“Code 4 trainee, please step forward.”
A brief silence followed. Go Jae-seong didn't move. He looked as though he hadn't even realized he was being called.
“Code 4 trainee?”
Only at the second call did his shoulders twitch.
“……Ah, yes!”
He managed a smile and stepped forward. He tried to look composed, but it was already too late.
There was no way the camera had missed his stiff expression.
“That concludes the announcement of the Code B group.”
The air in the practice room turned cold.
“……That's it?”
Someone muttered.
If my number hadn't been called by the end of Code B……
‘I'm in Code A?’
Murmurs spread in an instant.
“How does that make sense?”
“I mean, how long has he even been here?”
“I thought Jae-seong would be in A for sure……?”
“What are they even judging us on?”
Open suspicion and discontent poured out behind my back.
It wasn't time to reveal our names yet, but Go Jae-seong's name was already being thrown around everywhere.
Five people remained, yet everyone's gaze naturally settled on just two of us.
Go Jae-seong and me.
Go Jae-seong himself was trying to stop the other trainees.
“Stop it. They must have had their reasons.”
He pretended to hold them back, but he couldn't hide the aggrieved look on his face.
‘Cunning bastard.’
He said nothing himself and let the people around him voice the complaints for him. That was how Go Jae-seong had operated throughout the survival show.
“Congratulations, Code 2 trainee.”
Kang Se-jun continued the announcement despite the considerable commotion.
“You've become the sole Code S trainee and the first center of Boys Code.”
“Thank you so much!”
Juhan stepped forward and bowed deeply.
“I'll work hard!”
As expected, Juhan was the center this time too. I'd quietly hoped it would be Kang I-yul, but after seeing Juhan for myself, I couldn't deny his skill.
Still, there was a meaningful change.
Kang I-yul was Code 3 instead of Code 6.
Unlike the previous time, when he'd narrowly missed the top ranks, this time he'd made it into the debut lineup outright.
His determination to perform despite his injury seemed to have moved the judges deeply.
And there was one more thing.
[Risk Level: 85% (▼5%)]
‘Thank you, King of the Underworld!!’
A five percent drop all at once. It was the result of both my place in the debut lineup and Kang I-yul's rise in rank.
‘I just have to keep this up.’
If I stayed in the debut lineup until the end and we debuted together,
I might really be able to bring it down to zero percent.
“Code 20, Code 3, Code 10, and Code 1 trainees have been automatically assigned to the Code A group.”
“Seong-woo, congratulations!”
Han Sang-yun patted my shoulder.
“Ah, ah. Yes, Sang-yun…… congratulations to you too, sir.”
“There you go again.”
Han Sang-yun laughed, but it did nothing to ease the atmosphere around us.
Who had become center was already beside the point.
Everyone was fixated on one thing.
‘Why I'm in Code A.’
“It seems some trainees aren't happy with the results.”
‘Oh, that was a direct hit.’
Kang Se-jun's lightly amused remark silenced the commotion at once.
“Let me explain the criteria for this signal song evaluation again.”
Kang Se-jun turned over his cue card.
“Today's evaluation wasn't simply about choosing the best dancer.”
Several trainees' expressions stiffened.
“The signal song was revealed to you two days ago. You were all given the same song, the same choreography, and the same amount of time.”
Kang Se-jun's gaze swept over the Code C group.
“The judges evaluated who observed the choreography most accurately and carried it out in that short time.”
“……Accurately?”
Someone asked cautiously.
“Yes. Accurately.”
This time, Katin raised his microphone.
“Being a good dancer and performing the choreography you're given accurately are two different things.”
He demonstrated a brief movement with his hand.
“The direction of your fingertips. The angle of your fingers. They seem minor, don't they?”
The trainees watched him in silence.
“But the choreographer didn't put in those details for no reason. The movements were designed to create the mood and key moments of the song.”
Katin lowered his hand.
“So missing those details isn't a simple mistake.”
His voice grew firm.
“It means you either didn't focus on the task you were given, or you roughly adapted it to the way you're used to doing things.”
The murmuring died away completely.
