Chapter 28: 28

“I don’t know about that. It’s not that I’m still actively in love with her. I just have residual feelings for her. No, to be honest, I don’t know.” Woo-Jin shook his head, not knowing how to explain how he felt.

Truth be told, if Lee So-Hyun were to tell him ‘Let’s date again,’ then in his current emotional state, he would probably agree. In fact, he would be more than happy to do so, triggering the love he had for her in the past to surface once more and devoting it to her.

However, regardless of how he felt, rationality was stopping him from doing so. Even if they were to date again, it would only be because he was caught up in his delusion of wanting to revive his feelings for his first love; the pure and innocent love he had for her in the past was no longer there.

Nonetheless, his heart was telling him something else. Will I ever meet a girl who I’ll love as much as I loved her? If I can’t love anyone else as much, then there’s no reason for me not to love her again.

“Are you okay, Mr. Woo-Jin?” asked Kang Ho-Soo, who went up to him, studying his expression. He had been following Woo-Jin the entire time while keeping a distance.

In the questionnaire that Kang Ho-Soo had given Woo-Jin the other day, one of the questions was about his first love or girlfriend. Woo-Jin had answered the question honestly. There would be nothing beneficial about hiding his past from his manager, and he did not want to hide the relationship he had with her by lying about it.

That’s why Kang Ho-Soo, who had been quietly observing what had happened, knew who she was immediately. On the surface, they looked like classmates who were greeting each other after running into each other by chance. However, there was hidden tension and excitement between them.

This is not good, not good at all. Kang Ho-Soo muttered to himself as he went up to Woo-Jin. When Chae Woo-Jin signed the contract with the agency, he had removed the clause pertaining to the prohibition on dating. This was because according to his past experience, he was rather defiant in the face of that rule. If he was in a relationship, he would try to hide it to the best of his abilities, but he strongly insisted that he hated any bans that were placed on his personal life. Hence, as his manager, Kang Ho-Soo had no choice but to pay close attention to Woo-Jin’s love life.

“I’m fine. Also, it’s not going to happen right now,” replied Woo-Jin.

Perhaps Woo-Jin knew what Kang Ho-Soo was worrying about because he shook his head at Kang Ho-Soo. It was not going to happen yet. Even if he were to start dating again, whether it be with Lee So-Hyun or someone else, it was not going to happen right now. The reason why Lee So-Hyun wanted to break up with Woo-Jin had not been unraveled, and that itself was holding him back. Regardless of who he dated, the experience of losing somebody once because of the harsh reality was more than enough.

Kang Ho-Soo, who had not formed any trust or emotional bonds with Woo-Jin yet, did not understand what Woo-Jin was trying to say. However, he had understood that Woo-Jin had no desire to date right now, and so, he was relieved. Hyun-Min was the only one who sensed that Woo-Jin was open to the possibility of dating her again, causing him to be unhappy.

“Since we’re not in the best of moods, let’s go somewhere for a drink,” suggested Hyun-Min hastily. He thought that they might see Lee So-Hyun again if they continued to linger here.

“It’s still daytime, though?” said Kang Ho-Soo. Seeing him rather taken aback by the idea of day-drinking, Hyun-Min looked pitifully at him. Instead of elaborating and explaining, Hyun-Min poked Woo-Jin in the ribs.

“We don’t drink when we meet with our friends. Most of us can’t hold our liquor,” said Woo-Jin.

“It’s not that we can’t hold our liquor – we just don’t drink!” exclaimed Hyun-min.

“If you throw up after you drink, then you can’t hold your liquor.”

Woo-Jin, who had quickly regained his composure, placed his arm over Hyun-Min’s shoulder and smiled at Kang Ho-Soo.

“In that sense, let’s go grab a drink. There’s a cafe nearby that has really good coffee”

“The cafe had closed down,” said Hyun-Min.

“What? You’re lying!”

“Other cafes started springing up in the area and caused competition to intensify, so they had to bring down their prices and it eventually went bust. That cafe used expensive coffee beans, so they couldn’t lower their prices,” Hyun-Min recounted sadly, as he recalled how bitter he had felt after finding out they had closed when he tried to visit the cafe a while ago with his girlfriend.

He could not hide his disappointment as he told Woo-Jin that one of the part-time staff had been very pretty. Regardless of whether he had a girlfriend or not, it was still the truth.

Instead of going to the cafe, they picked a restaurant that was frequented by female students. Being surrounded by couples and women, their table was the only one where there were only men. In some sense, they had achieved their goal, because they received a lot of attention.

