Are We Losing?
The moment the stage ended and we made it backstage, I sank straight to the floor.
"Haa… haa…."
All the exhaustion and tension I'd been holding back seemed to crash over me at once.
Thump.
Even though several minutes had already passed since we left the stage, my heart still wouldn't settle.
Not that I could blame it.
This performance had been… the first live stage I'd ever given in front of a real audience of ordinary people.
If my heart was still racing this hard after it was over, I could only imagine what it had been like while I was actually up there.
I was terrified….
All those eyes fixed on me. The cheers. Dancing and singing in the face of that roaring wave of sound had been anything but easy.
But I'd done it.
And….
It was fun.
Every hardship we'd endured felt like a single fond memory now — that's how much I'd enjoyed it.
I wasn't the only one. The other members gathered around me with flushed faces, still gasping for breath.
"Everyone… everyone worked so, so hard…!"
Among them was one member already in tears at the thought that we'd have to go our separate ways starting with the next round.
"This whole time… hic…. It was so much fun… and now it just feels so bittersweet. Hic."
"Come on, unni. Even if we're not on the same team next time, it's not like we'll never see each other again. Don't cry~"
Park Yujeong was wrapping her arms around the crying member, comforting her, when one of the lower-ranked trainees spoke up in a worried voice — and let a little of the air out of the room.
"But… did we actually do well? I mean, I think we did, but… what if we end up in the bottom six…."
"……."
"……."
Her words dampened the mood a little.
Still, I could understand where she was coming from. If we somehow landed in the bottom six, she was almost guaranteed to be eliminated.
More than that, though — did we actually do well?
"……."
I couldn't bring myself to answer her right away either.
We'd given it everything we had, and personally I thought it had been a highly polished stage. But we'd gone first, so there was no real way to compare ourselves objectively against the other teams, and I couldn't say with absolute certainty how the audience had seen us….
Just as those negative thoughts started creeping into my head—
"Did we do well? Unni, are you stupid? What kind of dumb question is that?"
Seo Yujin — our team's youngest member and its leader — looked at her like she was an idiot, then pointed toward the stage.
"Can you not hear that right now?"
From the direction her finger indicated….
"Kyaaaaaah—!"
"That was insane—!!"
"You were so good—!!"
"Encore—!!"
The audience was still calling for us.
"Ha Yerin is so pretty—!!!!"
"Lee Hyejeong, fighting—!!!"
"Unnis, you did amazing—!!"
It was as if they'd overheard our worries — they were shouting at the top of their lungs that we'd done incredibly well.
Thump.
Hearing those cries set my heart racing all over again, and with it came a sudden certainty.
"Yujin's right."
"……."
"Looks like… we really crushed it this time."
At my words, the members stared at me blankly for a moment, then broke into shy little smiles.
"Unni, did you know?"
"Hm? Know what?"
"You just smiled really big. Like, really wide."
"…What?"
I immediately reached up and touched the corner of my mouth.
Now that I was conscious of it, my lips had already settled back into their usual cold, rigid line.
Ever since I'd been reborn in Ha Yerin's body, I had never properly smiled. A cold, blank expression was basically my default setting….
I didn't even use Heavenly Demon Illusion, and they're saying I smiled?
I fretted at the cold corner of my mouth, then looked at my teammates.
"I guess performing with you all — and with the unnis — was even more fun than I expected."
"Yerin-ah…."
"Unni…."
The members looked at me as if they'd never imagined I'd say something like that, their faces soft with emotion.
Whirr—.
A camera happened to be rolling on us just then. I glanced at it and recognized, with practiced ease, that this was a broadcast moment.
"And having the audience respond like that — loving us like that — made it even more fun. More importantly… this is our last time together. Want to put our hands in?"
I stretched my hand out into the center, and the others laughed as they stacked theirs on top of mine.
"Ugh… we're not little kids. Why do we have to do something this cringey… seriously…."
Even Seo Yujin, for all her complaining, casually slipped her hand on top at the very end.
Once hers was in place, I spoke right away.
"We absolutely killed it on stage today. I hope next time we can do this again — and that every single one of us here debuts together. Okay, when I say 'from now on,' raise your hands and shout 'fighting.'"
"Wait, unni. As this team's leader, I should be the one who—"
"From now on—!"
"Fighting—!!"
"Waaaaah—!!"
"Everyone, great work—!!"
Even knowing it was for the cameras, the old me would have hated something this cheesy. But somewhere along the way, I'd become the one leading the cheer — and I was clapping along with genuine joy.
Bit by bit… my teammates, the stage, the audience — they were changing me.
