Chapter 108 – Conflicting Interests
Inside the first-year Comic Creation Department classroom.
“Class president, what’s wrong with those two?”
“Hmm…….”
During break time, the kids kept glancing at one side.
“Ughhhhh…… I’m trashhhhh.”
“Damn it.”
Oh Dong-gyo and Kim Rok-hee were both clutching their heads and acting like they were dying.
Class president Song Hyun-hee adjusted her glasses and shook her head slowly.
“Probably because their serialization prep isn’t going well.”
“Serialization? You mean that webtoon thing they’re doing at Bluehouse?”
“Yeah, it’s their first time preparing for official serialization.”
“Hmm, but both of them are good at comics, right?”
“Long-form and short-form are completely different territories.”
“I see…….”
Surprisingly, Class President Song Hyun-hee’s words were exactly right.
Oh Dong-gyo and Kim Rok-hee.
The problem the two were facing right now was precisely that.
‘I have no idea what to do after chapter 3.’
‘Long-term goal, long-term goooal…… I don’t know anything about that!’
Both of them had managed to create decent manuscripts for chapters 1 through 3, but everything after that was the issue.
- Writer-nim, regarding the proposal you sent this time. There are some parts that concern me……
- If you proceed like this, problems will arise when you continue the serialization.
Assistant Editor Pan Hee-hyun from Bluehouse was stricter about reviewing the project than they expected.
But even if they wanted to argue, everything she said was 100% correct, so they had no choice but to accept it.
Therefore, unlike their vague belief that things would somehow work out once serialization started.
The two of them now……
‘Is my ability just not enough?’
‘At this rate, it feels like I won’t be able to draw a long-form series.’
They were realizing their own limits almost in real time.
At this point, instinct told them clearly.
If they started recklessly here, there was a 50000% chance of disaster, the serialization falling apart, and a “dropped midway” ending.
Once again, they thought……
‘Kang Min-hyuk and Han Yu-ra. Just what the hell are those two!’
‘Monsters.’
It was the moment they truly, concretely realized just how monstrous the Kang-Han duo’s genius was.
But while the two were drowning in despair like that.
The person in question, Kang Min-hyuk, wasn’t having an easy time either.
“Ughhhhh, ughhh…….”
Kang Min-hyuk sat at his desk scribbling something in his sketchbook.
Dark circles filled the area under his eyes, and his cheeks were sunken.
The reason Min-hyuk was in such terrible shape was……
Because he was running like crazy toward finishing Brave King by December to aim for the Bucheon Comic Awards.
On top of handling all the school assignments, he had to produce almost twice the usual number of manuscript pages……
His physical condition was completely falling apart.
‘Is sheer willpower not enough after all?’
He had thought he could do it.
But his wrists were aching and his eyes felt dry and gritty.
If he was already like this in September, running at this pace until December was simply impossible.
With the situation like this, all sorts of thoughts crossed his mind.
‘I miss Oh Seung-heon.’
He desperately missed Oh Seung-heon, who had been his assistant in the early days of Brave King.
Just having someone handle the pen lines, screentones, and inking alone could save 20~30% of the time.
But that was an impossible daydream.
Because Oh Seung-heon……
- Yo, I passed the planning meeting! They said we can start serialization next month!
- Congrats. You’re officially a pro comic artist now.
Unlike Oh Dong-gyo and Kim Rok-hee, who were still struggling at the planning stage, Seung-heon had gone straight into serialization.
Since he was doing a gag comic that didn’t need a long-term plan to carry it forward, and they had agreed to serialize ‘Earth-Destroying Level Gag Impact’ as it was, there were no problems at all.
‘Damn it, but I can’t bring in someone else as an assistant either…….’
Physically, the only people Kang Min-hyuk could work with were students belonging to Animation High.
Paying fair compensation to school kids and hiring them as assistants didn’t seem impossible if he got permission from the school and teachers.
It could be approached as a form of industry-academia cooperation.
However, there were two big problems with that.
First, to do this, Min-hyuk would have to reveal that he was David to the other person.
