4
Chapter 4
‘Why on earth did this guy ask me to come?’
Lee Seon narrowed his eyes as he glanced at the junior standing in front of the register.
Yoo Seongha, whom he was meeting again after several months, was even more unusual than his first impression had
suggested.
He could overlook the fact that, despite being given a choice, Yoo Seongha had deliberately chosen a shabby Korean
set-meal restaurant.
He could even more or less understand how someone with such a sophisticated, urban appearance could make conversation
feel so comfortable.
The problem was, well, this kind of thing.
“Here.”
“......Ah, thank you.”
Lee Seon reluctantly accepted the mint candy Yoo Seongha held out to him.
As always, the sweet and refreshing flavor spreading across his tongue was satisfying.
Thanks to that, the irritation he had been feeling for no particular reason eased a little.
“I told you I would pay. That was the promise we made in the first place.”
“You came all the way here because of me. I can't ask you to pay for the meal on top of that.”
“But still, getting a junior to buy me food is a little......”
“Technically, I'm the older one when you consider our ages. If it really bothers you, just buy me a cup of coffee
instead.”
Lee Seon nodded enthusiastically for a moment, but then narrowed one eye and asked,
“Hmm, I've been wondering about this the whole time...... You didn't call me just to have a meal, did you?”
“I didn't call you just to eat.”
Then what was it?
When Lee Seon asked with his eyes, Yoo Seongha shrugged and answered.
“There’s something I want to ask your advice about. I’d like to talk about it slowly over coffee. You have some time,
right?”
Realizing that his silence meant yes, Yoo Seongha left the restaurant a step ahead.
Lee Seon followed him at a leisurely pace.
Objectively speaking, Yoo Seongha wasn't particularly good with words.
Nor did he seem like someone who was especially clever or calculating.
So why did Lee Seon keep getting swept along by him?
It was simply puzzling.
If he had to find a reason......
‘He somehow feels like he's got more life experience than me. And he seems to know me pretty well, too.’
Neither explanation was particularly convincing.
He had mentioned being older, but the difference was only two years.
The latter was equally ridiculous.
They had only just become more than strangers.
‘Forget it. Let's not dig into something pointless.’
His mind was already complicated enough.
He didn't want to waste energy worrying about something like this.
After forcing his thoughts aside, Lee Seon sighed when he saw Yoo Seongha enter somewhere.
“You really are a strange junior.”
There were cafes all over every alley, and yet he had chosen a convenience store.
Lee Seon hurried inside after him and pointed this out, but Yoo Seongha merely shook a coffee bottle with an orange
label and said,
“I like this better.”
“Hmm, you don't have to go out of your way to......”
“This is yours, right, sunbae-nim?”
Lee Seon instinctively caught the object flying toward him and shot his eyes upward.
The milk tea, recognizable by its somewhat old-fashioned can design, was famous for being an extremely divisive drink.
Of the six, no, now former members, Lee Seon had been the only one who liked it.
“But how did you know that I......”
“You looked like someone who would.”
What a vague answer.
Lee Seon clicked his tongue but didn't question him further.
He had already realized that he wasn't going to get a proper answer.
After paying, they were about to sit at the tables outside the convenience store when Yoo Seongha hurriedly stopped him.
Lee Seon wondered what it was this time.
Yoo Seongha said they should move because they were right beside the main road.
Lee Seon declined, saying there was no need to worry so much, but Yoo Seongha didn't even pretend to listen.
“How about we walk to the university while digesting our food? It should also be better for avoiding people's eyes.”
“I don't know. Do we really have to go that far?”
“Yes, of course.”
You're an idol, after all.
His gaze seemed to say exactly that.
Without realizing it, Lee Seon muttered,
“......Being an idol is relative.”
What good was having such a glamorous title?
He had merely pulled his cap down carelessly, yet no one had recognized him during the entire trip here.
Even if he had gone bare-faced, things probably wouldn't have been much different.
That was the reality of Lee Seon and his group, O*rt.
Lee Seon didn't want to dwell on this bitter reality.
If he did, he might end up wanting to run away from even that.
“Fine, fine. I don't care either way, so do whatever you want, junior.”
Lee Seon waved his hand exaggeratedly and abruptly changed direction toward the university.
Unlike before, Yoo Seongha quietly followed behind him.
Perhaps because it was right after the start of the semester, the campus was unusually quiet.
The two walked along the outskirts of the campus for a while before sitting on a bench among the bushes.
There were only a few streetlights around, so even if someone happened to pass by, they probably wouldn't be able to see
their faces.
What kind of serious problem could he have that required this much caution?
By this point, Lee Seon was becoming a little curious himself.
He rested his chin on his hand and deliberately pretended not to care.
Then Yoo Seongha asked a question that instantly drained all the tension from him.
“Did I get it wrong?”
“Excuse me?”
“The milk tea. You haven't touched it at all since earlier.”
Unlike Yoo Seongha's coffee, which had noticeably decreased during the walk, the beige can was still untouched.
“I'm watching my weight. Don't worry about it...... Hmm, no. Still, you went through the trouble of choosing it for me.”
Lee Seon answered automatically, then contradicted himself.
He immediately emptied the can in one go, as though he had a grudge against milk tea.
The sudden sense of injustice had pushed him to do it.
‘As if I'm going to make a comeback anytime soon. What's the point of managing my weight?’
Wasn't their agency the kind that would even turn down offers to appear on shows because they claimed they didn't have
enough money?
There was no way they would easily let him make a comeback.
