A few days later.
On the day Andrew was leaving for Korea.
Fidgeting with the passport that had the business class ticket to Korea Gyeong Chanhyeon reserved tucked inside, Andrew waited for his flight.
“Hm…”
Just then, a little kid and a man who looked like the kid’s father passed right in front of him.
“Dad! Buy that for me.”
“Ice cream?”
“Yeah! I want to eat that!”
“If I buy it for you, will you give Dad a kiss?”
At the man’s words, the little kid broke into a shy smile and nodded vigorously.
Watching their backs as they grew farther away, Andrew let out a deep sigh.
Ring!
At the sudden phone notification, Andrew flinched and rummaged through his pocket.
Evelyn.
At the name of his ex-wife, Andrew took a deep breath once, then carefully answered.
“Hello?”
—Oh, Andrew. You haven’t left yet, right?
At Evelyn’s warm voice, a smile spread at the corner of Andrew’s mouth.
But as if he did not want to show it, he answered in a flat voice.
“Yeah. Why?”
—No, it’s just, you said you’re going to Korea to film. I went and got a tarot reading. You go crazy for this kind of thing again.
“Hm… ‘go crazy’ is a bit much…”
—Then I won’t tell you? I went to a place that’s supposed to be really accurate.
At Evelyn’s words, Andrew fell silent for a moment, as if flustered.
—You’re really not curious?
“Just tell me once.”
At Andrew’s reaction, Evelyn let out a hearty laugh and said,
—Your tarot reading came out really weird. Even the person reading it frowned.
“What…? What is it?”
—You said to tell you once. Your voice sounds really curious.
When Evelyn teased him like that, Andrew shook his head, made a defeated face, and said,
“If it came out weird, how could anyone not be curious? So what is it?”
—Says you’re going to meet a hugely lucky benefactor soon. And that person will lead you to good fortune too, apparently.
“A benefactor…?”
Andrew asked with a frown.
—Yeah. A benefactor! They said it’s someone who’ll be a huge help to your life.
“There’s no such thing.”
—But the nonsense “law of the total amount of luck” you believe in exists?
At Evelyn’s words, Andrew frowned.
“I’m telling you, that one is real.”
—Who knows, maybe this one’s real too? You’re the one who believes tarot more than I do.
“That’s true, but… if they just say ‘benefactor’ out of nowhere with no hint, how do I know if it’s a con artist?”
At Andrew’s words, Evelyn clicked her tongue playfully.
—That’s why I asked for a hint too.
“Huh…? What is it?”
[ This is an announcement. Asian Air Flight 147 to the Republic of Korea will be departing shortly, so passengers who have not yet boarded…]
“Huh? Damn it!”
—What, what happened?
“I’m going to be late for my flight. Damn it. I lost track of time…”
Andrew hurriedly grabbed the backpack he had prepared separately and shoved his passport into his pocket.
—Good grief. Hurry up. The hint is…
Rip!
“Damn it!”
When the strap suddenly snapped, Andrew frowned, holding the bag in one hand and his phone in the other.
“What the hell is this….”
—…eats a lot….
Without Evelyn’s voice properly even reaching his ears, Andrew barely made it to the gate entrance and boarded the plane.
Finally seated, he looked at his phone, thinking he would call Evelyn back, but there was no battery.
“What did she say again… damn it. Nothing goes right.”
Starting several days before Andrew arrived in Korea, I was so busy I felt like even having two bodies would not be enough.
I had to check on Taylor’s CG side, and I had to make sure to confirm Art Director Kim Juri’s props as well.
Production design that could recreate the background of my script without being off by even an inch.
For that, I threw myself into work like a madman until sweat soaked my feet.
“Hoo….”
And today.
The day the crew and actors would gather for the first time after the production design reached a level where filming could begin.
Maybe because there was still plenty of time, most people had not arrived yet.
“What, no one’s here?”
Junseong, behind me, said.
“There’s still time.”
“They’ve all gotten slack. Slack. Back in my day, I mean… huh? You came early, warmed up by talking work!”
“Jinsu hyung is coming today too, right?”
“…”
The cinematographer for this film was Park Jinsu again.
When I called to recruit him, Jinsu hyung answered as if he had been waiting.
‘Hey, you! It feels like yesterday we worked out together at Cannes and you already have a new project? You don’t rest? You’ll die early like that! Take it easy!’
He started joking like that, but at the words “space opera,” his voice filled with doubt.
Still, the amount was far too big to refuse, so we could work together again this time too.
