Idol Hides His Military Service

"Install a ring, and I run a Royal Rumble."

"What?"

Seo Ryujin had thought she’d gotten used to it enough that no matter what Lee Sion blurted out, she wouldn’t be startled anymore—but Sion lightly cleared that “immunity” again.

From the moment they started heading back after visiting DARE; ON’s showcase, Sion had been oddly excited.

Even though a whole day had passed, seeing her still this hyped left Ryujin feeling half unease, half relief.

Lately, when Sion was seriously thinking something through, Ryujin knew—even if nobody else did—so she’d been keeping an eye on her.

But now that Sion had returned to her usual self, Ryujin couldn’t help thinking maybe she’d just been bored.

Even right now, in the middle of a meeting about the stage they’d show at the guerrilla concert, Sion was suddenly saying they should set up a ring.

"What’s a Royal Rumble?"

"Ah···you don’t know? That’s basically a bloodbath for real men."

"We’re not men, Sion."

"That’s not the point. Listen. I get up in the ring and wait, and then you, Ayeon, Gahyeon, and Yuri come up one by one."

"Come up and do what?"

"Throw hands."

As soon as she finished, Sion got excited and started whipping her fists through the air—whoosh, whoosh.

'That ingrown-toenail bitch.'

Ryujin couldn’t help getting a headache just watching her.

How could one person come up with something new to torment Ryujin every single day?

Once, Ryujin had seen a post online that said ingrown toenails were a divine punishment God had dropped on humanity. She couldn’t help thinking that if an ingrown toenail were a person, it would be Lee Sion.

On the outside, Sion looked like a gift—like an angel had dropped her straight from heaven. But the nature hidden underneath? It wouldn’t be an exaggeration to say it was something a devil made to tempt people.

Smack.

"Keek!"

And exorcising that devil was Ryujin’s job.

She brought her hand down hard on Sion’s back—Sion had been all hyped, telling Shinyu that Ryujin would definitely K.O. her with one punch—and “exorcised” the devil in one clean hit. Then she tried to steer the meeting back onto a normal track.

"We’ve got about three songs that make sense for the concert. Our debut song, Something’s About to Start, and Don’t Blink, and lastly, Only You, the fan song Shinyu made."

When Ryujin listed the three titles, everyone nodded in agreement—except Sion, who was still clutching at her back, whining dramatically over a spot she /N_o_v_e_l_i_g_h_t/ couldn’t even reach.

"If you add prep time and talking for each song, that’s five minutes per song. So we need at least three more songs."

Like Ayeon added, the important thing right now was choosing three more songs to show the audience within the thirty minutes Iam had been given.

"Watching DARE; ON’s showcase today, I thought one of them should be ‘Spotlight.’"

"Yeah. If we try to prep a brand-new song right now, it’ll take way too much time. Spotlight is something we’ve already done, so we can get it ready fast."

"Then when we do Spotlight this time, make Yuri the center! Ayeon-chan and Sion-chan already did it!"

Spotlight.

It really was a perfect pick—so perfect nobody could reasonably object to Iam singing it.

"Hydra Venom would be a bad idea, right?"

"That probably wouldn’t be good. We already did it on broadcast, and since the original song is VYNNIA’s, it doesn’t fit Iam’s guerrilla concert."

Other ideas came up too—Hydra Venom from the competition, or maybe one of Raon’s songs—but the answer came back that it would feel too repetitive, which was a shame.

'This isn’t easy.'

Ryujin realized all over again that putting together a set list for a thirty-minute guerrilla concert— not even a full three-hour concert—could be this hard.

Part of it was that they didn’t have many songs to begin with. And building a stage that could satisfy the people who came to watch, while also considering what would work within that short time, was never going to be easy.

"Then the Royal Rumble is—!"

"No, it’s not!"

The moment Ryujin showed even a hint of worry, Sion—the Royal Rumble demon—jerked her chin up again.

Ryujin shut her down right away, but she still couldn’t help wondering if Sion was right that they needed some kind of performance.

Something that would grab people’s attention hard without wrecking the concert’s mood.

