Chapter 62 - Because I'm Not Going to Eat You

“I'm Tangie Tae-yeong from Jeju Island! I definitely want to become an idol at Haram Entertainment! Please take good care of me!”

The brown-haired applicant who had appeared at the new girl group interview bowed her head deeply.

With an overall radiant image, her curvy body was a characteristic feature.

Seeing as she was wearing a T-shirt with a large picture of a tangerine on it, it seemed she was putting forward a 'Jeju Island' concept as her unique characteristic.

“Um…”

Baek Hyeon-woo checked the resume with Choi Tae-hyung.

Her real name was Park Tae-yeong, her age eighteen.

Her hometown was written as Seogwipo City, Jeju Island, and that after passing an entertainment agency's audition, she had lived as a trainee for one year while attending school in Seoul.

“So you were at Duldul Star Entertainment until now.”

“Yes, I was working hard with the goal of debuting, but the company said they weren't doing the girl group business anymore, so...”

It was Tae-yeong whose expression had clouded over slightly, but she immediately raised her hand high and spoke energetically.

“Still, I really want to be an idol, so I came to apply to Haram Entertainment!”

“Ah, you don't have to raise your voice that loudly.”

“Yessir!”

Aigo, my ears hurt.

Being motivated is good, but her voice was too loud.

“Um, let's see...”

Choi Tae-hyung carefully threw out a question.

“If you're from Jeju Island... can you show us some Jeju dialect?”

“Ah, I can't do the dialect. My mom and dad also both lived in Seoul before coming to Jeju Island.”

To make a Jeju Island concept her sales point when she can't even speak the dialect!

Both Baek Hyeon-woo and Choi Tae-hyung couldn't help but chuckle.

“Even if I can't speak the dialect, my love for Jeju Island is stronger than anyone's!”

“Yes, yes, I understand. Then could you sing one song you're confident in?”

“Yessir!”

Putting the Jeju Island appeal aside, she was a kid with a good vibe.

First of all, her face is pretty and her body is good. She possessed visuals that could sufficiently pull off both an innocent concept and a sexy concept.

However, her singing and dancing were just at an average level. Just slightly better than an ordinary person?

“Assistant Manager Baek, what do you think?”

Choi Tae-hyung, who had been watching Tae-yeong's performance, asked Baek Hyeon-woo.

“Do you feel any potential?”

“Well...”

Baek Hyeon-woo checked Tae-yeong's status window again.

————

[Tae-yeong]

Vocal: C

Dance: C

Visual: A+

Potential: S

Body Condition: 80%

Mental Condition: 95%

– Mental Condition is very good.

– A plus correction is being applied to Visual.

————

Her Vocal and Dance are still lacking, but her Potential was an S.

If she is trained properly, her skills will grow by leaps and bounds.

And he also liked her Mental Condition, which was being maintained at 95%.

It seemed her usual positive and lively personality was maintaining her Mental Condition at a high level.

“She has a good feel. I'm also curious what kind of chemistry she'll show with Eun-joo.”

Tae-yeong, like the brightly shining sun.

Eun-joo, like the mysterious moon.

He looked forward to seeing what kind of image the two, who possessed contrasting charms, would show when they debuted together.

“As expected, right?”

Hearing Baek Hyeon-woo's words, Choi Tae-hyung made a relieved expression.

Before he knew it, Choi Tae-hyung had come to have great trust in Baek Hyeon-woo's intuition.

“Good, Tae-yeong-ssi.”

Choi Tae-hyung said with a smile.

“You've passed. We would like you to become a member of the girl group that our Haram Entertainment will be launching.”

“Really?!”

Tae-yeong, who had received the notice of acceptance, clenched both fists and cheered.

With this, the second member of the new girl group was chosen.

Thanks to carefully selecting them while looking at their status windows, he had chosen only S-rank Potentials, so if they prepare well and debut them, they should be able to get good results.

“Thank you! I'll work hard!”

“So, your voice, a little softer…”

Aigo, my ears.

……

‘Well now... I keep receiving help from Baek Hyeon-woo.’

