The Idol Who Returned from Hell Chapter 201

“……So I thought of these five concepts in total, what do you think?”

To be honest, I was a little surprised.

Of course, I already knew that Yu Ha-woon had high creativity and liked thinking about various things.

But I didn’t expect him to organize such diverse genre concepts in such a short time.

“Ha-woon, did you eat meals and only think about the solo concert?”

“I do comment monitoring too! The domestic fans seemed to have very disappointed feelings, so I kept brainstorming solo concert ideas during our break.”

“We should have filmed this and uploaded it as a vlog.”

Seong-hwi, a thorough slave to capital and cameras, was eagerly craving content even in this situation.

I chuckled at him and then patted the youngest’s shoulder.

“I personally think all 5 have clear themes, which is good. Should we decide which one’s best by majority vote?”

“Of course! We’ve always been a fair group, right? Living in a democratic country means we have to decide everything democratically.”

“……Sometimes we just did whatever you wanted, brother.”

“Tsk! You shouldn’t add those kinds of comments in this situation!”

Ma Si-hyeok was subtly delivering a fact attack to Kang Seon-woo.

After receiving my praise, Yu Ha-woon’s eyes sparkled as he got up from his seat.

“I’ll go get paper and pens!”

And so we each received one sheet of paper and one pen.

Watching this scene, somehow bad memories seemed to be surfacing.

{It’s similar to the moment Master ended up wearing that pink outfit. You wrote down which outfit you liked just like this and submitted it.}

‘You don’t need to remember such details.’

{What can I do? My brain is just too smart, you know?}

While Cerberus arrogantly raised his head, I quickly wrote down one concept and submitted it to Yu Ha-woon.

“Then I’ll start counting the votes now!”

After reading through the papers we had written one by one, Yu Ha-woon announced the finally selected concept.

“With a total of 3 votes, CENTIX’s first solo concert concept has been decided as ‘Game’!”

“Aw, too bad. I thought the fairy tale concept wasn’t bad either.”

“We can do that for a later concert! There’s always next time.”

The youngest cheerfully comforted Chae Ha-ru.

Now that our meeting was finished, all that remained was to quickly deliver it to the higher-ups.

I called the manager and told him about the decided matters.

“I told you to rest, but you didn’t rest and worked again?”

“You already knew from the moment you handed over the setlist composition plan. I think I mentioned it before.”

“Still, I meant to take it easy.”

“This is what the members want to do most anyway. It’s okay.”

With the final words that he would deliver the solo concert concept to the planning director, the call with the manager ended.

Returning to the kitchen, some tremendous discussion was in progress again.

“Shouldn’t we give some impact during the solo songs?”

“Honestly, lifts are a bit clichéd. Fans can predict them easily enough.”

“But we can’t just drop from the sky, right?”

“Hmm.”

The opinion had converged toward showing all the solo songs that had been included in our first full album.

And everyone seemed to be seriously considering how to construct those stages.

“From the sky.”

Seeing the fanatical light in Seong-hwi’s eyes made me feel uneasy.

“Wouldn’t it be possible to hang from wires and fly around?”

“Th-that sounds scary, Brother!”

“Who said you had to do it? This kind of entrance should be for my solo stage.”

“That’s not fair!”

Yu Ha-woon, who had been unilaterally teased, fought back with a stronger opinion.

“If brother is just going to come down from the stage on wires, then I’ll fly from the middle of the audience to the stage.”

“Oh, that’s pretty good too? Thanks for the idea.”

“No, why are you taking this and calling it good again!”

‘Here we go again.’

The moment I slightly shook my head, I made eye contact with Chae Ha-ru, who had been watching this scene with a similar expression.

And even though we didn’t say anything, we both got up from our seats at the same time.

“Let’s think about the setlist in the room.”

“I agree.”

* * *

MILLENNIUM had been in a slightly dejected state from before.

Anyone who had followed idols for a while would understand.

There are many more spacious venues overseas than in Korea, and foreigners’ ticket power is also strong, so considerable profits can be made.

Especially for groups made through survival programs, the agency’s determination to extract maximum efficiency within a set period is inevitably present behind the scenes.

When news of CENTIX’s Japan arena tour first came out, domestic MILLENNIUM had been composed about it.

Overseas tours are natural for my kids’ stable activities.

But they also had hopes that a concert would be held domestically first before going overseas.

So it was impossible not to have disappointed feelings.

The most painful time was when arena tour videos were released one by one.

Seeing CENTIX really excitedly interacting with the audience and enjoying the stage, the desire to be in such a place only grew stronger.

Some MILLENNIUM who couldn’t keep such wishes to themselves even wrote to Rave Entertainment with their practiced hand movements.

Letters mixed with lamentations like ‘please think about Korean fans too.’

Of course, MILLENNIUM had no way of knowing that Ryu Si-hwan and the other members were enthusiastically preparing for a solo concert.

So when sudden teaser images were uploaded in the middle of February, countless question marks were generated.

―????? What is this all of a sudden?

