Yoo-jin found the nearest 24-hour PC bang. The air inside was thick with the smell of instant noodles and the low, constant hum of computer fans. The rhythmic clicking of a hundred keyboards sounded like an army of insects.
He sat Mina down at a terminal in a dimly lit, private corner, shielding her from the other gamers. His expression was completely focused, his earlier panic replaced by a cold, sharp clarity.
"Hana thinks that video is her weapon," he said, his voice low and intense. "A knife to hold at your throat. But a knife can be used by whoever is holding it."
He turned to face her. "We're not going to wait for her to stab you in the back. We're going to leak it first."
Mina stared at him, her eyes wide with a fresh wave of horror. "What? Why would we do that? Everyone will see…"
"Because," Yoo-jin cut her off, his fingers already flying across the keyboard, "we're not going to release her story. The story of a failed trainee having a panic attack."
He met her gaze, his own eyes burning with a strategic fire. "We're going to release yours. The story of a girl with an incredible, mysterious voice, too shy to show her face, who was brutally attacked in public by a jealous rival."
He didn't need to guess. His system showed him exactly what the public craved. He scanned the top trending topics on the biggest online forums, and the blue screens confirmed his instincts.
[Public Interest: Underdog stories (High)]
[Public Interest: Bullying scandals (Very High)]
[Public interest: Unfairness in the K-pop industry (High)]
Hana had handed him the perfect ingredients for a viral narrative. He just had to cook the meal.
Yoo-jin created a new, anonymous account on 'K-Pop Korner', the biggest and most influential idol gossip forum in Korea. A rumor that started here could bring a company's stock price down by morning.
He downloaded the video Hana had sent him. Then, using a simple, free editing software, he began to cut.
He was meticulous. A surgeon. He completely removed the first few seconds of Mina's shaky start. He cut out the part where Yoo-jin had stepped in. He made only two, crucial changes.
First, he made the first thirty seconds of the video a black screen, with only the audio of Mina's voice at its most powerful. Haunting. Perfect.
Second, he slowed down the last moment. The video would show Hana's hand lunging into the frame, ripping the mask away, and then it would freeze on Mina's shocked, innocent, terrified face for three full seconds before cutting to black.
It was no longer just a clip. It was a story. A tragedy in sixty seconds.
He wrote a short, explosive title designed to be pure clickbait.
[VIRAL] The Masked Singer of Hongdae and the Starforce Trainee Who Attacked Her.
In the body of the post, he didn't write a long, defensive explanation. He wrote only one line, a line designed to provoke immediate, emotional outrage.
Her voice gave me chills. What that other girl did made my blood run cold.
He looked at the blue progress bar as the video uploaded, each percentage point feeling like a point of no return. He hovered the mouse over the 'Post' button. He glanced at Mina. She was pale, her hands clasped so tightly her knuckles were white, but she nodded.
He clicked. The fuse was lit.
For sixty agonizing seconds, nothing happened. The post sat there with zero views, zero comments. Yoo-jin's heart hammered in his chest. Had he miscalculated?
Then the view count ticked to 100. Then 1,000. A few seconds later, it jumped to 5,000.
The first comment appeared.
User1: OMG HER VOICE IS INSANE!!! WHO IS THIS??
Then another, and another. A dam had broken.
User2: I was there! I saw this happen! The girl in the mask was amazing, and that other girl just attacked her out of nowhere!
User3: Wait, I recognize the girl who attacked her. That's Lee Hana from Starforce, isn't it? The one they keep pushing in their trainee vlogs? Disgusting.
User4: This is straight-up bullying. She looked so happy singing and that witch just ruined it. Starforce better have an explanation for this.
User5: Forget the bully, I need to know who the masked singer is! That voice… wow. Just wow. #FindTheMaskedSinger
Yoo-jin and Mina watched the screen, transfixed, as the comments flooded in, a tidal wave of public opinion. The view count exploded past 100,000 in less than ten minutes. It was going viral.
But more importantly, the narrative was exactly what he had planned. No one was laughing at Mina. No one was calling her a failure.
They were defending her. They were championing her. They were demanding to know her name.
Mina read the comments, her eyes scanning the words of support from a hundred anonymous strangers. Tears began to stream down her face, silent and steady. But for the first time that day, they weren't tears of fear or humiliation.
They were tears of relief. For the first time, she saw that the world wasn't just a panel of cruel judges waiting to tear her down. It was also full of people who could be moved by her voice.
Yoo-jin's phone, which had been buzzing nonstop with forum notifications, suddenly let out a sharp, official ringtone. The sound cut through the noise of the PC bang like a siren.
He looked at the caller ID. The name was simple and chilling.
Starforce Entertainment - Main Office
His stomach twisted into a hard knot. The fire he had started had finally reached the castle walls.
He answered the call, putting it on speaker. A woman's voice, as cold and sharp as ice, spoke without preamble. It was Director Park's secretary.
"Assistant Manager Han. Director Park wants to see you. And the trainee, Choi Mina."
She paused, letting the threat hang in the air.
"In his office. Immediately."
The line went dead.
Yoo-jin hung up and met Mina's nervous, questioning gaze. The fear was back in her eyes, but underneath it now was the small, resilient spark he had seen in the alley.
He gave her a reassuring nod he didn't feel himself.
"Don't worry," he said, his own mind already calculating the odds of the coming battle.
"This is just the next stage."