The Maknae Has to Be an Idol

“Time?” I repeated Kang Hyun-Sung’s question. What did he mean by that? He must also be well aware that we were in the middle of filming right now.

I said, “We have to go treasure hunting. They said they’re prizes involved.”

“Let’s go find that a little later.”

“It’s a broadcast. Shouldn’t we do as we’re told?”

“Sir.” Instead of answering my question, Kang Hyun-Sung went to producer Park Soo-Chul. He seemed like he said something to Park Soo-Chul, and after their conversation was over, he approached me again and took off the microphone on his waist.

He said, “Let’s go.”

“What?”

“You should take off your microphone too if you don’t want our private conversations to be broadcasted on TV.”

It was the first time I had ever seen him act like this. I didn’t know why he was going so far to have just a little conversation after giving me such a stern warning last week on top of the stairs. Was he planning to take me to a corner and beat me up? I don’t think I would lose in my current state but…

‘What the hell am I thinking about again?’ I cut off these meaningless thoughts and took off my microphone. It seemed meaningless for me to keep resisting more from here.

When I went to the producer and handed him the microphone pack, Park Soo-Chul said, “I’m just giving you 10 minutes. Please have a quick conversation about Mr. Young-Ho and come back.”

I now understood how this private time was created. ‘He sold off his hurt maknae.’

Since he didn’t do anything seriously bad, it felt out of line for me to say anything. Furthermore, a request like this only worked because Kang Hyun-Sung asked. If it were another group leader, they would definitely have been like, ‘What? You should just keep shooting.’

“We’ll come back in 10 minutes.” Kang Hyun-Sung said and moved to the waiting room.

* * *

Kang Hyun-Sung and I sat face-to-face in the waiting room. It was even more awkward because we were alone in an enclosed space. Kang Hyun-Sung called me all the way here but just stared at me without saying a word. I wondered why he was staring at me so intently, but I felt like I would be losing if I moved my gaze away, so I glared back. Silence continued like this for a while, and then Kang Hyun-Sung spoke first.

“Thank you for helping Young-Ho.”

“Ah, yes.”

“The doctor told us that if it weren’t for you, his leg would have been broken.”

“That’s a relief.” Even from my perspective, I thought that would be the case, so that’s why I had gritted my teeth and caught him.

“Thank you.” Like this, his awkward and dull gesture of gratitude ended. He must not have called me out separately just to tell me this. I wondered what else he wanted to tell me.

Kang Hyun-Sung asked, “How are you preparing for the next performance?”

“What?” He suddenly asked me about the preparation for the next stage. It was strange that he started the conversation by saying thank you and was now trying to dig up information.

When I stared blankly at him, Kang Hyun-Sung continued, “For us, we’re taking the whole song apart and revising it extensively.”

“Ah, yes. Go ahead.” I wondered what reaction he wanted from me. It was a mission to steal another group’s performance, so it was natural to rearrange it.

“We took out all the Korean instruments and changed the song from ‘Walya’ to ‘Moon Night.’” Kang Hyun-Sung’s explanation began to get more and more detailed. At this rate, he was going to spoil everything about their next performance.

He continued, “We also considerably changed the interpretation of the song. The lyrics you wrote were about a love that cannot be ful…”

“Excuse me?” I cut him off before he could go any further and asked, “Why are you telling me this?” I had never asked how Only One was preparing for their performance.

Kang Hyun-Sung stared at me again and said, “Be prepared.”

“What?”

“I don’t know what kind of performance you prepared, but I’m telling you to listen to what we are preparing so that your group can prepare something that will be good enough to rival us.”

What the hell was up with this bastard? He was outrightly telling me now that since we’re rivals, we should make good use of that for the show and maximize our benefits.

“We’ll take care of our performance by ourselves.” However, he was going a little over the line. Was he trying to teach me a lesson or something? It didn’t feel very pleasant because it felt like he was belittling us.

“Yes, well. I got it.” Kang Hyun-Sung nodded without further words. I wondered if this was something he should say to a person he was thankful to, but I just decided to think of it as his own version of expressing gratitude. Overall, he did share information about their next performance and told us that we should lead the show together.

