LIGHTNOVELONLINE Chapter 89
Chapter 89
There were, of course, a few troublemakers who failed to read the room and tried to bash On Raon as they had before.
However, they were literally beaten into submission and disappeared, provoked by the emotional wave of countless netizens in the dead of night.
Even the general public, who had been watching the last broadcast, joined in to support On Raon, the hottest tragic hero of the night, so things would be quiet for a while.
Real-time search keywords included ‘On Raon’, ‘Reality of Idol Trainees’, ‘True Entertainment’, and ‘Lee Do-yeop’ among others.
Why had the production team released such provocative content only now?
Of course, it was because of On Raon’s character.
From the beginning, the writers had designed his character, based on the preliminary meetings, to be a trainee struggling after being ultimately eliminated from the debut group of a major agency.
And that image had been completely shattered from the first day of filming.
Then, on the day before the live broadcast, a controversy erupted, and PD Jo In-soo, who saw it as a golden opportunity, urgently inserted the finished segment into the broadcast, tweaking it to boost ratings while waiting for the vote tally.
The trainees were watching the same footage as the audience on a separate TV set up backstage.
As I received sympathetic looks from the other trainees and passing staff along with the notification of increased favorability, I thought to myself.
‘Jo In-soo, that ratings-crazed psychopath…’
* * *
As soon as I got to work in the morning, PD Jo In-soo had called me in and said a few words.
But it wasn’t so much seeking my permission as it was notifying me.
What infuriated me the most was that there was nothing I could do about it now.
I had left my phone in the waiting room, so I couldn’t check the internet reactions immediately, but judging by the on-site reactions, I knew people had turned favorable towards me.
It was certainly a good thing, but…
“…”
I made eye contact with Oh Hyun-jin.
First of all, I had to deal with that guy for sure…
Ugh, my head was a mess.
“At least it’s a relief. The misunderstanding is cleared up.”
Just as I was about to run my hands through my hair, Seo Moon-gyeol quietly spoke.
“Yeah. Just think of it like that for now.”
Ban Yo-han chimed in as well.
“I also didn’t think it would blow up into such a controversy. I never expected something like that to happen…”
“Right. And I believed in you. Because you can’t lie like that, hyung.”
Kim Jun-woo and Jing Xiao approached and each said a few words to me.
Other trainees who had shared the stage with me, like Ok Do-yoon and Na Yoon-jae, also comforted me, saying it must have been tough.
I felt better than I expected.
* * *
While the text votes were being tallied, the trainees had a time to reunite with their families on stage.
The trainee would go out first, have a brief interview with Jena, and then their pre-arranged family member would come up on stage to congratulate and support them.
Some trainees had to replace this with video messages due to circumstances, but with over 15 trainees to go through, it was the perfect time-filler.
Even during rehearsal, the production team had only vaguely gone over the order and positions without clearly specifying who would come out.
The other trainees seemed to at least know whether their mom, dad, or sister was coming.
‘I don’t have anyone coming for me, do I?’
It was unlikely that On Raon’s family would go through the trouble of flying over the ocean just because of me.
But if we really did meet here…
What should I do?
I wasn’t ready yet, but my turn was approaching, and soon I found myself taking the mic from the tear-streaked Kim Jun-woo and heading to the center of the stage.
As I walked out, the audience, still affected by the earlier video, made sympathetic sounds.
Then, at some point, I heard a collective gasp.
Wondering what was going on, I looked around and saw my face on the installed screen. Since I was looking back, only the back of my head was visible.
As I continued standing there, this time I heard a sound closer to a groan of frustration.
“This reminds me of the first mentor evaluation. Do you remember saying something similar back then?”
Jena asked with a kind smile, and I turned back to her and nodded.
“Yes. I remember. You said I had pretty eyes.”
“Now I see, it’s not just your eyes that are pretty. Everything about you is beautiful. Just seeing you standing here is so endearing. Our Raon, you’ve worked hard, haven’t you?”
“Thank you. Jena, the other mentors also worked really hard for us.”
I replied without bringing up the previous topic.
[Jena respects your wishes. Jena’s favorability +5, current favorability +57]
“No, Raon, you’ve always shown such dedication that I always wanted to teach you even more.”
“Thank you.”
“Then, shall we meet the family you’ve been longing to see?”
I felt a bit nervous.
And a moment later, the person who came up on stage was…
“?”
…Muk Hye-sung.
‘Why is the mentor coming out here…?’
* * *
– ??????
– ???
– Muk Hye-sung????????
– No wonder he wasn’t in the mentor’s seat since earlier?????
The viewers’ reactions watching the broadcast weren’t much different from On Raon’s.
On Raon tried to stay calm and think rationally.
Why was this person here (did he come by mistake?), was Muk Hye-sung somehow a close family member (there was no mention of him in any letters), were there any odd behaviors in my past actions (there were many), and how should I react now (got it?)?
As On Raon’s head exploded with confusion, the bewildered words that burst out were:
“Wh-who are you…?”
– LOL LOL LOL LOL LOL Who are you LOL LOL LOL
– No, what do you mean you don’t know him, you fool ㅠㅠㅠㅠ
– LOL regardless of their relationship, Muk Hye-sung must be really hurt LOL LOL LOL
– Hey, but he’s a mentor LOL LOL LOL and you love Chronicle’s Muk Hye-sung, and yet you ask who he is LOL LOL LOL
The scene of me covering my mouth in shock after speaking was captured and would be long remembered even after the broadcast.
On Raon hurriedly added.
“No! Of course, I know it’s Mentor Muk Hye-sung!”
