The Idol Who Returned from Hell Chapter 43

The filming location for 〈Idol Stove League Season 2〉 was worth the massive budget that went into it.

I never imagined there would even be a professional medical facility inside this dormitory.

“……”

“Haha, don’t glare at me so intensely.”

Then don’t look like someone who deserves to be glared at.

Seong-hwi, lying on the patient bed, let out the same laugh as always.

His swollen ankle had subsided a little.

Fortunately, according to the doctor, it was a mild ankle sprain. There was just inflammation in the ligament, but it hadn’t ruptured.

At least we avoided the worst-case scenario.

But the pain would last for several days, and the diagnosis came with instructions to avoid putting too much strain on the ankle for the time being.

In short, the situation had arrived where he couldn’t perform the dance break choreography he had devised overnight.

I sat down on the chair placed next to the bed.

“What about the other guys?”

“They’re practicing.”

“That’s good, at least they’re working hard at practice.”

“……You know too, don’t you? That we have to change our choreography.”

Seong-hwi’s expression hardened at my words.

The hand resting on his knee trembled slightly.

“I obviously know you made an effort in your own way. You stayed up all night creating it while ignoring even my words. But performing the original choreography on stage with that ankle condition is impossible.”

“I feel so ashamed when you put it like that.”

“Of course you should, it’s not like I never told you to rest.”

I recalled what Cerberus had said last night.

If he’s definitely hiding something.

I have no choice but to ask about it directly.

“Can I ask you honestly?”

“……About what?”

“Why you’ve been acting like this.”

“Ah, ah. I did expect that Brother Si-hwan would ask me that question someday. I just never imagined I’d hear it in a hospital room like this.”

Seong-hwi laughed briefly in a hollow way and gently rubbed his ankle wrapped in bandages.

“How can even the injured area be exactly the same.”

“You hurt your left ankle before too?”

“Two years ago.”

Seong-hwi’s nose wrinkled slightly as if unpleasant memories had surfaced.

After letting silence flow, he seemed to have made up his mind to tell his story and looked straight at me while opening his mouth.

“Brother Si-hwan. Does my behavior look wrong to you too?”

“Specifically what?”

“We came here to prove ourselves, didn’t we. If we made the decision to appear on a survival show, we should approach it with appropriate resolve. Naturally, we should aim to successfully complete every stage. We should raise our recognition enough to survive the ranking announcements. Didn’t we come here to debut?”

Not a single word of that was wrong.

If they had appeared on a survival show like this despite other paths to debut existing, this kind of competitive spirit should naturally be there.

But.

“But that doesn’t mean the mindset of trying to do everything by yourself is right.”

“Haha, I thought you’d say that. People all have different living environments, so you probably don’t know the internal agency situation either.”

No, I know better than anyone.

I had to endure that awful trainee life for 6 years.

But since I couldn’t say this outright, I silently continued listening to Seong-hwi’s story.

“I thought the same way as you at first. That being an idol isn’t something you do alone. That it’s important to work as a team and match each other. I spent my X2 trainee days thinking like that.”

Seong-hwi’s hand resting on his knee gradually began to clench into a fist.

“I’ve never properly attended school either. I started my social life as a trainee without even graduating middle school. Looking around, everyone was older than me, taller than me, and much better skilled too, you know? So with naive thoughts, I figured ‘It must be natural for me to yield.'”

Considering that Seong-hwi is 20 years old now, he became a trainee around the same time as me.

However, unlike the previous life’s Ryu Si-hwan who received concentrated support from his casting agency, there was a high possibility that Seong-hwi, who entered a major agency, couldn’t receive such treatment.

“If those older trainees had been kind, it might have been different. But the hazing was so severe that I couldn’t even get the parts I should have received, and they all went to the other trainees instead. During monthly evaluation periods when we lived together, I always had to use the bathroom last. When I asked where I should sleep, they told me to sleep anywhere on the floor. It was really a continuous ordeal. I seriously considered just throwing it all away and not becoming an entertainer.”

Stories about hazing naturally arising among trainees were quite familiar.

It was because Black Hash Entertainment was well-managed both internally and externally, but thinking about old stories I’d heard through acquaintances, Seong-hwi’s words resonated with me.

Even X2, which wasn’t a small agency but a mega-corporation, was like that.

I spoke quietly while looking at Seong-hwi’s still-trembling hand.

“But you didn’t leave and endured it.”

“Haha, I did! I don’t know what kind of courage I had back then to think I could endure it, but somehow I persevered. Even though after practice ended I couldn’t drink water and had to do all the cleaning by myself, I don’t know what made me think it was okay. Ah, those trainees I mentioned earlier debuted long ago. They’re quite famous. They even won Popularity Award of the Year the year before last or this year.”

If it’s a male idol group that was popular two years ago…… it must be Zephyr.

Learning that idols who had reached such top-tier status had committed such misdeeds in the past made me feel inwardly disillusioned.

They’re all people who need to receive rehabilitation education in hell.

“So those trainees debuted and left the trainee dorm, and new kids came in. I suddenly became a senior when I didn’t know anything. When the team leader said ‘Now you’re a senior so do well,’ I had just one thought. I wanted to let the kids who came under me practice as happily as possible.”

“That’s admirable.”

“Mixing in praise in the middle makes me even more embarrassed. It’s not like I gave them my liver and gallbladder or anything. I just let them use the bathroom on time, let them sleep on beds instead of the floor. I just tried to protect basic rights as much as possible.”

Up to this point, I couldn’t see Seong-hwi’s current appearance at all.

Rather, it seemed like he had prevented other juniors from experiencing the situations he had gone through.

What on earth had happened to make him show such bitter eyes?

