Chapter 115

Chapter 115

Claims in the comments that TeSTAR did not deserve a Rookie of the Year award became more elaborate in their logic since they’d shifted their focus onto the new artists rather than TeSTAR themselves.

- I feel so bad T_T. Artists who might have won probably gave up on the idea already...

- A group from a variety show has an unfair advantage. There’s no question about that. You have to wonder, would TeSTAR have done so well if they didn’t debut coming off of a TV show? I think not

└ Yeah, people are raising questions about how fair Idol Inc. really was. They can’t have the Rookie of the Year award as well

- I think you’re taking it too far. The way you’re talking, it’s almost like you’re accusing TeSTAR of faking their album sales

└ I think this is more serious than fraud, to be honest

└ Hello? Fraud is a crime. What the hell are you saying?

└ Doesn’t it occur to you that it’s a problem precisely because it’s not a crime? That’s why there’s no way to stop them from doing this sh*t

- Maybe we should take this opportunity to stop groups from doing a clean sweep of awards thanks to some TV show. The Rookie of the Year award needs to go to a real rookie

They’re good at putting together an argument, I’ll give them that. Since they couldn’t find any fault with how well we were doing as a group, they seemed determined to keep us from winning the rookie award at least, which carried a heavy symbolic meaning in the industry.

If their smear campaign actually worked and we didn’t get the award, they could then use our failure to argue that we had an unfair advantage after all—why else did we fail to get the award?

But that wouldn’t happen. No matter how much they stirred the pot, they couldn’t impact the standards used to select nominees.

It’s not like it’s possible to cast negative votes, either, like in Idol Inc. We still had the mainstream audience on our side and it wasn’t likely there would be problems when the judges cast their votes. Communities online could criticize us for taking the rookie award and refuse to congratulate us all they liked... but that wouldn’t get in the way of us actually winning the award.

Even the post I was reading was starting to lose traction.

- Wow, they’re trying to accuse them of buying their own albums to drive up sales. They’re really losing their minds under the weight of their inferiority complexes

- Well, I’d have been convinced if some rookie group appeared out of nowhere and sold around two hundred thousand albums. Sadly, nothing like that happened LOL

- I can understand where you’re coming from. But you idiots don’t get to change the criteria for the Rookie of the Year award

Comments like these were steadily on the rise.

I should just get back to practicing for the year-end performances. I stopped reading through endless threads on the internet for the time being, wanting to avoid any unnecessary stress.

I hope the fans don’t get too stressed out by all this, either. We’d been prohibited from communicating with them by the company, including using our social media account, so there was nothing we could do. If I were to insert myself into the conversation, I could try to turn the negative opinions around by asking a question like, “Who do you think should get the rookie award instead of TeSTAR, then?” But the scandal that would result if someone found out it was me wouldn’t be worth it.

I’ll just concentrate on practicing. My thoughts returned to practice once more. Sighing, I accepted the situation for what it was.

“One more time.”

“Okay!”

It wasn’t long before the others also turned their focus to practicing, all looking rather grave.

They’ve all seen it, too. It seemed that the posts had spread quite a bit online. Maybe they’d seen the fans complaining about the accusation and now they were suddenly intent on showing off their skill—so much so that the energy in the room reminded me of the team battles in Idol Inc.

Chungwoo seemed on the verge of passing out, but he muttered as if reminding himself of something he already knew.

“This one... It’s for SBC, right?”

“Yes,” Raebin replied.

Bae Sejin was pale as he murmured, “This one seems the hardest.”

“Yes! It’s fun!” Eugene said cheerfully.

Bae Sejin looked like he wanted to punch Eugene in the face just once, and Chungwoo just laughed as he shuffled everyone into position

“All right. Let’s practice hard and put on a good show.”

“Yes!”

“Hang in there!”

The agency had cut back some of our public appearances for November, perhaps in preparation for any additional controversies that might break out. This gave us a little more time to practice.

As a result, we were fully prepped and ready for all the awards ceremonies ahead of time. The first of which was ToneA.

