I headed for Sinsa-dong with a sense of novelty. It had been a long time since I had taken the subway instead of riding in a company car driven by my manager.
How long had I been walking?
Across from the tree-lined road in Sinsa-dong, ‘DM Entertainment’ came into view, occupying a prime location.
The building itself was clean because it had not been built long ago.
But the area was quiet, without a single person around.
“DM Entertainment is a new agency right now.”
But Chanhwi knew that before long, a single artist would carry this small agency on his shoulders.
“Let's go in.”
Familiar music reached his ears when he entered the building.
It was a rock ballad that had been popular ten years ago.
The song had not been released by the fledgling agency. The singer who performed it was the man who founded this company.
‘Great song.’
From the song reaching his ears, Chanhwi could vaguely sense the direction DM Entertainment aspired to take.
He was excited.
The idea of returning ten years to the past and starting again from the beginning made something strangely tickle inside his chest.
“You've checked your number, correct? You'll be called by number. Please enter the set when you're instructed to.”
The auditions were being held in one of the company's practice rooms.
Dozens of people sat on chairs placed in the corridor outside the practice room, waiting for their turn.
Someone quietly hummed a song and worked to keep its rhythm in mind.
Someone else practiced their steps in secret.
But despite their different actions, they all had one thing in common.
Desperation.
Naturally, every one of them had aimed to enter a major agency, the places commonly called the Big Three entertainment companies.
But many had failed audition after audition at those companies and finally come all the way to a fledgling agency.
In other words, they were cornered at the edge of a cliff.
That was why they had prepared with more desperation than anyone.
Feeling the stifling atmosphere for the first time in ages, Chanhwi unconsciously exhaled.
“Whew.”
“You must be nervous?”
When I sighed, the man sitting beside me with a confident smile spoke to me.
“Oh, yes.”
“Is this your first time at something like this?”
Ah, I remembered.
I had definitely been asked the same question in this very seat before.
Back then, it had been my first audition, so I had betrayed my nerves badly enough for my legs to shake, and this man had asked me the same question.
“Don't be too nervous. You just have to do what you practiced.”
The man wearing number 49 said he had plenty of audition experience and offered one piece of advice after another, though none of it was particularly useful.
“Don't tremble, do what you always do, and look the judges straight in the eye.”
Hearing the exact same advice I had heard back then made me truly realize that I had returned to the past.
“Understood? Just do what you always do.”
‘I can't do what I always did, sir.’
Knowing what was about to happen, Chanhwi found the advice from contestant number 49 ridiculous.
To jump ahead, the man wearing number 49 would do anything but what he always did. His voice would crack repeatedly, and he would fail.
He would be that nervous, and there was exactly one reason for it.
Before the regression, I had felt the same pressure as him, so I remembered it clearly.
“Contestants 41 through 50, please enter now...... Contestant 41 isn't here yet?”
The employee checking the numbers asked the contestants with surprise, but there was no way they would know.
Chanhwi had been waiting for this moment.
‘Surely, any moment now......’
“I'm sorry!”
Chanhwi's head snapped toward the voice.
Back then, he had worn a checked shirt tucked into his trousers, proudly displaying what could commonly be called an extremely unfashionable outfit.
“It was my first time coming here, so I took a taxi, but traffic was backed up......”
The face offering that excuse was youthful, but it unmistakably overlapped with the face from back then.
He was unquestionably the ‘Yujin’ I knew.
“You......?!”
Chanhwi sprang to his feet in shock.
“......?”
Everyone, including Yujin, turned to look at Chanhwi.
The sudden weight of all those eyes was uncomfortable, but it could not be helped.
He had naturally known they would meet because he had returned to the past, but now that it had actually happened, should he call it half delight and half surprise?
‘What should I say?’
He had called out because he was so happy and surprised to see Yujin, but he could not think of what to say first.
Why did you die?
Did you like running away after you won?
He had wanted to unleash words like those when he met Yujin, but realized that the present Yujin could not possibly understand them.
After agonizing over it, he finally found his answer.
“That hairstyle seriously sucks.”
Chanhwi's gaze moved to Yujin's bowl cut.
“What?”
Yujin's brows drew together in displeasure.
That was only natural. A man he had never met had picked a fight out of nowhere by saying his hair sucked, so his displeasure was only natural.
“What did you just say?”
“Are you two friends? I'm sorry, but we're short on time, so stop chatting and please go inside.”
“Yes. Understood!”
At the employee's urging, Chanhwi quickly turned and followed the employee.
‘I managed to smooth that over, thankfully.’
