A Blank Slate Regression for the Idol That Lost His Original Mindset - Chapter 299

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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A Regression Guide for Idols Who Lost Their Initial Intentions Episode 299

The detailed bracket for DTB’s second main round was released. As expected, I would be facing Choi Hyeongjin in the second main round.

It was finally time to collect on the rival narrative bait that DTB had been chanting about like a mantra. I was absolutely delighted to finally be able to show that the weight class difference between Choi Hyeongjin and me was too great for us to be paired as rivals.

Hyeongjin, I’m grateful that you helped a lot with resolving the plagiarism controversy, but what can I do? I can’t diminish my skills to the point where people would call us rivals just to repay that favor.

I wasn’t sure how Gongchul and Seven Kick were doing, but at least BQ9 and I were smoothly progressing with our competition song work.

“Wait, how about trying that part with syncopation? I think it would be good to add variation around here, in my opinion.”

BQ9, who had briefly stopped the beat, conveyed his message to me through the microphone from outside the recording booth.

“Really? Then let’s record it first and compare the two versions.”

“Yeah, let’s do that. You can handle it, right?”

“Of course.”

I answered confidently and spit out the lyrics with syncopation to match the beat that started flowing again.

I came out of the recording booth and listened to the work-in-progress with BQ9. Since we focused the song and rapping on avoiding Yongcheol Hyung’s predictive responses, knowing me well, even I found it unfamiliar to listen to.

“Wow, it definitely feels distant from my usual style. Yongcheol Hyung is going to be properly flustered, right?”

“Which one do you think is better? Don’t be too conscious of D.I and let’s go with the one with higher completion.”

“Then let me try the syncopated part one more time. Since it’s not a style I do often, it feels a bit awkward. I think I’ll definitely get used to it if I do it a few more times.”

No matter how much of a skill gap there was between my opponent and me, I couldn’t be complacent until the results came out. Since I didn’t know what variables might arise, I had to do my best so I wouldn’t regret it later.

Right now, even I was doing this, claiming to catch Yongcheol Hyung off guard. Yongcheol Hyung was probably thinking similarly.

No matter how close of a younger brother I was to him, with his personality, there was no way he would drop his team member who trusted and chose him for my victory.

Although Yongcheol Hyung found Choi Hyeongjin, who constantly picked fights with me, quite disagreeable at the time…

Of course, compared to my underground days with Yongcheol Hyung, my skills had grown to an incomparable level, but the Yongcheol Hyung I knew would be someone who could thoroughly analyze even my rap style from Rev’s debut until now and then some.

So I couldn’t let my guard down. Well, that kind of diligence was Yongcheol Hyung’s strength though.

BQ9, who handed me a water bottle filled with warm water, let out a short sigh as if he had forgotten something, then asked me.

“Ah, come to think of it, I forgot to ask about that. Did you contact D.I? What kind of approach are they taking?”

“I was actually trying to probe, so I poked at Yongcheol Hyung once, but he told me not to contact him until the second main round ends. He said he couldn’t trust his own mouth and hands.”

At my words, BQ9 burst into a short laugh with his characteristic cynical expression.

“Since the period is until the second main round ends, I guess he has a premonition he won’t make it to the semifinals?”

“I actually said the same thing, but he said he’d accept it for about a day after the second main round ends. I got told not to make such negative comments.”

Conversely, he didn’t even think about trying to dig out how our team would approach it.

Whether that was Yongcheol Hyung’s confidence from knowing me well, or consideration for a younger brother who was also going through a survival broadcast he had experienced once.

If it was the former, it would be quite fun to shatter that confidence and see Yongcheol Hyung’s dumbfounded face, but if it was the latter, I’d feel a bit sorry.

“This time I really have to win. I don’t want to lose to the same person twice.”

Since I had contributed just a little bit to changing the fate of Season 3’s winner and runner-up, I scratched my cheek at BQ9’s coldly burning will. I didn’t feel particularly sorry, but since it felt unsettling, I should create a winner-producing team once.

“And that crazy plan of yours too…”

BQ9, who had been muttering additionally, rubbed his forehead with a face that said his head hurt from thinking about it again.

“But that’s really okay, right? Wow, it’s a case that’s never appeared before, so I really can’t gauge the reaction at all?”

Well, this hyung, I didn’t see him that way, but his guts are quite small.

“If it’s not okay, I’ll just get some criticism. The purpose isn’t even trolling, it’s just me doing the stage I want to do.”

“It’ll become legendary in various ways.”

When I replied refreshingly with a reassuring tone, BQ9 made a groaning sound.

“If you’re really anxious, ask the PD once. Whether it’s okay.”

“I should do that. I have no sense of whether this is an acceptable area or not.”

BQ9 nodded and wrote down the schedule in his phone’s memo app.

We resumed recording, and after a couple of re-recordings, both BQ9 and I were able to produce results that we were completely satisfied with. I produced BQ9’s featuring part.

Now what remained was Gongchul’s featuring part. Since he was also working on his competition song, I had to deliver the lyrics in advance and schedule time so it wouldn’t overlap with his work schedule.

Thanks to that, Gongchul was summoned to our studio with a completely haggard-looking face.

“Wow, you guys already finished working on your song?”

“It’s not completely finished yet, but entering the final stage? Once we record hyung’s featuring part, it’ll be roughly done. We can spend a day on post-production.”

“If you have some spare time, help us out a bit. Sigh… The opponent just had to be A01, so I can’t feel at ease at all. If it had been Junmyeong who came up instead, I could have relaxed a bit.”

