Chapter 822: Winning or Losing Doesn’t Matter (10)

"Let’s sort out this one more time."

"Yes, Team Manager."

"So Wooju has gotten a lot weirder, right?"

At Yoon Seokhwan’s words, 4Black nodded.

But it was still slightly hard to understand.

Even if you dissolve more salt into saltwater, it’s still saltwater. Add one spoonful of weirdness to Sun Wooju and he was still Sun Wooju.

But.

"Wooju hyung. He’s really weird."

When even Kim Junhyun, the one officially in charge of weirdness in NewBlack, said that, it was hard to brush off.

"Right."

Yoon Seokhwan placed his interlaced hands on the table.

"Let’s at least hear what happened."

"Yes."

The older members nodded and turned their gazes to the youngest.

The maknae cleared his throat.

"Ahem."

Soon, the maknae who had once won a storytelling competition began.

That morning.

The day after returning to Korea, the members each dragged themselves up at dawn.

‘Practice... have to practice....’

While they had been enjoying their schedules in America, their competitors were probably pulling all-nighters dancing and singing.

No matter how tired they were, thinking about competitors jolted them awake.

"Ugh... I’m dying."

"We have to eat breakfast quickly and fix the jet lag."

"Food......."

While reheating the food Biju had prepared the night before in the microwave, the members noticed something strange.

"Where’s Wooju hyung?"

"Didn’t he stay up all night and just fall asleep?"

Someone suggested that maybe he had stayed up as usual and passed out, but the members soon tilted their heads.

‘He can’t pull all-nighters like before anymore, though?’

Because if he stayed up all night, the younger members wouldn’t talk to him as a penalty, their leader had stopped staying up.

So by now he should have come out stretching.

"Maybe...."

Ri Hyuk, who handled worrying duties, swallowed.

"What if something happened while he was sleeping? At this rate of overwork, something should’ve broken a long time ago."

"......."

"......."

Putting down their spoons, the underlings rushed up to the second floor.

The leader’s room in the corner.

They arrived at the room piled high with instruments and sheet music and saw—

"Huh?"

Their leader lying there like a princess, wearing a sleep mask.

North, south, east, west.

Four humidifiers were spraying mist, and his skin looked even more dewy than usual.

ASMR meant to help sleep was playing somewhere.

"......."

"......."

Even his sleeping posture had both hands neatly folded.

If a sleep specialist saw it, they would probably shout, “Yes! This is it! Modern people!”

"Wooju hyung?"

"Good morning, guys."

At the gentle voice, goosebumps rose.

Soon Wooju stretched and sat up.

With the sunlight streaming through the window, he looked like the protagonist of a movie or drama waking up.

And when he removed the sleep mask—

‘Oh my. Look at that moisturized skin.’

‘He looks healthy.’

He was radiating health from head to toe.

It felt like tears might well up, but for some reason Biju couldn’t cry.

He didn’t know why, but...

‘Something’s weird.’

Sun Wooju looked unfamiliar somehow.

It wasn’t just that he looked overly healthy... something was different.

"Hm?"

Junhyun asked.

"Hyung, are you wearing pajamas?"

"Yeah."

Wooju smiled as he stretched.

The leader who °• N 𝑜 v 𝑒 l i g h t •° usually rolled around in a T-shirt and sweatpants was neatly dressed in pajamas and had slept in perfect posture.

"It’s the pajamas you guys bought me before. You hated the floral pattern, so I’m wearing this one."

"Ah......."

Then he picked up the remote and played the audio.

Mozart’s “Twinkle Twinkle Little Star” variations began to flow, and Sun Wooju started smiling like a painting.

Completely different from the old Sun Wooju who used to curl up on the bed groaning.

"This might be sudden, but I’ve decided to live healthily from now on."

"......."

"After going to the Grammys, I started thinking that this is going to be a long-term battle. To do that, I need to live healthily. We have to look at the long run. We can’t get exhausted already."

"R-right......."

It was all correct, so they couldn’t argue.

Those were the things they always said.

—Wooju hyung, think about your health first.

—What’s the point of winning an award after collapsing?

