Chapter 73
Chapter 73
I didn't know the legal details, but I could say this with certainty.
This was... a bad call.
Why?
Because among the companies suspected of collusion, two had notoriously terrible rumors swirling around them.
One was rumored to have a CEO with gang ties, and the other was supposedly bankrolled by a cult. A truly insane lineup.
Even if by some miracle those were just rumors, stepping forward as an accuser against six companies wasn't something an individual, now stripped of any agency protection, could handle.
"Don't do it."
"Okay, I won't."
Ahn Jiwon shook his hands out like he was literally dusting them off, as if to say he really meant it.
Then he spun around and leaned his back against the railing.
"I called Lee Jaeyoung right after I posted on Inheart today."
Ahn Jiwon brought up his own actions that had sent the internet into a frenzy just a few hours ago, speaking in a voice oddly peaceful, as if it didn't suit him at all.
"I told him I'd broken the ice, so he should come clean too... but he said he wasn't planning on saying anything. After that, I talked to Kim Hanul, and Choi Junbin, and Seho... they all said the same thing."
No, actually, he sounded a bit more rambling than before.
Maybe he realized it himself, because Ahn Jiwon let out a long, irritated sigh and shut his mouth.
I just waited in silence.
The wait wasn't long, anyway.
"......I was sorry. Toward you, hyung. Because of me, your freestyle dance got completely edited out of the show. And besides that, just... all kinds of things kept popping into my head and suddenly I was just so damn pissed. And now people are saying you're the same as me. So in the heat of the moment, I just figured, let's all go down together, and I found the reporter's number who wrote my article and called him. I was on my way to spill everything......."
But the words that tumbled out were still raw and unorganized.
Fortunately, Ahn Jiwon went quiet after that last sentence, so there was enough time to sort through it all.
'So, in other words.......'
The intent behind his confession had been... let's come forward first, because there's a trainee unfairly being branded as a pre-selected member.
That seemed pretty far removed from his earlier claim about 'wanting to get less hate.'
"Well... so this was where you were heading."
"Yeah. But when I actually saw you, hyung, I figured you'd handle things fine on your own."
"Handle what?"
"Anything. But now that I'm saying it out loud, I realize I just chickened out and couldn't go through with it. I'm sorry. ......For this whole situation."
'......Hm.'
Even if Ahn Jiwon hadn't taken part, some other pre-selected trainee would have filled that spot anyway. From the moment the higher-ups decided on it, this was already set in motion.
That didn't mean his apology was pointless, though.
It just meant the other party was the one in the wrong.
Maybe for another trainee, but for me, who knew everything from the start and came here to exploit it... receiving an apology felt like deception.
'Still, this is an apology given to me.'
So I just said what I felt.
"It's fine."
"......."
"Really. Like you said, I'll handle myself just fine."
Ahn Jiwon stared straight at me.
It was strange. We'd just had what felt like a soul-baring heart-to-heart.......
But as he kept fixing me with that gaze of his, still utterly unreadable, I felt a strange sense of déjà vu.
"Hyung."
"Yeah."
After a long pause, Ahn Jiwon called my name.
Then he said something completely out of the blue.
"Can I have your number?"
"My number?"
"Yeah."
"......Ah, sure."
I almost reflexively asked why, but I pulled out my phone without another word. Because I instinctively knew there was no ulterior motive behind this request.
He wasn't the type to go around selling other people's information.
Ahn Jiwon's name was added to my contacts, which hadn't registered anyone new since Hyun-i hyung and the <Nice Zombie> team.
'Is this number what I got from this hint?'
I had no idea if we'd ever be in touch again.
It was a reward that would likely have zero impact on my life aside from one extra line of digits.......
Still, I thought, it wasn't bad.
* * *
The internet was in chaos.
―God, please blow up the school, not Mebaek
―Yeah it's fine if it fails~ We'll just go back to our home base~
└Mebaek became my home base, fuck
└Honestly same...
―I heard there was a funeral, do you guys have any hangover soup?
└You're a Wonseokit fan aren't you, you motherfucker
└Huh? Why are you suddenly pulling Oiler's hairㅠㅠ
└Nobody but you guys flaunts this hard
―Our kids are having a comeback soon~~ lots of love and views plz
└Get lost
Since <MAKE100%> had been QTen's flagship program, the hopes of fans who had believed they would somehow salvage it were completely shattered.
