“What’s this?”

“Snacks for the girls.”

“Feed them stuff like this and you’ll ruin their bodies.”

“If they don’t eat, later on they won’t even be able to have kids, and they’ll live out their lives wheezing with osteoporosis. These are handmade burgers—organic vegetables, slow-fermented buns and Korean beef. Good for them.”

“Even so, they have to put up with it for the fans!”

“We all work so we can eat. Fans come second.”

“But who are you? You don’t work here—can you just walk in like this?”

What a face…

After parting with Director Jo, I went to the KNB Entertainment office.

We needed to rehearse together for tomorrow’s talent show.

The building they were in was modest.

A small three-story building on a back street in Nonhyeon-dong.

They seemed to use the whole thing, basement included.

The company wasn’t doing great, but the building was slick.

The atmosphere didn’t feel very friendly.

The building itself felt gloomy.

It was as if deep, bitter grudges had soaked into it.

Just the place for hatching schemes.

But the manager in front of me, Manager Hwang, was all right.

When he frowned he was scary, but his concern for the girls was pure.

We’d run into each other at the entrance to the basement, where the girls were practicing.

A face with convictions… a deep, steady philtrum. Three creases between the brows—the three-lines-of-luck face, which smooths out once he meets his benefactor… mister, you’ve hit the jackpot.

“I’m Seo-ryeon’s oppa from back home.”

“Seo-ryeon’s? Ah! You’re that Hanguk University law student?”

His sentences were getting shorter and blunter.

“You know about me?”

“Of course I know. Seo-ryeon works her events like mad so she can earn money to support you studying for the bar exam.”

What a sweet kid Seo-ryeon was—she really hadn’t been joking.

No—she had an amazing eye for investment.

She seemed to know that if she made money and invested it in me, she’d hit the jackpot.

Clever little thing.

“And I’ve booked the girls for today and the next two days. You know about that, right?”

“Huh? Then the hotel too?”

Manager Hwang caught on fast.

“Yes. That was me.”

“You must have money.”

Once he knew how old I was, he’d naturally dropped into talking down to me.

This man didn’t seem to have lived an ordinary life.

He had a knack for exactly when to drop the formalities.

“I’m self-made.”

“Aren’t you a college freshman?”

“Can’t a college freshman be self-made?”

“…”

Manager Hwang smacked his lips, as if he had nothing to say.

“Here’s my card.”

I handed him a card printed with the company’s address and the CEO’s name.

“For real?”

“Should it be a fake?”

Manager Hwang shut his mouth.

“But the girls ride around in this? The van looks pretty old.”

It ought to at least be a Carnival, not an old-model Starex.

And it had rust spots here and there on top of that.

Thinking of the FOB girls crisscrossing the country in that thing, I could hardly see through the tears.

“What can I do if they won’t buy one? I make two million a month too. After everything’s taken out, I can’t even cover my kid’s formula.”

“You’re married?”

He looked like a confirmed old bachelor, but he’d managed to land a wife.

“…I think she’s about to divorce me.”

We’d just met, but for all his gruff looks, Manager Hwang opened right up.

“Hang in there a little longer. Soon you’ll meet a benefactor from the east. Then the second act of your life will open.”

“Are you a shaman or something?”

“Are you crazy? What about me looks like a shaman!”

“…That’s what it looks like to me. My grandmother was a well-known village shaman. I can read a little myself.”

Th-this guy suddenly seemed dangerous.

Manager Hwang was in the mid-170-centimeter range, with a slight belly and hair falling over his forehead.

Not much to look at, but he had a friendly face.

Come to think of it, his eyes weren’t ordinary.

There was something in them that saw right through people.

“Aw~ don’t joke. What would I do, take up the spirits? Once you get to know them, they’re all pitiful.”

“The gods are pitiful?”

The rest is a top-level heavenly secret I can’t mention.

That they’re dying for my points is a first-class trade secret.

“Come find me sometime. We’ll have a drink.”

“Aren’t you a minor?”

“College students are fine. Loosen up a little.”

“Yeah… I’m a little short on that, I guess.”

If he knew that much about himself, he’d learned a thing or two about the world.

The world is full of people who want to snap whatever’s strong—that’s another law of the world.

“If you know it, reflect on it. I’m going in.”

“Nothing for me?”

Manager Hwang eyed the burgers and smacked his lips.

He wasn’t unlikable.

“Geez. Are you always this nice a guy?”

