Chapter 1127: Welcome to Alaska (13)

It began with a news clip.

[Global superstar group NewBlack has volunteered to help repair the damage caused by the earthquake in Anchorage, Alaska. Working alongside more than six hundred fans, they completed all restoration work in just three days...]

Photos of NewBlack carrying supplies with their fans appeared on screen.

[Last night, they also held a special performance for the citizens of Anchorage. Let’s take a look.]

Blurry cellphone footage.

On screen, the NewBlack members were singing "Jingle Bells" while the citizens of Anchorage danced.

The hosts smiled as they covered the amusing story from the previous day in a lighter news segment.

[Just watching this makes you happy.]

[Yes. Apparently, several thousand people gathered for the event. Despite the festival being organized on such short notice, the response from local residents was incredibly enthusiastic.]

Everyone watching the news smiled warmly.

It’s been a while since we had a heartwarming story.

Amid news dominated by economic and social problems, this was a rare piece of good news.

A warm story reaching people who had grown weary.

A famous group and their fans coming together to do something good for the world, then celebrating with a festival.

Americans who opened social media each wrote down their thoughts.

-I saw the story about NewBlack and their fans on the news this morning. It made me start the day with a smile :)

-Whenever I see something like this amid all the garbage in the news, it makes me think there’s still hope for us.

-I felt like the world was a little better today.

-Sunny is living by the lyrics he sang in Answer. Waste no more time arguing what a good man should be, be one.

It was that uniquely soft, swelling feeling people got when they heard warm news during bleak times.

Up until then, the general reaction had been no more than, Oh, what a heartwarming story.

But the atmosphere slowly began to change as videos appeared on MyTube.

[NewBlack Anchorage Festival]

Most of them were low-quality videos filmed by ordinary people.

Yet there was something in them that stirred people’s emotions.

[Hey! Wooju! Say hi over here!]

"Hello."

It was a video uploaded by an Anchorage resident.

Amid a crowd of locals, Wooju of NewBlack had paused while hanging Christmas decorations on the wall of a shop to greet the camera.

There was something instantly likable about seeing a celebrity who seemed as though he should be traveling around in limousines doing something so ordinary, and the sight of the NewBlack members working among the people preparing the festival was wonderful to watch.

"Wow..."

It was the kind of scene people worn down by life in big cities always dreamed about.

It felt like a movie.

People in a quiet city finishing the earthquake recovery and rallying together to create a cheerful festival atmosphere.

Warm conversations passing between people as free food was handed out here and there.

Joyful music filling the streets as night gradually fell, decorations lighting up one after another until the city square transformed into a Christmas town.

"..."

It was healing just to watch.

Just as the more sensitive viewers began watching with misty eyes—

[Anchorage! Are you ready to have some fun?!]

The five members climbed onto the stage.

With no special instruments aside from the acoustic guitar strapped over Wooju’s shoulder, the performance began under his lead.

NewBlack was more captivating than anyone else in those videos.

Were they always this incredible?

It was only natural for people to think that.

Most of the performance videos being uploaded had been filmed by Souffle.

There was a reason photos taken by lovers, or pictures parents took of their babies, often looked so beautiful.

They were filled with affection.

It was also one of the reasons even a well-filmed broadcast fancam could sometimes fall short of a single video shot by a fansite photographer.

The footage Souffle had filmed with so much love looked stunning even to ordinary viewers.

And above all else...

[This song would be difficult to reproduce properly with the sound setup we have here. Let’s try it a little differently.]

[Is there anything anyone wants to hear?]

The raw, unprepared feel of the performance was wonderful.

Elaborate stages filled with dazzling lights and gorgeous costumes were impressive, but sometimes it was a raw performance like this that moved people more deeply.

Comments poured in beneath videos of NewBlack freely shaping the performance while interacting with the audience in real time.

-There are no stage effects, no powerful sound system, and no good equipment... but this is the best performance I’ve seen in 2018.

-I get chills every time I replay it.

-I think it’s incredible that people who overcame a crisis together could all come together as one for this performance.

-Watching people become one is always moving. (crying)

-I want to meet friends like that too...

The videos were shared everywhere, spreading like wildfire.

Before long, articles with titles like "Christmas in October" began appearing, making people smile.

But what truly helped the event spread far and wide was none other than a short-form video.

A clip uploaded to TikTok and other platforms.

-October Christmas

It was a brief video of the NewBlack members enthusiastically singing "Jingle Bell Rock" among people dancing happily.

As the clip rapidly spread, the news of NewBlack in Alaska soon reached nearly every ordinary person.

[Have you seen this???]

People shared it with friends through instant messages.

"Did you see this? NewBlack?"

"Oh."

It came up in everyday conversation.

The video struck directly at the emotions of Americans who named Christmas as their favorite holiday of the year.

And naturally, it also contributed to a surge of interest in NewBlack.

The graph that had leveled out again after Supernova Dodgeball began to curve upward once more, rising steeply.

"Wow..."

The TF team employees at Lemon Entertainment, who had been watching the situation from Korea, stared dumbfounded at the data sent over from the American side.

One of the TF team employees spoke.

