Chapter 83

Chapter 83

Chapter 83 We're All MeTube Stars (6)

“Jinseong! I need a contract!”

“A contract?”

Ah!

I'd completely forgotten.

Because Lia and Sani's channels were registered under my MeTube account, I'd simply assumed I could divide up the revenue according to whatever each channel earned. That had been the problem.

I hadn't expected the MeTube channels I'd created for experience to do this well, so I hadn't prepared a single relevant document.

My and Lia's channels had grown too large to keep handling things so haphazardly... Wait, this doesn't even apply to Sani, does it?

“You're still a long way from making money with your MeTube channel. You need more than three thousand subscribers.”

“It's not because of money! No, it is because of money, but anyway, I need a different contract right now!”

“What on earth are you talking about? What contract?”

“This is frustrating! Wooju asked me for a contract!”

“Could he mean the energy of the universe or something?”

“Not the energy of the universe!”

The Haedong Divine Maiden's deduction missed the mark spectacularly.

“This! This!”

Apparently frustrated himself, Sani stamped his feet and held his phone out to us.

@SaniTV · 4 hours ago

Are you a singer? Then come to my channel as a guest. We'll sing and dance together!

┗ @Wooju-WN3 · 3 hours ago

Thank you for inviting me as a guest on your channel. As soon as you send the contract and business registration certificate to my agency, RTM Entertainment (Space@rtmenter.co.kr), I will visit immediately.

The single comment Sani showed me only made my head hurt more.

This reckless raccoon dog had apparently gone around leaving comments on real singers' MeTube channels asking them to film videos with him.

And the reply beneath it was equally astonishing.

What possible benefit could a singer gain from appearing as a guest on a channel with fewer than a hundred subscribers?

It wasn't even a polite refusal saying they'd consider it. It said he'd come immediately as long as we sent the contract, without so much as a single phone call.

Judging by the songs uploaded to his channel, he did seem to be a singer...

He had a little over two hundred subscribers. But that was the only evidence that this person called Wooju was actually a singer.

There was no profile for him on portal sites, and I couldn't find him on the agency's website either.

“With this little information, he might really be a complete rookie or even just an aspiring singer.”

“He said he's a singer!”

“Yeah, yeah.”

A promise was a promise.

I'd tried to create a nonexistent sacrificial victim to replace National Champion Han Seun, only for Sani to bring back a real guest in half a day.

“Hurry up and send the contract! He might change his mind if we're late!”

“All right. I'll make one right away.”

Fortunately, it wasn't difficult to find a standard contract for MeTube appearances online.

I'd also already changed the business name to the reasonably respectable Dangsan Enterprises and added media content creation to the business category, so there shouldn't be any issues.

There was just one thing bothering me: the appearance fee.

Sani had made the offer recklessly, but the one who'd hurried to accept it was actually the singer Wooju.

There was a good chance he'd accept even if I put a fairly small amount on the contract.

But when I actually tried to write down the figure I'd been considering, my hand hesitated.

They say worrying about celebrities is pointless, but this singer named Wooju seemed to be in a slightly different situation.

I could vaguely imagine how much pride he must have swallowed to respond immediately to a childish comment from Sani while even posting his company's email address and saying he'd come right away.

It meant lowering oneself.

And that must have been especially difficult for a young man who looked to be only in his mid-twenties.

At that age, pride was often a greater possession than money.

__________

The next day, Wooju had to repeatedly bow his head to someone who wasn't even in front of him while speaking to his manager on the phone.

(Hey! What were you thinking, deciding something like that on your own? You should've discussed it with me first! Is the company some kind of joke?)

“You told me to go somewhere first...”

(That's! Ha, damn it.)

“I'm sorry. I really needed the money.”

(Just go for now. I'll take care of it.)

“Thank you!”

(And since you're going anyway, do your best. I'm sorry all I can do is say things like this without actually giving you anything.)

“No. Thank you for looking out for me.”

(Looking out for you, my ass. I'm hanging up.)

He wasn't a bad person.

He simply didn't have the time or resources to keep looking after a rookie who had ruined his very first debut stage.

That was the better interpretation for both Wooju and his manager.

‘Still, this really is the middle of nowhere. Is there actually a MeTube office in a place like this?’

He'd gotten off the subway and transferred buses twice, yet the map app still said he had another thirty minutes to go.

After traveling for quite some time, he finally arrived not at some wealthy family's mansion, but at a shabby coffeehouse building.

‘This is the right place...’

No matter how many times he checked, this was definitely the address from the message.

There wasn't another building nearby except for a prefabricated warehouse across the road whose purpose he couldn't identify.

The sign had faded until it was nearly beige, and the only clean-looking thing on the exterior was a doghouse marked “Sani's House.”

He'd prepared himself to simply film a video and collect five hundred thousand won, but after actually arriving at the shabby building, he couldn't help feeling as though he'd been tricked.

‘Right. Let's just film quickly and leave. All I need is the activity allowance.’

And so, like every other first-time visitor to the coffeehouse, Wooju loitered outside the door for quite a while before finally managing to open it.

-Jingle.

“Welcome.”

“Huh? It's Wooju from MeTube!”

“You invited him. Why are you talking like you just ran into him on the street? Ah, come in. It's really hot outside, isn't it?”

