Chapter 54

Rows of costumes hung from dozens of racks, with props scattered everywhere. The flashlight searching the room suddenly jerked and swung around.

“...Shit, it was just a mannequin.”

Apparently even he found searching a place like this in the middle of the night unsettling, because he quickly left.

A little while after the man was gone, Gowon slowly released Yusang. Then he moved without making a sound.

There was something he had glimpsed in the corner earlier.

A freight elevator.

“Should we take this down?”

“Where?”

“The underground parking garage. I think we can get outside from there.”

“...All right.”

Before long, the arriving elevator opened its doors. Perhaps because it was not intended for passengers, the interior was crude and dim.

“Eek....”

Yusang naturally tugged at Gowon’s elbow.

“......?”

Gowon had not particularly intended to send him alone, of course, but for him to act as though Gowon accompanying him was a given....

...Never mind. Forget it.

The sight of him seeking help from someone older in such a familiar way stirred several thoughts.

Gowon entered the freight elevator first and let Yusang follow behind him.

“...Excuse me.”

A hesitant voice called to him.

“You are helping me, right?”

“Yes.”

“But... why aren’t you scared?”

“...I’m not sure.”

His pessimistic mind habitually assumed the worst. Yet even to Gowon himself, his current state felt slightly strange.

As though, just like Yusang earlier, he believed someone would miraculously come save him....

A low hum filled the freight elevator.

Yusang’s frightened breathing grew rough. Gowon glanced at him, then silently aimed his phone flashlight at the floor near their feet.

When they reached the basement level, Gowon stepped out first again.

Yusang straightened from the awkward crouch he had fallen into from fear. His steps remained unsteady, as though the tension had not left him.

Even so, he followed desperately. But the moment he stepped onto the stairs leading to the ground floor, he grabbed the railing and clenched his teeth.

“Ugh...!”

“Are you hurt?”

“...From running earlier.”

“.......”

“I’m fine. Let’s go.”

Gowon started upward.

But after repeated escapes and prolonged tension had stiffened his body, Jung Yusang kept stopping to grit his teeth and clutch his knee.

Gowon eventually stopped at a landing and turned his back to him.

“Get on.”

“......?”

“It’ll be faster if I carry you and run.”

“N-no.”

“Is this really the time to be protecting your pride?”

Gowon gestured with his eyes toward Yusang’s trembling legs. Yusang muttered something sulky under his breath, but eventually climbed onto Gowon’s back.

Gowon hitched him up once, then picked up speed as he climbed the stairs.

“Am I... heavy?”

“You’re a little over fifty kilograms, right?”

“...Yes.”

“I used to lift that much often at my part-time jobs.”

“...What kind of job makes you lift fifty kilograms? Did you work at a gym?”

“.......”

Gowon did not answer and simply kept moving in silence. Yusang, who had seemed uncomfortable at first, gradually tried to remain as still as possible so he would not burden him.

His mouth failed to make the same effort.

“Excuse me.”

“Yes.”

“Why are you helping me...?”

“You seemed to be in a bad situation.”

“...You don’t hate me?”

Even after I acted like such an asshole....

The mutter escaped him like a sigh, and Gowon, whose face was right beside his mouth, heard every word. Gowon forced himself to swallow a sigh.

“You remind me of my youngest brother, so I don’t like it.”

“...Your youngest brother treats you—no, treats you the way I do?”

“No. Suhyeon listens to me.”

Still facing forward, Gowon suddenly glanced at Yusang on his back.

“I watched Newton’s original content. The way you looked at Nam Jeongho there was... exactly the way my brother looks at me.”

Gowon hitched Yusang higher on his back.

Why does someone like him treat someone like me that way? What am I to him, that he acts as though I’m so impressive? I never understood why my brother did that or what it felt like.

“.......”

“...But now I can somewhat understand wanting to show someone older than you your best side.”

“.......”

“Thinking about it that way, I also understood why you saw me as someone on the opposing side.”

Recently, Gowon and Newton had been fiercely compared within the company, as though one had to succeed at the other’s expense.

Yusang could not say anything. Gowon had not particularly expected a response either, so he continued walking in silence.

But not long afterward, Yusang tightly gripped Gowon’s clothes.

“Then you won’t hate it if I call you Brother.”

“What?”

“I’m still in high school, so calling people ‘Mr. So-and-so’ feels awkward. If you don’t hate me either, I’m just going to call you that.”

“...Ah, all right.”

“If you don’t like it, you can speak casually to me too....”

Gowon continued walking without a word. Then Yusang suddenly thought of something and asked,

“By the way, how old is your brother?”

“Ten.”

“...What?”

“We’re getting close to the first floor, so contact the people coming to pick you up.”

“Ah!”

Yusang called Jeongho again. Because their faces were so close together, Gowon could hear the voice on the other end more clearly. It was unmistakably full of worry.

“Yeah, Jeongho. The back entrance would be better. I’ll come out through the emergency stairs and go straight there.”

