IWDAR Chapter 2

Wooyoung caught the eye of a wealthy chaebol¹madam who was struggling with infertility when he was eight years old. 

Though he had grown up in an orphanage, learning to read the room before he learned to be carefree like other children, Wooyoung didn’t find it all that bad. In the director’s office, there was an organ as old as time, its sound as rich as its age. When he clumsily hummed a tune while playing it, he felt like he owned the world. 

One day, while spending his time as usual, Wooyoung’s small world was greatly shaken.

“Oh my, it’s opera!”

A woman with a sharp perfume, who had been watching Wooyoung play without him knowing, strode over and firmly grasped Wooyoung’s small hand. 

Her eyes gleamed. 

The inconsiderate grip was painful, but Wooyoung couldn’t say anything. He could clearly see the director’s anxious and uneasy expression beyond the unfamiliar woman. 

Don’t ever misbehave when unfamiliar adults come.

It was the most important rule that every child in the orphanage had heard until their ears were raw.

“Did you just play that?”

“Yes…?”

“You played the piano yourself?”

Wooyoung nodded slightly, and the woman frowned. 

“These uneducated ones, honestly.”

Wooyoung clearly heard the small voice that brushed past him.

“And the singing too?”

“…”

“When did you learn to play the piano? To sing? Did someone teach you how to vocalize? Did you know that the song you just sang is a very famous, high-level opera piece? Hmm?”

All the words the woman rapidly spewed out sounded like alien language to young Wooyoung’s ears. The tightening grip was too strong, and the pungent scent was making his nose numb.

The director, unable to stand it any longer, cautiously approached.

“Madam, Wooyoung has never had any formal music lessons. He’s only been exposed to instruments and singing since we introduced the external program two years ago.”

“That’s impossible! Director, this child is a genius! A true genius!”

“…”

The director’s gaze briefly landed on Wooyoung. He hadn’t known it then, but now he understood the meaning of the emotion in the director’s eyes at that moment. It was pity.

｡ﾟ•┈꒰ა ♡ ໒꒱┈•  ｡ﾟ

Han Wooyoung. 

Twenty, not twenty-five. 

An…idol trainee who fell from a four-story building?

After barely managing to change into the clothes the woman had given him, Wooyoung stared at the hospital mirror, lost in thought. A listless-looking face stared back at him from the mirror. It was definitely him, Han Wooyoung. 

Although his hair was messy enough to completely cover his eyes, unlike his usual neatly styled hair that revealed his clean forehead, and he was wearing shabby clothes that would have horrified his parents, the man in the mirror was indeed Han Wooyoung himself.

Lowering his head, Wooyoung stared at his uninjured right hand. His hands, which had never lifted anything heavy in his life, had never even had a small blister… It was strange that his knuckles were calloused, as if he’d been doing hard labor for a long time.

“…Is this a dream?”

Wooyoung touched his hand, feeling a strange  sensation.

‘Strange.’

With his calloused hand, Wooyoung pinched his cheek hard.

“Ouch.”

It really hurt.

“It’s not a dream.”

Strangely, his grip seemed to have gotten stronger too. Even with the sharp pain, nothing changed. His fractured limbs, his messy hair, his worn clothes, his hands bearing the marks of hard work.

But even though everything was different, he was definitely Han Wooyoung. He was indeed Han Wooyoung.

Then…

“What is this place…?”

Even Wooyoung, who had lived a stifled life under constant surveillance since leaving the orphanage, knew what an idol was. 

Boys and girls who sang and danced, endlessly shining in front of the camera. In the classical music world, there were quite a few arrogant people who didn’t consider singers to be musicians. 

The old man who was Wooyoung’s teacher and a renowned professor at a prestigious university was a prime example. Wooyoung always disagreed with that opinion. To him, idols were all pretty and cool. Radiant and fresh, like they were covered in the purest dew. 

Unlike him, who lived a gloomy life like a puppet despite singing freely, the idols he saw through the media were always beautiful. Perhaps he even admired them. Their dazzling freedom.

