Chapter 63
Chapter 63
[Juha: Hey GPT, tell me the temperature of the Han River water]
[Juha: Yes, master. The current Han River water temperature is minus 18 degrees, perfect for freezing to death]
[Juha: Unnie, I'll go now to meet Neuti]
[Me: Neuti didn't die...]
Early Saturday morning, after Episode 8 of <MAKE100%> had ended.
After receiving Homma's message, Woomjjalgye was deeply troubled.
'She'd seemed so happy when she came back right after the live audience recording.'
But even to Woomjjalgye, it was transparently obvious that the production team's intent in Episode 8, which had just aired, was to eliminate Han Neuti.
It made her think that the post that had once gone up—'Han Neuti grabbed Lee Wi-yeon by the collar so he has no screen time... deleted after 3 seconds...'—might have actually been true.
[Me: But still, Neuti didn't get that much hate, did he??]
[Juha: He's getting a ton of hate outside ㅠㅠ]
[Juha: Ugh, those fucking crazies, I can't take it, I'll cuss them out too]
The 'outside' here meant outside the timeline.
Since Woomjjalgye had only followed Seo Cha-gyeom's fans, she could only see their opinions on her timeline.
Because Seo Cha-gyeom and Han Neuti's fans had an unofficial alliance, Seo Cha-gyeom's fans were always unconditionally friendly toward Han Neuti.
And besides, wasn't this Kim Han-ul—the very person who'd had bad blood with Seo Cha-gyeom before? Anyone siding with Kim Han-ul... was likely a spy, so they should be blocked immediately.
'...Should I check out what it's like outside, too?'
Having made up her mind, Woomjjalgye turned off Wit and ventured out to observe public opinion beyond her carefully curated timeline.
[Today's group project PTSD trigger: Kim Han-ul vs Han Neuti]
(screenshot)
(screenshot)
(screenshot)
It's true that Kim Han-ul's tone was harsh, but in a situation where the same mistakes kept repeating, continuing to sugarcoat things would have wrecked the result even more.
And Han Neuti actually did nothing for the team.
Group project leaders who have been labeled nasty bastards just for being a bit firm with uncooperative members are collectively voicing their trauma right now...
Comments
―Ah, Han Neuti's tone... brings back memories of school days, I scrolled down, trauma surfacing, I can't watch ㅠ...
―Kim Han-ul wasn't the leader, she just put on the armband herself lol. While watching the show I was like, what's that, pretending to be a leader? And some people actually bought it.
―Neuti fans promoted him as King Timid Cat, and after today's episode they're fucking bewildered lololol. King Timid? lolol
―So this is why Han Neuti has no screen time heh heh~ It was all defamatory so it got cut??
―Actually, didn't Kim Han-ul give O Yun-hwan, who was following directions well, unnecessary crap, and Han Neuti stepped in on his behalf?
└Exactly, the school bully act was Kim Han-ul's doing, seriously.
―I pick O Yun-hwan, so I don't get why Neuti is getting cursed at... It felt like Kim Han-ul was looking down on him because our guy barely made the lower ranks.
―Kim Han-ul fans are trying hard, I saw they posted this on male-dominated sites too.
―Whatever it is, Han Neuti's tone really breaks the immersion... If he's like that in front of the camera, what's he like behind the scenes?
"Hmm......."
Woomjjalgye, who had been reading the last comment, frowned.
'Yeah. If he's like this in front of the camera, behind the scenes....'
"Gasp! I mustn't be swayed!"
Woomjjalgye slapped both cheeks with her palms.
'This isn't right. Juha uploaded Cha-gyeom's preview too!'
Before judging who was more at fault, Woomjjalgye remembered her precious friend first.
To be precise, the preview of Seo Cha-gyeom that her precious friend had uploaded.
The preview Homma had posted received overwhelming attention and spread across all sorts of sites, and thanks to that, mentions of Seo Cha-gyeom and Baek Gyeonwoo had recently reached a level that could be called a syndrome.