—You’re young now, so it’s just gastritis. Soon it could be something worse.

Ever since he had collapsed from gastritis in America, they had always insisted on that.

And yet their leader had half-listened while burning himself out on work.

After the fishing variety show, he would say like someone enlightened, “I should live healthily,” but during work hours he overworked to the point of grinding his body down.

So they should have welcomed it.

But...

‘Something’s weird.’

It felt off, like a screw was missing somewhere.

Jiho stepped forward.

"Who are you. Give me back my Sun Wooju... ah!"

The maknae, hit on the back, yelped in delight, and the other members brightened.

Their leader scolding the maknae as usual.

‘He’s the same as always!’

He might be talking about health all of a sudden, but he was still the same Sun Wooju.

No doubt about it.

But at breakfast, they felt the strangeness again.

"Salad?"

"Why are you suddenly eating salad, hyung?"

The eldest, who used to pick only the meat when meat and vegetables were together, began eating salad.

And while classical music played, Wooju gazed lovingly at the vegetables.

"I’m playing music for the vegetables. Vegetables. Become healthy."

"......!"

Ri Hyuk, furious at the pseudoscience, was about to speak, but Biju raised a hand to stop him.

"You’re... eating the salad?"

"Yeah. I need to be healthy. I should take in plenty of fiber to help with composing."

Wooju smiled healthily.

"......."

"......."

They were unfamiliar scenes, but things they could brush off.

If their eldest wanted to live healthily, shouldn’t they be happy as younger members?

But after finishing their lessons and arriving at the studio, they witnessed something strange again.

Dding— dling— ddiririring—

Indian music played.

On the studio floor, sitting on a mat, Sun Wooju was in lotus position.

His entire body relaxed, meditating.

Junhyun gasped in awe while Biju asked,

"What... are you doing, hyung...?"

"Ah."

Wooju smiled brightly.

"I’m meditating for healthy work."

"......."

"......."

Only then did the underlings realize the source of the unease they’d been feeling.

‘He’s... obsessed with health...!’

"......."

After hearing the whole story, Yoon Seokhwan asked flatly,

"Isn’t that just the life of a healthy person?"

"W-well, yes, but."

"Is there anything else different? Did his way of speaking change?"

"No. That’s the same."

While everyone hesitated at the question of what the problem was,

Jiho spoke.

"Hyungs, instead of this, we need to show Team Manager Wooju hyung directly. A hundred foxes can’t beat one fire fox. There’s no point watching a fire fox from afar."

‘It’s probably better to see once than hear a hundred times....’

The words “I’m more worried about your common sense than Wooju’s health” rose to Yoon Seokhwan’s throat, but he laughed.

"Alright. Let’s see."

"Yes."

4Black led him to the second-floor studio.

‘What’s the problem?’

Thinking that, Yoon Seokhwan stood in front of the glass door.

"Th-there! Look there, Team Manager!"

"Hm?"

"There’s Wooju hyung."

Through the glass, he saw Sun Wooju.

‘A scale?’

On the studio table, a scale was set up, and he was placing things on it one by one, grinning.

Like he was measuring something.

As Yoon Seokhwan tilted his head to see what was on the scale, he noticed the containers on the table.

Dozens of supplement bottles.

"......."

Watching him measure supplements with sparkling eyes, Yoon Seokhwan blinked.

"He’s definitely a bit weird."

"Right?"

"Yeah...."

Whether the shock of the Grammys was big, Sun Wooju seemed even stranger than usual.

Junhyun asked for advice.

"What do we do, Team Manager?"

"What do you mean what do we do. You can’t stop that kid’s stubbornness. Even his grandmother can’t."

The man who had watched Sun Wooju for nearly ten years smirked.

"You have to leave him alone until he realizes it himself."

Whisper whisper.

After huddling and talking for a while, the underlings announced the meeting result to me.

"Congratulations, hyung."

"Hm?"

"As of today, we’ve decided to abolish the Third Biju Agreement."

"Huuuh!"

The Third Biju Agreement, which imposed penalties if I pulled all-nighters or harmed my health multiple times.

That evil law was finally repealed.

Biju widened his eyes.

