TDOCD Chapter 21

Chapter 21

Group name

Min Ha-young, an undeniable dance prodigy, had initially clashed with Han Da-min on the first day, creating a tense atmosphere.

However, since then, she had begun to approach the other members more cautiously.

She learned to read the room and became more aware of others' feelings.

As they naturally grew closer, the members discovered that once Ha-young felt comfortable, she was incredibly lively.

She would get excited and happy over the smallest things, making her an easy target for playful teasing when she let her guard down.

Her emotions were clearly visible on her face, which made her reactions all the more satisfying to the others.

Using that first day's mishap as an excuse, all the members started teasing her one by one, until she became the group's primary source of amusement.

 Although the members were being mischievous, this kind of interaction was better than letting Ha-young's image remain tarnished by that initial incident.

 "Still, we're all equally tired," Choi Song-yi muttered softly.

Interestingly, it was the youngest, Song-yi, who maintained a cynical attitude. There was something cat-like about her.

 "Wow, even Song-yi is teasing me now," Ha-young complained.

 "I'm not teasing you. I'm just stating facts," Song-yi retorted matter-of-factly, even as she leaned heavily against Ha-young.

As Ha-young's face turned bright red while she bickered with Song-yi, the other members watched the scene with amusement.

 ...What is this strange sense of nostalgia?

Although the members were different, being with this group kept reminding me of my former group. I couldn't help but laugh as I watched Ha-young collapse to the side under Song-yi's weight.

 I just love this kind of atmosphere.

It was clear that they had grown much closer since that incident. When I first saw the awkward atmosphere and their fights, I was quite worried.

I wondered if this team would really be okay, and if participating in the competition might actually hinder their debut.

But as with most conflicts, time solved the problem.

'I'm not sure how this will be edited,' I thought to myself.

In any case, the team atmosphere has been very harmonious lately.

"Everyone, since this is our last day of training camp, let's work until we're perfect, even if we get tired," Da-min said.

 "Yes!" the others responded enthusiastically.

 Da-min had grown accustomed to her role as the leader.

 Oh, and about the status window - I confirmed that it was possible to improve stats through practice. However, it seemed that the higher the stats, the harder it was to improve them through practice, as there had been no change in my status window.

 Ding!

· ✦•·····················•✦•···················•✦·  ​

 Min Ha-young (20 years old)

 - Unaffiliated

 Vocal: D+

· ✦•·····················•✦•···················•✦·  ​​

Ha-young's vocal grade, which had been significantly lower compared to the other members, had somehow improved from D to D+ at some point.

 Now that I knew it was possible to raise stats through effort without necessarily using the cash shop, I was determined to practice relentlessly to raise my vocal grade to A as well.

 "Is everyone warmed up? Let's start practice," Da-min said.

 All the members took their positions. Just as they were about to begin practicing...

 Knock knock.

 "F team, have you started practicing yet?"

 "91......"

 The members looked at the person entering the room with surprise.

 "Writer-nim?"

 It was Son Yeo-jin, the main writer for Start Plan.

 Why is she here suddenly? We hadn't seen her since the first day of the training camp.

 Writer Son looked around the practice room, then gestured to us with a smile.

 "You haven't started practicing yet, right? Can you come out for a moment? We have some additional filming to do."

 "Ah, yes......"

 Wow, additional filming?

 What a treat!

 We followed Writer Son out of the practice room as if in a trance.

 ***

 The conference room on the first floor of the dormitory.

 We cautiously opened the door and looked around. The space was pristine white, with an equally white table and a 24-inch monitor set up at the front.

 In the center of the table, several cards were placed face down.

 What could those be?

 The members reflexively reached for the cards but hesitated, glancing at each other.

 Are we allowed to touch these?

 Writer Son had simply brought us here without explanation, so we were still unsure why we'd been called.

 All we knew was that E team and F team were doing separate filming sessions with the same content.

 "Should we sit down?" Da-min suggested.

 The members, suddenly realizing, quickly took seats at the nearest chairs.

 We spent several minutes just looking around nervously.

