Save a Failed Idol’s Life

Chapter 69 Everyone’s Reason

I asked because I wanted to hear it, not because I was curious. 

I lifted my head, thinking of a slightly sarcastic remark.

“Yeah.”

Seong-won, who had been silently looking down at me for a long time, finally made a rare expression and lightly curled his lips.

“I’ll tell you after the finals.”

What? He acted like he had some amazing reason. I narrowed my eyes and glared at him incredulously.

“What kind of big story do you have?”

“There is one.”

Seong-won cut off the conversation as if he didn’t want to talk more and took out an eye mask from the console box.

“Wake me up when we get to the dorm. I’m going to catch some sleep.”

“Hey, why do I have to wake you up?”

He was always doing whatever he wanted. I didn’t want to waste my energy arguing with this guy, so I shut my mouth.

There were so many things that didn’t go my way, and I felt hopeless that I couldn’t do anything about them.

But even in that situation, there was something I could do, so I had to do my best.

I vividly remembered the candidates who were packing their bags in the same waiting room, with joy and sorrow mixed depending on the draw.

If the song that required RnB skills had been chosen in the second round, the winner might have been the 14th contestant instead of Seong-won.

‘I’ll have to go through these things a lot more in the future.’

I didn’t need to feel guilty for winning by luck.

It was more important to take a step forward than to hesitate in uncertain assumptions and delusions.

‘Let’s get a grip, me too.’

As I renewed my determination, the lodging was getting closer.

“Hey, wake up.”

I gently grabbed and shook Seong-won’s shoulder. He had just fallen asleep, and he opened his slightly cloudy eyes.

“Are we there?”

“Yeah, wake up. Walk properly on your feet.”

I held Seong-won with my right arm as he staggered in his sleepiness. I felt his feverish body temperature.

He pretended to be calm and said he was fine, but he didn’t mean it.

I wish he would just say he was scared, thank me for coming with him, and cheer me up. Wouldn’t I like it if he was honest?

He was not honest and sensitive, which seemed to work as a charm point for the fans, but not for me.

I liked it when people were clear and straightforward, like the others.

‘You would have been adorable to the heavenly adults.’

I grumbled inwardly and messed up Seong-won’s small and pretty head.

“What, what are you doing?”

Seong-won had finally woken up properly and looked at me as he walked, holding the stair railing firmly.

“I’ll give you one more rice cake, you brat.”

I shamelessly ruffled Seong-won’s hair one more time and ran up to the next floor.

“What, that’s ridiculous.”

I heard Seong-won muttering behind me, but I didn’t care. I quickly opened the door lock and the front door, and saw the members waiting in the living room.

“How did it go!?”

Seon-woo, who was playing with the cat in his arms, ran to the entrance with the cat wrapped around him.

“You did great. The finals are live on the holiday, so if we don’t have any other plans, we should go to the audience and cheer for you.”

“That’s awesome! I was worried last year because the luck factor was so huge…”

“It was bad this year too. Luckily, the song selection wasn’t so bad that it would interfere, so I think it went well.”

Kyunghwa sighed long and hard, and tilted his head as if he was finally relieved.

“I know you’re good at singing. But I’m worried because I don’t know what song you’ll be up against and who you’ll be paired with, ugh.”

I briefly wondered if I should mention Kang Yugeon, but I decided not to.

It was something he would find out during the live finals anyway, and I didn’t want to give him one more thing to worry about.

That’s when Seong-won, who was staggering up the stairs, opened the door lock and came in.

“What are you doing, you can’t go alone.”

The cat, who was snuggled in Seon-woo’s arms, meowed loudly as if he was complaining about me.

“Oooh, is that so? Our Meongie was lonely today because he didn’t see his brother? Come here, I’ll hug you.”

“Lonely, my ass. He was running around like crazy because Seon-woo and I played with him.”

The cat only said one word, but Seong-won acted as if he heard ten. He quickly wiped his hands with the hand sanitizer at the entrance. Then he took the cat and buried his face in its soft belly.

“Is he a male?”

Kyunghwa asked with a disgusted look, as if he was surprised by Seong-won’s attitude towards the cat.

“He’s supposed to be a male if he looks like this.”

I didn’t ask about the gender when I went to the vet, because it wasn’t a situation to distinguish it.

“Isn’t this a rather private part? Can you expose it like this?”

“Ah, this is a male for sure. See, it looks like a peanut.”

There was a crowd of people at the entrance, looking under the cat’s tail.

I thought this was the time for me to play the villain.

“Let me remind you all, since you seem to have forgotten. We’re going to find a good family for him after he gets all his shots. We can’t raise him.”

Now that we had to sync up with the backup dancers, we had to stay in the practice room all day.

I couldn’t bear to think of the cat being left alone in the house, while all five of us were gone. It was cruel to the cat to keep him.

“You bloodless, tearless villain! Conglomerate! Lustful!”

“What are you talking about. Don’t talk nonsense.”

Ye-jun ran away, screaming with exaggerated gestures. The only thing that made sense was conglomerate. And that was not even me, but Cheon Yise’s parents.

“Lustful is you, I’m worried that you’ll cause a scandal.”

I fired back at Ye-jun, as if it wasn’t a counterattack. 

Ye-jun tilted his head and blinked his eyes.

“Me? Why me?”

He was surrounded by female staff a few days ago, laughing and having fun.

“Let’s be honest. You can’t neuter Meongie and yourself at the same time.”

