"Can you take my hand?
Pull me into your arms."
Rayen belted for the nth time, followed by the three cubs roaring at the same time.
And as usual, Yeo Haru paused the music and stopped the three other members to complain.
"That's not how you do it!"
Having heard that same line countless of times, Minho fixed his hair once again. Meanwhile, Renjiro feigned a cough in awkwardness. Binh, the one Rayen thought to be familiar, apologized.
Rayen sprawled on the ground as he massaged his sore throat. This was so exhausting!
"You sound like newborn kitties! You should sound like a fully-grown lion!" Yeo Haru scolded the three. "Brother Singer, show them again!"
'This damn Yeo Haru!'
"No! Give me a break!" Rayen screamed in frustration.
For the first time in ages, instead of complaining in his mind, Rayen voiced out his concern. Even though he could possibly buy a remedy in the Memorial Shop if he ever lost his voice, he still didn't want to spend his coins on a totally avoidable situation!
Liam, being the only silent one in the group as though contemplating something, spoke too. "We should probably resume practicing after the rearrangement was done."
Yeo Haru nodded in disappointment. The only members he was satisfied with was Rayen and Liam. Fortunately, he listened to Rayen on selecting this friend of his. If not, they wouldn't have someone with high production skills.
"I already told you my ideas. Please incorporate them," Yeo Haru said.
Liam nodded in understanding.
Rayen sighed while laying on the floor. At last, he was free!
But upon remembering something, Rayen immediately stood up. He saw Liam was just about to go out of the room and called out for him.
Halting his steps midway, Liam looked back from his shoulders while still holding onto the lyric sheet.
"I want to talk to you about—"
"We don't have time," Liam interrupted his words.
Liam showed Rayen the lyric sheet, seemingly trying to explain with his actions. Rayen frowned in confusion.
Scratching his head, Liam didn't know how to properly say it without looking like he's avoiding it. But it's already useless. Might as well make it obvious that he didn't want to talk about it.
"We don't have time to talk. I still need to rearrange the song."
Despite being disappointed, Rayen still let him go. Because of his three day mission, he let his old friend's attitude slide. Continuing to bug this person would slow them on coming up of a choreography.
His current situation right now was more important than learning the truth anyway. He didn't want to meet that woman again!
'I should probably just eat for now. I doubt it's even possible for him to come up with so many reasons.'
Rayen went to the fourth-floor cafeteria alone to grab a snack while massaging his itchy throat.
The whole cafeteria wasn't too empty. Many of the tired participants were digging onto their plates after an exhausting day of meeting with their teammates to prepare for the first round.
A salivating scent of food assaulted Rayen's nose that made his stomach rumble. Seeing the buffet, he made his way to it and grabbed a plate before starting to fill it with food.
'Oh, there's lobster! I should get this... And this... And this...'
Before even noticing it, the one plate in his hand was already not enough for the food he wanted to try.
Rayen walked away from the buffet area and went to find an empty table. Just then, his phone vibrated on his pocket.
He quickly pulled out his phone and saw 1 notification coming from Idol:Revive.
[You have five new messages.]
'A message? Is it a new feature from the update?'
Immediately clicking on the notification, Rayen saw a list of his unread messages.
[The True Top 1 Group
Yeo Haru: Yo. I saw this new feature and made a group for us.
We'll get top 1 for the next round!
Renjiro: (Cheering Black Cat sticker)]
Rayen didn't have any words to respond and only sent a thumbs up. When another ding sounded, he closed the group chat to see who else messaged him.
[Navin: Roommate, grabbing dinner?]
[Navin: You forgot about me quickly? After you became teammates with your old friend and that camera hog, you easily forgot about me (crying Plotter emoji)]
'I haven't even sent anything!'
[Navin: I can read it in your face (smug cat emoji)]
Reading the text message, Rayen could already guess who this person was. He looked around the cafeteria and saw Adrian waving at him. Even though he didn't want to see this person's face, he still made his way toward his table.
"Why did your name become Navin?"
Proud that he had convinced this famous vocalist to eat with him, Adrian grinned.
"That's my stage name."
"Stage name? When did that happen?" Rayen shook his head. That's not the right question. "How did you set it?"
"I set it before the update—after we received our new Life Books."
Setting down his tray, Rayen sat in front of Adrian and listened intently.
"Tap your display picture, it'll take you to your profile settings."
Rayen did as he was told and saw what Adrian was talking about.
"Tap it, you'll be able to change it."
After Adrian said that, Rayen immediately tapped on the "Stage Name" section, but nothing happened.
"Why's nothing happening?"
Adrian also frowned, having no idea what just happened. Was it a bug after the update? That's not what happened when he tried that.
Rayen repeatedly tapped the stage name section until a pop-up window appeared.
[You can no longer change your stage name.]
Out of frustration, Rayen once again repeatedly tapped on it. He couldn't accept it! Why did no one said that there was a time limit on changing their stage name?
'Damn useless Mini Plotter! If you're going to live off of my phone, you should have informed me!'
As if also reading his thoughts, another pop-up window appeared to answer his question.
[The open broadcast for the first episode had already aired. You can not change your stage name anymore.]
Rayen gave up and set down his phone. He ate away his bitterness of not being able to set a stage name for himself. Adrian also noticed the pop-up and laughed.
But then, Rayen, realizing something, stopped eating and asked. "When did the first episode air?"