The Road To Glory [EN]: Chapter 2121

[Extra Story] 14. Ordinary Things for Us

“This village is really unique.”

PD [Producer Director] Na Hye-ju agreed with writer Do Min-hee’s words.

From the moment they received the tip and started looking for the house, their impression of Baekun Island was ‘unique’ and ‘unexpected.’

Starting with the charming village broadcast where the village chief was the only one using standard Korean, while everyone else spoke in dialects [regional dialects].

And the subtly stylish young people.

They mostly saw them from behind, but there were people who didn’t seem to fit in Baekun Island. Well, they probably have relatives or acquaintances here, so it’s not that strange.

“Ah, I think this is the house.”

“Address confirmed.”

PD Na Hye-ju cleared her throat and looked for the recorder. She always carried it when visiting prodigies. Originally, she brought a VJ [Video Journalist] and a few companions, but with each failure, the team dwindled until only the two of them remained.

“Hello, is this the house of Winter?”

The single-story house, without even a yard, looked smaller than the other houses in Baekun Island.

“Who are you looking for, asking about our child?”

“We came from MNC after receiving a tip. It’s about a musical prodigy.”

“Oh my.”

A woman with a baby on her back came out.

“I didn’t expect you to really come. Is our child going to be on TV?”

“We need to talk to Winter first. Is Winter inside?”

“Oh, what should I do? Winter just left.”

“Left?”

“After listening to the morning broadcast, she just took off.”

The woman saw Winter sitting still, then getting surprised by the morning broadcast, and running off somewhere after hearing the song.

It just sounded good to her, but she wondered what Winter was thinking.

She often couldn’t understand Winter’s actions.

“Excuse me-”

“Oh, just call me PD Na, ma’am.”

“PD Na, if you have something to do, should I bring Winter back?”

PD Na Hye-ju and writer Do Min-hee looked at each other.

What should we do?

Is this for real? Are they hiding the kid?

We still have to check.

Having known each other for over ten years, they could read each other’s thoughts without speaking.

“Ma’am, we’ll go ourselves then.”

“Do you know where Winter is?”

The woman scratched her cheek and replied.

“Probably.”

At the Baekun Elementary School broadcasting club.

She caused an accident a long time ago and was banned from entering, but seeing her run out after hearing the morning broadcast, it seems she hasn’t given up.

They never imagined that the village broadcast would be connected to the elementary school broadcasting club.

PD Na Hye-ju vaguely thought that she might also meet the person behind that voice.

#

“No one’s allowed in here, how did you get in?!”

“By walking.”

“…”

For a moment, the broadcasting club became silent.

The kid seemed speechless, moving his lips as if to say something.

“It should have been locked…”

“Someone opened it for me?”

“Who?”

“It was me, you rascal.”

Just then, the caretaker grandpa, who had been standing next to them, grabbed the kid’s head.

“I’m sorry, you must have been surprised.”

It was said that the grandpa, who spoke the best standard Korean in this village, always used honorifics with everyone.

“You, sneaking in again? If you’re kids, go out and play like kids, don’t cause trouble.”

“Let go!”

As the kid struggled, the grandpa skillfully handled him, saying he was quite healthy. It seemed like it wasn’t the first time.

“You’re going in, right? Let’s go together.”

“Let go of me, baldy!”

The grandpa, who had politely greeted Halo, paused at the heart-piercing words.

Then he yelled at the kid.

“Why am I bald? I still have so much hair! All my peers are balder than me-”

“If it shines, it’s bald!”

“!”

The grandpa seemed utterly speechless.

“Still, I won’t let you in, so give up.”

Watching them bicker, it felt like watching a grandfather and grandson, not a school caretaker and a student.

“Why can’t I?”

“It’s been a while since the island chief banned you from entering. Winter, you should reflect on yourself.”

“Banned from entering?”

Halo tilted his head.

He wondered what she had done to be banned from entering.

“Anyway, let’s go.”

The kid looked at the broadcasting club with a lingering expression and was dragged away.

The sight of him being dragged away reminded him of someone.

Halo followed them and opened his mouth.

