Was it the aftermath of sitting face to face yesterday and spilling his story along with alcohol? Go Won had learned to show his prickliness outwardly quite well. This made him look exactly like a twenty-year-old, which was much better to see.
“Go ahead.”
I took out my phone and made a call. The recipient was Kwon Taeyoung.
“Yeah, Taeyoung hyung. It’s me. Ah, I have something to ask. What’s Go Won’s schedule like today?”
At the appearance of the general manager, Go Won’s eyes widened. The kid still didn’t have the guts to lunge at me to stop the call with Kwon Taeyoung.
– Why are you asking that?
Of course, Kwon Taeyoung was also a sufficiently rational person.
“He slept at my place yesterday. Well… since that kind of thing happened, if he has a schedule, I was thinking of pretending to go out somewhere and giving him a ride.”
He wouldn’t know I was deceiving him with Go Won right in front of me.
– It’s not an important schedule, so it can be skipped.
“Well, I’ll ask him when he wakes up. He might say he wants to do it. If he wants to rest, he can rest.”
– Ah.
‘It’s a lie, Director-nim. Don’t be fooled!’
That was exactly Go Won’s expression.
– There’s no schedule, and, um, he said he was going to take certification shots of the subway advertisement.
“Aha, I can drop him off in front of the station then. Thanks.”
– Baek Hanje, you’re really taking good care of Won. Really, for the first time, the maknae has a younger sibling…
Click.
No need for useless talk.
I turned to look at Go Won, who had frozen in place from absurdity.
“So which station is it?”
“……”
“I’m still holding my phone in my hand, you know? It takes less than a minute to search, so just tell me easily.”
“Hyung is really such a…”
Go Won soon mumbled the station name. Last week, an ad celebrating his debut and first music show win went up, and at a nearby station, an ad saying they were waiting for his comeback went up a few days ago. So he wanted to go there too.
Q2-4. Steady Growth is a Shortcut to the Goal
(Revised Edition)
A major incident has been resolved and peace has arrived.
But there’s no such thing as complete rest.
A rookie idol has a long way to go.
Show your face on various variety programs and become imprinted on the public.
Condition: Appear on public broadcast variety programs (0/3)
Upon success: MAX LEVEL increase (100→120), Go Won’s fandom size expansion
Upon failure: Comeback scenario execution impossible, Quest Scenario forced termination
Time limit: 499h 35m 01s (D-21)
‘Ah, at this timing?’
The 2-3 quest that had been pushed down in priority due to the emergency situation—raising vocal and dance abilities—disappeared as is, and the 2-4 quest newly appeared.
The rewards from 2-3 had been transferred over as they were.
‘Status.’
Pop.
Go Won
Vocal Lv. 91
Dance Lv. 95
Current MAX LEVEL: 100
100 wasn’t far off, so it would have been unfair if the reward had disappeared due to an emergency quest that wasn’t my intention. So it seemed they’d taken care of it as if carrying it forward.
Anyway.
‘I roughly understand how this structure works…’
First of all, this quest has the biggest theme.
<The Sunbae Who Paves a Flower Path> to fulfill Go Won’s wish, ■■■ ■■■■■ ■■.
And the journey is divided into several major acts.
Specifically, divided into Parts.
The first was Part 1. Debut. The one where I threatened Kwon Taeyoung while holding his life in my hands.
The Sunbae Who Paves a Flower Path Part 1
Have ‘Go Won’ debut as a K-POP singer in South Korea.
Stage 1 Goal: Flawless Debut
This was cleared along with ‘Flawless Debut.’
Then Part 2 began. Establishing a Position.
The quests derived from it were literally for Go Won to establish his position in the entertainment industry. They seemed to continuously be created with new numbers like 2-1, 2-2…
Then probably, the ultimate goal of Part 2…
The Sunbae Who Paves a Flower Path Part 2
Establish yourself as a K-POP singer.
Stage 2 Goal: Achieve Top 10 in CPCE Public Reputation Index
This repetitive work would continue until this was achieved.
In other words, if the ‘Stage 2 Goal’ was achieved quickly, it meant there was no need to perform sub-quests.
Going around in circles with quests was also annoying work, so a shortcut was definitely best.
As I stared intently, Go Won turned his head to the side.
“I can’t go today anyway. All my clothes are at the dorm, how can I go?”
“I have a lot of clothes. I’ll lend you some. The size will roughly fit too. And you absolutely have to go.”
To his puzzled eyes, I answered as if asking what he meant.
“You need to show the culprit that you’re perfectly fine and unaffected by such things.”
“…Ah…”
“You’re going, right?”