―What, are we suddenly getting a new song?

―It definitely doesn’t seem like a new song vibe…… How long has it been since these kids released their full album anyway

―There’s no kind Conan to interpret the uploaded video?

A 30-second short video was uploaded simultaneously to all of CENTIX’s official SNS accounts.

[Wanna Play With Us?]

A simple sentence asking ‘Won’t you play with us?’

The letters that had appeared on the black screen flickered and disappeared, and suddenly cheerful BGM played.

An effect flashed as if something was falling frantically from the black sky above.

At the same time, a doll standing below picked up some unknown small shadow.

At that moment, the shadow that had been an ordinary body type doubled in size, and the moment it jumped once, the black sky came crashing down.

As black debris poured down, a yellow ball rolled in from the edge of the screen.

And like a vacuum cleaner, it sucked up the debris and exited to the opposite side of the screen.

[Show Upcoming: March]

With subtitles saying a show was scheduled for March, the video abruptly cut off and ended.

It felt like many messages were hidden, but it was difficult to figure out immediately.

While the vast majority of MILLENNIUM were confused by this completely unexpected post, a very small number of people analyzed the meaning of this video.

[For a gaming nerd like me, it was all easy]

At the beginning, the BGM and the afterimage of something falling from the sky → Tetris

Someone picking up a mushroom shape and their body getting bigger → Super Mario

Sucking up debris → Pac-Man

I can tell what these are but I don’t know what the message is ㅇㅅㅇ…

―Ah, so they were all retro games

―But why did they suddenly show these game scenes and upload a 30-second video?

―They said a show is prepared for March, but didn’t the kids’ Japan activities already end?

└Yeah, they ended ages ago

└Then what? It definitely can’t be a comeback

└Lmao. If it’s a comeback, we’d have to set fire to the Rave building. No matter how money-crazed these bastards are, if they work the kids like this, we’d have to kill them all

―Japan activities are over and it’s not a comeback, so doesn’t that leave only one possibility?

└Whoa, no way no way no way

└Is something big really coming? Something big???

└Hey, really? Domestic solo concert?

A show is being held in March.

MILLENNIUM who thought about this meaning from various angles reached one conclusion.

The domestic solo concert they had been talking about for so long might really be happening.

If it’s not an overseas performance and not a comeback, the only remaining major event is a concert.

A few days after the first teaser was released.

An official poster that definitively nailed down the date appeared.

―Kids kids kids, something big really came! March 11th solo concert!!! (photo) (link)

└Wow, is this real? Did the lamentations the fans sent really succeed?

└That doesn’t quite make sense LOL. The kids probably wanted to perform with domestic fans right after finishing the Japan tour

└No, please rest a bit. If it’s like this, aren’t they preparing for a solo concert right after coming back from Japan?

└These addicts, I can’t let this slide. I’ll have to go to the solo concert and scold them with love

―Lol. Looking at the poster theme, it’s definitely a game concept! (photo)

└The kids standing in that 64-bit feeling, why is it so cute

└I had a feeling from when Tetris and Super Mario came out, but they really seem to have planned it with a retro game concept

└There’s definitely going to be special stages, right? Ah, I’m so excited

―Are the ticketing dates out too?

└Yeah, MILLENNIUM 1st generation exclusive opens one day earlier than usual (photo)

└Ha, I’ve really been holding on just for this day. Please, goddess of luck, I don’t care about anything else, please hold my hand on this day, please, I’m begging you like this

└For you all who might get completely shut out, they’re also selling online live streaming tickets hehe… (link)

└Ah, absolutely no~ I already watched the fan meeting like that so I’ll never want to watch it online again~ I’m definitely going to the venue~

└Who’s going to send you? lol

└Shut up

Even though the official poster had only been up for a short time, the feeling that it would already be a bloody ticketing battle was strongly emerging.

Since it’s a concert held at Gocheok Dome, the capacity would be 20,000 people.

Every MILLENNIUM was setting their goal as breaking through this tremendous competition and getting into the lucky 20,000.

In a situation where pressure about ticketing was intensely building, another surprise event came out.

[Random Gatcha Event: Who will be the selected ones?]

Specifically, during the ticketing process, 1,000 people who book certain seat numbers would receive ‘special gacha gifts.’

Nothing else was revealed about what criteria this would be based on or what the gifts would be.

However, MILLENNIUM already knew the type of these surprise gifts well.

―Remember the bracelet gift through scratch tickets at the fan meeting? This time it’s a solo concert, so there’s a 100% chance something crazier than bracelets will come out

└Ah lol I deliberately got 3rd place in that scratch ticket so I could win this one. It’s definitely not that I had bad luck

―So now we have to hope to get seats and also hope to win that lottery? It’s really too intense

└CENTIX, these mischievous guys didn’t bring the game concept for nothing…… They definitely planned this to torture us with hope

Regardless of everyone’s outcries, time passed.

And CENTIX’s solo concert reservation date arrived in the blink of an eye.

It was the decisive moment.