Bloom from the Ashes
It happened about two years ago now. To improve the trainees’ singing skills, they had brought in a famous vocal trainer for a special lecture. But after listening to Yu Hana sing, the trainer poured out a scathing assessment, claiming that relying solely on her voice left her performance without any real depth. That was the first time. The smile vanished from Yu Hana’s face, and her dark pupils became sharply, unmistakably visible. The practice room froze over in an instant. Of course, she quickly returned to her usual smiling expression, but the scene that day had left a deep impression on CEO Cha as well. It was like seeing another side of Yu Hana, who usually seemed so mild-mannered and harmless. Because it had been so long ago, he had forgotten about it for a while. Yet recalling that moment made one thing perfectly clear: Yu Hana definitely had a villainous side hidden inside her.
The material Chief Cha had prepared was excessively detailed and persuasive. It meticulously broke down the differences between villains and phantoms, the degree of disparity in public perception, and exactly how to elevate the positive image of phantoms without triggering a backlash from those who supported them unconditionally. Even CEO Cha—who had been firmly against the villain concept—found himself nodding in agreement. Opposing it any further at this point would have been nothing but pure stubbornness. He had no choice but to accept the situation. The concept for Cha Entertainment’s next girl group would have to be villain. More precisely, phantom.
“Ha, fine. You win. If I still oppose it after seeing this, I wouldn’t be qualified to represent this company.”
With even CEO Cha, the final holdout, approving the villain concept, the debut team’s direction was officially locked in as villain + phantom. It was obvious to anyone that this was the optimal path.
Still, because villain + phantom was a concept no one had ever attempted before, they needed to approach it with extreme care. As the man responsible for Cha Entertainment, CEO Cha could not avoid bringing this up with Chief Cha.
“Crush-type concepts aren’t particularly rare, but for a villain, it has to be much harder and rougher than that. Naturally, it will need clear points of differentiation from existing crush concepts. The songs, the worldview—everything must be unique. That’s no easy task.”
“You’re right. I’ll be extremely cautious when selecting the tracks.”
“Good. Also, as the data indicates, it’s unclear whether the phantom supporters will become enemies or allies. Think about ways to pull them onto our side as well.”
“Understood. I’ll keep it in mind.”
Cha Wooseok had already worked as a manager for several years and even handled casting duties. CEO Cha planned to gradually entrust more of the company’s operations to him. He saw no better candidate for his successor. It wasn’t simply because Wooseok was his nephew—anyone could see that he was an outstanding employee. That was why he intended to trust him with this new girl group project as well.
“So, concept aside, have you settled on a group name?”
“If the concept is confirmed as villain + phantom… I was thinking of Ashy-Bloom.”
“Ashes and flowers. Or, more accurately, flowers blooming from the ashes. It’s definitely not bad. I can already imagine the kind of planning it will involve.”
CEO Cha muttered “Ashy-Bloom” to himself several times, then nodded and waved Chief Cha out of the office. He genuinely thought the name had a decent ring to it.
In front of him, the Blood Rabbit video Chief Cha had left playing continued to loop.
“Hmm… But something feels off. They said it was their first appearance, yet it looks strangely familiar.”
What caught CEO Cha’s eye most was Rabbit Vader standing at the center. The other members were impressive too, but something about Rabbit Vader—the center and leader—felt oddly intimate. What was it? He had never encountered villains or phantoms before in his life.
“It must be the sudden idol pose. I see idols every day in this job, after all.”
Thinking this was yet another occupational hazard, CEO Cha smiled wryly, stopped the video, and began checking reactions on internet communities. If their next girl group was going with a villain + phantom concept, the popularity of this bizarre group called Blood Rabbit would be closely tied to its success.
***
It had already been three days since they stopped the terror attack at the Seou Industries building. Yet Blood Rabbit remained a scorching hot topic. To be more precise, the entire internet was blazing as if it might burn to the ground at any moment.
First, Psyker Mad—which had exclusively covered Blood Rabbit’s activities—had doubled its subscribers overnight and grown into a megaton channel approaching ten million. These days, viewers from Japan and the United States visited regularly, steadily laying the foundation for it to become a truly global channel.
No, ten times the subscribers from just two videos? Is this even a functional country?
