Chapter 71
Chapter 71
[Objective progress updated.]
[Objective: Recruit colleagues and debut. (3/N)]
'As expected, it only updates after signing the contract.'
Including me, that made four.
The time I used to imagine debuting as a duo with Kim Sanho... well, it didn't feel like just the other day. Just how many incidents had erupted in barely half a year?
Feeling a renewed sense of strangeness as I looked at the System, I lowered my head back down.
Where I was now was the dorm living room.
On either side sat Kim Sanho and Jeong Sowol, and in the middle of our triangular seating arrangement lay a single phone.
"......."
After a moment of all of us staring down at the phone, Jeong Sowol shuffled over on his knees.
Then, leaning close to my ear, he whispered almost like a breath of wind.
"How quiet do we gotta be?"
"......I turned off our audio."
"Ah, got scared for nothing."
This phone was connected to the President.
And the President had just gone to meet the production team with Han Neuti. To decide the program's future.
This was why I had rushed Han Neuti's contract.
No matter how small a company with single-digit employees was, it would still be harder to deal with than a rookie independent trainee fresh out in the world.
Perhaps Han Neuti also found it overwhelming to handle the situation alone, as he hastily completed the contract before facing the production team. It looked like external pressure, but it ultimately worked in my favor.
So, why were we surrounding the phone like some kind of ritual?
This went back to this morning.
―You're going to record today's conversation... right?
Before visiting the station, the President answered my question.
―Is it because you want to hear the conversation?
When I cautiously nodded, the President entered my number into his phone and showed it to me.
―I'll connect the call here, so listen through that.
―......Is that okay?
―Well.
And he added.
―Have they only done things that were okay?
It was exactly right.
Anyway, so it had come to be that we were eavesdropping in real time on the showdown between the production team and the President.
After a while, from the phone that had only been emitting rustling sounds, a human voice finally came through.
[First... let me begin with an apology.]
It was a familiar voice.
'It's the main writer.'
At the pre-meeting, that is, when I first joined the program, the very first official I saw was this person.
After a formal apology, he started making excuses, saying there had been a mistake in the tallying process.
'So it was never manipulation, huh.'
It seemed like they had no intention of scrapping the program just yet.
As expected, the following words made my guess even more certain.
[......So, if Trainee Han Neuti is okay with it, we can have him rejoin the program. And of course, we'll discard the current mission and start over from the beginning.......]
It was going as expected.
There was no need to worry about this.
Since it was such an obvious offer, we had naturally prepared a countermeasure the night before.
[We've already completed the contract to debut under our company, so having Neuti return to the program would be difficult in the current situation.]
[......What does Trainee Han Neuti want?]
[It's as the President said.]
With even Han Neuti taking a hard line, silence fell once again.
Not being able to see their expressions was suffocating. I couldn't read the atmosphere.
Left with no choice, I waited quietly, and only after a long while did a voice continue.
[Then is there something Trainee Han Neuti desires?]
'......Good.'
It was still going as expected.
Since this was also a question we had prepared in advance, the President opened his mouth without hesitation.
[The original data.]
[Pardon?]
[We would like you to release the raw vote data.]
The reason we were demanding the original data here was more for me than for Han Neuti.
If it really was only Han Neuti's data that was manipulated, they could have confidently claimed it was just a mistake.
But I was certain.
They had messed with all the rankings.
'Me, 5th place?'
If I had been in the blind rankings as usual, they wouldn't have been caught, but they got too greedy.
They were probably trying to keep Baek Gyeonwoo in check rather than me...
Though it took a slight detour, in the end it arrived exactly as planned.
[.......]
The writer sighed first.
[Trainee Han Neuti.]
It was the President who kept speaking, yet he deliberately addressed Han Neuti...
It looked like a tactic to pretend to respect the individual trainee's wishes, while pressuring the easier target to steer the situation advantageously.
[If this agreement falls through, the program will just end as is.]
[.......]