***

ToneA. Hosted by T1, it was self-titled as “Asia’s biggest global music awards.” This meant that the host of this particular awards show was very interested in seeing TeSTAR succeed. We got the awards our sales numbers deserved, of course.

“And the winner is... TeSTAR! Congratulations!”

We’d heard this same announcement four times already in a single day. We’d won the Excellence Award, the Most Popular Artist Award, and even the Best Music Video Award. The Rookie of the Year Award was also awarded to us, of course.

“Thank you very much! We’ll take this acknowledgment of our efforts to mean that we should never stop doing our absolute best.”

Big Sejin was giving the speech for the Rookie of the Year Award very intentionally, after a discussion with Chungwoo. His speech contained nothing that could cause controversy since it had been vetted by the agency, and anyone who did manage to criticize us regardless was always going to do so anyway.

I turned out to be right about one thing—my status abnormality didn’t disappear.

I wasn’t even expecting it to. Even if ToneA liked to call itself the biggest ceremony in Asia, everyone knew that it didn’t actually exert much influence. In any case, the members seemed relieved to be done with their first awards ceremony without incident.

“Good work, everyone!”

Honestly, the relief we felt at having completed the show eclipsed any excitement over winning awards.

Why’d this controversy have to surface now, of all times? They should have been basking in satisfaction after a year of working their asses off. The situation left a bad taste in my mouth.

“Good work, guys,” Chungwoo said.

“Hehe.”

“I-I’m relieved t-things went well.”

“Putting everything else aside, I think we performed objectively well considering how much we practiced,” Raebin said.

There was a brief silence as everyone considered Raebin’s words.

We did our best, without a doubt. We’d performed for a total of eight minutes during the ceremony.

Tnet had asked us to show off just how many hits TeSTAR had put out in one year, so we’d done a medley of four of our songs. There had been almost no additional choreography to memorize, so preparing had been relatively easy, though we were badly out of breath after we were done since there had been no breaks in between all the songs.

Still, I believed we’d done quite well and successfully avoided making any mistakes. The only problem was the cameras. We’d gotten to see only the latter half and the camerawork had been terrible. The screen was dark, too, so it was hard to focus on what we were doing.

That’s irritating. I wouldn’t have minded if it was a fancam—I hoped people in the audience had gotten good footage of us with their cameras. I’d have to look it up later on WeTube.

“Hmm. I suppose the live audience probably enjoyed our performance at least.”

“The cheering was great!” Big Sejin said.

We couldn’t complain about the cameras while we were still backstage, so we quickly changed the subject. There were plenty more performances we’d worked hard for, and that was probably a good learning moment for the members so they could learn to cope with their disappointment regarding the camera work going forward.

I’ll just go back to the waiting room and get my phone. I wanted to check that no fresh problems had arisen, though I would probably find nothing more than a handful of criticisms among the trending posts.

When I arrived at the waiting room though, I was met with a completely unexpected person, one I’d rather not have met.

“Hello.”

“Oh! Cheongryeo!”

“Hello!”

It was Cheongryeo.

Why is the winner of the Best Artist award lingering in front of a rookie group’s waiting room? He might as well have been standing there screaming as far as catching the staff’s attention was concerned.

Is he trying to make sure we can’t avoid him? In any case, the members were shocked to see him waiting for us and kept bowing as they congratulated him.

“Congratulations on winning the two grand prizes!”

“Congrats!”

“Oh. Thanks,” Cheongryeo said, smiling.

Raebin’s eyes glowed as he stared at the older artist. “What brings you here?”

“I thought I’d congratulate you and say hi.” Cheongryeo locked eyes with me. “Congratulations on the Rookie of the Year Award. Though it’s pretty meaningless at this point.”

“I’m sorry?” Raebin said, looking dazed.

Cheongryeo added awkwardly, “Since you’ve already won four awards, you’re doing too well to be considered rookies, that’s all. I look forward to your future successes.”

“Oh. Thank you!”

