Chapter 105

“Do your best. You’ve got plenty of opportunities right now.”

Big Room gave Gowon’s shoulder the most senior-like pat he could manage and stepped away from the vending machine.

Truthfully, he hadn’t broken through that situation entirely on his own either.

Back then, it had been his members who turned his anxiety into certainty.

The moment the rap battle Gowon had mentioned aired, the members rose up from wherever they were.

The first social-media notification came from Cha Yensu, who at the time was still living like someone only half-employed.

(Photo)

youngace.cha

Fourth ♥

It was a photo of Big Room on the TV screen with a hand heart drawn in front of him.

Despite Cha Yensu’s delicate appearance, Yensu had never been the type to hold back when provoked, and the post directly mocked the opponent’s cypher for bringing up finger hearts.

Next came Kwon Taeyoung on MeVerse.

Leader Kwon

As of today, Big Room is the leader of Young Ace.

Artist reply 1

BIGROOM

Why are you doing this too?

Stop talking nonsense;;

Baek Hanje posted a long screenshot of his work-in-progress track list to his story.

@hanze.hanzel

Genius rapper Big Room, I’ve got tons of beats

If that’s not enough, I’ll make a hundred more

If you use just one during the competition I’ll consider it an honor until the day I die

Please

Then there was Kim Yeban, who also worked as an actor.

ARTIST Kim Yeban

ARTIST Kim Yeban

Our members, and Spades, who are always precious to me no matter when or where.

Watching today’s broadcast made me think back on all the time we’ve spent together.

You’ve always embraced me warmly despite all my shortcomings...

That was how the absurdly long Boggle message began.

Once the Young Ace members openly joined the fray, some fans started pressuring Yunjin.

What about Yunjin? Why is Yunjin the only one not doing anything?

That didn’t last long.

Big Room ended the controversy by posting a screenshot of his phone screen to Stargram.

Call History

Yunjin — 02:16:07

anbangisbigroom

This one was the biggest pain in the ass

Called me and cried for two hours straight

And just like that, the activities of the group’s most emotional, affection-filled member were completely exposed as well.

When Big Room had still been agonizing over whether to appear on the program, the members had worried through the decision with him.

But once he made up his mind, not a single member said anything negative.

They simply made one thing clear:

All of Young Ace supported Big Room’s challenge.

In truth, Big Room had continued worrying even afterward.

What if my lingering attachment to hip-hop ends up causing trouble for the members?

But the wave of support that followed one after another that day became the driving force that carried him all the way to victory.

That was probably why, even while maintaining separate activities in the hip-hop scene, a summons from Young Ace would always take priority—and why this place still felt like home.

Big Room opened the door to Baek Hanje’s workroom, the most familiar place to him in all of K-Dom, and returned to his members—

“What did Gowon say?!”

“?”

Their youngest member was someone Big Room was grateful for, but sometimes—no, frequently—found difficult to deal with.

“He didn’t say anything weird, did he?”

“What kind of weird thing?”

You’re the one acting weirder, glaring around like some ghost possessing Gowon.

“Like suddenly getting some stupid idea about wanting to date, or saying he likes someone?!”

“...Why are you doing this to a kid who’s working hard?”

From what Big Room could tell, Gowon wasn’t interested in dating, hip-hop, or any other distraction and was just focused on doing what he needed to do.

Guess getting suspected by your seniors is the fate of every junior.

Big Room reflected on the fact that he had also suspected Gowon for no reason.

“No...!”

But Baek Hanje had a reason for making this much of a scene!

***

Server Clock has been successfully applied.

One day after the Server Clock appeared, the quest window finally revealed the contents of Part 5.

The Senior Who Paves the Flower Road Part 5

Growth on the Outside, Growth Within

It sounded like something that could be slapped onto the cover of a self-help book and sold immediately.

Just as promised, Part 5 contained only one quest.

Even its explanation was the shortest of any quest so far.

Q5-1. Realize your own feelings and confess them

(0/1)

What?!

It hadn’t even been a few months since Hanje had threatened to kill him if he started dating.

A confession? A confeeession?

A first-year rookie who ought to be declaring his love to his fans a hundred times a day and still not doing enough!

And the condition about realizing his own feelings meant there was already someone he had feelings for!

That little bastard—sure, he’s at that age, but still...!

Hanje clutched his head over the absurd quest before suddenly snapping his eyes wide open.

Who the hell is it?! No, seriously, this kid only ever goes between home and the company. Where did he even meet somebody?!

“The ink from his first fan signing isn’t even dry yet, and he wants to daaaate? That little peanut, seriously...!”

Hanje poured out this crisis to Yunjin after the other two members left to greet company staff they hadn’t seen in a long time.

“Our youngest really has turned into a complete old man....”

“No, isn’t this weird? This damn quest wants Gowon to become the best idol possible, and it thinks giving him an assignment like this is okay?” 𝒻𝘳ℯℯ𝑤ℯ𝒷𝘯ℴ𝓋ℯ𝘭.𝑐ℴ𝑚

“Hmm....”