Gongchul kept dry-washing his face, saying he had shot himself in the foot.

“That’s why I said let’s just do it the way we always did, but why did you insist on doing 2-on-2 team battles?”

BQ9 clicked his tongue.

“But why did you really go that route? I’m not being sarcastic, I’m genuinely curious. The 2-on-2 team battle in the first main round was the first introduction in DTB history.”

At my question, Gongchul let out a deep sigh with an embarrassed face.

“I used my head a bit because I didn’t want to hear that I was too obviously picking only people from my label’s connections. I thought Junmyeong would definitely team up with you. You didn’t have any particular issues with Junmyeong. Rather, you had some friction with Seven Kick. During the Group Leader solo performance mission.”

It was Seven Kick who had first picked a fight with my only solo song at the time, and it was true that Seven Kick felt a bit uncomfortable because of that. The image he showed to viewers during the group music source mission process also played a part in getting his image severely damaged.

If IJM had suggested teaming up during the first main round, I would have agreed without much thought.

“But who would have known that stupid guy would be keeping you in check from the first main round? He said he wanted to drop you early because he didn’t want to meet you in the finals. Sigh, frankly speaking, it was uncertain whether he’d even make it to the semifinals, yet he was already counting his chickens before they hatched. When recruiting for the label, I’ll have to do fucking intelligence tests now too.”

It was a tragedy brought about by excessive ego and insufficient self-reflection.

However, considering that Seven Kick’s appearance, where the connection hip-hop vs. skill hip-hop battle and the baseball uniform stage costume matched well in a different sense, became a small topic and Team Gongchul & BQ9 was definitely imprinted on the public, Seven Kick coming up instead of IJM might have been a blessing in disguise.

The biggest beneficiary of Gongchul’s blunder was Seven Kick, who rejected the comfortable path of riding the connection hip-hop bus and chose me, thereby recovering his damaged image and getting his face quite well imprinted by appearing in communities thanks to the stage costume I chose.

“Only I almost got screwed, only me. I was crazy to earnestly request that you be paired together in the first main round. I thought another DTB Season 4 TOP4 would come out from our label, but what is this because of Im Junmyeong’s wrong choice?”

Since the label story wasn’t my concern, I naturally cut off Gongchul’s endless lamentations.

“What can we do? Right now Seven Kick hyung has come up. We have to beat A01 first.”

For my plan to succeed, Seven Kick absolutely had to beat A01 and advance to the semifinals.

“Gyuin hyung, let’s keep our work on hold and help them first? Ours is roughly finished now.”

“Yeah, let’s do that. We have to for the semifinals… Sigh…”

Unable to continue his words, BQ9 let out a sigh. What’s wrong with my grand plan?

* * *

On a day when all five members had no schedules, lessons, or training, Rev’s enjoyable first music camp was finally held.

The location was decided to be my studio since getting a private pension for a day would be a luxury given the members’ schedules and lesson extravaganza.

Kim Dobin, who spotted the military cap on my head, even clapped his hands to express his joy.

“See, I told you so. I said Eden Hyung would definitely come wearing that hat. I said it wouldn’t be a harmonious music retreat but would become a marine boot camp. Wow, as expected, it doesn’t deviate from my expectations, does it?”

“Is that something to be happy about? Why are you so pleased, hyung…?”

Ryu Jaehee’s eyes looking at Kim Dobin were quite displeased.

“Our Doby was secretly hoping for an intense marine boot camp. Then this hyung has to meet those expectations too. Isn’t that right?”

“No, that’s not right.”

Kim Dobin shook his head with a shameless face. After achieving a relationship improvement level of 100, Kim Dobin had a ghostly ability to know where to stretch his feet and did so accordingly.

He used to tremble just from me breathing, but why is there no middle ground with this guy?

First, I tried Plan 1 of the composition camp I had prepared in advance. The evaluation of the result born after roughly five hours was…

“It’s like strawberry macaron mint choco whipped cream kimchi stew.”

Kim Dobin said while shaking his head. It couldn’t have been a more accurate comparison.

Then the method of throwing in everything the members wanted was a failure. Going to Plan 2, I tried to tear apart and fix the song that was relatively the best based on the members’ opinions, but that was also a huge failure.

Setting aside that the original version of the song didn’t remain, since everyone pursued slightly different tendencies, the song overall lacked unity.

The deadline was approaching, but after 10 hours of marching, we hadn’t salvaged anything.

“You can’t get full from the first spoonful.”

When I roughly messed up my hair, Gyeon Hajun lightly patted my shoulder.

“Right, everyone goes through trial and error like that.”

Seo Yehyeon, who had been the main culprit causing the most confusion in the song by constantly changing his words, added with a shameless face.

Ryu Jaehee seemed to be rolling his eyes, thinking about how to break through this situation. I had absolutely no intention of leaving even the music domain to that guy.

But both time and my mind were too tight to feel disturbed by that.

I played the original version of the song again to think one last time whether to compose anew or somehow go with modifications.

The song was subtly bland, or should I say it looked empty? Anyway, the completion was lacking, but I couldn’t figure out which part was the problem.

Kim Dobin, who had been moving his upper body according to the melody as if following choreography next to me, said casually.

“But I’ve been thinking about this continuously, doesn’t this chorus sound somewhat like a traditional Korean music tune? It would go well with a fan dance.”

I stopped clicking the mouse meaninglessly.

“Doby, what did you say?”

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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