Free Web Novel* * *
<ParCheHi>’s view count was skyrocketing. Every single day, multiple new posts about <ParCheHi> appeared.
From short posts saying it was fun, to long promotional threads where people screen-captured the entire storyline.
[Hot / When your friend suddenly calls her boyfriend while she’s with you.jpg]
(A scene from <ParCheHi>. Yeoreum gradually sliding out of frame every time the camera catches her.jpg)
<ParCheHi> had countless moments that could be turned into memes. Any scene, once captured, became a meme.
After some time, even people who had never watched <ParCheHi> started recognizing its memes. Yeoreum’s auditorium scene spread everywhere as a short clip, and that one-minute video exceeded 10K RTs.
Aetami (Not a multi-level-marketing account demX) @AnYtimeMedia
(Clip of Yeoreum’s auditorium scene)
When losers come home and regret their actions.
˪You suddenly feel like you acted too hard?
˪You feel like you really shouldn’t have said that?
˪You’re like... uh... why is it so silent after I spoke?
˪Stop mentioning me, losersㅠ
Yeoreum’s cringeworthy performance led directly to an increase in viewers coming to watch <ParCheHi>. Han Yeoreum’s influence kept growing.
With Episode 6, more viewers began liking the combination of Joo Junseo and Han Yeoreum.
-I’ve never even attended a co-ed school but this symbolic youth madness is insane
-Please make it illegal to put a guy like that and a girl like that in the same frame it is too violent
˪Sorry but what exactly is the problem?ㅠ I don’t really get it
˪It’s just... obsessive otaku babbling that normal people won’t understand.... Sorry ( ´•̥̥̥ω•̥̥̥` )
-By Episode 6 they should at least hold hands please auntie is begging I can’t sleep
When Episode 6 uploaded, comments easily surpassed a thousand. Likes rose several times higher. Some people even began predicting the future plot. They were comments you wouldn’t normally see in a web drama.
-Turns out they’re not from a pure romance manga but a comedy manga... and ❀ Nоvеlігht ❀ (Don’t copy, read here) what if this is also a mistaken-identity trope?
˪This will soon become a sacred comment
-If you look at Episode 1 Chaewon’s skirt color is different, feels like a foreshadowing that the real world and the romance-manga world haven’t fully overlapped yet, no way they chose that for no reason
Youstagram
@midsummer
Followers 19K
Meanwhile, Yeoreum’s follower count was approaching twenty thousand. All over the place, people began asking for the SNS account of the actress playing Pi Chaewon.
Beyond the character name, more and more people were becoming curious about Yeoreum herself.
* * *
-Oh~. Yeoreum-ah!
“Director!!!”
-Did you see what I sent you? Did you? Did you??
“I saw it....”
Director Jang and I were having an emotional phone call. Several celebrities he knew personally had mentioned <ParCheHi> directly on their Stories.
-I seriously... to be honest, I didn’t expect <ParCheHi> to do this well.
“I knew it would. Because I trust you, Director.”
-Yeoreum-ah....
“Director....”
I could hear Director Jang swallowing back tears over the phone. Thinking back to <ParCheHi> before regression, such a reaction made perfect sense.
‘Because back then, the response wasn’t positive at all.’
There were plenty of mentions, but mostly mockery — consumed purely as a meme.
People hardly ever predicted the next plot or made promotional threads capturing entire episodes.
Terrible acting from the leads, awful dialogue, and music and editing that were far too overblown. Those three components were what made up <ParCheHi>.
‘As expected of Han Yeoreum.’
I enjoyed a brief moment of self-admiration. ƒreewebɳovel.com
-In the future, we absolutely have to work together again. Promise me that. I want to work with you longer. All of this together doesn’t even add up to two hours.
“Of course. Director, you have to call me for your next project.”
While working this time, I realized Director Jang’s directing ability was better than I’d thought.
‘Enough to make me look forward to his future dramas.’
It would be nice if he sent me a script later. Thinking that, I ended the call and focused on the script in my hands.
This was the script Myeong Jeha had sent me — the most successful among the ones in the box.
“This sort of thing only circulates internally.”
Meaning: if you have no connections, you don’t even get the chance to audition.
Time is money in this industry. Dozens, even hundreds of projects get canceled every year. Finishing casting as fast as possible is what matters.
‘So the truly promising scripts get passed through recommendations.’
They only audition using a handful of carefully filtered ones. Of course, since Myeong Jeha gave me only the script with no audition information, I wasn’t included in that list...
‘Still, what am I supposed to do when I want to practice acting?’
And I wanted to prepare as much as possible. If—just by the tiniest chance—an audition opportunity came and I wasn’t ready, I didn’t want to freeze and miss it.
I opened the first part of the script for <Faster Than the Law>.
Since I didn’t have an agency, unless an open audition was held, I had no way to receive scripts. Maybe because I had watched this film in theaters several times, scenes immediately formed in my head. freeweɓnøvel.com
“It would be great if they held an open audition.”
I didn’t expect them to contact me first. I had barely secured one lead role in a web drama.
“Even a small role is fine. I just want to stand in front of the camera again....”
The lens fixed on me, the lights pouring down from above, the shout of “Ready!” before filming begins. I can’t forget any of it. It makes me want to die on set someday.
“I feel like I could do this role well.”
I underlined the lines of a role that probably had less than five minutes of screen time. I wanted to do it. I wanted it desperately.
* * *
Finally, the release day of <ParCheHi> Episode 7 arrived.
Thanks to the posts and clips flooding the community the past week, viewers poured in.
Among them were real drama nerds — people who watched every single drama broadcast every year. The realest of the real.
Intube
@JC ENM 610K subscribers
[The Cherry on the Parfait Belongs to the Heroine! Ep 7. Reversed] 16:15
Even the title sparked curiosity. In the last episode, Chaewon tried to become the heroine, to rewind the world’s timeline, by using every cliché she could.
-Let’s all turn to the next page. Chapter 3.
-...Success.
The story, which had never advanced before, finally moved. The timeline was shifting in subtle ways. But something felt wrong.
Sscrrch— a scratching sound echoed again. Chaewon opened her palm.
Red was spreading along her lifeline. Her body was turning translucent.
-Why...?
Chaewon tried to find the cause. Come to think of it, Hina wasn’t there. Jun’s seat was also empty.
-Hina. I have to find Hina.
With her translucent body, Chaewon moved frantically. Even while she ran, her body grew blurrier. Chaewon ran up to the rooftop to call Jun.
But her voice wouldn’t come out. Proof she was disappearing. She opened her palm again.
-....
Uneasy BGM played. Her body wouldn’t obey her. All she could do was twitch a finger. Chaewon’s expression hardened—right at that moment.
-Pi Chaewon.
Bang—! The rooftop door burst open. Jun rushed in, stripping off his jacket as he walked.
He wrapped the jacket around Chaewon’s frozen form. As she wore Jun’s oversized jacket, color slowly returned to her translucent hands. Only then could she move again.
-What the heck. What’s wrong with your body right now?
-My screentime... I think something’s wrong with my screentime. Hina’s missing.
-Hina’s missing?
-Yeah! This is definitely....
That moment, a sound came from a corner of the rooftop. Jun and Chaewon immediately ran toward it. And there, they found.......
