“Are those crazy bastards seriously trying to hook me up in a dating rumor?”
After barely calming Hajun down, the members blinked slowly, trying to process what was going on.
“Uh… so this model is actually your sister?”
“Yes!!”
“Hold on, hyung. You don’t mean a close friend, but a real sister? But you two have different last names, and, well…”
Keun Sejin trailed off, realizing this was getting pretty personal.
Hajun didn’t go around bragging about his messy family tree, but he didn’t care enough to hide it either. He just said it like it was nothing.
“Marvell is her middle name. She uses it as a stage name. Her full name is Katy Marvell Won. She came to Korea a few days ago… stupid paparazzi!”
“Ah…”
“Oh, right. You’re probably wondering why she looks mixed-race but I look pure Asian, right?”
“……Are you adopted?” Seon Ahyun asked quietly.
“Yeah. But we share some blood. I’m an illegitimate child.”
Seon Ahyun gasped.
The guy himself just yawned lazily and casually brushed off his family’s drama. When he finished, the room went dead silent. Everyone looked like they didn’t know what to say. Hajun scanned their faces and smirked.
“What? Afraid to talk to me now because I’m born out of an affair?”
“N-No, that’s not…!”
“Whatever.”
Seon Ahyun looked completely overwhelmed by the intensity of Hajun’s joke.
Hajun scratched his head, thinking about what else he should warn them about to prevent future surprises.
“Oh, also, my real name isn’t Won Hajun.”
“…Excuse me?”
“Well, depending on how you look at it, it is my real name… but legally?”
Wait, what?
They had been living and practicing together for months on Idol Co-op, and now they found out his name wasn’t even real? The members looked like they had been hit with a frying pan.
“My passport name is Damon. Damon Jun Won. But Hajun is still my real name. My biological mother gave it to me when I was born, and I lived in Korea until my first year of middle school.”
“Um, then what should we call you…?”
“Whatever you want.”
Hajun figured that was enough sharing for one night. It was up to them to process it. Yawning with his mouth open wide, he headed back to his room.
The remaining members stood in the living room, blinking in a daze.
“Uh, so… let’s tell the company she’s his sister first…”
“W-Will it be okay? His family history…”
“They already know!” Cha Eugene suddenly shouted.
Oh, right! Cha Eugene was from the same US state as Won Hajun. The members’ eyes lit up. Ryu Cheongwoo turned to Eugene, hoping he might know more.
“What do you mean they know, Eugene?”
“Katy Marvell is super famous! All my friends know her! She has two brothers, and one has a different mom. People in America know this. It’s a famous gossip. But nobody knew her brother was Hajun. Even I didn’t know!”
According to Eugene’s broken Korean, Katy Marvell’s privileged family background was common knowledge. Her father ran logistics and real estate businesses, while her mother designed for a luxury brand. People knew she had a half-brother, but since Katy never shared details about her brothers, there was little information about him. Even in the celebrity gossip world, messing with a wealthy, private family wasn’t a good idea. That was why almost no one knew Hajun was her half-brother.
For Park Moondae, the hardest part wasn’t that Hajun was related to a famous model, or that his name was Damon. It was accepting that Hajun wasn’t a mobster or Yakuza, but a rich kid from a legitimate family.
Well, maybe not completely normal, given how chaotic his family history sounded.
Leaving the dating rumor and the explosive news for the agency to handle, TeSTAR wrapped up their emergency meeting.
When Moondae returned to the room with Lee Sejin, he found Hajun already fast asleep, completely unfazed after dropping such huge bombshells on everyone. Moondae couldn’t help envying those nerves of steel.
Thanks to his early sleep, Hajun was in a decent mood the next morning. He even managed to stay calm when the director called them in to talk nonsense.
Seriously, though. I’ve always been the one in charge.
Being ordered around didn’t really sit well with him. He wondered if there was a way to pull some strings at T1 using his US connections. His tech company Depone had grown pretty big over the last two years, so it was actually quite useful. T1 was a giant conglomerate with branches in software, platforms, and apps, which would align nicely with Depone.
Wait. Maybe I should just buy some T1 stock.
Hajun smiled warmly at the thought of using money to solve his problems. Moondae, who had no idea why Hajun was suddenly grinning, felt a sudden chill.
When they returned to the dorm, Eugene was jumping with joy after finding a claw machine left by the production team. Hajun stood aside, watching the members fail one by one.
“…You’re not playing?” Lee Sejin asked, gathering his courage.
“Too lazy,” Hajun replied without emotion.
Lee Sejin flinched at the cold response. Taking the controls from Seon Ahyun, Sejin carefully moved the joystick. Hajun watched, slightly impressed by his precision.
“You’re actually good at this.”
“!”
Startled, Sejin slipped, dropping the doll. He glared at Hajun with a highly offended face that screamed you made me drop it! Hajun raised an eyebrow. How was that his fault?
Nudging Sejin aside, Hajun grabbed the joystick and easily pulled a doll out on his first try.
“Whoa!”
“Oh~ you’ve got good hands.”
“I’m good at everything.”
