Chapter 80: Consequence
"Mr. Lee. It seems this issue was caused by Jung Yoon-Ho."
"Huh? Are you messing with me right now?"
"Of course not. Please hear me out."
Kim Dong-Soo presented his analysis to the irritable Lee Gi-Cheol. He explained that it was unlikely that Lee Dong-Min could resolve this issue so quickly on his own, which meant that it was done by Jung Yoon-Ho.
"Look, I know Assistant Manager Jung is competent, but do you really think it makes sense for a first-year newbie to solve such a big problem? There's a limit to imagination, seriously. Tsk!"
Lee Gi-Cheol was displeased that Kim Dong-Soo was fixated on a mere assistant manager when there was a mountain of work to do.
"But Mr. Lee, that guy, Jung Yoon-Ho...He even had a private meeting with Miss Kang. Officially, it is said that the meeting was about a bonus. But they spent over 30 minutes together."
Lee Gi-Cheol fell into deep thought.
‘Kang Ji-Yung is known to get straight to the point, but she actually spent 30 minutes with him?’
He figured that Kim Dong-Soo's conjecture was possible after all.
"So, what now?"
"......I never thought I'd say this but......"
"What is it?"
"It won’t be easy, but before Jung Yoon-Ho gets into the President’s faction, maybe we should try to pull him into ours."
"What? That hothead, Jung Yoon-Ho, to our side?"
As Kim Dong-Soo spoke, he looked like he had bitten into a sour lemon.
***
The alarm rang loudly.
When I sprang up and looked around, I was in the makeshift duty room situated in a corner of the recording studio.
"Ah, right. I slept here last night."
I stayed beside Bang Seon-Woo all night as I feared that he would be shaken by the plagiarism issues.
At that moment, Bang Seon-Woo, who was sleeping next to me, also woke up.
"Oh? Hyung...how was your sleep?"
"It was good. Did you sleep well?"
Bang Seon-Woo smiled brightly in response.
I never thought I'd end up managing a composer's mental health.
‘I’ve been so busy these days taking care of everyone. I really wish I could clone myself.’
As soon as I woke up, I checked my planner as usual.
[Everyday V10]
[Date: July 1, 2022]
-01:00 PM <Deleted Schedule>
(Deleted Schedule: Bang Seon-Woo's funeral at 10 AM at Suwon St. Mary's Hospital Funeral Hall, Room 8.)
'So that was the reason for the previous schedule.'
The incident that couldn’t be deleted until last night was finally gone. It turned out that cutting the link between Epil K and Uncle Music was the key to preventing Bang Seon-Woo's death.
A sigh of relief naturally came out of my mouth. "Ugh. My whole body feels stiff."
My shoulders were stiff from sleeping on the narrow field bed last night. I swung my arms to loosen them.
At that moment, my phone in my right hand fell to the ground.
Bang Seon-Woo, who was stretching with me, picked up my phone. "Here you go, hyung."
But Bang Seon-Woo's expression immediately changed as he saw my phone's screen.
‘Could he have seen the screen and the future events written on the planner? What if he saw the one about his own death?’
Wondering how to explain, I opened my mouth.
"Um, Seon-Woo. This is...."
‘Damn it.’
I was at a loss for words. There was no way to explain this situation to Bang Seon-Woo. If it were any other incident, I could have lied to him and said it was just something I wrote down. But this was about his own funeral. It was impossible for him not to be curious about such an incident.
‘Is this how my secret gets revealed?’
My heart started pounding.
That's when Bang Seon-Woo said something I never expected.
"Hyung, why were you looking at an empty planner?"
"An empty planner?"
It felt like a bucket of cold water had been dumped on me, snapping me to my senses. Bang Seon-Woo tilted his head in confusion and handed me my phone. Indeed, the phone still displayed the [Everyday V10] with the future events deleted.
I showed him my phone's screen again to double-check.
"Look closely. What does it say here?"
As Choi Hyun-Oh stood up, Woo Hyung-Jun looked around cautiously. "J-just the two of us?"
"Yes! That guy ran off to save his own skin! We must catch him no matter what!"
"But is that possible? I can't even handle one punch from him."
Choi Hyun-Oh was about to burst in anger.
Thump, thump, thump!
At that moment, the door shook and a rough male voice was heard.