“I’ll be on my way now. I have somewhere to be.”

“All right! Thanks for coming by!”

Cheongryeo nodded slightly and said with a smile, “Goodbye.” He strode down the corridor, disappearing from sight.

I silently tutted.

He knows I need to win the Rookie of the Year award. No doubt he’d had to meet a similar condition since he’d even pointed out just now that the ToneA award was meaningless.

I don’t like this. It felt like I’d handed him information for free and I didn’t enjoy the feeling.

He might try to use the list of status abnormalities that he experienced against me. I was lost in thought when the other members began to prod at me.

“Well, well, Moondae! Looks like you made a friend doing that variety show!” Big Sejin said.

“A-are you close?” Ahyeon asked.

I nearly balked. “No. We’re just acquaintances.”

“T-then would you mind if I asked you a question?” Raebin asked suddenly. I assumed he was stammering from excitement.

Come to think of it, he talks about VTIC a lot. I guessed he must be a fan of them.

Raebin pulled himself together enough to ask desperately, “I’m very curious what program they used to arrange their past album’s title track!”

Hmm... so it’s not VTIC themselves he was interested in.

“I’ll ask him if I get the chance,” I said.

“Thank you!”

Raebin seemed happy, not catching on that I was hinting pretty heavily that no such opportunity would likely ever come. Well, at least one of us is happy.

Let’s see what the viewers have to say. While sitting in the van on the way back to our dorms, I went on a quick tour through all the various social media platforms and communities. Public opinion hadn’t gotten worse, at least, since there were more messages of congratulations than sarcastic comments.

The fans are being... patient. I could see that they were doing their best to post as many congratulatory comments as possible to drown out the aggressive ones, trying to prevent any more arguments from breaking out.

If things got too heated, TeSTAR would be the ones who would suffer for it. There was a lot of censure going on in the fan’s personal social media posts, of course.

- It’s the records that matter, in the end. All this bullsh*t people are saying will be forgotten in six months. I’m paying it no mind and simply voting

- F*ck, those idiots really deserve a beating. I’m so upset right now trying not to fight back

- There are so many people who are into bashing people’s success. And now even the cameramen are messing up. I’m going to lose it

- R. C. was a terrible pick. All this is happening because of him! I had a bad feeling from the start when he was named leader after the mess he made on the TV show

Group fans as well as individual fans of the members were all complaining. I was starting to feel really bad for them.

I wish I could just refuse the awards. It left me feeling bitter, knowing I had to stay silent if I wanted to avoid an untimely death.

It doesn’t seem like I’m going to die, at least. Because public opinion hadn’t shifted all that much in reality, things were likely to stay this way before fizzling out toward the end of the awards ceremonies.

And we only received the awards we actually deserved at ToneA as well. I’d been worried they’d pile too many awards on us, but they’d had enough tact to refrain from doing so. It was standard for a group to win more awards at the ceremonies that favored them, so not many people criticized us for it.

It’s a pity our performance didn’t net much praise. Time would solve that. We just needed to wait for the fancams to go up online. We had a handful more performances left, anyway.

Things didn’t go perfectly to plan, but that’s just how life is, I guess. Once things settled down, I planned on uploading something that would help the fans destress. Organizing my thoughts, I was about to turn my phone screen off when I spotted a newly trending community post.

[A rookie male idol group forced to stand and applaud on the sidelines while a Tnet variety show group takes four awards]

I stared, then clicked on the link. A series of images appeared.

Well, f*ck. They’re really gearing up for a fight, the bastards.

***

Cheongryeo looked down at his phone, where a controversial trending post about TeSTAR’s receiving Rookie of the Year stared back at him.

“I’m curious.”

“Huh? What about?” one of his members asked.

Cheongryeo ignored him. He opened his social media app.

What’s going to happen now? Cheongryeo uploaded a few of the photos he’d taken today, with captions. He added a very particular image among them casually.

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Junior idols working hard. Hoping for good things for them at the end of the year

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He uploaded the photos. The fuse had been lit.