Chapter 96
In truth, the program Masked Singer had long since ceased to be part of the mainstream.
The days when household names appeared to compete and every community tried to guess the champion’s identity were several years in the past.
Still, even a fallen great house is said to last for three years; Masked Singer was nevertheless a program with at least some buzz, and the fact that the current champion was Joo Jin-woo was also fairly well known.
[Will Jin-woo hyung keep his champion’s crown this time too?]
-Looks like he will, since there’s no one else to appear.
-There’s no one who can beat Joo Jin-woo. He might as well throw the match on purpose.
-Honestly, it might be time for him to throw one on purpose.
-The university festival season is coming up soon. How much would he lose if this kept him from going? lol
Usually, talk about Masked Singer circulated mainly in music communities rather than general-purpose communities.
Compared to its heyday, when it had been a major topic on general communities, that was rather pathetic. But at a time when nearly every TV program had seen its ratings and buzz crater, Masked Singer was still relatively respectable.
-It’s starting.
-Jin-woo hyung is looking insanely cool today too lol
-Look at those broad shoulders.
Yet, as if to betray the viewers’ expectations, they were met with stages of utterly disastrous quality starting from the first round.
Considering that Masked Singer put considerable effort into polishing the stages it aired in order to preserve its contestants’ minimum dignity, the quality was truly beyond pathetic.
-No way, is the whole thing really this much of a fucking train wreck?
-How many months has this been going on? lol
-Is it really impossible to recruit someone with even a little class?
-I’ll bet one of my balls that there isn’t a single singer among them.
With public opinion already in the gutter, they reached the fourth performance.
The moment the second contestant’s stage name was revealed, people began openly expressing their excitement.
-Look at that name lol
-The Princess, seriously?
-They’re really pushing her, huh?
-She’s showing up last like the protagonist.
-Is the protagonist of this episode that Princess?
-She’s tiny as hell?
↳She looks about 160 centimeters, but that’s not that short.
In fact, anyone knowledgeable enough about Masked Singer to discuss it on a community already knew that a name containing words like singing or music meant the production staff were pushing that contestant.
Especially this time, they had even put the word ‘Princess’ in her name, so expectations were even higher.
-Isn’t that Seo Si-yeon?
↳No, she’s way too tall for that.
-Who is she, really? Are there still people left they’d promote this hard?
-Isn’t she one of the BaeMon members?
↳Jia? Suyeon?
↳At this level, she’d be worth pushing.
↳But their vocalists aren’t that good, are they? Are you making Jin-woo hyung look like a chump?
Regardless, the stage began amid everyone’s questions, and the performance that followed left them utterly aghast.
-What’s wrong with the man? lol
-Is he a robot?
-Why are his hand gestures so stiff?
-His voice is shaking like crazy. Is he nervous?
-I’ve never seen anyone like this on Masked Singer. He’s completely covered up, so why is he acting like that? lol
-Did he get into a fight with a woman?
-It was originally an incredibly sweet song, but the mood is completely ruined.
-Even the judges are totally bewildered and speechless.
Normally, attention would have been focused on the woman, but the man’s stage was such a disastrous catastrophe that the spotlight shifted entirely to him.
After the broadcast ended, all kinds of Shorts mocking Rian began circulating, and their influence started reaching not only people who had watched the show but ordinary people as well.
Some people cursed Rian for knowing how to work his fangirls, while others marveled at him, calling him incredible.
“Wow! This is absolutely amazing, isn’t it? Rian. You did very, very well!”
“…Yes, CEO.”
“Now that’s how you work your simps.”
In the midst of all that, someone let out a delighted scream at the unexpected attention.
“Wow, seeing it on the broadcast, he sang even worse than I thought?”
“Saki unnie, have you gotten that much worse from taking a break from singing?”
“Shut up.”
Someone else frowned at the lower-than-expected buzz and disappointing stage.
And in the midst of it all, Seo Si-yeon…
“Looks like no one knows yet?”
Once she realized that no one had noticed her identity, she smiled with satisfaction.
* * *
The first broadcast of Masked Singer took place during the last week of February.
