Chapter 13

The Natural Enemy of the Natural Enemy (2)

Was it just a coincidence?

There happened to be a quest related to the drama The Story of Five Sisters, which my daughters were going to film this time.

[At the script reading for The Story of Five Sisters, get a positive response from the staff.]

[Upon completion, you will receive 3 points.]

Three points were impossible to pass up.

If I wanted to raise my daughters’ stats, I needed to collect as many points as possible.

To do that, I first needed to come up with a plan to safely clear the quest I had received yesterday.

While I was sitting at my desk, lost in thought, Director Hwang Cheolho, the cameraman who had worked with me before, appeared in the office with an,

“Huh?”

“PD-nim. When did you get to work?”

“Just now. Director Hwang, didn’t you say you were going to take the day off at home?”

“Ah, I was going to rest, but… I felt my wife watching me, so I came to work.”

Was this running away under the name of going to work?

Since I had once been a married man myself, I could roughly understand Director Hwang’s situation.

“If I had known you were going to be here, I would have bought another cup of coffee. I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay. I have something to drink here anyway. By the way, Director Hwang. You worked with PD Oh Sooyoung before, right?”

“Yes. I worked on her team for a while before PD Oh moved to RETC. About two years? Something like that.”

“Hmm, really?”

PD Oh Sooyoung and I didn’t have much in common.

We were both PDs, but we weren’t particularly close either, so I didn’t know much about PD Oh Sooyoung’s specific working style.

Even the advice I had given my daughters when they auditioned was nothing more than things I had heard indirectly.

I had been able to help my daughters somewhat during the audition, but to properly support them, I needed a lot of information about PD Oh Sooyoung.

Director Hwang looked around the office.

Only after checking once again that the two of us were the only people here did he speak again.

“It’s because of Doye and Dobin, right?”

“Yeah. Since I can, I want to tell my daughters things that might help them during filming.”

Drama filming was ultimately something done by people, not machines.

Everyone had their own style.

If an actor fit that style well, and could adjust to it properly, filming would go much more smoothly.

“I’ll treat you to a big meal later, so if you hear any useful information, let me know.”

“Really, PD-nim?”

“Of course! When have I ever said one thing and done another? Tell me whatever you want to eat. I can at least treat you to that much.”

Director Hwang’s eyes sparkled.

“Understood. As it happens, I’m having a drink tonight with the lighting team working with PD Oh Sooyoung, so I’ll casually ask them. The script reading is tomorrow, right?”

“Yeah. If possible, make sure it doesn’t look like I asked you. We can’t let them find out.”

“Don’t worry, PD-nim. Just trust me.”

Director Hwang was usually very good at keeping his mouth shut, so I decided to trust him this once.

“But PD-nim. Is there anything you’re curious about regarding Siyoon?”

“Siyoon?”

“Yes. It seems like she’s been receiving a lot of offers from different places because of her project for her return to Korea. If you want, I could meet the kids today and casually ask about that too…”

Of course, I was also very interested in Siyoon.

Her past, her future, and her present.

She was the woman I loved.

But—

“It’s okay. You don’t have to go that far for me.”

I didn’t like the idea of unnecessarily digging into Siyoon’s affairs.

This was something only Siyoon and I needed to deal with.

I didn’t want to solve it by borrowing other people’s help.

Besides, I still had no idea why Siyoon’s status window had started appearing to me.

Because I could only see the status windows of Dobin and Doye, my daughters, I had assumed there was a condition called ‘family’ that allowed me to see someone’s abilities.

But Siyoon and I were legally divorced now.

In other words, we weren’t family.

And yet I could still see her status window.

‘Does that mean there’s still something left between us that I haven’t realized?’

This was also something I needed to think about seriously at least once.

The day of my daughters’ drama script reading finally arrived.

Since it was such an important day, I couldn’t just send the two girls to the broadcasting station by themselves.

At least I was their father.

I thought I could at least drive them there, so I put both girls in the back seat of my car.

As she got into the car, Doye brought up something that had been worrying her.

“Dad. What if we go to RETC and someone finds out that we’re father and daughter?”

“It’s fine. I’ll only drop you off at the parking lot.”

There was no one at RETC close enough to me to remember my car’s license plate or even its model.

I started the engine and quickly drove toward the broadcasting station.

As I drove, I decided to tell my daughters the information I had heard from Director Hwang yesterday.

“Should Dad give you a few tips again this time?”

At the word ‘tips,’ Dobin and Doye immediately perked up their ears.

During their previous audition, they had gotten good results because their dad’s tips had hit the mark.

Because of that experience, the girls naturally looked expectant.

“If you had something like that, you should have told us sooner.”

Doye spoke in a slightly resentful voice.

I wanted to do that too.

“It took me some time to gather information about PD Oh Sooyoung, so I couldn’t help it. Dad doesn’t know everyone in the entertainment industry, you know.”

I continued speaking while briefly stopping at a red light.

The important thing wasn’t showing off my connections.

What mattered was helping my daughters receive praise from the staff at the reading.

“When the reading starts, don’t get intimidated just because there are senior actors there. Be confident no matter what. And you need to speak loudly. Got it?”

“Do we really have to speak that loudly?”

“Yeah. This isn’t one of those small readings you do during filming. Almost all the actors and staff will be there for this large-scale reading. You need to speak loudly so that even the people sitting far away can hear you delivering your lines. Right?”

It was the first time all the actors would gather together and work with one another.

Since this was the first step, they needed to build a good impression with everyone from the very beginning.

