* * *
Just past midnight, Heungmin and Woochul were heading back to their dorm with snacks they bought from a convenience store.
The snacks were nothing more than imitation crab meat and sparkling water, but they needed something to fill their stomachs to fall asleep.
“Hey! Look at that, hyung!”
Woochul, swinging the bag, suddenly stopped and pointed at the bus stop.
[THE ORIGIN’s Myeongwoo
Happy birthday to you!
Myeongwoo, you are the only true one in my life!
-Myeongwoo Fan Union-]
The bus stop billboard that Woochul pointed to displayed a birthday advertisement for Yoo Myeongwoo, a member of THE ORIGIN, a new group that had debuted not long ago.
The photo of Myeongwoo on the billboard was taken during his trainee days.
“Wow… It’s really different for someone from New Entertainment. How does a member who debuted just a week ago get a birthday advertisement?”
Woochul clicked his tongue in a voice mixed with jealousy and envy.
“Big agencies like New Entertainment start attracting fans even during their trainee days…”
“I knew that, but it’s still impressive. I heard their album sold a lot already.”
Heungmin silently nodded.
In the past, he would have felt nothing but envy, but knowing about Dojae’s situation, he felt uneasy.
Through a friend who was a trainee at another agency, he found out that the bullying Dojae had mentioned was far worse than he described.
They had beaten him to the point of bruising, under the pretense of jokes and game punishments, just because he was poor and unremarkable, and because he tolerated any kind of harassment.
“That guy must have been one of those who bullied Dojae too, right?”
“Well, even if he wasn’t as bad as that Sunghwan guy, he’s probably similar.”
Since they were in the same group, at the very least, he was a bystander.
“Ugh, just thinking about it makes him look even more annoying. So irritating.”
Agreeing with Woochul, Heungmin glanced around the empty street.
“Still, watch what you say. We’re about to debut too.”
“Whatever, whatever.”
“What do you mean, whatever?”
“Come on, how could they have bullied Dojae hyung…”
Staring at the billboard, Woochul was at a loss for words.
It was shocking when he first found out, but the more time he spent with Dojae, the harder it was to understand.
To Woochul, who had lived closely with Dojae for nearly a year, he seemed like a near-perfect person.
He was always the first to wake up and moved diligently, managing himself meticulously.
No matter how hard it got, he never swore and always behaved correctly.
He seemed more like someone educated in Cheonghak-dong than someone who had been a trainee at New Entertainment.
“If they said he was bullied because he was too perfect, I could at least understand that… but hyung isn’t the type to expect others to be perfect like him.”
“Exactly. What could have made him seem so easy to target…”
“How did Dojae hyung endure it for three years? Looking at him now, I can’t imagine he would put up with it.”
Just because he didn’t swear didn’t mean he was someone who couldn’t speak his mind.
Even with the music video director a while back, he showed respect to adults but confidently expressed his opinions.
Therefore, it was hard to fully accept that Dojae had been bullied and ostracized, although they felt pity and anger about it.
“Well… Dojae must have been younger back then.”
“Maybe he was a little less perfect then.”
Woochul said with a slightly relaxed expression, laughing quietly.
Thinking about how Dojae was probably out running along the Han River while they were on their way to the convenience store made him admire Dojae all over again.
***
“We’re back! Whoever’s hungry, come out.”
Returning to the dorm, Heungmin placed the bag of food on the living room table and shouted. Kim Kyuseong and Louis, excluding Kijoon, who had fallen asleep early, came out to the living room.
“Old man, acting like you’re the oldest.”
Heungmin grumbled, muttering under his breath, still feeling a bit sour from being scolded by Kijoon during the additional recording of ‘Dynamic’ a few days ago.
Nevertheless, feeling sorry for Kijoon, who was juggling both debut preparations and song production, Heungmin brought some red ginseng drink for him.
Noticing Dojae’s absence, he asked.
“Where’s Dojae?”
“He went for a run! He is awesome. Doesn’t he get tired?”
Louis, opening a packet of chicken breast sausage, stuck out his tongue.
“He’s still not back? It seems like he’s been gone for over an hour.”
“That’s strange. He said he’d just go for a light thirty-minute run since we have a profile shoot tomorrow.”
Said Kim Kyuseong, who shared a room with Dojae.
“It’s hot just breathing… What if he collapsed while running?”
Woochul’s concern sounded like a mere joke, and everyone took it as such.
They all knew about Dojae’s incredible stamina.
However, it was indeed strange that he hadn’t returned yet.
If Dojae said he would run for thirty minutes, he would return exactly in that time.
“Try contacting him. He’ll probably be hungry after coming back, so let’s leave something for him.”
“Got it.”
Louis called Dojae on behalf of the group.
After holding the phone for a while, Louis tilted his head.
“That’s strange. He’s not picking up.”
“He might be working out and can’t answer right now.”
It was when Woochul was tidying up that Louis’s phone rang.
It was Dojae.
“Hey! Hyung! Why are you so late? Oh, oh?!”
Louis, who was eagerly speaking as soon as he answered the call, suddenly paused.
Then, he screamed in what sounded like a shriek.
“The hospital?!!”
Everyone in the living room froze.
It was like a bolt from the blue on a clear night.
***
“Doctor, doctor! Please come quickly! This patient’s heart rate is…!”
