The Reincarnated Idol Hard Carries an Indie Band - Chapter 98

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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A Former Idol’s Indie Band Hard-Carry
Episode 98
Less than a day after the video went up, comments began flooding in at breakneck speed.
-Wait lol what is this why is it so good
-The editing is trash but why do I keep watching?
-The audio quality is rough lol but that’s the charm
-Aren’t these the kids who were messing with the PD during the live broadcast? Why do they look like neighborhood unemployed guys here?
└That’s why it’s good
└I thought they were scary but they’re just cute high schoolers lol
-Cha Seo Ha dropping the camera in the water at 1:42 I’m dying replaying it forever lol
-Wait not even high schoolers they look like elementary kids lololol
-What’s Kang Min doing with that weird dance in the back at 2:04?
└Annyeonghaseolbeop!
└How can you not know konnichiwaselbeop
└What is that you anime freaks……
-Jun Sung…. that’s not how you grill meat……
└Some wasteful humanity……
The video didn’t have any special content.
Just us hanging around.
That was all there was to it.
But people were going wild over that very “lack of something.”
-Wow seriously healing ㅠㅠ I want to hang out with my friends like that too
-OKTOP looks better like this than when they’re cool on stage
-This is what youth is
-But after watching this video the Rendezvous hype is crazy
└Streaming gg
└I’m gonna go to Rendezvous too
-Where did the person who’s been listening to OKTOP for 3 years go?
└I’ve been there for 6 hours now
* * *
Our first video surpassed a million views in just four days.
Subscribers grew rapidly too, already crossing two hundred thousand and still climbing steadily.
For a freshly launched channel, the numbers were abnormal.
As many people watched it, others started creating secondary works based on the video.
And Kim Ju Hee was among them.
Back when OKTOP first busked at Banwol Park.
A salaried worker who first filmed them on a channel called “Human Kim Ju Hee.”
The moment OKTOP’s first video went up, she uploaded one to her own channel.
-Current status of the indie band (not idol) I first filmed a year ago
The video was the shaky busking footage she’d originally captured.
In other words, a cross-edited video of OKTOP’s first busking performance and this vacation vlog.
Many of OKTOP’s fans already subscribed to her channel as the number-one fan-tuber.
The video sparked a subtle emotional response and spread rapidly.
-Wow has it been about a year and a half? Watching them side by side like this gives me chills
-Comparing with Kim Ju Hee’s first video shows how much her editing skills improved
-Honestly…. OKTOP was youth then and they’re youth now. They’re basically Rendezvous incarnate as a band
-The video is so moving…. I feel like I raised OKTOP
└Me too…
└OKTOP should’ve been born to me
└What are you saying?
Kim Ju Hee’s YouTube subscribers grew steadily, now approaching thirty thousand.
Now there were quite a few people curious not just about OKTOP but about Kim Ju Hee’s personal updates.
The channel of the person who first filmed OKTOP was growing alongside the band.
It was another proof that musicians and fans share growth and narrative in a close bond.
* * *
Heo Jun Sung, sprawled across the couch in the Practice Room while scrolling through his phone, spoke up.
“Yo, we just uploaded a video of us hanging out and it hit a million?”
“Yeah.”
“Whoa……”
Heo Jun Sung scratched his belly and muttered again.
“But we haven’t even released the Music Video yet.”
“That’s the core of it.”
At my words, he tilted his head in confusion.
“People are dying to know about OKTOP right now. They saw us causing a scene on stage, and because of that Lee Jong Myung is getting it, but they confirmed we’re hanging out at the beach. Now they’re hooked.”
“So?”
“But we haven’t actually given them the new song yet.”
In the idol world, dropping bait before a comeback is standard practice.
Concept jacket, haram, teaser, tracklist.
Add on top of that photos spotted at the Music Video shoot location too.
Show little by little, stretch the anticipation to the max, then drop the track.
“But we’re an indie band, right? Not doing that stuff is our identity.”
“We dropped a teaser before though.”
Heo Jun Sung stopped mid-sentence.
“Idiot, Cha Seo Ha isn’t talking about the method—he means the sensibility.”
Kim Ji Hu clarified my point, but Heo Jun Sung just kept scratching his belly.
“Anyway, since we’re an indie band, we’re not gonna give them a bunch of different stuff. Instead, we’ll throw just one—the strongest card.”
“The nine?”
“Sakura. You dumbass.”
Just as I was about to give up explaining to Heo Jun Sung, Lee Do Young spoke.
“You’re planning to reveal Ga Young as a teaser?”
“Yeah, see, Do Young’s sharp—unlike someone else.”
“Hey, I know stuff too?”
“What could you possibly know?”
“Thirty-eight is the highest card obviously.”
“Go throw your hand out and leave.”
* * *
Moon Ga Young was now the most-watched actress in the world.
“Bricks of Weight” had clinched the OTT global number-one spot within two weeks of release.
Moon Ga Young, who made a dramatic exit in episode eight, was trending second only to actor Nam Yu Min.
Overseas fans turned her chilling one-liner into a meme and spread it everywhere.
