Chapter 95

“...Sorry.”

Gowon hung his head, unable even to look at me.

Well, I mean. He didn’t have to go that far....

Besides, in the real world, it was a story anyone could find if they searched a little deeply. It just wasn’t openly visible because the company and fandom had worked hard to scrub it away.

“It doesn’t matter. You heard what I said. You know I don’t care.”

“What’s wrong with being adopted? It’s way better than having people who don’t deserve to be called parents. ...Baek Hanje, don’t let it bother you at all. You’re doing great.”

Gowon kept talking in his clumsy way.

“No matter how vicious people are online these days, anyone who attacks someone for being adopted gets treated like trash. Why did CEO Kwon say that was something people could attack you over? Isn’t there something wrong with the way he thinks too?”

Huh. Amid all that rambling, there seemed to be a misunderstanding.

“Ah, well. It wasn’t... just the adoption. I was adopted, then relinquished, then adopted again.”

“...What?”

“I think it was right before I entered elementary school.”

The adoptive parents who had relinquished me back then claimed that the older I got, the harsher my face looked, and that I seemed like I would eventually cause some kind of trouble.

They said I wasn’t affectionate at all, that criminal tendencies were hereditary, that there was no telling what kind of people my biological parents had been.

Baek Junhee, a family-law attorney who happened to be visiting the children’s home for work, overheard them saying all that.

I hear the most innovative bullshit of the month at a children’s home instead of divorce court?

Then she stared at me for a long while and, not long afterward, abruptly adopted me herself.

She said she was divorced and would have to raise a child alone anyway, so a kid who was already a little older would be more convenient.

“And that’s how I became Attorney Baek’s son, Baek Hanje. Ha, right. I guess that did become something people could use against me.”

“......”

Gowon hesitated before speaking.

“I... thought you grew up in a good home, loved by everyone, studying music as much as you wanted.”

“Oh, really? That’s because my mom is amazing. I actually did grow up with a great mother without ever lacking anything. Don’t worry.”

“......”

Gowon was silent for a moment before sighing and rubbing around his eyes.

“Baek Hanje, keep talking about what we were discussing earlier. I still don’t want to give up on the competition song.”

Huh? What the hell was with this guy all of a sudden?

I nearly snapped, then calmed myself down in case this eighteen-year-old teenager decided to go off the rails again.

“...What exactly is your reason?”

“It’s the last one, so I’m going to see the stage I want to see.”

“What stage do you want to see?”

Not perform. See?

What was that supposed to mean?

Then it suddenly clicked.

“...You still think you won’t be able to debut?”

“......”

“Why? You’re third. You’ve climbed all the way into the likely debut range.”

Current Plausibility: 65%

That wasn’t merely his probability of debuting. It meant he had a sixty-five-percent chance of actually winning.

My goal was to make Gowon take first place, so sixty-five percent felt precarious to me, but third place was more than high enough for someone to start dreaming seriously about debut.

“If you had no expectation of becoming an idol, why did you practice like you were trying to kill yourself? And why the hell did you move like a complete lunatic every time you got onstage?”

Gowon had been keeping his mouth tightly shut, but my irritated huffing finally made him answer.

“I liked those moments when I was onstage.”

...Of course you did.

Anything about you hating the stage would have been a lie.

“Think about why you liked it.”

The answer came sooner than I expected.

“...I think I liked that, after being born into this world, I got to shine at least once....”

Then Gowon raised his head.

“I wanted to show people that version of me.”

Part of the wish has been revealed.

Wish: To ■■■■■ ■■ in the world.

Quest Scenario <The Senior Who Paves the Flower Road>

“......!”

Gowon’s wish.

Ever since the quest window first appeared, it had been completely blacked out, so I had thought I simply wouldn’t be able to see it at all.

Part of it had finally been revealed.

To shine at least once after being born into this world... No, that’s too many characters.

...Either way, now I understood what kind of feelings had carried him through <Debut Chart>, and how he had caught the viewers’ attention.

He treated every stage like it was his last.

Every single trainee was desperate in one way or another, but the desperation of someone throwing himself into every moment as though it were the final stage of his life had to be on another level.

That passion, burning through his entire body, had carried straight through to the debut stage of the twenty-year-old Gowon I met in the original world.

And I had already seen that future.

“Gowon.”

“...Yeah.”

“Am I good at singing?”

“Yeah.”

