Contrary to Park Moondae’s worries, Hajun didn’t contact Cheongryeo first. Why would he? He had gotten something way better than a phone number! It was an unexpected win. After carefully wrapping Cheongryeo’s hair in a handkerchief so he wouldn’t lose it, Hajun thought for a second and called his smart AI assistant.
[Thia, is there something like a Cheongryeo doll?]
[Found about 1,234,000 search results. Would you like me to filter the 11 links currently confirmed for sale?]
“Oh, let’s see… second-hand deals?”
Even better. He was thinking of making one himself, but since there was already a finished product, it saved him the trouble. Plus, it was already used by someoneโand not just anyone, but a fan who probably cherished the dollโwhich made it even more perfect. He clicked the link to check the details.
“VTIC Cheongryeo attribute cotton doll… why do they call it an ‘attribute’ doll? It’s pretty cheap anyway.”
Hajun messaged the seller without hesitation. He didn’t care that it was the middle of the night, but then again, otakus never sleep.
[Me: Sold?]
[Seller: No]
[Me: Account number]
[Seller: Oh, wait! Don’t you have any questions? I wrote in the post that it has two defects, did you check them?]
[Me: Don’t care]
[Me: Account number]
[Seller: Okay, it’s Daehan Bank XXX-XXX-XXXXX-X]
Hajun removed his own name from the sender ID and used his birth mother’s name instead. He finished the quick trade with a final message.
[Sent]
Then he closed his phone. He set the shipping address to the house he bought last month, so there was no problem. He had already hired a few housekeepers, so they would handle forwarding it here.
Putting his phone down, Hajun checked on his roommates who were fast asleep. Everyone was completely exhausted from going to early morning pre-recordings for music shows every other day. Hajun yawned to shake off his fatigue, walked over to Lee Sejin (Bae Sejin), and tapped him. It was about time to wake up.
“Cake, wake up.”
“Ughhh…”
“You too, Moony.”
“……”
Feeling great after getting what he wanted so early in the morning, Hajun woke up the members one by one, turning the dorm upside down. First, Seon Ahyun and Kim Raebin’s room.
“Sunny, Bunny! Rise and shine!”
“Y-Yes, hyung…”
“I’m up… Good morning… or night? …Good dawn…”
Kim Raebin, with his messy hair and eyes looking even scarier from sleepiness, slowly blinked and gave a confused morning greeting. Seeing that they were awake, Hajun moved to the next room.
“Gummy bear. Time to wake up from hibernation, Teddy.”
“Ah… seriously! Can you please not do that??”
Keun Sejin, who woke up with goosebumps from hearing that deep, pleasant voice whispering so sweetly, rubbed his ears in disgust. Hajun didn’t reply, just grinned playfully and approached Cha Eugene.
“Champ, get up. It’s morning, morning!”
“No… it’s night…”
Hajun whispered in the ear of Cha Eugene, who was mumbling with his face buried in his pillow.
“Wake up, sleeping beauty.”
“…Argh!! [Seriously, please don’t wake me up like this, for real!!]“
Cha Eugene, who took a harder hit than the others because it was his native language, screamed as he woke up. Hajun easily dodged the flying pillow and replied that if he didn’t like it, he should have gotten up sooner. Waking them up was way too fun.
Ryu Cheongwoo, who had already woken up and washed his face, walked into the room and caught the pillow Eugene threw. He greeted Hajun.
“Everyone’s up, right? Thanks for waking them.”
“Morning, hotshot. You’re already up?”
“Haha, yeah.”
Maybe because he used to be an athlete, Cheongwoo had amazing stamina. While Hajun and Cheongwoo were having a casual chat, Eugene, still trying to shake off the goosebumps, yelled at Hajun.
“If you call me ‘sleeping beauty’ one more time, I won’t forgive you!”
“Really? Then how about ‘darling dreamer’?”
[Are you serious? Do you really want to do that?]
[It’s not like I can’t.]
Eugene stared at Hajun in shock and muttered.
[I finally know your real name, Hajun. It’s Mr. Flirt-with-everyone.]