On domestic portal search trends, “Bricks of Weight” and Moon Ga Young’s name rose and fell every single day.
And now that actress, with no agency, was appearing as the lead in a low-budget indie band Music Video.
Did that even make sense?
In the original timeline too, Moon Ga Young became a global star briefly, then came back to Korea saying she wanted to do music, her career taking a temporary hit.
Others don’t know that, but I do.
So this timing was perfect.
When Moon Ga Young would shine brightest.
We were just borrowing that light for a moment.
Of course it wasn’t a bad deal for Moon Ga Young either.
The first stepping stone for an actress moving into music.
The far side of that bridge, I planned to decorate with my own hands.
* * *
Two teasers were released in total.
Two videos posted with no warning to the OKTOP official channel.
-OKTOP Coming Soon.
We were planning to go with a Double Title for this Mini Album we were releasing.
The first video contained a scene that hadn’t appeared in our original vacation vlog.
That ocean-background footage we’d seen in the vlog.
No explanation, but it was a Music Video teaser for the first title track.
And the second video.
The exterior of an old 2-Story House.
And the interior of the building that followed.
The shadow of a fireplace.
Five silhouettes standing expressionless scattered across the first floor.
And the darkness that followed.
From within that darkness, a woman’s eyes slowly lifting.
Just one frame.
That was all.
The screen went black and one number appeared at the very end.
-D-7
* * *
Ten minutes after the teaser went up.
OKTOP’s newly opened fan community exploded as users flooded in instantly.
-What is this teaser that just went up to the official????
-Wait the ocean video made me think they were doing something cute again but what’s the second video?
-But did anyone see the woman’s eyes at the very end?
└Yeah
└Pause at 0:27
└Who is this? She’s a woman?
└Is there a feature?
As various posts and comments flowered, one post began to change the entire conversation.
-I’ve seen those eyes somewhere, aren’t they similar to the eye look of MGY from the end of Bricks episode 1?
And immediately that post gained high recommendation and countless comments began flooding in.
-????????Are you insane??
-No you’re actually crazy
-You’re not new here right?
-MGY? Fuck are you saying it’s actually MGY?
-Oh thinking about it Cha Seo Ha and Lee Do Young and Heo Jun Sung and MGY all go to the same school
└Who is MGY?
└Moon-GY
└M-GaY
└M-G-Young
-Crazy this must be some serious school connections
└So the narrative from the idol audition show extends here? Did OKTOP go insane for real?
-Wait but an actress hitting global number one with Bricks of Weight is gonna be in an indie band Music Video? What’s this loyalty about?
-OKTOP became known in Korea because of MGY and now they’re becoming known worldwide?
-OKTOP owe Moon Ga Young your lives
└It’s not cool seeing people in the fan community write about owing and being indebted to other celebrities without using honorifics
└Don’t say they should work or owe anything!
-Crazy the writer’s eye for detail is insane there’s already a comparison capture post on YouTube
-How am I supposed to wait a whole week for this
* * *
The reaction wasn’t just domestic.
The spark had already spread overseas.
Actors have fewer fan theories to obsess over compared to singers.
So naturally, newly arrived fans began searching for that actress on various portals.
Through that route, countless overseas fans of Moon Ga Young discovered OKTOP’s Music Video teaser.
-Wait, Is that girl from Bricks? In BAND MV?
-Who is OKTOP? Korean Rock Band? I need to know NOW
-Bro why is she in random band video LAMO this is weird
Moon Ga Young’s global recognition naturally carried the name OKTOP out into the world.
People who’d watched “Bricks of Weight” searched for “the actress in that band video” and flowed into OKTOP’s channel.
They clicked on the “Released Tracks” list.
Naturally listening to Rendezvous and then Cruise!!, and finally the newest track Awaken.
And then they watched the vlog.
And they didn’t escape.
That’s how OKTOP official’s subscriber count broke through four hundred fifty thousand in just a single day thanks to one teaser.
* * *
“Yo, you see the comments? Everyone figured out Ga Young.”
Heo Jun Sung waved his phone around, clearly excited.
“That’s why we threw it as bait.”
“Ga Young! Look at that card, is it sakura?”
“That’s not it!”
That guy’s been hooked on some weird stuff and keeps saying weird things.
“Anyway, Seo Ha is seriously smart.”
This time Lee Do Young reached out.
“If it were me I would’ve revealed everything excitedly. But you deliberately put Ga Young in an ambiguous short video, right?”
“Exactly, look how loud it got because of that. Since we didn’t give them the answer, they went crazy trying to prove it themselves.”
When people aren’t given the answer, they search for it themselves.
In that process, they search the word OKTOP hundreds of times and speak it thousands of times.
That’s the strongest marketing that costs almost nothing.
“The merchant Seo Ha-kun is impressive……”
“Don’t force a rhyme with pointless stuff, Kang Min.”
And then Kim Ji Hu, who’d been quietly sitting beside me scrolling through his phone, opened his mouth.
“This might actually work.”
“What might?”
“That thing you said before you went on the audition show.”
“What thing?”

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