It had been a fragile hope that could have shattered at any time, but like a game of Jenga where whoever topples the block tower takes all the blame, people's resentment was aimed squarely at Ahn Jiwon.
―What's the point of revealing it now?? He already got all the popularity lol He got every benefit possible and now he wants to slip out alone? So petty
―Even if the other kids confess now, they're just gonna get accused of doing it because Ahn Jiwon forced their hand ah this is so selfish
―The Ahn Jiwon fans running defense right now are funny too. If Ahn Jiwon had gotten no screen time on the show and been treated like a total nobody like the others, you guys wouldn't have liked him either... ugh
Ahn Jiwon's fans lamented that if he was going to get cursed out either way, he would have been better off staying quiet.
But his exposé wasn't meaningless.
For other trainees who had considered silence the 'obvious' response, a new courage bloomed — the feeling that maybe, just maybe, speaking out was okay.
[Hey, I'm a trainee who was on Mebaek this season]
All of us trainees know perfectly well who the pre-selected ones are, but Chaegyeom is absolutely not one of them..
Chaegyeom and those guys were not on good terms. They'd openly badmouth him and stuff.
Hyung was seriously so kind and helped out a lot of the other trainees.
Comments
―If you're a trainee, go practice
└Yes sir
―Proof?
└Sorry
―OP, even if it wasn't rigged, you probably would have gotten eliminated anyway!!
└Yeahㅜㅜ
―Are all the comments from pre-selected stans? Don't be hurt, I'm rooting for you
└Thank youㅜㅜ
―The 'hyung' at the end, I can't tell if that's a high-level bait or a mistake;;
Compared to Ahn Jiwon's boldness in revealing his identity and making the exposé under his own name, anonymity was nothing.
The anonymous post that first broke the ice was instantly buried under public apathy and distrust, swept away in a flash.
But the trainees knew that post was real.
And originally... among aspiring celebrities, there were plenty of attention seekers.
[I was a trainee too, and the whole thing was just a staged rigged mess]
That whole group was being completely blatant and talking about it openly. They didn't say it was rigged, but more like, you guys aren't gonna debut anyway, that kind of thing?
Especially Seo Cha-gyeom, anyone could see he was debut-ready, but they kept running their mouths that he wouldn't debut, that's when I caught on lol
And Armstrong lolol
Chaegyeom wrote all the lyrics for that song except the rap, and it all got cut from the broadcast lolol
What's even funnier is, parts of the rap were written by Chaegyeom too
Remember on the show, how someone was whining and crying that it was hard, then suddenly whipped out the lyrics? Weren't you all surprised?
Wonder why that is ^^
Anything beyond that is... [muffled]
Comments
―???
―Are you talking about Kim Hanul?
―Is this real?
―The way they talk is so fucking cringey, total loser speak
―But you're totally doxxing yourself right now
[Post deleted]
[What was that deleted post]
Is it real? lololol
Comments
―Fuck, Woojin
―No, my pick was a guy this moronic?
―Wait, so doesn't that mean the whole thing is real too??
―Kim Hanul is exposed for sure lol. His fans were doing mental gymnastics, saying he was just getting hate and his core fandom was uniting. It's so pathetic I can't even curse at them.
[Whoa, so does that mean Seo Cha-gyeom wrote all the Strong Boy lyrics??]
Kim Hanul's a landmine, but even so, I admitted Strong Boy was good
What?? Give me back my approval
Comments
―I also thought Kim Hanul's rap wasn't bad and his lyrics were well-written, so I was pushing him for a rapper slot.. But this is just
―Fucking hell, the more I dig, the more shit keeps coming out about this bastard
―What kind of rapper can't even write his own lyrics, fuck, I'm embarrassed I ever liked him
[I heard Chaegyeom wrote Strong Boy so I watched it again]
Even if everyone tries to shake me
Even if everything is a lie
Even if there's not a single star shining there
Doesn't this sound like he's talking about the Apollo 11 conspiracy theory?
