Before idols are idols, are they singers or dancers?
Of course…
Singer…
Yeah, idols were singers.
Even if the sophisticated dance skills of idols have been praised since the 2000s, the essence of an idol has always been singing.
“…It’s singers, right? Idols are singers.”
“Yeah, idols are singers. But Ye-rin, think about the time you invest in vocals and dance.”
For sure… I had been focusing more on dance than on my relatively weaker vocals.
But I had my own excuse.
“But unnie…! I’m not the main vocalist. You and Hye-jeong are here, so is there a reason for me to be great at vocals too?”
I was an idol belonging to a group, not a solo artist.
Rookies had a total of six members, and each member’s roles were divided based on what they do best.
For example, Na Han-na and I are for dance, while Yoo Seol and Lee Hye-jeong are for vocals.
I felt like Rookies were doing pretty well, so I questioned whether I really needed to step into Yoo Seol and Lee Hye-jeong’s territory.
But Yoo Seol seemed to think otherwise.
“Of course, each of us has our roles. Still, Ye-rin, your vocal ability is a bit lacking. Honestly, your outstanding dance skills make the lack of vocal ability stand out more.”
“…Is it that noticeable?”
“Yeah, Ye-rin. In Na Ah Ah, performance was the most important, but now the most important thing is the music stream. Sure, these days, equipment is advanced enough to make tracks sound good with a bit of tweaking, but… eventually, there will be limitations.”
“Ah….”
“Earlier on stage too, Ye-rin. I noticed your pitch wavering because you were so focused on the dance. No matter how much you use AR for singing… someone will definitely notice.”
Yoo Seol’s expression didn’t seem just like scolding me; it genuinely looked worried.
Concerned that I might get hurt, Yoo Seol gently patted the back of my head and continued.
“Of course, you’re doing well right now. But I’m telling you this because there’s room for more growth.”
“Unnie….”
“Let’s go back now. We need to quickly remove our makeup and head home.”
“…Okay.”
So I took Yoo Seol’s hand and we went back to the waiting room.
But….
‘Before idols are idols, are they singers or dancers?’
Yoo Seol’s words were stuck in my mind and wouldn’t easily leave me.
A few days after the showcase.
“Oh, [Breaking Bad!] will be released soon!”
“I’m so nervous even though it’s not my first time…”
Today is the day of the release for [Breaking Bad!].
“Wow! Our song is out!”
“Then let’s wait until we chart in the Top 1 at 1 o’clock!”
So, despite being tired, we stayed awake, waiting for [Breaking Bad!] to make it onto the Top 100 chart.
And at 1 o’clock.
“3, 2, 1…. It’s 1 o’clock!”
“Refresh! We need to check if we made it on the chart.”
Following Hye-jeong’s words, I held the phone and dragged my finger to check the chart.
“Did it show up?”
“Oooh…! Our name is there! We made it onto the chart!”
“Wow-!”
The Top 100 chart counts views collected over 24 hours, making it very difficult to chart in just one hour.
Yet, [Breaking Bad!] secured a spot on the Top 100 within an hour.
But….
“Uh? But….”
“The ranking is…”
[99th Breaking Bad! – Rookies] New!
[Breaking Bad!] ranked at 99th on the chart.
When [Secret Girl] first charted, it landed at 73rd…
Compared to that, this was a bit low.
As the mood dampened, Yoo Seol stepped in to comfort the members.
“It’s okay.”
“……”
“Honestly, charting within an hour is amazing. Most popular first-tier groups from the big three agencies take around 2-3 hours to chart.”
Yoo Seol’s words were indeed true.
Since the Top 100 chart was revamped on the music streaming site, making it onto the chart within an hour had become nearly impossible.
Only a handful of top-tier groups could do so in that timeframe…
Still, our Rookies managed to succeed in making the chart, proving our popularity.
“And in the last chart, other popular groups were on breaks, so it’s expected that our ranking would be lower this time since the competition is fierce…”
Yoo Seol’s reasoning was very logical and persuasive.
However, some members still wore gloomy expressions.
Among them was…
“…I think it’s because of me.”
Park Yoo-jung.
“It’s just gotten noisy because of me… affecting our music activities.”
“Park Yoo-jung.”
