The long, grueling winter passed, and the spring sunlight that opens a new semester poured through the windows of the PLUTO dorm too.
Thanks to that, the dorm was noisy from morning with the minors getting ready for school.
Mornings in the pigsty (※holding steady), made up entirely of students, were especially loud.
"Seo-jun, the sun's high in the sky! Get up quick!"
"Five more minutes......."
"If the sun's high in the sky, isn't it past twelve? You're late, Seo-jun."
"...Eugh, twelve?!"
"Don't worry, it's still 6:40. Hurry down and eat!"
By contrast, the room Cha Min-seong and Ha Hyun used kept its usual quiet atmosphere.
"If you leave the clothes you're changing into on your bed, I'll take them to the practice room."
"Thank you. Then I'll leave it to you, Min-seong-hyung."
The living room I used was, well...... naturally bustling like a meeting plaza.
They moved busily over things like who'd wash first and what to eat for breakfast.
Ha Hyun, who came out wearing a dark navy jacket over a school uniform with light beige check patterns here and there, asked.
"If you sleep here, it'll be noisy at this time every day. Will you be okay, Seol-han-hyung?"
"I don't mind. I was already getting up at this time anyway."
"If you want to sleep more, go to that room and use my bed."
"I'm really fine, so you don't have to worry about it."
When I refused again, he didn't ask a second time, but there was no sign of the worry leaving the guy's face as he looked at me.
I really am fine, though.
Anyway, having seen nothing but comfy practice clothes for two whole months, seeing them in such crisp clothes like this drove home that these guys really are students.
I'd been told that Namgung Hyun and Ha Hyun attended Woori Arts High School, and Go Yeon-gyu, Saedam Arts High School.
They're both arts high schools, but Woori Arts High is the so-called 'idol military academy' focused mainly on popular arts education, while Saedam Arts High is the kind dealing with the fine arts that usually comes to mind when you think of an arts high school.
I heard that Seo Seo-jun, now in middle school, also plans to go to Woori Arts High for high school.
It's probably an unavoidable choice if you want to juggle idol activities and school.
Still, it's a relief that this agency doesn't have an atmosphere of forcing students to drop out.
You never know how life will turn out, so if you're not confident you can make them succeed for sure, it's better to at least look after their education.
And the period in life when you can build social skills mingling with peers isn't all that long.
Namgung Hyun, dressed in the same uniform, strode this way holding a white dress shirt.
"Ha Hyun, where's the iron?"
"It should be in the pantry if you look. Why?"
"Look at this, the shirt's all wrinkly! I can't send our Seo-jun off wearing something this uncool!"
Anyone watching would think Namgung Hyun gave birth to Seo Seo-jun and raised him.
"Give it here, I'll iron it. You finish getting ready for school."
"Aah, this hyungnim, who looks like a cold-blooded third-generation chaebol who'd never get a drop of water on his hands but is actually so domestic... So. Freaking. Cool."
"Who taught you such weird stuff?"
"BeTube, TicTacTok, Instar."
"The darkness of big corporations deepens day by day."
I took the steam iron out of the pantry and was diligently smoothing Seo Seo-jun's shirt so not a single wrinkle remained, when Go Yeon-gyu, dressed in a sober chestnut-brown uniform, passed before my eyes.
"Dressed like that, you really look like someone who does classical music."
"What did I look like before?"
"An idol trainee."
"...What's the difference?"
I heard the competition for Saedam Arts High is insane, whether for admission or transfer, so I have no idea how that guy got in.
The more I see of him, the more I think Go Yeon-gyu is a talent too precious to be held in a soy-sauce dish called PLUTO.
But what can you do. This is the path you chose too.
It's not like I bullied you by saying I'd die without you or anything. You came rolling in on your own after I persuaded you a little, didn't you?
Wearing the crisply ironed shirt, Seo Seo-jun finished getting ready last and came out to the living room.
I wonder if it's okay to say this about a third-year middle schooler who's gentler and kinder than anyone, but he really does look like a punk.
The other guys gave off a respectable model-student feel in their uniforms, but even dressed neatly like this, Seo Seo-jun's face overflowed with delinquent vibes.
"It's been a while since I wore it, so it's kind of tight. I guess I got taller!"
"No, maybe you put on weight."
"Heok......."
Seeing Seo Seo-jun's blatantly despairing reaction, Namgung Hyun burst out laughing like he'd run out of breath.
Meanwhile, I straightened Seo Seo-jun's messy collar and, while I was at it, picked the dust off his arm too.
Gathered at the dorm's front door, the students said goodbye before opening the door and leaving.
"We're off then! See you later, hyungs!"
"Watch out for cars."
Only after the four minors' getting-ready-for-school time had blown through could Cha Min-seong and I eat a proper breakfast.
In a silent mealtime broken only now and then by the faint clink of dishes, Cha Min-seong, as usual, quietly pushed food into his mouth without making a sound.
Even when moments like this came when it was just the two of us, Cha Min-seong never asked again about the strange behavior I'd shown on the holiday.
'You'd think he'd be curious why a person suddenly acted like that.'