‘......If our last activity had gone well, I could at least demand one.’
Earlier this year, the album O*rt released failed to even surpass ten thousand copies in first-week sales.
The figure was not merely disappointing.
It was disastrous.
Especially considering that they were about to celebrate their third anniversary since debut.
Although none of them had said it out loud, Lee Seon and every other member instinctively knew.
There wasn't much time left until their disbandment.
A company couldn't keep investing indefinitely in a product that had no value, after all.
They hadn't managed to surpass the break-even point for years, and yet they had continued receiving support.
In that sense, they could even be considered lucky.
But there was nothing they could do about the frustration and suffocation they felt.
‘We haven't shown everything we're capable of yet. Is this really the end?’
The bigger his dreams had been, the harder it was for the flame in his heart to go out.
Even after burning through every last bit of hope at the bottom of the box, until nothing remained but white ash, the
pain wouldn't disappear.
That was why he had raised his voice at Yoo Seongha's seemingly innocent question.
“You can't even eat whatever you want. Being an idol really is hard.”
“......I suppose.”
“Hm?”
“Something like this doesn't even count as hardship.”
If dieting could improve their situation, Lee Seon could go without food for days.
No, even weeks.
Salad?
Exercise?
What did things like that matter?
None of it was difficult for him.
“But I guess I'm the only one who thinks that way.”
This was where he had to stop.
There was nothing to gain from complaining to an outsider.
Besides, the person who had asked for advice wasn't Lee Seon.
It was that junior.
He knew that.
Yet the moment his eyes met Yoo Seongha's, Lee Seon was suddenly overcome by an intense urge to tell him everything.
If he did that, it felt as though everything would be all right.
‘He doesn't know anything. He couldn't possibly know......’
Yoo Seongha's eyes, quietly gazing at him, were astonishingly calm and warm.
It was as though he were an old friend who knew every detail of Lee Seon's circumstances and understood him completely.
In the end, Lee Seon surrendered to his instincts.
“You roughly know too, right, junior? About me, or rather, about our group.”
“......”
“You don't have to look for some way to sugarcoat it. I know better than anyone that we've completely failed, with
absolutely no excuse to make.”
It was brutally objective self-assessment.
Seeing Yoo Seongha hold back his words, Lee Seon gave a small laugh and continued explaining his situation.
“We're really desperate. If only we had an opportunity, we'd work ourselves to the bone, whether it meant suffering or
anything else...... I'm not speaking figuratively. I'd even risk my life.”
But opportunities weren't distributed equally.
Even opportunities they managed to find could easily slip away when faced with poor circumstances.
“Recently, we received a rather unusual offer from a broadcasting station. It's under an embargo, so I can't tell you
the details, but from my perspective, it seems like an opportunity that won't come twice. But they're saying we
shouldn't do it.”
“The company? Or the members?”
“The agency. They say it's too much for us in several ways.”
The biggest reason was money.
The broadcasting station had informed them that the agency would have to cover most of the costs necessary for the
performance.
The employees had immediately shown reluctance upon hearing that.
Perhaps they were embarrassed to reveal the financial issue openly.
Hwang, the executive who held the real power at the company, came up with other excuses and rejected Lee Seon's desire
to participate.
“Ahem. Did you already forget that two of you ran off not long ago? And now you want to do a stage...... Do you think a
survival show is some children's game?”
“Then and now, I believe I've been fulfilling the role of leader sufficiently.”
“What about the main vocalist? Don't tell me you plan on being that too, Seon?”
What they had been offered was a survival program structured around competitions.
And the heart of a competition was a dramatic stage performance.
‘It'll be difficult without a main vocalist.’
As luck would have it, the two members who had recently disappeared were the ones responsible for the high notes.
Lee Seon's singing ability wasn't bad either, but it wasn't enough.
Of course, high notes weren't everything on a stage.
But could they captivate an audience without an intense climax that felt like carbonation being poured directly over the
crown of your head?
Lee Seon couldn't easily nod at the idea.
“What happened to the members who disappeared?”
“I don't know either. They both went completely off the radar at the same time a few months ago, as if they'd planned
it.”
If only they had waited a little.
If they had, they could have seized this opportunity together.
Lee Seon resented the members who had disappeared after leaving behind nothing but handwritten letters saying they were
leaving the group.
At the same time, however, he understood them.
Who could blame someone for escaping a sinking ship?
But Lee Seon was a little different from them.
He still didn't want to pull out.
He wanted to see this through to the very end, this work to which he had devoted half his life.
“Well, it's not like I have some brilliant solution either. I just stormed out of the dorm because I was frustrated.”
What good was boldly walking out?
With nowhere else to go, he had eventually chosen to hole himself up in the practice room as usual.
Realizing anew how miserable his situation looked, Lee Seon lowered his head.
He figured that even this polite junior wouldn't be able to help sneering after hearing all this.
His guess was only half right.
Yoo Seongha was indeed smiling.
But the emotion behind that smile was quite different from what Lee Seon had expected.
“That was wise.”
“I understand, ......what?”
“I said it was wise. Thanks to that, you met me without delay.”
I heard he was a sensible person.
Then why was he suddenly speaking like some old-fashioned romance novel?
Puzzled, Lee Seon raised his gaze.
As though he had been waiting for it, Yoo Seongha reached out his hand.
Then, unusually, he smiled with his eyes and whispered,
“Let's live together, sunbae-nim.”
......
Maybe something was seriously wrong with that junior's head.
Lee Seon narrowed one eye as he came to a somewhat impolite verdict.