The fact that there was no objective indicator for achieving the KPI was the same as a workplace with five or more employees not guaranteeing paid leave on statutory holidays.

In other words, it was nonsense.

In that sense, getting all worked up because my proficiency alone had gone up by 1 was just as meaningless. There was nothing to compare it to.

If my goal was to debut together with SPARK, I needed to figure out roughly what level those guys were at.

And on top of that, it was showing an invisible factor as a clear, numerical value called proficiency?

You’d have to be an idiot not to exploit that opportunity.

‘Since it’s a trial ticket, I guess it’ll only let me view one person.’

I had already decided whose résumé I’d look at, if I could only see one résumé out of the five.

A vocalist with no glaring weak points, who served as the all-rounder of SPARK, even including self-management.

 [SYSTEM] Would you like to view ‘Jeong Seongbin’s’ résumé?

▶ Yes / No

 That was Jeong Seongbin.

Right away, a résumé appeared in front of me, using the exact same format as mine.

Before reading the contents, I checked to see if there was a viewing time limit or some kind of timer, but I didn’t see anything like that.

Looked like my assumption that the restriction lay in how many people you could view had been correct.

 [SPARK’s Eternal Leader] Jeong Seongbin

Jeong Seongbin (18)

Career History

― Overall 4th place in February end-of-month evaluation

― 5th-year trainee under UA

Performance Evaluation (100)

― Vocal Proficiency: 12/20

― Dance Proficiency: 8/20

― Self PR: 7/20

― Attendance Management: 13/20

― Organizational Adaptability: 11/20

 The résumé I’d finally gotten to see after busting my ass was a shock, pure and simple.

It was only natural, but still—I’d barely scraped together a two-digit total in vocal and dance proficiency by using underhanded tricks, and Seongbin’s numbers were different from mine starting from the very first digit.

The only thing that puzzled me a little was that, even though Seongbin danced way better than I did, his dance proficiency was only three points higher than mine.

In that case, the answer had to be one of two things.

‘Either the density of proficiency built through actual effort is higher than proficiency earned with tricks like mine, or there’s a big wall between 6 and 8.’

If it was the latter, then it was about time I started managing my vocal proficiency too.

Another thing that stood out was his Organizational Adaptability.

Jeong Seongbin’s adaptability was almost as high as his singing.

Considering that even if he’d debuted somewhere else he would’ve been main vocal, it was safe to assume that adaptability score was also at a pretty high level.

So you needed that much adaptability to be the leader of SPARK.

I gave Jeong Seongbin a round of respectful applause in my heart. With my adaptability stuck at 10, that was a realm I couldn’t even dream of reaching.

‘For the time being, I should put my welfare points into vocals.’

If a gap of about 5 points in proficiency didn’t cause any major problems, then considering my original goal of aiming for sub-vocal, it seemed about time to shift my focus to singing.

Somehow, I felt like a pitiful office worker who only obsessed over their HR evaluations for the sake of promotion.

The chance to practice singing in a new way came along sooner than I expected.

The manager came in with a guide recording job for an established UA artist.

“Seongbin is going to actually take the guide, but the CEO said he wants you all to get some recording experience, so you should all take turns giving it a try.”

It was very much what you’d expect from a company that actually had a recording studio in-house.

At companies where you have to reserve an external studio by the hour, this wasn’t the kind of opportunity you came across easily.

Right on cue, a new task popped up.

 [SYSTEM] ‘New Task’ has been assigned.

▷ Experience recording

▷ Reward: Experience (5)

 ‘Five...’

About that experience—right after I confirmed that my vocal proficiency had reached 6, an adjustment came in.

 [SYSTEM] Obtainable experience has been adjusted.

▷ Previous: Base experience reward 10

▷ After change: Base experience reward 5

▷ Special Note: Once a score in the Performance Evaluation reaches 7 points, manual distribution of points will be restricted.

 Now it didn’t even bother to give a reason before making adjustments. Filthy system.

On top of that, it looked like once you hit 7 points, you couldn’t arbitrarily raise your proficiency anymore.

I didn’t have a choice, so I had to do as it said for now, but someday I’d really like to be able to give that system a star rating too.

You think you’re the only one who can give out scores? I can give them too. I’m a registered Job Planet user, you know.

Anyway, if I wanted to grab even that tiny, miserable 5 experience, right now I needed to focus on the guide recording.

‘It’s nice, no pressure.’

The job itself didn’t demand high completion, and my own completion standard for the task was “experience,” so there was almost no burden.

Instead, I did want to get something out of it. I didn’t want to waste my time just for a bit of experience, especially when we’d gone all the way to the studio.

On behalf of Jeong Seongbin, who needed to concentrate on his main job, I turned to Park Juu, who looked about as relaxed as I was.

“Has Seongbin been doing guide recordings for a long time?”

“Probably... As far as I know, around two years.”

“That’s talent. Serious talent.”

At that, Lee Cheonghyeon cut in from the side.

“I think for Junhu sunbaenim’s songs, it’s always been Seongbin hyung doing the guide.”

“I see.”

Jang Junhu was a singer I knew too. A ballad singer who had shot up into the ranks of celebrities when his debut song became a big hit.

‘If you only look at range and tone, they do feel kind of similar.’

The song we’d been given in advance to practice this time was also a straight-up ballad.

