Chapter 112

The audience's roar took a beat to come.

Only after the Destis had finally shaken themselves out of the trance and pulled their heads back together did they scream with everything they had.

"Whew…. aigoo, that was rough. Thank you!"

Blue Flare, who'd held their ending pose a moment longer, laughed at the response and let their posture relax. A brief stage cleanup followed, and Blue Flare stepped down to touch up hair and makeup. Even so, the heat in the audience wouldn't cool.

"Please — seriously, guys — no, I can't even talk right now, no…."

Soda clutched Squishy Bear's hand, hanging on to a grip on sanity that felt about to fly off, and barely got her mouth open. The problem was, Squishy Bear was in no better shape.

"Unnie, Siwoo… Siwoo…. our Siwoo really is a prince after all. I mean, seriously — I've been gushing about him as Miro's noble young lord, classical prince, and now he actually shows up as an actual prince — this is deliberate stan-death, seriously…."

Squishy Bear, who'd always run a classical-prince-track-through-arts-middle-school-arts-high-school-and-arts-university headcanon for Jung Siwoo, muttered while pressing at her temples. The white shirt plus cummerbund had clearly landed critical damage.

And then, someone caught them both by the shoulders.

"…everyone shut up for a sec. My feelings are way too complicated right now."

While watching her onepick's chest and back through the viewfinder, and even while that onepick was belting out a three-tier high note, Gwajam had bitten down on her back teeth with superhuman resolve and swallowed her scream.

Squishy Bear and Soda looked at her in awe.

"You seriously…. how did you hold it in?"

"I held on thinking that if I couldn't get this on the card, it'd invalidate my entire fansite-photographer life up to this point."

"Unnie, did you actually get the shots?"

"Got at least one of each of the kids, I think. Don't know, I was just focused on not shaking, so at this point I've burned through everything and there's nothing left of me."

Gwajam said she'd shot everything she was going to shoot today, and — to fully enjoy the rest of the talk — tucked the camera back into her bag without a second thought. Before putting it in, she double-checked the previews, and just in case, pulled out the memory card and stowed it separately. The three of them couldn't contain their excitement at the thought of going back to the room later to look through Gwajam's previews on her laptop.

In the meantime, the stage was reset, and once again Seo Taeil came up first.

"Blue Flare's Set Me Free. Looks like everyone… enjoyed the stage."

Right where he should've been asking how was it~?, Seo Taeil just nodded as if he already knew, and everyone cracked up.

"Alright then. As before, we're going to move into voting."

The earlier stages had also taken votes before the after-talk. Probably because they didn't want the afterglow to fade, or the impression to blur out during the talk.

"Whoa…. what do I do here."

"What do you mean what. Onepick, obviously?"

"I know, but…. I mean, I know, but…."

For the earlier two stages, the timing had felt perfect — but when this stage came around to picking a trainee, she found herself hesitating a little.

"My head says Doha, obviously…."

"…unnie, Yugeon's getting to you, isn't he?"

"Yeah. No, it's not out of pity or sympathy, honestly it's just…."

Soda finally admitted it.

Today's Lee Yugeon, no matter what anyone said, was the MVP of this stage!

Especially in that last stretch, when he was slamming his body around and layering his own rap on top — she'd found herself thinking, this must be how Pygmalion felt looking at his statue after it came to life.

"I'm gonna push Hajin anyway."

"Haa, should I push Doha?"

"No — something about it. I feel like everyone's gonna push Yugeon. Hajin killed it too, but honestly, Yugeon had that stuff earlier. Anyone who watched today's stage — Yugeon probably moved them."

Gwajam offered a coolly analytical read. After some thought, Squishy Bear gave her point to Siwoo.

That left Soda.

'Ah, what do I do?'

While Soda was still weighing it, Seo Taeil announced that voting would close soon. On the LED, the trainees' assigned numbers ran in age order — Doha was 2, Yugeon was 4.

Torn between 2 and 4 down to the wire, Soda finally pressed a button.

—…3, 2, 1! Voting is closed.

"Unnie, unnie. Who'd you push? Doha?"

"No. Yugeon."

"Whoa, for real? Unnie, so you decided to take him in after all?"

"…not quite that far yet, but, yeah."

Soda shrugged and said they could talk about it later. Squishy Bear and Gwajam glanced at her, then gave a small laugh like they got the gist.

Soon, Blue Flare came up onto the stage.

"Aaaah!! Siwoo-yah!!!!!"

"Kang Hajin, marry me!!!!!"

"Guys, I love you sooo muuuch!!!!!"

At the shouts flying up from every direction, the trainees took their spots on stage and gave small smiles. Only after the AD at the foot of the stage hastily reined in the individual shouts did the audience settle. Gwajam, camera set down, waved Hajin's slogan with shining eyes.

"Blue Flare, please give our Destis a proper greeting first!"

"Yes. Here we go. Two, three!"

"The light that burns inside the Destis! Hello, we're Blue Flare!"

On Hajin's count, the six boys aimed toward the upper-left of the sky and mimed loosing an arrow. At the unusual greeting, Taeil asked, curious.

"Ah, this team's got a unique greeting. What's the motion?"

At that, every gaze turned to one spot.

Lee Doha — who did not look like the sort who'd come up with anything like this — blinked, blank-faced.

"That part will be kindly explained by the creator of the team name."

"Ah, so trainee Lee Doha named the team and made the motion? Shall we hear it?"

Our Doha named it? Soda's ears pricked up like a rabbit's. She was going to lock in every word without missing a letter and slip it in later as low-key Doha bait when she wrote up the audience recap.

Doha took the mic, seemed to hesitate for a moment, then opened up.

"Um, to explain that, we'd have to start with the program's subtitle…. so it's gonna get a little long."

"Ah, is there really that deep a meaning?"

