A Blank Slate Regression for the Idol That Lost His Original Mindset - Chapter 450

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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 Original Intent Episode 450

“The regular album preparation period was quite long, but the promotion period seems to pass by too quickly.”

“That’s right. Already it’s time to wrap up promotions and prepare for the repackage album. It feels like yesterday when DTB’s first preliminaries were causing a stir, but it’s already the end of May. Time really flies. Soon DTB Season 5 will be broadcasting too.”

Since this was our most successful promotion, it felt bittersweet to see it ending. At least I don’t have to do the half-and-half hair anymore, which is good.

“How much do you think 【Reality Test!】 contributed to Nightmare maintaining first place all this time?”

“Well, I’d like to believe it’s because this song is good rather than because of that show.”

【Reality Test!】, which had become an issue once with its failed social experiment and Truman Show ending, was abolished due to unsavory incidents, and our episode 5 became an issue once again.

Naturally, we turned on a live broadcast to strike while the iron was hot.

[Back then we only clarified the script controversy. Now that it’s been abolished, I can say this – they edited out the entire lunch part, didn’t they?]

[That’s right, the first and second floors got food based on what we wrote as our favorite foods in our profiles, but the basement got what we wrote as foods we dislike. But thanks to our youngest member noticing and immediately taking the vegetable bibimbap, we avoided the disaster of having to skip lunch. Ugh, I’d rather starve than eat vegetable bibimbap. It’s a bit different from being picky about food.]

[No, hyung. That is being picky. You just don’t like vegetables.]

[I eat salads well though. It’s not that I dislike vegetables, I just don’t like bibimbap with only vegetables and no meat.]

[Dobin was blocked by our youngest member, and in my case, Hajun knew I dislike sundae soup and gladly gave me his grilled mackerel set meal. It was touching. Don’t you like soup? I do like soup, but I don’t like sundae soup. Someone who likes pizza can dislike pineapple pizza, it’s like that.]

[It wasn’t really a touching sacrifice like Eden’s explanation suggests. I eat sundae soup just fine. I just like grilled fish the most, but I’m not particularly picky about anything else.]

[No, Jun. Among these indifferent people who only remember that I’m a soup fanatic, you alone remembered that detail – that’s what was touching. ‘Eden, noona remembered too!’ This person is also touched. Thank you.]

[Well, when you two went to eat soup before, you explained why you hate sundae soup like ten times.]

[That’s right! You only told Hajun and didn’t tell us, so how did we know! What? You said it during a live broadcast? Ah, his individual live broadcast. I’m breaking out in a cold sweat right now, Daydream.]

[So thanks to that, everyone could eat lunch without anyone going hungry, but on the broadcast it was all cut out and shown as if they gave us fair treatment? They cut out all of our Rev teamwork.]

[The basement environment… the lack of ventilation was the worst part. And since we kept cycling, the smell of sweat was just…]

[Did you get paid for the doll eye-gluing labor? No. They didn’t give us anything. Sue them for labor exploitation and wage theft? ‘Double lawsuit let’s go’ – who is that?]

-Damn, they cut this out. Their intention to only show conflict scenes and not show heartwarming teamwork is so obvious

-Kids, let’s sue them

-It was worth mass-reporting to the broadcasting standards committee. Shows like that should be abolished for real

-Why did they maintain boundaries well through episode 4 but then break their principles and go crazy on the episode with our kids? Are comedians and actors difficult but idols easy targets?

-The person who sued the broadcast was also a comedian, so let’s refrain from such speculation…

-Our kids suffered so much during filming, I want to smack the heads of those who insist it was scripted

-Please protect your artists. Don’t just accept any popular variety show without prior checking

-I felt it when they said someone was driven to panic attacks with that Stanford whatever experiment, but hearing these filming behind-the-scenes stories, that PD is really crazy…

The price for touching ‘rice,’ the most important thing in Korean sentiment, was very high. There’s a saying that even dogs aren’t bothered when eating.

Thanks to that, our buzz increased once again, and we were able to safely sweep first place on music shows even in our third week since comeback.

If we could get first place until next week, we could achieve a triple crown on terrestrial music shows.

Because next year Music Center would abolish their ranking system again only to revive it after a year, making it impossible to set triple crown records for a while.

If we’re going to set a record anyway, it’s better to do it when we have one less year of experience.

“Still, the first place candidates are formidable, so it doesn’t feel like we’re just picking on an empty house.”

“That’s right. Who would have thought the day would come when we’d compete for first place against Adora sunbaenim, the digital music powerhouse.”

As Ryu Jaehee and I were exchanging conversation, Kim Dobin, who had just returned from filming 【Trouble Travel】 and was sprawled on the sofa, suddenly joined in.

“I feel strange.”

“Why, because you’re competing with Adora sunbaenim for first place?”

“No, because our group is the villain interfering with Adora sunbaenim’s glorious first place after their comeback.”

“My goodness, didn’t you say before that you feel more like a junior than a fan now? Was that all lies?”

“Adora sunbaenim’s new song this time is really good.”

Kim Dobin made excuses while rolling his eyes, then slyly added.