“But me, an idol trainee…?”

Was it a product of the intense desire he had secretly harbored? 

Or had he finally gone insane? If he was insane, which one was real? 

Han Wooyoung, the genius who had been relentlessly driven since childhood? 

Or Han Wooyoung, the idol trainee who jumped from the roof of a building? 

Which was the dream, and which was reality?

It was while he was kneading his soft cheeks that the bathroom door burst open, interrupting his increasingly chaotic thoughts.

“Hey, you little…”

The woman who had come to find him snapped.

“I was so startled, thinking you had jumped again!”

This woman seemed quite displeased with Wooyoung’s suicide attempts. More than that, Wooyoung decided to point out a more crucial fact to her.

“Excuse me, this is the men’s restroom.”

“What are you talking about, you look like you couldn’t even function as a man.”

“……”

Unable to retort, Wooyoung timidly countered in his mind, ‘Sexual harassment in public places is punishable by a fine. At least 5 million won².’ Of course, only in his mind.

“Come out quickly, we don’t have time. I told the President you were sick when he asked what you’ve been up to for days, so don’t say anything stupid and just stay quiet.”

“But, you weren’t really sent by my parents?”

At Wooyoung’s cautious question, the woman, who had been striding down the hospital hallway, stopped. She glared at Wooyoung with a hardened expression.

“I’m sorry, if you’re trying to guilt-trip me to escape, it wont work. It’s unfortunate that your parents passed away early, but just because I’m your manager doesn’t mean I’ll be swayed by emotions—”

“Yes…?”

Wooyoung, who had been listening blankly, suddenly grabbed the woman’s hand.

“What did you just say… No…”

It was the first time Wooyoung had initiated physical contact like this, so the woman was startled.

“Did they really passed away? When? My parents? Really? For real?”

The words pouring out of him were loud and high-pitched, and his wide-open eyes were clear. The woman involuntarily took a step back.

‘What’s with him? He’s definitely Han Wooyoung, but he’s acting like a completely different person…

A chill ran down the woman’s spine at Wooyoung’s expression. Because what was reflected in his pure, innocent pupils was clear excitement.

When Chae Soohee heard that Han Wooyoung had finally done it, she thought, ‘Well, it was bound to happen.’

That kid was a ticking time bomb, even within Sohee’s tiny, hole-in-the-wall agency, “Lilac Entertainment”, which was barely a proper company.

The President was at fault for sweet-talking and bringing in a kid who had lost his parents, dropped out of middle school, and was living on the streets. And the kid was also at fault for signing the contract without a second thought, blinded by the contract money.

‘How could he know what they’d demand from him in exchange for that measly sum?’

No matter how much Han Wooyoung had lived through thick and thin, he was just a kid who had barely become an adult. Meaning, he was too young to know that you shouldn’t mess with businessmen.

In the end, the moment the President, harboring obvious ulterior motives, revealed his sinister intentions, these hellish days began to unfold for Wooyoung.

The President, babbling about investment money, tried to sell Wooyoung off to a sponsor, and Han Wooyoung raised hell, demanding to terminate the contract.

Naturally, the CEO refused to let Wooyoung go, demanding several times the contract amount as a penalty.

Chae Sohee had been anxious when the boy, who always visited the office with a dazed look and clutching the contract, suddenly vanished without a trace. And then, when she finally heard the news of his suicide attempt and rushed to the hospital…

“So, you’re saying you’re not in your right mind.”

Soohee spoke first, desperately trying to erase the image of Wooyoung from a moment ago, his face filled with excitement as he asked if his parents had really died. Even now, his clear eyes staring blankly at her made her uncomfortable.

“…Well, it’s not that I’m not in my right mind, but my memory is a little fuzzy.”

Wooyoung held back from saying that this place didn’t seem like where he lived, fearing he would be definitely treated as a complete lunatic.

“What a load of crap.”

Even so, Soohee’s perception of him didn’t seem to have improved much.