22. 1st Team Composition
The blind vote counting is complete. All the participants gathered to hear the results.
"The participants will be ranked based on the results of the blind vote. The ranks will be readjusted based on the rankings and we will proceed with the 1st round mission song stage. After the midterm evaluation here, we will return to Seoul and film the rest at PLu Broadcasting Station."
Without delay, the results of the song vote were revealed first.
[1st place: Gal Neoul]
[2nd place: Baek Yuri]
[3rd place: Yeo Dobin]
[4th place: Ha Onha]
[5th place: Gye Taeseok]
The participants rolled their eyes to find their names and soon responded with exclamations or sighs.
The results of the dance vote were also revealed.
[1st place: Woocheong]
[2nd place: Ha Onha]
[3rd place: Baek Yuri]
[4th place: Kim Ji-rok]
[5th place: Baek Gi-yeom]
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[78th place: Gal Neoul]
Neoul was delighted to see the three letters of his name that he had become familiar with on the screen while looking at the fake resident registration card. It was the only letter he could read.
'It's at the very beginning and almost at the end!'
The PD explained that the overall ranking was determined by adding up the votes received from the song vote and dance vote.
[Overall ranking]
[Tie 1st place: Ha On-ha, Baek Yuri]
[3rd place: Yeo Do-bin]
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"Wow! It's a tie for 1st place!"
"Awesome!"
"Wow!"
"Wow! Is that possible?"
As everyone was shouting and reacting from all directions, Neoul asked a quiet, young human nearby who was in 1st place.
The person sitting next to him was Lee Gal-chae, a child actor who had practiced the signal song in the same business class but had never talked to him because he was so quiet.
He had been following him around since he entered the auditorium, keeping an eye on him, and at some point he was sitting next to him.
"Ha On-ha hyung and Baek Yu-ri hyung."
His voice was particularly nice and his pronunciation was clear. He thanked him for telling and looking for his name.
[29th place: Gal Neoul]
He was able to find the only three letters he knew a little above the middle. He looked through the list of numbers and names he had to push through to debut.
Even though he couldn't read it, he could feel the weight. The weight of the twenty-eight names weighed heavily on his shoulders.
'Can I do it?'
Will I be able to beat them, push them out, and climb higher?
Unlike people who are used to standing in line in any field, everything was new, awkward, complicated, and difficult for him. So, it was inevitable that he doubted whether he could do it. But....
'I have to try.'
He had come this far, so he absolutely could not return to the Dragon Palace empty-handed.
No matter what happened, he has to 'do it', so he braced himself.
***
The ranks changed due to the rankings. The number of people in each rank remained the same.
The production team gave out badges instead of stickers that were worn out from being removed and reattached every time they washed their clothes.
Neoul, who maintained business class, received a blue second-class badge.
When he turned his head, he saw Baek Yuri and Ha On-ha wearing purple first-class badges on their practice uniforms.
Woo Cheong also successfully upgraded from business class to first class as he had hoped.
On the other hand, Baek Gi-yeom was demoted to business class. Baek Gi-yeom's biggest weapon was rap, but he received a slightly disappointing evaluation for his singing in the signal song blind vote.
'I should wear purple too.'
That way, he can debut successfully and get Sir Rabbit's liver to take to Abamama.
Neoul resolutely fiddled with the badge. However, he didn't know how to attach it to his clothes.
'If I don't know, I should ask right away.'
Neoul was not the type to be ashamed of ignorance. He knew that questions always brought the easiest answers. He immediately asked the young human, Lee Galchae, who was sitting next to him, for help.
But Lee Galchae asked in a truly curious voice as he put on the badge.
"Hyung. Don't you know me...?"
"...?"
"No, I just.... I guess you don't know because you don't find it interesting like other people.... The other participants here all know me. Even if they didn't know before, most of them look up articles about who's on the same program...."
"I know the name."
Neoul remembered the name of Lee Galchae that he had heard during the ratings evaluation. Neoul added, smiling satisfied at the neatly hung badge.
"And I don't know many people."
"Don't you watch TV or YouTube much...?"
Neoul nodded. Smartphones, tablet PCs, YouTube, etc., all of them were new to him in the past few days.
The smartphone that the sea priestess had put in his luggage hadn't been returned since the production crew took it away last time. They said smartphone use was prohibited during filming.
