Talk. A Body Frail as a Paper Doll
My body felt so drained it seemed like it would crumple like a paper doll if touched. It was hot. Warmth enveloped me like I'd sunk into a bathtub. Red. Ah, is this my blood?
"Hey, you bastard. What the hell are we gonna do about this? Is he dead?"
"Fuck. Seriously…… We were just supposed to scare him a little……"
"Get rid of 'this' quick! Clean it up now! It's staining the carpet. Do you know how expensive this is?!"
My vision blurred gradually, and Chairman Jung's obnoxious shouts echoed fainter and fainter like a distant reverb. Good riddance. I didn't want to see his face or hear his voice anyway. I'd seen all there was to see, so now it was time to go home. Maybe if I got home, had some hot ramen with a shot of soju, and crashed, I'd sleep like a baby.
But my body wouldn't move as I thought. I couldn't muster the strength to go where I needed to. Move, Seo Hyun-woo. Come on, move a little. Please, get this damn body moving and get the hell out of this office. You don't want to end your last sight with that screeching Chairman Jung, do you?
As if some god had heard my desperate plea, my eyes began to close slowly. What? Am I seriously dying like this? Am I dying?!
Slap!
It hurt. A sharp pain shot through me—a fierce slap across the cheek that left it stinging. My eyes snapped open.
"Whoa! Fuck, what the hell?"
The body I'd been begging to move shot upright on its own without me even commanding it. My blurry vision sharpened bit by bit, and the space felt off. An unfamiliar energy lingered, and there were so many people. Of course there were. Chairman Jung had brought all those thugs to kill me.
"Hey. Hyun-woo."
Had we even exchanged names? We were that close?
"Huh?"
"……Huh?"
"Hahaha. Our Hyun-woo hasn't quite come around yet? What do you mean 'huh'? Hyun-woo. The trainer."
Trainer? The face right in front of mine—too close to make out before—was finally coming into focus. It wasn't one of the thugs I'd glimpsed. No, he didn't have that muscle-pig build to begin with. A skinny, bony man glared at me like he wanted to kill me.
"……Hyun-woo?"
I turned my head toward the man who'd been cautiously calling my name. He was too young to call a full-grown man, a boy with a youthful charm waving his hand frantically. Looked like a high schooler. His face tugged at some memory, drawing my feet forward. I stood up and approached the high schooler.
"Have we…… met somewhere before?"
Wait. Why are there so many cameras? And every single one is pointed at us.
"Uh……."
The familiar high schooler's abdomen was plastered with stickers reading [A - Jae-hyun], and like white drawing paper suddenly filling with ink, memories flooded back.
My hand, reaching for Jae-hyun, trembled violently. And the space I'd thought unfamiliar—the events in this training center—started coming back one by one.
Jae-hyun slowly recounted what had happened.
"You okay? Hyun-woo. You were practicing performance stuff earlier, tried some acrobatics, and fell headfirst……."
The hand I'd stretched toward Jae-hyun just shook instead. My head shook too.
"I…… I don't feel so good…… Gonna hit the bathroom real quick."
I needed a moment to sort my thoughts.
***
Slap. The sting from that so-called trainer's hit still burned on my cheek. It hurt. So it wasn't a dream.
"Then this is reality?"
An unbelievable reality was, in fact, real. Regression. There was no other explanation for this situation. 2032, beaten to death by Jung Pil-woon. I pulled out my smartphone and checked the time. 2021 now. I'd gone back to the past, given a chance to relive my utterly failed life. With full knowledge of that shitty future.
Which made my head even more of a mess. To screw over Jung Pil-woon—the bastard who killed me—just like he did to me, what position should I take?
"Ha……."
I swept back my sweat-soaked hair.
"If you're gonna regress me anyway, couldn't you have bumped it back a little further?"
Why here, why now? Twenty-two years old, too awkward to prepare properly for anything. At the KBC entrance, massive banners hung in front of the annex to promote the program.
'Vote for Your Idol!'
'The Idol You're Creating—You Are the National Producer!'
The program filming in full swing: I'm the Only Idol. I'd thrown everything into it, debuted as group N.E.X.T, and bombed spectacularly. Digging through memories, the show hadn't even aired yet. Filming had just started—not even a month in. Roughly four months to go. Did I really need to hang myself on a program whose outcome I already knew?
No, let's rewind the question. Hey, Seo Hyun-woo. Do you want to be an idol?
"Hey! Seo Hyun-woo!"
Before I could turn, fresh pain exploded across the back of my head. Someone had smacked me hard.
What the—
"You crazy bastard."
Not the coaxing Jung Jae-hyun from before. It was the dance trainer who'd spaced out earlier.
I rubbed the back of my head and asked, "Ow…… What the hell?"
"……What the hell? Oh! Ow? Has this bastard lost it?"
Lost it? Yeah, I had. My judgment, barely steady, was spinning again thanks to the spot you'd hit.
"No, you're the one who seems off?"
"Whoa. Listen to this guy's mouth. You really nuts?"
No, not nuts.
"Why'd you hit me, then?"
"Why'd I hit you?"
The trainer planted his hands on his hips. Cocky prick.
"Yeah. If you don't want me to really lose it, spill it."
I needed to know why I'd gotten hit, at least.
"What? This bastard's been talking down to me nonstop? Why do you think? 'Cause you're a pain in the ass. Hey!"
The trainer kicked at my leg.
"If you're just a trainee who hasn't even debuted, act like one. Shut up and keep your head down. Who the hell are you to keep mouthing off? Got something? No agency even."
No agency, solo contestant. Hearing others rattle off my resume like that, past me was something else. Impressive, really.
"And earlier? You nearly died from a concussion, I barely saved your ass, and you're spitting casual crap. You even call yourself human? Didn't you serve in the military? Shouldn't the first thing out your mouth be thanks? But fuck. Instead you……"
"Thank you."
"Huh?"
I bowed deeply in thanks. Now I knew for sure. My future. Maybe I'd known from the start. I wasn't cut out to be an idol. Even with foreknowledge of the future giving me a solid edge, pretending under assholes like this, faking gratitude—I wasn't built for that charade.
That question from earlier. Hey, Seo Hyun-woo. Do you want to be an idol?
Time to answer. I shook my head. No.
"Thanks. And I don't want to anymore."
"Wh-what?"
I raised my arm high, and the trainer blocked his face with both hands.
"I'm out because of you."
Oh, and that thing floating over this dance trainer's head since earlier.
"What's that thing stuck to your head?"