Yes. Because of being an idol, I was changing.
If I keep changing like this… maybe someday I'll be able to smile like a normal person.
With a new seed planted in my heart… our first team-round performance came to an end.
Of course, just because the stage was over didn't mean we immediately went our separate ways.
We headed back to the waiting room and watched the other teams' performances on the monitor.
"Oh… they're good."
"Whoa…."
The other teams had clearly sharpened their blades for the first team round as well — every one of them showed skill that was hard to believe belonged to mere trainees.
Still….
Compared to our team… they're not quite there?
I couldn't help feeling a little underwhelmed. The more stages I watched, the more their mistakes and concept mismatches seemed to jump out at me.
"Everyone's weaker than I expected."
I wasn't the only one who thought so. Park Yujeong leaned in and whispered so only I could hear.
"At this rate, aren't we going to take first place?"
"……."
First place….
Objectively speaking, it wasn't impossible.
But….
"…I think we need to see the next team's stage first."
There was still one final boss left, wasn't there?
"All right — next up, please welcome the Veggie Sandwich team—!"
On the waiting-room screen, Han Siwoo announced the start of the stage for the Veggie Sandwich team — the one Yu Seol belonged to.
The other members scooted their chairs forward and locked their eyes on the monitor.
Even if no team so far had surpassed ours… Yu Seol's stage was bound to be something else entirely. Tension was inevitable.
"What song is their team doing again?"
"It's a Bumblack senior track. Thank You Very Much."
"Ah… right."
Yu Seol's team had the only boy-group song in the entire first team round.
Back then I thought her team had drawn a bomb, but Yu Seol's expression had been completely fine.
Just what kind of stage had she prepared?
I leaned as close to the screen as I could and watched intently.
With every gaze in the room fixed on it, the stage began….
WEEEEEEEEENG—!!!!
"……!"
A siren designed to ratchet up the tension started screaming in our ears.
"Wh-what the hell."
The sudden siren startled me and the other members alike.
"Did the original intro even have a siren?"
"No, it didn't…. They must have rearranged it."
While we were still talking, the darkened stage lit up and Yu Seol's team appeared.
The second I saw their opening look, I knew the concept.
Bad boys.
Bumblack's original group concept was the bad-boy image. Clearly, Yu Seol's team intended to carry that concept and atmosphere straight through.
No — wait.
Given that they'd added a siren to the intro that hadn't been there before, they were clearly going for something even more aggressively bad-boy than Bumblack itself.
I couldn't help tilting my head.
Bad boy. That was a concept that fundamentally clashed with Yu Seol's image. Could she actually pull it off?
But the moment the first verse hit, I knew that worry had been completely baseless.
There's no seat for you here.
Everything in front of you right now is mine.
"Whoa…."
"Holy shit…."
I'd forgotten.
Her acting stat was 99.
With facial expressions so overwhelming no one else could touch them, Yu Seol devoured the stage from the very first second. Layer on heavier makeup and styling than usual, and she looked like a bad boy incarnate.
And that wasn't all….
If you're so confident, step up in front of me
Come on out and go one round right here
She's good at rapping too…?
Showing off sharp rap skills on top of everything else, Yu Seol proved she was a true all-rounder.
She hadn't even been the main vocal on this stage to begin with.
She was the center.
Pulling moves that called b-boying to mind, she locked every eye on her — and in her rap sections, she dragged the audience's energy right along with her.
The result from the seats….
"Kyaaaaaaaaah—!!"
"Yu Seol—!!!"
An enormous roar erupted.
The second I saw that, I realized I'd been thinking about this all wrong from the start.
Ninety percent of the seats currently filled were women.
And what female fans — girl fans — went absolutely crazy for was….
…Girl crush.
Our team's stage, if I was being honest, had leaned more toward male fans' tastes.
But Yu Seol had already zeroed in on the heart of the team round — and she was tearing through the girl fans' hearts without mercy.
The order was a problem, too.
We'd gone first. Yu Seol's team was second to last. It was only natural that a late-slot stage would stick in the audience's memory.
"……."
"……."
The other members seemed to pick up on it as well — their chatter dried up completely as they watched Yu Seol's team perform.
And through it all, Yu Seol carried the stage to perfection, carrying her entire team with her.
Drop everything you're holding and leave
All of yours is mine now.
I'll put it to good use — thank you very much.
Honestly, up until a little while ago, I'd been holding onto a quiet hope that our team might take first.
But….
This team's stage is way too strong.
The more I watched Yu Seol's team, the more that hope began to crumble, piece by piece.