"Like Wooju always says... this really worked?"

"It actually worked..."

"Now I understand why everyone keeps talking about going viral these days. This is more effective than any promotion."

Manager Hong Seoyoung looked over the data and said,

"In terms of promotional impact, it’s actually stronger than Supernova Dodgeball. There were too many other celebrities involved back then, so people’s attention was easily divided."

"Right."

"But this Alaska issue is focused entirely on NewBlack. You couldn’t ask for better publicity."

The situation was producing better results than any promotion NewBlack had done for so far.

The streaming trends and MyTube view counts proved it.

Yoon Seokhwan let out a disbelieving laugh.

"This was completely unexpected."

They had sent NewBlack off to film a travel reality show, only for them to return after pulling off one of the greatest promotional campaigns in history.

"Team Leader, ABC is preparing a Christmas special, and they contacted us about appearing."

"This network wants a brief talk segment about what happened..."

"We also received a request for a Christmas song collaboration. What should we do about that?"

As the American side quickly tried to capitalize on the momentum, the TF team sprang into action just as fast.

Team Leader Yoon Seokhwan smiled.

Alaska... not bad.

Then a message came in.

It was Producer Gu Jaeyoung.

[What time should we hold today’s meeting?]

Producer Gu Jaeyoung was preparing a Newniverse special involving Antarctica.

At first, Yoon Seokhwan had thought, Come on... sending the kids all the way to Antarctica...

But after seeing what happened in Alaska, he changed his mind.

Send them.

The TF team leader had learned the lesson that apparently good things happened whenever the members were sent somewhere difficult.

This reality show had been an exhausting ordeal not only for NewBlack, but for the staff as well.

"Ughhhhh..."

"Groooan..."

The reality-show staff collapsed en masse aboard the chartered plane.

After organizing the equipment, the camera operators took off their socks and massaged their feet.

"Ow..."

"Is your ankle swollen?"

"Yeah, a little."

They massaged their red, swollen ankles and helped one another apply pain-relief patches to their lower backs, upper backs, and shoulders.

Then they stared blankly into space with hollow eyes.

That was seriously exhausting.

It had already been brutal since the survival segment.

Their entire bodies were stiff from doing manual labor after being blinded by the promise of gold.

Then NewBlack decided to volunteer as well, extending the filming period.

One of the writers said,

"Wow. I really don’t think I could do this twice."

"Me neither."

"Once is enough. Next time, let’s go somewhere like a resort."

Their eyes closed on their own even while they sat still.

While some people were already nodding off, several staff members looked out the plane windows.

"Oh. Look over there."

"Hm?"

They could see a banner the citizens of Anchorage had put up.

The words were written in Korean.

[Thank you. See you again.]

The staff waved back at the citizens waving from a distance.

Someone said quietly,

"Still... this does feel nice."

"Yeah."

Was it because they were NewBlack’s reality-show staff?

Everywhere they went during this trip, the staff had been welcomed.

There had been more than one occasion when they felt awkward over receiving such generous treatment even though all they were doing was filming.

And when it was time to leave, the production crew had received many gifts from the residents.

"There are so many gifts."

"The plane’s completely full."

Even the captain and copilot blinked in surprise as they checked the amount of cargo.

The staff felt proud.

This is nice.

People felt good even when they held an elevator door for someone running toward it and received a simple "Thank you."

After being shown this level of hospitality, there was no way they could keep from smiling.

"But I’m still never doing this twice..."

"Me neither..."

Before long, NewBlack finished saying goodbye to their fans through a small fan meeting and boarded the plane.

Junghyun came aboard with his arms full of gifts from fans, while Ri Hyuk waddled in carrying an enormous teddy bear.

The producer said,

"Tired, aren’t you? You worked hard."

"It was nothing."

Jiho grinned, then collapsed into a seat with an exhausted expression, while Biju walked around checking on the staff.

"Is everyone all right? No problems?"

"Yeah. We’re fine."

Wooju, who boarded last, carefully made sure everyone on the staff was all right before smiling.

"You all worked incredibly hard. Every time we film a reality show, you always suffer so much. We nearly went skydiving, ran into sharks..."

Everyone burst out laughing.

"Seriously."

"And we definitely started in Jeju Island, right?"

"While filming season one, I remember thinking, Oh, this definitely has a season two coming. But I imagined Eastern Europe or America. I never thought we’d busk for money in Australia, then come all the way to Alaska and help with earthquake recovery..."

In many ways, it left them feeling deeply reflective.

Who could have imagined that two years after first meeting NewBlack in 2016, when they had nervously said, "Th-this is our first reality show!" they would end up together in Alaska?

The sound director joked,

"Hey, Wooju. You seriously have to make sure we get hazard pay and everything this time. And don’t forget the gold you promised us."

"Of course."

"Give mine to me as a gold coin. A huge one."

Everyone burst out laughing and nodded.

Of course, no one truly believed they would actually receive gold.

We’ll probably get a decent amount of extra pay.

Gold was not some child’s toy, and even the lumps of pyrite they had earned at the survival camp were tiny.