“Do you think I’m good at producing too?”

“Yeah.”

“I’m overflowing with talent for popular music, right? Don’t I seem like someone who was born to advance the history of music?”

“......”

His eyes narrowed, but he slowly nodded.

“If you can’t trust yourself, then trust me, since I look like a genius to you.”

I spoke with absolute certainty.

“You’re going to become a great singer. I guarantee it.”

“......”

“Even the people who voted you all the way up here believe in you without ever having met you. So why are you the only one who doesn’t believe in yourself?”

A smile rose in place of the sigh I swallowed.

“Hey. From the first time I saw you, I thought you looked like someone who was born to stand onstage.”

The day I first met Gowon.

Even with every ridiculous possible disaster stacked against him, he had been willing to suppress his temper and keep his head down if that was what it took to seize a chance to perform.

He had said that even if <DRIFT> never saw the light of day, he would rather perform it amid controversy than hand it over to someone else.

The survival show in this world had been the same.

The Plausibility I contributed was only a slight shortcut. He was the one who struggled and grew through every competition, becoming more and more like an idol each time.

“Let’s work hard for the final. Just one more time, give it everything you have and shine.”

I pressed both hands firmly onto Gowon’s shoulders.

“I’ll pave the road ahead of you.”

And I don’t mean that as empty talk.

If you do well here, one incredible senior is going to save your debut album when it’s on the verge of failure by putting one of his treasured songs on it, then write a title track just for you and give you a comeback even more spectacular than your debut.

“...Granted, right now that’s coming from a seventeen-year-old kid, so I don’t know how convincing it sounds.”

I was fine.

I just wanted him to take whatever faith I would have needed for myself and use it to believe a little more in his own potential.

Feeling awkward, I turned away first.

We had wasted quite a bit of time already, so we needed to hurry, settle on the song, and start practicing....

Just as I thought that, a strong grip caught my shoulder.

Then spun me around.

And in front of me—

“I believe you.”

Huh?

“Because you’ve always been like that.”

Plausibility has increased.

Current Plausibility: 77% (▲12)

Gowon

Current Status: How did I become ■■, ■■?

“......!”

The eyes looking back at me belonged to a junior who had grown a little beyond that awkward teenager.

***

“Oh, Hanje and Won are back.”

“Yes. We resolved the discussion peacefully.”

Unlike when I had left, I returned wearing a bright smile.

“Alright. What did we agree on?”

I turned toward Gowon, who had followed obediently behind me.

“We will absolutely follow Bro— no. ...Han...je’s opinion.”

“Hm?”

“Huh?”

“I think Song Number Three is much better. For our team.”

“Wait, Won, you didn’t go get beaten up somewhere in the corner... right? Even the way you talk suddenly sounds different. Hey, if something happened to you, you have to tell us.”

“No. I was wrong to argue, and Hanje’s... opinion is completely right.”

It felt as though months of indigestion had vanished all at once.

A junior properly tamed through a senior’s kindness was this convenient.

Gowon’s memories came back.

Like me, Gowon had become his current self.

In other words, the Gowon from the world where I existed as Hansel of Young Ace.

What the hell happened?!

Ha. I never thought I’d see the day when that insolent way you constantly talk back would sound polite. I’ve reflected on myself.

Ah, Hanje.

Yeah. Good to see you, junior.

I had no idea why the hell this was happening, but—

Trainee Gowon gains the first opportunity to choose the song!As a rookie singer in his first year who had rushed onto every variety show that invited him, Gowon cleared a mini-game without breaking a sweat.

Next came dance lessons.

“What happened to Gowon? Why did your dancing suddenly improve this much?”

“Ah..., well, I practiced. Thank you.”

Gowon

Dance Lv. 147 → 137 (Instability due to physical change –10)

Becoming eighteen again had imposed a slight penalty, but even so, his skill was leagues beyond trainee level.

Now that Gowon had become ‘Gowon’... which sounded weird, but anyway.

I could see his stats properly again too.

“There’s nothing for me to teach you. Just keep doing exactly that!”

“...Yes. Thank you.”

Gowon bowed politely to the trainer and stepped back.

The trainees began murmuring when the guy who had still seemed rough around the edges just moments ago suddenly started radiating the aura of a celebrity.

“Did Gowon switch salons or something? Why does he suddenly look so different?”

“It kind of feels like he grew up overnight too....”