After that, what I had to do was really quite simple and obvious.
“…What else would I do? I gotta go to school…”
Since it was the first week of March, every well-behaved child in the world had to go to school.
I was a well-behaved child too, so I had no choice but to rub the sleep from my eyes, get up in the morning, grab a roasted egg, and head to school.
There was no excitement over my first day of school. There couldn’t be.
Because I’d be staying home more days than I went out anyway.
You had to take exams to graduate, but there was no obligation or reason to get good grades on them.
Therefore, the only thing I had to do at school was attend.
“It’s the first day. Can’t they just send us home early?”
I entered the classroom, muttering that to myself.
Since I hadn’t arrived particularly early, the room was already fairly full.
Whenever attention briefly turned toward me, the entire class fell silent, but I was so used to that atmosphere that I ignored it and sat down in a suitable spot.
Most of the kids in this class were studying different majors.
The school didn’t focus solely on music and also accepted students in a wide range of sports and artistic fields, so naturally, there weren’t that many musicians among them.
If anything, that percentage would rise once they entered high school; not many middle schoolers majored in popular music.
There were probably plenty of classical music majors, though.
That was why no one in particular came over to talk to me.
They merely stole wary glances at me, as if I were a stranger.
Since I hadn’t been planning to make a lot of friends anyway, this situation wasn’t so bad.
If anything, should I say it was comfortable?
As I gazed lazily up at the sky, I found myself thinking of nothing at all.
Because of COVID, even seatmates had disappeared, so there was no need to force a conversation with the person next to me. Everyone could just do their own thing.
So I pulled a book out of my bag.
It was a book written by Kim Seol’s father, which I had put down last time because I couldn’t get into it.
Having taken it out again after several months, I found that, for some reason, the contents didn’t really sink in.
So I closed the book again and looked straight ahead.
“Hmm.”
A girl I had never seen before was standing there.
They say being too flustered can make it impossible to speak properly, don’t they?
The sudden sight of someone’s face directly in front of me left me so dumbfounded that my brain seemed to flee the scene, and I stammered.
Meanwhile, the girl spoke first.
“Hi?”
“Ah, hello.”
“Can I sit in the seat in front of you?”
“Yes.”
“Hehe. Thanks.”
The girl let out a small laugh and sat in the seat in front of me.
She seemed to set her things down, then immediately turned around and spoke to me.
“…I’ve heard a lot about you from my sister.”
“Your… sister?”
Who did I know with a younger sister around that age?
I thought for a moment, but no one came to mind…
‘Oh, now that I think about it.’
There had been someone who almost never brought up personal matters.
When I looked up at the girl’s face, I felt a strange sense of familiarity.
“Seol’s little sister?”
“Yeah. That’s right. Kim Seol’s younger sister. I didn’t expect us to end up in the same class.”
Now that I looked at her, their overall atmosphere was strangely similar, so it wasn’t particularly surprising that the two were sisters.
Kim Seol herself had never talked much about her family, and I hadn’t even known she had a younger sister, so I knew absolutely nothing about the girl in front of me.
As though she knew that, the girl in front of me calmly began telling me some basic information about herself.
“My name is Kim Byeol. My major is literature. What I like… novels, comics? Anyway, I like all kinds of creative works.”
There was plenty of energy in the girl’s manner of speaking.
She was completely different from her older sister, Kim Seol.
“I’m Seo Si-yeon. Nice to meet you. Byeol… unnie.”
I didn’t particularly like calling a mere middle schooler ‘unnie,’ but once I decided to get used to it, there was no point in hesitating.
“Yeah! Nice to meet you. Still, it’s lucky that I know someone! I was worried about what I’d do if I had to go around by myself.”
I could only stare at her with wide, blank eyes, too dumbfounded to respond otherwise.
What was someone who obviously looked like she’d be good at making friends talking about?
That prediction of mine proved exactly right.
Monday through Friday.
In exactly one week, the group consisting only of Kim Byeol and me grew by seven girls, becoming a group of nine.
They were all friends Kim Byeol had made recently and brought along.
‘Please stop growing…’