Chapter 110

Team Candy Crush had walked off stage, but the heat in the audience showed no sign of cooling.

Choker, he said.

Choker?

What is going on with the choker.

Dan Haru scattering confetti and Seo Taehyun sporting a cat-ear headband — how anyone was going to top that madness of a stage, they had no idea.

A choker? And on Lee Yugeon of all people?

Not everyone gathered here was a Yugeon fan, but the sheer visual punch the pairing choker + Lee Yugeon delivered together drew an instinctive response.

"No, seriously, what kind of concept has him in a choker…."

Soda, too, clapped a hand over her mouth at the visual shock of it (never mind that she hadn't actually seen it yet).

But what jolted her even harder was what Gwajam — who'd been mulling something over beside her — said next.

"Guys, listen. Remember I said earlier that the kids came in split across a bunch of cars…?"

"Huh? Yeah, yeah."

"But thinking about it now, the ones in that first car were all these Candy Crush kids we just saw, right? And, no — I mean — but if that's the case…. Then…."

Gwajam's sentence didn't make it any further. She didn't have the nerve to face the fallout her own words were about to unleash.

But in Soda's and Squishy Bear's heads, listening along, a certain line of reasoning was quietly falling into place.

〈Lee Yugeon wore a choker on stage today.〉

〈Members who came in together in the same car are on the same team.〉

〈Lee Yugeon, Kang Hajin, and Lee Doha were in the same car.〉

The single proposition that logic proved?

"Holy. Yah, then Dohajin too…!?"

"Unnies, my hands are shaking right now."

"No, guys. It might not be. Calm down first."

Gwajam barely managed to talk Squishy Bear and Soda down as they started to spiral. Squishy Bear went aw, then what about my Siwooㅠ? in disappointment, but that got waved off easily.

"Ohh…?"

By the time stage cleanup was done and Seo Taeil was back at center alone, the audience was now burning with a certain sense of purpose (read: mania).

'…what's this?'

Seo Taeil sensed something was off, but quickly clocked that the heat wasn't strange enough to disrupt the recording and smoothed his expression again. On the PD's cue through the intercom from beyond the audience seats, in the right tone and at the right beat, he read the next line.

"Once again — the time to choose!"

A cheer went up about an octave higher than before. Seo Taeil, as if slightly caught off guard, went wide-eyed like a bunny and smiled softly. Then, as if he'd just now grasped the situation, he gave a small shrug.

"Wow — the choker really did land hard, huh?"

"Aaah!!!"

"The two stages left are both fun enough that they absolutely won't let you down. So — everyone, look forward to them evenly, yeah?"

"Yes~!"

"Alright. Then, right now — I'm revealing the next options!"

The second round of voting looked like it was using different options, not the original keywords. New choices came up on the LEDs on either side of Seo Taeil.

〈Silver Chain〉

〈Blue Flare〉

"The two keywords are the names of the remaining two teams. So — from now, please select the team whose stage you most want to see next!"

The buzz across the audience grew.

The Lee Yugeon choker shockwave was massive, but even if they didn't pick it now, it wasn't like they wouldn't get to see it at all. It was only a matter of watching it now or next — and yet the Destis found themselves agonizing over it pretty seriously.

A moment later, everyone had cast their vote.

"Alright. The second stage you've chosen — let's watch it together!"

'Who's it going to be?'

Stage setup went on for a bit, and the familiar darkness settled in.

The word 〈Chain〉 appeared on the upper LED, and reactions burst out from a few people. Looked like they were reading chain = choker.

Drrrrr— Pam, Pam!

A sweeping drum-roll countdown mixed with slick electronic sounds and hit the ears hard.

Yeah—!!

A thrilling high note punched through as air cannons went off. In the bright lights, the trainees came into view.

But against the audience's hopes, Yugeon wasn't among them. Nor, obviously, did any of their outfits have anything to do with a choker.

"Whoa, who's the ad-lib?"

"That kid, that one. Uh, Gong Seok."

Gong Seok was a member who hadn't gotten much spotlight in episodes 1 and 2. He'd been main vocalist of Team B, but Hajin — on the same team — had swallowed all the coverage.

His story-arc on the broadcast really started standing out from the second mission on. But since that footage was in episode 4, airing tonight at 9, the Destis in the room could only be blindsided by Gong Seok's sudden high note.

Let's go! C'mon!

"Gong Seok's good too."

"This song's a banger, though?"

The second team's song was a signature hit by a solo male singer who'd been in his prime in the 90s. The bright, hopeful melody and lyrics were the selling points — a song still played at sports days and festivals to hype the crowd.

Where the original leaned musical-showtune, heavy on brass — trumpets and the like — Team Silver Chain went for a rock arrangement that tapped a sleeker feel and a surging emotional payoff.

'Not bad.'

Fitting for a team that had picked a 90s song, the coordination matched that era — goggles, puffer vests, ski jackets. Nice touch. Only….

"…kind of a shame, right?"

"Yeah. Seok's the only one carrying it."

At Soda's read, Squishy Bear nodded, cynical. The song was undeniably a banger, but the trainees singing it couldn't quite bring out the ringing, cutting vocal color of the original.

The oversized-fit coords were cute enough, but shouldn't a song like this have leaned sportier? The regret kept coming back. And of all things, the stage right before had nailed everything — hair, makeup, costume, right down to the trainees' attitude — which only made the gap feel wider.

For our life! To our life!

'……? What's that?'

Right in the middle of that thought, Soda started to feel like her eyes kept meeting one of the trainees'. He'd been looking this way from the song's opening, and something about how often their eyes kept meeting didn't sit right — she looked again, and it wasn't her he was looking at. It was the person next to her.

'Ah. Is it 'cause I'm holding a slogan?'