Unless it was someone like Dong-gyo or Rok-hee who already knew the truth, he would have to publicly reveal it to recruit assistants.
‘That alone is already a problem…….’
And the issues didn’t end there.
Second, there weren’t many kids who had the skill level worth trusting as an assistant in the first place.
The only ones who satisfied both conditions were Rok-hee and Dong-gyo, but……
‘Both of them are busy preparing their own new works.’
In the end, only one choice remained for Kang Min-hyuk.
Double manuscript fever time, chosen by himself.
Endure with pure grit and willpower!
Heavy sighs kept leaking out of Kang Min-hyuk’s mouth.
***
Evening free drawing time, inside the counseling room.
Oh Dong-gyo and Teacher Choi Jung-an sat side by side, talking.
“So you’re stuck at this part?”
“Yes…… After one episode ends, you need a new goal, right? I barely managed to come up with one and finished it, but how am I supposed to come up with the next one? How did you handle serialization, Teacher?”
“Well, that’s something that becomes possible once you accumulate experience and intuition…….”
“Haha, experience and intuition…… experience…….”
Dong-gyo had come to the counseling room because of his new work.
He was preparing a male-oriented romance, the so-called harem genre……
Unlike the works he had drawn before, he was struggling to set up a long-term plan from the beginning to the end of the story, so he had asked for counseling.
However, what Teacher Choi Jung-an could say about this was very limited.
“Think about what you want to say in this work and what makes it fun.”
“I just…… wanted to draw pretty girls, I think.”
“Ugh, then it’s going to be tough.”
Dong-gyo was quite outstanding in terms of drawing skill.
He also had a talent for handling character ‘codes’ when dealing with genres he liked.
But……
‘He’s never done a long-form before, so this problem appeared.’
Whether he could actually serialize it was an entirely different story.
In fact, just by reading the proposal Dong-gyo brought, Jung-an could tell.
‘There’s no…… overarching purpose running through the work.’
If he started the work like this, it was obvious that the serialization would fall apart or the development would become a mess within a few chapters.
It was only natural that it wouldn’t pass Bluehouse’s planning stage.
“For now, focus on what I told you today and rewrite the proposal from the beginning, Dong-gyo.”
“Yeees…….”
The problem was that Dong-gyo wasn’t the only one facing this situation.
“Teacher, at this rate, am I really not going to be able to serialize it?”
“Hey, let’s cheer up, Rok-hee. If you refine it a little more at the planning stage, you’ll be able to do it.”
“But I can’t think of anything! I just want to draw pretty clothes and cute characters…… How am I supposed to think about the story 30 or 50 chapters later!”
Kim Rok-hee was suffering from the exact same problem as Dong-gyo.
Jung-an had given them various pieces of advice, but even after several counseling sessions, their fundamental issues remained unsolved.
In this situation, both the students preparing the works and Jung-an, who was helping them, felt equally frustrated.
Of course, one way to solve the problem immediately would be for Jung-an to set the overall direction of the project and have them follow it……
‘But that won’t do.’
Jung-an knew it well.
Drawing comics is an extremely difficult and grueling marathon.
Every week you feel like you’re being roasted in hellfire. To carry a work that isn’t truly yours—all the way to the end and do it ‘well’?
That was impossible from the start.
It would clearly have a negative impact on the two kids’ growth as comic artists too.
While Jung-an was tapping the desk with her fingers and pondering, Rok-hee flopped down like a jellyfish and said.
“Teacher, how did you manage long-form serialization…….”
“Well, I learned it under the department head.”
“Huh? The department head?”
“Around five years ago, when he was serializing, I was his student assistant. I learned a lot back then. From methods to carry a story long-term to various techniques and mindsets. Even I couldn’t even imagine doing long-form back then.”
“Oh…… even you, Teacher?”
“Yeah, of course. Who starts off doing everything perfectly?”
Jung-an smiled faintly.
Then Rok-hee tapped her lips with her finger and asked.
“What about Yu-ra and Min-hyuk?”
