Five Idols Equal One Tank Battalion
According to Yu Hana’s information, the terrorists planned to strike tomorrow at three in the afternoon. They would seize Seou Industries, take the employees hostage, demand the release of Scorpion’s boss “Venom Scorpion,” and then call for a helicopter to carry everyone out. The idea of loading hostages onto the chopper so it couldn’t be shot down mid-air was actually pretty ambitious. Still, it didn’t matter. Whether we stopped them or the bombs went off, those bastards were dead men walking anyway.
The forces they’d mobilized were roughly twenty remnants of the Scorpion gang plus about ten mercenaries who’d joined from China. Around thirty bodies total, including a dozen or so superhumans—quality troops, no question. Even so, I wasn’t particularly worried. Back-alley superhuman villains were almost always weaker than properly trained ones. Like I said before, overcoming your limits as a superhuman requires insane training. If they were willing to train that hard, why become villains in the first place? With that kind of grit they could’ve succeeded at anything. The truth is, most people who awaken powers and immediately turn to crime don’t exactly have the greatest work ethic.
Of course there are always exceptions—those rare freaks who become villains for a specific purpose like revenge. But a reckless criminal syndicate like Scorpion mixing with Chinese mercenaries? Safe bet they’re all trash. On the other hand, our side consisted of two former Special Task Force combat superhumans and one three-year veteran Phantom. The two in the rear were a bit unreliable, but if Ji Seoeun pulled out her weird weapons again we could probably brute-force it with equipment advantage.
And above all else… we’re idols, aren’t we?
This is a story from the world I used to live in, but there was an old internet meme about the combat power of high-school girls. One high-school girl equals two special forces soldiers. Three high-school girls equal the latest main battle tank. Something like that. There’s a similar meme here: five girl idols are supposedly equal in combat strength to an entire tank battalion. It’s obviously a joke. But our team is the one that can make that joke a reality. And out of the three of us who count, two are military-service-completed idol leaders, thank you very much.
The reason I’m even bringing up this stupid topic is because an equally stupid meeting is currently taking place in our dorm.
“With a terrorist incident of this scale, the press will definitely swarm the scene. Broadcast helicopters are a given.”
“That’s true.”
“Since we’ve formed a team, shouldn’t we announce it? Popularity and reputation matter too.”
“Since when does a Phantom care about popularity?”
“Phantom work doesn’t leave anything behind. At least let us have the fun of being popular~”
It wasn’t exactly profound. The media would flock to the scene anyway, so they wanted to use the chance to loudly announce that we’d formed a team. From my perspective it sounded like pointless nonsense, but Seong Jiyeong’s argument that “doing unpaid Phantom work should at least be fun because of the popularity” was hard to refute. The words “if you’re upset, just quit” crawled all the way up my throat, but that would’ve been the same as picking a fight.
This girl is secretly a huge attention whore.
Come to think of it, it’s hilarious that Golden Roll—one of Korea’s top Phantoms—is a teleportation user. With that ability she could’ve operated completely unseen. Yet the number of serious criminals Golden Roll has captured over three years is around twenty. She’s famous precisely because she always dumps the criminals she catches directly in front of the Public Security Agency. The reporters and streamers who camp outside the agency catch it on camera, and that’s how it spreads online. At this point it’s reasonable to suspect she shows up on purpose just to feed the press material.
That Gray J guy is the same. He’s famous for leaving a signature card that says “Gray J” after capturing villains. Maybe all Phantoms have “attention whore” as a passive skill? Phantom and attention seeker—there’s definitely a connection. Maybe Seong Jiyeong is actually perfectly suited to be an idol after all. Attention whores and idols go together like peanut butter and jelly. That industry literally feeds on people’s interest.
Still, I doubted things would go exactly the way Seong Jiyeong wanted. The broadcasting stations and reporters who caught wind of the terror attack would definitely try something, but the Superhuman Bureau wasn’t going to sit back and allow it. Media control is standard procedure for an incident of this scale. Whether they could stop the YouTubers and streamers was another question, but at minimum they’d try to muzzle the major networks. Once the first wave of media control kicked in, even the YouTubers and streamers who usually got the news late would have trouble catching on. So the big reaction Seong Jiyeong was hoping for probably wouldn’t happen.
“Yeah, yeah. If we’re doing it, we should do it right. I’m totally on Jjeong-jjeong’s side~”
“Team unit debut. Good idea. Position should be unnie in the center.”
“Hm, I don’t quite understand the meaning, but if the members want it, I won’t object.”
While I was busy pondering the correlation between attention whores and Phantoms, the discussion suddenly picked up speed. Yu Hana and Ji Seoeun had cast their votes in favor, and Tasha’s stance was basically “whatever.” Wait, it was actually going through? I’d been spacing out thinking it would obviously get rejected and got slapped in the back of the head. Maybe I’d underestimated how crazy our team really was.
“All right. Once the operation is over, follow my orders immediately. Evacuation will be from the roof.”
“Understood.”
“This is going to be more fun than I thought~”
“Roger.”