“What are you trying to do in there?”

The kid turned around to look at him.

“Will you let me in?”

“Maybe, tell me.”

“…”

The kid glanced at the caretaker grandpa. When the grandpa didn’t seem to care, he mustered his courage and opened his mouth.

“Sound.”

“Huh?”

“I want to continue the sound.”

The grandpa scoffed and interrupted as Halo paused at those words.

“Are you trying to scare the aunties and uncles again?”

“I never did that.”

“You didn’t? Who was it that messed with the broadcasting equipment and made the villagers’ eardrums burst?”

“It wasn’t me.”

“It felt like the world was ending.”

The grandpa shuddered as he recalled that time. The kid glared at him.

“Baldies are stupid.”

“You’ll learn when you grow up. Baldies are the kindest people in the world.”

Halo chuckled and slowly shook his head.

Watching the kid and grandpa bicker, he started walking again.

:

“! Are you a singer then?”

The kid suddenly showed interest in him when he heard his profession.

He didn’t know how it happened, but the school caretaker grandpa couldn’t just leave the school, so he ended up taking the kid with him.

They were going in the same direction anyway.

The kid, who had been walking awkwardly, asked what he did in Seoul, and Halo replied that he sang.

From then on, the kid, who had perked up, sparkled his eyes between his thick hair and asked.

“No, then the one who sang the foreign song-”

“Yeah, that was me.”

He recalled the song he had heard while running after realizing the village broadcast was on.

“You sang a little well.”

“A little?”

Halo retorted as if it was absurd.

The kid twitched his lips.

He didn’t want to admit it, but it sounded good.

He seemed to be the best singer among the villagers.

“How did you sing that? Do all Seoul people, or singers, sing like that? How can you become a singer?”

He seemed to have a lot of questions.

But Halo wasn’t a kind adult who would answer kindly. Rather-

“You said you wanted to continue the sound.”

“Huh?”

The kid, who was used to hearing kind answers or promises to answer later, tilted his head, wondering, ‘Why isn’t he answering?’ and replied vaguely.

“What kind of sound do you want to continue?”

The kid, who had been walking, stopped.

Halo kept walking without caring, so he followed.

No one had ever asked him this question before.

They told him he was joking, but no one had ever asked him properly.

Is a singer something different after all?

“…Humming.”

“Huh?”

“I want to continue the sound of my mom humming.”

It was an unexpected sound.

Halo glanced at the kid.

The kid was staring at the air as if thinking about something.

To be exact, he was regretting it. He wondered why he had said this to a stranger. And if he asked why, he wondered how much he should say.

But Halo didn’t ask why.

“Can you continue it?”

“Huh?”

The kid’s eyes widened.

He felt relieved that he didn’t ask why.

He felt like he could answer this easily.

“I don’t know.”

“…”

“I have a lot of thoughts, but it’s complicated. There are too many paths, and I don’t know which one is the answer.”

“Too many paths.”

“Am I weird?”

“No.”

When he said this, adults usually laughed or looked at him as if they didn’t understand, but the adult in front of him just smiled.

The kid came closer and hummed the sound in his head.

“Why are you laughing? Am I really weird?”

“…”

“Why don’t you tell me? Are you making fun of me?”

“No, just.”

Too many paths are visible, and he doesn’t know which one is the answer, and his head gets complicated.

Sometimes it’s too noisy, sometimes it’s too beautiful, and sometimes it feels like his head hurts.

“That’s too-”

That was too common for him, and the kid said so too.

Halo smiled and replied to the kid.

“Because it’s ordinary.”

“Ordinary?”

“…So it’s not weird? It’s not weird.”

The kid tilted his head for a moment and soon understood, nodding. His face was much lighter.

“Then, can you teach me how to sing?”

Halo stopped walking for the first time at that question.

“Huh? Mr. Halo!”

Just then, a voice called him from behind.

“Where did you go with the camera? I’ve been looking for you.”

The VJ [Video Journalist], who had found the camera that Halo had left at the Baekun Elementary School broadcasting club, was making a sad face.

And a voice coming from the other side-.

“…’Mr. Halo’?”

