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Translator: penny
Chapter: 1
Chapter Title: Wise Unemployed Life
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#1.
Dawn.
The hour when everyone was asleep.
The company's employees had all gone home, and as usual, I was the only one left in the studio, working alone. I set down my hands that had been resting on the keyboard.
"...Nothing's coming to me."
I couldn't write any songs.
It wasn't whining or exaggeration. No matter how hard I racked my brain, no melodies surfaced. In the past, dozens would pop into my head every single day. Now, not a single one did.
It was like every staff line in my mind had been wiped clean.
My head felt utterly empty.
I gritted my teeth at the reality I didn't want to accept and placed my hands back on the keyboard. But no matter how much I tried, nothing came.
Was this the end of the line?
In truth, it had been quite a while since I'd last written a song. I'd just been refusing to admit it, thrashing about pathetically on my own.
But now, I had to face it.
I'd reached my limit.
Everything had become utterly exhausting.
"Hyun, this won't sell if you keep doing it like this."
The section chief who demanded revisions every time I made a song, claiming it wouldn't sell.
"Isn't it a bit lacking?"
The band members who only ever pointed out the flaws.
"...Dawn again."
The dim sky I greeted every day in the company studio.
"Shut up."
The noise from upstairs in the apartment building I occasionally crashed at.
I was sick of it all.
Age 10.
Fourth grade in elementary school.
Ever since becoming a trainee at a major entertainment company, I'd been scrambling desperately to survive. At first, it was all to debut. While going to school, for the weekly evaluations and monthly assessments, I gave it my all every day.
To survive among trainees brimming with incredible talent. To beat them. Fortunately, I had talent of my own.
But I was unlucky.
I grabbed several debut opportunities, but projects kept falling through, pushing back my debut endlessly. My trainee period dragged on.
Ten years like that.
A trainee life far longer than anyone else's.
At the end of it, I finally seized my last chance.
The debut group.
The perfect shot at debuting.
But I didn't debut.
I got kicked out of the company.
Still, I didn't give up. I couldn't. While scouting other companies, I scraped by with part-time jobs to make ends meet and prepared for a comeback.
Then I got drafted. Rather than delaying it, I volunteered for enlistment to get it over with quickly.
Was I lucky?
Or unlucky?
A spot opened up, letting me enlist fast. But during service, an accident happened, forcing a medical discharge.
Discharged unexpectedly, I went back to part-time work and picked up music again. Luck struck—I signed with a company. It wasn't the solo debut I'd dreamed of, but...
I debuted as the vocalist for a band.
At the time, I thought that was it. I'd reached the finish line. Achieved the dream I'd longed for.
I was wrong.
Yeah, wrong.
I didn't know debut wasn't the end, but the beginning.
The music industry was a battlefield.
All the talents I'd seen as a trainee.
A warzone packed with even greater ones.
I'd never thought my talent was lacking.
I still didn't.
Every time I heard songs by others, or the hits topping the charts, I was convinced I could do better.
But being a singer wasn't just about talent and skill.
Five years passed like that.
I wrote songs daily, practiced vocals daily, hunted down materials to fix my weaknesses. But I never got a stage.
To cover living expenses, I squeezed in every odd job imaginable, countless part-times.
Every day was a war.
The company, band members, other singers, the public consuming my music.
And me, unable to forgive myself.
The war with them.
I was sick of it all.
"Yeah, time to go."
So I decided to leave.
Before I broke completely.
The studio that had become like a second home—no, where I'd spent more time than home since debuting. The cramped two-pyeong space filled with my traces.
Seoul, where I'd lived alone since age 10.
I'd leave them all and head to the house by the sea where I'd lived with Grandmother as a child. Someday, I might return. Or not. Either way, for now, I'd rest up in my hometown, treating music as a hobby.
People telling me not to go, holding me back.
People saying yeah, go.
Leaving their varied reactions behind, I departed Seoul for the seaside where Grandmother lived.
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