Chapter 15

Survival programs surely are weird.

Contestants can go from smiling at each other to being quite awkward in an instant.

It's a trick that even an alchemist could pull off themself.

I stared at the three very stickers that were shown with a bitter smile.

A crown sticker that's for the center position.

A sticker with the letter L for representing the leader position.

And a microphone sticker for representing the main vocal position.

Since this is a group battle, it would only make sense that the majority of the group will be performing together.

The more you'd have 6-7 people on stage, the more important it is to know who'd be the one playing which role.

How you allocate the center and main vocal positions could also make or break your mid-range rating with the judges.

Having analyzed all of the previous 'Asri 1', I was well aware of how badly the teams that had rehearsed with the less capable centers broken down after.

It wasn't just the center that was criticized, but the rest of the trainees who'd let him do the center were also criticized to equal measures.

To avoid such a spectacle, it's imperative to have someone in charge and lead the entire team.

This is where the behavior of the leader, the owner of the L sticker, comes into the play.

During my six years as a trainee, I understood the importance of the leadership position as I'd learned firsthand on how important it was in the countless end-of-month evaluations.

'I really can't go wrong from here.'

But what is the jinx of this group battle.

Individual play in the guise of team play, where the trolling and selfishness all run rampant.

Even if you're all on the same page, there's always be at least someone who's going to sow the seeds of their discontent.

I looked over at the members who were focused solely on me.

'...But maybe it's better this way.'

For now, I'm the only one in Group 9 with an A-grade.

And I'm the one who'd carried it during the selection process.

So the initiative naturally fell to me.

The parting of the ways may not go as smoothly as I expected.

{Yes, master, there's no better human being here than you, so let's just take it all!}

'What the hell are you doing here? I told you to stay in your room for as long as possible while we're shooting.'

{I was sleeping in my room, but as I had gotten bored, I came down to see what was going on, and now my heart is pounding with excitement! It's exciting!}

'Do you have anything useful to tell me other than that?'

Cerberus shook his head slightly at my question.

{I'm truly sorry, my lord. It's hard to distinguish scents in such an overcrowded place, but of course, they don't all smell clean, and you should always be well aware when a weirdo could just come from anywhere.}

You should always be on your guard, my lord.

I clapped my hands once, speeding up the distribution of our parts.

"We need to decide on a center, a leader, and a main vocalist, right?"

"Yeah! Actually, we kind of tacitly decided that before you got here."

Seeing what was so exciting, Yoo Ha-woon hopped to the front of the gun like a rabbit and then placed two stickers onto my chest.

"No matter how you slice it, our group leader and main vocalist has to be no one but you!"

"Yeah, well, but how'd you get to that mezzo?"

"Well, he's a handsome A-grade, so of course!"

Originally, I was going to volunteer to be the leader and main vocalist for the sake of stability.

But I didn't expect to be confirmed on it before I even had a chance to pitch it myself.

If I go just a little further, I'll be able to take over as the center spot.

But knowing that it's not a good idea to monopolize all the positions, I decided to ease up on the reins a bit.

"I'll be the group leader and main vocalist, and we'll figure out the center position later. As we practice the choreography, we'll see who has the most presence in the center, but for now, I'll leave myself out of the center competition."

"I can't think of anyone better suited for center than you."

"No, I have enough of these two undeserving stickers, and I think you guys deserve a fair shot. Let's talk about it and pick a center together. What do you say?"

"Bro... I think it's so cool, even a guy like me would fall in love with it!"

As much as I could stop Yoo Ha-woon from launching an endless barrage of affection at me, I explained why I'd chosen 'Volt' in the first place.

"First of all, I should explain why I picked this song, the reason why I chose 'Volt' is simple, what do you think of all the songs that were offered to us, everyone?"

"I thought they were all by very famous groups with very strong fan bases!"

A B-grade contestant that sat next to Yoo Ha-woon said, raising his hand.

I shrugged and smiled a little.

"You're not wrong, that's the first impression everyone gets. But after that, there's something more important."

Next to the practice room table was a whiteboard used for brainstorming.

On it, I wrote the names of all the songs on today's sign.

"It's true that the options we've been given today are all songs that have taken the Korean music scene by storm and helped launch K-pop, so what other risks can we think of?"