It's nice not having to rack my brain to come up with an excuse, but I'm a little curious what on earth goes on in that guy's head to make him act like this.
Since that day, every time I tried to guess whether any other memories had gone missing, a splitting headache came on.
As if it were trying to stop an intruder from forcing his way into a restricted area.
It can change my age, send me into the past, control my body, and on top of that, even tamper with my memories. F—ck, how is it this good at so many things? Is the other party even human?
...Damn it, judging by the headache creeping in again, I don't think I should think about this topic any more.
Let me think about something else, quick.
"Our practice hours change starting today, don't they?"
"Students come right after school and go until 10 PM. Non-students go from 10 AM, likewise until 10 PM."
It turned out that was the original practice routine here, and the practice hours were extended until 2 AM only during vacations.
They meant to make up then for all the practice they couldn't do during the semester, I guess.
"Don't you go to school? Seo Seo-jun said the other day that you're in college."
The Seo Seo-jun part is an excuse, of course. I already knew before Seo Seo-jun told me.
"I'm on leave."
"I see."
Then again, a guy debuting this year wouldn't have room to worry about his grades too.
After finishing the resumed silent meal, Cha Min-seong and I headed to the practice room on time.
Since the patient teachers who checked my form during self-practice had all gone to school, today Cha Min-seong had no choice but to take over that role.
I heard Namgung Hyun and Ha Hyun had repeatedly begged him to look after me well in their place.
Maybe because of that, Cha Min-seong showed a kind side, not just watching me practice but even playing the videos filmed during group practice and calmly pointing things out one by one, frame by frame.
"Don't lean your upper body too far forward here. Shift your weight on your feet and let your torso move along with it naturally."
"Got it."
"And this part where everyone bends their knees together. Bend your knees a bit more to match Ha Hyun. Otherwise the height won't line up."
Still, he taught better than I expected.
But I can see why the hallucination didn't recommend him.
This guy falls into the type who only keeps raising the whip when teaching others.
He doesn't know how to use the carrot and the stick in moderation, so it was a teaching method perfect for starting a fight with one wrong move.
But for me, a fight like that is a luxury.
Right now I had to be grateful just that he wasn't giving up on teaching me.
What I saw of myself when we played the group choreography video was the very image of a sky dancer flailing in front of a newly opened shop.
The appearance of a sky dancer on a stage of dance gods and dance kings.
I can vividly picture a future of getting caught up in endless malicious trolling the moment we debut.
Having finished the video feedback session, Teacher Cha Min-seong put the laptop back where it belonged and said flatly.
"Still, I think you pick up dance fast."
"Thanks, even if it's just lip service."
"It's not lip service. You're doing in two months what took Seo-jun more than half a year of practice. And for a beginner, you memorize choreography fast too."
Is that so. I'm a layman in this area, so I wouldn't know.
Dance was definitely easier to pick up than vocals.
Vocals were tricky because I had to learn invisible things like breathing and how to use my vocal cords by feel alone, but with dance, just inputting what I was shown into my head and outputting something passable got me halfway there.
When I told Seo Seo-jun this the other day, the answer I got was that for beginners, the inputting itself is the hurdle.
Ever since I joined as a trainee, my days spun busily like a motorized hamster wheel that never shuts off.
That's because on top of vocal and dance lessons, I had to take all sorts of side classes too—character education, foreign languages, music theory, fitness, and so on.
The types of side classes differed a little by trainee; for example, Go Yeon-gyu took more composition classes instead of foreign language classes.
They asked me if I'd take separate acting classes, but I was currently a low-grade stiff robot who couldn't afford to waste a single minute or second before debut, so I turned it down flat.
That must be how Baek Ji-hyuk took acting classes and ended up appearing in all sorts of dramas after debut.
When it was about time for the students to get out of school, the guys in uniform began appearing in the practice room one by one.
The first to arrive were the Woori Arts High students.
"Hark, is anyone within!"
"We're back. We'll change and be right there."
I couldn't bring myself to find the strength to get up, so I just waved my hand while lying on the practice room floor, and Namgung Hyun stuck his face over me and grinned.
"You've turned into rice-cake dough. You miss us, huh? Now you finally know how lovingly Ha Hyun and I taught you, right?"
"Yeah, you two get ready to receive carnations on Teachers' Day."
"Uhahat! I'll go change too, so rest a little longer!"
Not long after, Seo Seo-jun and Go Yeon-gyu arrived at the practice room too.
"We're back!"
"What? Why did Yeon-gyu and Seo-jun come together?"
"Ah, I ran into Yeon-gyu-hyung right out front!"
After confirming that Seo Seo-jun and Go Yeon-gyu had changed too, we were about to start today's group practice.
When suddenly, some familiar people opened the practice room door and came in.
"Sorry, you must all be busy! Can we come in for a sec?"
The woman at the front, holding a paper bag in each hand, looked at the trainees and spoke in a booming voice.
"Kids, how've you been?"
The identity of the familiar people: PLUTO's direct senior group, and the very ones who made Solar Entertainment—which until then had been run with a focus on developing solo artists—leap into the idol industry in earnest.
'Colorize.'