A Week After the Showcase
The aftermath of Jiho's performance was a slow, rising tide.
It didn't come with roaring applause or blinding cameras. It came with closed doors cracking open — just wide enough for opportunity to slip through.
Jiho received a folded letter from the head trainee coordinator one morning before vocal training.
To: Yoon Jiho
You are hereby invited to a preliminary audition session with BlackHaze Entertainment's Development Division.
Your performance at the showcase was evaluated by external producers, and they have expressed direct interest in evaluating you further.
— Talent Acquisitions, BlackHaze
Jiho stared at the words, pulse still and quiet like ice settling in a glass.
He didn't smile.
He just folded the letter once, tucked it into his pocket, and returned to practice.
But the moment the door shut behind him, he exhaled.
This was it. The first real door.
The one they said he'd never reach.
Whispers Follow
By that evening, the rumors had spread.
Some said Jiho was being fast-tracked.
Others said he had "someone backing him."
A few said he'd blackmailed his way in.
And Hyunwoo? Word was that his demotion had become permanent. His connection — the cousin in casting — had been quietly relocated after an anonymous report leaked their unethical favoritism.
Jiho never admitted to filing it.
He never had to.
He just kept moving.
Seungmin Breaks the Silence
They hadn't spoken in ten days.
But Jiho found Seungmin waiting on the dorm rooftop after evening practice, hoodie pulled over his head, arms curled tight around himself in the biting spring cold.
Jiho paused at the door.
"I heard about the audition," Seungmin said, not looking up.
"I didn't tell anyone."
"You didn't have to."
Silence stretched between them like wire — tense, waiting to snap.
"I should be happy for you," Seungmin said at last. "We used to dream about this."
Jiho stepped closer but didn't sit. "We don't dream the same anymore."
Seungmin finally looked at him, and there was something in his eyes Jiho hated recognizing: not anger, not even disappointment — but grief.
"You let them change you."
"They didn't change me," Jiho said softly. "They revealed me."
The First Audition
BlackHaze's audition studio was smaller than Jiho expected.
The walls were matte gray. The floor polished but unpolished — like everything here was designed to strip away pretense.
Three men sat behind a black table.
One wore a crisp suit. One wore a beanie and oversized glasses. And the third — older, clean-shaven, and silent — only watched.
Jiho stood dead center, breath controlled.
"Yoon Jiho," said the suit. "Let's see what you've got."
He sang.
He danced.
He improvised a line rewrite when the lyrics sheet they gave him was wrong — and made it better.
And at the end, when they told him, "That'll be all," he bowed once, turned, and left without looking back.
The Offer
The email arrived that night.
Subject: Conditional Development Agreement
Congratulations, Jiho. We believe you show long-term potential. Pending final agreement, you will enter a private training track under BlackHaze's Development Division.
Jiho didn't celebrate.
He stared at the screen.
He reread the phrase: long-term potential.
They didn't say "star."
They said potential.
A possibility.
Not a promise.
Which meant the game wasn't over.
It had just changed levels.
The Return of a Ghost
Two days later, Jiho found a package waiting outside his dorm bunk.
No note. No name.
Just a phone.
Burner model.
Untraceable.
Jiho didn't react — not outwardly.
But something beneath his skin tensed like a snare.
He waited until lights-out to power it on.
There was only one message.
"BlackHaze doesn't make stars. They make weapons. Be careful how much of yourself you sell — or you won't get it back."
No sender ID.
No number.
Just: K.
Jiho's Sleepless Night
He stayed up, staring at the phone.
He thought about the last time he heard that name — the mysterious figure whispered about among trainees who suddenly succeeded, or survived falls that should've ended them.
A shadowy name passed around like a ghost story.
A protector.
A devil.
Or both.
Jiho had thought K was just a myth.
But now…?
He didn't delete the message.
He didn't reply either.
He just tucked the phone beneath his mattress.
And began making plans.
Seungmin's Departure
Three days before Jiho was scheduled to begin his exclusive training, Seungmin was called into the office.
When he returned, his eyes were empty.
"They said I'm not progressing fast enough."
Jiho's throat tightened. "What?"
"They're giving me one month to improve or I'm out."
A beat passed.
Then Seungmin looked at him, something bitter curling in his voice.
"You're going to debut. I'm going to disappear."
"You're not—"
"Don't," Seungmin cut him off. "Don't pretend you didn't see this coming. You moved up. I didn't. That's how it works, right?"
Jiho opened his mouth.
But for the first time, he didn't have the words.
Seungmin gave him a small, crooked smile.
"It's okay," he said. "I just hope… when you're on top, you still remember what it was like to bleed for it."
And So, the Door Opens
On April 9th, Jiho entered the private training wing of BlackHaze.
It was nothing like the dorms.
Soundproof rooms. Custom programs. Personalized branding specialists. Only six other trainees — handpicked, silent, cutthroat.
Jiho was given his own schedule, a biometric ID, and a stylist who referred to him as "a blank slate."
He realized something as he looked in the mirror after his first rebranding session:
They didn't want Jiho.
They wanted who he could become.
And that, somehow, was far more dangerous.