“Then, you have nothing more to say, right?” However, this kind of situation was only unpleasant, and I didn’t want to stay here any longer. I tried to get out of my seat, but Kang Hyun-Sung wasn’t finished.

“No, I have one more thing to say.” He looked in a specific direction and said, “You’ll probably shoot the PepCola commercial with us. Don’t be too disappointed.”

“What?” He brought up unexpected information. What kind of nonsense was he saying about shooting the commercial together? Of course, Only One won the PepCola commercial in my past life, but that was the past. Since we’ve won the most games, we needed to be the models, but why was he suddenly saying that we needed to co-model with them? I glared at Kang Hyun-Sung because I thought there was a hidden alliance between the production crew and him.

He seemed to have read the hostility in my gaze as he replied, “In the first place, that model proposal came to me personally, but I talked to the production team and made it into a game for the sake of the show. Whatever the outcome of the game, it was supposed to be with us. I didn’t commit an immoral injustice but did everyone a favor instead.”

When I continued to look at him with suspicion, he stared at me with a little annoyance and got up. “I told you in advance so you won’t be disappointed that you have to co-model with us.”

He must have thought he was doing me a favor, and I put aside my distrust and thought rationally. No matter how successful The Showcase 2 was, it was not popular enough to gain an advertising model deal for a single game. Advertising was a huge investment. Therefore, it was actually reasonable for Only One, which included Kang Hyun-Sung, to become the advertising model.

‘As he said, he may have done us a favor by giving us a chance.’ This meant that Kang Hyun-Sung shared the modeling deal with us even though he could have done it alone.

“No, I believe it. After thinking about it, that seems more plausible.” I withdrew my suspicions about him and said, “You have nothing more to say, right?”

“Yes.”

“Then let’s head out.”

“Yes, let’s do that.”

The two of us came out of the waiting room side by side. While I was heading out, I wondered why this guy called me out all the way here. Since he called me out separately, I thought he might tell me something really important, but it was nothing much.

He just told me the behind-the-scenes story about the PepCola modeling contract, and all he did was give a warning that sounded like an order to prepare a similar level of performance as theirs. It seemed as if this was how Kang Hyun-Sung was repaying the favor, but they were all TMIs that I didn’t need to know.

He must have thought he was sharing some kind of critical information, but it didn’t matter to me if I knew about his performance or not. I was a little curious about their performance, but just because their stage concept was good, it didn’t mean their skills would suddenly soar, so their performance was probably within my expectations anyway.

For the PepCola modeling case, it was not something I could do anything about, so it just worsened my mood. Kang Hyun-Sung and I didn’t say a single word to each other while moving back to the studio.

When we returned, Park Soo-Chul made a fuss and told us, “The other group members are already all looking for treasures. You two should hurry up and go look for the treasure too!”

After wearing a microphone pack back on, Kang Hyun-Sung and I went to the open space outside the studio and joined the treasure hunt.

When I approached the other members, they asked, “Tae-Yoon, where have you been?”

“I was in the bathroom,” I simply replied. It was a bit hard to say that I was with Kang Hyun-Sung as I didn’t reap any benefits from that. Then, I quickly switched the subject of the conversation to finding the treasure. “Did anyone find the treasure?”

“No…” Yeon-Hoon replied with a sullen expression.

“I think the other teams found at least one, but we couldn’t find a single one.”

“Is this rigged?”

“Who rigs a treasure hunt?”

Strangely, it seemed as if we were the only group who couldn’t find a treasure. Other groups were all holding something that looked like a monster ball. I thought that was probably that treasure with the prize inside.

I started searching the open spaces with the members. Since we got the PepCola advertising deal, finding the treasure was not that important, but it was good to have it. I also thought the members would like it if we got one or two. However—

“The treasure hunt is over!”

“Ah.”

“I can’t believe we couldn’t find a single one.”

“We seriously have no skills.”

We couldn’t find a treasure until the time limit was up.

“Please return to the studio!”

We returned to the studio per the direction of the production crew.