“Except Jinsu hyung. Huh? Taylor. Isn’t this too American minded just because she’s American? I know she’s capable, but if she came to Korea, she should get patched properly the Korean way! Drill manners into her…”
Knock, knock.
Right on cue, with the sound of the meeting room door being knocked, Taylor entered with a bright smile. Nick followed behind and closed the door.
“Hello! Director Gyeong! PD!”
At the sight of Taylor, Junseong glanced at me as if flustered, then forced an awkward smile and said,
“Ah, yes. Haha. Taylor, long time no see. Nick too.”
So where did the Junseong who was just talking about “Korean style patching” go?
Seeing him like that, I could not help laughing.
“Did something funny happen?”
When Taylor asked, Junseong pinched my thigh and, gritting his teeth, said,
“Hey, buddy. You’d better stay quiet.”
“That hurts. You lunatic.”
When the two of us spoke in Korean, Taylor tilted her head.
“Haha, it’s nothing. But you came really early, didn’t you? There’s still quite a bit of time left.”
“Ah! Hehe. Yes. Today the staff are eating separately, and Nick and I tried ordering something called ‘delivery’ on our own for the first time because we were coming here, right? But it came way faster than we expected! We figured we’d have plenty of time, like we’d budget an hour, but it came in ten minutes, so we ate and came right away… It was kind of an awkward time to start work, you know.”
A pointless swell of national pride rose up, and without realizing it I smiled, and a warm mood continued.
“How’s the CG team atmosphere? The results seem fine, but…”
When I asked her carefully, she answered with a bright smile.
“It’s good. The team members we hired are diligent people, and their understanding of rotoscoping and tracking is really high. The designers are doing even better than what you sketched out, Director.”
“That’s a relief.”
“But Andrew is confirmed as Nixroad, right?”
“Yes. That’s right.”
At my answer, she looked at me with a slightly uneasy expression.
“Is there a problem?”
“There’s something that programmer from The Lord of the Rings told me about Andrew that’s been bothering me…”
“…?”
What she told me was something I already knew.
Something you could figure out after meeting him for about two days.
A twisted personality and a blunt way of speaking.
And with it, worry that he often blows up in anger.
“So you already know.”
“Will it be okay? I’m worried he might ruin the filming atmosphere for no reason…”
“Hm… but…”
As I briefly organized my thoughts and looked at her, the galaxy spread across her clothes caught my eye.
“If it’s Gollum from The Lord of the Rings, the result he got while sacrificing his acting career, then I think it’s only natural he’d get angry.”
“Pardon?”
“For Andrew, The Lord of the Rings is a project he staked his acting career on. So he must have tried to do even better somehow.”
“…”
Taylor silently nodded.
“In a situation like this, more than a kind actor, we need an actor you can trust and leave it to, even if his personality is nasty. And there’s no actor who suits that role better than Andrew.”
“You know something more, don’t you…?”
Taylor stared straight at me.
“Me?”
“If you’re that confident, Director Gyeong… it feels like you know something more.”
“Ah… haha.”
“Then I’ll just trust you, Director!”
After giving me a small bow, Taylor returned to where Nick was.
Andrew slowly got up in the hotel Seonghyeon Productions had arranged for him.
Checking the time roughly, it seemed he had plenty of time.
“Sleeping is definitely meant to be done in a bed.”
Reassured by the generous time, Andrew lay back down and let his body sink into the bed.
The soft mattress wrapped around him as if it would not let his arms and legs go.
With a face that said he had no choice but to lie there, Andrew rubbed his face into the bed.
Over the past few days, Andrew had spent his time busily too.
Even though he had not been in from England for long, he used the DVD player prepared in his room and watched all of Director Gyeong Chanhyeon’s films, and also all the films featuring Kim Seunghun, the lead actor of Space Vagabond.
Director Gyeong Chanhyeon.
Contrary to his likable looks and the way he seemed a little out of his mind, he was a lunatic with more ability than expected.
The three feature films he had directed so far.
Night, Muyok, Jawol were each directed interestingly with completely different themes.
Direction and story so varied you could hardly believe it was the same director.
In particular, his directing was not inferior to any Hollywood directors, no, to a level where it could overwhelm them.
A director who might have become a young master right away if his nationality had been American instead of Korean.
It was amazing enough that such a director had contacted him first like this… how he had recognized him.
No matter how Andrew thought about it, it made no sense that he contacted him just from seeing Gollum in The Lord of the Rings.
“Hm…”
But unlike that, Kim Seunghun’s acting was not good.