To be honest, both the first and second videos contained the kind of violent content that would be unthinkable to upload on YouTube in reality. But here, it wasn’t an issue. The only thing this world’s YouTube cared about was portrait rights violations, and in both videos neither the perpetrators nor the victims were in any position to file reports.
They were either villains, villainized, or phantoms—who the hell would report it? Besides, YouTube was an American company. The Korean Superhuman Agency had no power over it. If control had been established from the beginning, things might have been different, but at this point even the Agency would have a hard time taking action. It was an absurd situation all around.
Blood Rabbit and Rabbit Vader remained trending search terms on major portal sites even after three days. Phantoms had always been popular, but this time the heat felt especially vicious. Curious, I checked the communities and discovered the reason: the storytelling was on another level. The bloody duel between Black Yaksha and Rabbit Vader, followed by Golden Roll. The three of them wearing rabbit ears together and crushing villains apparently felt like watching a hero movie. Plus they were insanely strong. For superhumans, strength itself was cool. That was exactly why Black Yaksha had become a nationwide phantom in just a few days. And this wasn’t some scripted film—it was real life. When something more cinematic than a movie unfolded in reality, people had no choice but to lose their minds with excitement.
Of course, to me—who knew the full story—it all seemed ridiculous. But those Psyker Mad bastards were so good at selling the hype that there was nothing I could do about it.
“Wow, military field jacket. Sold out already?”
“Yeah. It was a clunky design with piles of unsold stock. At this point we should probably admit that Rabbit Vader has entered celebrity territory, right?”
“…It’s not exactly beneficial for us, though. It’s not like we can get sponsorships from it.”
“That’s the disappointing part. Well, can’t be helped.”
“Ha, life is truly… How do you become a phantom celebrity before you’ve even debuted?”
One interesting fact: among the members mobilized this time, I was the only one not wearing equipment manufactured by Ji Seoeun. I had been wearing the military field jacket Seong Jiyeong bought herself. It was from a fairly well-known brand, but according to her it had been a failed design with enormous inventory piled up. Yet after the video exploded, it flew off the shelves. Eventually every single piece of stock that had reached Korea was completely cleared out. Of course, because the design was so terrible they hadn’t produced many in the first place, but considering the price of those jackets, the sales volume was nothing to sneeze at.
Just what the hell is going on with the world? When I single-handedly took down countless fucking bastards and saved hundreds of lives, all I received was criticism for inadequate initial response. So I was simply bewildered.
“Ha, I really don’t know anymore.”
That wasn’t the only confusing thing. The achievement window that had suddenly begun asserting its presence was equally frustrating.
Role advancement and narrative expansion through achievement points. Because the system seemed structured to accumulate points inevitably through entertainment activities, my anxiety only grew. At this rate, if the points kept piling up, couldn’t it theoretically reach protagonist level? Of course it would require an absurd amount, but it wasn’t impossible in theory.
What genre would a novel even be if the protagonist was a villain, a phantom, and an idol?
The only reason I could still find some peace of mind was that this was supposed to be an entertainment idol novel. If the protagonist changed and the genre shifted, there was no telling what kind of insane developments awaited. The thought left me uneasy.
“Besides, what the hell is narrative expansion supposed to mean? Nothing seems different at all.”
When it said my narrative had expanded, I wondered if something would change. At the very least, I thought it might gradually fill in the incomplete memories of Na Yeri. That’s usually how it works in possession stories, right? The protagonist recovers fragments of memory each time something significant happens, expanding the story along the way.
But there was no recovery at all. Not even an ant’s eye worth of memory had returned. Even if Na Yeri’s memories were mostly useless, the fact that the narrative had supposedly expanded with zero visible change only made me more anxious. After all, something absurd could be happening somewhere I didn’t know about.
Honestly, if an incident had to occur, it would be far easier if it exploded around me or my immediate surroundings. If some lunatic like Dr. Oh was committing atrocities in a place I wasn’t aware of, I would genuinely lose my mind.
“You seem to have a lot on your mind. But please consider our schedule too. The filming is coming up soon.”
“That’s right. The filming.”
Good grief. For Seong Jiyeong of all people to be the one warning me to prepare for the shoot—my condition must really be obvious. Since there was nothing I could do about it right now anyway, I needed to focus on my immediate life first. After today’s filming there was a concept meeting with the planning team. I couldn’t afford to stay distracted like this.
I took a deep breath and pulled myself together once more.