Chapter 139

Chapter 139. Break Up With Kim Serin Right Now

[Title: 3/10]

[Post Office Delivery]

[Your ordered package has been shipped.]

[Track Delivery: http://thl46ad.co.kr/dw9eb2]

Another suspicious-looking link.

They say pleasure always comes after hardship, so I ignored the instinctive rejection I felt and clicked it.

Once again, three videos appeared.

This was only the third link-type spam message, but I'd already developed the habit of checking the thumbnails first.

The first showed Blue Moon standing on some kind of outdoor stage.

The second showed Blue Moon being announced as the winner of a music show.

The third showed someone kneeling in the middle of a street.

For starters, the first two were clearly good news.

I couldn't tell for certain what the first video was about, but for some reason, it looked like the United Talenet Live stage Jo Tae-hyung and I had just been talking about.

Tens of thousands of people watched a performance against the backdrop of a peaceful beach at sunset.

That was the typical image people associated with United Talenet Live.

I couldn't be certain yet, though.

If I was right, then just as Jo Tae-hyung hoped, Blue Moon would get invited there because of 〈Hippie〉 and his music video.

Dae-hun, slaughter a cow.

I'd worked hard too, but honestly, when I saw Moon Hee-jung bring Dessault such a huge opportunity, I couldn't help feeling a little jealous.

Excluding Dessault, only five Korean idol groups had ever performed on that stage.

And just as Jo Tae-hyung and I had agreed moments ago, each member was dressed in cosplay based on a profession.

The second video was obviously good news too, although it didn't look like a particularly unusual achievement.

Not enough to slaughter a cow.

Maybe a pig.

It predicted Blue Moon taking first place on 〈Music Bang Bang〉.

Looking at it this way, the thumbnails alone were already showing me about as much information as the future spam had when I first started receiving it.

Compared to back then, this was more than three times better.

In that sense, if we're slaughtering cows...

Fine.

Two cows would be acceptable.

I'd finished checking all the good news.

That left only the third video.

Honestly, its thumbnail stood out the most.

Someone was kneeling in the street.

And the place was right in front of the main entrance to Universe's new headquarters.

I zoomed in on the person's face.

She was crying.

And she looked familiar.

After digging through my memory, I remembered that she was a hardcore member of the Apollo fandom, almost on the level of the so-called Twelve Elders.

If I remembered correctly, she was the same age as Youngchae.

Her name was Kim Hye-jin, wasn't it?

I'd heard Dae-hun talk about Kim Hye-jin once.

Apparently, before I joined Universe, he'd even spoken with her parents.

She had lived in Seoul her whole life, but suddenly announced she was going to Mokpo.

When her parents worried about her, Kim Hye-jin had given them Dae-hun's number, which was publicly listed on the Universe website.

She had been twenty-two at the time.

Dae-hun had apparently gone so far as to buy her meals and send pictures to reassure her parents.

He said he'd had to take better care of her than some of the Blue Moon members.

As far as I knew, she was a very positive person.

So why was she kneeling there and crying so miserably?

The first two videos were probably showing me Blue Moon's future achievements.

There could still be some sort of stage accident like before.

But the only video that looked like an immediate crisis was the third one.

What if one of the members got hurt and that was why she was crying like that?

I didn't hesitate.

I clicked the third video.

"Uwaaaah, unniiii... My life is ruined... What am I supposed to do...?"

"W-Why? What's wrong?"

As soon as the video played, Kim Hye-jin began desperately pleading with someone standing in front of her.

The other person, clearly flustered, asked what had happened.

As they gradually entered the frame, I saw who it was.

Youngchae.

Weren't they the same age?

"At United Talenet Live... No, I went there and filmed the performance. I made a cross-edited video and uploaded it, and suddenly they're suing me. United Talenet Live is suing me!"

"United Talenet Live is suing you, Hye-jin? Why?"

"I don't know! Uwaaaah... They said I violated copyright. The video's at ten million views... They're saying I have to compensate them for some portion of the ticket revenue or whatever. They said I infringed their copyright!"

Damn.

So that problem was going to happen after all.