Fortunately, it seemed they had almost arrived.

“Brother Gowon, I can run.”

“All right.”

Gowon lowered Yusang from his back, and the two ran the moment the emergency-exit door opened.

“Yusang!”

“Jung Yusang!”

The Newton members, including Nam Jeongho, hurried toward him.

“Waaah, Jeongho...!”

Yusang burst into tears.

The coldness Jeongho had shown for the past several days was nowhere to be seen. As Newton’s leader, Nam Jeongho checked Yusang all over for injuries. His gaze held the warm concern Yusang knew so well.

But only for a moment. Once the members had welcomed back their youngest, they flinched in surprise at the person who had come with him. Yusang hurriedly waved his hands.

“Jeongho, Gowon helped me. He hid me so I could get away and carried me all the way here.”

“Ah....”

After getting Yusang into the van, Nam Jeongho relaxed his guarded expression and approached Gowon.

“Thank you. ...Were you called here for the same reason, Gowon?”

“No, I was in the practice room when....”

Ah. Gowon let out a low groan and glanced behind him.

“I should go now. You should leave quickly too—”

“What the hell do you bastards think you’re doing!”

A middle-aged man’s roar cut Gowon off.

Executive Director Choi Dongjin, head of Division Four, was standing in front of the van before anyone realized it. Whether his back was heaving so violently because he had run all the way there or because he was beside himself with rage was impossible to tell.

Newton’s road manager, who had arrived in the van with the members, barely managed to suppress his anger and spoke in a strained, placating tone.

“Director, Yusang is still young. It’s difficult for him to attend a meeting alone. So—”

“Young, my ass! This is work!”

“Did you... hear that the person from the other side was the one who bullied Yusang at school?”

Another employee who had been called out in the middle of the night cautiously stepped in. It was foolish to expect Executive Director Choi to react with an apologetic, What? Is that what happened? even now.

“They said it happened in his first year of middle school. He had barely graduated elementary school. That’s why Somyeong Entertainment made such a generous proposal.”

“...You knew from the beginning, and you still arranged that meeting?”

Nam Jeongho asked again, his face shocked.

“Ha, Nam Jeongho. I thought you, at least, were an adult. You call yourself the leader, yet you can’t even judge a situation properly? How can you act like this?”

“How could you do this to Yusang?”

The executive director struck his own chest as though he were genuinely frustrated. The more he did, the harder everyone else’s expressions became.

Realizing there was no one here who would help him, the executive director whipped his glare toward the dark interior of the van.

“Hey! You’re the one ruining the entire group! Because of you, Newton won’t be able to release another album or promote again!”

“.......”

“Stop.”

Gowon stepped in front of the cowering Newton members.

Even knowing he was just a young brat, anyone would flinch when someone well over six feet tall approached them.

Moreover, Executive Director Choi had experienced the same thing from Kwon Taeyoung in the conference room. That made his displeasure flare even more violently.

“What? Are you going to run and tell Kwon Taeyoung?”

“Yes. I’ll tell him everything that happened today and everything you said. He told me to report any problem immediately.”

Gowon looked him straight in the eyes.

Executive Director Choi was not someone Gowon feared.

Unlike last winter, when he had shrunk before him.

The people of Division Five, and Baek Hanje, had given him that much trust.

“I saw it. People from Division Four chasing Jung Yusang because they were trying to drag him in front of the person who bullied him at school.”

With bloodshot eyes, Executive Director Choi looked in the direction Gowon indicated.

Then he let out a mocking laugh.

“What, do you think you can go back and report this? Even the head of PR, who dotes on the singers, will try to shut Jung Yusang up.”

“.......”

“Do you think you can tell anyone outside the company about this? And besides.”

A nauseatingly sordid emotion swirled in his black eyes.

“Nothing happened in the end, did it?”

“...Ha.”

Gowon felt the strength drain from his upper body, which he had been holding rigid through sheer effort. The man was so shameless and so utterly devoid of morality that even Gowon’s desire to fight back collapsed.

At the same time, he could not hide the contempt that surfaced on his face.

“You little bastard....”

Executive Director Choi noticed the feelings Gowon was poor at concealing.

“I’ll make sure you fail.”

“.......”

“Executive Director.”

Just then, an employee approached and whispered something to him. Executive Director Choi nodded.

“Jung Yusang, go back and just say you two were good friends. Something like that. They said they’ll take your circumstances into consideration.”

“Executive Director!”

“You can’t even do this much? Isn’t selling an image your job? Huh? Drag the rest of those bastards back too!”

“Wow, pathetic. I should make sure I never grow old like that.”

A leisurely, twisted voice cut into the heated atmosphere.

Its owner walked into the chaos, caught Gowon by the elbow, and pulled him half a step back behind himself.

“Ten minutes are up. You held out well.”

The voice reached Gowon’s ear in exactly the same gently sardonic tone he had heard in the hallucination.