//TN: I was told that some other TLs of this novel have been taken down. I will keep translating here regardless and if it ever comes to the point that I have to remove the chapters, I'll try to notify it here in advance. If there are no new chapters for weeks and no announcement then you can check my Twitter. The username is little_miru or you can find the link from my profile. If I have to stop uploading here then I will make a discord server for the TLs. Let's just hope for the best since I don't exactly profit from this other than receiving joy from the readers :'D.

PS. I don't mind you sharing this TL with other people like through DMs or such but pls don't share it openly on social media.

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TeStar's album this time, obviously received a lot of expectations from fans, but at the same, some fans were concerned. It was because of the notice of each member having a solo song.

Of course, the music scores of the solo songs did not indicate each member's popularity. It was because they were released as one album anyway and revealed under the group's name so in the end, the chart ranking was divided by the popular appeal of the song.

However, due to the characteristic of being a survival show group, it was unavoidable that the 'digital song score by each TeStar member' would be expected.

While slight concerns as such were growing within the high expectations, TeStar's teaser video was announced.

It was an advance notice of the teaser video using WeTube's premiere function. This meant that the video would be released the day after.

A thumbnail appeared without much hint other than an arrow stuck in a tree in a dark forest.

It didn't spark much interest, so people were apathetic.

However, when people checked the video information, the situation changed completely.

Because the video was eight minutes and twelve seconds long.

K-pop music video teasers were usually short, under one minute. Eight minutes was unusually long.

Of course, there was no harm in it being long. After all, teasers were now more for the sake of fulfilling the fans' expectations rather than promotional purposes.

Still, some fans, who cared about the numbers, felt regretful.

Because it was just a teaser, fewer people would watch the video unless they were already fans, but since it was eight minutes long, the number of views would obviously decrease.

As their appearance on the American program got thriving attention, the influx of international K-pop fandoms was to be expected, so there was a desire to quickly make sure that there was an indisputable indicator pointing at the top.

Of course, since they shouldn't do anything to spoil the mood before the comeback, the fans pushed the atmosphere up with positive words at all costs in open communities and social media.

The fans waited impatiently for the release of the teaser, hoping that the anticipation would not cool down as soon as the teaser would be released.

And on the day of release.

People waiting for the premiere were pleasantly shocked in the live chat of the teaser video.

As fans had speculated, the teaser had a very authentic historical drama style.

However, the roles the members played were not human.

The video began with a huge palace and entering it as if being sucked in. The scene turned around the corner, opened one of the paper doors, and entered it.

It was a library full of books.

Among them, the scene was followed by an old, worn-out book lying open on the floor.

Inside the book, there was a rough ink painting of an arm sticking out from the sea.

At that moment, the video changed to a scene of a real beach.

Flutter.

The scene quickly moved to the sea and reflected a human figure lying on a huge rock under the water.

The figure was Seon Ahyun with blonde hair and wearing a loose white robe.

Sunlight penetrated the blue waters and shone on the pale face on the rocks. It was a beautiful but peculiar scenery.

At the bottom, white subtitles appeared in an antique-looking font.

It was the name of the song that was on the released tracklist.

And along with the sound of the gayageum harp's strings, Seon Ahyun's solo song came out.

At that moment, Seon Ahyun rose and began to slowly dance in the water.

It was not a choreography set in the song, but just beautiful movements.

His hair and the robe drew flowing lines in the water.

People were amazed. And they thought.

'Seon Ahyun's solo song is the intro!'

However, as soon as the beautiful underwater performance was over, the camera made eye contact with Seon Ahyun within the bubbles and rose from the sea again.

Then the scene approached a mother-of-pearl shell with drawn strange circular patterns.

When the evening sun was setting, a figure, who had been curled up in the pattern, stretched out and stood up.

It was Cha Yujin who covered his mouth with one hand.

On his cheeks, collarbones, and back of his hands, old Hangeul letters in strange handwriting shone like the patterns in the five-colored mother-of-pearl shell.

Tididing, tingting, tiding!

A new song with an intense beat started with the sound of the kkwaenggari gong instrument.

It was Cha Yujin's solo song.

The live chat window was flooded with a chaotic mix of responses to Cha Yujin's performance and strong speculations about the current situation.

And their speculations were correct.

All the members' solo songs were subsequently introduced in this way.

Following Cha Yujin, a blindfolded Bae Sejin sang a ballad melody while sitting on top of an old tree. There was a gentle chime of a pyeonjong bell instrument.

Then the view of the video entered a cave in the forest and illuminated Kim Raebin who used lantern lights that shone like neon.

Kim Raebin's solo song was a future bass song with the saenghwang wind instrument as the main sound.

After that, the camera came out of the cave and headed toward an old, thatched house in the forest.

As the mismatched fabrics with peculiar colors were wrapped around the decayed paper door of the thatched house...

Park Moondae was sitting on the veranda.

And the already familiar sogeum bamboo flute sound of the song 'The Eve of Flowers' started playing.

