Rebirth: King to Superstar

Chapter 82 - Drama

Joon-won and the rest were watching the performance from backstage. The story was simple. It was about a prince who was betrayed by his own father as a sacrifice for the greater 'good'. But he survived because of a minister played by Kar Jung and was sent away to live by him. Kar Jung was one of the few who opposed the ritual and as a minister, he couldn't let anyone know he went against the king's desire by saving the prince. 

After that accident, it's a typical story of revenge through gaining strength in the dark. The prince who grows hatred for the kingdom gets trained by one of Kar Jung's men and becomes an assassin. He builds his own assassin clan under a different name and looks. 

After the organization became famous and caught the eyes of many people and even the king, he took action against the people who supported the king first. As the number of ministers and other noble families who got assassinated increased the panic among the people in the royal court also increased. 

Kar Jung, who knew about everything, was the insider the prince trusted and got most of the information from. The king hatched a plan as he doubted there was a traitor among the people near him and found out it was Kar Jung. He kept Kar Jung on death row to lure out the one behind him. 

The prince who learned of this hatched his own plan to kill everyone and also save Kar Jung. He killed every royal family member, including his own mom, who supported him from the front to have him killed. He didn't bother to leave his siblings or anyone else, and this was unknown to the king who was overseeing the execution. 

By the time he felt something was wrong, he noticed the prince walking up to the execution platform and was shocked. The prince killed everyone in his path before saving Kar Jung and even killing his own father. After that, he didn't bother to take over the throne and continued to expand his organization, which he built with his own efforts. 

That was the entire story. The story seemed pretty generic and normal, but it was also interesting at the same time. Joon-won who saw this drama remembered something similar from his old world. Before their kingdom ruled over the others, due to his wife's power, there was another kingdom nearby that was facing a huge revolt from a bastard child of the king. 

That kingdom was the first to go down in his wife's conquest, and she eventually went on to take out every person who dared to go against them. She left the people who surrendered and killed the fake people. As she was doing that, he was still her fiance and was learning under the king about administration. The husband and wife split the duties of the kingdom. He was in charge of the kingdom ruling from within while she took care of everything related to outside the kingdom. That was how the kingdom was peaceful.

He looked out towards the audience and saw how excited most of them were while watching the drama. Most of the audience were either middle-aged men or senior citizens. He could barely find any young people who looked around his age. It was understandable why it was like that. Most of the modern generation were more interested in movies than watch a drama. Movies were much more convenient to watch compared to a drama where they had to be present on a particular day to catch it. 

He looked at the backstage and saw most of the people were moving around with props n their hands or the actors running to get to their places so that they could enter the stage when needed. He thought about the days of him being a drama artist and how short-handed they were. Each person in their group had to at least take up 2 tasks so that the drama could go smoothly. 

The drama ended by 5 and the audience slowly left the theatre. Now it was only the workers left and they closed the theatre fr any outsiders before starting to clean up the whole place. Joon-won helped them by carrying a few props to the huge container they had behind the building. The container was huge, and they neatly placed many of the props on shelves inside. 

After another one hour, everyone was in the theatre with San Min on stage. She looked at all the people working under her sitting in their seats and nodded before saying. 

"Alright, guys. Today was a hectic day, like every Sunday. But we managed to pull it off once again. Both of our shows sold out completely and we made a huge profit once again. I'll transfer some bonus to you guys by the end of today." As soon as she finished her words, the crowd went berserk and everyone clapped with happiness. Who wouldn't be happy with more money?

"Alright Alright. The audience seemed to be quite satisfied with our performance and the rating for this drama was an 8 out of 10." The crowd cheered once again after knowing the result. Every drama house would get assessed by evaluators like how movies getting ratings and are published online. A rating of 8 was pretty good and was stable for a big theatre like theirs. 

"Now, with that out of the way, I booked a whole restaurant at our usual place to celebrate. So those who have the rest of the day free can join." The cheering continued as San Min got off stage. Joon-won looked at Gim Tae beside him, as he didn't know what the party was about. Most of the people got up from their seats and were already exiting the place. 

Gim Tae noticed his confusion and said, "Oh. right. You don't know the theatre routine. If your drama house performs well and the feedback is good enough, the boss will host a wrap-up party for the week in a nearby restaurant. It's a 3-star restaurant and is pretty famous, so the food is amazing. You shouldn't miss it."

Joon-won nodded and asked, "How do we get there?" 

"Well, some people take the cab, while some just walk there. We all mostly walk there." 

Joon-won nodded and their group also exited the place. The entire front area of the theatre was filled with the workers making their way towards the restaurant. Most of them were using their own vehicles while some were walking towards the restaurant. 

Joon-won and their group were about to start walking towards the restaurant before a car stopped beside them. It was Kar Jung's car. Inside it was San min and Kar Jung. 

Kar Jung waved his hand through the hand and said, "Get in Joon-won. Let's talk while we get there." San Min also nodded and invited him into the car. 

Joon-won looked around him before Gim Tae pushed him towards the car and said, "You come with the boss and we will meet there. We all are going towards the same destination, anyway." Joon-won nodded and got in the car before Kar Jung drives away. 

Joon-won looked at Kar Jung and San Min, who were sitting at the front, and asked, "Was it really needed for both of you to come up and invite me? We could have talked about whatever you wanted to say in the restaurant."

Kar Jung started to laugh and San Min said, "It was his idea, not mine." putting all the blame on Kar Jung. Joon-won turned towards the old man driving the car and asked, "Why did you call me, Old man." raising his voice a little in the last two words.

Kar Jung immediately snapped back at him when he heard that, "Boy, are you trying to provoke me? I'm still very much in my youth and you are calling me an old man? You'll get a beating from me." raising one hand from the wheel to show his clenched fist. 

San Min immediately snapped at him when she saw him doing that, "Kar Jung, hands on the wheel. And what are you shouting for? I can even see those grey hairs you desperately trying to hide. So, Shut up." 

Joon-won looked at San Min and was surprised a little at how close the two were. It almost seemed like both were friends. Kar Jung was only a few years older than her. He didn't tell anything about his thoughts and simply looked at both of them again. 

Kar Jung noticed his stare and said, "So, what did you think of today? We were good, right? My acting was probably the best." 

Joon-won shrugged and said, "I mean, it was like how I expected it to be. Your drama house is one of the top in the entire world and if you guys couldn't even draw that much audience and perform like that, I would think it's a scam."