Chapter 14
On the stage, where the afterglow of a strange disappointment still lingered, the large monitor was already displaying the name of the next team.
The chilly silence and disappointment left behind by Joo Jin-woo’s team had barely faded, yet the heat in the venue began to burn with a peculiar sense of anticipation, as though trying to fill the void.
That was because the next team was also a combination everyone was eagerly looking forward to.
After Joo Jin-woo’s team finished, the audience was buzzing noisily in their seats. But the commotion died down in an instant when the name Seo Si-yeon was called.
“Hey, Seo Si-yeon’s next. Did you see the sneak peek earlier? The one with Park Han-su?”
“I’ve never heard of him before… Is he famous or something?”
“Hey! You don’t know Black Canary? They’re one of the top-tier bands in Korea.”
“I don’t listen to bands.”
The atmosphere among the judges was unusual as well. Yoo Sang-hyeon, who had been frowning deeply at Joo Jin-woo’s team’s cacophony, rolled his pen between his fingers while staring intently at the stage entrance.
Seo Si-yeon.
When he first saw her, Yoo Sang-hyeon had thought she was merely a child with a reasonably cute face.
Yet he had seen her perform only three times, and already a sense of anticipation was filling his chest, as if she were about to show them something extraordinary.
“Gina, did you see the sneak peek earlier? Did you know Si-yeon could play the violin, too?”
“No. It’s an instrument that’s difficult to encounter at such a young age… Where could she have learned how to play it?”
Surprisingly, it was at the orphanage.
As part of a government-sponsored program, a music teacher came to the orphanage once a week, and she had learned the violin then.
Of course, Seo Si-yeon’s current skill hadn’t come from what she learned there, but it would serve as a plausible explanation for why she knew how to play the violin.
Gina’s eyes sparkled with anticipation as she straightened in her seat.
Even Yoo Sang-hyeon, who had been spewing venomous criticism, couldn’t hide the pure curiosity he felt as a musician this time.
After only three stages, everyone was already waiting eagerly to see what Seo Si-yeon would show them next.
In the meantime, Seo Si-yeon and Blooming took the stage.
It took a little while because they needed the band instruments, but no one in the venue found the wait boring.
That was because everyone was brimming with anticipation for the stage that was about to unfold.
“Please listen. This is an original song, ‘Glassy Sky.’”
* * *
On the stage beneath a blanket of silence, Si-yeon secured the violin beneath her chin.
The lights dimmed, leaving only a chilly spotlight falling upon her small silhouette.
It was a stage direction Si-yeon had requested from the production crew in advance—a device meant to create the most impactful opening possible.
Perhaps that staging device had worked, because the moment Si-yeon raised her bow and placed it on the strings, even the sound of the audience breathing disappeared.
Screeech—
The violin’s high note, both nerve-racking and smooth, cut through the air of the studio.
An elegant violin melody, like the opening of a classical piece, rang out.
As Si-yeon’s fingers raced across the fingerboard and created a dreamy introduction, Park Hui-su’s bass soon joined in, revealing its heavy presence.
Boom, boom-boom—
The violin melody, reminiscent of classical music, instantly transformed into a funky sound when the bass joined it.
After being coached by Black Canary, Park Hui-su’s bass was much sharper and more aggressive than before.
At the instant the two instruments became intertwined, as though invading each other’s territory, the drums’ hi-hat burst out brightly and raised the tempo of the song.
The Blooming members and Si-yeon exchanged glances, and at last Yoo Seol-ha took a small breath and gripped the microphone.
Her voice was even clearer than usual, but her distinctive habit of trailing off at the ends of lines combined with the song’s dreamy atmosphere to create a strange addictiveness.
-I feel trapped beneath a glassy sky.
-It’s cold, like walking across shards of broken glass.
Even while playing the violin, Si-yeon controlled the session’s intensity with her eyes.
Whenever her bow drew forcefully across the strings, the band sound surged in like a wave, and whenever she lightly plucked the strings pizzicato, the sound sank for an instant.
