The Japanese program TeSTAR appeared on was a morning broadcast with the time displayed around 7:41 at the top of the screen.
Come on, K-pop groups have levels too. Why are they showing up on something like Morning Yard?
The high school student was a little dissatisfied.
Still, since he’d already turned it on, he kept watching to see what they did.
Korean subtitles, apparently added by a fan, were attached.
[A super-special K-pop group has come to visit!]
[Korea’s national idols, TeSTAR]
Then TeSTAR’s career history and achievements rapidly aired, intercut with music-video footage and scenes of them receiving awards.
[Their latest album has sold an incredible 1.1 million copies!]
[Is the secret the seven members and their seven distinct charms, brought together through a survival audition?]
[We asked Hallyu fans in Shin-Okubo!]
Then came a brief series of interviews with K-pop fans on the streets around Koreatown.
[They definitely feel like the hottest group lately?]
[My favorite is Moondae. A cute puppy who sings well!]
[We all have different favorites.]
[Because watching how hard they work is moving, and they’re really cute.]
Oh… They’re pretty popular in Japan too?
The high school student’s indifferent expression relaxed slightly.
With all sorts of sparkling effects, the video finally announced TeSTAR’s entrance.
[Korea’s super-special idols]
[Now entering the studio!]
Doo-doo-doong!
Along with some rather nakedly dramatic effects, TeSTAR entered a pastel-colored set with four or five panelists clapping in the background.
They looked neat in navy suits tastefully matched with traditional accessories.
Look at those leg lengths.
While the high school student enjoyed some secondhand satisfaction, TeSTAR smiled without appearing particularly nervous and bowed politely.
[Hello. Take your STAR, we’re TeSTAR!]
[Waaaah!]
[Welcome! Please introduce yourselves one by one!]
[Yes!]
At the MC’s request, they introduced themselves one after another, mixing in extremely simple Japanese or simply using English.
Since they knew they hadn’t been given much time, each of them slipped in a small defining detail as well.
[Hello. I’m TeSTAR’s leader, Ryu Chungwoo. I used to be on the national archery team.]
[Gasp!]
[Really?]
[Yes. I was a gold medalist.]
Then he smiled and handed the microphone to the next person without lingering on it at all.
That drew even stronger reactions on purpose.
[He’s too cool! That’s dangerous!]
[That must be his charm point!]
The person who created the subtitles had even reproduced the panelists’ murmured background comments in small colored text.
They were mostly things like handsome and cute whenever a member smiling broadly appeared on-screen.
[I’m Bae Sejin. I was a child actor, and……]
[He’s an undeniable tsundere!]
[……!]
Lee Sejin cut in just as Bae Sejin was hesitating and about to wrap up his introduction.
[Tsundere??]
[Hahaha!]
After drawing laughter with Bae Sejin’s dumbfounded expression, Lee Sejin continued his own introduction with a smile.
[My name is Lee Sejin, and because I have the same name as this tsundere hyungnim here, I made the nickname Big Sejin.]
[Big?]
[‘Big’ means large in Korean~ Yep. I’m in charge of dance in the team!]
Thanks to the language training he’d received as a trainee, fluent Japanese came out naturally.
[…Hello. I’m… Seon Ahyeon. I majored in dance. …Please take care of me.]
[I’m Park Moondae. You can think of whichever image you prefer between a singing puppy and a Tibetan fox.]
[HELLLLO GUYS, I’m Eugene. Please remember me! Thanks!]
And like that, the turn finally reached Kim Raebin, who was standing at the very end.
This time, however, one of the panelists asked him a question.
They had noticed that the ornament he was wearing so cleverly on his foot, almost like part of the styling, was actually a brace.
[Is your leg uncomfortable?]
[Yes. But it won’t prevent me from showing you the performance.]
When the interpreter translated Kim Raebin’s crisp answer, the panelists nodded and reacted with appropriate admiration, saying things along the lines of how confident he was.
Their dance is fucking hard, though. What’s he planning to do?
The high school student watched with mild skepticism.
[TeSTAR’s stage is coming up shortly~]
Normally, it felt like an advertisement should have gone there.
But because this was an edited clip, the video immediately continued into the performance.
On a platform set up over the moderately cleared studio floor, the lights began moving.
The stage started with Japanese subtitles appearing alongside the song.
