Chapter 46
Leaving the three trainees deep in thought, Se-rang quietly headed not toward the underground parking lot, but alone toward a bar near the company.
She even refused Secretary Cha when she offered to follow her.
Because the assignment she had given those three was, in truth, an assignment Se-rang had once given herself too.
She had always given her artists that kind of homework. Because idols inevitably lived inside images created by other people.
Whether that be the company, the producers, or the public.
But those were all merely manufactured images. To keep their center among those images, the artists themselves had to know who they were.
Who they defined themselves as. What they were here for. Se-rang had always repeatedly told them that they had to constantly recognize that they were different from those fabricated images, that they too were living, breathing “people” carrying their own worries.
However, those same questions were now assignments Se-rang was giving herself.
Ever since she began living not as Kang Iwon, but as Yeon Se-rang, she had felt deeply strange.
Iwon had never had a family to begin with, so she treated the artists she raised as family and the songs she created as her children.
But in this world, her artists had all gone down completely different paths, and all her songs had disappeared.
Everything belonging to Kang Iwon had truly vanished.
And in a world like that, trying to mix Kang Iwon’s identity with Yeon Se-rang’s life gave her feelings of déjà vu more than once.
One of those was—
“I told you not to drink alone, Yeon Se-rang.”
The feelings she had toward the man named Baek Do-gyeong.
“Get lost.” Se-rang answered carelessly with a face that clearly showed she did not even want to reply.
“I really want to get lost too, but your personal safety problem is directly connected to me.”
After ordering a glass of whiskey, Do-gyeong took off his jacket, hung it on the chair, and sat beside Se-rang.
Not wanting anything more to do with him, Se-rang ignored him completely.
“You still haven’t brought up the broken engagement to Chairman Yeon.”
“It’s not the right time to talk about that yet, and your issue doesn’t even rank among the priorities of problems I need to solve.”
“…….”
“That’s how meaningless you are to me, Baek Do-gyeong.” After spitting the words out harshly, Se-rang downed her alcohol in one gulp.
“At times like this, I really wonder whether there was actually a period where you liked me and obsessed over me.”
“If you’re not going to leave, then I will.”
Instead of answering, Se-rang stood up from her seat. She was so sick of this man that she did not even want to exchange words with him anymore.
But Do-gyeong grabbed her hand as though intertwining fingers with her.
The overwhelming disgust rising inside her made Se-rang immediately shake his hand off.
“You don’t even want to answer me anymore?”
“…….”
“I won’t cling to you like this again. Calm down and sit. You don’t really want to turn me into your enemy at a time like this either, do you?” Do-gyeong whispered as though soothing a child. “I was wrong. I’m sorry. I didn’t know those trainees meant that much to you.”
“You knew. That’s exactly why you did it.”
“Haha.” Do-gyeong did not deny it. Se-rang had never expected honesty from him anyway, so she only silently revealed her contempt. “I won’t betray you again. Just forgive me this once.”
“Betrayal? I never trusted you in the first place, so I wasn’t betrayed. I was simply attacked.”
At Se-rang’s cold words, Do-gyeong deliberately put on a wounded expression.
“That hurts to hear.”
“I know you didn’t get hurt in the slightest, not even close, which is why I don’t want to answer you. Don’t pretend you care about things like that.”
“At moments like this, you really do seem like the Yeon Se-rang who knew me so well…. When exactly did you change this much?”
Who knows. Maybe from the moment I learned that you were the one who ruined my life and my artists? Se-rang only gave a bitter smile instead of answering.
“I checked the reaction to episode one. The response was pretty good. A lot of buzz, and you got hated a lot.”
“…….”
“That’s what you were aiming for, wasn’t it?”
So this bastard figured it out immediately.
Se-rang merely shrugged as though unsurprised.
Considering Baek Do-gyeong had always possessed animal-like business instincts, it was not surprising.
“Everything’s going exactly the way you wanted. I lost. Just let this one slide. You suddenly changed so much that I tested you a little. I wanted to know how much you’d changed.”
This bastard really was like a ghost.
What good was being a ghost? He wasn’t even taking this bastard away.
“You enjoy testing people? Did you get the result you wanted?”
“I did.” Do-gyeong smiled softly. “Now I know for certain. Just how much you’ve changed.”
“…….”
“That’s why. Seeing you stand against me equally inside the company now, and watching your eyes shine while looking at trainees, felt unfamiliar.”
Instead of responding, Se-rang looked at Baek Do-gyeong, who had rolled up his shirt sleeves and loosened his tie.
She knew. Even the fact that this man was showing such a relaxed appearance right now was all part of some calculation.
That he was trying to loosen tension and lower her guard somehow to shake her emotions.
That this man was currently producing himself.
But humans got deceived even while knowing it, and his gentle voice was persuasive too, so Se-rang sighed and turned her head away.
If she had not known this man’s true nature, she would have fallen for it at least a hundred times already.
But she remembered clearly.
“I hope you won’t take this personally. I simply ended up like this while doing my job.” Baek Do-gyeong saying those words with the coldest, driest eyes in the world.
A person with eyes like that could never possibly feel affection toward someone. Could never truly hold genuine goodwill toward anyone.
All of this was merely an act on his stage.
An act to enchant the audience.
“Don’t disgust me by pretending to understand me, pretending to acknowledge me, pretending you want to understand me.”
“…!”
“I know you’re just working right now. I know all this fake sweetness is just business to you too.”
Instead of answering, Baek Do-gyeong only stared at Se-rang with genuinely strange eyes.
“So stop pretending to care this excessively. If you don’t want the engagement broken off, then I’d rather we never meet privately like this again.”
After saying that, Se-rang called over the bartender and handed over her card.
It was time to leave now.
“And I know you planted tracking devices on me. I broke three of them already, but there are more, right?”
“There are.”
“Then turn them off or something. You’re pissing me off.”
“Why does it piss you off?”
“Would you like it if I appeared everywhere you went?”
“I think I’d like that.”
“That’s why I’m saying you can stop with those disgusting lines you don’t even mean. I’m not falling for them.”
After getting her card back from the bartender, Se-rang stood up and put her coat back on.
“So you’re forgiving me?”
“What?” Se-rang frowned and asked back.
Was this bastard insane? Forgiveness? How dare he even say that word?
“There’s nothing for me to forgive you for. Right now, I simply have too many enemies to deal with, so I’m leaving you alone. You’re probably clinging this desperately because if the rope called me gets cut, you’ll become a floating gourd with its string snapped too.”
(Translator’s Note: Floating Gourd with Its String Snapped (끈떨어진뒤웅박) — Korean idiom referring to someone who has lost support, backing, or protection and is left drifting helplessly.)
“…….”
“So for now, both of us need to maintain the title of engagement out of necessity, but we will never return to being temporary partners like before.”
“Yeon Se-rang.”
“Don’t talk to me, and don’t approach my artists either.” After saying that, Se-rang added one final sentence. “If you pull something like that again, I won’t stay still either.”