Chapter 7 – Afternoon of Good Style (2)

‘Yawn.’

Minho stretched his arms out widely and opened his eyes. After a short but sweetly deep sleep, his entire body felt refreshed.

“Huh?”

He looked around but couldn’t see any of the stylists. Sora had disappeared as well. Only the employee at the entrance remained, so the makeup room was empty.

“Where did everybody go?”

As he saw the cushion resting against his neck, and noticed that the time had just passed noon, Minho roughly figured out the situation. It seemed that everyone had left for lunch without waking him from his deep sleep.

Minho got up from his seat and admired his completed hairstyle as he whistled. His skin was brighter than before and his hairstyle, pulled backwards to one side with prominent curls, was quite stylish. The skills of a professional made all the difference.

 “Let’s just have some lunch.”

After touching the tip of his hair, Minho turned his head and fixed his gaze on the box where all the hairstyling equipment had been organized. This was because there was a faint glow coming from inside it.

‘Oh ho.’

What Minho discovered was a pair of scissors, smudged with fingerprints. As expected, an incredible feeling of curiosity urged him onwards, just like with Sohee’s pen.

What would be the scissors’ power?

Minho, who was looking over at the employee at the entrance, slowly walked over to the equipment box. The scissors looked old but the box it was stored in looked luxurious, giving him a notion that he shouldn’t touch it without permission. 

Even if it wasn’t expensive, one shouldn’t touch someone else’s things without permission. But what could he do–he was curious.

“’’Scuse me~”

Minho held the scissors in his hand. As soon as he touched them, the glow faintly emitted from them disappeared. When he looked at them up close, the scissors seemed to be a different color from the others even though they were made from the same stainless steel. 

‘Is it the brand?’

He stared at them for a while, but couldn’t sense what other power or function they had besides the intrinsic ability they probably had as scissors to trim hair neatly.

Minho stepped in front of the mirror to at least touch a strand of hair. And he was shocked at his reflection in the mirror. He spotted a bit that looked unnatural on the hair that he’d been satisfied with a moment ago.

‘A haircut with a soft two-block, undercut pressed down cleanly with wax doesn’t match someone with thick hair. A soft swallow perm that has a natural curl as its strong point will be good. If I lessen the wax and rearrange it by scrunching it…’

Without clearly understanding what he was thinking, Minho fell into a trance. He quickly rinsed his hair in the sink and came back to start styling himself.

He first dried his roots with a dryer, then repeatedly rolled the tip with a curling iron and loosened it gently. Soon the fuzziness disappeared, and his hair was reborn into a style that looked dishevelled but natural.

With a ‘snip’ sound, the hair strands that were sticking out were cut with the scissors. Then Minho quickly regained consciousness.

“What is this?”

Minho faced his hair that changed in an instant. His hair was less eye-catching than before and looked more classy. The employee at the entrance, who was watching what he was doing, was now staring at his movements with her mouth open.

“Haha……”

As Minho let out an uncomfortable laugh, the employee who was facing him awkwardly turned her head and mumbled.

“Do rookies these days learn those kind of things before they start working?”

From the perspective of an employee who had been under Jay Kim only shampooing for a year, she didn’t want to acknowledge that a rookie was able to make that kind of style by himself. The employee only looked at the monitor acting like she wasn’t interested, but when Minho turned his eyes away, she took out her cell phone and took a picture. She wanted to look at it later for reference.

Minho looked at the scissors and admired them.

‘So this is what a cherished object is, huh?’

He stared at the name tag ‘Jay Kim’ underneath the hair equipment. Minho had briefly heard somewhere that he was the chief here.

Minho was sure this pair of scissors was cherished by Jay Kim, so unfortunately, he had to put it back.

‘Ugh~ Should I bring a pair of scissors of the highest quality and ask him for a trade?’