People like me who used to professionally film idols would directly ask entertainment agencies for permission before doing commercial work.

But fans who weren't trying to make money would simply film performances, upload the videos to Nutube, and let Nutube's system automatically send usage revenue back to the agency.

That was how things worked in practice.

Strictly speaking, though, any footage filmed and uploaded without direct permission was illegal from the moment it was recorded.

Fans and agencies had simply looked the other way because neither side had much to lose.

But things changed once the stage organizer got involved.

Even then, organizers usually ignored it.

But if a fan video became too successful and the view count got tempting enough, sometimes organizers would suddenly act shamelessly and sue.

They didn't care about fandom culture or promoting the artist.

The American organizer of United Talenet Live had sued Kim Hye-jin for copyright damages.

So even the third video was indirectly telling me Blue Moon had succeeded.

Of course, as Hye-jin had put it, her life was practically on the verge of being ruined.

Well.

What could I do?

I knew in advance now.

Once United Talenet Live was confirmed, I'd just negotiate video rights as one of the conditions.

Or meet Kim Hye-jin before then and warn her directly.

"Dae-hun. Kim Hye-jin's been pretty quiet lately. Have you seen her recently?"

"Hye-jin? No. Ever since our events got bigger, I haven't really run into her. She's short, so she's hard to find in big crowds. Maybe we should hold a fan meeting."

"How do I contact her?"

At my question, Dae-hun started searching through his phone.

"I only have her mother's number."

Kim Hye-jin was blessed.

What manager kept the phone numbers of fans' parents?

He didn't even have Hye-jin's own number.

Dae-hun dug through a drawer filled with old sticky notes, checking them one by one.

Then he sent me a blog address.

Apparently, she had separate blogs for her real life and her fandom life.

She was living boldly on the internet.

There was no way I could simply ignore someone's fandom blog.

I clicked that link first.

Dae-hun immediately spoke.

"For reference, I don't recommend looking at the fandom one. It'll only hurt you. And she's really strict about separating her online fandom life from reality, so you won't learn anything useful there."

"You should've said that sooner."

Her fandom blog was incredibly flashy.

A banner caught my eye, filled with carefully edited photos of our members, though the editing was a little clumsy.

The left side of the blog had countless menu categories.

One of them was labeled Fanfiction.

It was locked, so I couldn't read the contents.

But the subtitle of the most recent fanfic chapter was visible.

〈Break Up With Kim Serin Right Now, Do Jun-hyeok〉

"Ugh... What the hell is all this?"

"If you already entered the fandom blog, I especially recommend avoiding the fanfiction category. Hye-jin's favorite is Youngchae. You might see something rough."

Tell me faster.

The contents were already beginning to form in my head, so I hurriedly switched over to her real-life blog.

Its banner showed her with friends at a seaside café, apparently cultivating great ambitions or something.

The contrast was so severe that I almost admired her courage in showing both blogs to Dae-hun.

Just as he said, the real-life blog had far more useful information.

It even explained why she spoke politely to Youngchae despite being the same age.

Hye-jin had been born early in 2003 and graduated from university in Seoul last year.

She was currently a new employee in the marketing department at ZJ Group headquarters.

A photo from her first day of work in January showed her flashing a V sign beside her employee ID.

By now, that post felt like ancient history.

First things first.

Let's go meet her.

I called Youngchae, who should've been in the practice room.

"ZJ headquarters? Why am I suddenly going there?"

Youngchae followed me obediently, but asked why she had to come.

Honestly, she didn't really need to.

But after briefly seeing just how much Kim Hye-jin loved Youngchae through that fandom blog, there was no way I couldn't take care of her at least this much.

Why did fans make videos in the first place?

Was it because they wanted to raise their blog visitor counts and make money?

Of course not.

Out of affection for the members, they pointed cameras at performances they could've simply enjoyed with their own eyes.

Then they went home, fought through their exhaustion, stayed up all night editing the footage, and uploaded it to the internet.

It was all driven by affection and fandom passion.

Of course, deep down, they were probably dying to receive a little thanks or praise from the members too.

Now imagine some bastard named Do Jun-hyeok suddenly showing up at your house or workplace and warning you,

Don't film the next event.

