Who Are You?
What the hell is he doing?
I was staring blankly at Yoon Hyeon-min, wondering if he'd finally lost it, when a voice cut in from the hallway.
"Do Won-woo. Come out for a second."
Jeong Hui-min happened to be walking past and called to me from outside the door, gesturing. I didn't want to spend even a single second in the same room as Yoon Hyeon-min, so my body moved almost on reflex.
Thank god.
Thanks to Hui-min calling me at that exact moment, I managed to escape that awkward, bizarre situation. I closed the door and stepped into the hallway, where Hui-min was waiting with a grave look on his face.
"What's up?"
"Well..."
Before I could even ask what was going on, Hui-min gestured for me to come closer.
"Just a second. Follow me?"
"Huh?"
"We need to talk."
Hui-min tilted his head toward the corridor, then started walking without telling me where we were going. Before long, he'd led us out of the building entirely, heading toward a secluded, deserted spot.
We're going pretty far.
I understood why, though. There were cameras inside the building, and none outside. He'd deliberately brought me here to get away from prying eyes...
But what could he possibly need to say that required dragging me all the way out here?
I was following behind him, suspicion creeping in, when Hui-min stopped walking and let out a sigh so heavy it could have cracked the ground. Then he turned around and stared straight at me.
"Do Won-woo."
He said my name, then seemed to hesitate, holding back whatever came next.
"You're wondering too, right? What I dragged you all the way out here to talk about."
I gave a small nod. Hui-min raked a hand through his hair. Even before he started talking, his expression was heavy with thought.
"I know you've been really worried about Ji-an."
He can tell?
Well, of course he can. It'd be weirder if he couldn't, given how much I've been stressing over it.
"I get it. You two are really close. I don't know when you suddenly got that close, but at some point I started seeing you two hanging out and talking a lot."
Hui-min scratched his head mid-sentence, then continued.
"Maybe that's why. Anyway, there are times when you can't seem to focus during practice. Ji-an might be part of it, but there's probably other stuff too. Either way, it feels like your head is somewhere else entirely."
In other words, I looked like I'd lost my mind. Well, if Hui-min said so, he was probably right. Even just looking at his character profile, Jeong Hui-min had excellent intuition and observational skills. More than anyone, I knew better than anyone that I wasn't in a normal state right now. But if that had been affecting practice, I should apologize.
"I'm sorry. If I've been a distraction during practice..."
"No, no. It's not like you've been hurting the practice or anything."
Hui-min waved it off.
Come to think of it, Hui-min's in a dangerous position too, ranking-wise...
He needed to make a comeback this round somehow, and yet every last bit of my attention had been on Won Ji-an. Even if we weren't particularly close, hadn't I been too indifferent toward him?
We've been funneling the center position and all the parts toward Won Ji-an. From Hui-min's perspective, that's honestly a situation worth resenting...
He might find both me and Ji-an pretty hard to look at right now. I would have, if I were in his shoes. But Hui-min seemed calm, if anything. I didn't sense any hostility from him. Whether he was hiding it or had just let it go, I couldn't tell. Either way, talking to him like this, a guilt that wasn't quite guilt was welling up inside me.
In the original story, Jeong Hui-min debuts. But now that fate has changed, he might not make it this time.
I just felt sorry.
"I'm sorry."
"Why are you apologizing again? I just said it because I was worried. You've been doing fine, though. Your skills have improved a lot, too."
Hui-min said this with a complicated look on his face. Judging by the atmosphere, there was more he wanted to say.
"What is it?"
"Well... you know."
Hui-min started carefully.
"Hyeon-min hyung's not in a good state right now."
I nodded. Ah. So that's the other reason he called me out here. Makes sense. The conversation we'd just had could've easily happened inside the room.
"He suddenly stops in the middle of practice, does these weird dances, mutters to himself. You've seen it too."
"Yeah."
Hui-min sighed.
"You probably feel the same, but the stages we do here really mean a lot to me. They last forever, you know? But I'm worried something huge is going to happen during the actual performance if he keeps this up..."
"Ah. So that's what you're worried about."
"Yeah. Honestly, I'm scared."
So I wasn't the only one who felt like we had a ticking time bomb on the team. Everyone must have felt it.
Honestly, at this point the production team should be considering forcing him off the show. The fact that they're just letting it continue makes it hard to shake the feeling that they're using him for the buzz.
From the producers' perspective, it didn't get better than this. Last episode, Yoon Hyeon-min had pulled some all-time insane stunt, and the ratings had shot through the roof. They'd suggested he leave, but they hadn't forced it. That meant the production team was quietly keeping their hands off and watching how things played out.
Even so — they're just going to leave him like that?
