Waking Up in the Past
My head throbbed like it was about to split open, and I couldn’t summon even an ounce of strength in my arms or legs. Which made sense, because I had just…
At that moment, my hazy vision suddenly sharpened.
“Na Yeri! Are you out of your damn mind? The debut team audition is right in front of us and you’re doing what right now?!”
A middle-aged man was screaming at me from point-blank range. His face was flushed beet red. I had no idea what I’d done, but he was clearly furious. The sight felt both strangely familiar and alien. If my memory was correct, the man yelling in my face was Min Yongsik. It had been a long time, but his unforgettable personality kept the memory crystal clear. The guy looked exactly like a bulldog. He always had, but when he was this angry he was a spitting image of one.
Min Yongsik was Cha Entertainment’s vocal trainer and de facto drill sergeant. His nickname was Bulldog-ssam.
Good grief, Cha Entertainment. Now that was a nostalgic name. When was the last time I’d seen Bulldog-ssam? At least ten years ago, probably. The final time had been the day I left Cha Entertainment.
But why was this old man suddenly here? I was clearly… Wait. Hold on. How had he not aged a single day? They say people who swear a lot live longer, but this was pushing it.
The moment I sensed something was wrong, the rest of my surroundings finally registered. A huge practice room with mirrors covering every wall. Bulldog-ssam stood in the center, surrounded by a line of girls who looked to be late teens to early twenties. The scene was eerily familiar.
So this was… vocal training? Was I dreaming? I didn’t remember missing this period of my life. And this situation felt exactly like…
Before the confused me could finish the thought, a message window popped up to perfectly explain my current circumstances.
Your role is Minor Character 17 (Villain).
Complete your own History.
It was the same message I’d seen when I first entered this world. It looked like I had returned to the very beginning.
There was once a novel called The Retired Superhuman Raises an Idol.
In a world that had gradually stabilized after the chaotic emergence of superhumans, some of those superhumans became celebrities with popularity rivaling top entertainers. Popularity brought money, and money drew attention. One entertainment executive, watching all of this, had an idea: If superhumans make money, what if we gather the pretty and handsome ones and make an idol group? Wouldn’t that be a jackpot?
So they did. An idol group made entirely of superhumans. The first superhuman idol group caused a genuine sensation, so every agency copied the concept and superhuman idols popped up like mushrooms after rain. These superhuman idols boasted overwhelming performance capabilities that regular idols couldn’t even dream of. Fans, no longer satisfied with ordinary performances, began demanding more. Eventually the equation became simple: idol = superhuman idol. The entire idol industry had been completely taken over by superhumans.
In that climate, the protagonist—who had been working as a combat superhuman for the Superhuman Agency—retired due to injury and entered the idol industry to raise idols. That was the main story of the novel.
And I had been possessed into that ridiculous story. As a throwaway villain who only appeared in the prologue.
“I thought it was fairly fresh when I read it, but I never wanted to be the one getting possessed. Besides, it’s not like I did anything to deserve it.”
To be honest, it felt a little unfair. I really hadn’t done anything that warranted possession. But there was no one to complain to. These days, contextless possession stories were all the rage. It didn’t matter if you sent the author a 5,700-character complaint or if you weren’t the sole reader of a failed novel, the only strategy guide for a dead game, or the ancient master who had cleared every ending. Random possession had become commonplace.
Of course, getting hit with a gender-bender beam on top of that was a slightly different case, but what could I do? The deed was already done. All that was left was to adapt and live with it.
Even in the novels, people who got possessed rarely returned to their original worlds. Once you crossed over—willingly or not—you usually just adapted and kept living. I was one of those people who chose to adapt rather than flail around in hopeless hope.
While my head spun with all these thoughts, my eyes accidentally met my reflection in the mirror. There stood some weird girl glaring back at me, face caked in heavy makeup. She had tried and failed to sharpen her eyes with clumsy technique, then piled on more until the result was a tacky, early-2000s color palette.
“…Right. There was a time like this too.”
Seeing the ridiculous state of my makeup with my own eyes finally made the current situation click. I had despaired quite a bit the first time I possessed this body and saw this face.
I mean, come on. Isn’t it common sense that getting hit by a gender-bender beam turns you into an absolute beauty? So how was I supposed to stay calm looking like this? Even if I had to be possessed, I should at least get the minimum compensation package.