Yunjin watched Hanje flail for a while before speaking.

“Hanje, aren’t you assuming too much about what the junior’s Wish is because of your own case?”

“...What?”

“His Wish might not be to become the greatest idol. It could be something as simple as ‘I want to live well.’ Success as an idol might just be part of the process.”

Huh?

“.......”

Hanje had never once considered that perspective.

...That’s true. I don’t even know what Gowon’s Wish actually is....

He had only just managed to learn the first three characters of it recently.

Wish: The world ■■■■■ ■■.

The world’s... greatest singer.

Hanje had been the one mentally forcing something like that into the blanks.

Actually, Gowon was dragged into <Debut Chart! 100> while working part-time, and before that he had absolutely no interest in the entertainment industry....

If, just as Yunjin said, what Gowon desperately wanted was a broad Wish involving his life as a whole—

...then fulfilling a love might actually be something that brought him closer to that goal.

But since he had already chosen the path of an idol, couldn’t he fulfill that love after forty, when fans started saying, Won, could you please finally let us eat wedding noodles?

Shit. So that’s why there’s no time limit....

“Then I’m supposed to carry this quest window around while that kid gets old?!”

“I don’t think that’s what it means either, so try to calm down....”

Honestly, there was something Hanje found even more offensive than the sheer audacity of an idol dreaming about romance.

After Hanje had fed him, clothed him, and raised him with such devoted care—

He likes someone, and he didn’t even give me a heads-up?!

The look Gowon gave him, filled with admiration and wonder.

A gaze that naturally inflated a person’s ego and made the words Fine, your awesome senior will handle everything! come spilling out all on their own.

He would probably look at the person he liked with even greater longing.

No matter how I look at him, this feels like it would be his first love.

So who the hell was it?!

Ah, is this how people with younger siblings feel? Why does it feel so unfair, like someone’s stealing something that belongs to me?

...And at the same time, part of him couldn’t help wanting a kid who had lived such a difficult life to become a little happier.

“Why is this so hard?”

“What’s hard about it? You said at least you can actually see what you’re supposed to do. I didn’t even have a quest window or anything like that.”

“...What the hell was yours like?”

“I figured it out because if I didn’t periodically donate or volunteer, I started getting sick.”

Wait, this guy. Was that why he threw around so much money he became famous as the idol donation king?

And why he periodically disappeared off to remote places to volunteer?

“...Then are you okay now? You’re not going to have to leave somewhere far away again, are you?”

“I’m fine now. I earned credit for helping you correct the past.”

“Hm? But that wasn’t even a good deed. Why?”

“How do I explain this....”

Yunjin snapped his fingers.

“Like how... instead of picking up trash along a stream, volunteering directly at a major institution to help organize their paperwork would count for more?”

“.......”

Even for something out of science fiction, the reasoning was spectacularly cynical.

“...Just try disappearing on me again. I know everything now, so I’ll bargain with the quest window and tell it to give Yunjin back.”

“I told you, I’m not disappearing. From now on, I think I can manage by donating around half of what I earn through Young Ace.”

“...That’s still an insane amount.”

“I got my life in return. As long as I’m alive, what can’t I do?”

“.......”

No matter how much Hanje pressed him on that subject, Yunjin never gave any answer beyond that.

“Ugh. I thought it was great that I got a quest I could work on while waiting for the Rookie Award, but Part 5 is just as open-ended as ever.”

“Then start with what you can actually see.”

Hm?

“You said you have to hit a YouTube view count.”

“Ahhh, right... that.”

The combined Divisions Four and Five... in other words, Miracle Label, had been pouring so much effort into Newton and Gowon lately that Hanje had assumed the quest would solve itself if he simply sat back and waited.

But with the typhoon weather wiping out YouTube filming schedules left and right, it seemed about time he at least gave Gowon a heads-up.

“True. The sooner the video goes up, the more time it has to build views. I should tell him.”

“Hey, youngest. I think I saw a thumbnail earlier that would get great views and make the fans lose their minds.”

“Hm? What?”

Yunjin pointed toward the now-empty spot on the couch.

“K-Dom’s legendary center visual lineage: a senior and junior who look exactly alike.”

“...Oh....”

If Cha Yensu and Gowon appeared side by side and put their looks front and center, then yes.

It would create one hell of an image.

“But would Yensu really do something like that? People come waving piles of money asking Yensu to shoot commercials, and Yensu just keeps hammering away at things instead. The second the company asks for self-produced content, they’ll probably get blocked.”

“I think Yensu will do it.”

“No way. You know Yensu found everything in the world annoying even when Young Ace was active. And you think Yensu would step up for some junior they barely know?”

“Hmm... The way the members look at our youngest tends to be pretty similar. I’m sure Yensu will do it.”

Before Hanje could figure out what he meant, Yunjin relayed their conversation to Cha Yensu, who had returned to the workroom.

“Our Hanje’s new little brother? Sure. Want me to talk to Taeyoung?”

What? Seriously?

“Ha ha. That actually sounds fun....”

Cha Yensu smiled brightly.