04. Flag (1)
"This is the practice room that the trainees use."
The next day, I was handed over to the staff member in charge and given directions to various places in Lime Entertainment.
From the lobby on the first floor, where people come and go, to the cafe attached to the lobby, and the training center and underground practice room that the trainees use. Since the other areas are not yet open to trainees, this is the end of the introduction.
"There are also restricted areas, so don't get lost."
"Yes, sir."
Lime Entertainment is built a bit complicated, but it's been ten years, no, the new building was built four years ago... They are worried that I would get lost in the building I've been commuting to and from work.
I nodded without showing my true feelings. The staff member in charge sighed and knocked on the door of the practice room in Class A.
"I won't be confiscating your cell phone, but you know that you should refrain from using it as much as possible, right?"
"Yes, sir."
"Here, take your employee ID, and I'll be leaving now."
"Thank you. Please go safely."
As soon as the staff member left the room, the tense expression on my face relaxed. My facial muscles found smooth stability.
'It is hard to even pretend to be a polite trainee.'
I entered the practice room of Class A and looked around. The practice room was bigger than I thought, but the area in front of the mirror was already full of trainees who had arrived earlier.
As I was watching them, a man approached me. Judging by his age, he seemed to be a trainer who was teaching trainees.
"Your name is Yoo Young?"
"Yes, sir. Yoo Young is my name."
"That's quite an interesting name. Come on, guys, gather around. There's a new trainee here."
The trainees started to gather at the trainer's call. Maybe because it was still morning, there were more middle and high school dropouts or guys in their early 20s than young kids.
"More kids will come later after 12 o'clock. What did you say your position is?"
"Oh, that it was dance..."
"Really?"
I looked around while introducing myself. The kids gathered in a semicircle with me and the trainer in the middle. Their sharp gazes were fixed on me.
'Hmm....... Are they being cautious?'
What can I say? I feel like I'm stuck in a group of hedgehogs with their fur standing up.
"The lesson will start soon, so those who need to go to the bathroom, hurry up and go now."
The trainer glanced at his watch and waved lightly. I said hello to the trainer and left the practice room. Instead of the awkward atmosphere, I felt a warm heat.
'It's already hot.'
It was still early June, but it was hot.
Since I was out, I checked the location of the water purifier because I wanted to quench my thirst. The water purifier was at the other end of the hallway. It was a long walk.
'When they built the new building, I suggested that they build it in a practical way.'
I muttered a complaint to myself as I recalled the past. The Lime Entertainment building was spacious and had many welfare facilities, but it was also complicated. People who came for the first time would get lost once.
It's not like I can do anything as it was the CEO's taste, but.......
".....?"
As I walked through the long hallway and approached the water purifier, I felt a presence in the corner.
Was it a trainee who came to drink water? I turned my head in a cool mood. Then, my eyes met with a man crouching down in an unsightly manner.
"....."
"....."
Up until here, it was fine. He didn't seem like a threat.
The problem was...... The guy was holding a cup of ramen.
'Isn't bringing food prohibited here......?'
There are a few things that agencies usually strictly control, and one of them is high-calorie food.
In particular, Lime Entertainment was quite strict about diet management. They have weights checked every day, and the company cafeteria even had a separate menu for trainees, so that goes without saying.
'What should I do about this?'
As I was rolling my eyes at the small incident I had accidentally witnessed, the man who had been holding the cup ramen got up from his position. It looked really pitiful to see him holding the cup ramen so preciously.
"Excuse me......."
He carefully opened his mouth, as if he was nervous that I might run to the new department and snitch. I stopped and waited for him to speak.
"Can you keep what you just saw a secret...? I've only been eating grass for a while."
"Ah......."
.....Yeah, when you're growing up, you can sneak a cup ramen when you're hungry. I tried to pass it off quietly, as if nothing had happened. Until another one popped out of the hallway.
"What the..."
The man frowned as soon as he saw us. To make matters worse, the cup ramen guy and I were moving around awkwardly, perhaps because we had stopped moving. So to sum it up, we were like thieves who had been caught running away.
'What are we going to do about this awkward atmosphere, really? Anyone can tell that it looks like we're two people who got caught eating ramen in secret.'
What kind of situation is this from the first day? As we continued to stand there looking at each other, I felt suffocated. I held back a sigh and opened my mouth to the cup ramen guy first.
"Well, I'll pretend not to know for now, so eat comfortably."
"Thank you!"
My head hurts when I see the guy who suddenly brightened up. The man who came out later looked back and forth between me and the cup ramen guy and sighed deeply. His expression looked a little shaky, but his reaction was not as bad as I thought.
"Are you going to use the water purifier? Should I wait?"
"Yes, well... No."
I moved a step to the side, and the man approached the water purifier. The cup ramen guy seemed to not be able to hear our conversation because he was busy eating the ramen. The man who was gradually approaching stood tall in front of the water purifier.
"Hey."
Cup Ramen was startled by the man's words and shivered. I quietly took two steps further away from the tense standoff.
Be that as it may, the man spoke firmly.
"It smells like ramen, so if you're going to eat, why don't you eat at the emergency exit next to the break room? There are a lot of people here."
"Slurp....... Yes, I understand."
"And over there."
I stopped moving as the man's next target. His face was pretty and cute, but his aura was sharp.
