Chapter 46
A little while ago, while lying in bed, an ominous scenario suddenly occurred to me.
Last Mile was a song released under ASD’s name, and the rapper was Delivery Man—in other words, Jay.
And Jay had left the Bloods.
As a result of me making his departure a condition.
At the time, I had thought rather naively.
He had left the gang, so now he was a civilian, and civilians were safe.
But after rolling around in this world for a few months, I had learned something.
Gang members are cruel beyond imagination.
Which meant that if, by some chance, this song did well...
Marcus.
That man on the Bloods’ side who at least had a decent eye for beats had once bought eight ASD beats.
After releasing two songs that completely flopped, he was probably extremely sensitive right about now.
But what if Last Mile so much as showed its face on the charts?
[Prod. asd1236]
—Huh? Isn’t this the guy who made those beats I bought?
And then Delivery Man, the rapper over that beat.
—Huh? This bastard... he left the Bloods and released a song? Can’t have that. Guess we have to kill him.
Eeeeeek!
Just thinking about it was terrifying.
I could not lose my little brother like that.
In the hood, someone with no affiliation was the easiest target to touch.
Because there was no organization behind them that would take responsibility and retaliate.
Of course, if the song failed, all of this would end as nothing more than a midnight delusion.
No one heard a song that flopped.
Neither Marcus nor the Bloods would spare even a glance for some obscure indie song that had completely bombed.
But I was not the kind of person who could bet on that possibility.
I was born a coward.
And fortunately, one solution came to mind.
I could put Jay into LK.
Touching an unaffiliated individual and touching an artist signed to a Crips-affiliated label were two entirely different things.
The moment the Bloods touched an LK artist, it would become an all-out war between organizations.
Even Marcus wouldn’t start that kind of fire just because his pride as a beat buyer got hurt.
The problem was, to do that...
...Ha. I have to go see Big Joe myself after all.
On the way there, I ran through about three scenarios in my head.
Big Joe rejecting me immediately.
Big Joe snorting in my face.
And...
Big Joe suddenly slapping me.
The moment I imagined the third scenario, goosebumps rose all over my body.
Please, let that never happen.
“Whew...”
I took a deep breath and straightened my clothes.
Knock, knock.
“So, what did you want to talk about?”
Big Joe carefully studied Shotgun’s face across from him.
It was the same expression Shotgun had worn on the day he first proposed the legal-advisor arrangement.
From that alone, Big Joe had a feeling.
This bastard was here to propose something again.
...Of course, in reality, it was just the same blank expression as always, and this was entirely Big Joe’s imagination.
“I came to propose signing a new artist to LK Records.”
Big Joe grinned as he cut the end of his cigar.
“Oh, that’s good. I like this proposal more than the last one. Who is it?”
“Delivery Man.”
Big Joe’s fingers froze over the cigar.
“The guy who used to be with the Bloods?”
“He’s unaffiliated now.”
“You can leave, but your origins don’t disappear.”
Big Joe crossed one leg over the other.
The interest had already faded somewhat from his face.
“You put him on one of Lil D’s songs before too, didn’t you?”
“That’s right.”
“Hmm. Why bother? I already heard him back then.”
“...”
“He left, but he still came from the Bloods. If we bring someone like that in, he’ll clash with our people.”
Bringing in someone from the Bloods was, honestly, an uncomfortable thing to do.
If Marcus accused them of poaching one of his people, the tension could drag on.
Bad blood between organizations tended to fester from small things.
The Crips members would also be unhappy about it.
Why should they accept a traitorous rat as family?
Noise would arise, and that noise might become a crack within the organization.
“He isn’t worth taking on all that trouble. His skills aren’t that exceptional either.”
Even so, Shotgun silently played the first card he had prepared.
“You should divide his value into two parts.”
Big Joe’s eyebrow rose.
“First, cost. Delivery Man is unaffiliated. There’s no signing bonus. In relation to his potential, his acquisition cost approaches zero.”
The words came out short and without any excess.
“Second, risk. The weakness you just pointed out, OG—his history with the Bloods.”
Shotgun paused for a beat.
“If you use it properly, that becomes a weapon.”
Big Joe narrowed his eyes.
“...A weapon?”
“A rapper abandoned by the Bloods succeeds under a Crips label. That is a story in itself. And at the same time, it would be the image the Bloods least want to see.”
Big Joe gave a meaningful grin.
Of course a lawyer would know how to use his tongue.
And meanwhile—
Please take the bait. Please.
Shotgun, or more precisely Park Geon, had cold sweat running down his back.
The desperation to save Jay, his little brother.
The fear-of-death switch was faithfully working again.