"To sum it up as much as I can — fire burns hottest at blue, so 'the light that burns hottest' is where the name Blue Flare came from. The reason it isn't 'Flame,' which also means fire…. is tied to the show's subtitle."

Soda thought Doha's low voice, gently laying it all out, was ASMR incarnate.

The subtitle?

Miro Maze's subtitle was In Search of Icarus's Wings. A story from Greek myth Soda was well familiar with. Her concentration climbed to its absolute peak.

"What Icarus ultimately loved was the sun. So for expressing the Destis, rather than flame — as in a burning flame — we chose flare, which also refers to the light energy given off around the sun."

"Whoa, that deep a meaning? Then what's the arrow-shooting motion? We're going to shoot the sun?"

"It's meant to be Eros's cupid arrow from Greek myth. It carries the bold ambition of making the sun we love have no choice but to love us back."

"Whoa…. that was a lot deeper of a setup than I expected."

Taeil sounded genuinely impressed. Beside her, Squishy Bear and Gwajam were thinking something like huh. So these days survivals require this much thought even on team names and hand signs.

But Soda — both eardrums on full alert, engraving every word of Doha's into her eyes, ears, and brain — felt something.

'…why is my onepick giving off the scent of a fellow fandom lifer?'

Sure, the show's concept was the show's concept, and stuff like Eros's Cupid arrow was too well-worn to raise an eyebrow, but….

'The trace of thought — where do I start explaining so the muggles don't get bored while still landing the meaning properly — that's just me imagining it, right?'

But at the individual greetings that followed, Soda made herself shake the suspicion off. From what he'd shown on the broadcast so far, Doha had a strong image as a god-tier normal-person, muggle-born.

Team intro over, one-by-one individual greetings followed.

Given how blazing their stage had been, and given that six men with those outfits and silhouettes were actually standing right there, a huge cheer went up every time one of them greeted the crowd.

"Hello, I'm Kang Hajin."

When Hajin's turn came, from every direction people waving his slogans welcomed him with dolphin shrieks. Wearing a red-toned makeup that made the sharp line of his monolids stand out even more today, Hajin looked at his Destis, smiling as if he found them cute.

Then, without a word, he turned around!

"Aaaaah!!!!!!"

"Kang Hajin!!!!!!!!!!!!"

Under the bright lights, the sheer panel down his back was that much more visible. After a brief moment of looking cool, Hajin quickly turned back to the front, laughing like he was pretty embarrassed.

"Feels like the cheer just now was bigger than when I hit that three-tier high note."

"That's how it works. I've been doing this about thirteen years, and even we've never beaten the cheer from the day Jinu showed off his abs."

At Taeil's answer, seasoned with all those years, the whole crowd cracked up.

Next up. Yugeon — who'd been listening to his teammates from a small step back — went ah and lifted his mic.

"Uh…."

Before greeting, Yugeon paused. He seemed to be picking a fitting line. At that, Hajin — standing beside him — leaned in and whispered something too quiet to catch the mic. Yugeon opened his mouth right after.

"Hello. I'm Lee Yugeon."

"……."

"Um, honestly I gave it some thought — what to say when I met you all."

Yugeon's contact-tinted grey eyes rolled once. He seemed to get slightly choked up, gave a small cough, and abruptly held the mic out toward the audience.

"Did you enjoy the stage—?"

"Yes!!!!!"

"It was the best!"

"Lee Yugeon, as of today you're Korea's number-one hip-hop!!!!"

Listening to the response, Yugeon broke into a pretty smile like something had lifted off him.

"That's enough for me. Thank you."

Another wave of applause broke out. Every Blue Flare member watched Yugeon with fond looks, patting his shoulder or tapping the small of his back like good job. At the sight of it, Soda somehow felt at ease.

Once Eunchan — last in line — had made it safely through his greeting, Blue Flare's talk time finally rolled around. Maybe because so many of them were in the current top ranks, the questions came in every flavor.

What made you dream of becoming an idol? (Baek Yeojin, 25, Bokjeong-dong)

"I always liked singing. It just — this probably isn't the kind of thing you can make a living off, is what I used to think. Then for some personal reasons I couldn't play piano anymore…. and yeah, one thing led to another and I just naturally ended up doing vocals."

Are there any words of comfort you'd like to share with people preparing for their exams? (Kim Yeongju, 33, Gaepo-dong)

Yugeon, how did you memorize the choreo so fast? Please tell us your practice method. (Han Jieun, 29, Miseong-dong)

"I need practice? Why?"

At Yugeon's answer, everyone stared at him. Feeling the stares, Yugeon laughed awkwardly and tacked on a capitalist-approved answer.

"I tend to memorize choreo quickly."

The truth was he'd picked it up from watching so much of it during his part-time gig at a dance studio. Yugeon left it at that.

Round and round it went, until it was Hajin's turn.

"Ah, Hajin — please let mine get pulled."

"Gwajam-ah, what did you put in?"

"Cover just one line of James Deer's 'Everything is fine.'"

"Whoa, huge match."

"The instincts of a lifelong stan, folks…."

Gwajam — who'd recommended a pop-song cover that had recently gone viral as social media Shorts BGM — clasped her hands like a prayer. Hajin slipped his hand into the box and carefully drew a slip, unfolding it.

"Uh…."

Hajin's face after reading the slip was hard to place.

"Pft—!"

"…seriously?"

Yugeon and Siwoo, sneaking a peek at the contents from the side, also couldn't quite believe it — one broke into a laugh, the other into a question.

What? What?

Just as murmurs were rippling through the audience, Hajin's question was read out.

Cry the way you cried at the subway station. (Anonymous, ??, ???)

Kang Hajin does what? Cries? Where? At a subway station?

Every face except Hajin's turned pure what.