Finally, the video returned to the luxurious palace, contrasting with the thatched house.

In the center of it, Lee Sejin performed a stunt-like dance to the beat of the drums while wearing huge tail-like waist ornaments.

It was an upbeat song that was easy to listen to.

Naturally, the fans were happy.

However, after Lee Sejin's dance, the screen turned off as he turned around and disappeared into the palace with a smile.

Not a single member reappeared, and the fans, who were perplexed by the fact that the title song might not even be shown, sighed in relief when the screen turned back on.

However, the screen again reflected Seon Ahyun in the sea. Along with the sound of the gayageum harp used in his solo song.

It was not an error.

Seon Ahyun on the screen stared at the camera for a while and then disappeared, and then it changed into a scene of Cha Yujin on the sandy beach staring at the camera.

Next was Bae Sejin.

However, even when the person changed, the sound of the traditional musical instruments in the background did not disappear and continued to increase.

The members incorporated the traditional Korean musical instruments of their solo songs into the beat of a melody one by one.

As the Korean traditional instruments entered the harmony one by one, a new beat melody began to be created.

Finally, as the screen reflected on Lee Sejin, the sound of drums could be heard, and the song began to take shape.

The moment the sound of modern instruments filled in...

The song suddenly stopped.

And on the screen that returned... a hand appeared.

A big, firm hand picked up a book that had fallen to the floor. It was the book with a strange ink painting that first appeared.

The back of the book was captured by the camera.

//TN: Yogwi means the same as the Japanese yokai. They are supernatural entities and spirits that are not exactly like demons but can be evil, kind, or playful toward humans.

"Do you want to leave?"

The camera climbed up the hand and captured the owner of the arm.

It was Ryu Chungwoo who was wearing a cheollik dress.

//TN: Cheollik is a type of hanbok typically worn by government military officers and warriors.

Regardless of what was shouted in the chat window, Ryu Chungwoo in the video brushed off the dust from the book with a complicated expression.

And with clear eyes, he answered someone off the screen.

"I should."

Turning around and capturing Ryu Chungwoo's back as he left the library, the melody burst out.

Then, after walking out of the walls, Ryu Chungwoo took out a bow hung behind his back and aimed an arrow at the forest.

It was a traditional archery bow lacquered in black.

The arrow flew and pierced the huge bamboo.

The video ended with an arrow stuck in a tree.

It was the thumbnail.

The solo songs of the members were connected to form the title song. And through the video, the story of the music video was implied.

In a sense, the meaning of the teaser was faithfully carried out.

And the composition clearly showed that they had thought of the systematic completion of the album.

This was shown more clearly in the information added to the 'see more' section of the teaser video. It included the list of copyright holders for the writing, composing, and arranging of all the songs on the album.

Although the order was backward, the names of various members were visible for each song. It was the same even if the song wasn't the member's solo song.

And the expression of the idea could be definitely felt in the teaser video from the fact that they showed all these things in connection.

With people thinking, 'the album songs are the work of the whole group'.

This meant that even if people divided each member in the future based on the number of views of the fan cams, the songs in the album showed a logical defense against the comparison of each member's performance in advance.

The fans of TeStar group, who liked all the members, and the fans of individual members, who were not too aggressive, were mostly satisfied.

However, Ryu Chungwoo's fans reacted strangely.

It was because even though Ryu Chungwoo seemed to be the center of the title song after seeing the end of the teaser, he did not introduce a solo song.

There was a subtle clash between the 'you're over-reacting before they've even opened the door for the comeback' and 'his song didn't appear in the teaser so of course, it feels bad'.

Fortunately, before there could be screenshots posted on social media with 'Controversial topic in TeStar's fandom', a post was uploaded on TeStar's social media.

It was a post with a nuance that said, 'You don't have to worry about Ryu Chungwoo's amount of parts'.

* * *

"Would this be enough?"

"Yes."

"Hmm, I sound kind of arrogant, though."

"You don't, so don't worry."

"Haha, okay. ...Thanks."

"...Don't mention it."

Ryu Chungwoo smiled and turned off his phone.

He didn't seem to dwell much on the responses. It was because when time passed and the content was released, it would subside anyway.

Still, I thought it would be good to give some reassurance at this time, so I recommended it to him.

'This is enough.'

After confirming that Ryu Chungwoo's fans' opinions had agreed to 'wait and see', I brought back the articles I was reading earlier.

'This is going to take longer.'

It was an article about the group that included Gold 1.

In short, the articles were saying that this group's comeback coincided with TeStar's promotional period.

Naturally, there was an arrangement that came to mind as soon as I saw this.

'Like during our debut.'

It was like TeStar's debut which coincided with the immovable top-tier VTIC.

It was precisely this arrangement that reminded me of the simultaneous promotions.

'Tsk.'

I clicked my tongue. I felt it for sure now.

These guys' agency was doing a good job.

//TN: Wheww... learned a lot about Korean traditional instruments while translating and researching for this chapter