"Hmmm... I don't know?"

They all gave me a blank look.

That seemed to be the limit of the 9th's imagination.

"It's just that it's 'too' famous. It's too famous, and it's also the characteristic of the group, so it'll be easily compared to the original if it's even slightly inferior. Especially the bigger the group, the higher the risk. It's more than just a comparison, it's a question of why these trainees don't know what they're doing and had chosen a song like this."

In my previous life, when I was a trainee, I watched other competitions besides these survival programs.

A typical one was a program that competed with cover performances, and there was an incident where a prominent idol group had tried to cover a hit song covered by a presidential ship and was ridiculed for it.

They didn't do the original song justice. They were told that they chose a song that was way too difficult for their current skills.

"Of course, we're still trainees, and we can't match the performance and song interpretation skills of professional idols, so my first goal was to not take any risks by covering a legendary song."

"Ha, but isn't Upbeat's 'Volt' also a very famous song?"

"It's a famous song, but there are a few things that distinguish 'Volt' from the songs listed here."

As I was slowly explaining my next point, someone behind me raised their hand.

It was Chae-haru, who'd helped me pick my rival group earlier.

"I think I can recognize some of those points."

"You said one day, why don't you talk about it first?"

His eyes were lifeless, which was quite a surprise, as I had expected him to stay quiet.

Chae-haru spread his fingers and slowly recited his thoughts.

"'Volt' is the debut song of 'Upbeat', so it's not without a relatively easy feeling compared to the difficulty of the other songs. It also doesn't have any special stage composition or extremely difficult choreography that completely sets it apart from the other songs at the time of the music broadcast. It's not a song that was popular from the beginning, but rather a song that came into the spotlight later as 'Upbeat' continued on with their activities."

I listened carefully to Chae-haru's words.

"It's obvious that this kid has a very good brain, because he immediately analyzed the composition of the other groups earlier and still does now. I can't believe he was thinking the same thing about 'Volt' as I was.

"Am I wrong?"

"No, it's exactly what I was thinking."

The members of Group 9 turned in unison to look at Chae-haru, who sat in the back of the room.

Despite the reaction, Chae-haru maintained a nonchalant expression.

"It's true that 'Volt' is a very popular song, but it's a debut song, so the choreography is much easier than other songs, and it has the rawness of a rookie's song. In other words, if we cover it as trainees, fans might not compare us to them, as long as we don't show too much difference in level."

"From the sound of it, it certainly does."

"I didn't think about that, I just assumed that if I did the most famous song, people would come to naturally like it..."

After listening to my words, the Group 9 trainees widened their eyes and nodded their heads repeatedly, as if they were deeply impressed.

Yoo Ha-woon, who had the best reaction, went to Chae-haru instead of me and shook his hand vigorously.

"Brother Haru, you're so smart, your analytical skills are crazy!"

"It's nothing."

"You're also chic!"

"I don't think I'm chic."

"No matter how much you deny it, you look chic to me, so I'm going to say so!"

Luckily, everyone seemed to understand.

However, one trainee looked a little uncomfortable.

'I recognize you from somewhere.'

As I searched my mind, I remembered his name.

It was Park Chang-joong, who was in the same class when we were practicing 'HIT'.

I had completely forgotten about him, except for the fact that he gave dance trainer Shin Jae-hoon a spirited fight in the beginning.

Apparently, he got a B in the final grading and was selected for our group.

I suddenly remembered Cerberus's words.

'A bomb could go off at any moment.'

I can tell by the look on his face that he's not happy about something.

Well, he's not showing any behavior, so let's move on.

"I chose 'Volt' for this reason, because it's a song that, if we were to practice really hard, we can get to the flavor of the original. We don't have to do complicated arrangements, and we don't have to try to put our own spin on it."

"Yeah!"

"But we all know that doesn't mean it's a finished song, right?"

I walked slowly to the entrance of the practice room.

"Even if you say the choreography is easy, it's still a big boy group senior's song. It's almost on the same level as the choreography for 'HIT'."

"It's that hard?"

"Yeah."

Everyone's eyes were locked on me as I reached for the doorknob of the practice room.

With a fresh smile that could only be seen on a direct-cam, I slammed the door shut.

"None of you are getting out of here until I have the full choreography draft."