"So from now on, you can stay up all night."

"But I don’t plan on staying up all night anymore."

"......."

Expecting something, Biju looked shocked.

They started another frantic meeting among themselves while I only laughed hollowly.

Ever since I declared I would live healthily, the underlings were suddenly trying to overwork me somehow.

"When I was working hard, you told me to stop."

"That’s different."

Ri Hyuk pointed out.

"We didn’t want you obsessing over health like this. We wanted moderation. You really have no middle ground."

"I’ve heard that a lot. Haha."

"That’s not a compliment!"

"Ri Hyuk hyung, hold it in. Hold it in. That hyung is immature."

While the maknae soothed Ri Hyuk, I lowered the volume of the TV playing in the studio.

Today was Friday.

On the cable channel IBC, the Geoje episode of Honey, I’ll Go Fishing had ended and the Thailand special was about to start. I turned it on to monitor, but since it hadn’t started yet, a Friday-Saturday drama was airing.

As a drama about con artists competing to see who was the best spiraled into chaos—

"Alright."

I gathered the younger members.

"Let’s meet. Time for a meeting."

"Yes."

Today’s topic was the concept meeting for our full-length album.

"First, we already made the skeleton of the title track last time, right? When we couldn’t sleep at Kim Deoksun’s house."

"I remember."

That night when none of us could sleep.

The song I made about insomnia.

So the temporary title was ‘Insomnia.’

Jiho asked,

"Did you decide on the final title, hyung?"

"No. Not yet."

I scratched my cheek.

"Maybe because the concept isn’t decided, I can’t get a feel for the title. The image isn’t clear."

Junhyun raised his hand.

"Before starting the meeting, how about listening again?"

"Good."

Soon I played the song on my laptop.

A song about insomnia flowed out with a punk rock sound.

Like the early-2000s teen pop stars I used to hear in elementary school.

The difference was that mine included retro and other sounds fitting the 2010s.

In a global music industry where retro was trending, early-2000s punk was a good reference.

"It’s good even after hearing it again...."

"It’s really good. Honestly, even if Wooju gets criticized for his personality, no one criticizes his face or songs."

"That part is so good."

The younger members said it was great, but to me there were many things to fix.

It sounded like a masterpiece the first couple of times, but you couldn’t listen to it dozens of times in a row.

For someone aiming for songs that never get tiring, it was lacking.

Anyway.

Putting revisions aside, I liked the direction of the song itself.

Because it started from my mom.

—Hold Mom’s hand tight and sleep. My baby.

The faint voice of my mother from childhood.

Inspired by recent insomnia and her voice.

The one phrase I most wanted to tell the people I love.

—Sleep well.

I knew that when the younger members kept telling me to sleep, it came from that context.

There’s nothing happier than someone you love sleeping well.

That’s why it matched well with the direction of our album starting from METRO.

The six-part series that began with Fireworks was about meeting and parting with “you.”

Empire, Dokkaebi, and Coin were about conflict and reconciliation between “you and me.”

Starting from METRO, it was about “me.”

Even the concept and music video of METRO was about boarding a train and entering the maze named “me.”

In that sense, this song’s message was good.

Maybe the one phrase I should tell myself, whom I need to love the most, is simply sleep well.

Of course, that wasn’t the end of idea building.

Because the maknae had said something.

—But hyung, isn’t just saying sleep well too vague? It feels a bit bland.

Just going good night~ was ambiguous for a title track.

Maybe as a B-side.

For us, who always pursued upbeat and fun music for title tracks, it felt two percent lacking.

—But insomnia also comes from worries, right? In our case.

—Right.

—Later, they’re all worries that aren’t a big deal. If you think about it, there are worries that don’t matter. But because of those, we can’t sleep....

Jiho offered a good idea.

—Sometimes I feel like if those worries had a physical form, I’d want to smack them with a flyswatter.

Worries and concerns that torment us.

If they had form, we’d want to gather them and burn them.

We all agreed.

And it was a good direction.

That’s how a lively song about burning away worries was born.

"Alright."

After the song ended, I clapped.

"From now on, throw out anything. Anything that comes to mind about the concept is fine. Let’s brainstorm."

