Chapter 142. Invincible Recon Blue Moon
A broadcasting station called UBS was about to launch a program called 〈Runner Runner〉.
The mayor's request was that Blue Moon appear on it.
As long as there were no scheduling conflicts, there was no reason to refuse.
If anything, I welcomed it.
〈Runner Runner〉 was one of UBS's popular variety shows.
The cast chased one another around while trying to rip the name tags off each other's backs.
However, the version Blue Moon had been invited to wasn't the regular 〈Runner Runner〉.
It was a special spin-off that Jinju City had poured a huge budget into, with the goal of promoting Jinju and the Lantern Festival.
Even though it was a spin-off, plenty of idol groups were scheduled to appear, so it would probably get a fair amount of online exposure.
I informed the managers accordingly and received the script from UBS.
"One who reverses time! Kraaaagh!"
I had no idea which unlucky bastard would end up shouting that line.
Apparently, it was supposed to be yelled when someone was about to have their name tag ripped off.
I'd watched a few episodes of 〈Runner Runner〉 before.
If done well, it could actually be funny without being cringe.
If not...
Perfect material for a lifelong embarrassing memory.
The first page of the script listed all the supernatural abilities.
There were seven participating teams including Blue Moon.
Naturally, that meant seven abilities.
The One Who Reverses Time received the blessing of Chronos, god of time, and could literally turn back time.
If a teammate had their name tag ripped off and was eliminated, they could reverse that result.
The One Who Commands the Sun received the blessing of Apollo, god of the sun, and could reveal the locations of all participants for a certain amount of time.
There were various others too.
The One Who Rules the Sea.
The One Who Watches the Course.
The One Who Commands the Wind.
There were plenty of abilities that looked pretty good.
There was only one problem.
The order in which the teams got to choose their abilities would also be decided through a game.
An online FPS game.
The kind where you moved around in first person and shot people.
Since we were going anyway, it would be nice if Blue Moon stood out.
But I didn't think our members had any particular advantage in gaming.
For a moment, I considered giving them some free time to practice shooting games.
Then I dropped the idea.
〈Runner Runner〉 was important, sure.
But maintaining their condition before the comeback mattered much more.
Filming was scheduled for June 26.
The episode would air on Sunday, June 30.
And soon, the 26th arrived.
The script said the supernatural abilities required plenty of strategy.
Still, the show's name was 〈Runner Runner〉.
Physical ability had to support everything in the end.
What good was knowing everyone's location through the blessing of the sun god?
You still had to run over and catch them.
Anyway, the FPS match to determine selection priority began.
There were exactly fifty participants across all seven teams.
They would fight as teams in a chaotic battle.
The first team completely wiped out would receive the latest pick, and so on.
That also meant groups with more members naturally had an advantage.
Each group was given its own room.
Naturally, cameras were rolling the entire time, so cheating was impossible.
Still, managers were allowed to give strategic advice.
So I'd gotten a copy of the map in advance.
"Let's just survive as long as possible. Let everyone else fight, and we'll hide somewhere. I already picked out four good spots."
I had thought long and hard about the strategy.
Serin immediately disagreed.
"Come on. That'd be boring. It's still a game."
"Huh?"
"I think our starting position is pretty good. Youngchae and Aran, you two pick sniper rifles. Anna and I will take assault rifles and move while facing opposite directions."
The members agreed and began selecting their weapons.
I was slightly stunned by Serin's unexpectedly professional tactical command.
It was basically a two-by-two formation, but by facing opposite directions they minimized blind spots.
Were they special forces?
"Unni, what gun are you using?"
"Use the MSBS-K. This game gives it a really tight grouping."
"Unni! Use a Beretta as your sidearm! I saw Chow Yun-fat use one in 〈A Better Tomorrow〉 and it had infinite ammo!"
Was this really a conversation between girls born in the 2000s?
The only thing I recognized was the MSBS because I'd seen one in San Francisco.