"Ah, right—when it comes to the things we need for the stage, who do we ask?"

"Hm?"

While Ryujin and the others were agonizing over the concert structure, Shinyu spoke up.

"Normally we’d tell PD Raon and ask, but since she isn’t here, I don’t know who we’re supposed to talk to."

"Right. Then do we tell the CEO?"

From stage outfits, to the props and equipment they needed, to coordinating the backup dancers’ schedules—

There had been so many things, and so many different kinds of things, to prepare for the last round of Three Kingdoms that they needed someone in the middle to organize it all and help.

And that role had usually been Raon, but with her gone, they didn’t really have anyone to ask—so Ryujin wondered if she should talk to CEO Kim Sanghyeok, at least.

Normally it wouldn’t be something you took to the CEO, but—

—It’ll actually be harder to control things if you all talk to the staff one by one, so while PD Raon is gone, just tell me what you need.

Since he’d already told them in advance to come directly to him if they needed anything, Ryujin was planning to go to his office.

"Let’s go together. If he hears my Royal Rumble plan, he’ll definitely approve it."

"Listen to you. I swear he goes too easy on you."

As Ryujin moved to leave the practice room and head for the CEO’s office, Sion stuck close, making a huge fuss about how she was going to report her Royal Rumble plan no matter what. Ryujin bickered back the whole way.

***

'A legal chance to crush the rebels.'

Brrrrrr! Ha!

In my mind’s eye, I could already see it—my loud entrance theme blasting as I stepped into a square ring and delivered some proper discipline to the members who’d been treating me like I was nothing lately, starting with Ryujin.

First, a piledriver on Ryujin, the rebel leader.

A powerbomb for Ayeon.

Yuri had a wicked mouth, so a chokeslam.

Gahyeon was heavy, so hard to lift—so I’d finish with a dropkick.

WWE Champion Lee Sion.

It was a theme that fit a guerrilla concert perfectly, no matter who looked at it.

Of course, the pack of wicked rebels led by Ryujin was against it—maybe because they knew they’d be the ones getting it.

But if it was CEO Kim Sanghyeok, the light and salt of KJ Entertainment, he would definitely understand my grand plan.

'It’s gotten clearer.'

Normally my head was too messy for me to come up with a brilliant plan like this, but I was back to my original condition now.

—I think I wanted to see people smiling at me, not debut.

Suyeon had said she was still anxious when I asked how debut felt, but she also said she was happy.

After hearing that, it felt like the things that had been messing up my head this whole time had gotten cleanly solved.

'I don’t need to overthink it. I’ll just do what I want.'

It seemed like an old habit from my previous life had popped out without me noticing.

Planned. Ruthless. A field demon.

But since I’d decided to live a more relaxed life this time around, I was going to go with wherever my heart pulled.

Knock, knock.

The first step in that decision was, of course, the Royal Rumble.

If I sent Ryujin into the CEO’s office alone, she would obviously “forget” to report anything about the Royal Rumble, so I followed along.

As descendants of the nation of Eastern etiquette, we announced our arrival with two polite knocks.

But even after we knocked, there was no response from inside.

"That’s weird. Did he go somewhere?"

"He might be on a different floor. He walks around a lot."

Normally an answer came back the instant you knocked, so with no response, he probably wasn’t in there.

So just as we were about to go down to the fourth floor to look for him—

"The CEO? He took a day off today."

"What? A day off?"

"Yeah. I was surprised too, since it’s the first time since the company was founded. But he’s still a person—he has to rest sometimes."

We heard the shocking news from a content team staffer we ran into: Sanghyeok was on leave for the day.

"True. Now that you mention it, I’ve never seen him take a break."

"The higher up you are, the harder it is to rest."

"What would you know?"

Ryujin snapped at me, but I knew better than anyone.

—Hey, we’re going into training prep. You think the company commander can just be gone?

A bleak memory surfaced: back when I was a company commander, I couldn’t use a single day of leave and got it paid out in cash at the end of the year.

—There’s no budget this year, so you only get ten days.