-Even if you struggle, you can’t escape
Today he arrives, making his procession
So another line can be added to the record
Now he arrives, making his procession
Damn, it fits really well.
Because they had already practiced choreography routes without Kim Raebin, the movement was smooth.
And since Cha Eugene was handling the opening, fired up from having the full group together again after so long, the level of immersion was enormous.
The extremely static camera showed every detail of the dynamic performance with almost brutal clarity.
Without realizing it, the high school student stopped thinking and concentrated fully on the stage.
-Procession
But that guy isn’t coming out.
The member with the injured leg hadn’t appeared onstage at all even after the first verse.
The high school student briefly found it strange, then pushed the thought out of his mind.
I’m pretty sure the Groom himself is doing the doubling throughout the chorus. Damn, why are my ears so good?
He was too busy watching the stage.
In fact, this was the first time he had properly watched a full performance of “Procession,” so he simply stared blankly through the first verse and the opening of the second.
Then, right before the final pre-chorus—
The high school student barely noticed Kim Raebin walking slowly forward from the back.
What are they going to do?
Just as he thought it might end up looking lame, the choreography formation shifted cleverly.
Then everyone suddenly drew back like a receding tide and lifted Kim Raebin.
“…!”
With fierce eyes, Kim Raebin climbed onto the members’ backs and arms as though riding in a palanquin and began his part.
-Someone came in the dead of night
The door latch smashed and torn apart
Bang bang bang
The rolling, bouncing sound
At the same time, the formation changed.
-Now, he has appeared
Warning after warning
Approaching in a figure eight
Slowly, thrillingly
Following a path made from arms and upper bodies connected to the floor, Kim Raebin slid lightly to the front as though landing.
He braced himself with his arms and pushed his body upright.
Then he stood at the very front, dead center, and glared into the camera.
-Me
“Holy shit!”
Regardless of the high school student’s exclamation, Kim Raebin didn’t stop rapping.
He kept going—
All the way until the next section arrived.
Huh?
Only then did the high school student realize what they had done.
TeSTAR had taken similar sections from the first and second halves, removed and rearranged them as needed, then concentrated one entire chunk of the latter half onto Kim Raebin.
Wow. That’s fucking bold.
Since the song contained a lot of rap, Kim Raebin’s presence was overwhelming.
He had no separate choreography while walking forward, but because the surrounding members moved like extensions of his limbs, it actually looked even more like a performance.
And as though inheriting that momentum, Park Moondae’s vocals climbed steadily higher at the climax near the very end.
This is it!!
Then came the final dance break, crashing in all at once.
After a sequence of movements so flashy that the Kim Raebin who had moved to the back became impossible to notice, TeSTAR deliberately pulled the formation far backward.
Then—
After regrouping with Kim Raebin, they hit the ending shot.
[Procession]
“They’re fucking good.”
The high school student slapped his desk without realizing it.
On-screen, the camera happened to be showing close-ups of the panelists’ faces after the performance ended.
Every one of them had their eyes stretched wide.
Oh, so the thumbnail came from here.
The male student snickered.
On-screen, TeSTAR stood upright and roughly fixed their clothes.
Then they immediately smiled toward the camera and greeted the viewers.
[Thank you!]
[That was TeSTAR’s ‘Procession’~]
The video ended there.
And the high school student became certain.
Honestly, they tore it up.
Now he understood why the video had so many views.
Just watching it filled him with a spicy, steaming bowlful of national pride.
Since it had been entertaining, he even checked the comments.
They were similarly overflowing with amused fans and Koreans.
-Let them have just a tiny taste of TeSTAR, not too much. We don’t have enough seats ourselvesㅠㅠ
-It must’ve felt like having your eyesight purified. We know the feeling lolol
-TeSTAR is too good to send off to Japan. Their agency should think carefully and focus more heavily on the U.S.
-Our K-pop idols~ I’m so proud of you!^^
-What? Isn’t TeSTAR above the level of appearing on some morning show? Earning foreign currency is good and all, but please keep some pride
└Morning programs like this have much higher status in Japan than in Korea. Their ratings are good too~ This really is a big deal for TeSTAR lol
└Oh, I see. Thx thx
“Oh….”
Apparently it was actually a fairly successful program.
The high school student shrugged.