If Joo Jin-woo’s team’s stage had been a battlefield where each person flaunted their own skill, Seo Si-yeon’s stage was a single, perfectly controlled organism.
No one tried to stand out, yet the harmony they created struck the audience’s eardrums more powerfully than any high note could have.
As the song approached its climax, Si-yeon set down the violin for a moment and stepped in front of the microphone.
Behind Yoo Seol-ha’s clear high notes, Si-yeon’s low, dry chorus overlapped them.
There was none of the high-pitched tone characteristic of a child; the calm, low register tickled people’s ears.
-Glassy Sky, sparkling as though it might shatter…
-To the end of this world that has trapped us.
The two voices collided with the band sound and exploded.
Jo Na-eun clenched her teeth and added groove to the electric guitar with the sharp cutting technique she had learned from Park Han-su. It was astonishing progress, difficult to believe she had achieved it in only two days.
A shuddering wave of exclamations burst from the audience, with no one holding back.
In the judges’ seats, Yoo Sang-hyeon had already set down his pen and was staring open-mouthed.
He saw how the conducting that began at a nine-year-old girl’s fingertips had transformed a high school band into professional-level artists.
Perhaps this was an even more valuable talent than her singing or songwriting ability.
Si-yeon didn’t move a muscle at center stage until the final afterglow of sound disappeared.
Her small hand holding the bow and the sweat beading on the faces of the Blooming members.
The instant that image filled the screen, the studio erupted in deafening cheers and applause after ten seconds of silence.
The fragments of disappointment left behind by Joo Jin-woo’s team moments earlier had already vanished without a trace.
Even after the final violin resonance scraped against the ceiling of the studio and faded away, a heavy silence lingered among the judges.
Yoo Sang-hyeon stared blankly at the stage, unable even to set down the pen in his hand, while Gina was already covering her mouth with both hands.
Yoo Sang-hyeon’s deep sigh was what broke the silence.
Yoo Sang-hyeon slowly removed his glasses and placed them on the desk.
A completely different kind of awe from what had filled his eyes while watching Joo Jin-woo’s team earlier was visible in his gaze.
“You told me during the preliminaries, Ms. Si-yeon, that even unconventional emotions could move people. I think you proved those words perfectly today.”
He continued speaking as he looked over the Blooming members onstage one by one.
“Si-yeon’s violin ability isn’t the only amazing thing. The band Blooming has advanced several levels from the first round.”
He pointed to the members of Blooming one by one, showering them with lavish praise.
It might have been an unfamiliar style of song for him, but he showed no sign of it and continued to heap nothing but praise upon them.
Next, Gina took the microphone in a trembling voice. The rims of her eyes were already red.
“Ms. Seol-ha, have you finally realized for yourself how captivating your voice is?”
At those words, Yoo Seol-ha blushed shyly and lowered her head, while cheers erupted from the audience.
“There was always a risk that your singing style might come across as old-fashioned. But the song Ms. Si-yeon created today transformed that weakness into an entirely different strength.”
She looked at Si-yeon and added,
“You instinctively know how far you can draw out other people’s talents. Today’s stage was the most polished stage of the entire season.”
Even K-Sep, who usually enjoyed delivering cutting remarks, was left shaking his head in amazement this time.
“Honestly, I was going to look at this crookedly, thinking you must’ve gotten a boost from Black Canary, right? I mean, we judges are here, and then you bring in an outside mentor? It rubbed me the wrong way.”
The audience burst out laughing at his easygoing joke.
“But I was wrong. What Mr. Park Han-su taught them may have been technique, but it was Ms. Si-yeon who breathed a soul into this stage. I also think it was the best stage of the season.”
There was no need to watch the later stages to know we would pass, so we smiled and slapped our palms together.
Behind the stage, Joo Jin-woo was watching the scene on a monitor. He crumpled the cold cup of hot chocolate in his hand and lowered his head.
“……I was completely defeated this time. She really had the whole board set up.”
His low murmur was swallowed by the cheers, but his sense of defeat filled the waiting room more vividly than ever.
* * *
Immediately after the broadcast aired, Korea was turned upside down—or rather, it wasn’t.