~

After seeing Death Hill’s trailer airing on TV, which had been shared on the internet first, Woo-Jin suddenly became depressed. Of course, he hadn’t been expecting much since he did not know whether he was a minor character or a supporting character, and he had only done a few more days of additional shooting.

Nonetheless, it seemed like he ended up having some expectations because of Director Moon’s praises and constant reassurance that he did not have anything to worry about when it came to editing, since he was a bit disappointed after seeing that he could barely make out his back in the trailer.

Upon hearing that Woo-Jin had signed a contract with DS, Director Moon Seung-Kwon contacted him first. Even when they had a meal together, the director had not said anything else to Woo-Jin; the entire time, he merely told Woo-Jin to look forward to the box office opening. However, now that it was just around the corner, Woo-Jin felt left out.

In any case, Woo-Jin had a special affection towards loan shark A. While it was his first role in a movie, A’s twisted and selfish character was extremely charming that it left a strong impression. As he agonized over the character analysis, and plunging into despair, it had also given him an opportunity to understand his past lives. While it was not a character that was cool or beautiful, as gruesome as it was, it was a very memorable one.

“But supporting characters, no, minor characters don’t even get tickets to the premiere…”

Woo-Jin was well-aware that he had no place in the press conference or the pre-premiere interview. The actors who played the male and female leads, as well as the other main characters, were so famous and popular that they had no reason to send a rookie there to promote the movie.

Death Hill’s press preview was going to be held tomorrow, and the VIP preview was happening on the following Monday, but Woo-Jin had not been given a ticket to any of the previews. Even though he did not expect the production company to contact him to take part in the publicity of the movie, it still made him feel a little sad to be treated as a nobody.

“That’s why it’s important to make it big.”

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For celebrities, even taking on minor roles or making a cameo appearance would make them a topic of discussion. To highlight their differences further, in this case, those celebrities were invited to the premiere and would get to be interviewed, while real cast members like him who had actual roles to play were treated like they were nothing. Naturally, he couldn’t help but feel disappointed.

Fortunately, Woo-Jin had not told his friends and family that he had acted in Death Hill, and so, he felt relieved. Judging from the vibes he got from the trailer, it seemed as though they had decided that A would be a minor character, rather than a supporting one. If his family were to watch the movie with great anticipation and see that Woo-Jin had only appeared in a few scenes, they would definitely be disappointed as well. Besides, only a few people had known that Chae Woo-Jin would be appearing in this movie. If Woo-Jin kept his mouth shut about it and only talked about Glooming Day, he figured that his family would not know about it. An amusing thought came to his mind: At this rate, people are going to mistakenly think that Glooming Day is my debut film.

Even though he was depressed, it gave him a reality check. Just because he was cast in two movies and signed a contract with DS, it did not mean that he had become a star right away. Realizing that once again, Woo-Jin thought, "Some things take time. I should not rush or be disheartened so easily. It would be greedy of me to expect myself to succeed right from the get go."

Woo-Jin felt that the best thing for him to do was to train and physically condition himself according to the program put in place for him by his agency and followed it diligently. After going through an intense training session with his personal trainer, he was dragged to the spa by Hwang Yi-Young, his beauty stylist, to get a massage.

“You are blessed with good skin, so you don't need any other treatment. By the way, your nose is real, huh? When the staff saw you for the first time, we talked among ourselves saying that you must have gotten a nose job, but now that I’m touching it, it’s really your natural-born nose. Mr. Woo-Jin, you should truly thank your parents.”

The beauty technician was full of admiration when she looked at Woo-Jin’s skin and facial features. When comparing him to the celebrities that she had taken care of, none of them could even come close to Woo-Jin in terms of having good skin. On top of that, his perfect facial features were completely natural, making him even more special.

That’s why she was rather nervous when she carried out the beauty treatment on Chae Woo-Jin. If she were to make a mistake and ruin his perfect skin, she was afraid of the consequences she had to face. Not only did she carefully select the products to use on him, she also had to meticulously check the patch testing she had done on his skin.

“Well, I’ve seen Mr. Woo-Jin’s mother and sister. They resemble each other a lot. Everyone can tell they’re a family.”

“Really?”

“Yes. His mother looks very elegant and beautiful. Mr. Woo-Jin will look amazing too, when he gets older.” The beauty stylist, Hwang Yi-Young, continued the conversation with the beauty technician, instead of Woo-Jin, who could only listen quietly because of his face mask.