Choi Tae-hyung thought of Baek Hyeon-woo while checking Tae-yeong's contract documents.

‘Still, it's a fact that that guy's intuition is outstanding...’

He had watched, thinking he would make a big mistake someday, but far from making a mistake, he succeeded in everything he did.

In the eyes of Choi Tae-hyung, an industry veteran, he had smoothly handled even truly absurd things.

‘To think he even scouted N.A.N's Ha-ryeong.’

He has to keep it a secret for a while to avoid friction with UBX, but honestly, it was a tremendous achievement he wanted to boast about all over town.

He still couldn't believe that a road manager who hadn't even been with the company for a few months had achieved such results.

‘Is making him a team leader the right thing to do after all?’

Originally, a team-leader-level manager is not something just anyone can do.

A road manager just has to run around as told and handle the schedule, but a team-leader-level manager has to create the schedule for their dedicated celebrity themselves.

Music shows, variety shows, events, festivals, etc.... meeting countless industry insiders to make connections and bring in work is the job of a team-leader-level manager.

That's why to become a team leader, you have to work for several years as a road manager and accumulate experience.

It's not like there's a manual called 'How to Work as a Team-Leader-Level Manager', so you can only act as a team leader after directly experiencing the industry and accumulating know-how.

But what about Baek Hyeon-woo.

He's just going around here and there by himself and bringing in all sorts of work.

He's also frequently meeting and interacting with PDs who are difficult to build connections with, like Seo Dong-cheol or Yoo Seon-hee.

If so, wouldn't it be better to officially give him a team leader's authority?

‘And if we hire more road managers and put them under Baek Hyeon-woo, it would be possible for him to be in charge of both Newstarz and Ha-ryeong.’

Ha-ryeong is hoping for Baek Hyeon-woo to become her dedicated manager.

If Baek Hyeon-woo quits being in charge of Newstarz and becomes Ha-ryeong's manager, the Newstarz members will protest greatly, but if he's promoted to team leader and manages both sides at the same time, there's a high possibility they'll be happy instead.

Since even if he becomes team-leader-level, he will often have to accompany them to sites, Ha-ryeong will also accept it without complaint.

‘The fact that there's already Team Leader Park Yeong-ho is a problem, but Team Leader Park Yeong-ho is acting as a director these days...’

Currently, Park Yeong-ho is focusing on things like promotional strategy and new song preparations.

This is, if I had to say, closer to the role of a director.

For that reason, even if he promotes Baek Hyeon-woo to team leader, if they just clearly organize the hierarchy and divide the duties, there shouldn't be a problem.

‘I'll have to talk it over with the CEO-nim. Since we'll have to hire new road managers too.’

Thinking that, Choi Tae-hyung scratched his head.

‘It would be reassuring if Baek Hyeon-woo could be in charge of the new group I'm making too.’

Until a while ago, he would get pissed off just from seeing Baek Hyeon-woo... but before he knew it, Choi Tae-hyung was thinking of Baek Hyeon-woo as more reliable than anyone else.

……

In episode 3 of 'The Idol', N.A.N showed their underlying strength and received the highest score.

2nd place was Choux-pop, who showed a stable performance, and Newstarz, who couldn't properly perform the mission song, took 3rd place.

“We're sorry. For not being able to maintain 1st place…”

“It's okay. Times like these happen.”

Receiving Seo Na-eun's apology in the studio where the recording had finished, Baek Hyeon-woo gave a calm smile.

As he had said in front of others last time, it's an impossible thing to continuously monopolize the 1st place spot.

Going back and forth will be better for the show's success, and all that matters is taking the final win.

“Instead, you showed many good sides of yourselves. The response will be good when it airs.”

“Ah…”

In this kind of program, performing the mission and its result are not the only important things.

The various sides that the participants show are just as important as the rankings.

Today, Newstarz showed themselves taking care of the junior group Bling Baby, who were on the verge of elimination.

Kim So-yeong comforted them, saying, 'We also had many hard times in the past. You guys can do well too,' and the Bling Baby members even burst into tears.

