Chapter 39
Chapter 39
Well, it might sound a bit obnoxious, but....
I honestly couldn't see myself being eliminated under these circumstances.
Of course, there were always people who never let their guard down. Some might even be expecting a last-minute twist.
But there was a nuance difference, wasn't there? In Jae-hyun's story, Lee Jae-young had this odd, thick air of certainty about him.
As if he really did know something.
"I'm sorry."
"Uh, what? For what?"
"I tried not to say anything so I wouldn't bother you, but I was worried you might get hurt...."
"Hurt? Oh, hurt."
His naive words nearly made me short-circuit for a second.
'You think I'd be hurt?'
I'd just been shocked.
Anyway, once Jae-hyun confirmed yet again that I wasn't that soft-hearted, he immediately spilled everything in a rush, like an alarm clock that had hit its limit.
A simple summary of the jumbled mess of stories went like this.
During the First Ranking Evaluation, Lee Jae-young had been placed in Tier 3, which had the most trainees, and he smoothly started building a clique.
After that, he used the Rank Adjustment Mission—where Tier 3 experienced major fluctuations—to balloon his faction in a pyramid-like fashion.
As a result, by the time of the Production Presentation, his faction was already fully formed.
'No wonder the atmosphere seemed off.'
That alone was ridiculous enough, but what was even more ridiculous was the reason he could play king of the alley here.
The guy had been bragging that his agency had ties to the show's higher-ups, and he'd been leaking information piece by piece.
So, putting all this together, basically.
'While I was racking my brains playing detective, the pre-selected member was running around behind us passing out flyers?'
"Good grief...."
"Hyung, I, if it did end up hurting you...."
"No. I just feel like I'm the only idiot here, that's all."
I said that, but honestly, it was only natural that I didn't know.
Because to join Lee Jae-young's gang, you had to pass through three different filters.
The first ones filtered out were trainees from agencies ranked equal to or higher than Lee Jae-young's.
Next were the ones who didn't particularly stand out—to use slang, the dregs who'd end up as dead weight.
And the final ones to be filtered out were... the Seo Cha-gyeom faction, or so they called it.
Let's not misunderstand—some ridiculous term like 'Seo Cha-gyeom faction' wasn't something I made up; I was just quoting Jae-hyun's story.
Unlike the other Grays who didn't even know factions existed, Jae-hyun had apparently been getting love calls from Lee Jae-young since before the Production Presentation. (He said he didn't know why, but it was probably because of his face.)
Jae-hyun had been vaguely aware they were badmouthing me, and when he remembered I'd ended up rooming with Lee Jae-young, he got a bit worried and came to check on me—and that was how he got dragged into all this.
"The second I saw them bring out the alcohol, I tried to leave, but then suddenly they started talking about you, hyung...."
In the barely one hour I'd been asleep, all sorts of things had happened.
"The stuff they were saying, too—like back when you were at Mary, you used to treat the other trainees...."
"That I went around ranking people?"
"Discriminate— oh, yes. Right, r-right—."
"That I'd ignore anyone with low monthly evaluation grades who tried to talk to me. That I discriminated against people and looked down on them. That the company jumped dead if I so much as breathed. Stuff like that?"
"Yes, yes, yes! ...But I don't believe it anymore!"
'You came pretty close to believing it, though.'
Well, it was all stuff I'd heard back at Mary a million times, so it didn't feel new at all.
It was true that I'd had limited interaction with anyone not in the debut class, so depending on your perspective, some of it could even be fair.
But whether the rumors were true or not didn't matter now.
'I do like how easy they make things to understand.'
What I'd learned from experiencing things firsthand was that rumors always have the ulterior motives of the person spreading them baked in.
This time was no different. It was so transparent, in fact, that I'd even begun to vaguely guess why Lee Jae-young had picked me for this mission.
'He wanted to try ignoring me.'
"I'm sorry. When you were sleeping, that part—I couldn't stop them...."
"You didn't need to go that far."
I felt like a path had cleared in my previously stuffy head.
Now that I'd grasped Lee Jae-young's true intentions, I was starting to get a feel for exactly how to handle his little gang. Almost as if I'd seen a hint.
