The Villainous Member Has Returned! Episode 59
An announcement regarding the interim ranking reveal arrived after a brief break.
The time allotted was short, around ten minutes, but the impact it had on the trainees was enormous.
That was because the words that came from Senior Choi Gaon’s mouth were short yet searing.
“The filming for the interim rankings, determined by official website votes and the first mission scores, is scheduled for this coming Wednesday! Now, this is the moment when the outline of the ‘real’ debut will be revealed.”
“…….”
“Everyone, shouldn’t you be smiling? The cameras are rolling right over there. Hmm?”
“Haha! Yes! That’s right! The interim ranking announcement, I’m so, so looking forward to it!”
“I wish it would come… quick- quickly… no, if only it could be pushed back a week…”
“Trainee Gong Minho, that’s an NG!”
“Eek! Yes! I’d love it if it were tomorrow!”
Following the filming that wrapped up in commotion, even afterward, the trainees couldn’t leave the grand hall and remained in their places, whispering amongst themselves.
After all, there was hardly anyone who didn’t know what interim rankings meant in an idol survival program, or what kind of filming this was.
Perhaps that went without saying.
“Interim rankings, I mean, it’s the interim rankings. Phew, maybe I should’ve asked my classmates to vote for me on the official website? I barely even went to school….”
“Jesus. How can I be this nervous when there’s no elimination!”
Even the eyes of Logan and Yuchan-hyung, who were still utterly ignorant of the idol survival ecosystem, were darting about wildly.
Ryota was probably the same, and Gaoyan was… still going, “Chun! Yong! Hyung!”
“God, Chunyong-hyung. Are you nervous too?”
“Huh?”
“You’re sweating a little. I guess even you get nervous thinking about the interim rankings?”
Perhaps I looked strange with my head fixed to one side, hurriedly avoiding Gaoyan, because Logan asked me that with an innocent face.
He had the wrong idea, but thanks to that, I managed to escape Gaoyan’s gaze.
A crane repaying kindness, no. A Liverpool boy repaying kindness. That was a bit funny.
“Oh, is it not nerves? Are you sick? If so, I can help….”
“Ah, no. I’m just nervous. It’s an important filming, after all.”
I stopped Logan, who was about to call over a staff member rushing about, and scratched my cheek.
Right. The interim ranking announcement was an important filming.
In terms of importance, it was probably above the competitions, perhaps second only to the final live broadcast.
Just as Senior Choi Gaon had said.
The moment when whether I could debut or not would be laid bare in stark relief.
Even though this was my second time, its importance hadn’t diminished one bit, nor was I not nervous.
It was just that I had too many things on my mind right now to truly feel it.
Before I knew it, I had no desire to even look in Liu Wei’s direction.
He was probably having some incomprehensible conversation with Li Mingshen, or standing still with an unreadable expression, or glaring at me.
Anyway.
The last time I checked, Liu Wei’s current rank was 3rd.
It had dropped a little from the 2nd place he held in the beginning, but it remained an unwaveringly stable ranking.
Of course, it was also true that being a multinational member, he was on a slight downward trend compared to the start.
Alright. Let’s roughly figure out the debut group taking shape right now.
“Logan, what was your rank the last time you checked?”
“What? Ah, my rank. Um, thankfully, maybe… 6th?”
“Oh, that’s the debut zone. Good for you.”
“The debut zone… I really never imagined it!”
Logan next to me was 6th, and Siu over there in the corner—being held in a headlock by Ji Hwasung with a slightly embarrassed expression—was 4th.
“Ah, all my classmates’ numbers got deleted! I can’t even contact them if I want to? This is bad.”
And Yuchan-hyung was 5th.
In contrast, I was….
Beep!
“Huh? Chunyong-hyung, that sound just now! I heard it during practice too. Was that from your smartphone—.”
“Ah, no.”
— X: You’re 7th 7th 7th 7th you bastard!!
— X: Ah, fucking lucky seven
— X: Anyway, do you maybe not read that… goal window? Huh?
— X: In the current goal there? Maybe?
— X: —- — X: Hey you bastard!! Take care of your own damn business, come on!!
“Chunyong-hyung? What is it?”
“Ah, it’s just… a mobile game notification. I downloaded it before the survival started, but for some reason it won’t delete. Haha!”
“Wow. Let’s ask the app store. That happened to me once before too. They’ll help you delete it right away.”
I ignored X, who was still screaming in the chat window, and stuffed my phone into my pocket.
Right.
