If I Don’t Earn 1 Trillion Won, My Regression Ends - Chapter 69

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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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Episode 69

To be honest, Staingry had absolutely no expectations for Act 2.

And he wasn’t the only one!

This was evident from the reactions around him during intermission, before the act began.

“Is it Act 2 now? The lead cast is Bae Tae-ak and Seosing-a… Seosing-a? I’ve heard that name somewhere.”

“That’s the mermaid girl. From the phone commercial.”

“Ah. But ten years old? Isn’t that too young? I thought Namihee from Act 1 was young, but this one’s even younger.”

An industry insider clicked his tongue in disappointment.

No matter how much it’s an academy performance, renting out the main theater to put on some school festival? What a flashy waste of money.

‘The Seagull’ was an introductory bible, so there were many who knew it inside and out. He immediately voiced his complaints.

“Nina isn’t just a one-dimensional character chasing fame. Act 2 is where Nina, who has lived her whole life oppressed under a strict father and stepmother, first unleashes her hidden desires. Can a child express that?”

‘Exactly.’

Staingry agreed a hundred times over in his mind.

One shouldn’t underestimate the character of Nina.

If Act 1 was about innocence, Act 2 required adding ‘longing’ to that innocence, making it actually demand higher acting skills than Act 1.

Are they kidding? How could a ten-year-old pull that off?

‘Maybe it’s Yewon’s scheme to advertise Namihee from Act 1?’

After all, a genius stands out more when there’s a comparison group.

‘Clever thinking. These bastards.’

Fortunately, Namihee, whom he had come to see, was more than satisfactory.

Staingry thought about the draft of the review he would upload when he got home. Act 2, which was merely a sacrifice for Namihee, was already out of his mind.

“Don’t be so serious. Maybe they just want to show Nina’s innocent days, so they’re using actual children~ Think of it that way.”

“If that’s the case, they used their heads strangely. It’ll be fortunate if they just memorize their lines properly.”

“From Act 3 onwards it’s the high school division. That’s when it’ll get real.”

The grumbling voices of the industry insiders gradually died down.

Then the blackout came, and Act 2 began.

Excluding special cases like Namihee and Seosing-a, all the other actors on stage were veteran upperclassmen.

After a scene where an actor made up to look old showed off his youth, Act 2’s ‘Nina’ finally appeared.

“It’s like a dream! Really, it’s like a dream!”

Indeed- what a pretty child.

That was the first impression the audience received.

Excited murmurs could be heard here and there in the audience, saying it was the girl from the CF.

But it quickly died down.

After all, Nina on stage was so fresh and full of vitality, unlike the mysterious girl in the commercial.

She existed before their eyes with explosive life force.

The audience was soon completely focused on ‘Nina’. As if being silently sucked into quicksand.

Not long after Act 2 began, several audience members unconsciously thought:

‘This second Nina is better than the first one.’

They didn’t know about the professional aspects of acting like pronunciation accuracy or vocal stability.

They just felt that this ‘Nina’s’ voice was very pleasant to listen to and her actions were much more natural than the previous cast.

Yes. It was natural.

It didn’t seem like acting at all.

It was as if the girl named Nina was a real person living and moving in daily life.

“…”

Staingry, who had been concentrating, was startled as he realized something.

His seat was in the corner of the 2nd floor.

Yet the girl’s nervous, trembling voice was reaching him clearly without any effort on his part.

He noticed it late because it wasn’t a squeezed-out, exaggerated voice.

This meant the sound from center stage was reaching beyond the 1st floor to the 2nd floor. This would be impossible without vocal training built through rigorous practice!

“What is that kid…?”

‘The picture isn’t bad.’

The industry insider evaluated coolly.

Whether due to makeup or the power of the stage, the child didn’t look as young as expected.

Being taller than her peers with long legs, she blended in quite well without any sense of discord when standing with older students.

Honestly, did such things even matter?

The moment Act 2’s ‘Nina’ appeared, she had stolen all the gazes in the audience.

The industry insider thought he should watch all elements of the stage meticulously due to professional duty, yet he became aware that unless he was conscious of it, he was unconsciously following and looking for Nina.

In professional terms, this was called Centering.

It was a phenomenon where audiences themselves set a specific actor as the center of the play and turn the rest into background, even without the director intentionally shining a spotlight on one person.

In other words, it was also called an actor’s ‘dominance’.

Was her acting that outstanding? Not really.

Her eye contact was clumsy, unfamiliar with the stage, and she sometimes stumbled slightly over her lines due to nervousness.

But as time passed, the young actor was concentrating and immersing herself more and more, and the more she did, the harder it became to look away.

Like a black hole, she converged and monopolized all gazes.

And when the other actors left the stage one by one, and the famous one-on-one scene between Seosing-a and Bae Tae-ak – that is, Nina and Trigorin – began…

The entire main theater held its breath in unison.

“What does it feel like to be famous, sir?”

Nina asked with pure, admiring eyes.

“It feels like nothing. Because it’s something you can’t feel.”

Trigorin answered boredly.

“Sir… You don’t know how much I admire your life. Your life is truly great and beautiful! If I could become famous like you… I, I could dedicate my entire life for the public!”