Yujin stared after him in bewilderment and spoke.
“What the hell was that?”
***
“Good work. Everyone, please step outside.”
Kim Dae-myeong, the CEO of DM Entertainment, sent the applicants away and sighed.
One of the other judges, who looked as if they could not understand his decision, posed a question.
“Sir, what about the kid who just left? His name was... Ah, found it. Didn't Lee Jae-jun sing well?”
“He doesn't have the looks. The looks.”
“Come on, sir. These days, you have to give up either looks or skill.”
Why was the idol market described as the more, the merrier?
Because groups were formed so that the members could make up for one another's weaknesses.
Groups with large numbers of members had grown far more common these days, banking on the thought that surely one of them would appeal to each fan.
But that was not the kind of group CEO Kim Dae-myeong envisioned.
A main vocalist and a main dancer.
He needed just two people, but they had to be talents capable of seizing everyone's attention.
Finding talent like that, however, was like plucking stars from the sky.
The major agencies had already swept up all the kids with both talent and looks, while this was the last refuge of applicants who had failed everywhere else.
Merely thinking about how they had struck out for days already made his stomach ache.
Seeing the CEO's brow twist and sensing his foul mood, the judges hurried to speak.
“Ah, there's still one group left, so let's look forward to the next one.”
“If that doesn't work, we could use Lee Jae-jun from earlier......”
“Forget his looks. He isn't good enough to be a main vocalist either.”
CEO Kim Dae-myeong cut off the judge who still could not give up on Lee Jae-jun, then sighed and delivered his verdict.
“Call in the next group.”
A short while later, the final applicants entered the practice room.
“Oh.”
The judges gave brief exclamations of admiration, their gazes splitting in two directions.
“Doesn't that one have decent looks?”
“Did he stop at a salon before the audition?”
Some looked at Chanhwi.
“I think that one's the best-looking one here.”
“His styling is a little... unusual, isn't it?”
Others looked at the strangely dressed Yujin.
“Yes, nice to meet you. I'm Kim Dae-myeong, CEO of DM Entertainment.”
CEO Kim Dae-myeong also watched the two of them with expectant eyes this time.
“First, only contestant 41, Yujin, will remain in place. Everyone else, take five steps back.”
The applicants, including Chanhwi, stepped backward.
CEO Kim Dae-myeong addressed Yujin, who had been left standing alone in the middle of the practice room.
“Yujin.”
“Yes, y-yes.”
When his name was called, Yujin answered with evident nerves.
“Is this your first audition?”
“It is.”
“I thought you'd come here for a hiking club meeting.”
The criticism was biting, but suppressed laughter came from several places, suggesting others had thought the same thing.
Yujin's face reddened, apparently embarrassed by it himself.
“We'll begin with a camera test. Take a pose, please.”
The camera operator beside the judges pointed the camera at Yujin.
Its footage appeared on a monitor beside the practice room.
A rigid, expressionless face. That was how Yujin looked on the screen now.
“You're too tense. Can you relax and smile a little?”
Yujin took a slow breath, then smiled brightly.
“Gasp!”
One of the judges drew in a breath at that smile.
It had struck so suddenly that they inhaled without realizing it.
His looks were perfect enough to make them want to urge the CEO to accept him on the spot.
He was tall and handsome.
And on top of that, he possessed a dazzling smile.
He was unquestionably the finest of all the applicants they had seen today.
‘Just have the skill. Please, just have the skill.’
The judges' eyes resembled beasts stalking their prey.
Not one person had passed the audition yet, so they could not help placing especially high hopes on this final group.
“Then shall we see what you've prepared?”
“I prepared a song. It is ‘Wildflower’ by Park Jeong-sin.”
The judges' expressions became troubled.
They were glad he had prepared a song rather than a dance, but unfortunately, his choice was a male soloist's song rather than an idol track.
And ‘Wildflower,’ the signature song of Park Jeong-sin, one of South Korea's four greatest vocalists, at that?
Even active singers struggled to follow it because the climax pushed high notes to their limit, yet he intended to sing it for an audition?
‘Ah, this one's hopeless too.’
They were disappointed, thinking it was the reckless bravado of a young applicant.
As the judges' faces darkened, the introduction to ‘Wildflower’ began playing from the speakers.
Unlike the judges' expressions, however, Chanhwi looked quite relaxed.
‘This was your first stage.’
With an audience of approximately fifteen people watching him, Yujin opened his mouth.
The moment Yujin's singing voice began to fill the audition room, the judges' eyes could only widen to the size of baseballs.