Chapter 48
[Aren't you sorry to the girls? How can you lie so brazenly?]
I shook my head without the slightest hesitation.
“Not at all. I usually give in on other things, and I do try to treat the girls fairly, but I can't compromise on this. I brought them here by deceiving them in the first place.”
[…….]
“We can't go with easy choreography to begin with. These days, even idols who are confident in their singing sometimes release solo albums, but without a performance, they can't even get a million views. It's genuinely hard to get tens of millions of views with just a song or a drama OST.”
It wasn't as if I wanted to deliberately put the girls through the wringer.
Still, we needed difficult or distinctive choreography.
That was the only way to get people interested in the first place.
And it was how you got people wanting to imitate it.
There was a reason a global K-pop dance hashtag like #KPOP PUBLIC existed.
[If I weren't a god-tier AI capable of reading my master's mind, I might have gotten angry.]
[But since I know you're doing this purely for success, I'll tell you.]
Why would you get angry in the first place?
[That's how hard the girls—Always—are working.]
“I know that, too.”
I nodded, having casually pulled off the black socks I'd worn all day and tossed them aside.
No matter how powerful the Blessing of Sex was,
it was useless if the girls' own determination and effort weren't at its core.
All day long,
we'd been so immersed in recording that we hadn't even noticed the day turning to night. That was how much the girls trusted me and followed my lead.
“I just want things to go well for them, as much as they trust me. So what if I get cursed out a little? In the end, the results are what matter.”
[Well, anyway. I didn't intend for this, and you could explain it as simple good luck, but there's an exceptionally talented choreography director in South Korea right now.]
“Who?”
Honestly, I didn't go around memorizing choreography directors' names,
but if she were really famous, maybe I'd get some sense of who she was as soon as I heard her name.
[Julia Smith.]
“J-Ju-Julia who?”
That was a name I'd never heard before.
I wondered if she was famous overseas, so I looked her up, but nothing came up at all.
“You're not messing with me, are you?”
[It's true that she hasn't worked on a single project yet, but I, Nobel, a god-tier AI, guarantee this.]
[If choreography directors were ranked, she'd be SS+.]
If she was that good, then she was no joke.
“Explain.”
[Julia Smith]
[She's the daughter of Kill Smith, a famous American choreographer, and Celia Robbins, a famous American performance director. She's naturally talented, and since she learned all kinds of things from watching her parents work from a young age, she's grown into a highly skilled young woman.]
“Next.”
[Of course, she's an incredibly talented dancer in her own right. She's also quite pretty, but perhaps because of her upbringing, she prefers to put people who can perform her choreography well in the spotlight and make them stars, rather than stepping forward herself.]
“Ah. I get it.”
I really understood how that felt.
They don't say children are mirrors of their parents for no reason.
Most children decide what direction to take in life by watching what their parents do.
[Were your parents managers, too, Master?]
“Don't ask when you know they aren't. My parents are just ordinary owners of a chicken restaurant. I became a manager by chance after poking around here and there, wondering if I might get to see celebrities up close. You're a god-tier AI. You know that, so why ask?”
[Anyway, maybe because she was born with exceptional talent and skill, as well as parents who could support her, Julia is a strict woman who doesn't even consider easy choreography to be choreography.]
“Ah. She sounds like she'd be a total bitch. Kids who are exceptionally gifted from a young age tend to have awful personalities. They know how great they are.”
[Well, I won't say she's nice.]
[But does her personality matter?]
“Not really, but if we want to ask her to choreograph for us, I'll have to go meet her. If I'm meeting someone new anyway, someone like Kim Gi-bok would be easier to deal with. It's not that I can't meet her or anything.”
I'd met all kinds of people working in the management industry.
It wasn't even a lie—some people who weren't anything special themselves
would throw their weight around just because their celebrity and agency were doing well.
[So what did you do? Did you stand up to them?]
What do you mean, stand up to them?
When there's a difference in agency power, it's not just the CEO who has to meekly bow their head.
If I didn't want to quit, I had to know my place. Fuck.
“Damn. Just talking about it is getting me worked up.”
[You should get the girls successful quickly so you won't have to deal with that anymore.]
“Exactly. But why did that amazing Julia person come all the way to Korea instead of working in America? If she has her parents' connections, it should be easy for her to work in the States, too.”
[The reason is perfectly obvious and simple, but I'll explain it in a little more detail.]
[Naturally, she wanted to create choreography. To do that, she watched American musicals and all kinds of shows, but unfortunately, none of them satisfied her. Do you know why?]
“I don't. That's why I'm listening quietly.”
[She saw K-pop. Specifically, the choreography of male idols famous for their intense routines. She got hooked on K-pop after seeing that and decided this was the kind of choreography she wanted to make. I'm not lying—after agonizing over it, she made up her mind just yesterday and came straight to Korea.]
“That crazy bi—no, she's got incredible initiative. I don't dislike people like that.”
In fact, people like that tended to succeed.
“But wait a second.”
[Yes. Go ahead, Master.]
“That woman really is only interested in the intense group dances of male K-pop idols, right?”
[Master. Women have eyes, too.]
“Fuck. So she was at least partly smitten with the male idols' looks, too. Would someone like that choreograph for our girls, a girl group?”
Nobel answered my question with shameless nonchalance.
[How would I know?]
There she went, hitting me with the “not my problem” routine.
[As I've told you before, my role is only to assist you, Master. I do use a bit of divine power to help you out unfairly, but you're the one who has to land the decisive blow.]
