The Malicious Member Has Returned! Episode 189
Despite my voice, in which I feigned as much naturalness as possible and tried to act shamelessly, no answer came back from Yeonwoo hyung.
Was it because of the storm of actions he’d unleashed on Senior Juyeong earlier?
“……”
Brushing back the hair that had fallen over his forehead, Yeonwoo hyung silently chose his words. Even in all my memories of him, he looked noticeably cold.
Almost comparable to the day when the fact that he drank—his most secret, self-destructive vice—had nearly been exposed by a journalist he was close to.
What had it been like back then?
Pretending not to notice the cold sweat dampening the back of my neck, I quietly recalled what Yeonwoo hyung had done at the time.
That day, when rumors had gone around the club Yeonwoo hyung and I often ran into each other at, saying, “A dirty article related to Jeong Yeonwoo might come out tomorrow.”
Back then, Yeonwoo hyung had probably…
“…
Well. Even if Mr. Chun-yong hadn’t told me, it was something I was going to handle on my end anyway.”
“I figured it would turn out like this. I was going to resolve it.”
Right.
Back then, just like now, he’d smiled like that and said something that shocked everyone.
As I’ve said repeatedly, Yeonwoo hyung didn’t get the nickname “the head of the first-tier male idols” by pure coincidence.
He knew everything.
He had even thought of countermeasures.
Even letting the incident happen had been within his calculations.
Judgment and confidence so sharp they gave you chills.
And the ability to back them up.
Because he possessed all of those things and knew how to use them well, Yeonwoo hyung had made it to that position.
“Mm…”
After tapping the pocket that held his phone with his finger for a moment, Yeonwoo hyung approached me quickly enough that the hem of his suit fluttered.
Because his outfit had unfortunately been remodeled in an Eastern style, would it be an exaggeration to say he felt a bit like a grim reaper?
Well. In that case, I would be the brazen person who threw someone in love at the grim reaper and tried to use that to make a deal with him…
It was a bit burdensome, but still.
I’d brought this on myself.
The distance between us closed quickly.
“Ahem.”
Close enough that, if we spoke with even a little care, the owner of the snack bar behind us—who was trying hard to pretend not to know what was going on with a fake cough—wouldn’t be able to hear the contents of our conversation.
He was taking care so that even someone who knew everything and kept his mouth shut wouldn’t hear.
Then that meant the words we were about to exchange from now on were truly confidential, something no outsider could ever know.
Staring straight at me from a slightly higher eye level, Yeonwoo hyung opened his mouth in a quiet whisper.
“…
I was certain from the beginning, circumstantially. What I needed was physical evidence or a confession. I suppose the gift Mr. Chun-yong gave me was more like confirmation of the kill.”
“Haha, really? I didn’t know that.”
“You don’t look very surprised, Mr. Chun-yong. Is it because you’re the one who prepared the gift?”
Yeah, I had figured the conversation would flow like this.
I gave a light shrug and pretended this situation didn’t bother me much.
“Well… I suppose it’s because I debuted through a survival show. Tsk, I went through so many strange things there.”
“The other two members didn’t seem like that.”
“That’s because those two are young. Young. They aren’t even adults yet, are they? For kids who haven’t even prepared for the college entrance exam, this would be a bit burdensome.”
“I see. Even though Mr. Chun-yong is only one year older than those two, and went through a survival show just as harsh as the entrance exam.”
“Haha, one year is a big difference. Do you know how many meals I’ve eaten in that time?”
The low-voiced exchange between us was taut.
With the most important fact placed between us, we circled around it, sharply probing one another.
It was something I could never have imagined back when I was Rex the Trash.
Using my head to extract the information I wanted from a conversation with none other than Yeonwoo hyung?
I guarantee it—back then, with that stupid brain soaked in alcohol, I would have failed miserably within two sentences and slammed my forehead into a club table.
It was fortunate that I’d returned with a clear mind, and that the current Yeonwoo hyung was younger than he had been back then.
In any case, the important thing wasn’t the fact that I was roughly keeping up with Yeonwoo hyung’s level of conversation right now.
Now that the simple probing was over.
I had to focus on parrying his attack and saying the most appropriate thing.