As Yoo-jung lowered her head in self-blame, Yoo Seol approached her, looking a bit upset.
“What kind of foolish talk is that? How could you affect our music activities? If anything, people are probably curious because of you, and they’ll listen to our song once more!”
“…….”
“And it’s only been an hour since the release. And you’re saying you’ve affected our activities? In the end, everything will be alright.”
Yoo Seol gently patted Yoo-jung and used her actual leader voice to calmly speak to the other members.
“Now that everyone has confirmed our song made it onto the chart, let’s go to bed. We’ve got a lot of schedule tomorrow.”
“Yes!”
In fact, we had only 5 hours left to sleep, so we followed her words and headed to our respective rooms.
“Unnie, I’m going.”
“Yeah, Yoo-jin.”
It was the same for me and Seo Yoo-jin.
But….
‘99th….’
I wasn’t feeling too great inside.
In fact, as soon as I saw the chart ranking, my heart did a little thump-thump.
Unlike last time with [Secret Girl], I was one of the main features this time with [Breaking Bad!].
I worried that this time might feel lacking compared to before.
Of course, the activities for [Breaking Bad!] had just begun, and nobody knew how things would turn out…
But those thoughts were unavoidable.
‘…I’m feeling a bit off.’
It seemed I wouldn’t be able to fall asleep easily tonight.
“Yoo-jin, are you sleeping alone in your bed today?”
“Yeah? Why…?”
“I’m going to look at my phone for a bit before sleep.”
“Geez…, Unnie, we need to go early tomorrow, so can you get to bed after just a little?”
“Sure.”
With that, I sent Seo Yoo-jin to the opposite bed and laid down with my phone.
Then, I started listening to the previous song [Secret Girl] and this new song [Breaking Bad!] back-to-back to compare carefully.
At first glance… both songs were good except for the different concepts.
After all, written by none other than Han Si-woo, it couldn’t be bad.
So instead of comparing the overall feel, I listened for the differences between the parts of other members like Yoo Seol and Lee Hye-jeong and my own part.
-B-B-Breaking bad!
-Stop pretending to be nice
-I’m not the idiot you think I am
Yoo Seol and Lee Hye-jeong’s vocal abilities shone in this song as well.
Their sensual tones and charming voices perfectly matched even to the fast beats of the song.
On the other hand, my part.
-B-B-Breaking bad!
-Think for yourselves
-I don’t care what you say
My voice flowed through after being fine-tuned by Han Si-woo.
At first glance, it looked like there wasn’t much difference compared to Yoo Seol and Lee Hye-jeong’s parts…
‘…But it definitely feels different.’
Something was off.
I couldn’t precisely describe what it was, but my part clearly felt inferior compared to theirs.
This could be considered somewhat natural.
My vocal ability stat was 65, while Yoo Seol and Lee Hye-jeong’s stats were over 90.
‘Something’s unsatisfactory… Should I have invested some of my dance stats into vocals?’
The stats in the status window seemed to quantify the limits of my talent, and no matter how hard I tried, they didn’t change much.
I had a regrettably low vocal ability stat of 65.
And….
(Rest stat: 3)
Looking at the remaining stats that I didn’t spend all during my time in Na Ah Ah made me lick my lips.
‘Should I invest these into my vocal ability?’
I thought about boosting my vocal stat to 3 but quickly shook my head.
After all, the recordings were already done… and investing just 3 wouldn’t bring about a dramatic change.
‘Then what’s left…’
Skills.
Indeed, my current skills highlighted my performance aspects, so if a new skill opened up in the vocal area, it would surely address my lacking vocal ability.
Of course, I didn’t know the opening conditions for the skills.
But every time I desperately wished for it, the appropriate skill would eventually open, so I could vaguely infer.
‘Please let me have a new skill this time too…!’
So, I fervently prayed for a new skill to manifest again but….
“……”
The status window was utterly silent.
“Haah…”
Well, skills don’t just pop up easily.
I quickly resigned and shut my eyes.
We had a fully packed schedule tomorrow, and it was already quite late.
I intended to sleep quickly.
But then, a thought struck my mind.
‘…But am I trying to depend too much on the status window?’
That sudden thought made me open my eyes again.
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