‘So that was it.’
Before my regression, this explanation had been cut down to a brief segment on the broadcast.
But hearing it in person made the criteria clear.
How faithfully could you carry out a new assignment within the allotted time?
That was the criterion for this signal song evaluation.
“The trainees named for Code A and S—”
Katin looked toward us.
“You were chosen for the top ranks because you did all of that.”
“Ah…….”
Short exclamations escaped as though they finally understood.
“Actually…… we had a long discussion over the final spot.”
At Kang Se-jun's words, everyone's gaze fixed on me again.
‘I know, you bastards.’
It couldn't have been easy for the judges to move me up to the A group either.
But what he said next took everyone by surprise.
“Code 10 forgot the lyrics but kept the performance going with a freestyle. Code 4 missed two details of the choreography.”
I couldn't help being even more surprised than when Go Jae-seong had been called for Code B.
“What? The new guy was a sure thing?”
“It was Choi Un-jo and Go Jae-seong they were deciding between?”
The direction of the murmurs reversed completely.
“Both of them made clear mistakes, so it was a very close decision.”
Kang Se-jun took a breath and watched the trainees' reactions.
“In the end, it came down to how complete their performances were. That's why Code 10 got the final spot.”
He smiled toward Choi Un-jo. As for Choi Un-jo……
He pounded his chest a couple of times with his fist. His satisfied expression and the grin lifting the corners of his mouth were the reaction of someone thoroughly used to praise.
“You'll perform on many different stages from now on. Once you debut, you'll face even tighter schedules and more difficult performances.”
He looked slowly around at the trainees.
“I hope you'll give each one your best and bring the performance to completion.”
Coming from Kang Se-jun, the advice carried more weight.
“Now, please line up according to your Code groups.”
The debut lineup's Code numbers appeared on the screen.
[Code 2 ▶ Code 1
Code 1 ▶ Code 2
Code 3 ▶ Code 3
Code 20 ▶ Code 4
Code 10 ▶ Code 5]
Juhan, the sole Code S trainee and the one in first place, stood at the very front.
Han Sang-yun stood behind him, followed by Kang I-yul, me, and Choi Un-jo in Code A rank order.
‘I'm ranked above Choi Un-jo.’
More than the fact that I was fourth, the thrill of standing beside Kang I-yul swept over me. And then there was Go Jae-seong, standing one step behind us.
“The top five, please select an additional item.”
Kang Se-jun closed his cue card.
“I'll see you tomorrow at the signal song shoot!”
And so the interim evaluation ended, leaving everyone in shock.
“……Cut! That's all for today's shoot.”
“Good work, everyone!”
“Thank you—”
* * *
Even after filming ended, it didn't feel real.
‘I'm…… in the top ranks?’
Code A. The words kept bouncing around in my head.
My goal had been clear: avoid Code C, the group that would receive a penalty during the signal song shoot.
So I'd practiced like my life depended on it, but I'd thought I'd land in the middle at best. Even if I'd gotten every detail right, I still wasn't a good dancer.
“Seong-woo, congratulations.”
“Th-thank you!”
The staff member who'd seen me crying offered me heartfelt congratulations.
“I didn't know you were such a good singer.”
“Right? No wonder he cried. He could do this well, but his body wouldn't cooperate. He must've been so frustrated.”
‘Singing…….’
The moment I heard that, the pieces finally fell into place.
The first reason was my singing.
I'd been setting the bar far too high all this time.
It made sense. Before my regression, I'd listened to fully developed vocalists in the recording studio every day.
Singers who sounded like a finished track from their first take.
The live vocals that sent chills through me over my headphones—that was my standard.
‘This much is just the basics.’
As a result, I'd never thought of myself as a good singer.
I took singing on pitch, memorizing the lyrics, and making it all the way through a song while dancing as things anyone should be able to do.
But it was only after watching the other trainees perform today that I realized it.
‘Oh, right. They're still trainees, aren't they?’
Some were so out of breath they couldn't sing a single line properly. Some forgot the lyrics because they were focused on the dancing. Some couldn't hit the high notes to begin with.