Perhaps judging that the sight of the cool unnie-style Kim So-yeong comforting her juniors was plausible, several cameras were filming the scene.

If it's the Seo Dong-cheol Division, they'll edit it nicely and air it on the main broadcast, and it will greatly raise the viewers' favorability.

‘Viewer votes are reflected when deciding the final winner. So we have to properly manage the viewers' favorability too.’

Getting a good score is good, but if you show a side of yourself screaming and trying to win by any means necessary, it's hard to be cheered on by people.

The unpleasant dogfights can be done outside of the broadcast, and on the broadcast, you just have to show your good sides.

“Hmph…”

At that moment, the N.A.N members passed by.

Ryu-hwa, with whom he had a bad history, openly glared at Baek Hyeon-woo, and the other members had a similar attitude.

However, Ha-ryeong greeted Baek Hyeon-woo with her eyes as she passed by.

“Keep up the good work.”

After whispering in a small voice that only Baek Hyeon-woo could hear, Ha-ryeong followed behind the other members.

“Did you by any chance contact Ha-ryeong sunbae-nim separately?”

“What?”

At that moment, Seo Na-eun asked in a low voice.

“Last time, that sunbae-nim was asking me about you, Manager-nim. So I answered her... but thinking about it now, it's a bit strange.”

“……”

The fact that Ha-ryeong had decided to come to Haram Entertainment is a top-level secret.

Even if it was Seo Na-eun, he couldn't explain the circumstances.

“Sorry, that's difficult for me to say.”

“……!”

Seo Na-eun's eyes widened.

“Manager-nim, don't tell me... even though you said you don't form that kind of relationship with idols...”

“What?”

“Ah, is it because she's not someone you work with? It doesn't matter if it's someone from another agency? Then...”

She was continuously muttering something, but he couldn't hear it well.

Why on earth is she acting like that.

“Oppa, what are you doing with Na-eun unnie?”

At that moment, Laura approached, saw Seo Na-eun's face, and freaked out.

“N-Na-eun unnie? Why is your expression so serious?”

“Because a vixen was wagging her tail...”

“What? A vixen?”

As Laura was flustered at the word she rarely heard.

There was someone who approached with light footsteps and spoke.

“Sigh, we barely won once.”

It was Seong Hae-won, the leader of Choux-pop.

Seong Hae-won made an eye smile while looking at Baek Hyeon-woo.

“It seems you didn't prepare much today, Hyeon-woo-ssi? Thanks to that, we won for the first time.”

“Seong Hae-won-ssi…”

It wasn't a tone of teabagging just because Choux-pop had won.

However, Seo Na-eun shot a fearsome gaze at Hae-won.

“One more vixen...”

“Huh? What did you say?”

At that moment, a man with a large physique walked up from behind Seong Hae-won.

It was Director Seong Soo-ho, whose face he hadn't seen lately.

“Assistant Manager Baek Hyeon-woo, do you have a moment?”

“What is it?”

“Because there's something I want to talk to you about urgently regarding the program.”

Seong Soo-ho said in a deep voice.

“It seems we'll be together continuously from now on, so I wanted to coordinate a few things.”

“Then it would probably be better for you to speak with Team Leader Park.”

Right now, Team Leader Park Yeong-ho was away with the other members because he had something to discuss with the production staff.

“Because there's a part I need to discuss with you, Assistant Manager Baek.”

“……”

It seemed Seong Soo-ho wanted to create an opportunity to talk with Baek Hyeon-woo somehow.

However, since he said there was something he wanted to discuss regarding the program, he couldn't just ignore him.

“Understood.”

Baek Hyeon-woo nodded.

“Manager-nim…”

“I'm just going to talk about the program, so you guys go on ahead with Team Leader Park.”

Even though Baek Hyeon-woo said that, Seo Na-eun couldn't hide her anxious gaze.

At that moment, Seong Hae-won grabbed Baek Hyeon-woo's arm and whispered to Seo Na-eun.

“Don't worry. Because I'm not going to eat him.”

Seeing Seong Hae-won laugh with a truly fox-like gaze, Seo Na-eun's eyes shot open.