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Chapter 15

Only One’s car was right in front of us.

“Ah...” We could tell it apart from other cars because a member of Only One, Park Young-Ho, came out of the car. Park Young-Ho was the lead vocalist of the group, and he froze when he saw us. By his immediate reaction, it appeared he was also aware of our existence.

“Ah, hello Siren members! I am Park Young-Ho from Only One!” He greeted us in a loud voice.

“Hey! Hello! I’m Woo Yeon-Hoon from Siren!” Yeon-Hoon greeted him cheerfully with a big smile on his face. Park Young-Ho looked a bit taken aback as he accepted Yeon-Hoon’s greeting when another voice intervened from far away.

“If you got what you needed, quickly return to the waiting room! What are you doing there!” It was someone who looked like the Only One’s manager.

“Ah, oh! Um, well then, see you guys,” Park Young-Ho said. It appeared he came to this place alone because he had forgotten something in the car. Park Young-Ho greeted us hastily and ran toward his manager.

“It gives me a weird feeling seeing other idols,” Yeon-Hoon said. He appeared to be happy to see other groups.

“Yes, it’s strange,” I responded and glanced in the direction that Park Young-Ho disappeared from. Park Young-Ho recognized us at first glance even though our profiles hadn’t even been uploaded online, nor were we famous yet. That seemed to mean that the Only One members must have discussed Siren on their own. It was understandable since we uploaded a video with the exact same song as them.

‘They seem to be wary of us,’ I concluded after thinking about Park Young-Ho’s reaction just now. Maybe this was how a South Korean would respond when seeing a North Korean person on vacation. Their eyes would be filled with surprise, shock, and curiosity all at once.

‘It would be stranger for them to not be wary of us, considering how many posts were tying Siren and Only One together on the internet,’ I thought.

“What are you thinking so long about, Tae-Yoon?” Woon asked, seeing my expression. It seemed my expression looked serious.

“Ah, I was just thinking about the shooting.”

“Really?”

“Yes.”

“Don’t think too deeply about it. I’m sure you will do well since we thoroughly prepared for it,” Woon said and patted my back.

“Okay! Let’s all go inside!” WD’s Hyuna and Seung-Yeon both stepped forward and announced.

Thus, we all went inside the studio.

***

The producers were waiting for us inside the studio.

“You can use this waiting room. We will call each group separately during rehearsals, so please come up when we call your group’s name. Please refrain from moving out of this room as much as possible. When you have to move elsewhere, we ask that you report to us before moving.” After giving us a couple of warnings, we went inside the waiting room.

Since we hadn’t even debut yet, everything was new to us. My group members looked around the studio set excitedly while moving toward the waiting room. Everyone expressed their amazement once we arrived inside the official room that had been prepared for us as a participant in this show.

‘I suppose it’s natural that my members would feel this way,

’ I thought while crashing into the room’s sofa. ‘I’m sure The Showcase is the only program that will provide a private waiting room for an idol group that hasn\'t even debuted yet.’ But in the end, this was for the fun of the show; if several groups used the same waiting room and developed a friendship with one another, it could lessen the competitive nature of the show.

On the monitor installed inside the waiting room, there was a warning:

—It’s against the rules to watch the rehearsal.

The message warned us to not turn on the monitor which would allow us to see the situation up at the stage. It was probably because we would only keep our current tension and nervousness if we went up the stage not knowing anything about what the other groups would do.

Even I, who knew what type of performances the other groups would do, felt nervous. Yet, this was a different type of nervousness than the one others were feeling. I was nervous not because I didn’t know what would happen but because I didn’t know whether everything would happen as I had planned inside my head or not.

“Ugggh. I wonder what the other groups would do.”

“Yeah.”

“What if they like, fly around the stage?”

“Do-Seung, how could a person fly?”

“...Dong-Jun, do you want to get hit before going up the stage?”

“Everybody, Do-Seung is going to hit me!”

Perhaps, it was because they were nervous but my group members seemed more energetic than usual.

‘Or maybe they are talking a lot for the cameras,’ I thought. They could also be constantly spitting out lines to fill up the audio.

“Let’s warm up our bodies for now,” I suggested.

“Should we?”

“Yes, let’s do some light stretching.”

The waiting room was spacious enough for us to even do dance training. Truthfully, it was almost similar to the size of our practice room at WD. We each took off our long paddings and began to warm up. Though we were inside, it felt a bit chilly after taking off our outerwear. This was especially so because of the outfits we were wearing.

‘The clothes are short.’ Though it was winter outside, our clothes were summer-wear. Do-Seung and I both wore long pants but Woon, Dong-Jun, and Yeon-Hoon all wore short pants.

“It’s a bit chilly.”

“It’s like we are the only ones in the summer.”

“You know what they say. True fashionistas dress coolly the colder it gets.”

My group members commented and began stretching. All in all, it wasn’t easy to get a good response from the audience by simply wearing out-of-season clothes. There was hardly anyone who wanted to hear a sorrowful ballad song when it was drenching hot or wanted to hear a cheery summer song when it was frigid cold. Yet, today was the exception.

I twirled my wrists and ankles like my group members did and continued to assess the situation. We went over our choreography again, took some breaks, and tried to kill time by doing various activities.

Knock, knock, knock. It was then, someone knocked on the waiting room.

“Yes!” We simultaneously approached the door.

“It’s Siren’s turn to do their rehearsal. Please prepare yourselves and come up,” the person told us. It was finally rehearsal time.