[Then the challenges of our trainee friends will end too, right? They're friends who worked hard to become idols and made it this far... they'll be very heartbroken. Including Trainee Seo Cha-gyeom.]
No, I wasn't heartbroken at all...
"Ugh."
At the sudden vivid voice, I turned my head to see Jeong Sowol clutching his head.
"So lame......."
Then he limply went into the room.
What was that? Some kind of allergy to lameness?
With Jeong Sowol knocked out and gone, the surviving Kim Sanho and I refocused on the call.
But the other side was still quiet.
It seemed... Han Neuti had uselessly felt something after hearing the writer's words.
But fortunately at this moment, Han Neuti was not alone.
[Writer-nim, if you truly want the program to resume, isn't it just a matter of releasing the data regardless of whether Trainee Han Neuti rejoins or not?]
[We can't just release the data that easily.]
[We're not asking lightly either.]
[......President.]
The writer's voice began to grow increasingly troubled.
'No wonder he's shocked.'
How fatal it was for an entertainment company to be on bad terms with a broadcasting station.
Moreover, QTen's presence in the idol industry was quite significant.
Not being able to appear on music shows... well, that could be substituted with other music shows, but the Neotube channels operated by QTen had overwhelming recognition overseas, making them hard to give up.
Even so, there was a reason our President could be so confident.
That was...
'Because he knows nothing.'
Our President was... a newborn puppy.
As they say, you're bravest when you know nothing.
[Trainee Han Neuti.]
This time, the voice that came was different from the writer's.
'The PD?'
Like someone playing a trump card, he resolutely called Han Neuti's name, took a deep breath, and spoke.
[Join the program. Join, and if you later debut from the company,]
Another long exhale was heard.
[We will actively support you.]
[.......]
[A debut reality show with at least 8 episodes, fully funded and scheduled by us.]
"......Wow."
'That's strong.'
As far as I knew, even a single episode of a reality show cost hundreds of millions of won including production and scheduling costs.
And all episodes would be uploaded to QTen's Neotube, which had subscriber numbers in the tens of millions...
'Definitely... an unconventional offer.'
There weren't many idols who could start off with a debut reality show from QTen.
A large company with subscribers comparable to QTen could make their own content, but our company hadn't even opened a channel yet.
Most trainees would probably accept the offer here.
But no.
'You can't avoid suspicion.'
If we accepted this offer, it would be no different from us having participated in the manipulation.
No, it's not a matter of conscience.
Let's say Han Neuti rejoins like this, and though it's uncomfortable, the program ends safely.
But a while later, QTen suddenly pushes a new company with no connections?
And Han Neuti is there?
Obviously, rumors will spread that there was some kind of deal. People these days aren't stupid enough not to deduce that much causality.
And there was another reason to refuse.
—Ah, I'm crying, my baby, if he goes back he's getting shelved for sure, you damn QTen are you gonna compensate for the damage ㅠㅠ
└they said they'd pay
└whoa
It was a comment I had seen in the hint.
'We'll get compensation anyway.'
Of course, the scale would be smaller than now.
I prayed inwardly for them to refuse and concentrated on the call.
[......That.]
The President began.
[That seems like compensation for our company, not for our trainee.]
......Huh?
[From the perspective of someone who's watched our kids' efforts all along, I cannot tolerate the results being muddied by just saying it was a mistake. There's only one thing I've wanted from the start. Please release the original data.]
[.......]
[I'll handle the trainees' debut myself.]
The refusal was good, but...
It was a reason I hadn't thought of at all, so I was a bit... dumbfounded.
'He'll handle it himself?'
What and how?
It would be a lie to say I didn't feel disbelief, but surprisingly, the presence of a different emotion was even stronger.
Something... well, it was embarrassing to feel moved.
Yet the emotion I was feeling now was so clear that I couldn't help but define it.
'......Yeah, I guess we can handle it.'
It was confidence. For no reason at all.
Due to the President's firm attitude, the peaceful negotiations ended in failure, and the long call that lasted over an hour came to a close.
And at the same time, a message came from Han Neuti.