Contrary to the goal window’s conditions, my current rank was 7th. I wanted to excuse it by saying it couldn’t be helped if I wanted to prevent Logan from getting eliminated, but…
Now that the interim ranking announcement had crept up on me, I felt anxious too.
“Hmm.”
I looked over at the (former) Arrows members sprawled about here and there in the grand hall, laughing heartily, then at Logan in front of me, and let out a hollow laugh.
If only I could somehow push Liu Wei aside and debut with these members…
I felt like it would be quite a sight.
Thanks to X’s messages and those faces, the anxiety that had been creeping up from my toes subsided slightly.
Right. Wasn’t it absurd to hope the Atonement Express would be a comfortable ride?
Now it all depended on how I untangled the problems before me.
The stage, and the Liu Wei matter. I couldn’t afford to lose either.
And for right now…
I spoke cheerfully to Logan, who was blankly staring at his empty Outgram account.
“Logan. The filming’s over now, so let’s go to the practice room.”
“Huh, already? It seems like everyone is still talking—.”
“No, look. Everyone’s taking photos.”
“…Huh. They really are?”
“Yeah. They said live broadcasts are only at set times, but they never said when we could start operating our accounts.”
In other words.
“…So the moment we received our smartphones, we could start immediately? Understood. But why are we going to the practice room?”
“Hey, you still don’t get it?”
I grabbed the shoulder of Logan, who was looking at me with a slightly bewildered expression, and broke into a grin.
“The lighting is much better there.”
Whether taking photos, doing live broadcasts, or whatever.
If you’re a trainee, it’s only right to do it in the practice room.
“…Holy.”
Whether Logan looked greatly impressed or not, I took out the phone I had put in my pocket earlier and checked my Outgram account and password. [Springyong_TT]
The account I used before was something like T-Rex, so it was embarrassing to post. This one was a bit better.
“…Whew.”
Let’s do something suitable for raising my rank.
* * *
“I’m glad we pushed back the initial live broadcast schedule, really. This is how we can manage the kids.”
Lee Hyeonjeong muttered as she crawled through the Targeting Star trainees’ Outgram feeds.
“Trainee Gong Minho already has six posts, Tsubasa has photos of landscapes he likes… wait, what is this now. Ha Juna. Ha Juna?”
“Yes, yes Writer-nim!”
Lee Hyeonjeong, who had urgently called the youngest writer, waved her hand about as if annoyed and spoke quickly.
“Let’s do just one broadcast at the dorm. Tell them not to have overly personal conversations with fans in the Outgram comments. Especially Trainee Kim Juan.”
“Uh, how personal?”
“Things like how many hours a day you practice on Targeting Star, when you can use your phone, what came out for meals, and so on.”
“…They’re talking about that with fans?”
“Yes. I really don’t know what they’re thinking. We need to add this to the prohibited items too.”
“Yes. I think blocking Outgram for about 6 hours should do. I’ll go broadcast it.”
“Yes, thank you. I need to check a bit more.”
Watching the youngest writer’s back as she hurried to the broadcast room, Hyeonjeong let out a light sigh.
Originally, not only she but also PD Ju Cheolyeong should have been sitting here.
However, that was how broadcasting stations were.
The assistant director heard what was said by day, the lighting department heard what was said by night.
And rumors that flowed in that way naturally tended to rise upward.
“Ju Cheolyeong, you crazy bastard!! Where, where do you think you are picking a fight with the investor side? Are you sane? Huh? Do you think money grows from the ground? You want to quit broadcasting?”
The moment Director Shin Giho learned that Ju-PD had slipped from his grasp, his phone calls went straight to the chief PD.
Wasn’t there a problem with advertisements; then was President Do Jaechan taking over investment matters from now on?
What exactly was the story with that side; picking a fight with Shin Giho, who brought in investors without a plan, and so on.
With the major event of the interim ranking announcement filming looming, every staff member felt like they were walking on thin ice.
‘He’s gone to see the chief PD again. Even though he knows he won’t listen…’
Recalling the chief PD’s stubbornness, Lee Hyeonjeong lightly pressed her forehead and turned her eyes back to her phone.
Liu Wei’s feed, which could be considered at the center of this mess, filled her screen.
Two half-body photos with a natural mood that looked like someone else had taken them.
And beneath the photos, a short phrase written in his native language, Chinese.
“It’s rather… ordinary, more than I thought.”
Reading the auto-translated text on Outgram, [I am Liu Wei from China, appearing on
However, her eyes remained ice-cold.
‘Trainee Liu Wei and Director Shin Giho stepped in to try to get Trainee Logan eliminated. And now the target is…’
Her finger tapped another trainee’s account and entered the feed.