She glanced at the person beside her, the one making eye contact with him nonstop — and the outfit was pretty uncomfortable-looking for someone here to sit in the audience. A skin-tight black rib-top and jeans, plus necklace, earrings, bracelet — and, above all, heels.

'You'd have to be out of your mind to wear heels to a standing-audience taping.'

The second Soda thought it, the woman knit her brows and made a show of her leg being uncomfortable. And it wasn't just for herself — she performed it for the trainee on stage, pulling a full-on pouting face right at him.

'…ah, fuck. My gut just called it.'

This is either a girlfriend, or a personal acquaintance.

Honestly, 99.99999% girlfriend — but between the recent Yugeon business and a lesson learned, she left the door cracked for acquaintance out of conscience.

'I mean — could be a noona. Or a real diehard personal fan he happens to be tight with because she's famous in the fandom…. No, Yun Se-eun, drop the habit of spinning up copium first.'

But the case was way too closed to leave any daylight. While another trainee at center was hogging all the parts, the trainee in question had shifted his path slightly to give the person next to her (presumed girlfriend) a little apologetic eye-hello — and she'd caught it.

'Wow…. what if a fan of yours was watching, are you insane, the guts on you….'

The spot Soda happened to be standing in was one where that trainee could be seen clearly — but if there'd been a fan there who came specifically to watch him? It was so blatant they'd have picked up something was off immediately. He'd probably overdone it a little, giddy at inviting her to his very first stage.

"Yah, Gom-ah."

"Yeah?"

"The girl next to me — pretty sure she's Shin Kyungho's girlfriend."

"……? For real?"

"Been trading eye-signals with Shin Kyungho this whole time."

The trainee in question was Shin Kyungho. And he was the trainee who'd ended up on the second-mission team with Lee Doha, back in episode 3.

Soda ended up glancing not at the stage but at the person beside her, right up until the second team's post-stage talk wrapped.

'How is it that regular-girl girlfriends have all apparently gone to the same school for how-to-behave?'

How do they all pull the exact same moves. If they just kept it off their face, the fans would happily cover for them.

Thinking that, Soda pitied whichever nameless Shin Kyungho fan had probably printed the slogan the girlfriend (presumed) was holding and handed them out.

---

"Wow, she actually left."

"Standard protocol."

Shin Kyungho's presumed girlfriend had, sure enough, elbowed her way through people the second the second team's segment ended and slipped out of the audience. Not long after she left, an announcement came that they'd be taking a break — so the three of them were, for the moment, catching their breath in the shade of a tree near the studio.

"Yah, come over here."

"Why?"

"That's the smoking area, people are about to be lighting up any second."

Gwajam pulled the two of them into a slightly-off corner of the parking lot. Later, when the guards called everyone in for the resumed recording, they'd have to move fast, so wandering too far wasn't an option.

Once they were settled, Squishy Bear, face flushed, grabbed Soda and pressed her.

"Unnie. Are you actually sure? A bluebird mutual of mine's onepick is that kid."

"I mean, I only saw it from the side — I can't say 100%. Ha, but my gut called it."

"Then it's 100%. She's got sniper aim, romance-division."

"Why romance-only?"

"Because everything else — DUIs, power-tripping scandals, all your assorted crimes — she can't catch a single one of."

"Haa…. can we drop that topic. I'm about to actually get sad."

But as Gwajam said, when it came to romance, Soda's gut was on target.

Hadn't she told them. She'd known about her ex-oppa's shotgun-wedding pregnancy before the marriage articles even dropped.

"He kept making eye contact from the stage, I'm telling you. And honestly, who wears heels to be part of a live audience?"

"Whoa…. so, you're gonna sit on this, right?"

"Obviously. He's not even my onepick, and his ranking's not threatening — why would I go out of my way to blow it up? His fans are gonna figure it out soon on their own anyway. Too obvious."

Since Shin Kyungho wasn't in the three of them's ranking, the topic soon shifted to 'idols' regular-girl girlfriends.' Even that wasn't exactly the kind of talk to have out in the open with a swarm of idol fans around — so as they headed back into the studio, they cast about for a common topic all three of them had a lot to say about.

The most fun topic in the world: 'my kid.'

"So the ones left are all one team, right?"

"Yeah. Siwoo, Doha, Yugeon, Hajin…. who else was left?"

"Eunchan and Wonho. What is this, basically a d*mn Avengers team?"

"On top of that, Lee Yugeon in a choker…. ha, insane. Lee Doha, seriously, if he shows off his abs what am I supposed to do?"

"What do you mean what. Yell 'Lee Doha is being a cheap k-pop hack' and open your eyes wide, that's what."

Audience re-entry was done. Usually after a break like this the headcount thins out — but the number felt basically unchanged from the start. The remaining members were all top-ranked, and the 'Lee Yugeon choker' hype had to have kept people around too.

"Whoa. Hajin has a ton of placards."

"But these guys are all kind of even, aren't they? Wonho's got a fair number too. I was a little worried the gap would be bigger."

Looking across the audience, the ratio of slogans in people's hands was overwhelmingly Hajin. Next-most-visible were Siwoo and Eunchan. Doha and Wonho had at least one name showing up here and there.

Surprisingly, Yugeon's name was showing up plenty too. Not so much because a lot of Yugeon onepicks had turned out — more like, with everything that had happened, people were carrying his slogan alongside their own onepick's out of solidarity.

Roughly the same process as before played out, and Seo Taeil came up onto the stage.

"You who would touch the sun — fly high. The third leg of the journey to become Miro's Icarus."

Compared to before, the space around them was incomparably still. Taeil — as if he knew exactly what that silence was asking for — opened his mouth with a lazy smile.

"At last — we're one stage away from the final."

'Ah. I'm getting dizzy.'

Five minutes to onepick contact.