Anyway, the match began under Serin's command rather than mine.
Our magnificent Blue Moon members gradually expanded their field of vision and pushed outward.
Each of them killed about three opponents.
In terms of kill count, they were first place.
They looked so cool that I took out my phone and filmed their backs.
"What the hell are you guys...?"
The match progressed rapidly.
Every Blue Moon member was still alive.
The only remaining group was a five-member boy group called Dickdeez.
They also seemed experienced with this game, because all five were still alive too.
Then the battle entered a stalemate.
Something shaped like a grenade suddenly flew toward Youngchae and exploded.
Fortunately, it was only a smoke grenade.
But while Youngchae's vision was blocked, the Dickdeez members charged.
Serin and Anna died almost instantly.
Those bastards were highly trained.
"Huh? What the! Someone's shooting me from everywhere!"
For some reason, Youngchae shouted that and then dropped a grenade at her own feet, blowing herself up.
At the exact same moment, one Dickdeez member's death notification appeared.
"He died behind me, Aran."
"Behind you? Someone shot from behind? Isn't there no passage back there that we don't know about?"
The moment Youngchae finished reporting, Aran threw another grenade toward Youngchae's rear.
Another enemy died.
Two members had flanked from behind.
The remaining three were fighting from the front.
That left a three-versus-one situation.
Now it was Aran's turn to shine.
Judging the rear secure, Aran moved upward again and climbed onto a tall stack of crates.
I'd tried this game once because a friend played it.
I'd never seen anyone play this professionally.
Blue Moon won.
Two Dickdeez members rushed the area where Aran had originally been positioned, found nothing, and were sniped to death.
When only one remained, Aran switched to a pistol.
Then she circled behind the final Dickdeez member and shot him cleanly in the temple.
I'd never seen Aran concentrate that hard before.
"Wow... This is incredible. You could form a professional team with this game! Hahaha!"
While we were celebrating back in the waiting room, a PD came in and showered them with praise.
According to our girls, whenever they wanted to hang out, they sometimes went to PC cafés and played this game together.
No wonder.
I'd been an idiot for even considering making them practice.
"Anyway, Blue Moon gets first choice. And just as a little tip..."
The PD walked closer and whispered to me.
"There are a lot of abilities, right? The most efficient ones are the god of lightning, god of fire, and god of water. Something like the sun god looks great, but it's harder to use than you'd think."
I see.
I carefully reviewed the three abilities the PD had recommended.
Things like shocking opponents or combining items looked somewhat boring, but their cooldowns were short.
For example, the god of time could only use its power once for the entire team.
The god of water, on the other hand, could use its ability once every ten minutes.
Of course, there was a downside.
If necessary, we'd have to shout the embarrassing skill name every ten minutes.
We were discussing it when, not long after the PD left, someone knocked on the door.
"Yes, come in."
I called out.
The door opened, and some young man entered and bowed politely.
"Hello, CEO Do Jun-hyeok. Blue Moon. I'm Manager Kim Do-an from Wise Entertainment. I manage Dickdeez, the group that fought you so impressively earlier."
"Ah, yes. Nice to meet you."
"Hello."
The moment he saw our pretty members, Kim Do-an's expression brightened.
Jealous, huh?
I managed boy groups too.
I know exactly how that feels.
Like you're looking into an entirely different world.
"Uh, well. Our Dickdeez sold one million copies in first-week sales with their very first album. It's extremely encouraging. If CEO Do Jun-hyeok could lend us a little help, I think it would contribute to the birth of an excellent junior group. I came because I wanted to ask one favor."
"What is it?"
Damn.
Once you start calling yourselves juniors, it becomes hard to refuse.
Sneaky bastard.
You knew that would put me in a difficult position, didn't you?
"This was arrogant of us, but... Haa. We honestly thought we were guaranteed first place in the FPS match. So we'd already planned everything around choosing the god of water and creating a really good broadcast moment. But things turned out like this... I know it's shameless, but we'd really like you to yield the god of water to us."
