would fall into even greater despair.
It was a painful and sad thing.
She just had to draw that desperation onto the musical score.
But that alone was not enough.
A-yun knew.
‘It needs hope.’
The reason she acted, knowing she would hurt the other person, was hope.
It was a cry to be saved, and in that moment, E-40 had to understand it.
‘Help me.’
She had to convey that voice to all the users who would become E-40.
A smile formed on A-yun’s lips.
The ability to draw abstract emotions and realize them in a tangible form, to express them musically for an auditory experience.
The ability to know what is needed for that.
The world calls such a thing talent.
A-yun had talent.
*Click.* The mouse moved.
‘The recorded humming should be exaggerated to the point it sounds like a scream.’
Let’s express the malice engraved in the empire’s history.
A 1,000-year history, so a grand orchestra in the back.
A low, heavy atmosphere with wind instruments, and ear-splitting screams with string instruments.
‘And…’
The voice asking for help would be a single person’s humming.
A small whisper that comes through more clearly than anything else, even as all sorts of noises tear at the eardrums.
A-yun recalled the words of comfort she had heard amidst the noise of Han River Park.
It was a low and gentle voice, a single phrase so quiet yet clearer than any other.
*Click—*
What was added was, again, humming.
Not the humming that had been mixed to sound like screams, but the humming A-yun had recorded alone, swallowing her embarrassment.
“Hmm~ hmm~.”
Readjusting the pitch, A-yun wrote down the chords.
Now, there was only one thing to focus on.
‘Balancing.’
How could she create a balance between the intense screams and the small hum?
Amidst such ear-splitting screams, how could she make the user, facing Miso while listening to this music, focus on her humming above all else?
A-yun knew the answer.
‘Give the sound a sense of perspective.’
The whisper is heard from close by.
The noise dominates the entire piece, merely layered on top.
The expression comes from the gap in pitch.
Only her humming would pop out, having a different pitch from all the other chords that were harmoniously blended into the track.
*Click.*
The completed music played.
*Bbababam!*
The orchestra.
*Ha! Ha! Ha!*
The employees’ humming, crushed and torn apart by mixing.
And,
*Hmm, hmm, hmm.*
Her own whisper, heard closest of all, above all that noise.
They blended together, and amidst the malice, a single cry came through as strikingly alien.
‘It’s done.’
Thus, the sound of the final chapter was complete.
The time it took to compose was just one day.