By trainee standards, I was higher up than I'd thought. The fact that I'd sung all the way through while dancing had already put me above the middle ranks.
‘Of course, that's only possible because Nix isn't a major agency.’
It was a company that had needed to gather trainees right up until the survival show's filming. Before my regression, they'd ended up going ahead with nineteen because they couldn't even fill all twenty spots. That meant a substantial number were there just to make up the numbers.
And the second reason was the details.
The judging criteria I'd just heard came back to me.
How accurately had we learned the choreography in the same amount of time?
Before my regression, the criteria themselves had been the same. But Juhan had been the only one to meet them properly.
The rest of the trainees had missed a similar number of details, so the Code A spots had ultimately had to be decided by how complete their performances were.
Even Go Jae-seong, who'd missed only two details this time, had missed more than five before my regression.
But this time was different.
It wasn't just me. Kang I-yul and Han Sang-yun, who'd practiced with me, hadn't missed a single detail either.
Once there were more trainees who'd performed the choreography accurately, the judging criteria had a real chance to matter.
The criteria hadn't changed. The people who met them had.
“……This is crazy.”
The plan I'd made to survive had ended up shaking the entire evaluation.
My heart raced. A good position at the signal song shoot was a chance to pull ahead from the very beginning.
But the joy was brief. Anxiety washed over me.
‘If they find out later how bad I am at dancing—’
I laughed bitterly to myself.
‘I'll really be finished.’
The brighter the spotlight, the deeper the shadow behind it.
I knew that better than anyone.
In the end, there was only one answer.
Practice, then more practice.
Out of habit, I stood in front of the mirror again.
We wouldn't be singing live during tomorrow's shoot. My strength as a singer would be gone, leaving only my dancing. If anything, the conditions were even less favorable for me.
From the position of my feet and the angle of my arms to the moment I turned my head, I slowly went back over each movement.
Now that I was in Code A, I had to look like I belonged there.
But—
My body wavered from the very first move.
“Huh?”
My weight tipped forward.
I quickly planted my foot and caught my balance, but something felt wrong.
My body followed the movement a beat later than I'd expected.
‘Maybe it's because the tension's worn off.’
I brushed it aside and started again.
This time, I was fine. The movements flowed naturally.
Then came the highlight.
One, two, three. The moment I popped my chest three times.
THUD.
My heart gave a heavy lurch.
My breath caught.
‘Wait.’
I clutched my chest and stopped moving.
I hurried to steady my breathing, but my heart wouldn't settle down.
‘What's going on?’
I'd pushed myself a little before the interim evaluation, but I hadn't felt tired enough for this.
I walked slowly to the wall. When I pressed my palm against it, the cold sensation reached me a beat late.
That was when the edge of my vision warped slightly. Everything blurred, cleared, then blurred and cleared again.
I blinked hard.
Once, then once more. Only then did my vision return to normal.
“……Wow.”
A hollow laugh escaped me before I knew it.
This wasn't simple fatigue.
‘Time-Reversing Hourglass.’
All the time my body had endured during the hours I'd turned back was still there. It wasn't only the memories of practice that remained. The fatigue from that practice had been piling up twice over as well.
I leaned my back against the wall and lowered my head slightly. I felt dizzy, but it wasn't bad enough to stop me from practicing right now.
Still, my body was already warning me. If I kept going like this, I'd cross the line for sure.
‘This is dangerous.’
I could feel it instinctively even without the status window appearing.
I'd thought I was gaining more time than everyone else, but in fact I was piling up debt. Debt at the staggering interest rate of a loan shark, at that.
I looked back at the mirror.
The shadows under my eyes had definitely darkened.
“……I need to pace myself.”
I couldn't use items indiscriminately. I could only generate what I truly needed, but I also had to save using it for when I truly needed it.
It meant that judging when that was was ultimately up to me too.
I got back into position. This time, I only ran lightly through the movements. I went over the points I needed to watch during tomorrow's shoot. In the mirror, I moved very slowly.
For now, I was all right.
But next time, I might not be.
That clear fact quietly pressed me onward.