[You asked me to recommend someone who could make the most intense choreography, so I did.]
It was true that male K-pop idols' razor-sharp choreography was famous all over the world.
If our girls got choreography from someone who'd come here to make routines like that, they'd probably be panting and dying after just one song.
“Setting aside how hard it is, I think the results will be great.”
Then that was all that mattered.
“But I'm asking just in case. That woman hasn't already applied to another agency or been scouted somewhere else, has she?”
[No. Since she's just arrived in Korea, I think she plans to enjoy sightseeing in Seoul for a while. Seoul's a famous tourist destination overseas, after all.]
That's true.
Seoul really was amazing.
“How do I meet her?”
Honestly, if I didn't know whether it would work or not,
the right thing was to go for it.
By this age, you learned that the stupidest thing was to regret not even trying.
[As it happens, tomorrow she'll show up at a climbing center about fifty-eight minutes from here.]
[She'll be there at exactly 11 a.m. She plans to work up a sweat climbing before lunch, buy coffee at a cafe, then go try Pyongyang-style cold noodles.]
“Wow. What a hobby.”
Even her hobbies made it obvious how intense she was.
“Okay. Good. Even if I have to cling to her pant legs, I'll hire her as our choreography instructor for the girls.”
[The really remarkable thing about Julia is that she's both a choreography director and a performance director. Even at her young age, she's learned a wide range of things from her parents, so she has much greater potential and skill than other people.]
[That means she can grow even more if she has the right impetus. And Always has enough talent to bring out that potential.]
“Okay! So I should bring videos of the girls dancing and singing, right?”
[What's scary about you, Master, is how quickly you catch even the smallest hint and snatch it up.]
And so,
after finishing my conversation with Nobel, I was just about to lie down and rest my exhausted body when—
Knock, knock—.
Someone knocked and poked their head in.
“Team Leader.”
It was Hee-ju.
“Yeah. What is it?”
“Oh, I figured you'd have taken your socks off by now, so I thought I'd put them in the laundry basket.”
“Huh? My socks smell bad, so I should probably wash them separately.”
“It's okay.”
Hee-ju hurried in, scooped up my smelly socks in her arms, and was about to leave when she turned back.
“Team Leader.”
“Yeah?”
“The unnis said they don't like intense choreography and that it's hard, but I'm okay with it. If you tell me to, I'll perform any choreography perfectly.”
Her boundless trust in me made me feel just a little guilty, enough to drive me crazy, but—
“Yeah. Thanks. For now, I'll focus on finding the best teacher possible. I'll make the choreography as easy as I can, too.”
“Yes. Good night.”
“All right. You sleep well, too, Hee-ju.”
[You're lying even to Hee-ju?]
What are you talking about?
I said as easy as possible, so it's not a lie.
[…….]
Let's just go to sleep.
I wasn't built to sleep all day like the others.
Even if I slept soundly after staying up all night recording, I might wake up in the evening.
But I had to wake up around lunchtime and bring back salads for the girls.
It was best to buy them in the morning,
but that place was so popular that they restocked at lunchtime.
[I know you're trying, so I'll let it slide.]
[Go to sleep.]
Yeah.
You sleep well, too.
* * *
The next morning.
“Ah. I'm dying.”
I was tired, sleepy, and my breath smelled sickly sweet.
Pssht—.
Still, I sprayed on cologne, popped a mint into my mouth, and made myself as presentable as I could before heading for the location Nobel had told me about at the appointed time.
[Hard Climbing Center]
The word “Hard” was already in the name?
[Apparently, this place is especially notorious even among climbing centers. Maybe that's why even national team athletes visit from time to time.]
“I'm already getting dizzy.”
“Oh, hello. Is this your first time here?”
“Yeah, sort of. It's my first time climbing at all, actually.”
“I see. Then would it be all right if I explained a few things to you?”
“Sure.”
The world really had gotten nice these days.
The service was so friendly.
After listening to the whole explanation,
I changed clothes, rented shoes, and went inside, where I saw a lot of people climbing by grabbing the little knobs sticking out of the walls.
[This is a special service. So you don't have to waste time.]
As Nobel spoke, information appeared above just one person among all those climbing.
[Julia Smith]
So that's her.
She was a pretty woman with blonde hair and blue eyes, the kind who looked unmistakably foreign at a glance.
“Hhup! Hup!”
The inside of the climbing center was divided by difficulty level.
And she was on the hardest course.
Every muscle in her body was no joke.
At that rate, wasn't she stronger than me even though she was a woman?
[Not quite, but she's definitely stronger than most women in terms of flexibility, core strength, and other things.]
“Ah. A strong woman. Talented, too, and strong on top of that. She really does sound like she'd be a total bitch.”
Still, I might as well brazenly go up to her and try.
[Can you speak English?]
“No. I can't.”
If I were that good at English, I could've gotten into some major corporation or public enterprise with my TOEIC score alone.
Would I have joined this crazy industry with its low pay and managers changing every year?
No matter how much I wanted to see celebrities,
[Then what are you going to do?]
“What's so hard about English? If it's for the girls, I'll figure out some way to talk to her.”
Fortunately, this world had a completely insane means of communication called body language.
“He. Hey. Julia Smith?”
“Who? Who called me?”
The moment I called her name, we made eye contact, and I put on a brave face and shouted.
“Ah. I-I'm your fan! Big fan!”
The response I got was—
“What the fuck?(What are you saying? Fuck.)”
Ah. That was English even I knew.