Personally, it wasn’t as striking as the guy’s debut song. Judging from the fact that I didn’t remember it well, maybe it hadn’t done that well.

Whether the goal was to make it easy listening or not, the song itself wasn’t difficult.

Whether it was thanks to that or to his own ability, I couldn’t say, but Jeong Seongbin’s guide went off without a hitch.

The rest of the members each went in and sang their turn just fine.

Even though people like Choi Jeho and Kang Giyeon weren’t primarily focused on vocals, years of training under UA showed; they displayed decent singing ability.

I also wrapped up the first recording of my life, squeezing every last drop out of my vocal proficiency 6.

“Iwol, this was your first time recording, but you don’t seem that nervous?”

“Your pitch isn’t drifting at all either. For a beginner, you did well! You can come out now!”

Apparently UA’s trademark shower of praise for beginners carried over to the recording studio as well.

Getting praised wasn’t a bad thing, but it wasn’t something I could afford to get complacent about.

Objectively, I had to treat the compliments right now as more encouragement and support than genuinely good evaluations.

There was only one thing to do at times like this.

Practice.

As soon as the guide experience was over, I headed straight back down to the vocal practice room in the basement and opened my lyrics book with a grim determination.

Today’s goal was to sing the assignment song from vocal class perfectly without any pitch breaks.

I took a deep breath and was about to dive headfirst into a world of self-reflection when I heard voices outside.

In this vocal practice room, no sound leaked out from inside, but a bit of outside noise seeped in.

‘Still, if I can hear it from inside, that means they’re talking pretty loudly out there.’

In society, there are times when the polite thing to do is pretend you didn’t hear something, even if you did.

I was just about to put my earphones in, being considerate, when I heard, “That’s not what I meant!”

It was Kang Giyeon’s voice.

‘Unless you’re actually yelling, shouldn’t it be hard for it to sound that clear?’

I was already feeling unsettled, and now this. A sigh slipped out of me on its own.

I stopped the playlist I’d been looping and stood up.

Outside the soundproof booth, Kang Giyeon—who tended to look like he was mad even when he was standing still—and a clearly displeased-looking Choi Jeho were facing off.

A tense atmosphere hung between the two of them.

Next to Kang Giyeon stood Lee Cheonghyeon, and between Kang Giyeon and Choi Jeho stood Jeong Seongbin.

By pure chance, I ended up meeting the eyes of Jeong Seongbin, who looked extremely embarrassed.

‘Seongbin, me going back inside helps, right?’

At my telepathic question, Jeong Seongbin’s face took on an expression like a dandelion seed wet with rain.

‘Please, just butt in......’

That was a bit of a problem. I’m in the “kids grow up by fighting with intelligence and logic” camp, you see.

Apparently, they still had enough presence of mind to hear the door opening, because Kang Giyeon looked over at me.

It seemed like the time had come to dust off the clueless-idiot act I’d honed at Hanpyeong Industries, which I hadn’t needed in a while.

“You two fighting?”

“...No.”

Forcing down anger that looked ready to explode any second, Kang Giyeon answered.

Looked like he’d raised his voice in the heat of the moment.

I was just thinking that ◈ Nоvеlіgһт ◈ (Continue reading) I should teach him the trick of writing “patience” three times next time when Choi Jeho cut in.

“Weren’t you trying to pick a fight? You obviously have a problem with me.”

At Choi Jeho’s attitude, which didn’t include even the slightest hint of backing down, the furrow between Kang Giyeon’s brows twitched again.

Before I taught “patience” to Kang Giyeon, it seemed more urgent to give this punk some education in “Speak nicely.”

Thanks to Choi Jeho, who was busy pouring oil on the fire, the mood was racing toward disaster.

“Hyung, can’t you do something about the way you talk...”

“Whoa there, Ganggyeon. Let’s stop right there!”

At the sight of Kang Giyeon looking like he was grinding his teeth, Lee Cheonghyeon tried his best to stop him in a bright voice.

But Kang Giyeon made no effort to hide that he still had plenty left to say. Taking advantage of the opening that Jeho had given him, he’d apparently caught fire on this side too.

I had no choice but to set aside my earlier thought of casually watching and then separating the two of them.

“Okay, Giyeon, I get that you’re pissed, but calm down a bit.”

“......”

“That way you won’t forget the real reason you ended up fighting. If you latch onto something unrelated, nothing’s going to work out.”

“...Excuse me?”

All four of them turned to look at me at once.

Why? When it comes to resolving a conflict, identifying the main issue is basic, isn’t it?

“Hyung, you are trying to stop the fight... right?”

With his face clearly written all over with panic, Lee Cheonghyeon asked.

I shrugged and answered.

“I don’t have any intention of stopping it.”

“What?”

“They’re not doing this for no reason. Look how old they are. If there’s something that doesn’t mesh, they can fight about it.”

Among them, the one whose face had gone the palest, Jeong Seongbin, opened and closed his mouth like he wanted to say something.

“It’s not like they’re going to start throwing punches, right? They’re kids who want to be idols. They’re not going to do something that pathetic.”

At my words, both Choi Jeho and Kang Giyeon made faces like they couldn’t believe what they were hearing.

Sorry, but from over here, I’m the one who feels deeply regretful about having to get involved in a fight between kids ten years younger than me at my age.