“Ahhhh!”

“Pwehh. Haaa.”

“...I’m suddenly getting really nervous.”

“I’m getting the jitters.”

My group members said and we all headed towards the stage to do our rehearsal.

***

The Showcase’s main PD, Park Soo-Chul stared at the completely vacant rehearsal stage and chewed on his fingernails. After seeing four teams do their rehearsals, he realized a pattern he hadn’t expected.

“Min-Young.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Do you also sense the problem that I’m seeing right now?”

“Well, yes.”

“Haa, well, I guess there’s no one to blame for this. It’s all my fault,” Park Soo-Chul said and wiped his face exhaustedly. The rehearsal that had begun early in the morning would be over with Siren’s performance. After the last rehearsal, they would take a short break before starting the shoot. In other words, there was only one performance left before their shooting began.

“This is driving me crazy.” Yet, a problem he hadn’t expected popped up.

“Why is everyone’s concept so dark?” Park Soo-Chul asked.

“Yes, I know.”

All the performances they had seen until now were similar. This 120-second performance was an opportunity for these idol groups to introduce themselves to the viewers. As idols, they expectantly prepared cool performances that showcased their talents in dancing and singing.

‘But why are they wearing all black, looking so solemn with flashing spotlights?’ It was hard to differentiate between these groups because they were all doing the same things. They all wore the same cool-style black clothes from head to toe and swished left and right across the stage before coming down. There was no team that did a bad job.

Everyone was good and seemed to have put all their hearts and souls into their performances with the mindset that this could be their last opportunity. But that didn’t mean much. South Koreans were known for working hard, and effort was separate from producing noticeable results. And in this idol business, it was even more important for one to stand out from the rest.

“At least Only One stands out a bit,” Park Soo-Chul noted.

“Even if they are wearing the same black and making flashy moves, the quality of their performance is different,” Min-Young responded.

There was no performance that remained in their memories except Only One.

“I read through each of their performance explanations, but it didn’t give me this feeling,” Kim Min-Young said and placed the explanation notes that she got from each of the idol group’s companies down.

“Of course, it will sound all perfect and dandy on paper.” On the files, all the companies had written about their group’s performances like some music critics, going on about ‘sharp synchronization, deep base combined with trendy dance music, movements expressing their ambition, and so on.’ Park Soo-Chul sighed deeply and pushed the papers aside.

“What in the world are they going on about? Synchronization and deep base? Tell them to not write things like this but only describe their stages as dark, bright, cute, sexy, and the like.” Park Soo-Chul said a bit sharply in worry that the show could come out bland.

“Siren is coming up!” One of the producers then approached him and said.

“Haa. Okay, let me have a look at them,” Park Soo-Chul turned his head and saw the Siren members going up the stage. He hoped that they wouldn’t all be wearing the same black as all the other groups.

“Hm?” Park Soo-Chul’s voice suddenly turned a bit softer. After all the idols who had just been wearing black with strange ornaments dangling off them, there was a group of five handsome men wearing white and navy sailor uniforms.

“Look at them, Min-Young.” It was as if his eyes were getting refreshed. “I won’t even need an eyedrop seeing them.” Park Soo-Chul’s sour face immediately brightened.

“Min-Young? Did you hear what I said? Why aren’t you replying?” Park Soo-Chul tapped Kim Min-Young while feeling a bit hurt that she didn’t respond to his joke.

“What’s with you?” he asked and saw Kim Min-Young’s eyes fixate on the stage and not move. Park Soo-Chul laughed seeing this and turned back to the stage. Then, he also watched Siren’s performance that Min-Young regarded so highly, and the whole time while the rehearsal went on, the two couldn’t pull their eyes away from the stage.

“Thank you! We are Sirens!” the group shouted at the end.

***

After the rehearsal ended, we came back to our waiting room and slumped on the couch.

“Pweh! I think I was really nervous. Look at how sweaty my palms are!” Yeon-Hoon pointed at his wet palms and almost bragged about them.

“It really feels different when you are dancing in front of the cameras.”

“Yeah, especially when we are also wearing our outfits on top of the stage.”

“I think I know why you have to do rehearsals now. After doing it once, I think I have a good feeling about what to do on the real stage.”

My group members talked and then discussed how we could do better; these topics included what details we would highlight, how bigger our formation should be because the size of the stage was different from our usual practice room, and so on.

‘I already knew this, but these people have the skills,’ I thought. My beliefs were confirmed once again seeing my group members. Though they had been unlucky in their past life, Siren wasn’t a group that should’ve disappeared without a trace. We were still having our meeting and break time when there was an announcement.

“Shooting will begin!”

“Please go up the stage in the order we call you!”

I thought the producers sure worked hard to limit our interaction with other groups.

“The first group in line is Only One! Please come up!” Only One went in first.

“Bleshu come up!”

“OnebyOne come up!”

“Luminin come up!”

Then Bleshu, OnebyOne, and Luminin went up. In my past life, only four teams appeared on The Showcase 2 and competed, but this time, we were also included.

“Siren, come up the stage~”

“Let’s go.”

“Let’s do a good job, everyone!”

We all opened the waiting room’s door and walked up the stage. This was the first time we were officially working with the Siren name on the line.

“We can do it, Siren!” Yeon-Hoon yelled what sounded like a little cheer.

“We can do it!”

“We can do it, Siren!”

The rest of the members also followed him. ‘We can do it, Siren,’ the words stuck to my tongue.