“I’ve got to eat too. I haven’t had dinner.”

“Here.”

I handed him one of the handmade Korean-beef burger sets filling both my hands.

“Thanks.”

With that, his character’s first-rate too, isn’t it?

For all his tough first impression, it felt like meeting a big brother from the neighborhood.

To survive in the entertainment business, you need that kind of nerve.

A benefactor only comes along when the time is right.

And so, having handed over a rice cake(?) to tiger Manager Hwang, I made it over the first hill. (TL Note: In the Korean folktale of the brother and sister who became the sun and the moon, a tiger waits for their mother at every hill on her way home and says, “Give me one rice cake and I won’t eat you.”)

“One, two, three! Good, nice timing! Feel the rhythm!”

The dance track was pounding loudly.

Ju-min, the leader, was calling out in a ringing voice.

The basement practice room was not pleasant.

Unlike the outside, the basement was a mess.

Even in winter, you could smell mold.

In that basement, twenty-some pyeong with a big three-sided mirror, the FOB girls were practicing, dripping with sweat.

Even in the dead of winter, the smell of sweat hit you hot.

Ah! A girl group’s sweat…

If the hardcore fans found out about this, they might kill me.

A girl group dewy with sweat was allure itself.

But mostly, I felt sorry for them.

The van was a wreck and the space was even worse.

I was proud of the girls for working this hard in a place like this for nearly two years.

“Oh! It’s oppa!”

Just then my eyes met those of Mi-na, the long-haired girl.

“Oppa?”

“Kyaaaaaah! It’s Tae-san oppa!”

“Oppaaaaaaa!”

The girls came stampeding toward me where I stood at the door.

It wasn’t like reuniting with a mother they’d lost three years ago or anything, but I could feel how thrilled they were.

With a satisfied smile, I opened my arms…

“Food! It’s food!”

“B-burgers!!!”

“Waaaaaaaaah!”

Whoosh, whoosh—suddenly my hands were empty.

The girls who’d run over as if to throw themselves into my arms just snatched the food.

“Thanks for the food!”

“Oppa~ I love you, for real.”

Even Seo-ryeon had become an icon of betrayal.

She said she loved me for real and grabbed a burger, but I didn’t feel the for real one bit.

“Have you eaten?”

Ju-min, a year older than the rest, did come over with a burger and ask.

“I bought plenty so we could eat together.”

“You eat this. It might look like plenty to you, but it’s nowhere near enough for the girls.”

“Won’t your manager chew you out if he finds out?”

I gave her a little scare.

“If you made it past the tiger to get down here, that means he gave permission. Heh heh.”

Ooh! Smart, Ju-min.

And so I had a happy handmade-burger time with the girl group.

They could really put it away.

Burger in their mouths, they grabbed fries with one hand and stuffed them into any free space.

Every slurp made the zero-calorie cola vanish.

Cleared in no time!

“I-is it okay for us to eat like this?”

“We sold our souls for burgers… sniffle.”

And then came the cold light of regret.

Looking at the burger wrappers and trash all over the floor, the girls had a meltdown.

“It’s fine. If it tastes good, it’s zero calories.”

I tossed out a word of comfort.

“Whoa! That’s such a cool thing to say!”

“Really? That thing about zero calories if it tastes good—that’s not a lie, right?”

“Oppa’s at Hanguk University, so it must be right. It’s scientific, right?”

A lying ad slogan meant to sell more meat, bread and food to overweight people all over the country had traveled back through time.

“Of course… it’s a lie~.”

“Waaaaaaaah!”

“Oppa, you’re mean! Big liar! Fibber!”

They’d eaten it themselves, and now they were blaming me.

“Don’t worry. After eating that, just exercise with oppa for five hours.”

Zzzt!

High-powered laser beams shot out of the girls’ eyes.

I didn’t get any bonus points like last time.

Their pent-up food-stress level must have been lower.

“So what are we preparing? Do we just sing our song?”

Ju-min, having chomped her burger to bits, asked.

“No… you’re going to be with me…”

A rush of confidence surged up in me.

Last night, coming back from Hong Kong.

On the plane, I’d been received by Her.

The legendary lady who’d melted the hearts of countless men in the Joseon era.

Her name was…

“Where am I this time!”

I’d talked big to Senior A-rin, so I had to be completely ready.

On the flight from Hong Kong back to Seoul, I put on an eye mask and called a god.

I hadn’t needed the gods’ help in a while, so I hadn’t had a chance to contact them.