“Sounds plausible. But that only matters if everything goes well. What guarantee is there that this Jay kid has that much talent?”
As though he had been waiting for the question, Shotgun took out his phone.
“You can listen for yourself. It’s a track made with an ASD beat. Last Mile.”
“ASD? Ah, that little side job where you shit out beats for fun. Those crappy beats?”
Behind his sunglasses, Park Geon’s eyes widened.
...Crappy beats?!
ASD was the music Park Geon genuinely wanted to make.
Unlike the commercial beats he produced as Shotgun, these were filled completely with his own tastes.
He might have been lazy about releasing them, but he had put a great deal of effort into making them.
But he could not say that aloud.
...Because Big Joe might slap him.
“Yes. Those beats. Please listen first.”
He pressed play.
At first, only silence came through the speaker.
Then—
Step.
The sound of footsteps.
Step. Step.
Footsteps at regular intervals, walking down a concrete corridor.
...Footsteps for an intro?
The moment the seventh footstep landed—
BOOM!
The 808 burst up through the floor.
The condemned prisoner’s final steps became the first bar of the beat.
Over it, Delivery Man’s first verse poured out.
From that point on, Big Joe listened in silence.
...His rapping changed.
Big Joe had definitely heard him once before.
Back then, he had thought nothing of it.
But now, this voice had improved so much that it was hard to believe it belonged to the same man.
A little later, the song ended.
Big Joe slowly opened his mouth.
“Definitely.”
He shrugged.
“The song is bad.”
“...!”
“But the rapping is better than I expected. His diction alone is better than some of our rappers.”
Big Joe looked again at the song title on the screen.
“Normally, when the beat is this trash, the rapper loses the rhythm first. But this guy rides it and chews it up.”
A scale moved inside Big Joe’s mind.
On one side, the internal friction and problems that would come from taking in someone from the Bloods.
On the other, genuine talent he could sign almost for free, along with the judgment of the expressionless strategist in front of him.
And most importantly—
Delivery Man, huh...
After a long deliberation, Big Joe rose from his seat.
“Fine.”
He tapped Shotgun on the shoulder.
“Bring him in. But you write the contract terms yourself. If the structure causes the company any loss, that will be your responsibility.”
“...Thank you.”
Big Joe knew.
This was not a clean decision.
The moment they accepted someone from the Bloods, trouble would definitely break out somewhere.
There was only one reason he had chosen to accept that risk anyway.
I’ve never seen that expressionless bastard make a useless move.
Shotgun bowed his head and turned away.
Only then did Park Geon let out the breath he had been holding.
...I survived. Jay too. Me too.
And—
I will definitely repay today’s humiliation...!
He intended to prove openly just how good the songs composed under asd1236 were.
He would make Big Joe regret those words.
Lil D’s first full-length album consisted of eight tracks.
Seven of them had already been recorded.
Only one remained.
“Let’s talk about the last song.”
Lil D tilted his head.
“This one’s going to be a little different.”
“...”
“I told you this whole album is my story. Hoover Street, my mother, gunshots, things like that. But for the last song... I want to talk about Dion.”
Almost no one in the entire neighborhood knew that name.
That was how personal the story was to Lil D.
And now, he intended to tell Shotgun about it too.
“Remember the freestyle I did at The Vault?”
“Yeah, I remember.”
Lil D murmured, retracing the freestyle from that day.
“My dawg took three to the chest on Hoover.”
“Sixteen years old, Mama couldn't even choose a casket that was right, had to use a GoFundMe.”
“Pour a little Henny, keep his memory alive.”
“Yeah. This is that story. Dion grew up on the same block as me.”
Lil D’s eyes began to sink into memories.
“We used to play one-on-one on the basketball court every day and run cyphers in the parking lot at night. There were two things that bastard loved more than anything in the world: basketball and rap.”
(Translator’s Note:Cypher — In hip-hop culture, an informal gathering in which rappers take turns freestyling or performing verses, often in a circle. Cyphers serve as spaces for practice, competition, reputation-building, and communal participation.)
His voice was unexpectedly calm.
“He was over six-foot-three. Seriously, he was even taller than Dustin, haha.”
“...”
“He almost went to college on a basketball scholarship. A coach had already contacted him.”
“...”
“But you know what Dion did? On the deadline for his scholarship paperwork, some older guys on the street asked him to run an errand. He couldn’t refuse them that one time, missed the deadline, and couldn’t contact the coach again. After that, he just... stayed on the streets.”
From that point on, Dion began to change.
He stopped playing basketball.
He stopped coming to the court.
“But... he never let go of rap. When I found him freestyling alone in the parking lot at night, I’d go over and rap with him. He was good. Seriously. Not better than me, though.”
