Returnee's S-Rank Management Guide

Things Falling Into Place (2)

Producer Do had been completely overwhelmed lately.

He already had his hands full with the shift to live broadcasts, but an unexpected news article had just exploded.

'Who the hell did it? If I get my hands on them, I'll...!!'

It was because the Ji Yeon-hwa incident from the third mission had made the news.

They had tried to keep things under wraps as much as possible, but it was all but meaningless.

Because of that, Ji Yeon-hwa didn't appear in the subsequent live broadcast and had gone into hiding, leaving him to deal with reporters all day long.

On top of that, the program began to trend for all the wrong reasons.

The reason was that they had continued missions despite such a dangerous situation.

"This isn't right."

The only consolation was that the ratings, perhaps thanks to the controversy, were pretty decent.

The problem was, 'pretty decent' was all they were.

They weren't jaw-dropping, just about good enough to say they'd managed to hold their own compared to past Super Hunter K ratings.

Considering the massive revamp of the plot and the promotional campaign, even that felt ambiguous.

"Producer Do, Upstream got in touch. It seems Ji Yeon-hwa won't be able to appear until Super Hunter K is over."

"What do you mean? Are these contracts a child's play to them?!"

"It's out of my hands, sir. They said an unexpected problem came up. They'll even pay the penalty fee..."

"Hah!"

Ji Yeon-hwa had a strong fan base.

Especially among the participating mentors this time, she had been the only one close to being S-rank.

From the standpoint of Super Hunter K, this was a double blow.

'No, there's still Shin Ah-yeon.'

Unlike Ji Yeon-hwa, who was close to S-rank, Shin Ah-yeon was a real S-rank.

But even so, it didn't mean much.

To be honest, Shin Ah-yeon was hopeless at variety shows.

She occasionally produced decent scenes while instructing Soo-ah, but otherwise hardly said a word, so there was barely any footage featuring her.

In truth, the reason Shin Ah-yeon hardly spoke was because Jung-woo had told her to be extremely careful, as her choice of words was not suitable for network TV. But Producer Do did not know that.

"Then what if we boldly cut back on mentor interviews and focus on the hunters' screen time instead?"

Producer Han quietly suggested an idea to the troubled Producer Do.

"The hunters? Who, hunter Ju Ji-sang?"

"Y-yes. He's been drawing quite a lot of attention, hasn't he? If we give him more screen time..."

"Listen, producer Kim. Do you know why our ratings are so sluggish right now?"

Producer Do's cold gaze made Producer Kim stumble over his words.

"I think... it's because of the recent string of scandals..."

"That's part of it, but there's a more fundamental problem."

He really didn't want to admit it.

He'd been deliberately ignoring it, but looking at the situation, there was only one reason to consider.

"A lack of stars."

"Hmmm..."

It was something everyone had been secretly thinking.

The hunter they'd been promoting as the face of Super Hunter K was, in practice, Ju Ji-sang.

He had the title of 'Sword King's disciple,' and even compared to past Super Hunter K winners, he was among the best.

But that was it.

Ju Ji-sang was simply skilled—there was nothing more to him.

"Come on, producer Do, you have high standards. He still stands out more than past contestants."

"..."

High standards. Producer Do shook his head.

If anything, his standards were shallow.

He had pushed someone who could have been the lead as the villain instead.

Come to think of it, the only reason ratings, which had been just average, became 'pretty' decent was because the 'villain' had made an impact.

"What does everyone think about Hunter Lee Soo-ah?"

At Producer Do's quiet question, a few PDs and staff exchanged glances.

She hadn't been a major talking point since the first mission, but to the staff who had seen the footage from the third mission, she had been a shocking figure.

"In the unreleased footage, hunter Lee Soo-ah was fighting among S-ranks. Even Hunter Ju Ji-sang was scrambling to get away."

And her manager had been there as well.

They couldn't understand what guts she had.

To be calmly watching an S-rank hunter fight.

'If only we'd handled Unique differently, would things have turned out another way?'

The first and third missions—

Those had been the episodes that drew the most attention to Super Hunter K.

And both of those featured significant moments for Lee Soo-ah and Unique's manager.

"But isn't it too late to focus on her now, with the image set early on? Besides, it's all live now..."

"Hmm. Sure, it'd be hard to suddenly focus on someone when so far most of their footage was cut, right?"

That was exactly the problem.