"First...."

Ri Hyuk began.

"I don’t know what the concept will be, but I think the background should be a virtual world."

"Why?"

"If we’re going to burn worries in the music video, filming something that reminds people of arson in the real world is a bit...."

"......Makes sense."

"Right?"

Ri Hyuk, in charge of meeting minutes, began typing in a basic font document.

This time Biju spoke.

"I think it would be good to adjust the message a bit more."

"How?"

"Maybe go in a more sincere direction. When you had insomnia, if someone just came and said sleep well, didn’t it feel hollow? Hearing that doesn’t make the worries disappear."

"That’s true."

"Um... it’s hard to express, but I want the message to feel more resonant."

Anyone could say stop worrying and sleep well.

I agreed.

Meanwhile, I reacted enthusiastically to their ideas.

"That’s good."

"Ri Hyuk, that was good just now. Right. What else?"

"Jiho? You look like you want to say something... Yeah, even if it’s ridiculous, just say anything."

The most important rule of brainstorming was never to criticize.

So outrageous ideas came out, but among them were gems.

Junhyun said,

"What about changing the background to a dream? In dreams, you don’t worry."

"You don’t worry in dreams?"

"Yes."

"That’s interesting."

We smiled at Junhyun’s warm smile.

"We worry even in dreams. I’ve been chased by pigs trying to kidnap me to Pyongyang."

"I’ve dreamed about being chased by Souffle."

"When I get indigestion, I dream a lot. Chickens across the country chase me and my dad with sticks...."

At our stories of fleeing in dreams, Junhyun looked fascinated.

I laughed.

"I really worry in dreams too. The most pointless worries...."

Being chased by a carp or stranded on a deserted island.

Once I even dreamed of meeting my old drill sergeant as a trainee dance trainer.

When you think about it later, they’re absurd dreams, but while dreaming you don’t realize it.

Junhyun, thinking, said,

"So the background isn’t the problem. What matters is who’s standing there."

"Huh?"

"Those dreams you mentioned. Worrying in dreams is characteristic of the person dreaming them. So what matters isn’t where we are, but who we are."

"......."

He’d been reading philosophy books while fishing before too.

We were all impressed by our philosophical rapper.

Junhyun continued,

"Considering what Kim Biju said earlier, what about changing the message in that direction?"

"How?"

"Instead of vaguely saying sleep well... what kind of person do we want to become? What kind of person would we tell ourselves to be when we can’t sleep?"

After he finished, silence fell.

If I were to say something to my past self full of worries...

"Become a healthy person?"

"......."

"It’s not wrong......."

At the underlings glaring at me, I closed my mouth and thought again.

Then I spoke.

"There is something."

"What is it?"

"I want to be free from these worries. Not bound by others’ gazes, becoming freer as myself...."

They agreed.

Worries and burdens hanging like chains, wanting to shake off others’ eyes and be free.

If we could become that kind of person, maybe we wouldn’t worry.

As I was saying that—

"Huh?"

The maknae jumped up.

"Hyungs, hyungs!"

"Yeah?"

"I got it. I think I perfectly understand what our concept should be."

"Really?"

His face flushed red.

Then he scribbled on an A4 sheet.

"Earlier, Ri Hyuk hyung said it would be good if the background were a virtual world."

"Right."

"And Junhyun hyung said what matters is not where we are but who we are. And you just said we should be free from society’s constraints."

"Yeah."

"And since it’s a virtual world, I thought of a concept where we act freely however we want."

He showed the drawing.

A monster tormenting people.

"What about cartoon villains? Like villains from American comic books."

"Oh."

"Cartoon villains don’t worry. Well, it depends on the villain, but there are ones who live however they want."

Kitsch and trendy, good for visuals.

Everyone’s eyes widened.

"That’s good."

"Right?"

"Yeah. It’s really good."

Then we looked at the drawing.

"But what’s this monster?"

"Oh. This?"

A monster wearing a flower headband, eating supplements while tormenting people with a piano.

The maknae said matter-of-factly,

"It’s you, hyung."

"......."

"Aaaah!"

The members burst into laughter.