Persuasion (3)
Kim Woohwan didn’t seem to be an especially ardent viewer of Idol Travel, because this was apparently the first time he had ever seen the Bangpaje Team’s stage.
The scowl on his face shifted, for the first time, into a flicker of surprise. Kim Woohwan watched the video through to the end.
Once Baek Yuri realized that Kim Woohwan hadn’t been following Idol Travel closely, he said, “Baek Gi-yeom can write lyrics and compose as well, and I can write lyrics too. Neoul is an excellent topliner.”
“...?”
Me…?
Neoul looked at him with a face that said he had never heard this in his life and pointed at himself with a finger. Baek Yuri and Yeo Do-bin both shot him frantic looks.
Neoul, you have that self-composed song Wave. During the skills evaluation!
You know how to write melodies…!
When Kim Woohwan turned to Neoul in obvious surprise, Neoul wiped the bewilderment from his face and quickly lifted his chin.
There was princely dignity pouring off that haughty expression and confident posture. At Neoul’s swift change of gears, Ha On-ha bit down on his lower lip and fought back a laugh.
“Representative.”
Baek Yuri spoke in a grave voice.
“We beg you to let us debut and move forward as a self-produced group. I promise we won’t bring the company any loss at all. And...”
Kim Woohwan’s expression seemed to be already halfway won over.
Baek Yuri swallowed hard with nerves and went on, “We want to debut under our own title on November 25. At the Jamsil Indoor Stadium, which we’ve already reserved. Next April is too late, and the buzz will have died down...”
“Hold on, hold on. Our own title? The indoor stadium?”
Kim Woohwan cut him off and deepened the furrow between his brows.
“Who decided on the title? Did Jae Ik-hoo tell you to do that?”
“No! It has nothing to do with Representative Jake! We just pooled our opinions together and—”
“Ha! I knew something smelled off. Jae Ik-hoo wanted to use this so-called self-production as an excuse to push his own plan, didn’t he? You liked his concept better than mine? I made you a concept that fits you perfectly, and you didn’t even recognize a good thing when you saw it. Tsk, tsk. Trying to fool me with that slick-tongued nonsense.”
“That’s absolutely not it!”
Kim Woohwan didn’t even give him time to protest before sweeping a hand through the air with a look of deep offense.
“All of you, get out.”
* * *
After being driven out of the office.
The members were so stressed they kept rubbing their foreheads or letting out heavy sighs. Ha On-ha crushed the stack of printed PPT materials in his fist and wore a savage smile.
“What exactly is he misunderstanding? Seriously... unbelievable.”
Yeo Do-bin said, “I think he may have some inferiority complex or competition going on with Representative Jake...”
The members stared at Yeo Do-bin in shock. That gentle tone and downcast face, and then he drops a verbal knife like that?
Woo Cheong clamped his mouth shut and said nothing, and Lee Gal-chae also lowered his head quietly.
They had been kicked out of the office, so there was nothing to do now but go home. But none of them could bring themselves to move. No matter how many times they said it had nothing to do with Representative Jake, it didn’t seem like he would believe them.
Baek Yuri let out a long sigh and gave a self-mocking laugh.
“Everything’s a mess from one end to the other. I wish someone would just tell us the correct answer. What are we supposed to do?”
“Why is everyone so discouraged?”
Baek Gi-yeom gave the members’ backs a couple of firm pats.
“How could we possibly get it right every single time? We failed this round, but we can keep trying to persuade him next time. If it comes to it, we’ll accept the concept and do our best to pull it off. If we keep emphasizing that at least the arrangement and choreography should be ours to revise, something might still work out.”
He was already looking ahead with a positive mind-set.
“We don’t have to be right every single time. Don’t strain yourselves so hard. Enjoy it. We might end up finding a cool wrong answer instead of the right one.”
A cool wrong answer.
That was always how Baek Gi-yeom thought. Not that they had to find the answer somehow, but that even a wrong answer could still be cool.
Nothing had been solved, and yet, strangely enough, the words made everyone feel a little lighter.
“Right. Maybe we will,” Baek Yuri said. Woo Cheong grinned broadly and nodded, and Lee Gal-chae lifted his head from where it had been bowed.
“I like that...” Yeo Do-bin said. Ha On-ha’s fierce expression softened a little.
They got on the elevator to head back to the practice room. But Neoul alone remained standing outside, not stepping in.
“Neoul. Why aren’t you getting on?”
“Neoul?”
Neoul stuck only his arm into the elevator and pressed the first-floor button and the close button in turn. Then, before the doors shut, he quickly pulled his upper body back out.
“Huh?”
“Hey! Gae-Neoul!”
“Raccoon Brother!”
The startled members reached for the open button and shouted after him, but by then the doors had already closed and the elevator was descending.
Neoul turned on his heel at once and ran back toward the office. Without knocking, he flung the door open and walked straight up to Kim Woohwan.
“What is this? You come barging in without knocking or permission?”
“Kim Woohwan representative.”
“What, what? Kim Woohwan representative?”
Kim Woohwan’s face flushed red and then blue. He sprang up from the sofa and jabbed a finger at Neoul.
“Young man, where did you learn manners like that? Weren’t you raised properly at home? Staring straight at an adult while you speak, huh? Is that what your parents taught you?”
Neoul took one step closer to Kim Woohwan. With Neoul’s 192-centimeter frame closing the distance in a single stride, Kim Woohwan flinched instinctively.
And then, perhaps offended that he had been frightened by a boy far younger than himself, he raised his voice even further.
“How dare you be rude to a man old enough to be your father! And I’m the president of this company!”
“My royal father.”
Neoul’s expression as he looked down at Kim Woohwan was as cold as ice. It was nothing like the face he wore around the others. It was a blank contempt for a soul that had rotted so badly it stank.