In a society with fragmented tastes, television programs could no longer win the popularity of the entire nation.
However, within the limited music industry, it was more than enough to deliver a continent-shaking shock.
The unfamiliar song titled ‘Glassy Sky’ began taking over the real-time charts on major music sites such as Watermelon as soon as the broadcast ended.
A bizarre phenomenon occurred: a song written by a nine-year-old girl, using a band sound considered niche, pushed aside prominent idols and established singers to claim first place.
It didn’t stop at briefly reaching number one in real time before falling back down; it ultimately took the daily number-one spot just one day after its release.
And then it took first place for that week.
There weren’t even any comebacks scheduled for top-tier idols for the time being, so it was impossible to say how long this ranking would last.
Just as speculation began spreading through online communities that it might even hold the throne for a long time,
I, the protagonist of Glassy Sky—
“Nom.”
“Oh my, you really eat well!”
“Hehe. It’s delicious!”
With my life at the orphanage now stretching past three months, I had more or less mastered how to live comfortably there.
At that moment, I was sitting on the lap of Seo Na-hee, who held the boss position among the high school seniors, leaning against her chest while she fed me snacks.
A kid has to act like a kid, after all.
If I had done this in my previous life, I would have been reported and thrown in jail, but there was nothing strange about second-grader Seo Si-yeon sitting on high school senior Seo Na-hee’s lap.
A former delinquent turned model student, she had the support of both the studious faction and the delinquent faction inside the orphanage. In practice, she was the absolute ruler of Neulneul Orphanage.
Could she actually have more power than the director?
“Na-hee, how many points did you get on this mock exam?”
“Hey. She got all ones again.”
“Hey, you only missed four in total. Med school is totally possible, right?”
She was even at the top of the country academically.
Honestly, lately I had naturally begun wondering whether she might be more amazing than me, someone who had possessed this body and was coasting through life.
Anyway, Friday of Singerstar had come to the orphanage once again.
The orphans gathered in a cluster in front of the TV, and after the previous broadcast had progressed through my stage, they crammed all four remaining stages into a single episode.
That was understandable, since the remaining stages were so ordinary.
There was nothing worth editing in either the practice process or the stages themselves.
And so, just as the children at the orphanage were beginning to feel bored and yawn one after another,
At last, all the stages ended, as did Joo Jin-woo’s rescue into the next round after the judges discussed the matter.
Even so, for some reason, there were still a full five minutes left before the program ended.
I tilted my head.
While I was wondering what on earth they were planning to put in, my face suddenly filled the TV screen.
“You can see my pores…”
“Si-yeon is cute anyway.”
And then the screen changed.
A young woman with a slightly plump build and sharp features was standing there.
The instant her face appeared, I realized what the production crew had saved that leftover airtime for until the very end of the broadcast.
Perhaps even they thought the middle of this episode had been boring, so they had inserted the most stimulating dopamine bomb possible at the end.
The woman on the TV raised her eyes menacingly and opened her mouth.
“For my opponent in the next round, I choose Seo Si-yeon.”
The camera shook as though it had been waiting for that moment. The judges’ facial muscles, filled with shock, and the audience’s reactions as they covered their mouths and widened their eyes flashed past in rapid succession.
And finally, the screen filled with a close-up of my nine-year-old face, blinking with a sullen expression without the slightest idea what was going on.
“I want to prove that the time and effort I’ve built up are more valuable than that child’s innate talent.”
The woman’s declaration of war was arrogant yet filled with grim determination. Then the screen showed me again.
“Well… if you’re a musician, prove it onstage rather than with words.”
The instant I crooked up one corner of my mouth and grinned, an intense beat from the ending song burst out, and the broadcast ended.
“…W-wait a second.”
I shouted into the air, my brow furrowed deeply.
“D-didn’t this make me look way too much like the final boss villain?”
At my flustered cry, Seo Na-hee, who was peeling a tangerine, snorted and replied dismissively.
“No. The villain is that pig who seriously picked a fight with a nine-year-old. It’s obvious her inferiority complex is exploding, so what’s the problem?”