Chapter 144
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Translated by Sylph
Read it only at Novelbyu.com & Utoon.net
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TeStar came down from the stage and sat on the guest sofa of the talk show.
However, the one holding the microphone was… Cha Eugene.
‘Is it okay for him to do that??’
Even though I knew Cha Eugene was the most fluent in English, I naturally felt worried.
But Cha Eugene was skillful.
[Welcome! What’s your first impression of my show?]
[Well, it’s full of color, cheerful, and you have a very good impression, mister~ I like that yellow tie of yours. It’s the 127 Section mark!]
[Oh, thank you! This is the very first official merchandise sold on the 127 Section official site last May 11th. I bought it with great difficulty, and I put it on for the first time for this special occasion.]
My younger brother smirked.
“Do you understand what they’re saying?”
How could I? I was just listening roughly.
Still, the atmosphere was good.
‘Cha Eugene, he has a different vibe when he speaks English.’
He felt much more relaxed and mature.
On the screen, the short small talk was coming to an end.
[Right, you really look like a Californian! Now it makes sense. I bet you like surfing, right?]
[Haha, is there anyone in San Diego who doesn’t?]
[Uh… if so, well, you might not be very interested in things like this. Yep.]
The host intentionally hunched his body and looked around. Laughter erupted from the audience.
[No, no, this is a fresh and fun experience. And 127 Section was a fun game!]
[You’re being generous~ Good. Then shall we talk a bit about your roles in the game?]
Then, Park Moondae, who was sitting next to him, immediately picked up the microphone.
[Actually, we are singers, and most of us had no acting experience. Though it was short, acting as game characters in the music video was fun and new.]
Neat English flowed out smoothly.
“Huh?”
The college student, who was a personal fan of Kim Raebin… no, now a fan of Park Moondae as well, almost shook her monitor.
“Wow, he’s damn good at English?”
“Exactly!!”
Unlike the college student who was excited by the unexpected English ability, Park Moondae on the screen continued the conversation calmly.
[Ah, so you weren’t the ones who gave inspiration for those companions to be created?]
[We did create the song after being inspired by those friends. Mainly this friend here. His name is Kim Raebin. You can call him Raebin.]
[Oh~ …Hello, Raebin? You really look like you’d compose! You have a musician’s eyes!]
[Hello.]
Kim Raebin on the screen awkwardly greeted the host.
‘He’s looking after Raebin first.’
Even without knowing the detailed context, it was clear just by looking at the video and hearing the words. The college student watched that scene with satisfaction.
[What part of the characters gave you inspiration? Whoo-hoo! No bad words, just a good question! Someone please let him know!]
[Oh, that friend’s impression is a bit strong, right? But if you look closely at his eyes, you’ll see he has a very soft soul!]
[I’m still scared!]
While Cha Eugene approached the host, who was deeply immersed in his nerd concept, and made excuses for Kim Raebin’s gaze, Kim Raebin’s words were translated through Seon Ahyun.
[He says their narrative had a lot of influence. ……Although it was a tragedy, he worked hard to capture the beauty and intensity… of the character’s good will.]
A French accent seeped through.
‘He feels different when he uses a foreign language too?’
Seon Ahyun, as in recent official settings, barely stuttered while using a foreign language. His slight hesitation could even be interpreted as shyness.
[Right! That’s the emotion I felt the whole time while rewatching the trailer after finishing Chapter 1! Oh, now I see your soul, Raebin!]
[Hahaha!]
Kim Raebin, perhaps not fully understanding the situation, tilted his head with a blank face.
“Ah, so cute!!”
“Is that cute to you? He looks like he’s about to extort money.”
“Shut up.”
The college student ignored her brother and focused on the screen.
[Then by any chance, is there no plan for a new OST for 127 Section?]
Originally, this question was about the ‘plan for the companions to reappear’, but it had been modified by Park Moondae’s previous answer.
Park Moondae gave the prepared answer calmly.
[We also really enjoyed our first collaboration, but even if a new OST comes out, I don’t think it will be our song.]
[Why on earth?!]