“About two years ago, orders came down to select a debut group again. Nine juniors including me entered the debut group and received tests for about four months. Among the selected kids were some I had gotten quite close with. We said that whatever results came out, we’d do our best. If it had been as easy as saying it, things wouldn’t have reached this point.”

The throbbing of his injured ankle seemed to flare up again as Seong-hwi’s mouth twisted strangely.

“The final monthly evaluation before the debut group announcement had an assigned song that was too difficult. Everyone was wracking their brains about how to handle it, when one kid said this.”

The temperature in the air-conditioned hospital room seemed to suddenly drop.

“He said he wanted to debut. He didn’t know what the rest of us would think, but he wanted to somehow get a decent part from this difficult song and definitely debut. Isn’t it obvious? Everyone felt the same way. They wanted to win. They became trainees because they wanted to debut, not because they wanted to roll into this hell to fail. Everyone would have the same feelings, so who would openly object to those words? Right?”

“……What did you do?”

“Me?”

Seong-hwi forced out a smile.

To the point where the muscles in his gaunt face trembled.

“I only chose to do stupid things. I volunteered and said this. Then I’ll cover all the parts you guys can’t handle. We’re one team. As one team, we need to create a good stage, so I’ll try my best. Really, really stupid, wasn’t it?”

I couldn’t give any answer. No, it would be more accurate to say I couldn’t.

Looking at him speak with such empty eyes felt like talking to a dead soul.

And I knew that hollow words of comfort wouldn’t work on such a soul.

I could only listen silently.

“So I practiced like crazy until the monthly evaluation. Like the old days when I was trampled by the older trainees, I didn’t sleep, didn’t go to the bathroom, just slept on the practice room floor. Staying up every night made me vomit when I tried to force myself to eat. I knew it myself. That it really wasn’t working. That even if I practiced this movement a thousand times, I couldn’t do it. But what could I do? I had made a promise with the kids. How could I take it back now?”

The tightly clenched fist slowly relaxed.

“Then two days before the monthly evaluation, my ankle completely gave out. This very ankle. Pushing myself continuously made the ligament snap.”

“……What happened with the monthly evaluation?”

“The monthly evaluation? I couldn’t even take it. While I was lying in a hospital room like this in a dazed state waiting for the debut group announcement, what the team leader said to me is still vividly remembered.”

Seong-hwi pulled his body toward me and whispered quietly.

“He asked why I had only shown useless consideration. He said if I had given up on the other kids and just properly taken care of my own parts, I definitely could have debuted, so why did I do such foolish things.”

Now hollow laughter came out in short bursts mixed into his words.

“Ha, haha! You know what’s really funny? That kid who said he definitely wanted to debut? He ended up debuting. He apparently took one easy part and handled it smoothly. And what he said to me later was ‘Thanks for sacrificing yourself.’ Because I dropped out while taking an impossible part, he could naturally move up. Haha! Really, really funny, isn’t it?”

Seong-hwi laughed loudly, his thin shoulders shaking.

The IV line stuck in his forearm swayed frantically back and forth.

“That’s when I understood. That sentimental feelings are a luxury on this scene. In the end, everyone only thinks about themselves, there’s no room to look after others. It’s just lonely. You have to do everything alone. If you really want to achieve something, you have no choice but to seize it with your own strength. Trust? It just comes back to stab you in the back. If you really want to debut, you have to walk alone.”

“So that’s why you tried to handle everything alone in the first team battle and this time too?”

“Brother Si-hwan, I can’t see anything in front of me now. Every stage only has meaning if you win, and to win, you can’t trust others. I can do it myself. If I take charge, I can definitely create a perfect stage, so why should I yield? I’m saying I don’t want to hear that I’m stupid ever again.”

Seong-hwi, who had been pouring out words in an intense tone, briefly inhaled and looked at me.

“……In that context, I said you seemed interesting.”

The words Seong-hwi habitually said whenever he looked at me. That it would be interesting.

I had thought it was just some trivial provocation before, but now I understood the meaning a little.

“You said it was interesting because I seemed different from you?”

“You really are different. You’re never alone wherever you go. Even though you have such tremendous capabilities by yourself, you yield to others. You yielded the center position, and if the judges hadn’t intervened, you were thinking of easily giving up your parts too. Why do you still manage to create successful stages in the end? I was so curious about that. Why? What’s the principle?”

I didn’t have any brilliant answer to throw back at that question.

“Even if you ask me like that, there’s nothing special about it.”

“If there’s nothing special?”

“I’m not much different from you. I just want to hear people’s cheers. I want to create a stage worth receiving applause. That’s all.”

“That’s really all?”

“Of course.”

I spoke decisively.

In the end, it was just as Cerberus had said.

Seong-hwi wasn’t fundamentally a bad person either.

He was just gnawing at himself because of trauma that had remained too deeply in his mind.

“I’m the same as you too. I want to debut. I definitely want to win this survival show and become an idol that everyone knows. I always live thinking this.”

What I can do for him is simple.

Help him break free from the memories where trauma remains strong.

If I show him with his own eyes that completely different results can occur even in similar situations, Seong-hwi will definitely change too.

“Me, you, and the other trainees here are all the same. So sometimes it’s okay to put down the burden on your shoulders, that’s what I’m saying.”

“……That’s not something that can easily—”

“I know, considering the experiences you’ve had, giving trust to others isn’t something that can be done at once. But Hwi.”

I stood up from the chair and looked straight into Seong-hwi’s empty eyes.

“Since you brought me to the same team with your own hands, you can trust me, right?”

“Ha, haha……”

Receiving my gaze, Seong-hwi laughed differently than before.

“You really are an interesting person no matter when I look at you.”