The Road to Glory – Chapter 226 – [Side Story] Chapter 28. The Meaning of the Mural

Author: Dawn

Later, viewers might think this:

That people are gradually being influenced by Halo.

And for good reason.

“Then, please take care of the children.”

On the day when the teacher had urgent business and left them in charge for the afternoon.

After waving goodbye to the children, Halo and the kids started fidgeting as soon as the teacher disappeared.

“Are they gone?”

Halo asked.

“Yeah, I think they’re gone.”

Gyeowool, who had become a second Halo, answered while scanning the corridor with sharp eyes.

“Shall we go out then?”

The other children’s eyes sparkled too.

However, among any group of children, there’s bound to be someone a bit timid.

A child asked worriedly:

“Don’t we need to study?”

“Studying isn’t everything in life.”

“…I guess we don’t have to study these days?”

The Grammy Award winner and top star from a prestigious university replied.

“Shall we go then?”

“But is it okay to go out?”

Lee Sora, sitting in her chair, smiled gently.

“Go ahead, Jeongmin. We need someone like you there.”

When Lee Jeongmin seemed concerned, Lee Sora shrugged as if to say it was fine.

“We can’t just send those kids alone.”

“Well, that’s true.”

The children were looking at Lee Jeongmin with desperate hope.

Lee Jeongmin couldn’t refuse, though he seemed to feel responsible.

“It’s okay, I’ll explain it well.”

“Then… I’ll leave it to you.”

“Alright.”

Lee Sora watched as Lee Jeongmin slowly approached the children.

With each step he took, Lee Jeongmin’s face gradually brightened as he let go of his burden.

“Let’s go! Let’s go!”

“We can’t let the teacher catch us.”

“What if we get caught?”

“Let’s say brother told us to.”

“Me?”

When the boy spoke shamelessly as if he didn’t understand, Lee Jeongmin laughed heartily.

“They look like they’re having fun. Yeah, kids should grow up playing.”

Lee Sora decided not to mention ‘The Truth About Baegun Elementary School’s Afternoon Classes’ as she watched them.

Does everyone remember?

Originally, lower elementary grades don’t have afternoon classes.

While upper grades have 5th and 6th periods, lower grades would go home before or after lunch.

So their afternoon classes are just additional, non-mandatory classes. It’s just optional classes to look after children while adults are away from home.

Therefore, this isn’t really skipping class, it’s more like a legitimate outdoor class.

Lee Sora, who was well-versed in school matters, didn’t explain this.

After all, even if it’s the same thing as skipping class, isn’t it more exciting and fun when done secretly?

And if there was one more reason, Lee Sora wanted Lee Jeongmin to let go of his tension and compulsions.

To sometimes break away from rules and feel freedom.

Well, this isn’t really a problem, and he doesn’t seem to dislike it either. Rather, his whole body is expressing ‘I’m having fun and I’m really happy right now.’ It’s both disappointing and amusing that he doesn’t notice this himself.

“Teacher! We’re going to look for treasure!”

“Have fun, kids.”

And so today’s lesson content became treasure hunting behind the teacher’s back.

The children were bent over a paper that appeared from somewhere.

[It holds the sea within it. Listen to it carefully. Find the sound that resembles it. You will know the way]

“What does this mean?”

Lee Jeongmin, who looked at it together with them, tilted his head at the unexpectedly difficult hint. It didn’t seem like a problem for lower elementary school students.

“Haeil-ssi-“

Lee Jeongmin turned around to ask for Halo’s opinion, but tilted his head when he saw the boy and Gyeowool stuck together.

“How about adding the sol here? Like la-la-la-la-?”

“Hmm. Like this?”

The boy and Gyeowool seemed to have no interest in treasure hunting.

Though they followed along, they were in their own world.

When Halo strummed the guitar, the children looked on with interest.

But when similar sounds kept repeating, they soon lost interest.

“Isn’t it the same?”

“Wow!”

Only Gyeowool noticed the difference.

Gyeowool looked at the guitar with wonder.

“Want to try too?”

“Can I?”

“Yeah. Try it.”

“But how do you play this?”

“However your heart guides you.”

Halo took off his guitar and handed it to Gyeowool.

Gyeowool’s eyes sparkled, thinking she would do well, but soon staggered at the unexpected weight.

“It’s heavy.”

“Hahaha.”

Halo laughed, having expected this would happen.

Belatedly realizing she was being teased, Gyeowool puffed up her cheeks.

While offering to help, he was half teasing her.

“I’ll hold it for a moment.”

Halo supported the guitar’s weight from the front. Only then could Gyeowool fiddle with the strings.

“Teacher, what are you doing?”

“Ah. We should solve the problem.”

Lee Jeongmin, who had been blankly watching them, came to his senses and looked at the problem again.

[It holds the sea within it. Listen to it carefully]

Thinking about it again, he seemed to understand.

Lee Jeongmin bent down and spoke kindly to the children.

“Teacher doesn’t know well either. But since it says it holds the sea, shall we go to the sea?”

“Let’s go to the sea!”

“Woaah!”

“Kids, let’s go slowly.”

The children who came outside the classroom after a long time rushed out in a group.

At the beach, the children played well on their own, forgetting about the treasure hunt.

While playing with the children, Lee Jeongmin secretly glanced at the boy and Gyeowool.

They were sitting on the beach sand boss, playing guitar.

To be more precise, the boy was teaching how to play the guitar one by one.

Although he had said he neither had the confidence nor wanted to teach, he looked no different from any other teacher.

At some point, Gyeowool, looking at Halo’s sketchbook, asked:

“But does sheet music have to be straight lines?”

“Huh?”

“You said sheet music is for marking so other people can read it too. Then isn’t any shape fine as long as everyone can see it?”

Halo paused at the unexpected question.