Cha Eugene cut in quickly.
[Because we’re curious about what kind of OST other artists will compose! Don’t you all agree?]
At that positive prompting, a reflexive response returned from the audience.
[Yeah, yeah, of course. But it’s still a shame! ‘Bonus book’ is a really good song.]
[Thank you.]
[You know what? Mister, you know your stuff! You have great taste!]
[Me? Hahaha, right!]
At Cha Eugene’s compliment, the host laughed, and the talk about the game ended like that.
And only then were a few words of self-introduction and greetings exchanged before entering the closing phase.
[The stage I saw earlier was truly wonderful, and I heard you prepared another stage?]
[Yes. We thought it would be good to show you a piece of the music we usually do.]
[Great, great! Then please, Andrew Band~]
As the band made the preparatory sounds, the TeStar members stood up from the sofa with smiles.
And they started taking off their shoes.
[Oh~]
“Huh??”
“Hey, hey, didn’t they get shorter?”
The college student didn’t even have the luxury to hit her brother who was talking nonsense.
In the meantime, TeStar on the screen also took off their cardigans or jackets and placed them neatly on the sofa. Staff members came out and quickly cleared the sofa.
Then, their outfits were unified into a barefoot look wearing blue jeans and white short-sleeved T-shirts.
Whew!
At the unexpected full-scale preparation, a responding sound was heard from the audience.
TeStar, still holding the microphones they were using for answering, moved smoothly and matched their choreography formation.
The lights went out.
Uuuu- Uu- Uuuu-
Over the band sound that crackled from the broadcast manipulation, a slow and melancholic piano rose.
And a movement close to modern dance began to unfold.
-Slowly being submerged
In the time, in the night
I don’t want to escape
Simple clothing, jazz sound, a foreign language, and modern dance choreography performed over live band sound.
Everything created synergy, making TeStar’s stage look artistic rather than conceptual.
Even elements that could be unfamiliar or feel repulsive here were buried within and made to be accepted as ‘high quality’.
Moreover, the strength of the K-pop genre, which had refined the fun of watching and listening to the extreme, was clear. Especially for a group that could pull it off well.
And TeStar was such a group.
-Midnight
When I met you
And the next
Thanks to that, the moment the stage ended and the lights came on, the audience was filled with the sound of applause corresponding to a ‘good performance’.
The host also came out while sending applause.
[Truly artistic! That was ‘Midnight, and next’ from TeStar’s album
Thus, their appearance, which started with ‘127 Section’, concluded with ‘TeStar’.
The screen changed to a commercial, but the impression of the stage did not easily disappear.
‘They killed it.’
The college student struck her desk with her left hand and raised it.
And this reaction became the public opinion.
* * *
Since we were in the US, various schedules that could be done here were set. After finishing a few, it was after the we appeared on had aired.
I lay on the hotel bed and first checked the Korean public opinion.
First, a few conventional articles like ‘Successful appearance, hot response’ appeared, and hmm…….
TeStar appeared on a popular WeTube channel video reviewing overseas reactions.
[(Overseas Reaction) TeStar showing Westerners the taste of K-pop! Reaction Compilation Korean Subs]
‘I guess the response wasn’t bad.’
Seeing that such videos were sprouting up like mushrooms, it seemed that we hadn’t been blindly ridiculed locally for now.
I searched for the stage video uploaded on the channel.
‘The view count is quite high.’
Even the one that wasn’t the 127 Section OST had a similar view count. It was something I hadn’t even expected.
Both videos were filled with English comments for the most part, but there was no great difficulty in roughly seeing the atmosphere.
It was because I had studied English bit by bit whenever I had time during this promotion.
‘Since I have the trait, I can’t waste it.’
It was with this in mind.
[Trait: International Student (A)]
– I understand exactly what you are saying.
: Foreign language acquisition ability +200%
Since it was the proficiency speed, the faster I learned, the easier it was to swap it out when the next trait came out.
Of course, because time was lacking, it wasn’t a great level, just enough to be able to say memorized words without it being awkward.