They needed to build a strong foundation so that the tower they carefully built wouldn’t collapse later.

Just as I was about to start driving again, Dobin asked me a question.

“Dad, when you do your first reading, do you also prefer actors who speak loudly?”

“Of course. Especially with newcomers, those are the kinds of things I pay even more attention to.”

Filming was the real thing.

People might understand that someone was inexperienced because they were a newcomer, but that excuse couldn’t keep working forever.

Every single filming session required a huge amount of time, effort, and production money.

I couldn’t let all of that be wasted simply because of a rookie actor’s clumsy performance.

“Later on, there will be times when senior actors, PDs, or staff members give you harsh criticism. When that happens, don’t shrink back. Act with determination. Your mom also grew steadily that way and eventually reached where she is now.”

They were children who had inherited Siyoon’s talent.

I believed Dobin and Doye were more than capable of doing it.

The entertainment industry was also a world where people lived together, so it wasn’t always harsh.

But sometimes, there were people who deliberately acted sharply toward others, like a sharp corner sticking out unexpectedly.

“There’s someone among the actors doing the reading with you today named Choi Guhang. You know who he is, right?”

I checked through the rearview mirror and saw my daughters nod.

Even if someone wasn’t involved in the entertainment industry, most people would know who Choi Guhang was.

He was a veteran actor whose face often appeared on the big screen.

He wasn’t usually a leading actor, but he had made a name for himself as an excellent supporting actor and had appeared in many movies and dramas.

His acting skills were certainly recognized.

But his personality was another matter.

‘If his personality were even half as good as his acting, he would be a really good person.’

Unfortunately, actor Choi Guhang was also scheduled to appear in PD Oh Sooyoung’s next project.

“There’s a nickname for Choi Guhang that people in the industry use. Do you know what it is?”

“No.”

“I’ve never heard of it.”

New actors probably wouldn’t know.

A nickname that followed Choi Guhang around like a label.

It was—

“‘Rookie Killer,’ apparently.”

Perhaps Choi Guhang would become a bigger obstacle for my daughters than PD Oh Sooyoung herself.

That was why I planned to add one more operation.

An operation to put someone who could become Choi Guhang’s natural enemy on my daughters’ side.

The script reading for the drama The Story of Five Sisters.

Many actors had already filled the seats.

When Choi Guhang, the second most experienced actor among the main and supporting cast, appeared at the scene, the junior actors who had been chatting immediately stood up.

“Hello, senior!”

“It’s been a long time!”

Seeing the juniors standing at attention, Choi Guhang casually raised one hand with an expressionless face.

He was one of the actors junior actors feared the most.

Choi Guhang’s eyes swept across the empty seats.

“Your senior came first. I guess there are still some highly successful juniors who haven’t arrived yet.”

There were still ten minutes left before the scheduled time, but Choi Guhang already looked displeased.

The actors nervously swallowed.

Fortunately, Yoon Dobin and Yoon Doye were among the actors who had arrived early and were already seated.

“Now I understand why Dad said it was better to arrive at least ten minutes early.”

“Exactly.”

Even though Yoon Dobin and Yoon Doye didn’t know PD Oh Sooyoung’s style in detail, Yoon Seongjun knew Choi Guhang’s personality very well.

He had heard plenty of stories about him.

And he had also personally worked with actor Choi Guhang before.

Everyone thought Choi Guhang would be the ruler and the one who kept everyone in line at this script reading.

Yoon Dobin and Yoon Doye thought the same.

And so, the first script reading began with tension filling the room.

S#5-2.

It was Yoon Dobin’s turn.

Hoo.

Yoon Dobin took a deep breath and, following her dad Yoon Seongjun’s advice, delivered her lines with as much confidence as possible.

“Mom, what are we having for dinner today? Don’t tell me we’re having curry again.”

“Oh my, what’s wrong with curry?”

“Do you know how boring it gets when you eat the same food for three days straight?”

Yoon Dobin gave such a natural performance, perfectly portraying a daughter complaining to her mother, that everyone’s attention was drawn to her.

But perhaps because she was too nervous—

“Unni. Here, the pen—no, pen…”

She stumbled over her line in the middle.

The actors’ eyes turned toward Choi Guhang.

He was extremely harsh toward newcomers, enough to earn the nickname ‘Rookie Killer.’

He believed that newcomers needed to be made to stay alert from the beginning so they could remain tense and focused during filming later.

But in Choi Guhang’s case, he went too far.

It was only one mistake.

It was a small mistake, but Choi Guhang wasn’t the type to let something like that go.

“You make a simple mistake like that in front of all your seniors? Where do rookies these days leave their brains? Huh?”

“I-I’m sorry.”

Yoon Doye looked sadly at her older sister being scolded.

What should she do?

Just as the Yoon sisters were panicking—

A savior appeared.

“Senior. That’s a simple mistake that anyone can make. Let’s just let it go.”

At PD Oh Sooyoung’s words, Choi Guhang cleared his throat.

“If Director Oh says so…”

In fact, the ruler and the one in charge of discipline here wasn’t Choi Guhang.

It was Oh Sooyoung.

She was.

“Don’t be too nervous. Let’s try it again slowly. Okay?”

“Yes, PD-nim!”

Her warm and gentle words gave Yoon Dobin courage.

The confidence and spirit of a rookie actress.

PD Oh Sooyoung liked that attitude very much.

That was why she had deliberately taken the sisters’ side.

In the end, Yoon Seongjun’s plan had worked.