Chapter 10

Chapter 10

Park Songhu’s gaze fixed on Park Songmin.

What was that just now?

The “I’ve been waiting” Park Songmin had said was the exact same line Park Songhu had repeated dozens of times.

Same words, same pronunciation.

But something was different.

It was like the air itself had been pressed down.

Like that quiet voice had filled the entire living room.

“...”

His pride refused to admit it.

No, more accurately, before he could even admit anything, he couldn’t understand it.

That guy had never learned acting.

Forget acting school, he had barely even stood in front of people.

So how could he put emotion into a single line?

“...Do it again.”

“What? Do what?”

“What you just did.”

“N-No! I was just talking to myself!”

Park Songmin waved his hands.

He really had only been talking to himself.

While writing the backstory, the character had been moving around in his head, and the words had slipped out unconsciously.

“Whatever. Do it again.”

Park Songmin flinched, then murmured the line again.

“...I’ve been waiting.”

“...”

Park Songhu silently picked up the script again.

He recalled the backstory Park Songmin had written for him.

A man who had lived in hiding for years.

A person erased from the world.

The moment he decided to reveal himself again.

“I’ve been waiting.”

No.

That wasn’t it.

“...Are you the male lead in a romance?”

Park Songmin teased him at the worst possible moment.

“You’re dead. Seriously.”

“Ah, eek!”

“Haa...”

Park Songhu leaned back against the sofa.

He stared at the ceiling and let out a breath.

“...”

Afraid the sparks might fly his way again, Park Songmin stared intently at his laptop screen.

His NovelJoA serialization page.

The comment section was visible.

Today, there were only about three comments again.

Park Songmin had no talent for plot progression.

He knew it himself.

He struggled to figure out believable ways for the protagonist to escape a crisis, and he was bad at controlling pacing to build tension in fight scenes.

But there was one thing.

Characters were different.

-This novel’s pacing is honestly frustrating, but I’m reading for the characters

-Isn’t the author a master at making characters? Every side character feels alive so I can’t drop it

-The characterization is seriously insane. Serin’s line this chapter gave me chills

-If the pacing were just a little faster, this could seriously rank high. Such a waste

Every time a comment appeared, Park Songmin’s emotions rode a roller coaster.

He’d beam at the compliments, then slump the moment he saw the word pacing.

Still, the readers who had remained all stayed for the same reason.

Characters.

Even the villains had their own logic, and every side character had distinct habits and speech patterns whenever they appeared.

The author Park Songmin was, in a way, a character fanatic.

Creating a character’s past and compressing that person’s entire life into a single line of dialogue.

For Park Songmin, who had spent his whole life shut inside his room, it was almost like borrowing someone else’s life and wearing it, the only passage through which he could experience the outside world.

That was what had happened earlier too.

When he wrote the backstory for the man in the <​Hwain> script, his fingers had moved on their own.

The face the man had never once forgotten during all those years in hiding.

That was why the line had slipped out without him realizing it.

The emotions of the man moving inside his head had simply overflowed through his mouth.

‘...Can you even call this acting?’

It was over-immersion.

Something he always did while writing novels.

Once he entered a character, that person’s emotions came rushing in as if they were his own.

The only difference was whether he wrote them down or spoke them aloud.

“Hey.”

“Y-Yes?”

Park Songhu had risen from the sofa and was looking at him.

Arms crossed.

Frowning.

“You’re going to the <​Hwain> shoot in my place on Thursday.”

“...?”

What?

Only belatedly did Park Songmin understand what this man had just said.

He was handing over his shoot.

And <​Hwain>, of all things!

The number-one Friday-Saturday drama, <​Hwain>!

“W-Wait! What do you mean...!”

“What.”

“I’m not an actor! I’m a web novel writer! I’ve never even been in front of a camera, so how am I supposed to...!”

“You did fine on the variety show.”

“That was because I had no choice! A drama is, a drama is completely different!”

Park Songmin’s hands flailed in the air.

Louis watched with interest, going, “Meow.”

