Free Web NovelBy nature, I was the kind of person who had very few things I actively disliked.
Even in Romance of the Three Kingdoms, if you excluded the people from Wei and Wu, I liked pretty much everyone.
Maybe because of that, there wasn’t much I really disliked in the Idol Ground 100 we were currently filming either.
Well, except for things like the occasional no-meat meal, or the ranking announcement ceremony that was happening right now.
“With this, we will conclude Idol Ground 100’s second ranking announcement ceremony. Among the contestants in this ranking announcement, those who placed 51st to 75th, unfortunately, will no longer···.”
Unlike the survivors, who were called one by one, the eliminated contestants were revealed all at once on the screen in a brutal system.
There were currently two contestants standing up on the platform.
The contestant who had placed 50th and the contestant who had placed 51st.
When the final rankings were announced, both of them burst into tears at the same time.
One was sobbing out loud like someone who had lost their country, while the other lifted their head, closed their eyes without a word, and cried quietly.
The one who survived was the former, and the one eliminated was the latter.
“I really hate this.”
“You have to accept it. Even if it looks cruel, reality is even crueler.”
“You’re right.”
The words “I really hate this” slipped out of my mouth before I knew it, and Yoo Jihae, standing beside me, patted my shoulder as she spoke. Her words stuck with me.
Was it because she had actually debuted as an idol herself?
Jihae was also sad watching the contestants get eliminated, but unlike the other contestants, she didn’t show any obvious signs of being shaken.
Of course, I didn’t think that being eliminated here meant the contestants’ dreams of becoming idols were over.
They could go back to their agencies and debut there, or use the recognition they’d gained here to find another path, or maybe walk a completely different road altogether.
The problem was that sometimes, that thing called reason and that thing called emotion ran on completely separate tracks.
There were times when you understood something in your head but couldn’t accept it emotionally.
For example, when Liu Bei lost Guan Yu, if he had acted rationally, he would have compromised with Sun Quan.
That would have been the more stable option for the future of Shu.
But Liu Bei couldn’t endure, and he went charging in, and that eventually returned as the disaster known as the Battle of Yiling.
In a way, it was a textbook example of what happens when emotion comes before reason.
However,
‘If he’d held back there, he wouldn’t have been Liu Bei.’
If Liu Bei had held back there, would he have been the Liu from the house of Liu, or just another Cao Pi-type figure? Would he have been the eldest of Liu, Guan, Zhang?
That’s why I liked Liu Bei.
These days, there were people who called Liu Bei stupid and said he didn’t have the qualities of a ruler.
But I preferred someone who, even if he got called foolish, jumped into the fire together when his brother died, rather than someone who stayed cold and calculating.
“Everyone, thank you for all your hard work in today’s filming. Starting today, you’ll have a two-day break. Just like with the previous break, anything that happened during filming must absolutely not be revealed to the outside. As for the return time···.”
While I’d been spacing out for a bit, the program was announcing that filming for the day was over.
At the same time, the staff started going over the rules the contestants had to follow during the break.
It was the moment they announced that, now that the second mission, the Position Evaluation, was over, the break period had come around again.
Idol Ground 100’s operating method: force them to live together for two weeks, then give them a two-day vacation.
Thinking about it now, it really was exquisitely calibrated.
“Ah, I just want to get out of here and lie down on my bed in my room.”
“I want to go home and watch Idol Ground 100 episodes 3 and 4!”
“The first thing I want to eat once I get outside is spicy stir-fried rice cakes. With extra cheese on top, like the ones from that super-spicy place···!”
“Hot dogs! We absolutely have to order hot dogs too!”
Watching my teammates and the other survivors, who had been sunk in gloom over the eliminated contestants just moments ago, suddenly regain their energy, I couldn’t help but admire the production team’s use of the stick and carrot.
‘This is exactly like a platoon getting weekend leave.’
One of the company commander’s main roles back in the day had been accompanying the platoon members on overnight leave.
In the unit I’d been in, once every half-year they allowed each squad to take a group overnight trip within the restricted movement area, and at that time one officer or NCO had to accompany them.
Honestly, it was a hassle, but unlike me, who could go out every weekend, the kids only got that squad overnight once every six months, so I had no choice but to go with them.
And the looks on the platoon members’ faces the day before leave were exactly like the expressions on my teammates’ faces right now.
Starting with making plans for what they were going to do once they were out, then excitedly chattering about what they’d eat, what they’d do for fun.
‘There’s definitely someone who did their military service involved in planning this program.’
It really was a wise choice.