“…It’s a relief that you know.”
Jena tried to suppress her laughter as she spoke to keep the conversation going despite the two’s rocky start.
“It seems Raon didn’t know Mentor Muk Hye-sung would be here. What’s the exact relationship between you two?”
Muk Hye-sung answered the question that everyone was curious about.
“On Raon’s mother is my cousin. Both his parents are overseas and busy with work, so they asked me to come just this once as a favor.”
Muk Hye-sung added plainly that the first time he had seen On Raon was during the mentor evaluation.
“Oh, so you didn’t originally know that you were related to On Raon?”
“Yes. It’s rare to have the surname On, and the name Raon seemed familiar, so I later asked On Raon’s mother and confirmed it.”
“What a connection.”
Listening to the conversation, On Raon racked his brain.
If his parents’ cousin is a fifth cousin…
Could he be the relative I was rudely awakened by last time?
I did think his voice sounded familiar back then, but could it be true?
Is this another prank by the system, or rather, by Larry?
As if he had read On Raon’s mind, Muk Hye-sung nodded.
“So, are you really my…cousin…?”
With an awkward expression, On Raon used a title unfamiliar to modern youth.
– This is the first time I’ve seen Raon this awkward around someone LOL
– LOL he looks like he just found out they’re related
– Just by his expression, it looks like he heard a secret about his birth LOL
– Someone please make a meme of Raon spilling orange juice LOL
┗ Oh my god LOL I knew Raon’s expression looked familiar, it’s like a morning drama LOL
┗ Muk Hye-sung: Raon, I’m your cousin’s son
┗ On Raon: ????? (juice spilling)
Muk Hye-sung, generally known for his indifferent nature, was often told by people around him that he didn’t have a personality suited for being a celebrity, let alone an idol, and he acknowledged that himself.
But even a village dog recites a verse if it lives at a school for three years, and Muk Hye-sung had been in this industry for twenty years.
He quickly realized that On Raon had no idea about his relation, and wisely decided not to bring up the phone call they had during training camp.
There were already some negative comments about their relationship surfacing on the internet.
– Do you really believe he didn’t know they were related?
– Now that I think about it, doesn’t the editing and content from the first couple of episodes seem forced? They portrayed him as a Chronicle fan, wasn’t that all staged?
┗ Wow… and knowing what state he was in back then, they still did this?
┗ It’s pathetic how they still want to bash someone who struggled. The voting’s over, let it go.
– But is it okay for a mentor and a trainee to be relatives? Fifth cousins aren’t exactly strangers, this feels like favoritism…
┗ So what? Ju-an and Ji Yeon-woo openly appealed to sympathy as same-agency trainee friends and swept the votes.
┗ Exactly. Muk Hye-sung never did anything like that. While Ju-an and Seok Soo-young got scripts to push certain trainees, Muk Hye-sung genuinely mentored and taught well, not just On Raon but all trainees.
The lingering impact of the previous stories hadn’t faded yet.
Thanks to Muk Hye-sung’s clean image, built over almost 20 years in the entertainment industry without any major issues, combined with his visibly flustered and shocked demeanor on live broadcast, the favorable atmosphere towards On Raon remained strong.
Meanwhile, On Raon kept saying something.
“No, I purely thought you were looking out for me as a diligent trainee, but it turns out it was just because of our blood relation… Such goodwill from a mere familial bond…”
Ah, he’s really flustered and out of his mind right now.
His speech was far less organized than usual, babbling in a way that made it clear to everyone that he had no idea he was related to Muk Hye-sung.
“How is a blood relation a mere bond? And being fifth cousins doesn’t make us strangers…not completely. It’s not like that.”
– It’s hilarious how he himself says blood relation = mere bond LOL Even Muk Hye-sung got tongue-tied trying to respond LOL LOL LOL
– LOL LOL LOL Now it’s just funny and seems like they really didn’t know
– This is a reaction that can’t be faked. This will be an immortalized legend on YouTube for years to come.
Realizing that he was getting caught up in On Raon’s pace, Muk Hye-sung thought it would be better to just stop this foolish conversation altogether. He decided to go for a hug, just like the other trainees had done with their families.
Of course, it wasn’t the most natural scene, but their excellent visuals made the moment look reasonably beautiful.
“We’ll talk later.”
Muk Hye-sung quietly said, lowering the hand holding the mic.
On Raon slightly nodded in understanding. He didn’t have the courage to ask “Who are you?” a second time.
Jena, standing off to the side, was so amused she had to cover her mouth with her cue cards to hide her laughter as Muk Hye-sung awkwardly patted On Raon’s back a few times and let him go.
The thought that he shouldn’t have done that came immediately after.
“Uh, but can I just keep calling you ‘teacher’?”
“What?”
“‘Uncle’ feels a bit too… distant.”
“…”
– Muk Hye-sung is genuinely flustered
– Suddenly denied the blood relation
– But the distance is definitely less with ‘teacher’ than with ‘uncle’
– How can he even come up with ‘uncle’ right away? Do kids these days even know that word? Interesting LOL
“…Do whatever you want.”
His tone was so resigned, as if he couldn’t deal with this anymore, that everyone watching burst into laughter.
While the other trainees were creating tear-jerking, heartwarming family dramas, On Raon and Muk Hye-sung were behaving like they were on a weekend evening variety show.
Thus ended the time of unexpected family reunions.
After all 21 trainees had divided parts and performed the acoustic version of ‘Rewind’, one of Pick Heart 3’s best outputs.
Finally, it was time to announce the debut members.