The days were busy enough just with practice, but there was a ton I had to keep track of.

The biggest one was the end-of-month evaluation. Right on cue, I was given new tasks related to it.

 [SYSTEM] ‘New Task’ has been assigned.

▷ Draw up a plan for the end-of-month evaluation

▷ Reward: EXP (10)

[SYSTEM] ‘New Task’ has been assigned.

▷ Earn a passing score in the end-of-month evaluation

▷ Reward: EXP (30)

 Guess getting a passing score really matters. Even after the EXP adjustment, it’s giving a whole 30 EXP.

More than that—if I don’t pass, that’s an instant KPI failure. Are you not going to do your planning properly?

UA’s evaluation items were two: vocal and dance. And lately I’d been focusing more on dance practice.

There were two main reasons.

First, I could at least pretend to sing, but I had literally never danced once in my life.

If you’ve got two writing assignments—Korean composition and German composition—you start by buying the German wordbook.

I was at least more confident about memorizing lyrics than I was about memorizing choreography.

So I invested most of the early portion of my allotted practice time into dance. I successfully memorized the routine, so I’d cleared the first gate.

Second, I was scheduled to have fewer vocal lessons than dance lessons before the end-of-month evaluation.

That meant there would be fewer pieces of feedback to hear and apply from vocal than from dance. 𝘧𝘳𝘦ℯ𝓌𝘦𝒷𝘯𝑜𝑣𝘦𝓁.𝒸𝘰𝓂

In practice, even when I took one class apiece, there tended to be fewer notes from vocal anyway.

“Rather than half-assing some solo bravado, it’s better to learn what I was taught, properly.”

Between a newbie who gets taught ten things and then ruins all ten after seeing some bogus tip online, and a newbie who gets taught one thing and nails that one thing perfectly—the latter is better.

Besides, the issues raised in vocal class were, thankfully, still within a range I could digest on my own.

So I diversified, but put a few more eggs in the dance basket.

The final goal was to grab my weak point by the scruff and drag it up, and prove I was at least half a person’s worth.

Once the direction was set, I could focus on dance practice, which was efficient.

All of this planning ultimately pointed in one direction.

Position.

I was aiming for exactly one thing: sub-vocal.

SPARK’s vocals were quite solid. UA’s the famed vocal house; they planned the group ambitiously.

The group’s position balance was good, too.

In the vocal line, Park Juu and Jeong Seongbin held center; in the dance line, Choi Jeho and Kang Giyeon held center.

If only rapper Lee Cheonghyeon had been able to do rap perfectly and just show off how cool that was, everyone would’ve been at peace, but...

Reality had some twists and turns. The vocal difficulty of the songs UA handed early-era SPARK was truly brutal.

≫ Did UA sons-of-X make enemies with the kids’ vocal cords or what

└ If it were me, I would’ve already sued UA the moment I got three consecutive high notes four songs in a row, “for part distribution” my ass

With their shining talent, SPARK miraculously handled dolphin-pitch highs and power dance every comeback.

In the process, Lee Cheonghyeon had to pull quadruple duty—lyrics, composing, rap, and even vocals. Jeong Seongbin developed vocal nodules.

Knowing there could be injuries, I’d already arrived at a provisional conclusion about positions.

“If I lighten the singing load even a little, they won’t have to do four jobs per person.”

So I decided to prepare for the sub-vocal position that creates breathing spaces for the members.

And that was about the only area I could actually help in to begin with.

Once I set the target as “a member who draws as little attention as possible and just fills the vocals,” the assignment became clear.

Getting to “a member who just fills the vocals” felt doable with some blood, sweat, and tears.

Among the many songs SPARK would sing in the future, there were definitely parts I could cover within my range.

It was a million times lucky the evaluation items were exactly those two. If fan service had been included, I’d have bitten my tongue and reincarnated.

No, but why don’t they evaluate fan service? Isn’t that the basic competency of an idol?

I don’t know what efficacy SPARK’s fan service supposedly had, but I do know the fans desperately wanted SPARK’s fan service.

The brats weren’t stone-faced blocks of wood brazenly plastered over; they did seem to try something, but objectively speaking it was just a shabby attempt that wasted their faces.

This is how SPARK’s fan service flopped, the fandom mood cooled, bait was taken, articles popped up every day, the kids disbanded...

Thinking about it got me boiling again. Deep breaths. Deep breaths.

Anyway. The remaining task was to keep my head down in the team as much as humanly possible.

If one stiff, frozen pollock is creaking among glittering idols, there’s no way it won’t stand out—so I had to grind dance too.

Once I settled on the provisional conclusion, the “draw up a plan” task auto-completed.

 [SYSTEM] ‘Task’ has been completed.

▷ Reward: EXP (10) granted

▷ Cumulative EXP: 10

▷ Cumulative Points: 0

 Now if I could just gather 90 more EXP, I could bring dance proficiency and vocal proficiency to parity.

The first milestone was right ahead.

Since moving out at twenty, I’d lived alone for about seven years, except for the time I was in the army.

And I’d forgotten one basic piece of etiquette for a while.

When you have roommates, you have to match sleep patterns.

Thanks to that, I had to play at being an ascetic—waiting until the guys fell asleep.