A vicious Ministry of National Defense that only counted ten days out of twenty-one, using “no budget” as an excuse.

Anyway, being in a position where you represent people means you need that much responsibility—and you can’t just rest whenever you feel like it. I knew that better than anyone.

'But something’s off.'

After our CEO’s-office expedition ended with nothing to show for it, and we started heading back to the practice room, I suddenly felt suspicious.

"The CEO definitely said we should tell him directly if we needed anything, right?"

"That’s why we went to his office."

"But he wasn’t there."

"He took a day off."

She still didn’t seem to notice, but I could tell.

Kim Sanghyeok was insanely meticulous—even to my eyes, and my eyes were accurate when it came to judging people.

—I already took care of that.

That sharp, borderline-cutting coordination, that perfect execution without a single gap—he was basically my mirror.

So for someone like that to tell us to bring things to him, then be absent?

That was suspicious.

"I smell something."

"It’s your sweat. You went wild in that mascot suit earlier."

Ryujin kept slandering me nonstop, but inside my head, a warning siren about something I was missing wouldn’t stop blaring.

This nasty feeling I’d felt before.

"Agbaek?"

"Why are you suddenly bringing up Agbaek?"

And then I realized when I’d felt this.

'When Episode 1 of Agbaek aired!'

Back then, I’d headed home without knowing anything, ran into a Battle God, and almost ended my life.

I’d definitely felt a similar warning then too—but I’d brushed it off like it was nothing, and got hit for it. That painful memory flared up.

Whip.

"What the hell? Why are you acting like that all of a sudden?"

"Is there any reason Madam Sukja would come to the company?"

"What? Your mom? Why would she come here?"

"If it’s not Madam Sukja, there’s nobody who can kill me···."

I looked around in case Madam Sukja was nearby, but of course, there was no way.

'What is it?'

The only person who could make me feel my life was in danger was Madam Sukja, so why was I getting this ominous premonition?

While I was stuck on that—

"Hurry up. The others are waiting in the practice room."

"···Yeah."

At Ryujin’s urging, I had no choice but to head back with that unsettled feeling still stuck to me.

My instincts never missed, but maybe I’d gotten dulled lately from living a comfortable idol life and was getting a false read.

Thinking I should soon throw myself back into the rift—where it was nothing but feral instincts and blood-soaked fights—to get my edge back, I reached the practice room and yanked the door open.

Creeeak.

"I’m back!"

The moment I opened the door and strode in like usual, full of energy, I saw the members who’d been waiting for us.

"The CEO’s on leave today. So for stage-prep stuff, we’ll probably have to tell him tomorrow. For now, let’s just practice the existing songs ourselves."

"Sion, run!"

"Huh?"

Right as Ryujin told them the CEO was absent and suggested they practice again, Shinyu—who’d been staring at me with this restless, fidgety look ever since I walked in—shouted at me to run.

I didn’t even have time to process what was happening—

Whip.

I trusted she wouldn’t say something that would hurt me, so I turned to bolt—

"Peekaboo?"

"···."

PD Raon—skin slightly darker, like she’d gotten sunburned—was standing behind the door, looking at me.

She was smiling so bright and innocent that I tried to go all-in and bulldoze for the door like a football player going for a touchdown escape—

Bang!

"Sion. Raon and I are back—didn’t you miss us at all?"

Gahyeon appeared outside, slamming the door shut, and my plan went up in smoke.

'Was today the day they got back?'

The end date for Raon and Gahyeon’s Paldo Man shoot—something I’d completely forgotten because it wasn’t my problem.

I’d forgotten it, but my instincts hadn’t. Only now did I realize that was what my instincts had been screaming about.

And now I also understood why the CEO—someone who looked like he wouldn’t rest even with a broken arm—had taken a day off today.

"The CEO ran first."

"We’ll deal with him tomorrow, PD."

"Yeah. Today, we deal with Lee Sion first."

Was it because they’d been to the army?

The way the two of them narrowed the net around me—there was a chill in their eyes that didn’t match the season at all.