Anything else fun?
Now that he was in the mood, he checked related videos.
One after another, reviews of Japanese reactions to TeSTAR appeared.
[Japanese Broadcasters Left Speechless by TeSTAR’s Traditional Korean Stage!]
[Japanese TV Goes Crazy Over TeSTAR’s Performance]
The national-pride channels are having a field day.
Normally, the high school student found things like this embarrassing and didn’t watch them.
But he decided he was only clicking one because he was bored.
For reference, around the same time, Park Moondae was monitoring reactions as well.
Read only on MUGEX
-TeSTAR’s stage was so amazing I spilled my milk. I can’t believe it
-Who is this child? Who in the world? No matter how many times I look, an angel (photo of Seon Ahyeon taken directly from the TV screen)
-Did he major in ballet? I thought he seemed graceful somehow. Such a pretty face and an angel’s movements (*´ω｀)
-Another Korean idol group appeared on a morning show. Their dance level is incredible, though.
-Someone tell me the name of the member with the injured leg! A frighteningly beautiful face, a cool voice, and a gentle personality? What manga character is this ww
-I’m interested in the Sejins. I can’t handle how opposite their characters are…
-An Eastern-style song. The impact is incredible!(◡‿◡✿)
-He obviously looks like a cute neko-chan, so why is Tibetan fox his nickname? I can’t understand Korea lololol (Park Moondae photo)
Did they only pick positive reactions?
There was a chance the video had distorted things slightly.
I shoved room service into my mouth while skipping through the video at high speed.
It was annoying how something that could simply have been uploaded as text took twice as long because it had been made into a video.
Still, I’m already dying trying to learn English. Japanese is impossible too.
The fact that I’d managed to pick up a few basic greetings and conversational phrases in two weeks was probably entirely thanks to my Trait.
I shrugged and roughly organized the information I’d gathered from fan SNS accounts and WeTube channels.
Seon Ahyeon’s response is good.
Kim Raebin was getting quite a lot of attention too, probably because his center position in the latter half had left an impression.
The rest of the members were receiving evenly favorable responses.
…There are more mentions of me than I expected.
I had no idea what exactly had clicked, but apparently that oddball, fourth-dimensional sort of character had appealed to them somewhat.
No idea.
Anyway, the conclusion was that the overall response was extremely good.
Of course, the fact that there had been a large enough response to count as a tangible achievement also meant there was no way every single comment could be positive.
[Japanese Far-Right Netizens Furious at TeSTAR’s Popularity]
The contents of this video were a decent example.
-TeSTAR? Who? lol Never heard of them. Only Zainichi probably like them anyway
-Another anti-Japan group? If you want Japan’s money that badly, decide your attitude properly
-These guys all got plastic surgery too
-A Korean-style concept? Just how far is the Korean government’s national-policy propaganda going to go?
-The spectacle is flashy but the song itself is just a noisy piece of garbage lololololol
Below each comment, the uploader had added commentary mocking them while presenting counterexamples.
Typical.
It seemed like they had collected just about every piece of bullshit any K-pop group that became even slightly known in Japan had heard.
I guess the response really was good.
I shrugged and ended the monitoring session.
And sure enough, a few days later, I heard news from the company.
“They’re officially broadcasting it in Japan too?”
“Yeah! Apparently the response to you guys was good, so the station over there bought it!”
It was news that Relisted! Idol Incorporated would officially air in Japan.
…Will that be okay?
The content was sensational enough that it might work in Japan too.
But I wasn’t sure how popular a survival show could be when everyone already knew the final result.
“Wow~ That brings back memories!”
“Y-Yeah.”
“It was difficult, but rewarding.”
Some of the members shared their own impressions when Idol Inc. came up again after a long time.
Since we’d ultimately won and debuted, enough time had passed for some of them to romanticize it, talking about it the way people remembered a difficult period of exam preparation.
Of course, not everyone was like that.
“…It should’ve been canceled.”
Bae Sejin.
Anyway, that wasn’t the end of the news about Idol Inc.
“Ah, now that I think about it, you guys know they’re doing a new season of Idol Inc. this time, right?”
“Whoa. Really?”
“They’re actually going through with it.”
“Yeah~”
The manager casually brought it up.
“So~ apparently they’ll do it if you guys appear once?”
I knew this was coming.