“……”
Well, the person before him had basically set it up anyway. It would be embarrassing to miss it.
Hajun ignored the silent members and checked the mission card attached to the doll.
“Watch a horror movie together. Who wrote this?”
“…Keun Sejin, was it you?”
“Hey, no way.”
“Ah, that’s mine,” Ryu Cheongwoo raised his hand.
Hajun glared at Cheongwoo in pure annoyance. He dealt with real ghosts every day, so why did he have to watch fake ones on a screen? He had no interest in seeing how well living humans could recreate spirits.
Despite the death glare, Cheongwoo only laughed feeling awkward. Misreading Hajun’s expression, he asked, “Do you hate horror movies? You don’t seem like the type to get scared.”
“I’m not scared. They’re just boring.”
“We can find a good one.”
Cheongwoo pacified the grumpy Hajun by showing him a list of highly-rated horror movies. Hajun scanned the posters and picked one that actually had real spiritual energy lingering on its file. If they were going to watch a movie, they might as well get some real thrills. He figured he was doing them a favor.
“Whoa, people say that one is really scary! Are you sure you’re okay with it?”
“Yeah.”
“Awesome! Let’s play it!”
“Sure.”
During the movie, Hajun treated it like a study session. From a spiritualist’s perspective, he counted the ghosts wandering in the background and peeking at the camera.
One, two, three, four. That’s it? Boring.
Sitting among screaming people was exhausting. On his left, Moondae was acting all tough but kept flinching and avoiding the screen. Next to him, Kim Raebin was turning pale, actually tearing his own shirt apart out of fear.
It was hilarious to see Moondae, who was currently carrying the most dangerous entity, acting so scared. And Raebin was terrified of a fake movie ghost while completely oblivious to the real curse sitting right next to him.
“Pfft, hahaha!”
“……?”
Moondae stared at Hajun like he was a complete psycho for laughing right when the protagonist was getting brutally slaughtered by a ghost. Only Ryu Cheongwoo smiled looking proud, thinking Hajun was really enjoying the movie. It was a complete clash of minds.
The ridiculous dating rumor was quickly cleared up once the truth came out, but Hajun’s family background remained a hot topic. Affair, illegitimate child, wealthy family! It was a massive gossip storm. Hajun clicked his tongue and had Thia collect the IP addresses of the online haters. Time to sue. Normally, the agency should handle this, but Hajun was used to solving things on his own, so he completely ignored the company.
Meanwhile, Katy called from America after hearing the news. After laughing her head off, she decided to make things official since her brother was now a celebrity. She posted a selfie with Hajun on her SNS along with a translated version of the Korean article, announcing to the world that this guy wasn’t her boyfriend, but her second brother.
Thanks to her massive influence, international K-pop fans became curious and started checking out TeSTAR even before their debut album was out.
As the excitement grew, TeSTAR worked hard to prepare for their debut. Moondae had been worried that Hajun might throw a tantrum over their concept, but Hajun was unexpectedly cooperative. Even when they presented him with Magic Boy, his only response was:
“You have a worse taste than you look… Actually, nevermind.”
“……”
Moondae felt slightly offended, but at least Hajun was cooperating. Honestly, after living with him for a while, Moondae realized he wasn’t as crazy as he seemed. Sure, he spoke bluntly and acted a little aggressive sometimes, but he didn’t seem like a bad guy…
“Kya-haha!”
“NOT FAIR!”
“You don’t know the rules! Winning is all that matters!”
“Villain! You villain! HELP!”
“Guys! You’re going to get hurt!”
…Nevermind.
For some unknown reason, Hajun and Eugene were currently wrestling in the middle of the living room. Hajun had tripped Eugene using a dirty trick and was laughing like a cartoon villain. Moondae was amazed they still had the energy for this after such a busy day.
Ryu Cheongwoo rushed over to break them up.
Hajun, still snickering, spotted Moondae and grinned.
“Hey, Moony. Want in?”
“……”
Who the hell is Moony? If that weird nickname was meant for him, he wanted absolutely nothing to do with it. Moondae shook his head as hard as he could and bolted toward the kitchen.
New Terms
- 쇼팽 녹턴 2번 – Chopin’s Nocturne Op. 9, No. 2 (Chopin’s piano piece)
- 베토벤 월광소나타 3악장 – Beethoven’s Moonlight Sonata, 3rd Movement (Beethoven’s piano piece)
- 지박령 – Earthbound ghost (Jibakryeong, a spirit bound to a specific location)
- 포도당 캔디 – Glucose candy (Sweets containing glucose)
- 떡꼬치 – Tteok-kkochi (Rice cake skewer)
- 쇼트케이크 – Shortcake (Bae Sejin’s nickname from Hajun)
- 데이비드 – David (Hajun’s older brother, Big D)
- 데이먼 – Damon (Hajun’s English name, Little D)
- 마법소년 – Magic Boy (TeSTAR’s double title track)
- 위튜브 – Wetube (In-universe equivalent of YouTube)
- 영안(S) – Spiritual Eyes (S) (Hajun’s S-tier supernatural trait)
