The judges sat speechless after watching Hajun perform. Finishing his dance routine left them stunned. Youngrin raised her microphone, her lips moving as she spoke.
“Are you… an amateur without an agency?”
“Yeah.”
Hey! You are no ordinary amateur! Alex had shouted at the screen during Episode 1’s broadcast, accusing him of lying through his teeth. Alex’s distant shouts back home never reached Hajun’s ears.
Mudi shuffled through Hajun’s profile sheets, mumbling to himself.
“Where on earth did he come from…? Are agency scouts sleeping on the job? No agency signed you yet? With this level of skill and these looks?”
Scouts had tried casting Hajun as a model back in the States, though he had turned them down every time. Hajun shrugged, giving a brief answer.
“Thanks.”
“Incredible…”
Shock aside, the judges had to announce the results. After whispering among themselves for a brief moment, they called out the rankings.
“Won Hajun… you place 3rd!”
His talent proved outstanding, yet his fierce personality raised questions about whether he could fit flexible idol concepts. Factoring in his lack of an agency, his older age among contestants, and his overall potential, the judges settled on third place.
Arguments had flared among the panel—some insisting he deserved first place, others calling that excessive, while a few raised eyebrows at his relaxed attitude. Indifferent to their debates, Hajun gave a single nod and walked over to take a seat at the third-place spot.
“Great performance. Congratulations on third place.”
The boy sitting in second place introduced himself as Kim Raebin, offering a polite bow. Hajun returned a small nod to the sharp-eyed, well-mannered kid.
Beside him, a boy with hair like fiery embers thrust out a hand. An American-style greeting.
“Hi! I’m Cha Eugene! Awesome stage!”
“Won Hajun.”
Dropping just his name, Hajun planned to wrap up introductions with these nineteen-year-old rookies. Yet Cha Eugene showed zero intention of letting him go so soon.
“Hajun! When did you learn to dance?”
“Cha Eugene, you should call him Hajun-hyung.”
Kim Raebin chimed in to correct him, though neither Hajun nor Eugene seemed bothered. Reading Hajun’s expression, Raebin fidgeted with a confused face before stepping back.
Hajun had no trouble grasping Eugene’s broken Korean syntax. He glanced at the kid’s sparkling eyes and answered.
“Don’t know. A little while ago.”
“A little while? You’re so good for just a little while!”
“If you say so.”
When did you learn singing? Let’s do a stage together! How did you grow so tall…? A one-sided barrage of questions followed. Giving dry answers, Hajun soon tuned out the chatter and focused back on the stage. Raebin, who had been nagging Eugene to mind his manners, relaxed upon seeing Hajun ignore the talkative cat from California.
Besides, Hajun had no time to waste on a hyperactive kid.
His eyes caught something on the stage.
—I remember the person I used to be…
That… Is that what I think it is?
It had been bugging him. People carrying around something like that were far from common. Surrounded by a sea of contestants earlier, Hajun had doubted his eyes. Now, staring straight into the center of the guy standing alone on stage, certainty struck him.
What the hell?
Hajun needed clear proof. He spoke up.
“Anyone got a hand mirror?”
“Pardon?”
“A mirror. Something got in my eye.”
“I don’t have a mirror… Want me to take a look for you?”
“Forget it. Just get me a mirror.”
Aspiring idols cared about their appearance, so someone had to carry one. Cha Eugene and Kim Raebin exchanged blank looks, making him doubt it for a second, but another contestant sitting a short distance away passed over a compact mirror. Hajun was right.
“…Ha.”
Pretending to check his eye, Hajun inspected his neck area in the glass and let out a faint chuckle. It was gone. That stubborn, wretched curse that had choked his throat like a heavy shackle… had vanished. Absurdity washed over him. Or was it hollow emptiness? Or maybe…
Handing back the mirror, Hajun reached a conclusion.
“…This pisses me off.”
“Huh? Did you say something?”
“No. Nothing.”
