The Maknae Has to Be an Idol

I ignored Young-Ho’s attempt to get my phone number and went outside the studio with my group members.

“Ahhhh! We can finally go home!” Dong-Jun shouted as we walked towards the basement parking lot.

“Yay, going home~ Sweet home~” Yeon-Hoon appeared cheerful to finally finish shooting and danced a funky shoulder dance.

“Woon, what are we going to eat for dinner?”

“Hm. Is there anything you guys want to eat?” Do-Seung and Woon pondered about the dinner menu as soon as they went inside the car. The mood was definitely lighter now than before.

“I want jaeyuk[1]!”

“Nope.”

“Then pork belly!”

“Nope.”

“That’s the answer.”

“How could there be a correct answer for even a dinner menu!”

Dong-Jun and Do-Seung bickered and joked like usual.

“Ahhhh. I’m exhausted.”

“You sure did a lot today.”

“Hm, no. Woon, you did a lot more.”

Woon and Yeon-Hoon exchanged compliments with one another as if they were trying to compete to see who was kinder. I watched them all from the back seat with a satisfied smile on my face. This was the everyday, normal dinner scene that I had so desperately dreamed about.

The shooting time ended one hour earlier than we expected. We also won a commercial opportunity, and I stopped Only One’s Young-Ho from dropping out of his group. Though there were some ups and downs in the middle, today was a pretty satisfactory day.

“Then, should we get salad takeout from the place near the practice room and go practicing right away?”

“Yeah~”

“Okay, let’s do that~”

My group members quickly decided on the rest of the plans for the day. We planned to eat dinner and practice right after that, but considering how difficult the performance we were planning to do was, we couldn’t rest even for a day.

“Then, why doesn't everyone get some sleep before we arrive at our dorms?”

“Ms. Hyuna! Please wake us up when we arrive~

“Yes~ Don’t worry!”

Everyone probably felt burdened by this intense schedule. We had only been sleeping three hours a day in the past week and even did some shooting today. Yet, we were going to go right into practice after this.

On the other hand, having a worn-out body was preferable compared to the listless days I spent with no end in sight and out of the spotlight. I planned to succumb to this nice feeling of lethargy and close my eyes when I remembered something again and opened my eyes.

‘Ah.’ I had forgotten about a crucial fact because I had been too busy with the shooting. ‘But don’t I have control over my Insight now? There was something about the sixth sense too?’

It was the changes that took place after I saved Park Young-Ho. It seemed evident that the system had given me some control over my Insight, but I wasn’t sure how I could go about it since I wasn’t too familiar with the ability in the first place.

‘And moreover, what is this sixth sense?’ I didn’t know what this was talking about. What was this supposed to mean? It was the kind of wording that made me think the system was kind of over the top. Anyway, I sat quietly and thought over the sixth sense and Insight.

‘I think the sixth sense is supposed to help me use Insight,’ I thought. Since Insight was a superhuman ability, I would probably need a new sense to control it.

‘Then, what in the world is this ‘sixth sense’ exactly?’ The system told me that I gained this sixth sense, but I noticed no changes in my body. Nothing special happened, and my mind and body appeared to be the same as before. I pondered about this while looking out the window.

‘Since it’s supposed to control Insight, maybe I should try to recall the sensations I feel whenever it gets activated…’ I tried a simple and easy approach first. Since I had control over it, I thought I might now be able to activate it whenever I wanted.

‘But what sensation did I feel whenever the Insight ability got activated?’ I was already stuck on the first point. I always felt urgent whenever I was in a situation where I needed the ability. Thus, I couldn’t easily remember the sensations I felt then since I was too busy solving the problem in front of me during those times. And while I was feeling frustrated, not knowing what to do, the car entered a tunnel.

Whoooosh—

The car entered a tunnel and the view outside the window instantly changed. It felt as if I entered another world in just a second and there was even something different about the sound I heard around me.

‘Ah.’ Perhaps, I should think about this ability like entering a tunnel. The moment I used Insight, the world I lived in took a clearly different form than before. My mind quickly sucked in information around me, and its ability to sense its surroundings quickened so much that I almost thought the world was slowing down.

It felt as if I was stepping into another unknown world. Using this Insight ability was similar to entering a tunnel, and I was planning to focus on this feeling when using the Insight ability.

Whoooosh!

I entered Insight mode, and the constantly changing scenery outside my car window fixed to a halt and all the changes that occurred inside the car clearly entered my ears and eyes. Everything that was within this confined space—the inside of the car—came within my range of vision. This rush of information could be the first step to taking control of everything. The word, ‘omnipotence’ came to my mind when the Insight ability suddenly ended by itself.

Psh.

Gasp! Perhaps, because I had tried to activate the Insight ability on my own for the first time, the side effects were severe, and I felt a head-splitting headache. If I had been standing instead of sitting down, I would’ve probably collapsed to the ground. Simultaneously, the system’s voice rang inside my ears again.

[You used your maximum limit of Insight for today.]

[You will be able to use it again after a specific time frame.]

‘What? Is there some cooling time or something?’ I wondered. Why wouldn’t the system just give me everything when it was giving me something? I scowled, feeling the head-splitting pain and expressed my annoyance to the system.

“Huh?”

“Mr. Tae-Yoon?”

