Chapter 161

A dazzling background LED — shooting stars pouring down like a waterfall — rolled, and purple, pink, and orange lights mixed together to bathe the stage.

Zzzzzziiing—, Zzzziiiiii—

A funky electronic sound, laced with a light noise like a radio being switched on, slowly grew louder.

Thud, thud — someone stepped briskly from stage side toward center in time with a footstep sound effect.

The moment the electronic screen caught the trainee, the comment window exploded.

- dan haru has lost itㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋ - ㅁㅊ dan haru - haru-yaㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋ ahㅠㅠㅠㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋ - what is thatㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋ

Pitch-black sunglasses, a red scarf around the neck, a black short-sleeved tee with a big graphic printed on it. Over that, a color-blocked blouson jacket, and skintight black jeans with rough scratch-work at the knees.

Smacking his lips as if he were chewing gum, Haru — looking like he'd been possessed by some delinquent's soul — moved from stage side to center with a swagger even in his walk.

- fuck who dark-sided our maknae

Around the time people were screaming and still finding that side of Haru cute, Haru arrived at center stage. Four trainees were forming a bike-like shape with simple movements, and Haru soon stepped into the middle of the four. He'd mounted the bike.

Brrrrr—

- does our haru have a license - meanwhile look how well the engine turns over - oh nice, expensive bike

When Haru turned the ignition, an exhaust sound came in, and the funky music from earlier rang out even louder. When Haru — gripping the handlebars — worked something on them, the music paused with a click, like a radio channel changing.

1, 2, 3

Hey!

The trainees who'd bowed their heads to the "Hey!" cue snapped their heads up all at once.

And then a fast, exhilarating EDM sound came in.

A beat like tearing wide open across a coastal road with sheer cliffs in view poured out. In time with that music, Team B's motorcycle set off too.

- ㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋ ah haru looks so excited - the exhilarating race of the smile-sunshine boy

The formation, moving with the tight unity and rush of a motorcycle ride, at some point — as a kick-drum sound seeped in over the rhythm — flowed naturally into choreography.

Out of that held formation, one person at a time stepped away to the side, and the movements shifting the group into a W shape flowed together like water.

We, go, high!

Floor it, all the way, run!

Our Finale, just beginning now

No tomorrow, enjoy it, shout!

The song started with a group-sung chorus.

Fast-shifting formations, freewheeling gestures, choreography that swept even the viewer up in the rush of it — at a glance you could tell it was a dense arrangement with no room to breathe.

"No, why is the song this good?"

"Is Seo Taeil getting married or something? Why's he suddenly delivering this hard. How much royalty money is he trying to pull in."

Gwajam had already predicted, from the moment she saw Siwoo and Hajin were on the same team, that her hands would get no rest.

Even while chatting with Squishy Bear — already on the verge of passing out — Gwajam, still gripping the cannon lens and mechanically ripping off burst shots, caught her god-tier-vocal genius-puppy bias inside her frame.

"Ha, crazy. Fucking cute."

Unlike earlier, when his hair had been neatly set, red bangs now lay across his straight forehead, swaying softly in the wind.

A loose-looking white shirt and a carelessly knotted blue tie.

Over that, a training jacket blending red and navy well.

The somewhat-unbalanced-looking boxy navy training pants had, like the jacket, white stripes placed here and there as accents.

It wasn't a stage outfit with any particular standout piece, but Hajin was the type who wore training clothes so well he'd earned the nickname "phys-ed dept rep."

On top of that, the sight of him — in an outfit that laid-back — executing intense choreography that mixed old-school hip-hop and locking was, by anyone's standard, the very definition of a P-R-O idol.

Finally—

We've arrived, right now

The Stage of our own, wished for and wished for

Maybe because he was still young and his joints held up — Jaeyoung, entering from the back with a backflip, grinned wide and let out the first line. Over a big blue short-sleeved tee, Jaeyoung wore a white-and-blue basketball vest and basketball shorts, and his movements were quick and light.