* * *

After returning to the studio, we took time to organize the results of the treasure hunt, and I was able to immediately confirm that what Kang Hyun-Sung said was true.

“Oh! We got this!”

“What?”

“Huh?”

“Wow!”

“Chance to appear as a PepCola model.”

Inside the treasure that Only One found, a note with the phrase ‘PepCola Advertising Model Deal’ came out.

“Only One found the treasure hunt’s highlight!” Host Kim Young-Jin said and uplifted Only One, and the other groups looked at Only One with envious eyes.

“Teams that do well keep doing well.”

“I’m jealous~.”

Other groups seemed to just accept it as Only One being lucky. However for me, who knew the whole story, just let out a hollow laugh.

‘Wouldn’t there be a controversy about the show being rigged if this is aired?’ I even worried about this, but—

“Ah? Ours is a trip to Jeju Island and a chance to film a traveling video?” Bleshu got the jackpot of going on a trip to Jeju Island and a chance to film a traveling journey video.

“Ours is filming a stay-in trip at Shilla hotel!” Luminin got the chance to upload a video of them staying in an expensive hotel.

“Ours is a pool villa in Gapyeong! And a chance to film a vacation trip!” OnebyOne got the chance to film a vacation video at a pool villa in Gapyeong.

‘Geez.’ The production crew was throwing money in the air to erase sentiments and ill-feelings of the show being rigged. The unexpected turn of events made me laugh.

‘At this rate, isn’t it a loss for us to be a model for a commercial?’ The others could increase their fame by playing and uploading a Utube video, but we were just going to work.

‘I’m so jealous.’ Of course, the behind-the-scenes of our commercial shoot would also be uploaded separately, but I felt annoyed that we might be getting the worse end of the deal.

“I also want us to go to a hotel…”

“A trip to Jeju Island, so lucky…..”

Yeon-Hoon and Woon sat side by side and envied the other teams.

“We can go by ourselves later~” Dong-Jun comforted Yeon-Hoon and Woon while saying words he could easily say.

“We’re coming out in a commercial. That’s enough,” Do-Seung said and soothed Yeon-Hoon and Woon. However, the two must be sad that they couldn’t find a treasure.

“It would have been so nice to go and rest with you guys.”

“Jeju’s grilled hairtail is really good.”

Woon must have really wanted all the members to go on a trip together and rest well, and Yeon-Hoon must have wanted to go on a healing trip.

Just in time, the production crew came out and began setting up again. “Please stand in ending formation again!”

It must now be time for the closing lines. We stood in the same formation as the opening and Kim Young-Jin came out in the middle. “Like this, we finished all five games, including the treasure hunt? Did everyone have fun?”

“Yesss!” Expected closing remarks rang out in the studio.

“Hopefully, this was time for all five groups to relax and have fun! We’ll see you all on stage next week!”

“Thank you!”

“Thank you for your hard work.”

“Good job!”

After shooting the ending, a lot of the equipment that was filming us began to fall back at once.

“Please take off the microphones and bring it here~”

“We’ll be moving the cameras out!”

We stood in the middle of the busy scene where the production crew was cleaning up and bowed to them to give the closing greeting, which all rookies needed to do.

“Thank you! Thank you for your hard work today!”

“Thank you!”

After greeting each and every one of the staff so that we could look as polite as possible, I was about to leave the studio when—

Tap.

Someone grabbed my wrist.

“What the.” When I looked back, Park Young-Ho looked at me with a frightened expression.

“Um, Mr. Tae-Yoon…”

“Yes?”

I thought Only One’s leader and maknae were both seriously bothering me today when Park Young-Ho asked, “Well, can you tell me your phone number? I’d like to thank you somehow.”

I was strangely very popular among Only One members today. However, I hoped that bothersome events like this would stop happening to me.

“I’m sorry. We’re not allowed to contact people privately.” I just made a half-ass excuse to get him to leave me alone.

“Ah! That—.”

“See you next time,” I answered curtly and ran quickly to the members who were moving ahead of me. I thought I could hear the sound of Park Young-Ho’s mentality crumbling, but it was none of my concern.