The staff smiled in good spirits, thinking that if Wooju spoke to him, CEO Park Gyuho might deposit a fairly generous additional payment into the production company’s account.

Even extra pay would be enough...

Their families had been terribly worried about them this time.

Still, they thought they might be able to save face by saying, "Look! This is how much I got paid!"

However...

After a long sleep, the staff arrived in

«N.o.v.e.l.i.g.h.t»

Korea and soon found themselves completely dumbfounded.

"Huh?"

"What?"

A red carpet had been laid out when they stepped into the Gimpo Airport business center.

"What is this? Why is there a red carpet?"

"Are we filming something? I didn’t hear anything about it."

"Did the American embassy or someone set it up? To thank the kids...?"

Just as their imaginations began to run wild—

Elgar’s "Pomp and Circumstance March" began to play, and a banner was unfurled in front of the red carpet.

[Thank You, Production Staff of NewBlack’s Travel Diary 3!]

NewBlack’s managers stood in front of it wearing suits.

They welcomed the production crew with delighted applause.

"...?"

"...??"

While the staff hesitated with openly suspicious expressions, the NewBlack members emerged last, pulling their suitcases behind them.

Everyone’s attention turned to them.

The producer asked,

"Guys. What is this?"

"A gift presentation ceremony."

"Gifts?"

While everyone blinked, the members stepped forward and began taking out boxes one by one.

Wooju spoke on their behalf.

"It’s been about three years since we first met, right?"

"Yeah."

"We’ve wanted to give you all a gift for a while, but we couldn’t think of anything suitable. Especially since our reality shows are several times harder than the ones other idols film."

That was not wrong.

While Street Boys went to Boracay, and TeenSpirit went to Northern Europe only to be mistaken for elementary school students...

NewBlack encountered sharks in a shark cage in Australia and filmed a survival program in Alaska.

"So, to repay you a little for all your hard work, we prepared something modest."

"Oh, you didn’t have to do all this."

Unfortunately, the tear ducts of adults who had already been beaten down by society remained as vulnerable as ever.

They’re such good kids.

This is thoughtful.

Wooju said,

"All right, please come forward one at a time. And don’t open the boxes yet."

"Okay."

Starting with the producer, everyone came forward in order and accepted a box from NewBlack.

Once even the youngest writer had received one fairly, someone asked,

"But what is this, guys?"

"We made you a promise at the Alex Corbin camp. We said we’d exchange one gram of pyrite for one gram of gold."

"You did."

"These gifts are exactly what we promised."

Everyone burst out laughing.

The pyrite they had earned as wages had only weighed a few grams, so they assumed there would be a few specks of gold dust inside.

Click.

The lids opened, and a brilliant glow burst forth.

Flaaaaash—

Reflected in the light of the oversized glow sticks the NewBlack members were all holding, the objects inside were...

"Hey... this..."

"Is this really..."

They were fairly thick gold bars.

The employees, stunned by an unexpected bonus, stared at the unofficial power behind the company that employed them.

"Wooju. This..."

"We did say we’d exchange one gram for one gram, but that would feel too stingy, wouldn’t it? So we prepared a little extra."

"..."

Moisture welled in the adults’ eyes.

Overwhelmed by the sheer power of capital, the tear ducts of adults beaten down by society finally burst.

Uh. This reaction was more than I expected...

"Sob... Honey... it’s gold. Gold."

One of the camera operators was bawling as he made a video call.

The sound director bit his lightly with his teeth, then kept twitching his cheeks in delight.

The producer stared at his in awe, murmuring, "Wow..."

"They’re happier than I expected."

"Seriously."

I had thought they would like them, but their reactions were far more intense than anticipated.

One of the directors spoke.

"Guys."

"Yes?"

"I’ll devote my life to you..."

"All of a sudden?"

It was a little bewildering, but as long as it worked, who cared?

The truth was, I had wanted to give the production staff of Travel Diary a big gift at least once.

It wasn’t as though we would meet once or twice and never see each other again.

They were people who would continue working with us throughout our careers.

It had not felt quite that way when we first filmed the Jeju Island reality show, but after living and struggling together in Australia and now Alaska, I strongly felt that these were people we would be with for a very long time.

Ri Hyuk shrugged and smiled.

"At least we wrapped everything up well."

"Yeah."

I took a deep breath and massaged my shoulders.

It finally felt as though we had properly brought this Alaska shoot, full of incidents and accidents, to an end.

"Hm?"

Flutter—

That was when I noticed a pile of papers one of the sobbing writers had dropped.

"Oh, Writer. These..."

And then—

As we crouched down to gather the scattered papers, all of us froze.

They were notes the production staff had scribbled during a meeting.

[They seem to make better television when there are obstacles??]

[Travel destination recommended by camera director: Amazon (apparently has documentary experience)]

[Mongolia??? Horseback riding across the plains]

[Search for remote places around the world]

Our eyes narrowed as we stared at the notes, which were overflowing with malicious intent to send us somewhere terrible.

Then our gazes met the staff members watching us.

"..."

"..."

The staff shook their heads.

"We already accepted them."

"We’re not giving them back."

We stared at the people clutching their gold bars tightly to their chests with expressions of utter betrayal.