“I’m not that bad. I’ll work on it.”
“Why are you working on that!”
Watching Hajun make even the wild Cha Eugene pull his hair out, Ryu Cheongwoo chuckled.
“Did something good happen? You’re energetic this early.”
“Yeah, something did.”
“Really? What is it?”
“I got what I wanted pretty easily.”
Hajun’s heart fluttered with excitement. Once the doll arrived, he was going to put the hair and the talisman inside it. He smiled brightly as he planned his next steps. He felt great, things were going smoothly, and his condition was at its absolute peak.
Watching Hajun look so incredibly energetic, the members secretly prayed that today would pass without any major incidents.
But a minor accident did happen. It was a bit different from what they had worried about at the start of the day, and for once, Hajun wasn’t the cause of it.
“Hey, you…!”
“…!!”
“Sejin!”
When they got back to the dorm after finishing their early morning pre-recording, Lee Sejin (Bae Sejin) stood up to get out of the car, stumbled, and collapsed. Luckily, Hajun quickly caught him, so he didn’t get hurt. Honestly, even if he had fallen, it was inside the car so he wouldn’t have been badly injured. Still, Hajun carried Sejin out of the car on his shoulder and kept holding onto one of his arms as they walked.
“Why are you so weak???”
“It’s not that I’m weak…”
Lee Sejin, who didn’t even have the energy to argue or refuse, was pale as a ghost and let himself be dragged along by Hajun. Seon Ahyun, looking worried, explained to Hajun, who was wondering how someone could just collapse like that.
“L-Lately, he hasn’t been eating well… It m-might be because of the diet…”
“Diet?”
“Ah, right. That must be it. Lately, we’ve only been eating grass and chicken breasts.”
For Hajun, who naturally had a small appetite and had a model sister, this kind of meal looked completely normal. But for the other members, who usually ate more than one serving, it was pure torture. Maybe only Seon Ahyun, who was used to weight management, could handle it. Lee Sejin, who wasn’t used to the extreme starvation that shaved rookie idols down to their limits and had the lowest stamina among them, simply couldn’t hold on.
After hearing the explanation from Seon Ahyun and Keun Sejin, Hajun nodded and came to a conclusion.
“So, he collapsed because he’s hungry?”
“I guess you could put it that way.”
“Then just eat.”
“B-But the company…”
Ignoring Ahyun, Hajun whipped around to face the manager.
“You heard that, right? Call the company and tell them to lift the diet restrictions. Someone literally just collapsed.”
“Uh, okay…”
“What are you waiting for? Call them now.”
He ordered people around so naturally. Because of this, Hajun was the only member the manager (who was usually very friendly and easygoing with the sweet members) found difficult and a bit scary.
Park Moondae shrugged as he watched the manager step away to make the call. It wasn’t like Hajun was power-tripping; it was a reasonable demand. Hajun’s attitude was a bit bratty, but it wasn’t a real problem.
Realizing that restaurants would be opening soon, Hajun called Thia. He usually avoided using her when the reality show cameras were rolling (since explaining what kind of unreleased AI she was would be too annoying), but otherwise, there was no reason not to use his highly capable assistant.
[Search for nearby restaurants that can deliver right now. Look for places with good ratings and balanced meals. Order 10 servings.]
[Order placed. Estimated arrival time is in 1 hour and 15 minutes.]
“What did you just say to your assistant?”
Asked Kim Raebin, the polite Confucian boy who was even respectful to AI. There was no need to answer, because Cha Eugene, who didn’t need any translation, cheered excitedly.
“Food!!”
“Did you order food?”
“Yeah.”
The members, who were secretly starving, didn’t say a word of complaint. By the time the company called back to say they would ease up on TeSTAR’s diet, the boys were already stuffing their faces with a massive breakfast inside the dorm. Lee Sejin barely managed to eat while trying to stop Hajun, who kept pushing food onto his plate.
“I told you, I’m full…!”
“No. Eat more. How does someone collapse just from skipping a few meals?”
“We didn’t exactly skip meals.”