If they had made them live together until the end of the program with no breaks for the sake of security, there definitely would have been some serious accidents in the dorm.
But if, even when things were hard or rough, you could think, “If I just hold out for two weeks, I get leave,” the contestants could throw themselves into the effort with burning motivation.
And like now, even when something sad happened, using the vacation as an excuse to flip the mood again was a really good thing.
“Now go back to the dorm and pack your things, then we’ll give you back the electronic devices you turned in, and you’ll get on the buses right away.”
While we were all chattering about what we were going to do during the break, a staff member told us to get ready to leave, and my teammates and I left the auditorium and headed toward the building with the dorms.
Since the dorm was in a remote place, even if they made us all come by ourselves when we checked in, at least when we checked out, they moved us to the MPlay broadcasting station by bus. That was a relief.
If they didn’t, we would’ve had to go back using public transportation, and in that case there would have been a lot of annoying, tiring things.
“Right. Last vacation, there were people who recognized me.”
“I thought no one would recognize me because my ranking was low, but there were people who did, so I was really surprised!”
“There were even people who asked me for an autograph, but I didn’t have a signature yet, so I just wrote ‘Im Yunkyung’ in block letters··· I’m going to make an autograph this break!”
Ever since Idol Ground 100 had become a hot topic and blown up, a lot more people had started recognizing the contestants, which made it awkward to just wander around public places.
[Our gallery bias’s “natural” concept, right?]
(A picture of Lee Sion in a hoodie with pajama pants on, glancing around inside a convenience store)
↳Now this is a real individual trainee
↳Since she doesn’t have an agency, we get to see this side of her
↳Honestly, if it weren’t for her face, that outfit would be identical to my kid sister lazing around at home, and that creeped me out a little
↳She’s just trying not to make fans feel distant from her
Even I still had a shot of me, taken when I went to the convenience store in front of my house to buy cola, floating around the internet.
“Ugh··· I wanted to at least have a meal just with us, but that’s not going to happen, huh.”
Nayeon’s regretful voice.
Just a moment ago we’d been saying we should at least go eat together as a team, but once we thought about how, the moment we all went out to eat together, we’d immediately become the center of attention, we realized it wasn’t going to be that easy.
“Then how about hanging out at my house?”
“Your house?”
“Yes!”
But then Yunkyung suggested that in that case, we could just hang out at her house, and sure enough, she really was still a kid.
“There are seven of us just in our team, you know, Yunkyung. We’re not shameless enough to do that.”
Bringing not one or two friends, but seven, back home?
If I had tried something like that, I would never have let those friends go home again.
Because the moment they left, there would have been a very high chance that the furious Lady Sukja would make that day my funeral.
Besides, even if you got your parents’ permission to have seven people visit at once, once you were actually at the house, there wasn’t really anything for seven people to do together.
There’s a reason that whenever people feel like there are too many of them, they automatically head to a PC bang, a billiards hall, or a karaoke room.
It’s not that there are so many places to go that they pick those.
It’s that there’s nowhere else to go, so they end up there.
“It’s fine! My house is really big.”
But even after I said that, Yunkyung answered that it didn’t matter because their house was big.
‘What, do they live in a fifty-pyeong apartment or something?’
I was about to tell her we’d go another time, thinking it was too much to just show up at someone else’s house with no warning, when,
“That’s right! I went to her house with Suyeon last time, and I think you could fit a hundred people in there just fine!”
Shinyu’s follow-up comment made me go speechless.
***
“Um··· so, Yunkyung?”
“Boss, what’s wrong?”
“This is your house?”
“Yes!”
Gulp.
Before I knew it, I swallowed.
I wasn’t the only one who was thrown by Yunkyung’s answer.
From our leader, Yoo Jihae, to Lee Gahyeon, even to Ryu Ayeon—everyone had gone blank, like they were at a loss for words at the sight in front of us.
Hannam-dong.
One of the neighborhoods in South Korea where housing prices were the highest—that was where Yunkyung’s house was.
–Company commander, people who don’t know anything think the rich all live in Apgujeong or Cheongdam, right? But the real rich live in Hannam-dong. You can’t just move in there just because you have money.
Staff Sergeant Park, who called himself the Warren Buffett of the 7th Division and whose mood supposedly rose and fell in real time with the stock charts during working hours, which was why the soldiers called him Roller Coaster Park.
Among our company’s officers and NCOs, Park had especially strong interest in investing, and if you ignored everything he said that was about investing, he actually had a surprising number of useful things to say.