“Oh?”

“Yes! I would sacrifice myself. I would gladly let them pull my chariot. Because they would feel happiness by getting close to me!”

Nina smiled brightly as if she truly believed it.

That conviction that she was the most fascinating and special being in this world, without a doubt.

Naive and foolish… yet at the same time fresh and dazzling.

The captivated audience couldn’t dare take their eyes off the girl.

Trigorin also muttered in a trembling voice.

“A chariot…? You are truly arrogant.”

Nina burst into laughter.

Her cheeks flushed with excited madness, as if bursting out all the desires and thirst that had been oppressed and deeply hidden.

“If only I could become that, if only I could become a beautiful and famous actress, I wouldn’t care if my family and friends turned their backs on me. Even if I collapsed from exhaustion, starving with a rotting stomach, it would be fine!”

Six months.

After finishing basic training, Kim Yeo-yeong handed a book to her students.

It was a play script, and the title was ‘The Seagull’.

Seosing-a practiced only this play for 180 days.

If one day wasn’t enough, then two days; if two days weren’t enough, then ten days; if ten days weren’t enough, then a hundred days.

For over a hundred days, she dug into only ‘Nina’.

It was enough time for the character Nina to be embodied within Seosing-a, for her ambition to become kindling and burn Seosing-a.

And what the prepared Seosing-a needed was just one thing: conviction about this path laid before her, one proper trigger.

“Who are you? Do you know acting? Do you know movies? Who are you! Just a commoner with nothing!”

“I’m going to make you a star.”

“To put it simply, you’re one in ten thousand.”

“Sing-a. I don’t think those people are lying to you. You can’t deceive someone by saying something that doesn’t exist is there.”

“Trust my words, Seosing-a. You’re a genius.”

People’s words had become the stairs they built up for her.

The final step. Seosing-a decided she would gladly climb it.

“Even if the public hates me, I’ll accept it gladly. Even if they complain and mock me because of my immaturity and inadequacy, that’s fine! I’ll willingly accept it all! But in return!”

The girl, Seosing-a, looked straight at the audience.

The main theater was silent.

The audience held their breath.

Someone leaned forward toward the stage, someone swallowed dryly, and someone else simply gaped in rapture.

On the crude, unrefined stage of amateurs, receiving the spotlight and gazes with her entire body, the young actress finally exploded with the ambition she had been hiding.

“In exchange, I will demand from them brilliant, true, perfect fame! That star in the sky! Irreplaceable by anyone, I will become a greater actress than anyone else!”

The scene changed.

The actors on stage changed too.

The curtain fell.

But no one was there.

No one who had escaped from that young, ambitious plea just moments before.

♧

Thump thump thump. My heart was beating as if it would burst.

My skin, heated by the lights, was burning hot.

A great actress.

A more brilliant actress than anyone.

It was a full house of 700 seats, packed tight without a single empty seat.

The second-floor audience seats that wrapped around the stage in a fan shape made me feel as if a massive wall was crashing down on me.

But completely buried in that unfamiliar and oppressive baptism of gazes.

Only after borrowing Nina’s lines and shouting with all my might did I realize how much I had truly desired this.

It was an unfamiliar yet never unfamiliar emotion.

I wanted to treasure the feeling of this moment forever.

I hoped people would continue to focus on me like this, yearn for me, and look up to me.

I am ultimately materialistic.

I was materialistic, obsessed with money, loving gold and diamonds, and truly wanting to be loved and cherished by people.

Then, to avoid letting others discover this vulgar cowardice, wouldn’t it be better to become a truly great materialist instead?

“It’s the moment when I forget that I am myself, while also recognizing myself as a person more intensely than ever before.”

“And the sense of achievement that comes when you finally accomplish it—”

“Catharsis.”

“Thrill.”

Thrill. It felt like electricity was flowing beneath my blood vessels.

Catharsis. Constraints were destroyed and desires became free.

‘Now I know too. This is exactly my path.’

I want to become an actress. I will become a more brilliant, famous, and great actress than anyone else.

That very thing was what I wished for.

“Seosing-a. What are you doing? Go out. They’re calling for you.”

Bae Tae-ak whispered with a smile and pushed my back.

The theater festival was over.

It was curtain call time after all the plays had ended and the curtain had fallen.

I walked out unsteadily. As I moved toward center stage on trembling legs, thunderous applause from the audience poured down. I couldn’t help but burst into tears.

It was a dream I had finally found only in my second life.

My precious dream.

And right at that moment—

【Hidden Mission: Find Your Natural Talent!】 (Success!)

【Without trying, no one knows where or what kind of talent they might have. In this era where careers are as countless as stars in the night sky, countless people end their lives without finding their true talents. Congratulations. You have broken through that slim possibility and found your own path with a 1:10000 probability.】

【Special Reward: Hall of Persona】

【Update in progress following hidden mission success…】

[!] 【New Achievement rewards registered upon meeting conditions.】

【Blue Dragon Film Awards Best Actress: Mission Progress +5%】

【Baeksang Arts Awards Grand Prize: Mission Progress +10%】

【Academy Award Best Actress: Mission Progress +15%】

【Challenger’s profession stats have been activated.】

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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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