“He told me not to speak even a word with a sinner who has taken on debt.”
Neoul took another half-step forward.
“If I converse with you, your precious ears will be polluted, so I must not listen too closely to a single word. Nor should I meet your eyes. So he said.”
“D-don’t come any closer! Get away!”
“But there is no helping it. Even when I try to persuade you with kind words, you refuse to cooperate.”
His voice was cold as frost, yet the sound of it was beautiful, almost like singing.
At that inhuman presence, Kim Woohwan found himself backing away without meaning to. His heel caught on the sofa, and he collapsed into it as if falling down.
Neoul looked down at him as though he were something utterly useless.
“Even if I must sacrifice my own ears and eyes, I will have no choice but to come back and speak honestly.”
“...!”
Kim Woohwan went rigid.
Speak honestly? Was this lunatic about to hurl insults at him to his face? What was wrong with this bastard?
He had thought Neoul was only a big, handsome guy who sang well, but it seemed his personality was far more rotten than expected.
And he had already signed the contract, which meant he couldn’t simply throw him out unilaterally! Jae Ik-hoo, damn him, had written every clause in a way that favored the artist.
Was he going to hit him? Surely he wouldn’t be that uncivilized? No, wait. If he was crazy, what did civility matter? A crazy bastard wasn’t civil.
Kim Woohwan’s fear surged as he looked up at Gaeneoul’s icy face.
“Enough! What, are you an orphan or something?”
* * *
“No, but that little scoundrel—!”
In the H.A.D Entertainment office, Won Hasin jumped and dropped the papers in his hands at the sudden curse from beside him.
“That no-good bastard, may lightning strike him! I’ll twist his neck clean off! Damned son of a—!”
The identity of the old woman spewing that furious stream of abuse was the Sea Witch.
Sprawled on the sofa and secretly spying on the Flux Entertainment office, she sprang upright and hurled out filthy language so vicious it could barely be repeated aloud.
The tablet PC in her hand rolled onto the floor.
“I should go there right now and tie him up proper!”
“Auntie! You said you were going to get in Neoul’s way!”
The Sea Witch looked ready to charge straight into Flux Entertainment at any second. Won Hasin rushed outside and wrapped both arms around her waist, dragging her back.
“That crossed the line! Hey! Where did you even dig up some moldy parasite like that? How dare he say that to my kid? That bastard is like chewed gum spat back out!”
“If you go now and get caught, it’s over! Next time we try to interfere, won’t Neoul figure out at a glance that it was you and me? No, seriously, at this rate will we even be able to carry out the next plan? Please, stay put!”
“Stay put? What stay put! Anyone who lays a hand on my kid dies! And I told you to interfere with the album results, not delay the debut! Don’t you know he has to find the rabbit soon? The song quality had to be just moderately ambiguous, too. It was so obviously bad that the kids’ fighting spirit only went up!”
“Aaaagh! My hair! My hair!”
Won Hasin shrieked when the Sea Witch seized him by the hair.
“Honestly! Is he the only kid of yours? Am I not one too?!”
“No, of course not! You’re someone else’s kid, aren’t you!”
“Wow, that really hurts to hear! Neoul is someone else’s kid too!”
“That boy has the affection I raised him with! You brat!”
“You said you were interfering! Aren’t you going to interfere? Right now you’re the one interfering with me!”
Because his hair was being yanked, Won Hasin lost his grip on the Sea Witch’s waist and grabbed at the hem of her pants instead. In the process, the Sea Witch toppled forward with a thud.
Won Hasin clung on even as she fell, grabbing her waist again.
“Let go of me!”
“I can’t!”
Song Bi-seo was standing just outside the door. In his hands were the documents for Won Hasin and the sushi meant for the Sea Witch.
Thinking that he would very much like to go home immediately, he opened the door carefully.
“...What are the two of you doing?”
Still clinging stubbornly to the Sea Witch, Won Hasin looked up at Song Bi-seo with tears in his eyes.
“Help me. Song Bi-seo. I’m losing strength.”
Grinding her teeth with her face buried in the carpet under her, the Sea Witch suddenly whipped her head up. Her eyes looked less than human and gleamed with ferocious intent.
Song Bi-seo suddenly wanted to abandon his boss and run.
Still, mustering his professional instincts, he set the sushi and documents down on the table.
He was curious what on earth had caused such a commotion, so he glanced at the tablet lying alone on the floor.
On the screen, Gaeneoul was looking down at Kim Woohwan with a cold expression. Kim Woohwan looked terrified.
“Representative. Lady Jo Geum-yeong. To my eyes, it looks as if Neoul is the one bullying Kim Woohwan representative...”
“That bastard insulted my kid’s parents!”
“Oh...”
Song Bi-seo offered a silent prayer for Kim Woohwan’s soul. Then he carried the tablet over and set it down in front of the Sea Witch.
“Perhaps you should watch how Neoul responds first? He’s twenty now; he isn’t a child anymore.”
At Song Bi-seo’s words, the Sea Witch gradually calmed herself and looked at the screen.
Kim Woohwan, babbling while terrified all on his own, was being quietly stared down by Gaeneoul. At last, Neoul spoke.
[Kim Woohwan representative. The confidence of the incompetent is self-delusion.]
[W-what...?]
[You have no eye for anything. You already failed once, yet did you gain nothing from that experience?]
“Damn it. How is that a bad thing to say?”
I should have taught him how to curse. For my kid not to know how to swear...
Clenching her fist, the Sea Witch muttered as she struck the floor.
By contrast, Won Hasin burst out laughing.
“Wow. He really went straight for the jugular. Nice one, Fish!”
Watching their opposite reactions, Song Bi-seo shook his head.
* * *