Chapter 180
I used Insight to look at the sandbag. Since they told us to knock over the sandbag, I was going to use my ability to see how I could knock it over. By using Insight, I instantly saw which area would be the most effective place to hit it, the hardness of the sandbag, and how I should extend my fist. After organizing this information in my head, I deactivated my Insight.
“Tae-Yoon?”
“Are you really planning to knock that over?”
“Standing sandbags are really hard to knock over.”
“But you’ve never learned boxing, right?”
When I stepped forward with a serious expression, the members tried to stop me, telling me to not overdo it. However, I didn’t reply and just looked at the producer. I could roughly predict why he didn’t think favorably of us, but I thought this was a bit childish. As a warning to the producer, I couldn’t easily let this sandbag mission slide.
“I’ll just give it a try.” I put the glove next to the sandbag in my hand and stretched out my fist, just like how I saw in the simulation I saw in my mind through Insight. Rather than just blindly throwing a strong punch, I needed to punch while thinking about how much impact I wanted to make at the hitting point. I lightly rotated my shoulders and extended my fist forward.
‘Here.’ And if I just added strength by rotating my waist before touching the sandbag—
Bam!
A nice and strong sound of impact rang out in the air.
“...What?”
“Tae-Yoon...?”
The area I hit right now was slightly below the middle of the sandbag; if it was a human, I would have hit around their pelvis area. My goal right now was to knock over the sandbag.
Whether it was a person, object, or standing sandbag, I needed to shake the center of gravity for something to fall. And to shake the center of gravity, I needed to shake up the lower body rather than the upper body. I didn’t miss the moment the sandbag shook and hit the same area one more time.
Bam!
This sandbag wouldn’t fall if I moved around and hit it all over the place. Rather, I needed to concentrate my hits on one place.
Once again, I extended my fist.
Bam!
Another one.
Bam!
Then I ended it with a kick.
Bammm!
If I kept giving the same impact to the same point with precise movement—
“Whaaaat?”
“No way!”
Thump.
The standing sandbag was bound to fall flat as if it was dying of exhaustion.
“I knocked over the standing sandbag,” I said as I took off my glove.
“Did you learn boxing, Tae-Yoon?”
“No.”
“But how did you hit it so well?”
“I guess I’m talented.”
“How can you reply so nonchalantly?”
“Was there really a need for you to be an idol...?”
The members were completely shocked that I knocked over the sandbag. In particular, Do-Seung looked at me with sparkling eyes, and as a fitness enthusiast, he seemed to have a newfound appreciation for me.
“Tae-Yoon, do you want to work out with me?”
“No, I told you. I don’t like the smell of iron.”
“With your talent, I think you’ll quickly get the hang of weight training.” Folloow current novÊls on nov/3lb((in).(co/m)
While we were chatting eagerly like that, the production team became quiet as mice. I checked the producer’s face. At first, he looked mischievously at us like he wanted us to suffer, but now he looked baffled. I felt proud to beat him at his own game, but soon, a smile appeared on the producer’s face and his eyes curved upwards.
‘...?’
Then he picked up the mike and started saying his lines.
—Siren. End of power test. The final rating will be revealed after all the tests are completed.
—Start of Reaction speed test.
That damn producer didn’t even blink an eye when he was imitating the voice of a robot. At that point, I realized that this producer was by no means a normal person; there was madness flowing through his eyes. Soon—
Bang!
“Ahhhhhh!”
“What is that?”
In the end, we had to repeatedly play the ‘don’t laugh challenge,’ which we had thought would be easy, until our stomach hurt, and it was from this game did I realize that even laughing could be torturous if it went too far. However, the producer didn’t stop the tests as if he were trying to test the limits of our patience.
—Test of unity. Build a human pyramid.
—Test of trust. Jump down.
—Test of humor. Make the producer laugh.
The games went through like a typhoon and were finally over.
—Thank you for your hard work. Siren’s rating evaluation has been completed.
Our rating metrics were now revealed.
—The final grade for all Siren members is S-rank. Congratulations.
Perhaps thanks to our hard work, we all received S-rank.
“...Haha.”
“Thank you...” However, everyone was too tired to express their joy. We sat down on the studio floor and accepted the ranking tag handed to us by the staff.
—We never had a group that filmed the ending scene while sitting down like that. Please get up.
They were forcing us to get up after working us to our very bones.
“Ack...”
“We’ll get up...”
The members and I tried to get up from our seats, but we couldn’t get up because our legs kept giving in. It was then the producer said something that immediately got us back to our senses.
—Do you not want to start the final mission?
The final mission was the most important mission in the Idol Encyclopedia program, and it was also the reason why we came out on this show.
“We’ll start...!”
“Ha...!”
The members and I firmed our resolve and got up.
—Then, we will now start our final mission.
There was nothing much to say about the final mission of Idol Encyclopedia.
—Live broadcast, start.
The mission was to turn on a surprise live on Idol Encyclopedia’s Utube channel. After turning on a surprise live, we quickly had to show our title song performance and end the broadcast, and this was a popular content among fans. There were even groups that doubled their fame with this content. Since we couldn’t miss this big event, we got up immediately. However, we must have been still out of it due to the hectic, consecutive missions as we went on air without checking our conditions.
Our clothes had stretched out and were on the verge of becoming rags, our hair was in a complete mess, and our stamina was rock bottom. Furthermore, this demon producer dragged a monitor in front of the studio so that we had to dance in front of a collection of humorous videos.
—Siren’s final mission will be done while watching a collection of humorous videos.
“Huhp!”
“Hahhhhack!”
“Argh! Please! Producer!”
“Ahhhhh!’
The live broadcast began and our title song, “Blue Summer Night” began playing.
—A new story between us
—The story that you and I’ll be writing
—SO GOOD I can feel it
I did my part exactly and pretended to be as calm as I could even in extreme conditions.
—A once-in-a-lifetime moment
—A drama that you’ll never see again
—Now, the two of us...hahahaha!
“Aghh!”
“Park Dong-Jun!”
As expected...our group suffered one casualty in front of the humorous videos.
***
While Siren performed their title song with messed-up appearances in Idol Encyclopedia, the lights were still on at Next Wave’s office building. It was not from a night shift ordered by the company, but a volunteer meeting from some A&R employees.
They set up late-night snacks such as chicken and pizza and waited for news. From their predictions, Siren was supposed to be able to achieve half a million today. On one side of the tablet, the A&R employees had Siren’s live broadcast on, and on the other side, they opened an administrator page where they could view the album sales.
“...Huh?”
“What...?”
Then someone jumped out of their seat while pointing at the screen.