"It's my first time seeing you, but you must be a trainee. You just joined the company?"
"Oh, yes. My name is Yoo Young, who just joined the company today."
"What class?"
"Class A."
"We're in the same class."
The same class? I tilted my head at the man's answer. I don't think that man was among the people who were announcing their names in the practice room. The man must have noticed my curiosity and continued his brief explanation.
"Lee A-ram, I'm twenty. I just got to work."
"Ah....... I'm eighteen. Feel free to talk comfortably."
"By the way, and he's in class B, so there's nothing to worry about."
"Aha.."
Lee A-ram turned around as soon as the water bottle he was holding was filled. I left the cup ramen guy and followed him.
Even though he could feel my gaze, he never looked back. His whole body was sending signals telling me not to touch, so I couldn't continue the conversation.
'Oh, but I ended up not drinking water.'
It was too much of a hassle to go back. I opened the practice room door and went inside. As we entered the air-conditioned practice room from the stuffy hallway, everyone's eyes turned to me and Aram.
"Oh, you two came together?"
"We ran into each other on the way back."
I gave a vague answer to the question and went to the corner of the practice room to warm up. One of the trainees' faces suddenly hardened, as if he didn't like my attitude.
'This is.... It looks like we're going to get into a fistfight soon.'
I barely managed to swallow my sigh. Everyone seemed extremely stressed. Of course, they must be feeling incredibly stressed because they're competing while working their bodies hard at a young age without any certainty about their future.
The company says that this method is efficient and they're letting it slide, but it wasn't a very pleasing sight.
'What was it like back then? When I was a trainee, we barely scraped together a handful of trainees and barely made a group without any competition.'
As I was thinking like an old man, someone opened the practice room door and came in.
"Okay, okay. What are you doing? Aren't you preparing for lessons? You're all so undisciplined, really."
The trainer, who just went somewhere, turned his shoulder and headed toward the speaker in the practice room. He counted the number of trainees next to the speaker and said,
"If everyone is here, let's start the class right away."
***
To conclude, the lessons conducted by the agency were quite informative. It felt like watching a lecture where they only picked out the important elements and taught us.
They not only taught us the basics but also corrected our postures and expressions.
'I see why they sing 'large size, large size,' now.'
I realized that the trainee training curriculum has improved a lot these days.
Of course, apart from the lessons, I can't say for sure that the quality of the trainers has improved.
"Stop."
When the trainer clapped his hands, the trainees gathered in one place. He took a deep breath and wrinkled his nose.
"Listen carefully, because the monthly evaluation schedule and team combinations for this month have come out."
Everyone in the practice room stopped moving at the mention of the monthly evaluation. Some people were holding their breath as if they were nervous. I frowned at them.
'They're announcing team members here like this?'
Monthly evaluations were usually divided into individual and group stages. Since the agency assigned the team members for the group stage, they could not be changed, whether they liked it or not. So it was important which team members they were grouped with.
Unlike the nervous trainees, the trainer continued to speak calmly.
"Please inform the staff in charge of your personal missions, and I will only talk about the team missions. First, Team 1......."
I waited silently for Yoo Young's name to be called. Since there were quite a few people, it took quite a while for them to just list the team members.
"Next....Oh, there's a new member here... Team 4, Kim Junghyun, Lee Aram, Yoo Young, and...."
I looked around while pondering over the names of my team members. The first person I met was Lee Aram. Next was the guy who had shown hostility toward me earlier.
"Ah."
Was his name Kim Junghyun? I let out a short sigh and looked for the remaining team members. The team members except me were standing there with faces that looked like they were in despair. Looking at their expressions, I felt a sense of anxiety creep up from the bottom of my feet.
"That's it. Then I'll be leaving work, so see you all tomorrow."
Only the trainer who dropped the bomb went out of the practice room happily. 'Do you like it when you leave work alone? Do you like it?' came up to the tip of my chin.
I called the team members over while glancing at the CCTV hanging from the corner of the practice room ceiling. Then I smiled as gently as I could and started talking.
"Please let's do well in this month's end-of-month evaluation. It's the first time, so I'm sure it's lacking, but I'll try my best not to be a nuisance."
Kim Jung-hyun still looked at me with displeasure, but I ignored him cleanly. If he was in his right mind, he would know how to handle things.
As I tilted my head to convey that meaning, as expected, Kim Jung-hyun, whose expression had completely changed, smiled along with me.
"Yeah. If we work hard together, it'll be okay. Let's do our best?"
"Haa......."
Lee A-ram sighed between Kim Jung-hyun and me, who were smiling at each other. Kim Jung-hyun's eyebrows twitched at the awkward atmosphere.
"You're really bad at keeping up with the mood. That's why you got kicked out of the debut group."
"What?"
Kim Jung-hyun whispered loudly to himself as if to be heard, and the corners of his mouth rose. Anyone could tell that he was picking a fight. If we let this go, it would definitely lead to a fight. As soon as he made up his mind, he interrupted Lee A-ram's answer.
"Should we check our parts first?"
"Huh? Huh, huh. Let's do that."
Fortunately, the other team members also seemed to have noticed and quickly followed suit.
'Isn't the difficulty level too high for the first month-end evaluation?'
Lee Aram stared at me and closed his mouth tightly. It seemed that my stomach was already hurting gently from the scheduled hardships.
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