When Choi Jeho and Lee Cheonghyeon’s tossing finally stopped, I carefully slipped out of the room.

Past 1 a.m., the living room was pitch-black and quiet.

If I turned the lights on, it felt like the whole place would light up, so I had no choice but to only turn on the laptop.

Fortunately, the agency had left one at the dorm for video searching.

I wanted to use WebCell, but unfortunately the laptop didn’t have the NS program installed.

I was dying to submit a purchase request for a license.

“If I find I need it even one more time, I’ll buy it out of pocket.”

With no choice, I opened a spreadsheet and started filling in items in order.

Song title, lyric-memorization score, basics, and total.

Next, under the song title, I listed all the songs I knew and cut everything where I couldn’t memorize at least 70% of the lyrics.

Since the time I could spend was limited, I planned to pour resources into increasing proficiency rather than lyric memorization.

Lastly, based on the basics I’d learned in vocal class, I scored each item by how suitable it seemed to showcase them.

“I should think of methods beyond dumb, manual-labor brainstorming.”

With gritty eyes, feeling that familiar stability while I typed, a hand appeared out of the darkness and tapped the table next to the laptop.

I looked up to see Jeong Seongbin, eyes half-open, standing on the other side of the dining table.

Jeez. You really don’t make a sound, do you?

“What?”

I asked in a small voice, and Seongbin blinked and said:

“Sorry to interrupt. But what are you doing, hyung...?”

“I’m trying to pick a song for the evaluation. Did you need the living room?”

“That’s not it... It’s late and I noticed someone was out here.”

Sleep was smeared all over his voice and face.

When I checked the clock, it was already 3 a.m.

No idea when time had run off like that.

This crappy world—prices and time, everything races ahead without me.

“I’ll wrap up and head in soon. If you just woke up, go back to bed. A good sleep today makes you 180 tomorrow.”

Instead of immediately turning back at the midnight nagging, Seongbin glanced between me and the clock. Then he pulled out the chair and sat at the table.

“Do you have candidates in mind?”

“Huh?”

“Song candidates.”

He rubbed his eyes and asked.

Amazingly, he seemed ready to stay in the living room for my sake after getting up from sleep.

I’m only comfortable if I’m alone, though.

Still, no matter how much resentment I had built up against SPARK, ignoring someone right to their face would be classless.

So I showed Seongbin the list of about seventy songs that had survived a brutal survival filter.

“The scores are... Ah, you scored them based on what the teacher said.”

“Yeah. And I focused on songs that felt in a similar range to what I sang in class.”

Reading the list, he nodded here and there at my explanation. Then he muttered in a voice that was clearly still not fully awake:

“I think I kind of get what kind of song you want to pick. Considering the range we heard in vocal class, I think you could sing this one too... Have you heard it before?”

“Are you trying to help me right now?”

“It won’t be a big help, but... If you wanted to pick from songs you already know so you wouldn’t mess up the lyrics... how about this one?”

“...”

“For this song, the first-verse and second-verse lyrics are almost the same. The lyrics are short, too.”

I knew from self-content that he was the type with a lot of kindness—the “Kind-Seongbin” tag showed up every time.

But I thought that was only relative, compared to the other members.

Looking at the dozing Seongbin, for a second I wondered if I should just carry him to bed.

Still, I carefully took down the feedback that felt like a spell.

After that, Seongbin—the K-pop one-shot instructor—kept touching his lips, marking circles and triangles on my pool, removing and adding songs, and in the end narrowed it down to thirty. My batting average seemed to be about 0.41.

Even with guidelines, the speed at which he produced appropriate values under suddenly set conditions was not normal.

“Seongbin-hyung is a real K-pop monster! He’s basically a karaoke swamp-monster.”

“He even knows songs from before he was born.”

“Hyung, do you do anything but listen to music? Ah... right, you only listen to music.”

“Then Mr. Seongbin’s nickname is Karaoke Swamp-Monster!”

Seeing it in front of me, I finally understood how scary a swamp-monster can be.

To survive in the harsh world of idols, you probably have to be this much of a knowledge-guy.

“What about picking from these? What do you think, hyung? Maybe something more recent would be better...?”

There was no way to interpret Seongbin’s help except as pure goodwill.

Even if he tried to squeeze me for a price, the only thing he could take from me would be an organ.

His character was not something you commonly see in someone who sleeps 4–5 hours, eats low-cal all day, and then dances and sings.

At least, I couldn’t. Even less so when I was eighteen, his current age.

“So this is the level you need to be to be a leader.” I was admiring him inwardly when our eyes met.

Maybe he’d fully woken up now; his eyes were bright.

I’d seen those eyes reflected in a photo with countless lightsticks—when I made the birthday ad that hung at Gangnam Station Exit 4.

“Hyung?”

“Ah, yeah. I’ll decide after I listen to the ones you recommended. Thanks.”

“No problem. Good luck.”

Even if, for now, the only things shining were a pitch-black kitchen and the dim laptop glow.

I felt the urge to ask # Nоvеlight # him, “Why are you this kind to a passing klutz?”

But I held back, worried his future height might suffer if I didn’t get him back to sleep now.

An idol’s growth period is precious. We have to protect it.