Wanna be Famous!

I want it — your gaze

Where you looking, Desty

Here I am, your Destiny

Haru — sliding his sunglasses down slightly with a hand, meeting the camera's eye — took the sunglasses off in time with the song and flung them off the stage. When on "Here I am, your Destiny" he cupped his face with his hands and threw a wink, cries of despair burst out from every side.

The funky electronic sound took a small variation, and the bass rhythm hit hard.

In time with the intense beat, Yugeon — stepping out to center — along with Hajin and Siwoo standing behind him, slid their bodies down and dropped flat to the floor. And then, immediately, riding a wave on that recoil, they pulled off the high-difficulty move of rising back up.

An altitude climbing without knowing limits,

A speed climbing, not knowing how to stop,

Timid haters gonna keep up just fine. Sure.

Like hell.

Yugeon, in a skintight black race-driver getup, spat out the rap fast. A black ball cap and a bandaid stuck across his nose brought out his edge even more. Behind that Yugeon stood Jung Siwoo, in clear goggles and moderately-faded black-blue overalls, with one strap deliberately undone and pinned at the waist.

"Why is Jung Siwoo dancing this well!?"

Squishy Bear was already on the verge of losing her mind at their classical prince lining up in the dance line with Hajin and Yugeon out of the five. Gwajam too, watching Siwoo — following along well without much sign of stiffness — snapped a few shots for Squishy Bear.

So someone who looks like that comes out fine even with sloppy shooting.

Thinking she'd be spared having to select photos thanks to that, Gwajam's lens quickly turned back toward center stage.

Coming up next was Hajin's part.

Sure enough, Hajin — slightly loosening his tie and rolling up his sleeves — flicked one eyebrow toward the camera and opened his mouth.

Hey, hey

Faster, Faster, We're going higher

Intense rhythm — Fakes who can't ride it, off,

A sharp, locked-in Flow,

If you've got the guts to keep up

Enjoy it, all you want

All for Free

What came out — throat scraped rough, close to a growl — wasn't singing. It was rap.

The voice that had been rock-solid when he sang pumped out a just-as-massive volume when he rapped.

If Doha showcased varied rap skills and hammered the lyrics home with precise diction,

and Yugeon, with that distinctive tone of his, instinctively adjusted the nuance to bring the fun,

Hajin's rap had its strength in a flow that pushed and pulled at will, almost like singing, and a pro-caliber emotional delivery.

- he can rap too? - no fuck guys are you seriously not gonna let kang hajin debut - mother how on earth did you raise your son - even a novel protagonist would catch flak if his setup were built like this…

In truth, of every backstory element making up Kang Hajin, the most nonsensical was that he was an N-th-run regressor who might have to serve in the army three times — but the Destis had no way of knowing that.

Not knowing that fact, the Destis freaked out at Hajin's rap — seen for the first time — and simultaneously went wild for it.

- but hajin's kinda hot today - the dye job fucking suits him - red-hair hajin is tearing the finals apart rn

People, watching Hajin — whose skill was somehow standing out much more than usual — thought it was uncanny.

Of course, that was the natural reaction.

Because in reality, Hajin really was pulling far more out of himself than usual.

It's not like I spent the last six months just playing around, you know.

label: Kang Hajin (Agency: Miro) Debuff: Certain stats reduced due to the Mental Care System's effect ※ All stats currently boosted by a special-skill effect ※ Vocals: S (A ▶ A+) Rap: A+ (A-) Dance: A+ (B+ ▶ A) Expressiveness: SS (S) Charm: A+ (A- ▶ A) Special: Made for the Stage (S) — In live performance, all stats are temporarily boosted with a set probability. Appeal Point: 'Even So' — Leadership, positive thinking, synergy

Hajin's updated stat window winked and floated up in front of his eyes.