Before, they at least gave her the 'villain' edit, but after the third mission, not even that.

Because while they were debating over Lee Soo-ah after the events of the third mission, the fourth and fifth missions had rushed by without them realizing.

Since he himself hadn't set the narrative, the scenes where Lee Soo-ah shined ended up mostly being cut.

Other PDs, thinking Producer Do didn't like Unique and Lee Soo-ah, had tried to please him.

'Damn, what a stupid mistake.'

Now, it was nearly impossible to clean up Lee Soo-ah's image and give her another push.

If it were pre-recorded, it might have been salvageable, but unfortunately, everything from here on out would be live.

'... No, wait.'

He had an idea.

'If it can't be done on the broadcast, then externally...'

It was a huge risk, but better to take a desperate chance than let the show quietly end.

'It's already leaked, so a little more won't hurt, right?'

If he did that, his relationship with Upstream would hit rock bottom—but so what?

They were the ones who had screwed them over first.

***

"Lee Soo-ah, fighting!!"

As the cheer rang out nearby, Soo-ah felt her body tense up.

She saw a blade approaching right before her eyes.

'A transfer would have been better than this!'

When she entered battle, her body used to move on reflex, but lately she had started to think.

Even now, she could clearly see the hunter rushing at her.

Her nerves had become acutely sensitive, and her sight and hearing were distinctly sharper than before.

She had no idea why.

Apparently, she had always fought in such a state, moving on pure instinct until now.

"Amazing! Lee Soo-ah!!"

'Oh, come on!'

The voice echoed again, making it hard for Soo-ah to focus.

Before, such cheers would have been drowned out and she wouldn't have heard them, but now she heard them clearly.

"An upset! Hunter Song Jung-ho, who advanced to the live round in second place, is defeated, and Lee Soo-ah advances to the semifinals!!"

From the live broadcast onward, the competition had officially switched to a tournament format with one-on-one battles.

The missions varied, but this time it was a basic head-to-head match, so Soo-ah was able to win easily.

'Easily?'

At the thought, Soo-ah looked at Song Jung-ho, panting in front of her.

He had earned the second highest points in the prelims after Ju Ji-sang and advanced in second place.

Though officially B-rank, he had the skills to reach A-rank soon.

"This... can't be. Me, losing to a C-rank hunter..."

She heard Song Jung-ho muttering in shock to himself.

At his words, she felt the heat in her body cool down.

'Something's wrong.'

She hadn't realized because Shin Ah-yeon had been the one supervising her training.

She had only directly fought hunters in the third mission, and after that incident, she hadn't had a chance to reflect on herself.

Baek Hojun, Shin Ah-yeon, and Ji Yeon-hwa's fight had made an even bigger impact.

But as the live broadcast went on, she began to feel strange.

Both the hunter she faced in the round of 16, and today's quarterfinal opponent...

They were too weak.

"You won, so why the long face?"

"Huh?"

She didn't even realize when she'd left the arena.

As she looked up blankly, she saw Jung-woo watching her.

At the sight of him, the recent events in the arena flashed through her mind.

"M-manager Park! Can you not do that?!"

"Do what?"

"T-the cheering! It really distracts me!"

"What's wrong with a manager cheering for his hunter?"

"It's just... too much!"

Soo-ah was not used to being cheered for.

She'd never properly received that kind of encouragement.

Even in this live broadcast, it was the same.

In the round of 16 and the quarterfinals, the audience had cheered for her opponents.

Producer Do had edited Soo-ah to appear entirely as the villain throughout the broadcasts.

With her gloomy appearance, always hiding her face, Soo-ah fit that image perfectly.

"You must be hungry. Here, I brought bread."

"Fried soboro again... Did you go to Daejeon?"

"I had some quick business there."

Taking the bread Jung-woo offered, Soo-ah returned to Unique's assigned seat.

She felt the surrounding eyes on her but deliberately ignored them.

"Why do you always bring fried soboro bread?"

"Seongrimdang is famous for fried soboro."

"No it's not! Seongrimdang has much tastier bread—why are you giving me that look?"

When Soo-ah grumbled, Jung-woo just shook his head, still smiling.

"No, it just reminded me how you wanted to say that before, but didn't."

"Oh. Did it show that much on my face?"

"You didn't say it back then, but the fact that you did today—maybe you feel a bit more at ease now, which I'm glad about."