“Ouch, it hurts! Please be a little gentler!”
“Waaah, mommy!”
From patients with stomachaches to those in critical condition, the brightly lit emergency room was in chaos with all sorts of patients.
And in a corner of the emergency room, there was someone with bandages wrapped around their shoulder and arm.
Dojae looked down at Sunghwan with emotionless eyes.
Despite being on painkillers, Sunghwan groaned and winced with pain at even the slightest movement.
“After finishing this IV, you’ll be moved to a general ward. Please wait.”
“…Okay.”
Sunghwan replied gruffly to the nurse’s instructions.
Once the nurse left, Dojae sternly interrogated him like a judge questioning a criminal.
“Why did you do it?”
“…”
This time, Sunghwan’s mouth clamped shut.
Seeing his shoulders tremble with resentment, Dojae clicked his tongue.
As he had thought before, Sunghwan was truly… too foolish.
When Dojae was leaving the building, he was suddenly attacked by a man reeking of alcohol.
Dojae narrowly dodged the man’s attempt to grab him from behind.
‘I almost got in big trouble because I let my guard down.’
As the third prince, his personal safety was generally secure, but he always took utmost care to protect himself in the Korean Empire.
When leaving the palace, not only Chamberlain Kim but also the Imperial Guards escorted him.
However, in South Korea, Dojae was still just an ordinary young man in his twenties.
He could go wherever he wanted freely, and there was no immediate threat to his safety.
So, he never expected something like this to happen.
Had his body, trained from twenty years of living as a prince, not moved instinctively, he could have been in serious danger.
Having learned martial arts from a very young age, Dojae easily flipped the assailant who had attacked him from behind.
The man, who had tried to punch the back of Dojae’s head, ended up being thrown to the ground instead.
Thud!
“Ugh!”
Dojae had thrown him down without mercy, and at that moment, the man felt a pain as if his bones were breaking.
If not for the alcohol, he might have fainted right then and there.
Rolling on the ground, the man cursed.
“You bastard!”
Recognizing the familiar voice, Dojae frowned and took out his phone to shine some light.
The man sprawled messily on the ground was Sunghwan.
“You…”
Dojae was speechless.
Even while cursing, Sunghwan floundered without being able to get up.
Debating whether to call the police or an ambulance, Dojae reluctantly chose to call an ambulance first.
Involving the police might complicate things, and he figured he could talk to Sunghwan once he sobered up.
After a quick check and treatment at the emergency room, quite a bit of time had passed.
Having called his group to assure them he was fine, he returned to find that Sunghwan had sobered up.
So Dojae asked again.
Why on earth had he done such a thing?
‘Though I did consider the possibility of retaliation.’
When he left New Entertainment, and when he heard that Sunghwan had been kicked out of New Entertainment, Dojae had thought that Sunghwan might seek revenge.
That’s why he had his mother quit her cleaning job at the building.
But things had been quieter than expected, so he thought Sunghwan was busy taking care of himself…
“You, you. Do you think I’ll let this slide? I’ll report you for assault.”
Instead of answering why he attacked, Sunghwan started talking nonsense.
Dojae let out a dry laugh and pointed out the facts in a cold voice.
“I should be the one reporting you. You attacked me while drunk at night.”
“In the end, I’m the one who got hurt…!”
“I was acting in self-defense. Can’t you understand that? There’s CCTV in front of the building and evidence of you harassing me before, so any way you look at it, I should be the one reporting you.”
“Damn it!”
Sunghwan swore for no reason. Dojae furrowed his brow.
“Now that I see, it seems like you didn’t think this through. Coming at me like this, have you given up on becoming a singer? Good decision. Trash like you doesn’t belong on TV…”
“It’s because of you, damn it!”
Sunghwan interrupted Dojae, shouting.
His voice was so loud that everyone in the emergency room turned to look at them.
“Patient! Be quiet! This is the emergency room.”
A passing nurse scolded Sunghwan.
Sunghwan continued, panting heavily.
“You didn’t let me debut! You ruined my life, damn it.”
“You ruined your own life. You harassed me.”
“Was it really necessary to go this far just because you were bullied a bit? If it weren’t for you… I would be on stage right now!”
His shamelessness was astonishing, but at least it was clear why Sunghwan, drunk and out of his mind, had come looking for Dojae.
‘He must be bitter seeing The Origin, the group he used to be in, debuting and doing well.’
Dojae frowned.
“You said you were leaving! Anyway, what you recorded… it wasn’t even a big deal, and the company could have easily handled it. They were going to debut me!”
Sunghwan’s words were unexpected.
No, Dojae had thought the same initially.
Considering the low moral standards of New Entertainment, they could have debuted Sunghwan as well.
“…But?”
“You’ve been threatening the company continuously, even Myeongwoo… So, Myeongwoo had no choice but to…”
Threatening?
Since leaving NEW Entertainment, Dojae hadn’t gone near it.
He hadn’t contacted Yoo Myeongwoo either.
After thinking for a moment, Dojae came to a conclusion and muttered pitifully.
“How foolish and stupid.”
“…What?”
Dojae almost felt sorry for the ‘Kang Dojae’ who fell victim to such an idiot.
* * *
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Thanks
🤣🤣he’s really an idiot