So, first things first, I had to say this.
"Jae-hyun."
"Yeah?"
"I'm sorry for misunderstanding you. I jumped to conclusions."
"I did take a sip, though. I swear, hyung, it was because of you...."
Jae-hyun seemed to be the type to say things he really didn't need to say.
My eyebrow must have gone up without me realizing it. I gave Jae-hyun, whose expression had quickly crumpled, a pat on the shoulder.
"Thank you."
"......."
"......."
Well, standing here and locking eyes for a long stretch with a guy who'd been drinking underage but still had those innocently clear eyes....
It was incredibly awkward.
'Right. We were never really that close, were we.'
With the sudden awkwardness feeling fresh, I sheepishly rubbed the back of my head. Then I realized my hair was all mussed up at the back.
I'd had quite the eventful time the moment I'd opened my eyes.
"Go to bed. We filmed for a long time today."
I was about to just leave when Jae-hyun's hand tugged at my clothes.
"Hyung."
"Hm?"
"Uh, you can sleep in my bed tonight. I'm going to the practice room with the others, so...."
"The others?"
"Gyu-min, Seongjun, and Yu-ma."
It seemed the Grays gathered to practice even when their teams were split up.
Separate from how commendable that was, a practical thought filled my head first.
'Who are Jae-hyun's roommates?'
......Ah.
* * *
"But, uh, your two roommates, they're a little...."
"Baek Gyeonwoo and Neuti hyung? What about them?"
[Thud!]
"......!"
A violent sound from beyond the wall sliced through our conversation.
I hurriedly threw the door open and shouted.
"Hyung! Don't do it!"
No matter where you went, it was the same familiar room layout.
Inside, Han Neuti was....
Collapsed on the floor.
"Oh. Seo Cha-gyeom."
Baek Gyeonwoo was frozen with his arm still raised.
"......Did you hit him?"
"What are you talking about."
Baek Gyeonwoo prodded the legs splayed limply on the floor with his foot.
Han Neuti, who'd been lying there shaking like a corpse, clutched his forehead a moment later and scrambled to his feet.
"Wow, your hand is fucking heavy. I feel like my IQ just dropped... ow!"
"What are you doing?"
"Hey, no! Wait! Don't misunderstand. We were just playing around!"
Why was he even trying to justify it?
Anyway, I quietly listened.
Baek Gyeonwoo and Han Neuti, the two of them, had been using rock-paper-scissors to decide on clashing parts during their mission meeting, they said.
Then the atmosphere heated up, and they changed the event to a forehead flick bet....
Mid-explanation, Han Neuti realized he'd just been messing around and awkwardly clammed up.
Breaking the silence, Jae-hyun tossed out a goodbye.
"I'm off to practice, then...."
"Ah, okay. Take care of your condition."
I closed the door after seeing Jae-hyun off.
As I naturally stepped into the room, two pairs of eyes tracked me like magnets.
"So why are you here? Because of me?"
"Jae-hyun said I could borrow his bed, so I came."
"What about your bed?"
"A drinking party broke out."
"Huh?"
"Ah."
Unlike Han Neuti, who seemed to be pondering what figure of speech that was, Baek Gyeonwoo nodded calmly and then opened his mouth.
"Kim Han-ul, that bastard, is in th—."
"Hey, hey, no swearing!"
Han Neuti urgently cut in.
"You'll get in trouble if you swear in front of Cha-gyeom!"
That was his reason?
"......Kim Han-ul, him."
Baek Gyeonwoo, who'd glanced at Han Neuti out of the corner of his eye and corrected his words, shut his mouth again.
'Come to think of it, he was on the same team as Kim Han-ul during the first round.'
Baek Gyeonwoo, who'd been grimacing as if in agony, stayed silent for a moment before blowing his bangs up with a puff of air.
Then, clenching his molars, he barely managed to finish his sentence.
"He insisted on sticking his girlfriend's signal into the ending and threw off our whole team's vibe.... Ugh, how do I say this without swearing?"
"Did he end up putting it in?"
"I told him I'd kill him if he did, so he didn't."
"For real?"
"I didn't go as far as saying I'd kill him."