Come to think of it, Soo-ah did remember Jung-woo handing her fried soboro when they first met.

She'd let it slide, thinking she'd mention it later, but she didn't expect it would come up like this.

"By the way, did you see this, Soo-ah?"

"Hm? What is it?"

Jung-woo tapped his phone a few times, then showed her a news article.

"If Chanhwa Doxuris wins just one more match, they'll go to the postseason."

"What?!"

Soo-ah took the phone and began reading the article thoroughly.

It was true. At the beginning of the year, they'd been a team that lost as a matter of course—how had things changed so much?

"From your reaction, you didn't know, did you?"

"... No, I really didn't. How didn't I know this?"

Since joining Super Hunter K, she hadn't had a chance to watch any games.

She'd been constantly worried about missions and spent all her free time training with Ah-yeon and Jung-woo.

Learning to control the phenomenon of mana dispersion,

And mastering swordsmanship that Jung-woo had somehow gotten his hands on—that alone filled her days.

So there was no time to bother with baseball.

Looking closely, she saw that the game determining Doxuris' postseason was scheduled for two days later.

'Fall baseball is right in front of me...'

She wanted to see it.

But would it be okay for her to go?

"You can take a break, you know."

"... But."

"After today's match, I think you'll be fine."

Today's match with Song Jung-ho had seemed intense on the surface.

But to Jung-woo, it was anything but.

Song Jung-ho was desperate, but he couldn't overwhelm the confused Soo-ah at all.

'There's a crack in the shell, but that's nowhere near enough.'

And it wasn't just that. She was also suffering from indigestion after gobbling down all the food she'd saved up.

In other words, she was in a state of indigestion.

She needed to relax and let things settle.

It was time to understand herself better and clear her head.

"The President will understand. Get some good rest before the next shoot."

"...."

At Jung-woo's words, Soo-ah hesitated, deep in thought.

"Manager Park! Please come over here and do an interview about Hunter Soo-ah's match!"

"Oh, okay."

Jung-woo was looking at Soo-ah when a staff member called for him.

Since Soo-ah had won the quarterfinals, they needed an interview with her manager, Jung-woo.

"M-manager."

As Jung-woo turned to go for the interview, he suddenly had to stop.

Soo-ah had grabbed his sleeve out of nowhere.

"Yes?"

"I-if it's okay, would you like to watch it together?"

"... What?"

Jung-woo looked at Soo-ah, utterly surprised at her sudden words.

Normally, under such a gaze, Soo-ah would have shied away, but today, though she flinched slightly, she held his gaze firmly.

"It's not just me overdoing it, right? Why don't you take a break too, manager?"

"That's..."

"As far as I know, Ah-yeon-unni doesn't have any schedule for a while. Super Hunter K is airing live, so isn't your schedule more open too?"

Ah-yeon did have her movie-related schedule, but it was only some acting classes at most.

The thing with Ji Yeon-hwa was still pending, but there was nothing to do about it right now.

'How does she know about my schedule?'

The thought crossed his mind, but Jung-woo just shrugged it off.

He'd neglected Soo-ah lately because of Ah-yeon and Ji Yeon-hwa, so he figured it wouldn't hurt to spend time with her for a change.

"Yeah, it might be nice to, sometimes—"

"Manager Park!!"

But before he could answer, another staff member rushed over to Jung-woo.

Soo-ah narrowed her eyes at the staffer, but the staffer didn't seem to notice at all.

"Oh, I'm about to go for the interview."

"That's not important right now!!"

Jung-woo thought he was just being hurried for the interview, but the staffer just waved his hands urgently.

"Haven't you checked the news?! A new leaked video is out!!"

"A leaked video? You mean the third mission video? That already got out, didn't it?"

"No, no! Not that!"

He tried to check on his phone, but then he remembered—he'd given it to Soo-ah.

"M-manager, here..."

When he turned, he saw Soo-ah, flustered, holding out his phone.

As the staffer had said, the news on the screen was about a newly leaked Super Hunter K video.

In this video, Baek Hojun and Shin Ah-yeon were visibly confronting Ji Yeon-hwa.

It was nothing like the ambiguous footage from before.

And in that video, there was one more hunter.

A single C-rank hunter standing among S-rank hunters.

That was Lee Soo-ah.

-------------= Clacky's Corner -------------=
【ദ്ദി(⩌ᴗ⩌)】