Conflict? (1)
Seol Soyoung had climbed into the ranks of Korea’s finest actresses with only two works to her name.
The awards she had collected last year alone proved it, as did her appearance in countless commercials for Cheil Electronics, cosmetics brands, and more. She even donated half of every advertising fee to underprivileged neighbors and children’s foundations, revealing a kind heart that only made her popularity soar higher.
Well… she was beautiful, she could act, and she was genuinely good-natured. It would have been stranger if she weren’t popular.
That was why casting offers for dramas and films poured in like rain—perfectly natural, really.
Honestly, I had no particular complaint about her appearing in other projects.
Think about it for a second.
If I told her to turn down every other offer and appear only in my works, that would sound terrifying from her side of things. I knew exactly what kind of person Seol Soyoung was, but she barely knew me at all. Some writer she had never even met had cast her as the lead straight out of obscurity, and now he was trying to restrict her other appearances…?
That was basically a public declaration that I had ulterior motives.
Anyway.
I wasn’t some factory machine that could spit out scripts forever, and I had no real reason to limit her other work either.
But the drama that had suddenly floated up in my mind made me pause and think carefully about her casting.
“I’m sure you’ve heard of them, Eunwoo. Whitebox is a top-class drama production company here in Korea. Well… last year they got completely steamrolled by us and went through a rough patch, but still.”
“Hss… so Whitebox sent a casting offer. The drama Soyoung was offered—it wouldn’t happen to be titled Demon’s Temptation, would it?”
“Oh? You already knew? It’s still in the planning stages, so that information is supposed to be pretty confidential.”
PD Na’s eyes widened a little at the fact that I knew the title.
…Of course I knew.
That drama was going to become the absolute worst thing that could happen to Seol Soyoung.
Demon’s Temptation.
Genre: action, crime thriller.
The protagonist, Oh Harim, joins a secret government agency to catch the man who murdered her father. There she meets her partner, Kim Yerim, and together they overcome countless hardships to become the ultimate duo. Eventually the final mastermind, Byeon Yohan, stands in their way, and Oh Harim realizes he is the one who killed her father.
That was the synopsis of Demon’s Temptation as I knew it.
Whitebox had poured everything into it, so the project was drawing massive attention from the production stage onward. And the actor cast as the final villain, Byeon Yohan, was none other than a first-rate star…
“I heard they’ve already finished casting Yu Byeongmin, the actor famous for his villain roles.”
Yu Byeongmin.
A powerhouse actor who had worked his way through countless projects from his mid-twenties into his early-to-mid thirties and firmly established himself among the elite. That crazed gaze that looked like he was on something, and the murderous smile that stopped a viewer’s breath—those were his unique trademarks.
But I knew the truth.
That unique identity only existed because he really was on drugs…
Yes.
Whitebox’s ambitious Demon’s Temptation would spectacularly crash and burn the moment Yu Byeongmin was investigated for drug charges.
On top of that, at a cast dinner, Yu Byeongmin would hand a cigarette to Seol Soyoung—who had looked especially troubled lately—saying that the moment you light one, all your worries just vanish. Handing a cigarette to a teenager was already insane, but the cigarette itself was marijuana. True to the absurd settings of this drama world, the whole thing was ridiculous.
Of course Seol Soyoung wasn’t the type to just take it and smoke it on the spot.
But back then she had been under far more psychological pressure than she was now—worries about her own acting ability, her mother’s still-unresolved illness, and so on. So she decided not to throw it away and simply kept it for the time being. Only when she heard the news that Yu Byeongmin was being investigated for drugs did she finally realize what it was.
By then, however, Yu Byeongmin had already finished confessing everything. Unwilling to go down alone, he cheerfully testified that he had also given marijuana to Seol Soyoung.
In the end she was hauled in for police questioning to confirm whether she had smoked it. Fortunately she had never put it to her lips, and the fact that she had only received it from him led to a finding of no charges. But in the public eye her reputation had already plummeted to the same rock bottom as Yu Byeongmin’s.
That was another unjust accident waiting for her in the original story.
The strange part was that Demon’s Temptation was originally supposed to enter planning in the second half of this year and air properly around January next year. In other words, the timeline had been pulled forward significantly. And the reason could be roughly guessed from what PD Na had just said.
Well… last year they got completely steamrolled by us and went through a rough patch, but still.
They must have felt a sense of crisis watching Studio NMIX solidify its position as the number one in the drama industry.
Healthy competition that revitalized the drama market was a good thing, of course…
But why did a landmine named Yu Byeongmin have to be sitting right in the middle of it?
A sigh escaped me on its own.
For now it wasn’t even certain whether Seol Soyoung would accept the casting offer, and even if she did, she wasn’t under the same psychological pressure as in the original, so I had no idea how the flow would change.
Hmm. Still, if I assumed the absolute worst for a moment…
“PD Na. If something bad suddenly happened to Soyoung right now, what do you think would happen?”
“Ah, if it’s just a dating rumor with you, Writer, there wouldn’t be much damage. A handsome guy and a beautiful girl getting together—everyone would just cheer them on, right? Plenty of people inside Studio NMIX are already betting on that particular coin.”
“???”
PD Na smiled at me with perfect calm.
What the hell was this nonsense all of a sudden?
“Sorry. Looking at your face, that doesn’t seem to be it. When something bad happens to an actor, it’s usually personality controversies. But Soyoung isn’t the type… If we’re really assuming the worst, it would be getting unluckily mixed up in some kind of crime.”
PD Na’s expression turned serious in an instant.
“……Don’t tell me you’ve already got something in mind?”
“Ah, no. The world just feels a little dangerous these days. Someone like Soyoung right now should be extra careful, that’s all.”
“Hmm, you’re right. We’ll do everything we can to protect her at Studio NMIX, but there’s always the ‘what if.’”
PD Na thought for a moment, then finally answered my original question.
“Writer. If a carefully built sandcastle suddenly gets hit by a wave, what do you think happens?”
“……It collapses.”
“Exactly. No matter how good Soyoung’s public image is right now, the entertainment industry is a place that can be utterly destroyed by a single giant wave. The best we can do is pray nothing like that happens around her. Or……”
Or prevent the wave from ever reaching her in the first place.
I came back home, but PD Na’s final words kept echoing in my head.
Prevent the unjust accident that would befall Seol Soyoung.
This was something I had already done once before.
Her mother, Lee Hwayang—if you looked closely, the reason she had undergone surgery was because of me.
Back then Seol Soyoung had asked for help first, so I had acted as if it were only natural.
Then what about now……?
Why was I worrying so much over her problems?
Because I had boldly declared I would take responsibility for her acting career? Simply because I was worried about her getting tangled in a drug scandal?
Even if she did get mixed up in this drug case, Seol Soyoung would bounce back quickly, just like in the original. Now that her mother was with her, it would be even easier.
……The truth was, I already knew it, vaguely.
Then and now.
The very fact that I was worrying about Seol Soyoung like this was a contradiction.
From that moment on, it meant I was already looking at her not as a character inside a drama, but as a woman—one real person.
A bitter smile rose on its own. And I remembered Seol Soyoung on the stage of the Cheongsang Arts Awards, wearing a small smile as she thought of someone.
Yeah. I still couldn’t put a firm name to this feeling, but for now……
Wasn’t the simple desire to keep watching that small smile and her happiness reason enough?
I hurriedly picked up my phone and sent her a text.
Of course……
This one might earn me a little of her resentment.