‘Still, it was faster than I imagined.’
If I had something like this back when I was still a college student, I would have been stuck in the library for about half a year.
Anyway, I roughly read the comments.
– Their firm musical identity is interesting.
– K-pop? *Mind blown*
– Truly great singers. Their live performance was impressive!
– I think I’ve fallen for them. The WeTube algorithm keeps leading me to new videos.
– Public Opinion: TeStar has been undervalued in the K-pop scene, and finally no one knew it would be nerds who discovered them.
Excluding the comments about 127 Section, the atmosphere was roughly like this.
However, what I hadn’t expected was that ‘Midnight, and next’ would work on the viewers of this program.
‘I thought they would hate it, saying it’s gay or something.’
Isn’t that what is often said in that neighborhood when watching K-pop? I know it too.
But it seemed to have benefited a bit from the song’s genre.
Among the viewers of this show, there were many programmers, and they say this kind of lo-fi jazz is a trend in that neighborhood.
– Added to my coding playlist.
– They looked like real musicians! I hope they do a Fall-in OST too (Crying-laughing emoji).
– Good music to calm down to. I should listen to it when I’ve coded all night and not a single bug has appeared (Fearful emoji).
Anyway, overall… it was a huge success.
Just in case, I checked the domestic game communities, and they had completely softened.
Rather, a few people appeared who were reminiscing about the early atmosphere of the game.
‘Drawing the line was useful.’
It seemed that because they didn’t think we would go overboard with the OST or characters, and because we showed the collaboration song well through a live performance, we recovered their favor.
TeStar fans, who were right on the verge of sharpening their blades at the 127 Section game communities, also calmed down completely.
“What are you looking at so diligently~”
“The internet.”
“Our stage?? It’s good~”
Keun Sejin, who had come out after showering, plopped down on the bed next to mine.
It was because this guy was picked while randomly swapping hotel roommates for the sake of WeTube uploads.
‘Surprisingly, he’s not bothersome.’
It’s a bit annoying and noisy, but our lifestyle patterns are similar.
Keun Sejin asked in a cheerful voice.
“How is it, do you think our next album will do even better?”
“Well. We’ll have to wait and see.”
“Hey, in times like this, you’re supposed to say it’ll all go well~”
Keun Sejin laughed heartily and then began to peer into his smartphone.
‘Well, the probability of it going well is high.’
As the video of the received quite favorable reviews, it was visible that overseas K-pop fans were rapidly becoming interested in TeStar.
It was probably because we received recognition in a field that isn’t familiar with K-pop.
‘Human hearts are originally like that.’
At this rate, it seemed okay to look forward to the music video views for the next album.
I shrugged and said to Keun Sejin.
“I’m sleeping.”
“Okay, you can turn off the light~”
I turned off the light, lay on the bed, and checked my smartphone again.
Now that I had finished the monitoring, it was to check how the overall domestic public opinion was turning.
And I realized.
While TeStar was starting to gradually take a piece of the overseas K-pop pie, a upheaval was also occurring domestically.
The debut song of a rookie boy group had become a huge hit on the music charts.
It was none other than the group of Gold 1, who had finally succeeded in debuting.
‘Oh.’
Checking roughly, although they weren’t at the level of TeStar at debut, they were doing remarkably well on the music charts.
The general consensus was that the song was truly good.
‘If they just maintain their momentum, they’ll be successful.’
Since Gold 1 is a pretty decent guy, it was a good thing.
And as I thought that far, my thoughts reached the other side.
My status abnormality.
If Cheong-ryeo’s words were correct, the 4th status abnormality I would receive this time was my final mission.
And looking at the flow so far, it would surely demand an even higher baseline.
‘…Then is it better to receive the status abnormality now?’
Looking at the response coming from overseas and the followers rising domestically, I had such a thought.
The thought that the next year or so might be the career high.
Of course, we could continue to grow endlessly like VTIC. But in such an uncertain industry environment, I couldn’t be so certain.
Still, it seemed almost certain that we would do well this year.
‘Hmm.’
For now, I called up the status window popup.