“Are you all right?” Ms. Hyuna and Ms. Seung-Yeong asked worriedly, seeing my condition through the back mirror. Though the pain didn’t completely subside, I answered in the calmest way I could possibly make.

“I’m fine. I’m just tired.” Then I pretended to be asleep. If I made any more fuss than this, I think I would wake my group members even though this was a precious nap time they rarely had. I needed to let them save their stamina as much as possible.

***

We arrived at the street where the practice room was.

“You can just drop us here!”

“We can drive you to where the salad place is.”

“No, it’s already right in front anyway. It’s the same thing,” Yeon-Hoon told Ms. Seung-Yeon and Ms. Hyuna, and they parked the car in the streets.

“Be careful!”

“Thank you for today!”

“Good work~”

We each thanked Ms. Hyuna and Ms. Seung-Yeon while getting out of the car.

“Okay~ Let’s go buy salad~” Like that, we went inside the salad store and ordered the menu we always did. Then, we returned to our practice room, ate, and rested for 30 minutes to digest our food; and then resumed our practice. Though we just came back from a shooting, I was surprised by how they practiced like nothing special happened. I was almost reaching my physical limit, but everyone dived into our training without showing any signs of fatigue.

“We are going to practice with dancers tomorrow right?”

“Yeah. We decided to go to their practice room because it’s much better than ours.”

Sigh.

“This damn WD Entertainment.”

“Yeah, but they did get dancers for us this time.”

The only conversation we shared was still just about practice or Woon’s teachings.

“Yeon-Hoon, move your leg!”

“Dong-Jun, extend your arm!”

“Tae-Yoon, put more pressure on your body!”

We continued to move like that until it was past midnight. We needed to wake up at 6 a.m. again tomorrow, so I worried that we might have to basically pull an all-nighter again.

“Okay, let’s stop our practice for today,” Woon said and announced the end of today’s practice.

“Haaaa!”

“Ugggh!”

“Ahhhh!”

My group members screamed while lying on the floor.

“Really good work, everyone,” I told my group members and also slumped to the ground beside them.

Then, after exactly ten minutes of collecting our breaths and resting on the ground, one of us said, “Let’s go home now.”

“Yeah, let’s go.”

And we all walked to our dorm.

***

As soon as we returned to our dorm, everyone did their own individual tasks. Yeon-Hoon, who always complained that he didn’t want to wash himself, quickly went inside the bathroom and finished his shower. I also took out the blankets and placed them on the floor as soon as I returned to the room. Woon and Do-Seung cleaned up the house a bit, went inside the bathroom, and washed up when it was their turn.

All these events took place without us exchanging a single word with one another. Because they were suffering from the highest level of fatigue, it appeared that they didn’t even think about talking. They simply thought of finishing everything they needed to do before going to sleep as soon as possible. And after cleaning the house, making the bed, and washing ourselves, we could finally get to bed.

We laid the blanket in the living room and turned off the lights. A comforting darkness befell the living space.

“It was a really, really long day.”

“Good night, everyone.”

“Let’s survive through the next day and see each other again.”

“You guys worked really hard today.”

My group members said to one another and quickly went to sleep. I also prepared to go to sleep following my members. It was a very exhausting day, and drowsiness overcame me as soon as I closed my eyes. Like that, I didn’t know when I fell asleep. I thought I could fall deep asleep without thinking of anything else today.

Yet, sometime later, I found myself unable to fall into a deep sleep and wandered between a state of consciousness and unconsciousness. I lay awake feeling drowsy and hazy when I sensed a movement from the space next to me.

Slid.

“….Hm?” Because I couldn’t fall asleep properly for a while, I was sensitive to the tiniest movement. I raised my torso halfway and looked around me.

“…Yeon-Hoon?” The person who should’ve been murmuring in his deep slumber wasn’t there. I wondered if he was in the bathroom, but the bathroom lights weren’t turned on either. I wondered if something happened and tried to search where he was.

“Ah.” Yeon-Hoon was standing in the darkest area of the kitchen.

“What are you doing there Yeon-Hoon? Go to sleep,” I told him and planned to bring him back.

“Tae-Yoon.”

Inside the darkness, Yeon-Hoon’s voice felt different from usual. It clearly sounded like him but the tone and the energy he gave off didn’t belong to the person I knew. Simultaneously, a memory came to my mind.

‘No way.’

Before I regressed, I got a phone call from Yeon-Hoon.

“…Yeon-Hoon?” I asked in a trembling voice but Yeon-Hoon didn’t answer. Because of how dark the kitchen space was, I couldn’t see his face clearly. I was about to take one more step when Yeon-Hoon pushed me and stopped me from approaching closer. But if I couldn’t approach him, I thought I could pull him towards me. I was about to grab his hand when I realized Yeon-Hoon didn’t budge like he was some kind of boulder.

“Umph!”

“…What?”

I couldn’t let this moment go. I thought the truth behind everything that started my regression was unraveling before my eyes and I was about to retrieve information about Yeon-Hoon using my Insight ability when the system’s mechanical voice rang again.

[You do not have the authority to approach further.]

Psh!

My Insight ability became blocked by some outside power. Yeon-Hoon stayed in the darkness and I was still unable to reach him.

Thump. “I’m sorry Tae-Yoon,” Yeon-Hoon said and collapsed towards my side.

1. Spicy marinated pork ☜