“Hmm…”
I felt his gaze sweep over me from the top of my head to the tips of my toes, taking in my neatly prepared appearance before the upcoming pre-recording.
And from that point on, it was a fierce exchange.
“How did you know?”
“…
Are you talking about Senior Juyeong?”
“Yes. No matter how stupid Juyeong was acting, he wouldn’t have done anything conspicuous in front of someone else. And it wouldn’t have been easy to provoke him so cleanly and make him confess in one go, either.”
I had already thought of an excuse for this part.
This wasn’t just anything; it was twisting the present with information from the future. I couldn’t afford to toss out something sloppy.
Lightly wetting my lips with my tongue, I rattled off the words I had prepared in advance, adding a bit of acting.
“…
At Catch Me Catch You, I happened to see Senior Juyeong exchanging messages. Senior Juyeong probably didn’t see me, though.”
“Ah, so you noticed then?”
“Yes. There were so many hearts in the messages that there was no way I wouldn’t know. And I also thought that the Senior Yeonwoo I’d spoken with wouldn’t tolerate that.”
“…
The time you mentioned a ‘better gift’ to me was also during Catch Me Catch You. You’re saying that the moment you saw it, you immediately thought you should use it in your deal with me?”
“Well, maybe it’s the judgment I developed thanks to the survival show.”
“Haha, I wonder… My thoughts are a little different.”
“…
Anyway, originally, if I met you today, I was only planning to inform you about that fact. It was a coincidence that Senior Juyeong said it directly like this.”
“A coincidence, you say. For a coincidence, the timing was too perfect.”
“Uh, the only person I’m in contact with from Sledix is Senior Yeonwoo. Should I show you my phone?”
“…
There’s no need.”
Yeonwoo hyung took a step back, making a gesture as if he needed to think about something for a moment, and I steadied my breathing as discreetly as I could.
The phone I’d been about to show Yeonwoo hyung had already been slipped back into my pocket.
Wow…
This is seriously intense.
This side of him was exactly why I’d included Yeonwoo hyung among the candidates for “the other bastards” in the first place.
Was there anyone who could act like this without having any information about that future, or anything equivalent to it?
No matter how much trouble he’d caused, he had terrifyingly cornered a member he’d lived with for days on end, and immediately afterward was coldly interrogating another person?
Really…
It was hard to even dare guess what kind of person he was, wasn’t it?
Jaeha hyung had a similarly inscrutable side to him, but that was only for the sake of the members, so I’d set that aside.
After living with our members, who were nothing but good-hearted, talking to someone who was this difficult to predict even when I knew what I knew was mentally taxing.
“Whew…”
That said, I couldn’t just focus on excuses and cleaning up after the fact.
Since things had turned out this way, I needed to get something I wanted, too.
The person in front of me was Yeonwoo hyung, around the same age as I had been back when I was Rex the Trash.
I had to remind myself of it again and again.
Unlike back then, when he truly had no rival in the entertainment industry, the current Yeonwoo hyung was still young.
If I thought about it carefully, was this brainwashing myself?
Anyway, well.
“I’m curious about something too, Senior.”
Taking a step toward Yeonwoo hyung, who had moved slightly away from me, I spoke first before he could answer.
“If it hadn’t been for the gift I gave you, what were you planning to do?”
“…
Oh.”
As Yeonwoo hyung’s short exclamation suggested, it was a question that could seem somewhat rude. It could sound like I was implying, “If I hadn’t set the stage for you like this, what could you possibly have done?”
But together with the current situation, this was a cross-check of the facts I knew—and the most important thing to determine whether Yeonwoo hyung really was one of “the other bastards.”
Previously, Senior Juyeong and Senior Billy’s dating scandal had broken exactly as it had.
Wasn’t that strange?
A person who had said he could make one of the main vocalists leave the group for Sledix’s sake knew about that fact, and yet the article had eventually come out?
This could be interpreted in two ways.
He couldn’t stop it.
Or, he deliberately didn’t stop it.
If he couldn’t stop it, that was better.
It would mean that even the meticulous Yeonwoo hyung, being human at the time, had things he couldn’t resolve, and that he’d grown from it.
But if he “didn’t” stop it?
If there was something he wanted to bury through that article, and he deliberately used it?