With the Mental Care System gradually stabilizing, and with the effort of the past six months of hard grinding — breaking through a hiatus of over ten years including his first life — his baseline stats too had grown quite remarkably.

On top of that, with the boost from his special skill Made for the Stage, those baseline stats had been kicked up another grade.

Even without help from skills or any other boosts, Hajin could already feel in his bones how incredibly hyped-up he was right now.

We, go, high!

Floor it, all the way, run!

Our Finale, just beginning now

No tomorrow, enjoy it, shout!

Jung Siwoo's vocals — sounding like since round 4 he'd figured out how to sing in a more relaxed, rougher way — burst out. Under the addictive EDM sound, the venue was engulfed in an almost concert-hall level of heat. With the trainees themselves — dancing and singing — laughing wide like they were genuinely having fun, even the people watching got swept up in it.

Fiesta!

A festival all our own

Toss the tangled worries aside — Fade out

On the group-chorus part where everyone joined in together, they lined up in a row, arms slung around each other's shoulders, and pulled off a group choreography using step-work. As the kick movements grew more intense, the killing point was Haru — sandwiched in the middle between Hajin and Yugeon — steadily buckling under it in a little skit.

Follow me!

Once they entered the second verse, the dance part between Hajin and Yugeon — now fully face-to-face, trading rap — took over. The pair dance of the two tall trainees, similarly proportioned at 182cm and 183cm, was more difficult and more spectacular than any Miro Maze choreography anyone had seen up to now.

It goes like this!

Lay down, got up, spun, sat back down….

Choreography that, no matter how you looked at it, seemed like doing it twice would blow out a joint — the two of them handled with the lightest of body movements.

In the middle of it, Hajin — as if the constantly flapping tie was bugging him — briefly caught the end of the tie between his teeth mid-choreography and moved right on into the next step. When the dance part ended and Hajin released the tie from his mouth, the shape of his lips was faintly imprinted on the end of it.

"That kid…. that kid really has lost it today…."

Sure enough, Gwajam — who hadn't missed capturing that moment either — ended up clapping a hand over her mouth and leaning her head back against the chair.

"Unnie, aren't you shooting more?"

"My hands are shaking so bad I can't shoot right now…."

It wasn't as if Hajin had ever let his fans down on stage before, but today looked like he'd really made his mind up about something.

Gwajam changed her mind.

Originally she'd been thinking, well, at least somehow getting him to debut would do — but seeing this now, that wasn't enough.

Right, the very idea that a kid like that would settle for 7th place made no sense. Mm-hm.

Yanking her phone out in a hurry, Gwajam pulled up her contacts and sent the pre-written Kang Hajin vote-drive message to every last person she could reach. Among them was that ex-b/f a-hole who last week had gotten hammered and kakao'd her at 4 in the morning with "you up…?"

At the time she couldn't stand the sight of him so she'd just left it unread and moved on — but now, in Gwajam's eyes, even that ex-b/f a-hole looked like nothing more than one precious vote for Hajin's debut.

Ding, ding!

While she was making the rounds of her contacts, Bluebird notifications had been buzzing nonstop in her top bar.

Gwajam tapped one of those notifications and opened Bluebird.

handle: @SS_university name: Sunset University My most brilliant sunset Please cast a vote for our Hajin Vote-auth event's on the main bird! #KangHajin #MiroMaze #Hajin [photo] [photo] engagement: shares 10k · quotes 4,220 · hearts 13k

At the Hajin preview — racking up more shares and hearts than any photo she'd ever posted — Gwajam nodded, satisfied, and uploaded previews of her newly-taken shots one after another.

On the vote-event birds set up with prizes like designer wallets and film cameras, proof-of-vote mentions kept flying in confirming votes for Hajin.

"I'm not going home today until I see Kang Hajin cry like he's going to die of happiness — guaranteed."

Gwajam, eyes ablaze, burned with resolve for her top pick's flower path.