This famous beauty spa in Gangnam was the go-to place for all kinds of people. Famous people, including celebrities, as well as rich people, were their main customer base. Their customer service and management were top-notch, but it had unwittingly become a hotbed for rumors. In other words, the first impression he made there was of great importance. This was because the evaluations of the staff, who called themselves experts and the likes, would lead to rumors, especially when there were suspicions of plastic surgery. Nowadays, once a celebrity was suspected of having done any plastic surgery, people would not believe any refutation, even if they were to take an x-ray of their heads and show it to the world.

For someone like Chae Woo-Jin who had perfect facial features, it was difficult to avoid suspicions when it came to plastic surgery. His features were so perfect that even Hwang Yi-Young had asked him where he had gotten his surgery done when she first met Woo-Jin because it looked so natural and flawless.

As such, it was expected to a certain degree that some self-proclaimed experts would run their mouths. That’s why it would be good for them to bring the ones who gossiped the most over to his side since they were the source of the rumors. Fortunately, they had succeeded in recruiting a talented and influential person like her in this field as his personal beauty technician.

“By the way, Woo-Jin seems to have gained some weight on his face, so please pay attention to the chin area. It’ll be bad if our dear Woo-Jin gets a double chin, so please rub it with more strength.”

“I don’t see any fat. You’re demanding!”

Hwang Yi-Young deliberately pointed to the chin while talking about the non-existent fat under his chin. Perhaps people working in this field had something in common; the beauty technician quickly understood what Hwang Yi-Young meant. She was trying to highlight the fact that Woo-Jin had a naturally small face without the help of any jaw surgery, and that she did not have to be too careful with it.

“Mr. Woo-Jin, you truly need to thank your parents multiple times.”

While Woo-Jin had always been grateful to his mother, he did not feel the same way towards his father. So whenever the beauty technician talked about his parents, he felt uncomfortable. It would be easy for him to find out information about his father, whose face he could barely remember now, but he did not feel the need to. Nonetheless, one day, he would have to talk about his family in an interview and he had yet to decide what he would say about his parents when that time came.

Well, his mother would be remarrying soon after all, so naturally, he would have a father after that. Woo-Jin finally felt relieved after summarizing his family relations in a simple manner - two parents and a younger sister. It was as though he had completed a difficult assignment. He made up his mind that he would not be including his biological father in his answers to the countless questions he would be asked about his parents in the future. Besides, that was something his biological father would want as well – to continue living like they did not know each other just like they had been doing up until now. Woo-Jin, who had become more at ease, fell into deep slumber at some point during the conversation between the beauty technician and Hwang Yi-Young.

***

Meanwhile, DS’ CEO, Jang Su-Hwan was smiling happily as he looked at the reviews that were posted after the press preview of Death Hill.

<A story that could only be told by Director Moon Seung-Kwon. He remains a legend.>

<The revival of Kang Hee-Joo. Her lack of discerning eye is no longer a cause for concern.>

<The movie was almost perfect. If only the male lead, who had mistakenly thought himself as the female lead, was taken out. Nevertheless, the second half of the movie was worth watching, but that’s about it.>

<Why doesn’t the male lead appear in the second half of the movie? The male lead, to me, is the unknown actor.>

<The movie has the perfect scenario, a pitiful but strong female lead, clean and sophisticated directing and editing, and last but not least, a beautiful and perfect supporting character that should have been the male lead. There’s only one thing that ruined the movie. I want to know who exactly casted the male lead.>

<Park Min had had nothing going for him apart from his good looks. But he paled in comparison to the unknown actor even in the looks department. Additionally, it’s a story that does not let its viewers understand why A-Ra chose the male lead. The movie was only good during the scenes with the unknown actor.>

<Three out of five stars. Why? What kind of main lead would XXX (spoiler) in the middle of the movie? When it came to the passion and love for Ara, looks, screen presence, acting skills, and action scenes, the male lead paled in comparison to the other actor. I don’t understand why the female lead ended up with him. So, only three stars.>

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~

The movie was generally well-received. There was not a shadow of doubt that it would be the movie of this summer. The only flaw of the movie was the male lead, Park Min. He was originally criticized for his acting, but now, people were criticizing his looks too. Additionally, although it had not been explicitly mentioned yet, people had been starting to talk about Chae Woo-Jin’s role. Critics and entertainment journalists who had attended the premiere were unanimously showing their interest in ‘The Unknown Actor’, who had overwhelmed the viewers with his beauty and irresistible charm.

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