Baek Gyeonwoo massaged his neck, then cracked it sharply to the left.
"You have to go at least that far for them to listen."
What did he do?
Han Neuti had become oddly subdued, so I took a seat next to him. It reminded me of something, since the first team mission topic had come up.
"Hey, I'm curious about something."
"What."
"Do you like Americano?"
"Why are you suddenly curious about that."
"......Just because? I'm curious about your tastes."
"Wow, he did this to me too. This guy's a repeat offender."
I'd just ignore Han Neuti's interjections.
I'd suddenly become a guy going around investigating other people's tastes, but thanks to that, I seemed to have dodged suspicion. A perfectly normal answer came back.
"The company won't let me drink anything with sugar. And I just don't feel like drinking tea. I don't particularly like it."
"Oh, yeah?"
"Yeah. It wasn't something I pre-arranged with someone else."
"Huh, what?"
"The first team selection. That's what you were asking about, isn't it?"
I couldn't grasp his meaning right away and just stood there blinking, so Baek Gyeonwoo gave a casual shrug with an ordinary expression.
"I found out because I share a room with them."
......So literally everyone knew except us?
"I thought you two had known beforehand and coordinated it too. That cucumber guy."
"......."
"......."
"Never mind."
Baek Gyeonwoo, muttering something about him having unique tastes, said he was going to get water and stepped out into the hallway.
Technically, I was the one who'd thrown the first punch here, but I felt a little wronged.
How could I suspect Han Neuti? This hyung had essentially been an outcast way back in Tier 3, the very place that had been Lee Jae-young's stronghold.
"Hey."
"Huh?"
Han Neuti, who'd been staring in the direction Baek Gyeonwoo had disappeared, turned his head toward me.
I was reminded again, but his face really was intimidating.
If I were someone who didn't know him well, I would've cycled through dozens of thoughts just from that expression, wondering what I'd done wrong.
"What were you two talking about? I didn't even understand the Americano part."
Of course, since I was in the know, I'd expected him to react like this.
I briefly laid out the inside story for him, along with the faction playground politics happening among the trainees.
As the story went on, Han Neuti's brow furrowed more and more menacingly, until by the end he bolted upright from his spot.
"No, if that's seriously true, then isn't that just, you know, that thing! Is that even allowed?"
He expressed his shock, then immediately clamped a hand over his mouth and looked around to check if the cameras were on or off.
Obviously, they were off, but even if they'd been on, with that kind of vocabulary, I doubted anything would come of it anyway.
I didn't bother to agree outright; I just silently looked up at Han Neuti. Then, I put on a reliable little smile.
This atmosphere right now, it was perfect.
"What are you worrying about."
Perfect for placating him.
"If we can't debut here, we can just debut somewhere else."
"Hey, it's not that easy. And in that case... Ah, whatever. Yeah. I do still have that business card I snagged, so."
"......Didn't you lose that business card?"
"You took it."
"So you knew."
"Who wouldn't notice when you swiped it right in the open?"
He hadn't said anything, so I'd thought I'd gotten away with it.
But, alright, if he hadn't noticed me taking it straight from his back pocket, that would've been worrying in itself.
I sheepishly averted my eyes, then met his gaze again.
I had no intention of giving it back anyway, so I might as well be even more shameless about it.
"That place is basically a start-up as far as idols go. If you're going to go to a start-up anyway, isn't it better to go somewhere you know someone?"
"Just where are you talking about...."
"My company."
Technically, that label Licks Hour had introduced had been acquired by Indeowol, one of the Big 4 agencies, and had a bright future ahead of it, but I didn't need to let him know that.
......I was even selling my conscience now. Nice going, Seo Cha-gyeom.
"Your company?"
"Yeah."
Han Neuti blinked vacantly.
Based on everything I'd observed so far, that expression was a signal that he was at least taking my words seriously.
'Why am I even nervous about this.'
From an objective standpoint, rejection was by far the more likely outcome, so I wasn't afraid of being turned down.
What worried me was the System.
What if it threw a fit and started beeping just because I got rejected once?
"But...."
After spending what felt like an eternity for nothing, Han Neuti finally spoke.