I was about to sigh in sheer disgust when Hui-min spoke up again, his expression worried.
"But..."
"I was heading to the bathroom and happened to overhear something Hyeon-min hyung said."
"What? What did he say?"
At my pressing, Hui-min's eyes darted away, like he didn't want to say it.
"You know how he mutters to himself all the time. So I figured it was just him talking to himself, but..."
Hui-min glanced at me, then finished.
"He was muttering something like... if he doesn't get to debut, he'll make sure you don't either. Then he suddenly took off somewhere."
I was speechless.
...What?
The sheer absurdity of it knocked the wind out of me, and a laugh burst out before I could stop it. Hui-min blinked at my reaction, looking puzzled.
"What? Is it funny?"
"No, no. It's just..."
Irritating, more like. I wanted to tell him it was time to knock it off already — how long was he going to keep this up? The words rose all the way to my throat.
He's getting eliminated this round anyway, isn't he?
His ranking had plummeted, and there was no one left who'd vote for him. I didn't think Yoon Hyeon-min was making it to the finale. So I had no idea how he was planning to stop me from debuting.
"I don't think Hyeon-min hyung is actually going to do anything major, either. But..."
Hui-min continued, ignoring my hollow laugh.
"I'm really sorry for saying something that'll mess with your head right before the stage, but you know. Hyeon-min hyung isn't in his right mind right now."
Hui-min pressed a hand to his forehead.
"I want to believe he didn't say it with some huge malicious intent, but his condition is unstable, and if you look at his eyes, he really doesn't seem... normal. So I was worried something might happen."
That's why he told me? Because he was worried Yoon Hyeon-min might try to mess with me?
"You're telling me to be careful, then?"
Hui-min nodded.
"Yeah. That's why I called you out. Sorry."
"No. Thank you for telling me."
We weren't even that close. He could've just let it slide. The fact that he went out of his way to tell me...
Did Hui-min sense something ominous too?
I felt the same way. Something didn't sit right. It was like that atmosphere right before a storm hits — the calm before everything blows.
I just hope it turns out to be an unfounded worry.
I was already losing my mind over the Won Ji-an situation, and now Yoon Hyeon-min too? This was chaos on top of chaos.
Seriously, when is Yoon Hyeon-min going to exit already? All the way to the end...
My head was filling with tangled thoughts, growing more chaotic, when Hui-min spoke again.
"You know this too, but... this might be my last stage."
The sudden words made me look up in surprise.
"What?"
"You know. My ranking's hanging by a thread."
Hadn't he been holding onto the upper ranks this whole time? I'd figured he'd at least make it to the finale. Nothing was confirmed, of course, and every trainee was in an uncertain position. But I hadn't realized Hui-min was looking at the current situation this pessimistically.
His usual expression hasn't looked great, but I didn't think he was already considering the possibility of getting eliminated this round. That's a bit of a shock.
"Don't say that."
"Why not?"
"It's just... I know how hard you've been working. But to be putting in that much effort and still feel that way inside..."
Jeong Hui-min was the one who always stayed late practicing with me. That's why I knew how desperate he was right now.
He's that desperate, working that hard — and yet inside, he's already resigned himself to the idea that this might be his last stage?
I was looking at him, worry stirring in my chest, when Hui-min — who'd been staring at the ground for a while — suddenly sat down against the wall.
"Honestly, is there anyone here who isn't struggling, who isn't desperate? Right?"
A bitter smile crossed Hui-min's face.
"But I get why you're so worried about Ji-an. I would've been the same. You two seem... special, somehow."
Then Hui-min suddenly looked up and asked,
"At first I thought you were closer with Hae-won. But at some point it started seeming like you were closer with Ji-an. How'd you two get so close?"
The question came out of nowhere, and I didn't know how to answer. I fumbled.
"...Just, you know. It just happened."
Won Ji-an and I were completely different people, and yet in some ways we shared the same traits. We'd both lived entirely different lives, then suddenly possessed new people in a new world. We'd both vanish from this world if we failed to debut. And we both had that damn System.
"He and I are alike."
Won Ji-an and I resembled each other. I didn't want to admit it, but we were also the only ones who knew each other's real names. Hearing that kind of thing from someone else was embarrassing, though, so I quickly tried to change the subject.
"Anyway, I hope you get to show everything you want to on this stage too. So..."
I was just about to continue when Hui-min's sudden question left me speechless.
"What?"
Hui-min asked again.
What...?
I was staring at Hui-min, completely lost, when he spoke. The look in his eyes was strange — nothing like usual.
"I don't think so."
In that instant, I understood. The person standing in front of me was not Jeong Hui-min.