Naturally, the Cha-Ti-Baek trio became even more solid. Even Han Neuti, who hadn't been on the same team, was able to be grouped together because his fan had posted a preview.
Though right now, some trollish instigators seemed to be stirring things up to drive a wedge between Baek Gyeonwoo and Seo Cha-gyeom.
And among those trollish instigators, actual Baek Gyeonwoo fans were definitely mixed in!
But at the very least, it could be asserted that Seo Cha-gyeom fans were not part of it.
The reason was as follows.
The current Concrete Line, meaning the trainees who were 'guaranteed to debut with Seo Cha-gyeom,' were Lee Jae-young, An Jiwon, and Choi Jun-bin.
Choi Jun-bin.
Needless to say. Due to the production team's forced rival framing, Seo Cha-gyeom and Choi Jun-bin's fans were already infamous as being like cats and dogs.
Lee Jae-young.
They had been on good terms as the hard carries of , but after a story broke that during the recent 3rd competition, a Lee Jae-young fan had stabbed Seo Cha-gyeom's Homma and got her removed, the two fandoms' relationship had turned utterly hostile.
And An Jiwon.
He was on the better side, but some fans had the perception that 'they aren't that close, An Jiwon just clings to him one-sidedly.'
In a word, everything was the production team's mistake.
By cutting out all the relationships that Seo Cha-gyeom initiated, they had made fans hunger for this very curiosity.
'Just who is the trainee Cha-gyeom actually wants to debut with!'
And at that moment, Seo Cha-gyeom's fans, who had even found out that he knew about the 'Airplane-z' and personally created a killing part for Baek Gyeonwoo.......
―Seems like Cha-gyeom likes Gyeon-woo lololol, right??
└100%ㅠ His expression was different, his expression.
―I really want to make these two debut...
―Things I'll ask if they debut~~ 1 when was the first time they talked 2 behind the scenes of that MV scene 3 Lee Bom-da behind!!
They had utterly gotten the wrong idea.
On top of that, after watching an episode that for the first time ended warmly without any lingering worries, Seo Cha-gyeom's fans were currently, quite literally, in a bodhisattva state.
They could now laugh off anything said to them.
As Seo Cha-gyeom's fans responded this way, the anger of Baek Gyeonwoo's fans, which had been refracted, also returned to its proper target.
―From the start, if only the production team distributed screen time more evenly, wouldn't it be fine??? This is seriously a problem of the production team's lack of ability.
―Still, I'm satisfied because I now know that Airplane-z talked todayㅠ
―If it weren't for Gyeom, our Gyeon-woo couldn't have done Lee Bom-da;;; I think Gyeon-woo wanted to do a sexy concept, but then he would have definitely gone to Incomplete, and then this legendary 3 seconds wouldn't have come out.
Like this, just two hours after the broadcast ended.
In just two short hours, the rift between the two camps was neatly sutured.
"Now the problem is... Neuti."
Woomjjalgye hurriedly closed the window and turned on the video player.
Then she clicked on '<MAKE100%> Episode 8 recording,' scrolled the playback bar, and searched for Han Neuti's scenes.
It was to live up to her nickname, 'GIF fansite.'
"I need to repay the favor, repay."
Woomjjalgye painted the big picture.
A situation where Han Neuti was hanging on the cut-off rank, a hair-trigger crisis.
At that very moment, someone who saw the GIF she'd made would shout, 'There was a handsome guy like this?' and vote for Han Neuti.
And just like that, Neuti would narrowly survive!
'Alright!'
Steeling her resolve, Woomjjalgye dove into the Han Neuti survival project in earnest.
And then.
"......Huh?"
While skipping through scenes frame by frame, she brought her eyes close to the screen.
[Han Neuti: It's nothing much.......]
This was the currently most controversial interview scene of Han Neuti.
It was also a scene that Han Neuti's fans were deliberately ignoring because he was getting twice the hate because of this interview.
But Woomjjalgye, who had been about to mindlessly hit consecutive capture just because he was handsome, discovered something on Han Neuti's hand.
