Let's Plan for the Future
Some might find it surprising, but I tend to maintain the relationships I've formed quite well in my own way. I reach out first a lot, and I'm good at actively setting up appointments.
Gradually, the controls due to the epidemic were loosening, and our society was adapting to the new order. Accordingly, the ban on gatherings was relaxed, and people started attending the various meetings that had been put on hold. That applied to me as well.
For starters, I have exactly five group chats that I'm in. One is the orphanage alumni group chat. It's a room where the kids from the same orphanage gather. While it's basically a notice board, active communication does take place.
And another one is the group chat made by school friends. But most of them are orphanage alumni too, so its nature isn't that different from the first one.
After that, it moves into work-related territory. First, the company group chat with Blooming, Noiris, and the boss. This one is usually used for work purposes.
Then there's the Singer Star Top Ten group chat. It's practically dead, with conversations happening about once a month.
Last is the one called "Do You Like Music?"—a group chat made by the people who filmed together. Surprisingly, conversations there were quite lively. Maybe because everyone was an industry insider? You could verify the truth behind all sorts of entertainment industry rumors in there.
After the gathering ban lifted, Hanyul—who talked the most in this chat—organized a meetup. Since none of us were particularly busy, we easily set a date.
“Senior Hanyul doesn’t do any activities but sure talks a lot in the chat.”
“...Unnie. What kind of way is that to talk?”
“The boss keeps asking me lately when Senior is going to be active.”
I let out a deep sigh as I listened to Jia’s words. It seemed her personality had grown a bit arrogant thanks to her currently soaring popularity.
The group Bad Monster that Jia belonged to was leading the fourth generation of girl idols and was essentially running unchallenged. From digital charts to initial physical sales, they dominated everything. I didn’t know for sure, but if they held a concert next year, they might even fill Gocheok Stadium by Korean standards.
“Jia. You shouldn’t talk like that.”
“...Okay. I’m sorry.”
At Saki’s rebuke, Jia pouted as she replied. Sitting at this table were Jia, Saki, me, and Baek Yuyeon.
To lightly change the atmosphere, I spoke to Baek Yuyeon in a slightly playful high tone.
“Yo, Yuyeon unnie, you look good these days? I heard you’re doing a drama OST.”
“Uh… yeah! It’s true that I’ve been getting more work lately!”
Baek Yuyeon, while having her personal album, mainly continued her activities with various historical drama OSTs. Saki, entering the twilight of her idol career, was slowly looking for another path, and that direction was acting rather than solo singing. She said she recently took a supporting role in an OTT drama, but I wondered if it would go well.
Naturally, as we talked about others, the conversation came around to me. Of course I couldn’t say I had created a sub-account with Japanese nationality, so I had no choice but to vaguely say I was resting well.
“Siyeon is a producer too! Even if you’re not doing personal activities, you’re busy. Our producer is super busy too!”
“That’s true. Producers are just as busy as idols.”
I mean I’m not busy at all. I’m just living off the songs I made in my previous life. I couldn’t say that, so I simply smiled silently.
“Kyaa! Have you gotten even cuter after not seeing you for a year?”
“Hehe. I guess so.”
The idea that cuteness fades as one ages only applies to ordinary people.
And so, with a light heart, I naturally brought up my concerns.
“But compared to the song’s chart performance, the actual popularity isn’t sticking, so I’m a bit worried.”
“Isn’t it too greedy for someone who’s only in their first year?”
“To be honest, from our perspective, you’re catching up so fast it’s scary…?”
The others’ reactions were different from what I had expected. And as the final touch, Baek Yuyeon spoke in a dumbfounded tone.
“Siyeon, aren’t your expectations too high…?”
“...Are they?”
Come to think of it, everything I did after reincarnating in this life seemed to be going too well. In my previous life, upon seeing Noiris’s results, I would have called it an all-time great and praised myself… so why was I strangely thinking it wasn’t that impressive?