Nova hyungnim seemed to have found a new lover, because he hadn’t shown up.

I’d gone looking for a god so I could spend the karma points I’d been saving.

I wanted a god who knew how to have real fun, one who fit the Korean spirit.

Then, with a flash of light, I was transported.

Boom! Boom!

It was a huge underground space with an intense beat thundering through it.

The space was so big the Hongdae clubs I’d been to a few times in my past life couldn’t even compare.

The stage was enormous too.

Dim lighting hung strangely over everything.

My head was spinning.

The beat felt like it would blow out my eardrums, but no god appeared.

Pow!

Suddenly the strobe lights flashed on hard.

“!!!”

Just then a woman appeared in the middle of the stage, bathed in colored lights.

I could only see her from behind.

She wore a skintight black leather vest and pants.

Her curves were perfect.

Just her back view was overwhelming.

“Whoa…”

Legs and a figure straight from the gods.

Her long straight hair was pulled tight into a ponytail.

♬ Boom~ boom-boom-booom~ ♬

She started moving to the beat.

It was an intense sound I’d never heard before.

Like heavy metal rock, but upbeat like an idol dance track.

Tak-tak.

In time with the beat, her fingertips, her toes, every line of her body moved.

♫ Boom-chk~ boom-boom gugugugugugu boom~ ♫

My shoulders started bouncing on their own.

Even I lost my soul to her fierce dance.

It wasn’t as blatant as a girl group’s hip-shaking dance, but it gave off sex appeal.

Watching the sweat drop from her, I felt a cool catharsis.

♬ Du-dum dum boom-boom chk~ ♬

I’d never known a solo dance could be that perfect.

It was sharper and more beautiful than any idol group’s knife-sharp synchronized moves.

Boom!

And then the short but intense music and dance ended.

“Heok.”

I’d been so absorbed I came to with my breath catching in my throat.

“Did you call me, oppa?”

O-oppa?

From behind me, with a sweet waft of sweat, came a woman’s sultry voice that hit my heart with a one-two punch.

Strangely, it sounded clean, too.

A woman’s voice with two tones at once.

My heart pounded on its own.

“How cute~.”

The woman had somehow moved right in front of me.

Oh! My God!

I found myself calling on God without meaning to.

She was the second goddess I’d met, after Dae Jang-geum noona.

The feeling was completely different.

If the goddess Dae Jang-geum was like a graceful Korean noblewoman, this noona goddess was…

A bewitching creature. Bewitching…

She picked my heart up and set it down, picked it up and set it down.

She was dangerously beautiful.

One look at her face and she was simply a national-treasure-class goddess.

On top of that, her sultriness, paired with those pure black eyes, was allure at its height.

I felt hot and cold at the same time.

She was smiling, but her eyes were cool.

But the red energy rippling deep inside them looked as if it could steal a man’s soul.

“Wh… who are you?”

I’d called her, but I didn’t know who this god was.

I’d asked for a Korean god with plenty of flair, but I hadn’t expected a goddess.

“Oppa, will you wipe me off?”

The goddess held a silk handkerchief.

She let down her long hair, a little damp with sweat, and bared the slender line of her neck.

Gulp—if that doesn’t make you swallow, you’re not a man.

Captivating? Bewitching?

I took the silk handkerchief and wiped the back of her neck with a trembling hand.

The flawless white line of her neck was a nuclear bomb all by itself.

I’d met a lot of beautiful women, but before a goddess, they’d all have had to kneel and worship.

Her own unique scent, which you couldn’t find in the human world, was exquisite too.

I quietly wiped away her sweat.

She didn’t move a muscle.

Ugh! This isn’t exactly a green light—what on earth is she?

I asked for a god who knows how to have fun!

“Pfft!”

Suddenly a laugh burst out of her.

— Blue stream in the green hills, don’t boast of how fast you run. Once you reach the wide sea, it’s hard to come back. The bright moon fills the empty hills—why not rest awhile before you go? (TL Note: A famous sijo, a three-line Korean poem, by the sixteenth-century gisaeng Hwang Jini. “Blue stream” is also the name of the royal scholar Byeokgyesu, who boasted he’d never fall for her, and “bright moon,” Myeongwol, was her own gisaeng name.)

Just then a sijo rolled clearly off the lips of the mystery woman.

Ah! And then I understood.

The name of a woman I’d never have dreamed of popped into my head.

“J-Jini noona?”

(End of Chapter 95)