Answering Kim Raebin—whose ears were sharp to a fault—Hajun looked back at the stage. The curse vessel—Park Moondae—who had just stunned the judges with a ridiculous popping dance, walked up toward seventeenth place with an expressionless face.
I’ll have to deal with that guy later too.
Glancing down, Hajun’s eyes met Park Moondae’s just as Moondae raised his head.
“…”
Moondae shifted his gaze away, trying to act natural. For a second, it felt like locking eyes with a wild predator.
What is up with that guy’s crazy eyes? Was someone like him on Idol Co-op before?
While Moondae racked his brain searching his memories as Ryu Gunwoo, Hajun leaned back into the sofa cushion and let out a long yawn.
A contestant stuttering through his introduction on stage had striking looks. Striking, huh? Guess the two most striking faces here belong to those two.
Hajun flicked his eyes over to confirm the national archer and the former child actor—though too grown up to be called a child now—sitting in the venue. Recognizing the actor’s face from screen appearances years ago proved easy.
Trembling with nerves, the guy seemed blind to anyone watching him. Looking like a trapped rat in a cage.
By contrast, the archer waited for his turn with a calm demeanor. When their eyes met, he showed slight surprise before offering a warm smile. A fleeting thought crossed Hajun’s mind about how diverse people could be.
Staring back at Ryu Cheongwoo without a smile, Hajun blinked once and turned his head away.
After an endless, tedious evaluation of seventy-seven contestants, Hajun—who had almost started searching for wandering spirits out of sheer boredom—was greeted outside by a familiar vehicle.
“Whoa, a limousine!”
“Insane!”
It was the type of car Katy often used when hanging out with her friends. Feeling his frayed nerves settle down, Hajun bypassed the cheering rookies and took a seat inside.
The contestant who followed him spoke up.
“Hey there. Mind if we drop formal speech? Seems we’re the same age—twenty-three, right?”
“Yeah.”
“Cool. My name is Ryu Cheongwoo.”
Though you know already. The famous archer offered an awkward smile, adding, “Nice to meet you. You performed great out there.”
“You too.”
“Haha, thanks. Mind if I call you Hajun?”
“Go ahead.”
“Feel free to call me by my name too.”
“Oh, is it introduction time? I’m…”
Starting with the contestant who chimed in out of nowhere, voices filled the black limousine carrying the top ten ranked contestants. Tuning them out from the start, Hajun rested his chin in his hand and gazed out the window.
He spotted the buses following behind. A deluxe bus carried ranks eleven through twenty-five. Behind it came a standard bus carrying ranks twenty-five through fifty. And behind those, the contestants ranked fifty-one to seventy-seven walked on foot.
His sharp vision picked out the person leading the walking group (though he seemed to be lagging behind step by step). The child actor.
He didn’t even make the top fifty? I assumed a famous face would secure a higher rank. Guess he lacks skill.
Having zoned out during the second half of evaluations, Hajun had missed actor Lee Sejin’s performance. Tapping his fingers against the armrest, Hajun let out a small hum.
What kind of game are these TV producers playing with young kids? Walking a ten-minute distance posed no physical challenge, yet crushing their spirits was another story.
Elena had taught him a lesson when he first got into trouble at school.
‘Why did you throw away Miss Anderson’s cookies? Right in front of her eyes?’
‘Because I didn’t want them and they tasted bad.’
‘Damon, you must never hurt someone’s heart like that.’
‘Why? Am I not allowed to decline?’
‘Declining like a gentleman is fine. But never stomp on someone just because you hold the upper hand. You are a smart boy, Damon, so you catch my drift, right?’
‘Hmm, yeah.’
‘A person has just one heart. Treat it with care so it doesn’t break.’
Well, a human body has 206 bones, so breaking one of those should be fine.
Either way, his point remained: instead of dividing ranks like this and inflicting emotional damage, the producers should have forced them through relentless dance practice or laps around the track. Tough physical training would turn even that weakling into someone sturdy.
In the end, broadcast producers were inefficient and mean-spirited.
Had Bae Sejin known Hajun’s thoughts back then, he might have begged for his heart to be broken instead.