Looking back, that had been a perfectly reasonable misconception. The idea that a woman’s bare face is always prettier is obviously nonsense. Any woman looks better with makeup; that’s just facts. But even with makeup I looked like this, so of course I’d panicked. It was hard to imagine that a girl Na Yeri’s age—who should have been obsessed with her appearance—would be this terrible at makeup.
I let out a small, bitter laugh as I recalled that time which had now become a memory, then began carefully wiping away the thick layers of cosmetics. Slowly, the real face hidden beneath the clown paint started to emerge.
“It’s a face I see every day, but it still feels new every time. And all those ugly scars are gone too… Yeah, this is definitely a face that turns heads.”
The golden rule of gender-bender stories had held firm once again. The Na Yeri I possessed was beautiful enough that once you saw her, you couldn’t forget her. For a minor character in a novel, this visual was insane. At this point I was genuinely curious what the protagonists I hadn’t met yet looked like.
“If I had to nitpick… it’d be the eyes, I guess?”
No matter how varied human tastes were, at least ninety out of a hundred people would call Na Yeri’s face a masterpiece. Still, there were minor complaints. Her eyes were too innocent. When she spaced out she looked a bit ditzy. In short, she looked like an easy target.
I’d never actually suffered because of it, but personally I found it a shame. I preferred a haughty, ice-queen style over this vacant look. Interestingly enough, the original Na Yeri had felt the same way. That was probably why she’d slathered on eye makeup to emphasize that area. Of course, the main reason she started wearing makeup was something else, but dissatisfaction with her own appearance had definitely been part of it.
“So… what am I supposed to do now?”
After thoroughly removing the terrible makeup, I’d gotten lost in memories for a moment before snapping back to reality. Possession, regression, all that nonsense was enough to drive anyone crazy, but this was real life. I had to adapt to the situation.
Whether it was possession or regression, none of it had been my choice. But since I was alive, I had to keep living somehow. At least this moment was far better than the last one I remembered. Still, the situation I was in now wasn’t exactly easy street. If I let things flow the way they had before, I’d end up in the same miserable state again.
Of course I was a person who could grow, so the chances of repeating the exact same failures were low. But I’d been burned too many times to rely on that alone. Especially in this kind of entertainment-industry story where idols were the main focus…
“Ha, whatever. It’s all in the past now… So in the end, it’s idol work after all?”
The most important thing right now was to steady myself in a stable environment, identify and eliminate the most fatal problems, and—if possible—work for a short time, make one big score, then retire cleanly to live a comfortable life. The phrases “short time” and “comfortable life” were so important I wanted to underline them in red twice. To be honest, I was exhausted. The first round had been absolute garbage.
In that sense, being an idol was actually a pretty decent option for me. The activity period was short, and if you succeeded you could retire with a nice chunk of money. Of course it wasn’t easy, so I had to consider the possibility of failure, but that was true of everything. The bigger the return, the bigger the risk you had to accept. Any path that let you make it big and get out quickly came with risk. Even crime worked that way—if you wanted to pull off one huge score and disappear, you had to bet your life on it.
Of course, I had unavoidable reasons that made choosing the idol route necessary right now, but even without those reasons it was an option worth considering.
“Besides, it’s not like Na Yeri had any other choices anyway…”
The person I’d possessed was truly at rock bottom. Na Yeri had awakened her superpowers at thirteen, immediately ran away from the facility, and had no family whatsoever. She’d been lucky enough to meet CEO Cha Seongjin and become a trainee at Cha Entertainment. Six years later, she was a twenty-year-old middle-school dropout with only 120,000 won in her bank account and six years of trainee experience under her belt. What other answer was there besides debuting as an idol?
Even the place I was living in wasn’t mine. This dorm had originally belonged to Purple Swan, a girl group from Cha Entertainment. After they each moved out, it passed to the next group. When the male group Black Dust disbanded early, the dorm sat empty. Since it was going to be vacant until the next debut team moved in, they’d let me—a trainee with no money—stay here out of pity. It was even free.
Well, they said it wasn’t free. I had the obligation to keep the place spotless while I lived here. But honestly, that was basically free. Just clean while I lived there. What was the big deal?
“Wait. I was only allowed to live here until the debut team moved in, right? So if I…”
I’d forgotten since it was so long ago, but if I didn’t make the debut team I’d have to vacate the dorm immediately. With only 120,000 won in my account, that meant I’d be thrown out onto the street.
And if my memory was correct, the debut team audition was exactly three days after I possessed this body.
“…Crazy.”
Future plans could wait. Right now I needed to fight to protect my sweet home—even if it wasn’t technically mine.