'Where have I seen this?'
It was common for Woomjjalgye to replay broadcasts frame by frame.
Moreover, because she often edited and zoomed in on photos, she would often remember detailed scenes that others easily missed.
And this marker stain on Han Neuti's hand—
"Ah, I remember!"
Woomjjalgye went into her file folder and clicked on Episode 3.
"This is it!"
Episode 3, the group meeting scene of the <Nice Zombie> team.
On Han Neuti's hand holding a water bottle was, as expected, the exact same marker stain.
While repeating and examining the interview a few more times to confirm if it was truly the same stain or if Han Neuti had a hobby of drawing dots on his hand, Woomjjalgye realized one more thing.
'Wait, this interview.......'
It wasn't 'It's nothing much'.......
But it sounded like 'It's nothing, though'?
The subtitle read 'nothing much,' so most people would trust it and move on, but once you noticed and listened again, it was clearly 'though' and not 'much.'
Woomjjalgye swallowed hard.
Taking all this together.
At the very least, this most heavily cursed interview scene was definitely evidence of devil's editing!
Woomjjalgye hurriedly opened Wit to spread this fact.
And there, she found.
[Han Neuti = Is it true he was the reason for the dogfight with Park Hyeong-tae?]
* * *
At the 3rd ranking announcement ceremony, with 23 trainees excluding Mun Jeong-jin, a huge number of changes truly occurred.
Really.
"The number of trainees who can advance to the final mission is just twelve."
At the MC's announcement, murmuring was heard from all around.
"What, so it's up to 12th place?"
"Aigoo, I'll be going home today. I packed a lot of stuff."
'......Why not 14th?'
Come to think of it, the production team had never announced anywhere that up to 14th place would survive at this ranking announcement.
However, because the survivor cut-off rank had been a fixed rule that never changed throughout past seasons, most trainees including me couldn't hide their bewilderment.
The cut-off of 14 had a reason to begin with. Since the debut group size was 7, the final had always been staged as 7 vs 7.
As if recognizing that this announcement was a bombshell, the production team displayed Han Neuti, who had been 12th at the last ranking ceremony, on the screen.
Han Neuti's expression... hmm.
He'd had that expression at every ranking ceremony, so I couldn't say he looked particularly more stiff this time.
After filming the trainees' reactions for a while, the MC picked up the microphone again.
"Also, we did not announce the on-site voting results from the last competition, did we?"
The MC continued his explanation.
"As a result of the 3rd on-site vote, the trainees ranked 1st, 2nd, and 3rd overall will receive benefits of 100,000, 70,000, and 30,000 votes, respectively, granted differentially."
It was quite a ground-breaking benefit, but the trainees who would receive those benefits would already be in the safe zone anyway.
Thus, the tension floating in the venue was faint.
Except, I was a little tense.
'Did they manipulate it... I wonder?'
If the production team had changed their mind and didn't touch the vote count.
And so the topic of manipulation never surfaced, and the fact that the debut team had been entirely pre-determined from the start was never revealed to the end.
Then.......
An image of me debuting together with Lee Jae-young formed in my head.
'Ah, that's horrible.'
But let's be at ease. If that happened, the System that loved Sorasum so dearly would kindly reset it.
At that moment, the MC announced the 3rd place trainee.
"Trainee Choi Jun-bin."
'Oh.......'
Choi Jun-bin, who had been the muse for this competition's bomb song <bone say>.
It was an unintended combination, and because the concept was the opposite of his usual image, many had worried about it.
But after the stage was revealed... surprisingly, assessments that it suited him well overturned the worries.
Personally, I speculated that the spell-like mechanical sounds of <bone say> had drawn out Choi Jun-bin's latent instincts.
"The 2nd place was taken by trainee Lee Jae-young. Congratulations."
Lee Jae-young.......
I see. Let's skip it.
"The 1st place trainee."
Was it because of the weight of the word '1st place'? The MC paused longer than during other announcements.
Soon, the MC opened his mouth.
"It is trainee Baek Gyeonwoo."