This is what they call the law of diminishing marginal utility in economic terms, right? It felt like my satisfaction with achievements was gradually decreasing.
What if, in this state, I returned under Seo Siyeon’s name and it flopped horribly? Attacks would pour in from sites relatively hostile toward me, and I might mentally crash to rock bottom.
“...I think I need to lower my threshold a bit.”
But honestly, there was no clear solution to this. I couldn’t deliberately release strange songs just to fail, so I had no choice but to wait for it to improve naturally.
Since those concerns wouldn’t disappear, I visited Park Han-soo’s instrument store after a long time. Park Han-soo had been active in a band for quite a while and, as such, had plenty of both successful and failed experiences.
I visited the highly respected senior musician to get advice on this issue, but the moment I stepped into the store, I was flustered by the greeting he threw at me.
“Hey there. Has the rookie artist who appeared like a comet these days, Mikansei, arrived?”
“...What? How did you know?”
“Instinct.”
Isn’t this person’s instinct truly the best in the world?
Thinking that, I leaned back on the old chair prepared in the corner.
“You’re not as surprised as I thought?”
“I figured some people would recognize me. I’m actually grateful that you figured it out when no one else could.”
Park Han-soo hadn’t even heard my changed vocal style, so he had truly relied on pure intuition to confirm my identity. A sense close to divine.
“...The Blooming kids didn’t recognize it?”
“No.”
“But the style is unmistakably Glassy Sky?”
“Exactly.”
Honestly, if anyone was going to recognize it, I thought Blooming would be the fastest. Their basic nature was otaku, so they had easy access to Mikansei’s songs. Above all, I made the most songs for them in this style.
Yet even though they listened to Mikansei’s songs, they still hadn’t realized that I was Mikansei.
“...Do you really think they wouldn’t recognize it?”
“Yep. They really didn’t know.”
“...I see.”
He tilted his head. Why is his reaction like that?
Anyway, I told him about the concerns I had been having lately.
“It’s a common thing. The higher you fly, the farther the ground feels.”
“Have you experienced it too, uncle?”
“Yeah. After my first album was a huge hit, I struggled for two years. It was painful back then.”
He looked up at the ceiling as if reminiscing about the past.
“How did you recover mentally back then?”
“I went to a mental hospital?”
“Aha.”
It was the most straightforward solution.
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Mikansei
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“Now the increase in views and subscribers has definitely slowed down.”
It wasn’t a bad sign. Honestly, it had risen quite a lot in a short period, so it was about time for the upward trend to flatten. Rather, at the point where the first song broke thirty million views, I realized knowing future information was definitely an advantage.
It was still before the genre of songs aimed at short-form content had emerged, so it made sense that people were going crazy over Happiness Theory in that format.
It could also be said that it was time to release a new song.
“...What should I do?”
There were two options. Take out a song I had made in my previous life—that is, from the hard drive. Or create a brand-new song.
And my choice was…
“I’m tired… let’s take a break.”
The first option.
Now that I had also passed the coronavirus period, work was gradually piling up. As the season changed and the atmosphere shifted toward concerts being possible again, Blooming needed to start rowing properly.
They had been completely idle for nearly half a year, so I had to oversee the process of raising their skills. I also needed to make songs for their activities.
One might ask, Can’t you just bring songs you prepared in your previous life for Blooming too? But I had already taken out almost all the band songs I had prepared. Two singles, one mini-album, and even a full album.
At this point, unless I started taking someone else’s songs as they were, there were no more tracks left to use.
“Using someone else’s song now feels a bit wrong.”
It’s not like there would be any particular problem if I did… but honestly, my conscience was starting to prick. One might say what am I talking about after using so many during Singer Star, but originally I tried not to if possible. I had only used them because the schedule was tight and there were no suitable songs at the time.
Anyway, for that reason, Mikansei’s new song would be an appropriate track taken from the hard drive, arranged, and released.
“This seems good.”
After several hours of searching, I was able to pull out a suitable melody from among the numerous ones.