“What if I cause an NG?! No, first of all, if I go there everyone’s going to think I’m you, which means I have to act in front of those people, in front of professional actors! Yoo Yeonjae will be there too! If I say lines in front of Yoo Yeonjae, that’s basically some school play...!”

Park Songhu took one threatening step toward him.

Even so, this time Park Songmin refused to back down!

“I’m not doing it! Absolutely not!”

“Really?”

“Really!”

“Then move out of this house.”

“...”

***

Thursday, six in the morning.

The black van driven by Jo Yonggi pulled out of the apartment’s underground parking garage.

“Hyung, are you feeling okay?”

Jo Yonggi glanced at him through the rearview mirror.

“...”

No answer.

He knew Songhu hyung was normally quiet, but today was especially bad.

Jo Yonggi turned the radio volume up slightly.

An early morning pop song filled the car.

After they passed the Paju interchange, the studio buildings started coming into view between the fields.

Of course, Park Songmin was staring out the window while calculating escape routes in case he got caught.

‘If I run across those fields, it’s about two kilometers to the highway. Then if I hitchhike...’

“Hyung, we’re here!”

The van door opened.

An assistant director came running out from the entrance.

“Oh, Songhu-ssi! Looking forward to working with you today!”

“...Likewise.”

He bent ninety degrees at the waist.

The assistant director froze.

Park Songhu was bowing ninety degrees?

It was completely different from the reputation he knew.

“Th-The makeup room is that way.”

“...Thank you.”

The moment he entered the set, the staff’s gazes gathered on him.

Rumors traveled fast.

It didn’t even take five minutes for word that Park Songhu had arrived to spread from one end of the trailers to the other.

A cameo appearance by the handsome genius who had fallen from grace in a personality scandal.

Of course people were going to talk.

As he walked through all those gazes, Park Songmin kept swallowing.

Every time someone looked at him, his neck stiffened and his walk became more robotic.

‘Naturally. Walk naturally...’

Jo Yonggi walked beside him and whispered.

“Hyung, the atmosphere on set is good right now. Everyone seems curious about you.”

Park Songmin only nodded.

He felt like something strange would come out if he opened his mouth.

They entered the makeup room.

The makeup artist sat him in front of the mirror, leaned in close to inspect his face, then said.

“Wow, your skin is really good.”

‘...Maybe stealing hyung’s skincare products actually worked.’

After finishing makeup and stepping into the hallway.

Someone was walking toward them from the far end.

Tall enough to stand out even among ordinary people, with a sharp jawline.

The lead actor of <​Hwain>, Yoo Yeonjae.

‘Wow... he’s handsome.’

He looked even better in person than on screen.

He was known for having crescent-shaped eyes when he smiled, an atmosphere completely opposite to the sharp detective he played in <​Hwain>.

“Huh?”

Yoo Yeonjae spotted Park Songmin and stopped.

His eyes widened, then he smiled brightly.

‘He’s a little different from what I heard.’

Unexpected.

Everyone in the industry knew Park Songhu’s reputation.

But the atmosphere around him right now was nothing like that.

‘He seems more humble. Did he really change?’

“Songhu-ssi.”

“...Yes?”

“I’m Yoo Yeonjae. I’ll be your scene partner today.”

“...”

“Looking forward to working with you.”

Yoo Yeonjae held out his hand.

A clean smile.

Friendly, but with a proper sense of distance.

They shook hands, and as Yoo Yeonjae walked away, he thought.

‘...Does he have hyperhidrosis?’

His hand had been absurdly sweaty.

Pretending to sit down, Yoo Yeonjae subtly wiped his palm on his pants.

***

The interrogation-room set was located in the deepest part of the <​Hwain> studio.

Walls made to resemble concrete, a metal table, rusted pipes.

A single fluorescent light hung crookedly from the ceiling.

Unsettling lighting deliberately created by the lighting team.

Park Songmin left the makeup room and stepped onto the set.

The face he’d seen in the mirror looked unfamiliar.

Dark fatigue on his cheeks, shadows under his eyes.

A man who had spent years on the run.

‘...What am I doing here right now.’

He sat in the metal chair.

A chill crawled from his hips up his spine.

The handcuffs were only props and weren’t actually locked, but even resting them against his wrists made them feel heavy.