Instead, they provided tablet PCs for each person to use in order to practice the signal song.
One time, Baek Gi-yeom used it to go on YouTube and found Baek Yu-ri's old debut stage video to show him.
— ʟᴏᴏᴋ ᴀᴛ ᴛʜɪꜱ, ᴡʜᴇɴ ᴡᴇ ᴡᴇʀᴇ ɴɪɴᴇᴛᴇᴇɴ. ᴡʜᴇɴ ᴄʟᴇᴀʀ ᴅᴇʙᴜᴛᴇᴅ.
—ᴡʜʏ ᴀʀᴇ ᴛʜᴇʀᴇ ʙʟᴀᴄᴋ ꜱᴘᴏᴛꜱ ᴏɴ ᴛʜᴇɪʀ ᴇʏᴇꜱ?
Baek Gi-yeom laughed out loud at Neoul's words and said that it was because of stage makeup. Baek Yu-ri ran over quickly like a rabbit, snatched the tablet PC from Baek Gi-yeom, and turned off the video.
—ɪᴛ'ꜱ ᴀ ꜱʜᴀᴍᴇꜰᴜʟ ʜɪꜱᴛᴏʀʏ. ᴅᴏɴ'ᴛ ᴡᴀᴛᴄʜ ɪᴛ.
Then he became listless and withered away, and started practicing hard again.
"I see... You don't know much about it..."
Anyway, Lee Galchae didn't say anything anymore. He just sat up straight and looked at the floor quietly.
However, his expression was more relaxed than before. It seemed like he was strangely happy as he was tapping his feet.
Lee Galchae's class had been downgraded from business to economy. Maybe because of that, he had been biting his lip and looking depressed until a while ago, but he seemed to have calmed down quickly.
After all the contestants had put on their badges.
The PD played a video and announced the team selection method for the first round. A man with a neat and tidy appearance appeared on the screen.
[Hello. I'm Jeong Ondo, who is the 'guide' for the trip to find the best idol. Nice to meet you.]
"Oh! Oh! Actor Jeong Ondo! Senior Clear!"
Woo Cheong shouted happily and looked at Baek Yuri. The leader of Clear, the group Baek Yuri was a member of, was none other than actor Jeong Ondo.
Baek Yuri's eyes widened. Soon, a slightly touched and happy expression appeared on his face.
[From now on, the twelve First Class participants will each become leaders and choose a member of their own team to perform on the first team competition stage.]
Jeong Ondo's face disappeared, and 138 cards with question marks drawn on them appeared on a huge screen that filled the entire wall.
[On the back of the question mark card on the screen, two pictures of each of the sixty-nine participants, excluding the twelve leaders, are mixed together.]
Also known as the card flip game.
It is a game where you can take a card by flipping over a card with the same picture. The key is to remember the location of the picture each time you flip over the card.
The rule of the game here is that if you match the same face picture, you can take the main character of that picture as a team member.
[The leaders can flip over four cards each time their turn comes around. If they succeed in getting a team member by flipping over the same card, they get a chance to flip over two more cards as a bonus. The game does not end until all the cards are gone.]
It meant that if a leader with a good memory sweeps out team members every time they turn, a leader who is not good at the game may not get a single team member.
If there are many team members, the attention for each individual decreases and the number of parts decreases. Instead, it can give a flashy and overwhelming feeling with group dance.
On the other hand, if there are too few team members, the stage may feel empty, but it can show each individual's charm more clearly.
Since the strengths and weaknesses are clear, it was important to adjust the number of people appropriately, not too many or too few. You have to use your head smartly.
[The twelve first class participants, please come forward.]
Baek Yuri, Ha On-ha, Yeo Do-bin, Woo Cheong, and the others came forward and stood side by side.
The order of the game was determined by the highest ranking, and Baek Yuri and Ha On-ha, who tied for first place, decided the order by playing rock-paper-scissors.
Baek Yuri, who won rock-paper-scissors, stood in front of the screen nervously. Although he had played the card-flipping game a few times before, it was the first time he will play with this many cards.
Since it was a touchscreen, he could pick the cards with his hand and the cards would flip over automatically.
Since it was the first round, he couldn't tell where the faces of the participants were.
Baek Yuri flipped over four cards horizontally from the front without hesitation.
"...!"
All the faces were different, and among them was Gal Neoul.