“Yes, thank you.”

Guided by Jinseong, Wooju sat down almost automatically, only then realizing that he'd been completely deceived.

‘It really is just a coffeehouse.’

The interior wasn't particularly different from the exterior.

It was clean overall, but every part of it clearly bore the passage of time.

From the sofa he was sitting on to the floor and wallpaper, everything was probably older than he was.

But the child sitting across from him and staring with an uncomfortably intense gaze was definitely the same child he'd seen on MeTube.

“H-Hi.”

-Pat, pat.

Since they were going to be filming together, Wooju offered a greeting, but instead of replying, the child stood up and patted him on the shoulder.

“I'll be the one singing during this shoot. So don't worry too much about being bad at singing.”

“Huh? What are you talking about?”

“I saw this.”

Sani played a video on the huge screen of the tablet the immortals used.

(Today's performer is the rookie everyone's talking about, right? Wooju sings To You Above the Sky!)

(W-We were thaaaat daaaay~)

It was his debut stage.

The dark chapter of his life that he'd never been brave enough to watch even once was now being forcibly shown to him by a little child.

“You're really bad at singing. It was so funny that I laughed for a long time!”

And the child didn't forget to deliver a brutally direct insult right to his face.

“Gasp, gasp... C-Could you turn that off?”

“Why?”

“I-I can't breathe...”

The nightmarish memories of that day came flooding back, and Wooju's vision began to darken.

Just as his consciousness was gradually fading,

-Click.

“Here's some iced coffee. I thought you might be hot.”

‘Huh?’

It was only a cup of coffee placed on the table, yet suddenly it felt as though the tightness in his chest had cleared away.

“Wooju is strange. I showed him this, and suddenly he looked like he was about to die!”

“You little—why would you show him that!”

Jinseong hurriedly snatched the tablet away.

“I'm sorry. The kid doesn't really understand manners...”

“No, it's fine. Thanks to you, I'm okay now. Um, have you seen this video too?”

“We all watched it! That Haedong Divine Maiden over there laughed the hardest and rolled around clutching her stomach!”

“W-When did I do that!”

“Pfft! When? You were laughing so hard you were practically crying and sniveling because you couldn't breathe.”

“You bastard monk, shut your mouth!”

“Good grief, please stop running around inside the coffeehouse.”

‘Everyone somehow looks like they're having fun.’

Because he'd been so nervous, the live performance he'd completely ruined on the debut stage he'd dreamed of all his life had gone beyond mere embarrassment and humiliation.

For a while, he'd even worn a mask because he was afraid someone might recognize him and whisper about him.

But the reactions of the people who had actually watched his video in front of him were quite different from what he'd expected.

It almost felt like bringing up old memories over drinks with friends who hadn't gathered in a long time.

The people assembled in this old coffeehouse felt like those kinds of friends.

Because their smiles were innocent laughter, not condemnation or malicious mockery.

“Haha...”

Without realizing it, Wooju found himself joining in with their laughter.

‘Yeah. Thinking about it now, it was pretty funny.’

They said time healed all wounds. Sitting in this coffeehouse that seemed frozen several decades in the past, even the wounds of those days felt like old scars whose scabs had fallen away long ago.

“Oh, right. I haven't shown you the filming location yet.”

“The filming location?”

He barely managed to swallow the question, You have one of those too?

“This way.”

“Ah, yes!”

The coffeehouse owner walked past the kitchen and opened the back door.

And beyond it lay an astonishing space.

The old wallpaper and scratched flooring vanished, replaced by a clean office.

It was a genuine MeTube studio equipped with the latest filming equipment.

“For now, Sani insisted on inviting you as a guest, but if he makes any outrageous demands, feel free to ignore them. If you indulge him too much, you'll really suffer for it.”

“No, it's fine. A contract is a contract.”

He'd rushed here because he desperately needed rent money, but he'd prepared himself for that much.

It was a channel featuring ridiculous songs and dances. Besides, it wasn't as though his image could get any worse.

Fortunately, however, both men's concerns proved unnecessary.

“I'm ready too!”

Sani entered the office carrying a large stack of A4 paper.

“Today, we're not dancing. We're going to do origami!”

“Origami?”

“Did you get Lia's permission for this?”

“We're family, so I don't need permission!”

“If Lia scolds you later, don't expect me to help.”

“Jinseong definitely told me to copy someone!”

“Who told you to shamelessly copy it this exactly!”

“It's different! Lia uses colored paper, but I'm going to fold this big paper.”

Wooju wasn't the only one who had reached a dead end because he needed rent money.

Sani, burdened with enormous debt and needing to start earning money through MeTube immediately, was also staking everything on this shoot.

His desperation was so great that he copied the MeTube content of Lia, his best friend who shared the same office, without so much as blinking.

And so Wooju began filming a video in which he folded paper with a child he'd never seen before in his life.

“But Wooju, if you're that bad at singing, how did you become a singer?”

“Huh?”

“If you look at this video, Wooju can't sing.”

(Today's performer is the rookie everyone's talking about, right? Wooju sings...)

“Aaaagh! Don't play it!”

Years later, whenever MCs asked him what the most difficult shoot of his career had been, Wooju always answered that it was the MeTube video he filmed with Sani that day.