HWARANG Rewritten✅

13. Dance rehearsal

Chapter 13.
Dance rehearsal.

They were awoken by the loud beating of drums. They all got up unwillingly, groaning and grumbling, before heading to class.

A man was there playing the drums. Poong Wol Joo joined him on stage after he finished his performance. "Soon the capital will celebrate Hangawi festival. You must perform music and dance in front of the people and the Queen Dowager," he informed and when there were protests and objections, he reminded them that Hwarang was for the subjects of Silla not the royal family. They did not have to impress the queen, but they did have to win over the hearts of her people. "This is your second assignment. 'Have fun'."

There were varying degrees of displeasure and disagreement on everyone's faces. Then motioning towards the other man, Poong Wol Joo said, "the right teacher to teach you music and dance is Woo-reuk."

After Poong Wol Joo left, Woo-reuk demonstrated his flawless talent on a variety of instruments as he explained that rhythm is the base of music. "Now open your hearts wide and feel the rhythm. Understand?" he ordered before getting each Hwarang to perform a piece so he could judge their capabilities.

Han-seong and Yeo-wool did an impressive dance duet as did Ji-dwi. Ban-ryu's attempt on the drums was hilarious and humiliating as he lost grip of the drumstick and sent it flying straight to Soo-ho. Soo-ho's dance was beautiful and so was Sa-do's. Seon-woo's was so horrible a few had to cover their eyes to save themselves. The seven of them were placed together in a team for a sword dance performance.

Their practice went smoothly for the most part if one excluded Ban-ryu moving in the opposite direction and Seon-woo whacking Han-seong on the head with the wooden practice sword. Thank goodness they weren't using the real swords just yet. They had a limited time period to perfect the routine before the festival. And a pass or fail in it determined if they remained in Seonmoon or not so the circumstances were rather critical as most had failed in the first task.

"It's not doing what I want it to do," Seon-woo complained as he hit Han-seong yet again, halting the entire practice.

Even Sa-do was nervous about this as it was going to be her first performance ever. Soo-ho patted her shoulder. "You are doing fine. Just stay focused."

...

Later on Ji-dwi was practicing the dance routine on the riverbank while Pa-oh did the washing. The royal guard voiced how ridiculous it was for the king to be dancing like this. With some light teasing, Ji-dwi finally got him off his back.

"Ahh I forgot everything because of you," he complained as he tried to resume the dance. There was some rustling sound from the edge of the forest. Pa-oh quickly took off as a figure approached the river and Ji-dwi realized it was Sa-do.

"What are you doing?" she asked bemused as she neared him.

"Laundry obviously."

Sa-do stopped by the pile of clothes and folded her hands across her chest. "Wow! You are washing clothes from all the way over there?" she asked with a raised eyebrow, trying hard not to laugh.