“Yikes, how can you say such a cruel thing!”

The atmosphere turned into a mess again.

“But what I really feel unfair is. I want to be friends with everyone, regardless of gender. But what if they’re not interested?”

“What do you mean, what if. You have to handle it well and avoid misunderstandings.”

I tapped his forehead with my hand, as if I was hitting a bean or a chestnut. Ye-jun grumbled as if he was wronged.

“It’s sad to be popular, huh.”

“Stop wasting time and help me with dinner.”

The atmosphere that had been tense for a while after the second episode of Jacon aired seemed to ease up a bit.

I hoped everything would go smoothly until the teaser was released.

According to the schedule of uploading one episode per week, tomorrow was the day I had to go down to the countryside again to film Jacon.

Aeong-i agreed to stay with us until the day of adoption. And the preliminaries of ‘Star Discovery’ were over, so I didn’t have any big worries for a while.

Or rather, I shouldn’t have.

If something else went wrong here, I wouldn’t have time to fix it.

‘Please, let’s get through this well.’

I prayed to the system. Please, don’t let anything happen.

But of course, there was no answer.

Only the fluffy thing at the bottom of the basic status window that popped up with a pop made a whining sound as if trying to cheer me up.

***

Once I got on the full-fledged track, time flew by like an arrow.

I had been stuck in the practice room for almost a month with dance practice, so I lost my sense of date.

Only two days a week. 

The time I got out of the practice room for the filming of ‘Boys in Crisis’ was like rain in a drought.

I was even happy to go out as a substitute for Kang Yugeon’s absence.

Singing the same song over and over, dancing over and over.

 By the time I heard the first verse, my body moved first. 

The day Seong-won stood on the main stage of ‘Star Discovery’ was approaching.

Soon, Clamak would come back too, and the comeback schedule was vaguely visible. It was one night around that time.

[Title] I tried to troll a top idol from my agency and got screwed badly, but I still didn’t come to my senses.

[Body]

I was a contract worker at M Entertainment until recently.

I came here to spill some tea about the failed idol who is famous for having a good image (like a parent, lol).

They are planning to come back around November.

I messed up the schedule of the first group in the agency and got cursed a lot.

And then I stole their title song and packaged it as if I prepared it.

They seem to be washing their image with Jacon these days, lol.

The fandom of the first group must be pissed.

I’ll delete this soon.

[Comments]

-No proof, no truth, gtfo

ㄴIf I bring proof, you’ll beg me to delete this, lol.

ㄴJust show proof and talk.

-Who’s coming back in November?

ㄴLooking at the first group in the agency and the parent thing, it seems like Km.

ㄴPlease refrain from mentioning initials for unconfirmed rumors.

-You can’t even diss them properly, but you’re trying to create anxiety like this? Is this fun for you?

ㄴYou want the fandoms to fight, it’s obvious. Who would fall for this trash?

“Ah…”

I had nothing to say. I woke up after tossing and turning in the night and saw that my subscription SNS timeline was a mess.

The fans didn’t believe the post that was uploaded and deleted in the middle of the night without proof.

But there had never been a rumor disguised as an experience like this before, only malicious interpretations. So everyone was restless.

The only good thing was… it wasn’t the kind of post I was most worried about.

‘If the original Cheonise’s bad personality that he committed before he died becomes publicized now, it would be a disaster.’

That was the only thing I was worried about… It wasn’t true anyway, and I had nothing to be proud of at this point, so I was fine.

It wasn’t a big deal that the article spread too much, so it was safer to let it go quietly without making a fuss.

Fortunately, the other members didn’t see it and passed by…

“Hyung, did you see it?”

As soon as I opened the door to prepare breakfast, Ye-jun was already awake.

“What?”

I pretended not to know, even though I had a hunch.

We had less than a month left for our comeback, so there was no need to deliver negative news.

Especially if Seon-woo or Kyunghwa heard it, they would both be anxious and couldn’t focus on the practice.

“That. The one that was posted on the entertainment talk board.”

He saw it too. Why did he monitor it instead of sleeping well at dawn?

“I saw it. There was no proof and it was a lie anyway, and it was already deleted.”

I briefly summarized that I didn’t need to take any further action or care, and Ye-jun made a face.

“Hyung, aren’t you angry?”

Of course I am. I can’t do anything right now, and it would be more harmful to respond, so I just didn’t waste my energy.

“Of course. We worked so hard to use the song that Floss threw away because we didn’t want to.”

It wasn’t just my own effort, but a result that all the members contributed their talents.

I couldn’t tolerate the labels of plagiarism or stolen songs attached to it.

“It didn’t spread much and it was deleted, so it’s better to ignore it than to respond now. It would only solidify Floss’s ghost image.”

Ye-jun couldn’t argue, knowing that it was logical, and bit his lip.

“It’s so frustrating. I’m angry. But the fact that I can’t do anything about it makes me more annoyed.”

Ye-jun slumped down, unlike his usual self, and hugged his knees with both arms.

All the members remembered how much he had refined and created a great result in a short time.

If it weren’t for Ye-jun, we would have been ignored by the company, saying, look at that, you guys can’t do it.

So I understood his anger, but. Today was Seong-won’s appearance on ‘Star Discovery’.

It was a happy holiday, a bountiful Chuseok…

‘Why are there so many shitty things happening?’

I rubbed my forehead and shook my head.

But, the trouble didn’t end there.