The unique determination and defiance he has when performing filled his two eyes.
“Yes.”
And so Go Won got into the passenger seat of my car.
If he feared crowds or was reluctant to go out because of yesterday’s incident, I was going to advise Kwon Taeyoung to set up psychological counseling for him, but that won’t be necessary.
Honestly, if that person had been a stalker showing obsessive affection for Go Won like a sasaeng fan, I would have been the first to stop outdoor activities.
However, considering the content written on the door and the hostile attitude shown to Go Won, that was…
‘Inferiority complex.’
It was an emotion of going crazy because Go Won was doing better than their ultimate bias, whom they loved to the point of entrusting their very identity to.
…And the most suspicious are the fans of Newton, the senior group from Division 4 who debuted right before Go Won.
I heard the atmosphere has been continuously bad lately. Not only fights between fans, but I heard there’s endless tension between divisions within the company too.
This is really…
‘If the CEO who stepped down saying to handle company matters well on your own saw this, it would be a situation to make her cry tears of blood.’
When K-dum, which former trot singer Yang Okmi-ssi established recklessly, miraculously grew, she changed the company to a division system saying ‘art shouldn’t have old people’s opinions in it’ and stepped down from the management front line.
When we were active, she was someone who lived practically tied to the company, but now she doesn’t even show her face.
‘The stage names for our Heavenly Voices. How about Michel for Mijeong, Henzel for Hanje!’
‘That’s so lame…’
When we sat in a circle on newspaper spread on the practice room floor eating cheap neighborhood pizza, we probably couldn’t have imagined this kind of future at all.
– Your destination is on the right.
While I was lost in thought, we’d already arrived at the station. As soon as I parked the car in the public parking lot near the station, Go Won unfastened his seatbelt as if he’d been waiting. Then he hurriedly escaped like he was being chased and greeted me from outside the window.
“Thank you for taking care of me yesterday and today. I’ll return the clothes through the company.”
While maintaining the “hyung” address, he pretended to completely forget about being told to come in and stay at the house.
That sight was quite funny, so I followed him after covering my face with a hat and mask. Go Won, who kept glancing back at me, finally stopped.
“…Why are you following me?”
“Since we came together anyway, I’m going to take pictures for you at the station. Would the billboard show up properly with your phone’s camera quality?”
“……”
Go Won’s advertisement was right in front of the ticket gate. More precisely, it was plastered all over from there to the stairs going down to take the subway.
Specifically, with his crying face after getting his first win.
“Wow, it came out well with a baby-like photo.”
“……”
He didn’t respond at all, but the kid’s ears turned bright red.
“Go stand there.”
“You’re really going to take pictures?”
“Then did I come here to take my selfie?”
Go Won gave up on the one-sided argument and stood hesitantly in front of his own tearful face. As if planning to milk what he learned once until death, he awkwardly drew a cheek heart.
“What kind of pose is that? How boring. Use your body more.”
“…Th-then…”
Go Won barely managed to strike a pose of shooting guns with both hands.
“Lift one foot, smile more, move closer to your face side, now stretch your arm. Hey, next pretend to take a selfie.”
The kid was already huge in build, and since he was striking eye-catching poses, he was starting to draw attention. And not long after that.
“Is that Go Won…?”
“That’s Go Won, right?”
People who noticed that the hulking figure in front of them was the person in the billboard started murmuring. Soon, everyone knew except for one person who was somehow struggling to take a selfie capturing all of the billboard background.
“It’s Won!”
At the unfamiliar voice calling him, Go Won quickly looked around. Before he knew it, people with shining eyes had gathered around him.
“Did you come to take certification shots?”
“Go Won, when’s your comeback? You shouldn’t be playing around when your joints are all lively—you should be working!”
Flustered, Go Won hurriedly pulled his hood down, but it was already too late.
“Yes, th-thank you. The comeback schedule isn’t yet…”
“K-dum is treating you well, right?”
“What are you eating for lunch today?”
“What do I do, you’re really so handsome.”
Now even passersby were looking around at the noisy scene. What is it, what’s going on? Oh, you know, <Debut Chart>. The first place among those kids who sang Some Super Star or whatever.
Go Won, trapped in the crowd, looked for the person he came with in confusion.
“Hy-hyung.”
However, his companion, the culprit who had him strike flashy poses to gather people, had long since fled.
“…?!”
Shortly after, Go Won, who had bowed repeatedly to the fans, ran at full speed and burst out to the nearest stairs.
When he came outside, right in front of the gate, a very familiar car would be parked on the shoulder with its blinkers on.
“Want to get in? Or not?”