Maybe because he always went looking for that kind of information, whenever the talk turned to money, facts popped out of his mouth like some kind of walking wiki.
In my past life, after lunch with the company’s officers and NCOs, we’d been chatting and the subject of Apgujeong building rents had come up by chance, and I remembered Park launching into an impassioned speech about how the real rich weren’t in Apgujeong, they were in Hannam-dong.
And right now, I was starting to think that maybe what Staff Sergeant Park had said back then really was true.
“Are these your friends, Yunkyung?”
“Yeah, Mom! You said you wanted to see the boss’s face in person at least once, remember?”
“Oh my, you’re even prettier in real life. It’s nice to meet you.”
“···Thank you.”
“I’m sorry, I left our guests standing outside. Come on in.”
“···Yes.”
A mansion that looked like something I’d only ever seen in dramas.
And when the front gate of that mansion opened and a middle-aged woman, who looked rich no matter how you looked at her, came out to greet us, introduced herself as Yunkyung’s mother, and smiled and told me and my teammates to come in, I couldn’t help but answer “Yes” without thinking.
“What kind of family is Yunkyung from?”
“Hey, Geum Shinyu, so you came here before and didn’t say anything?!”
“It’s just··· Yunkyung wasn’t saying anything, so wouldn’t it have been weird if I did?”
The teammates whispering.
Even someone like me, who’d already been through my share of ups and downs, couldn’t get my head on straight at the sight of this place. How much worse must it have been for my teammates?
“Well then, have fun and make yourselves at home.”
“Mom! That Yupgi Tteokbokki, right? Please order that and some other stuff for us to eat.”
“Yupgi Tteokbokki? Okay.”
The outside of the mansion was overwhelming, but the inside was like someone had transplanted a hotel as-is.
Paintings that looked expensive at a glance were hanging everywhere, and the central staircase right in front of the entrance when you came in.
For the record, just this room of Yunkyung’s that we were in now felt about the size of my whole house.
Click.
Once Yunkyung’s door finally closed and we heard her mother’s footsteps receding, we immediately surrounded Yunkyung.
“Yunkyung, what does your father do?”
“My dad? He works overseas, and he said he does some kind of consulting.”
“And your mother?”
“Oh, my mom is the president of XX Department Store. But why are you asking, Boss?”
“I’m not the boss anymore, Yunkyung.”
“What?”
“From now on, you’re the one who should be boss.”
In my heart, Second Lieutenant Im Yunkyung had been promoted to four-star general long ago.
***
Tap, tap.
[What’s the point of talking to people who didn’t watch this recording?]
(A photo of Ryu Ayeon and Lee Sion bickering with each other)
「I really want to spoil it for you all, but I can’t, so it can’t be helped. But this stage is something you can’t describe with words anyway.
Just look at the pictures.
ㅋㅋㅋㅋ How are you out here calling yourself the gallery bias’s fan when you didn’t even see that stage?」
↳Board owner!!! Please just ban this bastard!
↳If I get banned, I’m not posting the rest of the pics, bye
↳How about we ban the guy who said we should ban this one?
↳Are you really sure they were actually on the same team as our gallery bias and Ryu Ayeon?
↳No spoilers
↳Why are all the audience reviews like, “If you missed this stage, you’ve lost half your life”?
Kim Jinsoo felt satisfied as he watched the comments pile up in an instant on his post in the Lee Sion gallery.
The overwhelming sense of superiority created by an imbalance of information was not something you often got to experience.
‘My tongue is seriously itching.’
Honestly, if it weren’t for the strict non-disclosure agreement, Jinsoo would have already been spoiling how amazing a stage Sion had shown. But if he did, he’d probably get sued, so it took real effort to hold back.
‘Anyway, it’s a relief we’re at least allowed to post pictures.’
The one saving grace was that as long as the photos weren’t of the stage itself or the inside of the broadcasting station, there was no particular restriction on uploading them.
Thanks to that, the internet was currently buzzing with pictures being scattered by the 500 fans who had gone to the Position Evaluation recording.
[You’re telling me Ryu Ayeon and Lee Sion are on the same team?]
[From the sound of the reviews, that’s basically confirmed. Everyone’s saying it was insane.]
[The one who’s going insane is me! How am I supposed to wait another two weeks!!!]
[Show me what you saw, let me see it too]
Jinsoo lost track of time, snickering as he read the reactions of the fans who had seen the photos.
Of course, Jinsoo had posted his own pictures too, and one of them had spread beyond the gallery and was circulating around other communities.