"Oh, really? That does sound inconvenient. But why specifically the god of water? Is it the strongest ability?"
The god of water could create a water barrier that prevented opponents from entering a base.
According to the PD, it was a good ability, but the god of lightning and god of fire were similarly useful.
Had they simply picked one at random?
"Our new song is called 〈Water Boomer〉. It's related to water, yes. That kind of concept. We even filmed the music video at a swimming pool. So we thought the ability fit our concept well."
"I see."
"And the reason I dared ask is... Blue Moon's fandom is called Apollo, right? So you could choose the sun god. Or if that ability feels weak, you could take something cool like the fire god..."
That was true.
Still...
A water barrier that blocks people from approaching.
This whole neighborhood was about to flood soon.
I silently asked the Blue Moon members for agreement.
Then I spoke.
"Congratulations on becoming Poseidon, god of the sea."
Name tags on each member's back.
And one flag positioned in each zone.
The objective was to gradually reduce the opposing teams by ripping off their name tags, then ultimately collect the most flags.
"Yaaaaah! We are the god of water! We shall fill this Namgang riverside performance grounds with the power of water and defend it to the very end!"
The leader of Dickdeez stood far away on the outdoor stage and shouted.
All he needed to say was,
Rise, Poseidon!
Yet he'd gone out of his way to invent an entire spell.
Was he not afraid of creating permanent embarrassing footage?
"Let's use our spell as little as possible. UBS has a huge archive, apparently. This footage will exist forever."
"Ugh. Okay."
Dickdeez had to defend the Namgang riverside stage.
Blue Moon had to protect a flag on top of a public parking structure downtown.
At least our area was small.
That was an advantage.
"Army of water, follow me!"
The Dickdeez leader shouted solemnly.
His five members began following him.
A group of schoolgirls gathered nearby squealed about how cute they were.
So all of that really had been planned?
I explained the operation to Blue Moon, then returned to the control room.
Six managers watched the situation unfold while trying not to show how nervous they were.
The zones were fairly wide, so every team moved cautiously.
Our elite commander Serin checked the map and again split the team into pairs, just like during the FPS game.
In Dickdeez's case, once the Namgang outdoor stage disappeared from their line of sight, one member stopped moving.
Apparently, they planned to flood the riverside with their water ability the moment someone approached.
The effect lasted five minutes, with a ten-minute cooldown.
It wasn't something they could spam infinitely, so that was actually a decent strategy.
That reminded me of something.
I called Dae-hun.
"Yes, hyung. Aren't you filming?"
"I am. If you've got nothing to do right now, clean the storm drains near our performance venue. Make sure the water drains properly when it rains."
"Why are we suddenly cleaning storm drains? Us?"
Yes.
City Hall wasn't going to do it at the exact right moment.
So clear out the cigarette butts, trash, and whatever else is blocking them.
That's what I'm saying.
"I'll come help after filming. Just start now. There are plenty of drains around there, and we need to clear them early or we'll miss the timing."
"What timing? You mean because you said it's supposed to rain next week? Even if it rains, why are we doing that? I was going to let the staff rest since the members have an out-of-town schedule."
"Yeah. If they want to rest, they should rest. I'll do everything myself."
"No, seriously, what's going on? Is there some kind of massive flood coming?"
Dae-hun sounded dubious, but eventually said fine and hung up.
I looked at a screen showing the girl group Saint Laurent frantically trying to defend a Jinju movie theater.
Then I glanced into the distance.
Our staff members were wandering around with metal rods and shovels.
Once the initial probing phase of the game was mostly over, Serin, who had been moving along the river, quietly called out.
"S-Sun... Hoo... Sun god... Apollo, lend me your strength...!"
Her obvious embarrassment looked hilarious on camera.
Anyway, the ability activation notification was sent to all the members.
Everyone immediately checked the GPS.
Perfect timing.
