Chapter 41

After the dizzying verse from the young heir who had been enjoying the party with him, Baek Hanje pulled the atmosphere back together. Fortunately, Gowon regained his composure and made no further mistakes.

Then—

—Ah— Ah— Aaaah—!

At the end of the bridge, a high note burst from Baek Hanje’s microphone. The vibrato continued for a long moment. After letting the clear, powerful note ring out—

—Till the moon goes down.

He smiled at the cheering audience and began the final chorus. Their movements aligned perfectly with the altered choreography, bringing the performance to its conclusion.

As the camera closed in for the ending shot, Gowon smiled bashfully, while Baek Hanje touched his fingertips to his lips and sent them outward as though bringing the glamorous party to an end.

The man known as Baek Hanje seduced me first.

What is with their chemistry? The prim young heir and the smooth, experienced young heir... except the first one occasionally goes off the rails....

I feel like the experienced one took him out because he said, “You live too boring a life,” and then the first one got hooked.

I am genuinely looking for a novel with that exact title....

It had been a successful collaboration stage.

***

“This has been Baek Hanje, your special landlord for the one-thousandth episode of <Music Building>.”

“And Gowon. We’ll see you again, everyone.”

Their work as special hosts concluded with them waving at the camera. Gowon continued smiling even after the camera switched off, only relaxing his expression and breathing a sigh of relief once he had stepped down from the stage.

...It’s over.

Relief was immediately followed by regret.

The rap he had made a mistake during. The lines he had stumbled over while hosting.

The performance in particular had gone better during rehearsal. He had clearly remembered every part he needed to watch out for....

“You did well.”

His senior, Baek Hanje, gave him a light tap, laughed as though he understood exactly what Gowon was thinking, and walked ahead.

“.......”

The sight of his back felt profoundly unfamiliar.

Gowon knew Young Ace’s reputation. He was fully aware that Baek Hanje was an extraordinary senior artist.

But all those versions of him had existed behind a screen.

The Baek Hanje Gowon had actually seen was someone who propped his chin on one hand in the studio while drinking coffee like water, wandered around the apartment in comfortable clothes, or... rolled around in bed and ordered Gowon to turn off the light.

This had been the first time Gowon had personally witnessed Baek Hanje the idol onstage.

Everything had been perfect.

Baek Hanje did not step into the light onstage. The spotlight naturally followed him.

He shone so brightly that Gowon could not understand why someone like that had given him a song, invited him to live together, or helped him in so many different ways.

A distant star—no, the moon.

Floating impossibly high above, monopolizing everyone’s attention all by itself....

“Hanzel, it was an honor to meet you today!”

“C-could I please have your autograph?”

As they approached the waiting rooms, the singers who had shared the stage with them tried desperately to get close to Baek Hanje.

“Producers and staff are passing through here, so let’s do it later. Yes, thank you.”

Baek Hanje gently declined their requests and attempted to head toward his waiting room. But so many people had come offstage together that avoiding them completely was difficult. The local stage managers, unlike the Korean staff, were not even obligated to maintain professional boundaries around him.

“Sign, please.”

“Hanzel!”

“Oh, dear....”

As the crowd gathering to look at Baek Hanje of Young Ace grew, K-Dom’s managers left only the minimum number of staff with Gowon and converged around Hanje to protect him.

“Wow. Young Ace really is Young Ace, huh?”

Chief Manager Park shook his head beside Gowon.

“Jonghyeok, I’m going to the bathroom.”

“Uh... now? Well....”

“I’ll be fine on my own.”

Chief Manager Park looked around and spotted the bathroom sign directly behind them.

“You know where the waiting room is, right?”

“Yes.”

“Then don’t wander off. Come straight back, okay?”

In all the time Chief Manager Park had watched over Gowon, he had always been a quiet artist who never caused trouble.

He devoted himself so completely to practice that the company had to beg him to stop. They had not even specifically forbidden him from using social media, but he seemed so uninterested that he never looked at it.

Those accumulated experiences led Chief Manager Park to conclude that Gowon could safely be left alone for a moment.