[How our gallery bias reacts when she runs into a Real Madrid fan]
(A video of Lee Sion doing Cristiano Ronaldo’s celebration and shouting “Siuuu”)
「A fan at the recording told her they became a Real fan because of her, and she answered with a “Siuuu” right away」
The post Jinsoo had put up on the soccer board was already pinned as an announcement by the board ◈ Nоvеlіgһт ◈ (Continue reading) owner.
[Lee Sion’s fan service on her way into the broadcasting station]
(A video of her making a heart over her head and asking people to vote for Lee Gahyeon)
↳Is it even legal to act that cute with that face?
↳I’m going crazy··· I’m already a taken fan! Stop seducing me!!!
↳Okay, I give up, just debut already. I’ll go to a fansign even if I have to go into debt.
↳ㅋㅋ Right after this, Lee Gahyeon covered Sion’s mouth and Kim Nayeon and Ryu Ayeon dragged her off by force
↳No one got footage of that? I want to see it too!!!
There were even photos that captured moments he hadn’t seen in person or things he hadn’t been able to photograph himself, so Jinsoo was frantically hopping around Idol Ground 100-related communities.
‘Huh?’
And then one particular post caught his eye.
Sionism.
Lee Sion’s fan café, which had now passed sixty thousand members—first place by far among Agbaek contestants, and even compared to idol fan cafés in general, it had a very high member count. A giant fan café by any standard.
Among the posts there, one title in particular stood out.
[I can’t hold it in anymore, so I’m blowing the whistle]
「I can’t reveal my full personal details, but I work at MPlay.
Recently, I’ve been working on producing Idol Ground 100, and something happened during that process that I just couldn’t bring myself to overlook, so I’m here to blow the whistle.
The main point of my accusation is that the program’s main PD gave an order to edit out a specific contestant’s screentime.
I’ve blurred faces and muted parts where names are mentioned to avoid causing harm to the contestant in question or to innocent production staff if their identities get exposed, so I ask for your understanding. freewēbnoveℓ.com
The attached materials are an audio recording I secretly made and a meeting video that contains···」
“What is this?”
At first, Jinsoo had thought it was just another typical troll post, but the more he read, the more he realized it wasn’t trolling at all, but something written in earnest.
Before he knew it, his hand had moved to the attachment the writer had posted.
Unable to resist his curiosity, he clicked it and saw an audio file and a video file pop up in a download window.
***
–Miyoung, even if you step down, Lee Sion can’t.
Miyoung was thinking about the words of variety department head Kang Hyukjin.
They were a little hurtful, but true.
Even if she left Idol Ground 100, the program could still keep going, but if Lee Sion left, there was a high chance the entire program would collapse.
‘So even quietly resigning on my own isn’t an option?’
After the Position Evaluation ended, when she had gone to see Kang Hyukjin and revealed that Lee Sion was actually her niece, his face had turned pale.
For the main PD of the country’s hottest, highest-rated program and the contestant who was running in first place with overwhelming popularity to be blood relatives—that was no small problem.
Because of that, Miyoung had originally planned to quietly resign and wrap things up that way.
–Lee Sion is going to go all the way to debut. But if this comes out then, it’ll cause problems all over again. If we’re going to deal with it, now is the time.
But Kang Hyukjin refused, saying that would just be a stopgap measure, not a solution.
So in the end, Miyoung had no choice but to make a decision.
To choose Operation “Pearl Harbor Attack,” something she would never have chosen unless it was the last of the last resorts.
–Then how far can you back me up?
–Back you up? If it solves the problem, I’ll do anything!
–Then first, please prepare two tickets for a European cruise.
–What’s that for?
–Because I need a bribe.
When Miyoung made that demand, Kang said that in that case, at least tell him what she was planning to do, and Miyoung went into detail, laying out exactly what Operation Pearl Harbor Attack entailed.
Ring.
“Hello?”
“Senior, it’s Hyuksu. I, uh··· uploaded the thing you mentioned.”
“Okay, good work.”
“But··· are you really going to be okay with this?”
On the other end of Miyoung’s answer, Lee Hyuksu’s voice trembled as he asked.
“Don’t worry. The department head already reported everything to the president. I’m busy, I have to get ready, so I’m hanging up.”
Click.
Before Hyuksu could say anything else, Miyoung hung up and steeled herself once more.
‘I’ve already sold out my sister, and I’ve sold out my niece. I can sell myself too.’
It was the moment when the Devil of Ratings finally decided to offer up even herself as a sacrifice for the sake of ratings.