He quickly became sullen, thinking ‘It’s not going to work, right?’. He could neither steal it nor ask for it since it was a cherished object. Feeling bummed out, he calmly stared at the mirror for some time.

His hairstyle that he usually didn’t pay too much attention to and its impact had been internalized by Minho to great effect. He had completely understood how stylists looked at people like him. Minho felt he had gained a bit of a discerning eye for good style.

‘I think it’ll be good to use this hairstyle regularly. I should come during my spare time and familiarize my hands with it.”

Since he couldn’t obtain the scissors, Minho was getting determined to get used to the skill himself. At that moment, through the glass window of the makeup room he saw Manger Gong walking up with a young lady behind him.

“We’ll leave here at 1:30, so please get ready quickly.”

As Manager Gong opened the doors, he nodded briefly to Minho.The young lady spoke as she looked around.

“Okay, but I think no one’s here because it’s lunch time.”

Manager Gong made a troubled expression.

“Then we’re in big trouble. We can’t be late since the studio schedule is packed.”

“I guess I’ll do it myself then.”

“Will that be possible?”

“It’s just the basic makeup. The commercial company will change the rest in accordance with the concept.”

As Manager Gong nodded and stepped away, he noticed the hairstyle of Minho, who was standing in front of the mirror.

“Oh ho! Your appearance has definitely livened up. Did Chief Jay do it for you?”

“Ah, this, I……”

Minho shook the scissors that were still in his hands. Manager Gong asked again with a ‘Nah, really?’ facial expression.

“You did that yourself?”

As Minho responded, he thought ‘Oh, right’ and caught himself.

“Yes, somehow. Anyway, who’s this?”

대충 얼버무린 민호가 옆의 여성을 바라봤다. 공 매니저가 설명하기 전에 여성이 먼저 눈을 마주치며 활짝 웃었다.

After giving an evasive answer, Minho looked at the lady next to him. Before Manager Gong could explain, the lady smiled as she met his gaze.

“I’m an actress at KG Entertainment, Eunha Seo. You’re player Minho Kang right? I really liked The Answer and I saw you. Nice to meet you.”

“Nice to meet you.”

When Minho saw Eunha, who looked like she had just returned from finishing school with her tidy outfit, he felt that her affably smiling appearance was pretty. Should he say that she had a different quality of elegance when compared to Sora Oh? Eunha had an outstanding beauty that made one think that there were people who were just born beautiful.

“Excuse me.”

Sitting down in front of the mirror, Eunha untied her hair and took off her glasses, and looked at the makeup products that were lined up on the display stand.

“Hmm, I said it was basic makeup first, right?”

As she mumbled to herself about what to put on first, she grabbed one of the round bottles. She fell into contemplation after reading what was written on the bottle. Minho felt that she was rather inept with makeup, a skill that a woman should generally have.

‘Not that one, the one next to it first.’

With the scissors in his hands, Minho felt the information on the function and effect of the makeup items, the names of which he normally wouldn’t even know, pop into his head. It was obvious that the scissors likely possessed all of the styling abilities that their owner, Jay Kim, had stored in them. 

“That’s the cream. If you want to do the basic makeup, you have to use the moisturizing essence before that.”

Eunha turned her head towards Minho.

“Really?”

Minho picked out the makeup items one by one from the products in front of her.

“Cream, essence, foundation, in order.”

Nod nod. 

Eunha Seo opened her eyes wide and concentrated on Minho’s words.

“The day is dry, so it’s good to mix a drop of oil into the foundation. And finish off by spraying mist. You understand?”

“You know this really well.”

Minho put down the scissors in their original position and answered as if it was something trivial.

“Somehow I know. Manager Gong, I’ll be back after I eat lunch.”

“Okay.”

Manager Gong stared at Minho, who was walking out of the makeup room, in amazement. Eunha, who was putting on the essence, laughed as she spoke.

“As expected of a quiz show winner. He’s well-informed about makeup too.”

“Yes, he is.”

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