[be right there]
[President is asking what you want to eat]
How peaceful, as if it were a whole other world.
"Is there something you want to eat?"
"No......."
Right, even if I had an appetite, it would've disappeared with that bloodshed.
I sent a message telling them to come, and then lay down.
"How do you think it will go?"
Kim Sanho asked, sitting with his knees hugged.
Instead of saying I didn't know, I shook my head weakly and closed my eyes.
......Actually, the situation wasn't going smoothly.
—Please wake up, Sorasum fans, if Mebaek goes down we won't see Airplane-z
—#Forever_AWAKE MAKE100% anti-early-termination total offensive hashtag, please participate ㅠㅠ
—Now I really treasure all 12 of them... if it ends like this, what are they supposed to do? The production crew who made the mistake are at fault, what sin did the kids commit
—They said it was a mistake. They said it was a mistake but the kids who keep chanting it's manipulation are seriously suspected of being elementary schoolers ㅋㅋ they probably love conspiracy theories?
—......After seeing Kim Han-ul at 6th and Seo Cha-gyeom at 5th, you can comfortably say only Han Neuti was a mistake? What amazing flowery delusion.....
└You bastards like you kept bashing us so our Han-ul fans only fan over him on priv. And now you say it's nonsense that Kim Han-ul is 6th when you can't even see his fans... aren't you ashamed??
└And the gaslighting is amazing, you spread fake text posts about Han Neuti everywhere first and now that public opinion flipped you're feeling wronged? ㅋㅋㅋ
When the program was truly on the verge of collapse, the 'pro-program continuation faction' that had been consistently ignoring everything came out in full force.
—Seo Cha-gyeom is 100% PD pick, they say he only got evil editing, but there are tons of guys who'd kill for that screen time, so shameless for real
—Cha-gyeom fans? Did you selectively memory-wipe the 3rd round where they got lavish editing to make your bias the main character and turned the rest into extras?
—They got screen time in the grade eval, re-eval, 1st, 2nd, 3rd rounds, and just because they're close with Han Neuti they're pretending to be a victim too, boohoo whining it's so pathetic I can't stand it
└Grade eval: got slammed for being comparative + having no fighting spirit
Re-eval: got beaten down for dropping in rank
1st: the whole team got it
2nd: got cussed the hell out
Except for the 1st and 3rd rounds it was all crap scenes, if you're so jealous take it all, damn it
—Wow f... anyone who went to the live audience would never say he's a PD pick, Seo Cha-gyeom's stage editing was severely malicious every time
└So you're saying they'd butcher a PD pick's stage like that?
On top of that, I was even being framed as a pre-selected member.
I hadn't worried at the end because I figured it would be either full screen time or devil's editing anyway, but my sin was not calculating Mun Jeongjin's withdrawal.
If I meet him later....... Ugh, forget it. I'll just say hello.
'The way to clear myself of suspicion.......'
Releasing the original data wasn't a 100% solution. If it were just a matter of changing survival to elimination, maybe, but I had consistently been in the debut range.
But neither did I want the list of pre-selected members to be revealed.
It wasn't particularly to protect them... it was a truly childish reason.
'I hate the production team more.'
If the pre-selected members were revealed, naturally the arrows would be less aimed at the production team.
So the pre-selected issue should stop at the level of speculation, and the production team that participated should take the full brunt.......
"Hyung!"
"What?"
Jeong Sowol flung the door open and burst out like a waterfall.
I tried to get up at the sight of Jeong Sowol rushing over, but he was incredibly fast.
Before I could even lift my head, a phone was thrust right in my face.
Wit was open.
—What's this? (pic)
That was exactly how I felt.
"What is it?"
"Click it."
I obediently clicked on the picture that looked like an Inheart capture.
And.......
"......What the."
This is Ahn Jiwon of Deuz Planning. Through my agency, I have continuously received preferential treatment on MAKE100%, allowing me to proceed with missions from a more advantageous position than other trainees, and despite fully recognizing this was a clear act of deception......