A face handsome enough, maybe even the kind that could work overseas, but compared to his looks, his acting skill was far too lacking.
Especially his emotional line. That emotional line, his acting always consistent like output drawn from an input value, made Andrew feel a bit unpleasant as a fellow actor.
In the film Night with Gyeong Chanhyeon, his acting that was lacking had been filled in with directing, but in other films he appeared in, that inadequacy showed clearly.
“Tsk, if I had his face with my acting, I would’ve chewed up Hollywood. What a waste. A waste.”
For this project, Space Vagabond, Gyeong Chanhyeon said he was staking his life on it.
But Andrew was staking his life as well.
For Andrew too, the box office success of Space Vagabond mattered as much as it did to Gyeong Chanhyeon.
Especially if motion capture failed again this time, after Gollum, he would suffer under Nixroad too.
Rather than suffer, he had steeled himself to pour everything into it with the thought that it really would be his last.
“Hrrngh….”
After stretching out refreshingly, Andrew checked the clock once more.
“Huh?”
Even though he felt like he had been lying down for quite a while, the time was the same as when he first checked.
“Huh…?”
Flustered, Andrew hurriedly got up from the bed that had been holding him and checked his phone.
Time left until the appointment was twenty minutes.
At a time when he would be late even if he left right now, Andrew swallowed.
And then.
Gyeong Chanhyeon’s words brushed past his ear.
‘One of the Korean traits is “ppalli ppalli,” hurry hurry. I’m especially bad about it. So I’m not going to cling to you any more.’
“Damn it! You idiot!”
Cursing at himself over and over, Andrew did not even wash. He threw on clothes quickly, then took the taxi that had been called for him from the hotel lobby.
“Uh…”
He rummaged through his pocket, showed the taxi driver the business card with Seonghyeon Productions’ location, and the driver nodded and departed immediately.
“Can we get there in ten minutes?”
“Uh… I’m fine thank you! And you?”
Seeing the taxi driver sweating coldly, Andrew clutched his phone as if he had given up.
And the moment he passed the appointment time by a little, a call came right away.
With his hands trembling, Andrew carefully answered.
— Andrew. Where are you?
“Hello. Director Gyeong. I’m sorry, but… I think I’ll be late.”
—What? No. How can you be late from the very first meeting? Everyone is waiting right now.
“Sorry… It’s just, the hotel clock was broken, somehow.”
Even he thought it sounded ridiculous, and he let out a deep sigh.
—If you’re going to lie, make it at least believable. The managers check every day, and it just happens to break today?
“Hah… well…”
Hearing the irritation in Gyeong Chanhyeon’s voice, Andrew gave up trying to argue and apologized quickly.
“Anyway, sorry. I’ll be there soon…”
—Right now, the staff are raising hell. They’re saying if you’re an actor from Hollywood, do you get to be late, and making a huge fuss.
At the chill running down his spine, Andrew swallowed hard.
“I’ll, I’ll get there as fast as I can. I’m in a taxi now.”
—Yeah. There are over forty people waiting just for you, so hurry up and come.
After hanging up, Andrew let out a deep breath.
Despite how he seemed, Andrew was someone who deeply believed in superstitions.
The superstition he believed in obsessively was the “law of the total amount of luck.”
Whenever something good happened, something bad would hit first, and when something bad was coming, good things would arrive at uncanny timing.
Thinking about the good things that had happened before filming The Lord of the Rings, Andrew’s brow furrowed.
The championship of Arsenal, the soccer team he supported.
His daughter Grace’s excellent grades.
His wife Evelyn’s illness being fully cured.
Not just those, everything had been perfect.
When he moved by car, he barely ever got caught at red lights, and whatever happened, it all went perfectly, like gears turning smoothly.
But the price of that luck was far too great.
The downfall of The Lord of the Rings.
Even Andrew’s life as an actor was destroyed.
“Hah…”
And when his luck had become somewhat normal again, he met Gyeong Chanhyeon.
But ever since he met him, his luck had been filthy bad.
Was this a sign that something good was coming, or was his luck truly just bad?
He could not know for sure.
But even this taxi he was riding in now proved his luck, getting caught at every light, moving as if crawling.
At a speed where running would be faster, Andrew kept letting out sighs, and the taxi driver in front glanced at him with an awkward smile.
“Should I be happy about this…?”
This bad luck he was going through now.
A feeling like it was telling him to prepare for the good luck that would come next.
With that feeling, Andrew was not simply anxious. He held onto hope that maybe something good really would happen.
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