Lil D slowly closed his eyes.
“It was that night.”
Dion had been leaning against a car when someone drove past and opened fire.
No one still knew why.
It might have been a territorial dispute.
It might have been a personal grudge.
“He was sixteen. And his mother didn’t even have enough money to choose a coffin, so she had to raise money online.”
“...So that’s what those lines were about.”
The studio was silent.
The composer standing behind them had lowered his head.
“So I want the last song to be a song for Dion.”
...Will Shotgun cry again this time?
Lil D was secretly certain.
Shotgun had cried in front of Little K’s grave.
Shotgun had cried while playing the piano during the live performance of When I Wake Up.
There was no way a man who had gone that far for Little K, someone he had never even met, could hear this story and remain unmoved.
He’s definitely going to cry.
So Lil D had already begun preparing.
The moment tears fell beneath those black sunglasses, he planned to step over, thank him, and pat him on the shoulder...
“I see.”
“...”
Lil D blinked.
His ass was hovering awkwardly halfway above the seat.
“Do you... have anything else to say?”
“That must’ve been hard.”
“...”
“I’ll try to compose something good today based on your story.”
“...”
“To honor your friend.”
“...”
Lil D sat back down on the sofa and thought,
...This bastard is seriously too much. He cried his eyes out while honoring OG’s brother...
Delivery Man’s signing with LK Records proceeded without delay.
Park Geon himself drafted the contract, and the moment Jay received the pen, he immediately signed without hesitation.
“Thank you, hyung! Seriously, thank you!”
“...Yeah. Sure.”
Jay also knew that unless he joined an organization immediately, he would become a target in the hood.
Big Joe, on the other hand, showed little interest in Last Mile itself.
“That’s an ASD song. It has nothing to do with LK’s revenue. Release it or do whatever you want.”
Naturally, there was no label-level promotion.
No distributor.
No marketing budget.
Nothing.
It was a completely bare-handed release.
So Park Geon decided to use a different method.
“All right, everyone ready?”
J-Rackz’s studio, which had been converted from a garage.
Three men sat together inside the cramped room, whose walls were covered haphazardly with acoustic foam.
Park Geon, Jay, and J-Rackz.
In the middle of the room, a bowl of water sat alone on a small table.
“...So what exactly is this supposed to be?”
J-Rackz looked suspiciously at the bowl.
“It’s a traditional Korean method.”
With a serious expression, Park Geon rubbed his hands together.
“Before something important, you put out a bowl of purified water and pray, and things go well. My grandmother used to do it.”
“...Really?”
“Really.”
J-Rackz poked the water in the bowl with one finger.
“But isn’t this just tap water?”
“Originally, you’re supposed to use well water drawn at first dawn. But there are no wells around here, so I substituted bottled water from the convenience store.”
“...Wouldn’t that reduce the effectiveness?”
“It’s the sincerity that matters.”
“That’s awfully convenient. If that’s the case, why not use cola instead? Then we can drink it afterward.”
“Stop talking and put your hands together.”
At Park Geon’s words, Jay clasped his hands first.
He already looked as though he would believe anything Park Geon said.
“Like this?”
“Yeah. Rub your hands together and say, ‘I pray, I pray.’”
Park Geon began rubbing both hands together vigorously.
“I pray, I pray! Please let Last Mile blow up! On my mama, I’m serious!”
“...You crazy bastard. Leave out the slang.”
“Ah! I-I pray, I pray...”
Jay even squeezed his eyes shut.
His expression was more desperate than it had ever been before any stage performance.
Please... please let it do well...
J-Rackz also clasped his hands and began rubbing them together almost automatically.
“...I pray, I pray... Wait.”
He lowered his hands.
“Why am I doing this? Last Mile isn’t even my song.”
Park Geon answered while continuing to rub his hands.
“J-Rackz. You agreed to work with me on your next project, right?”
“Yeah.”
“Then this is your business too. Hurry up and pray.”
“...What kind of logic is that?”
“Hurry.”
“...I pray, I pray.”
In the end, J-Rackz began rubbing his hands together again.
Three grown men sitting in a cramped garage around a single bowl of water, chanting prayers.
Anyone who saw them might have reported them as a cult gathering.
After praying like that for a long time—
“Whew...”
Park Geon picked up his phone.
He opened the upload page of the distribution service and checked the track information one last time.
His finger hovered briefly above the upload button.
...I’m counting on you.
“You two keep praying.”
“I pray, I pray...”
“...I pray.”
Tap.
Independent release.
A method in which an artist uploads music directly through a distribution service without going through a major label.
[Last Mile] Delivery Man (Prod. asd1236)
The song was officially released.