1 The flag waving
2 The conspiracy theory itself
3 No stars visible in the photos
These are exactly the arguments conspiracy theorists use to claim the moon landing was faked
Comments
―Holy shit
―Whoa
―Did Gyeomie write this part too???...
―Oh you fucking bastard lololol. Production team... seriously, how could you... this stage... are you so obsessed with evil editing that you gave people no time to even re-read the lyrics...
[Now that it's confirmed Seo Cha-gyeom isn't a pre-selected member, I'm gonna say this]
The show just made his character so fucking weird
During the grade evaluation, he couldn't show any ambition and was too timid to even speak, then suddenly during Armstrong he was like "You can't do it? What about it? lol I'm good lol" showing crazy ambition
It was so obvious they were twisting the evil editing however they felt like day by day
Like this, Seo Cha-gyeom was the first to be cleared from the suspect list.
Moreover, as his contributions — which the production team had tried so hard to hide — were revealed one after another, people were universally appalled by the gap between the broadcast and reality.
Realizing that the pre-selected members hadn't just received favoritism but had actively harmed others, people blazed even hotter with a sense of mission to expose them.
However, many still remained ambiguous to judge.
[Trainees who are 100% not pre-selected, out of the 12]
Seo Cha-gyeom—Jo Woojin (Woojin, I won't forget you) confirmed
Jeong Hyeon-i—Completely edited out after early evil editing
Baek Gyeonwoo—No comment needed
Comments
―Wait, but Baek Gyeonwoo got that benefit at the very end too
└Do you have no conscience? Look at his screen time
└What use is a benefit to someone who's already at the top anyway
[What about Choi Junbin?]
What do you guys think
Comments
―Obviously
―lolol Just looking at how they forced that fake rivalry with Seo Cha-gyeom
―That guy has literally zero substance
―But Choi Junbin didn't have that much screen time...ㅜㅜ He only showed up during grade evaluations, round 1, and round 3. Even round 1 was just a Kim Hanul push...
└That's a lot of screen time.
[Honestly I'm not sure]
Lee Jaeyoung was always good
Song Seho was always ranked high, and his beret photo was famous
Comments
―If you look at Lee Jaeyoung's ranking fluctuation graph, he's 100% exposed too
└Maybe he just climbed naturally because he's good...
―I'm telling you they don't give screen time just for being good lol. By that logic, why did they only give Seo Cha-gyeom that kind of shit?
└God, Seo Cha-gyeom fans are acting so fucking wild
└I'm... not even a Chaegyeom fan???
―Ahn Jiwon and Kim Hanul are the only confirmed ones for now. Let's wait for the rest.
And it was around then that the article dropped.
<Police launch investigation into 'MAKE100%' rigging allegations>
It was an article stating that the police had finally launched a full-scale investigation.
―How long does it take for investigation results to come out?
└Idk
└Don't comment if you don't know
―It'll probably come out when we've almost forgotten about it, don't get your hopes up
―I really don't know man... they're going at them like they want to kill them even now, if the list gets revealed, isn't someone gonna actually die...
└Is now really the time to be getting emotional? The victims are more pitiful lol
└That's not what they're saying, stop making it a competition over who's more pitiful.
―But then, is there no chance the show resumes after the investigation wraps up?? Since round 3 was the one that was rigged, can't they just restart from round 3?
└So the kids should just sit around twiddling their thumbs until then?
└Honestly, I wish that could happen tooㅠㅠ It's a hundred, a thousand times better than debuting from some shitty no-name agency
Once the police got involved, some of the people who had been enjoying the incident as entertainment sensed the gravity and backed off.
Those who had been at the forefront of uncovering the truth also calmed down, figuring that since an investigation had started, the results would come out eventually anyway.
In this situation, each agency swiftly issued official statements.
<Youth Entertainment states position amid rigging controversy: "Protecting trainees is our top priority">
<Glantanic, Gaptown, DDD, reviewing possibility of 3-company project group>
This was effectively a declaration that they had nothing to hide.
Naturally, Sorasum also released an article.
<Acquiring independent trainee Han Neuti? Sorasum's future moves...>
And then, at the exact moment when the final live broadcast should have been starting.
[Notice to all K-Specialists]
<MAKE100%> came to a complete and total end.