Up to this point, it was conjecture, but if that was the case…
He was a person who could even use his own members, so he could certainly use some guy from another group notorious as a malicious member.
And that would become a clue that Yeonwoo hyung might be one of “the other bastards.”
…
As much as possible, I did hope hyung had nothing to do with my accident.
“Did you know that if you take panic disorder medication with alcohol, it helps you sleep? But you won’t wake up for a long time, so you need to know how long you sleep.”
“How… do you know that? No, isn’t it strange that you know? The hospital definitely told me not to take it like that.”
“Mm? Rex, you should know by now. As for me, I only take it occasionally to focus on the stage and work… but you’re different.”
“Huh… That sounds like an insult.”
“If you’re going to keep living like this, at least know how to take care of your body.”
At the time, I had taken Yeonwoo hyung’s actions toward me as a certain degree of kindness and concern.
Even if that hadn’t been hyung’s intention, that was how it had been.
But if hyung had been involved in my family’s accident, and had said that to me because of it…
“……”
I clasped my hands behind my back and clenched my fist tightly.
I really hoped Yeonwoo hyung would answer well…
So that the situation wouldn’t spiral in a bad direction.
“Mm, what was I planning to do, you ask. What, huh…”
Perhaps he hadn’t expected me to ask a question in this situation, because a look of surprise appeared on Yeonwoo hyung’s face as he raised one eyebrow.
There was also pure curiosity, as if he was wondering what this kid was thinking, why he would ask such a thing.
“Well…”
His long fingers wandered briefly along the end of his finely shaped chin, and his lips, which had been twitching in thought, slowly parted.
Would hyung know that, to me, that moment felt like an eternity, and that I even considered whether I might have to punch him if things went badly?
“I don’t know if I should say this…”
Pandora’s box opened at the moment I had wished for.
“First, with my suspicions, I would have…”
The legendary box said to have been filled to the brim with every evil heart and disaster, tormenting humans with suffering from the moment it was opened.
So, at the moment that box opened…
“…
Probably beaten him up.”
It wasn’t strange for something rather serious to come out…
Wait. What did he say?
“Y-yes?”
“I said I probably would’ve beaten him up. With my fists? Juyeong may be like that, but he’s still an idol. I couldn’t hit him with something like a crowbar.”
“What…”
No, what on earth had this hyung just said with that strangely handsome face of his?
Unable to hide my bewilderment, I had no choice but to let my mouth fall open.
The answer I had expected wasn’t something like this.
Threatening him, like he’d shown in front of Logan and Hwaseong today. Making a deal with the reporters and Senior Juyeong.
Or, at the very least, watching to see how far he went!
Wasn’t that the kind of answer that should have come out?
But what did he mean, beat him up?
S-Senior Juyeong?
With his fists?
If he could use one, was he planning to beat him with a crowbar too?
At the utterly unexpected answer, my mouth began moving on its own.
This was close to force majeure.
“…
You mean, instead of talking to him separately like today, you would hit him?”
“Well, I would do what I did today too. That way, his mentality would be shaken a bit, and he’d listen to me.”
“But you talked about beating him up before that…?”
“Mm, there were some points where I’d thought Juyeong was quite impudent for a while. I ended up speaking honestly without meaning to.”
“No, that doesn’t match your image, Senior! If it were you, Senior, I thought you’d threaten him even worse than earlier, or deliberately let an article come out to tame him, or…”
“…
Deliberately let an article come out to tame him?”
“—Hup.”
The moment I met Yeonwoo hyung’s slightly sunken gaze, I clamped my mouth shut and squeezed my eyes closed.
Ah, damn it.
If Yeonwoo hyung belonged to “the other bastards,” I’d just accidentally said something that could be read as meaning I knew information from the future…
No, but why did he have to say he’d beat up a member?
I was so flustered my mouth moved on its own!
“Haha… Mr. Chun-yong.”
As I flinched and took a small step back, Yeonwoo hyung smiled and approached me again.
With strides that weren’t large, but were certain.
With that strange, handsome face that still made it impossible to tell what he was thinking, and an attitude brimming with confidence, as if he knew everything.
After he came right up in front of me, the sentence he whispered while gripping my shoulder was…
“An article about my person, of all people?”
It was a statement that reminded me what had originally been left at the very bottom of that damned Pandora’s box.