The PD approached from beside the monitor.

“Songhu-ssi, it’s been a while since you filmed, so you must be nervous, right?”

He was saying that because of Park Songmin’s rigid shoulders.

Of course, there was the minor problem that this wasn’t his first shoot in a while, but his first shoot ever. Either way, he was definitely nervous.

“Just relax and take it easy.”

Once the PD stepped away, Yoo Yeonjae sat across from him.

Dressed as the detective.

His entire atmosphere had changed from when Park Songmin saw him outside the set.

His eyes had narrowed and the corners of his mouth were slightly lowered.

He already seemed fully immersed in his character.

Yoo Yeonjae looked at Park Songmin across the table.

A light nod.

Even that looked like something the detective would do, and Park Songmin admired him inwardly.

‘...He’s already fully prepared.’

Meanwhile, Park Songmin’s leg was shaking.

Only after becoming aware of it did he stop immediately.

His heart felt like it was about to burst.

‘Focus.’

Park Songmin closed his eyes.

Ever since the night his brother declared, “It’s Thursday,” Park Songmin had done the one thing he was best at.

He created a character.

The name was in the script.

Kang Yunho.

Twenty-eight years old.

Other than that, the script told him almost nothing.

So Park Songmin filled in everything else himself.

He opened a blank document and created the life of the man from the <​Hwain> script from the very beginning.

Past. Family relationships. Hobbies. Favorite food. What kind of clothes he wore in winter. The first thing he did after waking up in the morning.

Kang Yunho was a rookie reporter.

While working investigative journalism at a regional newspaper, he stumbled onto corruption involving a massive organization.

He wrote his first article at twenty-three, and that winter, he was “declared dead.”

A death staged to look like an accident.

His family, his colleagues, everyone believed he was dead.

He watched his mother sobbing at his funeral through CCTV.

He wanted to run to her, but the moment he stepped outside, he really would die.

So he spent five years in hiding.

Moving between tiny study rooms and public saunas around the country, gathering evidence in a single notebook.

Then he took all the evidence and walked into a police station himself.

That’s right.

Entering the interrogation room was his own choice.

Last night, Park Songmin had filled two entire A4 pages with this setting.

He had even decided what kind of convenience-store food Kang Yunho often ate while on the run.

Then, to immerse himself, he deliberately went to a convenience store and bought a tuna-mayo triangle kimbap.

“...”

Truthfully, half of that was an excuse.

He just hadn’t eaten one in a while and wanted it.

Nothing beat a triangle kimbap for value.

‘Focus again.’

You could call it unnecessary detail.

You could ask why two lines of dialogue needed all that.

But Park Songmin knew.

A character’s depth came from the parts no one could see.

Kang Yunho’s five years.

A dark, cramped study-room ceiling.

Names densely packed into a notebook.

The CCTV footage of his mother’s funeral.

Convenience-store tuna-mayo triangle kimbap.

Sleepless nights tossing around at a public sauna before dawn.

One by one, they sank deep into his mind.

The deeper they sank, the more the outline of Park Songmin faded.

His trembling leg stopped.

His damp palms dried.

His pounding heart settled.

His head slowly lowered.

The hands resting on the table clenched into fists.

The head of the makeup team watched Park Songmin from beside the monitor and nudged the assistant director with an elbow.

“...Look at his expression.”

The assistant director glanced at the monitor.

The camera was holding a close-up of Park Songmin’s face.

The corners of his mouth had fallen, with a faint crease between his brows.

“...What’s with that atmosphere?”

The assistant director muttered unconsciously.

The makeup chief nodded.

“They haven’t even started filming yet.”

The PD sat down and looked around the set.

The staff were all in position.

Two cameras.

The boom mic hanging overhead.

“All right, here we go.”

The PD brought the microphone to his mouth.

The set went silent.

“Ready—”

Park Songmin opened his eyes.

There was no timidness in them, no panic, no sense of betrayal toward Louis, no worry about the electricity bill.

Nothing remained.

Only Kang Yunho, who had waited five years.

“Action!”

The Genius Actor Is Hiding Twins