More importantly, he now needed to join the people dealing with Baek Hanje, who was trapped by the crowd.

Gowon watched Chief Manager Park run off for a moment before heading toward the bathroom.

His hands, tense throughout the entire day, slipped beneath the stream of water flowing into the sink.

“Haah....”

His heart continued pounding. It was not the breathless adrenaline that followed a performance, but something... sticky and unpleasant.

Considering the life he had lived until now, standing onstage in another country should have felt like an entirely different world.

So why did he feel as though something was missing?

How presumptuous.

He had more than enough. He could say he had everything and still fail to describe how fortunate he was.

The feeling was something like....

If they let me do it just one more time... I could do so much better.

Yes. That thought kept returning.

“Haah....”

At the same time, he also thought that even then, he would never catch up to half the light Baek Hanje radiated.

It was not because Gowon had practiced too little. The gap came simply from the fact that Baek Hanje had hundreds of times more stage experience than he did.

A senior artist admired even by the singers who had shared the stage with them, standing in a place so high that no one could even reach toward him....

...Get a grip. Don’t let anyone—especially Brother—notice that you’re feeling strange....

Even if the performance had left him dissatisfied, he still wanted Hanje to think well of him in every other respect.

He smoothed away his frown and looked into the mirror again, only to meet the eyes of someone watching him from behind.

“Hi.”

Only then did he remember something he had forgotten.

Kim Eumyul had also participated in today’s broadcast.

“...Hey.”

Gowon gave a brief answer and turned off the faucet. His gaze moved to Kim Eumyul’s outfit: a denim jacket and loose cargo jeans.

“Our concept today was white and denim. Ingyo wore overalls, and Seobin wore jeans with a white sleeveless shirt. We don’t wear jumpsuits every day.”

“.......”

Gowon already knew. He had caught a glimpse of their performance while hosting earlier.

“Congratulations on your debut. I’m glad it didn’t take too long.”

Whatever discomfort he felt toward Kim Eumyul, Gowon meant the words sincerely. But whatever interpretation Eumyul placed on them, his expression gradually twisted.

“You—ha...!”

He repeatedly swept his hair back, seething with anger all on his own.

“You saw what happened on my Stargram, didn’t you?”

“.......”

“That was aimed at you. Did you know that?”

“Yeah.”

“.......”

“But I didn’t expect you to bring it up first.”

At the time, Gowon had been bewildered and irritated. But once he heard that Kim Eumyul had even been forced to make a public apology, he let go of every emotion he had about it.

He had no desire to confront him over such childish behavior now either.

“Good luck with your promotions.”

When Gowon turned away as though uninterested, Kim Eumyul hurriedly stepped in front of him.

“Hey, you know what? Because of how that whole thing turned out, people started calling me Creepy Eumyul before I’d even debuted.”

“.......”

“But once I thought about it, being creepy actually suits me. A person who’s honest a hundred times gets criticized the moment they take one shortcut, but when someone sneaky and creepy acts righteous once in a while, people applaud them. So even within Boyholic, I decided my character would be the talentless cheat who takes shortcuts.”

The corners of his lips stretched as high as they could go on his pale, gentle-looking face.

Gowon exhaled softly through his nose.

“Kim Eumyul. I know that isn’t what you’re really like.”

Of course, Eumyul had played politics among the trainees and possessed a talent for subtly manipulating people’s emotions.

But that alone could not have earned him second place on a survival program. Gowon did not know whether Kim Eumyul had benefited from the producer’s vote manipulation. Even so, no one had ever claimed he lacked the ability to deserve second place. He had been a trainee with that much talent and star quality.

But Kim Eumyul could hear none of it now. He was filled only with rage that the future he had imagined after debuting had been distorted.

That anger had swelled rapidly after seeing Gowon today. Kim Eumyul wanted Gowon to feel it exactly as he did.

“What? Now you’re jealous because I established a character for myself? I suppose you are pretty bland.”

“No....”

“And you can’t even talk properly. Oh, is that why you still don’t have any original content?”

“.......”

The longer the conversation continued, the more exhausted Gowon became.

It did not seem as though anything he said would get through to Kim Eumyul today.