PD Na Hye-ju and writer Do Min-hee, who had gone to find Winter and returned after hearing from the caretaker grandpa that she had already gone home, pointed at him when they found them.

“Huh?”

“Noh Hae-il? No, Mr. Halo?”

In this chaotic situation, the kid – no, Winter – grabbed his clothes.

“Can’t you?”

He urged his answer.

Halo looked at Winter and replied.

“I can’t.”

#

The office worker shouted once again.

“I can’t!”

On the big screen, the black-haired boy didn’t care and started picking up the practice pieces that were rolling around and putting them in the trash can.

[Noooo]

[Please]

[Why are you throwing it away]

[PD, you didn’t really throw it away, did you? ㅠㅠㅠ]

[The music isn’t bad, please give it to me]

Another week has returned.

Those who had been waiting on Noh Hae-il’s account ‘Wave_r’ for an hour since the unforgettable slump confession, screamed when they discovered the boy cleaning up the practice songs from the first scene, slump or not.

With that, the screen stopped, and the subtitle for episode 2 came up.

Episode 2. Welcome to my trouble.

“Everything is good, but please don’t throw away the song and release it as a sound source, or even on YouTube.”

It was too good to waste.

Although he had confessed to a slump, episode 2 didn’t focus on that.

Instead, it highlighted a man who visited Halo’s house.

“Yo, how have you been?”

[It’s Shin Joo-hyuk]

[He must have come to comfort Hae-il because he’s in a slump]

[His presence is already strong even though only his voice has come out…]

“What is this?”

“A camera.”

“…Do you think I asked because I didn’t know that?”

Shin Joo-hyuk looked at the camera indifferently and came inside.

“No, more than that, you should have told me you were coming to Korea.”

“I told you.”

“Is answering ‘I’m in Korea’ when I asked how the weather was in LA considered telling me?”

A screenshot of Shin Joo-hyuk’s KakaoTalk [Korean messaging app] popped up.

It was exactly as Shin Joo-hyuk had said.

[Lol]

[Shin Joo-hyuk was so flustered that he didn’t reply for 2 minutes lol]

[More than that, they must be really close. They even KakaoTalk]

[Isn’t it famous that Noh Hae-il has friends with big age gaps in the entertainment industry?]

[Noh Hae-il is happy]

“By the way, I heard you’re making a comeback?”

“Changing the subject. Yeah, do you want to listen?”

Shin Joo-hyuk’s new song was released at the current time, so only the beginning was briefly edited and released. Halo just smiled when he heard it, and Shin Joo-hyuk asked.

“How is it?”

“It’s good.”

Of course-. Shin Joo-hyuk said he knew it would be like that at the following words.

“My taste is more-”

Halo, who was holding a guitar, immediately went through the arrangement.

[Wow]

[OMG]

“Oh. Then how about this?”

Shin Joo-hyuk, who was briefly impressed, took Halo’s guitar and arranged the arrangement, and Halo also arranged the arrangement of the arrangement as if it was fun.

It seemed like his competitive spirit was properly ignited.

Just like when they first met on the radio and sang each other’s songs.

Viewers who watched the process of the song being arranged without 정신없이 [without paying attention] recalled that time…

[????]

[No]

Did not, and

[Slump:???]

[Did the meaning of the word slump change while I didn’t know?]

[?? How did the word slump come out? Is it like devil’s editing? Did you play a word game?]

The chat that initially encouraged Halo gradually began to change.

Halo, who had been chatting with Shin Joo-hyuk for a while, quietly looked at the guitar when he was left alone. Sad background music was playing for him.

It was like music to comfort a singer who was suffering from a slump.

[You have to cry here ㅠㅠ]

[How hard must Hae-il have had it…]

Some people decorated it with tear emoticons to match it.

On the other hand, office workers and others watched this situation with blank eyes.

[Am I the only one who’s weird right now?]

[It’s sad background music…it seems like a sad situation…I think I should be sad…]

[50 million Koreans revealed to be psychopaths lacking empathy]

Then finally that video came out.

The scene immediately after Halo confessed his slump.