"Mr. Choi Hyun-Oh. A search warrant has been issued. Open the door!!"
"Wh-wh-what’s going on?"
Startled by the words from outside, Choi Hyun-Oh looked around frantically.
He was currently on the second floor. Wondering if it would be safe enough to jump out, he ran toward the window. But two police officers were already standing guard on the ground floor.
Realizing there was no escape, Choi Hyun-Oh's face turned white beyond pale.
"Damn it."
At the same time, a man was watching Uncle Music at the mouth of an alley about 50 meters away. The man sighed deeply with his face hidden under a black jumper and a baseball cap pulled low.
"Mr. Choi. No, Hyung. I learned a lot from you."
Cha Sang-Taek had secretly extracted Choi Hyun-Oh's documents the previous night and anonymously passed them to the prosecutors.
Then, he turned and quickly left the alley.
***
On Valentine's Day, I handed out handmade chocolates I had ordered in advance to all the staff and actors on set. Thanks to that, the atmosphere on set became much warmer.
"Cut! Okay! Miss Yoo-Jin, You’re doing great! Keep it up just like that!"
"Miss Yoo-Jin is really getting better day by day, isn't she?"
"Thank you."
During a brief break, Cha Soo-Yeon approached me as I was checking Yoo-Jin's schedule.
"Mr. Jung."
"Oh. Yes, Ms. Cha."
Cha Soo-Yeon smiled, saying she enjoyed the chocolate. "By the way, Miss Yoo-Jin received a sponsorship offer. Would you like to meet the representative?"
"Sponsorship?"
"LM Clothing wants to sponsor outfits for Miss Yoo-Jin. They fell in love with her after seeing an article where she wore a school uniform. What do you think? Are you interested?"
LM Clothing, the third largest clothing company co-headed by the married couple Lee Jong-Hoon and Moon Yung-Mi, started from a two-square-meter underwear shop in Daegu and became a legendary company over 40 years.
A sponsorship offer could easily lead to a commercial deal. Without hesitation, I readily accepted the offer. If we could secure an exclusive contract with LM Clothing, it would help dismiss Hong Sung-Beom's proposal from HK Clothing without any fuss.
But I was curious about one thing.
"Ms. Cha, why did they approach Yoo-Jin instead of Miss Ju Yung-In? Usually, sponsorships go to the lead first, right?"
When I asked, Cha Soo-Yeon carefully looked around and whispered in a low voice. "LM Clothing's Moon Yung-Mi was so moved by Miss Yoo-Jin's episode on The Human Stories that she cried her eyes out."
"Oh, I see."
"Anyway, Madam Moon Young-Mi will visit the set soon, so I'll arrange a meeting."
"Thank you so much."
"Thank me? I’m the one who should be thankful. Thanks to Miss Yoo-Jin, our drama Blue Sky is getting a lot of publicity. Let's keep supporting each other."
"Ha ha ha, of course."
"Alright then, keep up the good work!"
I couldn't help but smile. It was encouraging that the production director paid so much attention to Yoo-Jin who wasn't even the lead. It felt like fate was showering Yoo-Jin’s path with flowers.
But then, Yoo-Jin, who was sitting in the waiting chair, asked cautiously, "Oppa, the chocolate you gave to Choi Jong-Hyuk earlier...it wasn’t anything weird, was it?"
"Why? You think I gave him something inedible?"
The chocolate I gave to Choi Jong-Hyuk was specially ordered and wrapped by myself. Choi Jong-Hyuk, of course, misunderstood it as something made by Yoo-Jin.
When I didn't reply, Yoo-Jin glanced at my face with her eyes full of suspicion.
"Hey. You don’t trust me?"
"That’s not it... I’m sorry."
"There’s no need to apologize. But I did give him something different from others."
"Huh? What did you give him?"
"What I gave him was..."
Hearing my response, Yoo-Jin's expression turned to disbelief. "How could you feed that to another human being!? Are you crazy?"
"What? Some people like it, you know?"
Yoo-Jin shivered, saying that she never knew how cruel I could be.
‘But she’s smiling as well.’
"Okay, time's up. Let's go for the shoot."
Yoo-Jin made a cross with her fingers and booed. "Boo! You're the devil! You're evil! Begone!"
I looked at her playful face and replied calmly, "I told you. It’s still edible."