Before I could even raise an objection, the entire plan was moving forward smoothly. What the hell was this level of teamwork? For some reason these people only ever displayed absurd drive when it came to screwing me over. If they’d put that passion into their idol debut instead, it would’ve been great. Although… this counted as a debut too, in a way. Not an idol debut, but still.
But once it had gone this far there was nothing I could do. Our team was a democratic group that respected majority rule, after all. Ha. So this is the evil of democracy? The future of democracy looks incredibly dark.
“I don’t even know anymore.”
At this point I just stopped thinking entirely.
Finally, D-Day. The members finished morning practice without breaking a sweat and started sneaking glances at each other before slipping out of the company. Today’s concept was playing hooky. We were pretending to be exhausted from the brutal training and skipping afternoon practice to go have fun. The excuse was solid. Among entertainment companies, Cha Entertainment didn’t usually demand that much practice, but for the past two months we’d been training harder than any other agency.
The reason the training had been so intense was obvious: our team members had a lot of catching up to do in terms of idol skills. Three of us were only six-month trainees, after all. After rolling around like that for two months we were finally starting to look like proper idols, but it was also the perfect time to be thoroughly exhausted. If we’d been normal idol trainees we really would’ve been wiped out. So using that as an excuse to disappear for a day and come back later meant the company probably wouldn’t scold us too harshly.
“Everyone here?”
After each of us avoided the staff and made it outside, we took Seong Jiyeong’s teleportation together. Our destination was one of Seong Jiyeong’s safehouses. As a three-year veteran Phantom, she had set up hideouts all over Seoul—one in pretty much every district. The reason she’d made so many was obviously the distance limit on her teleportation. By hopping between safehouses she could reach anywhere in Seoul without being seen.
Most of Seong Jiyeong’s safehouses were on building rooftops. She’d furnished them like offices and left them vacant. They were camouflaged so that even if someone wandered in, they wouldn’t be able to guess the purpose. The reason she could build these safehouses so freely was simple: she owned the buildings.
“You have one of these safehouses in every district?”
“Yes.”
“And every building that has a safehouse is yours.”
“That’s what I said.”
This damn golden spoon. Just how many buildings does she own? Forget being an idol—at this rate, just sticking next to Seong Jiyeong would mean I’d never have to worry about making a living. Maybe I should just get a job with her instead…
“Ta-da!”
“Maintenance complete.”
While I was momentarily dazed by Seong Jiyeong’s wealth, Yu Hana and Ji Seoeun—who would be experiencing their first real battle today—had put on their work uniforms. They were also wearing masks with rabbit ears, just like the rest of us.
“…What the hell are you? A tin-can robot?”
“I’m Dr. Um.”
“…And what is that supposed to mean?”
Ji Seoeun had put on some bizarre tin can I’d never seen before. From what she explained, it was a character called “Dr. Um” from a famous sentai show. Apparently the character was a scientist. She must have worn it to stay true to her character concept, but her aesthetic sense was truly something else. No wonder the Special Task Force guys all had headaches whenever Professor G’s equipment came up. Still, since her whole body was covered in steel, it was probably safer than most equipment. Safety came first on a first real battle, so I’d just overlook the terrible design.
“But you… hmm.”
“Ta-da. Pretty, right? I’m Operator Asuka~”
On the other hand, Yu Hana’s mask was an incredibly beautiful female character. Her outfit was a mysteriously revealing sexy office look. It was apparently the operator character from a famous mecha anime in this world. The show was known for its pretty animation and lots of fanservice that made it popular with young boys. Among its characters, “Asuka” was the one that had been drawn the best. Since she’d modeled the mask after that, of course it came out pretty.
Well, that made sense. As long as the creator of the equipment wasn’t Ji Seoeun. The design was clearly not Ji Seoeun’s taste, so I couldn’t help but be suspicious. Don’t tell me Yu Hana had threatened her or something? When I looked at Ji Seoeun, she avoided my eyes again. Avoiding my gaze when they have something to feel guilty about is basically our team’s national rule. So there was definitely something shady behind Yu Hana getting assigned such a cool mask.
That squinty-eyed villain… Anyway, even though we all had rabbit ears, there was a massive gap between my Rabbit Vader and that Asuka. If I was going to wear one, it was only natural that I’d want something decent too.
“Since we’ve come this far, I think it’d be nice if I could switch to something else.”
“That is absolutely not allowed. Rabbit Vader is my soul.”
“…What do you mean, your soul?”
“I would rather die.”
“…Sigh.”
I’d tried subtly appealing to Ji Seoeun, but it was hopeless. She even declared that since her soul was contained in Rabbit Vader, she would rather throw away her life than give it up. There was no answer.
“It actually suits you quite well.”
“Na Yeri’s definitely has a different aura.”
Even the others chimed in with supporting fire, saying Rabbit Vader suited me. How on earth did these people’s brains work? Were they actually sane?
While I was busy doubting the members’ aesthetic senses, the time to move out crept closer and closer.