“Usually, people would collapse. By the way, Hajun, shouldn’t you eat more too? You barely ate half a serving.”
“Is your definition of a normal serving even normal? I’m good.”
“I’m good too…!”
Lee Sejin, who was almost touched when Hajun caught him falling, called the company, and ordered food, immediately felt disgusted by Hajun’s aggressive food-forcing and ran away. He wanted to slap himself for thinking Hajun was a nice guy even for a second. Get a grip, he’s just a lunatic. Nice my foot!
Around the end of their first week of promotions, Hajun finally received the doll he had been waiting for. He borrowed a sewing kit from Seon Ahyun, put Cheongryeo’s hair and the talisman inside, and sewed it back up.
The roommates, who had no idea what was inside, had weird expressions when they saw the Cheongryeo doll sitting on Hajun’s bed. The general consensus in the team was now heavily leaning toward Hajun being a hardcore fan of Cheongryeo.
Park Moondae was too busy worrying about whether Hajun was contacting Cheongryeo to pay much attention to the doll. He suspected Hajun was up to some witchcraft with it, but Moondae only cared about keeping their professional relationship clean, not Cheongryeo’s personal safety. To be honest, as long as it didn’t cause trouble for the team, Moondae didn’t want to get involved in a psycho’s business. Thanks to that, Hajun had free reign in the one area the control freak had abandoned.
But once Hajun actually had the Cheongryeo doll, it wasn’t as fun as he thought. This kind of petty stuff just wasn’t satisfying enough. Staring blankly in the living room, Hajun muttered to himself.
“…I really want to smash his head.”
He didn’t want to bully him in some petty way, nor did he want to actually kill him. He just wanted to whack that bastard’s head once. The impact would feel amazing. Ah, damn it.
Hearing Hajun mutter about smashing someone’s head, Ryu Cheongwoo called his name in warning. He didn’t take the objectless threat too seriously, but his tone sounded exactly like a parent warning a kid who just swore.
“Hajun.”
“No crimes allowed~”
Keun Sejin said lightheartedly as he walked by.
Seon Ahyun and Kim Raebin, who had been terrified at first, were slowly getting used to this. Now treating Hajun’s violent remarks as a casual greeting or a sign of life, Seon Ahyun handed him a stress ball.
“Instead of a h-head… how about relieving stress with t-this…?”
“Oh, let me see.”
Hajun immediately took the stress ball from Seon Ahyun and squeezed it. The object couldn’t withstand his monstrous strength and exploded.
“Oh…”
“Oh wow.”
Cha Eugene marveled as he watched the stress ball drip its contents all over Hajun’s hand. Realizing the liquid running down his hand was starch water, Hajun asked Ahyun.
“Did you make this yourself?”
“Y-Yes…”
“Sorry.”
“I-It’s okay…!”
Feeling bad for instantly ruining someone’s handmade item, Hajun apologized and promised to compensate Seon Ahyun, who kept waving it off.
Coming into the living room, Park Moondae looked at Seon Ahyun looking flustered, then at the squished remains in Hajun’s hand, and glared at Hajun as if he were a piece of human trash. Seeing Moondae suddenly narrowing his eyes and glaring at him, Hajun yelled.
“What’s with that look? I said I’m sorry!”
New Terms
- ์์ธํ = Cotton doll (Somin hyeong, a plush doll)
- ์์ฑ ์์ธํ = Attribute cotton doll (An anime/idol-inspired plush doll)
- ๋ํ์ํ = Daehan Bank
- ๋ฒ๋ = Bunny (Hajun’s nickname for Kim Raebin)
- ๊ฐ๋ฏธ๋ฒ ์ด = Gummy bear (Hajun’s nickname for Keun Sejin)
- ํ ๋ = Teddy (Another nickname for Keun Sejin)
- ์ฑํ = Champ (Hajun’s nickname for Cha Eugene)
- ํซ์ท = Hotshot (Hajun’s nickname for Ryu Cheongwoo)
- ์คํธ๋ ์ค ๋ณผ = Stress ball