Baek Yuri didn't want to perform on stage with the mermaid prince who would return to the sea as soon as the rabbit liver he ordered arrived.
In addition, for Baek Yuri, who was aiming for the main vocal, the person he has to avoid the most was Gal Neoul because their positions overlapped.
'I should never touch that one.'
In the next turn, Ha On-ha turned over four cards other than the four that Baek Yuri had turned over. This time, they were all different cards from the previous ones.
'Isn't the first order actually more disadvantageous?'
Ha On-ha stepped back, tilting his head.
However, since there were so many cards, the game really got fun after the 12 players had their turn.
A game where luck and memory played in equal measure.
In addition, since this was a game where you have to choose teammates to go on stage with, you have to be clever enough to filter out the ones you wanted to keep and select good teammates.
When it was Baek Yuri's turn again, he carefully chose one and pretended to let the rest slip away as if it was a mistake. He has nothing to be sorry about, but it was a bonus that he made a face that seemed genuinely sorry.
If you were caught intentionally slipping, it wouldn't look good.
Ha On Ha was also good at thinking.
On the other hand, Yeo Do-bin, in third place, was overly absorbed in the game. He played the game so earnestly that he ended up sweeping away four cards that Baek Yuri and Ha On Ha had discarded.
Yeo Do-bin smiled brightly, happy that he had swept away four cards in a row. His face looked a little different when he smiled, despite his sharp features like a gangster.
After picking a few more teammates in the previous round, it was 11th place Woo Cheong's turn.
"Hey! Raccoon hyung-nim!"
Woo Cheong found the remaining cards of Neoul. Remembering the location of the cards that Baek Yuri had flipped over at first, Woo Cheong excitedly flipped over the cards.
"Yes! I got Mebo!"
Woo Cheong jumped around in a joyful celebration.
"Aah! I was going to pick!"
"No!"
Several other leaders who were aiming for Neoul sighed and shouted or fell to their knees.
Neoul looked at the sighing humans with bewildered eyes. Then, Woo Cheong ran over and raised both hands, so he clapped his hands together.
The humans loved high fives so much that now even Neoul reflexively did the movement.
The camera captured Woo Cheong's ceremony and Neoul's bewildered face. It also filmed the reactions of the participants who were disappointed that they didn't get Neoul in close-ups.
Then, Woo Cheong, who got a chance to draw two more cards, eagerly turned over two cards that no one had drawn.
"Wow! Wow?! Jackpot!"
Both cards were Baek Giyeom's cards.
"Aahh! Giyeom hyung-nim! I got a rapper!"
Woo Cheong, who had drawn two of the hyungs he had become close with while being roommates, finally broke into a break dance. It was even better because their positions didn't overlap.
Baek Yuri, who was aiming for Baek Gi-yeom, bit his tongue slightly in embarrassment when his plan was disrupted. He has to quickly revise the picture he had drawn in advance.
The camera director, who noticed Baek Yuri with an embarrassed expression and was lost in thought, film him with his eyes wide open as if he had found a tasty prey.
The person who was picking and the person who hadn't been picked yet became increasingly anxious, and the
The leader who had lost all the participants he wanted, and the participants who had not been picked by the leader they wanted and ended up on an unwanted team had dark expressions on their faces.
Some people hurriedly tried to control their expressions and shouted, "Our team is good! It's okay!" and some laughed awkwardly.
However, some people couldn't hide the corners of their lips that were lowered in discontent.
The more they did, the more the production crew's eyes watching them twisted like those of mischievous children with hidden agendas.
***
The teams were all decided.
Baek Yuri and Ha On-ha each took four team members without a hitch.
Woo Cheong got four team members, including Gal Neoul and Baek Gi-yeom, and Yeo Do-bin took fourteen on his own.
The rest took about six or seven people.
The production crew asked Neoul if he would use the 'Team Member Change Ticket' he had obtained at the folk village.
Neoul shook his head. There was no one among the current team members who smelled bad in their souls.
The 'Team Member Change Ticket' could only be used once, so he has to use it carefully. He decided to save this because he thought it would definitely be needed next time.
[Then I will reveal the first twelve songs of the competition.]
[Even if I reach the end of destruction, I will miss you - RUMA]
[Surf - ARTRUE]
[Jealous - DUNKISS]
[I'll Pick You Up - SAIM]
[Over - B.A.D]
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12 songs were released all at once.
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