Only a single post had been uploaded. [Springyong_TT]
It was Kim Chunyong’s account.
‘They’re looking into every possible way to get him eliminated. Ju-PD will probably try to cover for him since he’s a trainee he favors, but that won’t be easy.’
At first, Lee Hyeonjeong too had thought Director Shin Giho’s insistence was a natural act of pushing a preferred trainee from the investor side.
When she heard that getting Logan eliminated stemmed from that, she had wondered, “Do they have to go this far?”
But now, since that wasn’t working out, they were scheming to eliminate another trainee.
“Phew. Ruthless, so ruthless.”
Lee Hyeonjeong didn’t even try to stop the sigh that escaped her and tapped randomly on her phone.
There wouldn’t be much change even if Kim Chunyong did well in the current situation, but she wanted to see how he was doing anyway.
However.
“…Huh?”
She opened her eyes wide and checked Kim Chunyong’s post over and over.
Hair that had grown out during the survival and was tied up slightly. She wondered if it was too sharp, but regardless, a handsome and neat face.
Comfortable practice training wear that showed off the advantages of his physique well.
It was the appearance of a trainee with nothing particularly special, but the post’s special point lay elsewhere.
“…A video?”
“For now, since it’s the first time, wouldn’t it be fastest to pick a handsome photo and upload one? And slap on a bunch of tags.”
“Or, maybe it’d be good to take photos together and upload them. With the kids who have high ranks…”
“…Should I go ask Yuchan-hyung?”
Everyone thought they needed to upload their first post well right away, but they hadn’t thought deeply about the form of that post.
Perhaps because of the rule that “live broadcasts are only at set times.”
They couldn’t even think of the idea that they could film videos.
Compared to those trainees, Kim Chunyong was…
Even though most of his followers were people who had rushed in to curse him out, an experienced idol was still an idol.
The toxic member Kim Chunyong had quite a history with Outgram.
After all, wasn’t Kim Chunyong the very person who had targeted the loophole in the rules during the first mentor evaluation?
— “Ah, can you see me well? Hello, I am Trainee Kim Chunyong, appearing on
Kim Chunyong lightly waved his hand toward his phone and continued speaking with a bright smile.
— “This is my first time meeting you Star Shooters and Outgram users through this platform called Outgram! Since it’s somehow my first post, I wanted to make it a bit special, so…”
The phone briefly moved away from Kim Chunyong’s hand, then was fixed somewhere, revealing his full body.
— “I thought I’d show you the dance I performed during one of
“Oh my… he thought of all this?”
Without even realizing the corners of her lips were curling up, Lee Hyeonjeong turned up the volume on Kim Chunyong’s Outgram video.
Before she knew it, the first verse of the dance he had performed with Choi Geonyeong was slowly playing in the video.
— “Thanks to Dancer Choi Geonyeong of Airik, I really had a great experience. And since I made mistakes here and there in the video a fan took of us there, haha. I wanted to show you a better version.”
— “Still, thank you for capturing my lacking self so wonderfully. This is Kim Chunyong!”
Even with just this, it was a first post worthy of admiration.
The flawless dance that followed immediately after, and the sensibility of subtly mentioning the “mission,” one of the core formats of the program he was appearing on.
“If he had worked in an office, he would’ve been very popular, really…?”
The reality was the exact opposite of Lee Hyeonjeong’s assumption, but whatever.
Anyway, the truly admirable part wasn’t that.
The tags Kim Chunyong put on his post were only three. The official Targeting Star account and his own account.
And one more was….
— “This bas—, no. This idol trainee friend tagged me, right? We danced together in Hongdae that time. So well, I thought I’d follow along and dance to the dance this friend, ah! Lee Hoejin! I said I got it! Ahem, this friend danced. Like a challenge? That kind of thing.”
The video where Choi Geonyeong, who already had countless followers, tagged Kim Chunyong’s Outgram account and uploaded a dance cover quickly went viral.
[The trainee whose dance Choi Geonyeong covered], [That Hongdae street dance guy], [Hongdae street trainee = blindfold guy]. Furthermore, [The trainee Jindasol asked to join his crew].
The right path that only those who had walked it before could choose to take.
Kim Chunyong was already walking briskly toward that place.
Ju Cheolyeong’s eyes had not been wrong.
Kim Chunyong had starpower.
“…What a waste.”
Without realizing it, Lee Hyeonjeong muttered and replayed Kim Chunyong’s video once more.
That it was a waste for him to be pushed out by the adults’ petty politics.
…Murmuring that there must surely be some way.