I'm an Unknown Actress, But Everyone Knows Me

I smiled while keeping my eyes tense.

“Didn’t get a good look at your face though? Doesn’t seem like you come here often.”

One of the gang members spoke in a loose, slouchy tone. He was one of the Funny Capsule distributors, the kind people also called “MZ gangsters.” The gang member wearing thick silver rings casually sipped whiskey with one hand.

“...Ah, damn it. Why do you keep nitpicking my face?”

Influencer 1 already knew exactly who he was. But she couldn’t just turn back quietly here.

I swept my hair back with one hand as if I were dumbfounded. It was a habit-like gesture of Influencer 1.

“I got my eyes just a tiny bit done, and filler... no, seriously, only a few CCs, okay? It’s basically natural? You get a little prettier and suddenly people can’t recognize you?”

“...Huh?”

“You grabbed my Yousta ID the month before last and didn’t even DM me!!! So I got it done, okay!!! Happy now!!!”

It was the most common kind of episode you’d see in a club, enough to confuse the gang member. Nearby, people teased him jokingly, calling him a bad guy, and laughter went back and forth.

“What’s your ID. Are we mutuals right now?”

“No. We’re not mutuals anymore. You pissed me off so I blocked you.”

A burst of mocking cheers rang out. The gang members went back to drinking, laughing and snickering. The half-out-of-their-minds extras clapped and laughed along. Everyone was riding the effects of Funny Capsule.

“But you still came back in here? This place?”

“...Being annoying is still annoying, though....”

My heart tightened with anxiety. I’d gotten past one hurdle, but my fingertips kept trembling, afraid the lie would be exposed.

‘If I really get caught, it’s over...!’

I was so scared I felt like I might start crying. The only sober person here was Influencer 1.

And she was the farthest from the door. Without realizing it, Influencer 1 brushed her hair back and lightly touched the radio once. A signal to hurry up.

Chiik....

A faint sound came through the receiver. It’s okay. They’ll come in soon. A weak sense of trust in Detective Yoon and Detective Kwak began to bloom.

“I heard all the rumors and came. Your crew’s pretty famous.”

Influencer 1 spoke carefully. The gang member who had been laughing just moments ago changed his expression, looking intrigued.

“I wanna join your crew too. What do I have to do?”

This was the innermost room. You had to pass through several doors to get in. She’d explained the location to them beforehand, so they should arrive before long.

“Ohhh~?”

Thump. Thump. Thump. Thump.

My heart was pounding so hard it felt like it might kill me. The gang member’s snake-like gaze, staring straight at me, was sharp.

“If you heard the rumors, then this?”

From within the gang member’s arms came an envelope with a smile sticker on it. Smiling, he shook the envelope lightly.

Pretending to tidy my fallen hair, I touched the radio behind my ear one more time. Hurry. Hurry up. Please hurry.

“Yeah. That one.”

“Damn... a girl I’ve never even met, acting all bold... Hey. You gotta know the effect to sell it right.”

Rustle-.

The sound of the envelope being opened felt unbearably loud.

“Don’t take them out one by one like it’s boring. Just give me all of it.”

Gulp. As soon as I finished the short sentence, I swallowed hard. My mouth kept going dry.

All of the gang members’ eyes were fixed on me.

A sharp silence sliced through the air like a blade. The few seconds of silence felt unusually long. And then, after a moment—

“Ahahaha! Look at this one. Tiny thing, no fear at all.”

“She’s a lady asking~. Ah, sorry about that!”

“Changseok, she said give it all at once. Just give it! Don’t be so stingy like a man!”

The gang members, faces flushed from alcohol, slapped the table as they laughed. They tossed around the kind of jokes you’d hear on a busy downtown street.

The lie had worked perfectly.

The envelope with the smile sticker finally landed in my hand, and the instant I seized the ~Nоvеl𝕚ght~ evidence—

Bang-!!!

“Ah, fuck, this is fucking complicated as hell. You assholes, how the hell are you supposed to run if there’s a fire? You twisted the building up like this? Looks like you gotta slam emergency exits into every damn wall!”

“Ha....”

With a deafening noise, the door flew open—

“Ah, why are you only getting here now!!!”

The detectives stormed in.

I lived.

* * *

“Yes. Just like that—! We’ll change the camera setting and go again.”

It had been a pretty long take, but there was no NG.

The tension and fear came through perfectly. When he opened the door just now, Yun Hyeonjo had clearly seen Han Yeoreum’s eyes. They were different from when she’d been teary-eyed beyond the window last time. Back then, she’d been flustered and at a loss. Now, it was more...

‘Like she barely survived.’

It felt like he’d caught a key point where Detective Yoon was gradually being influenced by Detective Kwak.

To Yun Hyeonjo, everyone in the world was beneath Detective Yoon. Detective Yoon was an elite. He became a police officer to stand above those who didn’t properly follow justice and the law.

That was Yun Hyeonjo’s interpretation of Detective Yoon. As the story progressed, he formed a certain bond with Detective Kwak and the investigation team, but that feeling didn’t extend to Influencer 1 or ordinary civilians.

“Hyeonjo-ssi! Before we roll, let’s match the action one more time!”

But Influencer 1 trusted the detective. She looked at him with eyes that believed he would definitely save her.

That wasn’t something he’d calculated. Yun Hyeonjo ran through the choreography he’d planned in advance with the action director. Throw the left punch, dip the body briefly, then a clean kick.

“Yes! That was perfect. All that repetition really paid off.”

To the action director and supporting actor smiling with satisfaction, Yun Hyeonjo made a suggestion that was, frankly, quite inefficient.

“...Sorry, but would it be okay to add just one more move?”

Yun Hyeonjo’s mind spun quickly. Detective Yoon was the type to show the slightest—just a tiny—bit of goodwill only to people within his boundary. He wanted to express a crack forming in that cold personality.

“Director Gong. I’d like to ad-lib this part.”

“Hyeonjo... you’re explaining the ad-lib before doing it?”

“If I do it suddenly on set, it’ll be inefficient. I just thought of it now, so it still counts as an ad-lib.”

“That’s right, it is! But what’s going on? I’m even seeing our Hyeonjo do ad-libs. What kind of change of heart is this~!”

At Yun Hyeonjo’s additional suggestion, Director Gong covered his mouth, deeply moved.

Yun Hyeonjo looked toward Yeoreum in the distance, getting her makeup fixed again after it smudged from tears.

* * *

‘Wow, it’s really different....’

Watching the action scene crash through like a storm right in front of me left me speechless.

I’d crawled under the table and given it my all too, but it didn’t even compare to the way Detective Yoon and Detective Kwak used their bodies.

‘Especially the last move.’

There was a moment where the two of them threw their punches at the same time, and the way they tightened their cores and used the rebound to drive their entire upper bodies was no joke.

‘I really want to try action someday too.’

Inside the wrecked filming set, Yun Hyeonjo—getting injury makeup applied over his reddened knuckles—beckoned to me.

“Did you call for me, sunbae?”