 "Hmm, why isn't anyone touching these? Aren't they here for us to look at?" Song-yi, unable to contain her curiosity, reached for the cards.

 Just then, with a click, the monitor at the front turned on.

 "Oh."

 Song-yi quickly pulled her hand back under the table.

 "The screen turned on. Look, everyone."

 "What's going on?"

 "Hey, this is scary!"

 In the quiet room, the sudden activation of the monitor startled Seo Ra-eun and Min Ha-young, who hugged each other dramatically. At that moment, black text appeared on the screen.

 [Please decide on a team name using the cards as reference]

 "Ah." "Oh, right......"

 We suddenly realized we had forgotten something important.

 "We completely forgot about that."

 We had become so accustomed to being called 'F team' that we had completely forgotten we needed to choose our own name.

 Occasionally, some of us had wondered, 'Are we just going to keep calling ourselves F team?' But every time practice started, we forgot about it again.

 So up until today, we were simply F team.

 I had wondered why neither the mentors nor the production staff had pushed us about it, but it seems they were planning to turn it into a segment like this if we didn't decide on our own.

 "So, we're supposed to come up with a group name now?" Da-min asked, shuffling through the face-down cards.

 "Has anyone thought about it before?"

 "......"

 How could we have?

 Everyone kept their mouths shut.

 If anyone had thought of a name, wouldn't they have

 suggested deciding on the group name much earlier?

 "Hmm......"

 The members' faces grew serious.

 This would be our name throughout the broadcast. It seemed everyone wanted to choose a pretty name with a good meaning.

 Watching the others, I reached for the cards.

 "Should we look at these first?"

 I'm sorry, but honestly, I don't really care about the name.

 I would have been fine if we had stayed as F team until the end.

 'It's not like this name will last forever anyway.'

 It might sound pessimistic, but that's how I see it.

 If we don't win, or even if we do, aren't the individual trainees just going to be part of a project group? A group that will disband after a short period of activity.

 Is it worth spending so much time deciding on a name...?

 If anything, putting too much meaning into the name might make it more painful when it's all over.

 "Yeah, let's flip over all the cards. What's written on them?"

 The members started turning over the cards

 Challenge, Moon, Flower, Beginning, Sun - the keywords on the cards were diverse.

 There were quite a lot of cards. Apart from a few generic keywords that could be used universally, most seemed to be related to the members' individual images.

 For example, Dance, Passion, and Struggle for Ha-young; Cat for Song-yi; Gentleness for Ra-eun, and so on.

 "Red! This is definitely for Da-min unnie," one of the members exclaimed.

 The others also seemed to have noticed the keywords meant for them and began enthusiastically sorting the cards.

 "Princess. This one's for Ji-ye," Da-min said, handing me a card with 'Princess' written on it.

 Huh? Why me?

 "Why am I 'Princess'?" I asked.

 Da-min grinned and replied, "I've been calling you Princess. Because you're pretty."

 When?

 Just then, Song-yi pressed a card into my arm.

 I took it and saw 'Winter' written on it.

 Why this one? I looked at Song-yi, who explained in a deadpan tone:

 "Unnie, you're cold when you don't smile. Put them together, and you're the Winter Princess."

 She smirked and walked away.

 "Here," Ha-young handed me another card.

 It had 'T' written on it.

 I stared at Ha-young, who simply said, "You're T."

 "I am T?"

 t/n : T represents Thinking/ or someone who is analytical, logical or rational in MBTI. Kr use this as a joke sometimes to accuse those who lack empathy

 "Pfft!" Da-min burst out laughing.

 Why are you laughing? It seems everyone has formed quite an impression of me without my knowledge. How much have they been observing me?

 Seriously.

 Still, seeing them joking around and acting comfortably with me wasn't so bad.

 Thinking this, I casually picked up the top two cards and flipped them over.

 "Last flower......"

 And then I froze, seeing the keyword written on the card.

 I stared at the card, momentarily stunned by what I saw. The word "last flower" seemed innocuous enough, but it triggered something in my mind. Before I could dwell on it further, the chatter of my teammates brought me back to the present moment.