For him, sheet music was just a tool to mark and store music, nothing more, nothing less.

So he had never thought about the form of sheet music.

Suddenly, Gyeowool’s freely drawn sheet music sketchbook came to mind.

“Then how would you like to do it?”

Gyeowool’s face brightened at Halo’s question.

Other adults would say ‘don’t ask useless questions’ or give difficult answers like ‘it’s a social contract like language.’

Gyeowool, who had never agreed with anyone to make sheet music in straight lines, had always been curious.

“Just like that sound!”

Gyeowool spread both arms wide.

“For example, sounds like wind should be drawn like this.”

Gyeowool flapped their wings and spun around and around, mimicking the shape of the wind.

“And fluffy music like clouds should be done like this. Isn’t the reason wave sounds are prettier because waves come like waves?”

Following Gyeowool’s words, the sheet music would flow like dancing.

It would flow freely here and there like parchment dropped on the floor.

That would be harder to read than sheet music in straight lines.

But.

It was interesting because it was a thought he’d never had before.

Wave sounds in wave shapes, wind sounds drawn like wind.

Maybe this is why hearing others’ opinions is more enjoyable.

Because everyone has different thoughts.

And Halo tends to enjoy new challenges.

“Shall we try it then?”

“How?”

“Somehow.”

Somehow, couldn’t we do it?

Though nothing comes to mind yet, it doesn’t seem that difficult to do.

The village mural work is progressing steadily.

First, they painted gesso on the wall surface to be painted, and those who finished sketching picked up paint. Since paint work is hard to undo, the villagers agreed to help on weekends, and they paired up one by one.

“Is Haeil on the same team as Gyeowool?”

“Yes!”

“…Hmm, is it okay for those two to be on the same team?”

Lee Sora watched with half worry, half playfulness.

While the production team’s opinion was favorable, and the parties themselves wanted this, and even she liked the combination of Haeil and Gyeowool, it was fun to see Halo’s expression turn sulky every time she said this.

“I’m joking, joking. This unnie will only trust Gyeowool. Fighting!”

“Fighting!”

“Unnie?”

Shouldn’t it be noona instead of unnie?

Halo tilted his head for a moment, but soon stopped caring.

Because he thought it didn’t matter how they were addressed.

“Everyone, you just need to color it in. Just carefully paint following the sketch. No more, no less, just coloring.”

“Yes.”

The teacher who said that glanced at Halo.

Halo didn’t understand why their eyes met after those words.

In front of them were sketches of houses, clouds, and trees.

There wasn’t anything too difficult.

Clouds in transparent sky blue.

Houses with red roofs.

Trees in green and brown.

Halo wanted to finish this simple task and plan the dynamic sheet music Gyeowool had talked about.

How could they make dynamic sheet music that everyone could see and read well? After doing it in the sketchbook and running out of space, he felt the need for bigger paper.

Very large paper.

Halo paused while picking up the paint brush.

A long, continuous large paper…?

“What’s this, noona?”

“Hm? The drawing looked a bit plain so I’m adding flowers. How is it? Prettier, right?”

“Yeah!”

After briefly glancing at Lee Sora’s additional mural work, who was good at drawing due to her fashion major, Halo took a step back and looked at his wall.

And slowly raised the corners of his mouth.

Then secretly approached Gyeowool and said:

“Let’s do it here.”

“Do what?”

“Drawing our sheet music.”

“!”

“We don’t have to draw it only in the sketchbook.”

Halo turned around.

Due to Lee Sora’s command to work, there was nothing watching them except the installed cameras.

After putting his hand to his nose with a playful face towards the camera, sealing even the viewers’ lips.

He raised his hand.

The caterpillar-like sheet music that Gyeowool wanted to do.

Staff lines fluffy like clouds.

“But the music isn’t complete yet.”

“We can draw just the staff lines so we can recognize it later, then do additional work. Confident?”

“…Yeah!”

Gyeowool’s eyes sparkled as she nodded resolutely.

Soon the two started giggling and building determination.

“I’m worried because Haeil and Gyeowool are too quiet.”

“But they were doing well?”

“Really? You’re not covering for them, are you?”

“Me?”

“Yeah, Jeongmin, you’re weak against Haeil.”

Despite being perceptive, he tends to give in to Haeil.

Sometimes it seems like he enjoys going along with the boy’s pranks, but more than half seemed to be a mixture of gratitude and fan sentiment.

“I wonder?”

Lee Jeongmin laughed as if unsure.

Are they really just working hard? Lee Sora couldn’t read more and moved on.

Lee Jeongmin threw his gaze back towards Gyeowool and the boy.

He actually knew they were doing something, but had no intention of saying anything.

Honestly, he enjoyed what they were doing, and it was just nice to watch.

He wanted to imitate that freedom,

And envied what he couldn’t have.

He was content to remain just a spectator from one step away, wanting to watch from afar.

When Halo and Gyeowool took breaks, Lee Jeongmin only harmoniously refined the parts where paint had splattered, then took another step back.

It’s another night.

Having finished working on the Mozart play sketchbook, Halo was lying on the bench, and beside him, Lee Jeongmin was blankly staring at the camping LED light.

“Heave-ho.”

At that moment, Kwon Jaeik came out of the room with a clatter and put something down with a thud.

“Hyung, you’re not sleeping?”

“I woke up thirsty, then saw his hair and thought it was a ghost and woke up completely.”

“What’s that?”

“Since I’m already awake, I’m preparing for tomorrow.”

As Halo was curious too, Kwon Jaeik brought it to the front of the door and put it down with a thud.

“This is-“

“Are we going fishing?”

“The captain said he’d take us sea fishing tomorrow. So we should go.”

Everyone nodded since Kwon Jaeik’s love for fishing was well-known.

“Do you want to come too?”