“Ahem, those two are just weird.”
“……So that’s how it is?”
“Obviously.”
Story, character design, drawing, handling various materials and manuscripts, coordination with the editorial department, and so on.
Since comics are a composite art, there are many different qualities one must possess.
Asking high school freshmen to have all these abilities at a ‘pro’ level would be harsh.
That was exactly why Min-hyuk and Yu-ra, who were doing all of this so effortlessly, were the strange ones.
‘There are those kinds of people sometimes…… geniuses who are far outside the category of normal humans.’
From the very first time she saw Brave King, why had Jung-an been so shocked and certain that the Korean comic industry would be turned upside down?
It was because the scent of a true pro wafted so strongly from that work.
Of course, that didn’t mean Dong-gyo and Rok-hee had no talent.
The two of them were also shining kids with outstanding talent.
It was just that if Dong-gyo and Rok-hee possessed the talent of one in ten thousand, then in the case of Yu-ra and Min-hyuk……
‘It feels like one in a million…….’
Genuine outliers who existed outside ordinary common sense.
If you used those two as the standard for comparison, there was no way an answer would come out.
“For now, take the feedback I gave you and rewrite the proposal from the beginning, Rok-hee. Don’t be too impatient. Take it slow and relaxed…… and you’ll be able to solve it.”
“Yes, Teacher.”
In the end, all Jung-an could do was send Rok-hee back with this kind of general advice.
Creak.
After Rok-hee also left, the counseling room became completely empty.
“Huuu, this is frustrating.”
Jung-an lay down with her arms on the desk and swept her hair back.
A strange sense of helplessness washed over her.
She was their teacher and homeroom teacher, yet she couldn’t help the kids this much.
‘I…… was lucky.’
Suddenly, the days when she worked in Department Head Ma Dong-hyun’s studio came to mind.
- Teacher, may I ask why you put this scene in the storyboard?
- Because inserting this kind of desire here creates room to operate the character later. For example……
Back then, she had asked endless questions.
What the teacher was thinking when making the work, what techniques were needed for long-form, what kind of mindset a pro should have.
Even though the questions of a skill-less beginner writer must have been annoying, the teacher shared his know-how without the slightest sign of irritation.
And that wasn’t all.
- Jung-an, how about rebuilding the work around this character’s story? I think the atmosphere would change quite a bit.
- Hmm, that sounds good. I’ll try it!
Whenever Jung-an brought his work or storyboard, the teacher gave sincere and heartfelt feedback.
It would not be an exaggeration to say that the experiences from that time created the comic artist Choi Jung-an of today.
‘If Dong-gyo and Rok-hee could also go through that kind of process…… it would really help them.’
But there was no way that could happen.
There was no one in the school right now who could provide that kind of space and experience—.
‘……Or is there?’
Suddenly, one thought flashed through Jung-an’s mind.
The only way for Dong-gyo and Rok-hee to absorb experience points and grow as quickly as possible.
The problem was that doing this would require the cooperation of ‘that person’……
While Jung-an was stroking her chin in thought.
Knock knock knock!
“Who is it?”
“Teacher, it’s me, Min-hyuk…… Can I get some counseling for a moment?”
In an instant, Choi Jung-an’s eyes widened round.
‘Speak of the tiger and he appears.’
The ‘that person’ Jung-an had been thinking of was none other than the student right in front of him—Kang Min-hyuk.
“Ahem, come in.”
“Ughhhh…….”
The door opened and Kang Min-hyuk staggered in wearily.
For a moment, Jung-an wondered if a zombie was walking in.
Min-hyuk’s appearance was that wretched.
As Min-hyuk plopped down heavily in the chair, Choi Jung-an asked with a worried face.
“Are you okay, Min-hyuk?”
“I-I’m fine. I just didn’t sleep much last night. Ha, hahaha…….”
“Ugh, so…… what brings you here?”
Kang Min-hyuk hesitated for a long time, lips twitching, before he finally spoke.
“I’m sorry, Teacher. It looks like…… I won’t be able to keep my promise.”
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