Wouldn't anyone feel hurt?

So I'd let Kim Hye-jin see Youngchae in person as much as she wanted.

Give her a proper one-on-one fan meeting.

Then give her the warning.

That way, she'd understand without getting hurt.

Youngchae and I stopped by an Aple store and bought the latest tablet.

I also downloaded one of the popular video-editing programs onto it.

I'd spent enough time as a professional fansite photographer that it wasn't difficult.

Then we arrived in front of ZJ headquarters.

I checked Youngchae's outfit.

"Pretty and approachable. Very good."

"You told me to dress like I was just going out with the members."

"I did."

She wore black slacks, a loose white shirt, and a knitted vest.

Youngchae probably thought she'd dressed neatly and casually.

To me, she looked like a luxury-shopping-mall fitting model who had torn her way straight out of a catalog.

"CEO Do Jun-hyeok~! Youngchae!"

Just as we finished checking her outfit and were about to enter the building, Jung Tae-jin came running over from a taxi in the distance.

"I heard you suddenly said you were visiting headquarters. What's going on?"

"What? Nothing important."

It's not like I was some foreign buyer bringing a trillion-won deal.

Yet even the chairman's second son had come to greet me.

"One of our longtime fans apparently works here, so I came to visit her with Youngchae."

"Ah, I see."

Thanks to him, at least we got a guide.

This was meant to be a surprise visit, so I hadn't arranged any meeting place with Kim Hye-jin.

I didn't know where the marketing department was or what her schedule looked like.

"It's lunchtime right now, so this is actually perfect. She's probably in the company cafeteria. Follow me."

Jung Tae-jin led Youngchae and me to the cafeteria.

Employees all around us recognized Youngchae and began whispering in surprise.

"Will you recognize her by face?"

"Yes. Definitely."

The cafeteria was enormous.

Still, finding Kim Hye-jin probably wouldn't be difficult.

Her head, cut almost into the shape of a spade, was visible from far away.

I thanked Jung Tae-jin, then crept toward her with Youngchae.

Standing behind Kim Hye-jin, I asked,

"Does our new employee Kim Hye-jin always eat lunch alone?"

"What? ...Yes! I prefer eating alo..."

Apparently thinking I was some superior at work, Kim Hye-jin turned around without much thought.

Then she saw my face and Youngchae's.

Her eyes grew enormous.

"Huuuh?! D-Do, Do, Do... Y-Youngchae unni! Kkh!"

It looked like the food in her mouth was about to fly out.

She hurriedly covered her mouth and lowered her head.

Everyone else in the cafeteria was dressed casually.

Kim Hye-jin alone wore a semi-formal business outfit.

She barely seemed to taste her meal as she rushed to finish it.

Then she led Youngchae and me to her desk in the office.

Blue Moon photos were scattered all around it.

Especially photos of Youngchae.

There were occasionally pictures of me too.

I had never once sold official merchandise using my own photograph.

Judging by the bizarre way my arms and legs had been stretched until I looked like a stick insect, Kim Hye-jin had probably taken and edited those photos herself.

I decided not to waste time trying to understand why.

"So... w-w-what brings you here...?"

"Nothing special. I suddenly thought about you, Hye-jin, so I came by with Youngchae. How's work?"

"Of course it's great!"

Kim Hye-jin's eyes rapidly darted between me and Youngchae.

Then she muttered something meaningful about how good we looked together.

We chatted casually for a little while.

I subtly brought up performance filming.

She revealed that most of the cross-edited Blue Moon clips currently circulating on Nutube were actually her work.

But I had only learned who Kim Hye-jin was after joining Universe.

If she'd had that much influence in the fandom, I would've known her back in my fansite-photographer days.

"I don't film much myself, but I'm good at editing, hehe. So I get footage from other fansite photographers, make cross-edited versions, then return the files. They upload them to their own accounts."

"So you're the hidden technician."

We were just moving to the lounge to talk some more when a text message arrived from Choi Gyu-sik.

[CEO Do Jun-hyeok. This is Choi Gyu-sik. Work on 〈The Stranger〉 is finished.]