“But still, our song is better.”

With this regular album promotion, we properly proved our songs and album by entering not only domestic charts but also Billboard.

Our second full album [NOX] was currently maintaining its position on the Billboard 200, the album chart among Billboard’s main charts, in the 40s for three weeks.

It was a performance good enough to aim for a grand prize in the album category at year-end.

And our title track 【Nightmare】 also peaked at 35th on the Billboard Hot 100 and had been fluctuating between 40th-50th place for three weeks.

We were holding our ground on Billboard’s two main charts for three consecutive weeks.

With our North American tour approaching and even making it onto Billboard’s main charts, our agency was in a festival mood.

The CEO, apparently having completely forgotten that he pushed for US expansion two or three years ago only to give up at my dissuasion, called us to his office and bragged about his insight and luck in booking this year’s North American tour.

“But didn’t you mention US expansion once before when we had no Billboard achievements? I heard Eden stopped you, saying we should secure the domestic market first.”

As expected, Gyeon Hajun, the most unfortunate and meaningless parachute hire at LnL, said everything he wanted to say even in front of the CEO.

Of course, Gyeon Hajun wasn’t the only one with speaking rights. None of us five couldn’t say that much to the CEO. That’s why the parachute hire is even more meaningless.

Poor Gyeon Hajun. Some people are Newborn parachutes who even kicked people out of debut groups.

“Ahem, so now let’s do one more promotion with a follow-up song from the repackage album and then seriously start preparing for the North American tour.”

The CEO quickly changed the subject.

“Is the follow-up song ready now?”

We had already selected the follow-up song when working on the regular album. So now all we had left to do was record the song and shoot concept photos and music videos.

“We haven’t started recording yet, and we can probably add one follow-up song and two or three more B-side tracks to the repackage album.”

“Let’s do our best until the end of this regular album promotion to finish beautifully, and wrap up the follow-up song promotion well too. We need to win a grand prize this year.”

As we left the CEO’s office, Seo Yehyeon muttered.

“I don’t know why I think of One Chance every time follow-up song promotions are mentioned.”

“That’s because you trolled back then, hyung. Your own dark history tends to stay in your memory for a long time.”

“You should have lived in my body once. How daunting it was to learn new choreography in just one week during those clumsy days. I still have nightmares about that sometimes. Dreams where I forget the choreography on stage and just stand there.”

“That’s a typical anxiety dream.”

Having a proper conversation like this with Seo Yehyeon really makes our debut days feel like a previous life.

* * *

[⚫REC]

[Hello, this is Rev’s Yuje!]

[Dobin!]

[This is Hajun.]

[It’s very hot because it’s summer, right? So we’ve prepared a surprise cooling horror special camera to blow away our Ilmong-ies’ summer heat!]

[It’s not summer yet though.]

[It’ll be summer when this is released, hyung.]

[The horror special theme is… giving our leader a horror experience. But will Eden actually fall for it?]

[As you Ilmong-ies know, Eden hyung is really fearless. He’s not even scared of ghosts. So the three of us planned a horror surprise camera targeting Eden hyung.]

[The reason Yehyeon hyung isn’t here is, well, we need at least one person who really doesn’t know this is a surprise camera for Eden hyung to fall for it.]

[Let’s just be honest. Yehyeon hyung is the worst at acting. We were worried he’d give it away by being awkward. I’m confident in my overreacting acting, so that’s why I’m participating.]

[No, honestly, if hyung doesn’t know it’s a surprise camera, he’ll either faint on the spot or burst our eardrums. We included him not because he’s good at overreacting, but for that reason.]

[So we’ll be fooling both Eden hyung and Yehyeon hyung with this surprise camera. I wonder if Yehyeon hyung will be okay. He got really scared when we went to Hell Maze together before.]

[Right. If we proceed at a level that makes Eden hyung fall for it and get scared, the horror level will be no joke.]

[It’s a small sacrifice for the greater good.]

[Sometimes Hajun hyung is the most cold-hearted.]

Ryu Jaehee pressed the recording stop button and put down the camcorder he was holding.

“So now let’s decide what we’ll use to fool Eden hyung.”

“How about a recording studio ghost? There are quite a few seniors who’ve experienced recording studio ghost stories. And we’ve heard some too. So wouldn’t Eden take this ghost story somewhat seriously?”

At Gyeon Hajun’s suggestion, Ryu Jaehee and Kim Dobin nodded simultaneously.

“Oh, recording studio ghost stories are good. We have follow-up song recording coming up soon too.”

“Somehow I trust this idea more because it came from Hajun hyung, who knows Eden hyung well.”

“Then let’s go with this. Youngest, think of some ideas. I’ll think of some too.”

“Hyung, why don’t you leave it to me?”

“Because your ideas won’t be scary, Dobin? Your horror threshold is too low.”

[⚫REC]

[Now then, before the recording day arrives, we’ll get help from the A&R Team to perfectly prepare our surprise camera setup in the company building’s recording studio.]

And so, with Kim Dobin’s idea that was selected at the end of the blind test, filming for the horror special surprise camera began.

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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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