This year’s Grammy Awards recorded viewership ratings so high that they were incomparable to the previous year.
[Min Hyunseung performs a special tribute stage for Daniel at the Grammys… Grammys become a sea of tears]
[Sarah Stewart wails after watching Min Hyunseung’s performance… even leaves the venue]
[Min Hyunseung wins Grammy for ‘Album of the Year’… “Daniel, I won’t forget you.” Acceptance speech…]
Articles followed one after another for days, most of them related to Hyunseung.
Among them, the moment when Hyunseung performed his special stage broke the all-time viewership record, and views of the performance clip continued soaring day after day.
It wasn’t just in the United States.
Not only America, but all of Europe and Asia were in an uproar.
And especially in Korea, Hyunseung’s homeland, it wasn’t merely an uproar. The entire country had been turned upside down.
Tadadak, tadak.
Jin Miso, who could arguably be called Hyunseung’s number one fan, was writing another post on the fan café today.
| Fan Café |
| [I mean, he goes to the US, reveals his name, and now he’s even revealed his glorious face? Is this for real? This is too much, honestly. Recruiting people to file a national petition to get him to come to this year’s Gayo Daejejeon.] |
| ↳ Are you saying only Americans get to keep that glorious face all to themselves? |
| ↳ We can’t let America steal the treasure Korea gave birth to. Post the national petition right now. Gather all your relatives. |
| ↳ Ah, seriously, should I just immigrate to the US… |
| ↳ And now he’s even DJing?;; Seriously, Min Hyunseung, just do everything you want from now on. |
| ↳ But was it just me who got a little choked up…? I think the part in the speech about not forgetting was for Daniel… |
| ↳ Same here. My eyes welled up and I wanted to give him a hug. |
She vented her longing for him every day like this, as though grumbling in a diary.
And then.
Others who missed him just as much as she did would leave comments.
Yes.
Seeing how quickly comments appeared the moment she uploaded a post, she clearly wasn’t the only one who missed him and was waiting for him.
That fact alone filled Jin Miso’s heart.
So that HS… no.
So that the person named Min Hyunseung would not be forgotten in Korea, Jin Miso roamed all sorts of communities today as well, spreading news about him, making him known, and cheering him on.
Yes.
While looking forward to the day Min Hyunseung would eventually return to Korea…
The aftermath of the Grammys lasted longer than expected.
Perhaps because he had finally revealed his face completely, even more attention poured in than after the previous Super Bowl Halftime Show.
“CEO, these are the proposals that came in today.”
As if he had suddenly become a popular celebrity, all sorts of brands sent proposals asking him to become an ambassador or appear in advertisements.
Not only that, but invitations to DJ festivals were flooding in from all over the world, not just the US.
Of course.
Hyunseung had neither the heart nor the energy for any of that right now.
“Please decline them all politely.”
For that reason, only Michelle was dying.
Once she arrived at work, she could barely leave her desk because she had to sift through and reject hundreds of proposals every day.
Hyunseung watched Michelle turn and leave without showing the slightest sign of hardship and thought,
‘I should give her a bonus.’
Seeing her already thin frame growing even thinner, it had to be tough.
Just then.
As though Michelle had run into someone at the door, she let out a scream, which was unlike her usual self.
Actually, even that was merely her voice getting a little louder.
“I didn’t mean to startle you. I’m sorry.”
The person who walked past her was Killian.
“It’s all right.”
Then again, it would have been harder not to be startled when confronted with that fierce face, unless she were a robot rather than a human.
“First of all, I have something to tell the CEO. May I come in?”
Since Killian asked quite politely, Hyunseung set aside the stack of papers for a moment and gestured for him to sit.
Michelle gave a polite bow and closed the door as she left.
“I enjoyed the Grammy performance.”
Then an innocent, childlike smile that didn’t suit him appeared on Killian’s face.
Among all the employees at Unice, Hyunseung was probably the only one who had seen this side of him.
Of course.
Hyunseung wasn’t exactly pleased about that.
Wouldn’t anyone feel the same way?
A man with that face and physique smiling brightly at him every day.
And only at him.
As a fellow man, it wasn’t particularly pleasant.
“Surely you didn’t come all this way just to tell me that?”
Hyunseung asked, narrowing his eyes slightly.
“Of course, that’s not all.”
Killian replied with a much more serious expression.
He then glanced toward the door.
He was probably checking whether it had closed properly.
That meant whatever he was about to say wasn’t something anyone else should hear.
“What is it?”
Hyunseung sensed the unusual atmosphere as well and straightened his posture.
“As I recently started working as an engineer again, I discovered something very strange.”
“What kind of thing?”
“A certain composer sends in songs from time to time, and there’s something strange about them.”
Killian scratched his chin with an uncomfortable expression and cautiously continued.
“Usually, composers have their own habits or patterns that could be called their signature. But this person is different every time.”
“Well, couldn’t they make each song differently if they wanted to?”
Hyunseung countered.
That was because Hyunseung himself tended to create songs with such different colors that one could hardly believe they had been written by the same composer.
If he set his mind to it, he could easily make a song sound as though he hadn’t created it.
That was an extremely easy task for Hyunseung.
As such, it was difficult to judge something as strange based on that alone.
“It’s not that kind of feeling. It feels as though several different people are taking turns making the songs rather than a single person.”
In particular, it was an even more delicate matter to suspect someone of using a ghostwriter for that reason.
However, if what Killian said was true, it meant a composer was using ghostwriters while putting forward only their own name.
“Is that composer by any chance affiliated with our Unice Music Group?”
“Yes.”
“Do you also have concrete evidence that he’s using ghostwriters?”
“That… not yet….”
“Then it’s still only a suspicion. I think you may be getting ahead of yourself.”
Since this was the kind of suspicion that could potentially destroy a composer’s reputation, Hyunseung’s expression sharpened.
Furthermore, as someone who had once fallen all the way to the bottom because of a single assumption…
He found the current situation, where Killian suspected someone based solely on personal conjecture, uncomfortable.
However, Killian pressed on and explained again.
“I’ve listened to every song the CEO has released so far. Everything, including the songs released in Korea.”
Seeing the madness swirling in Killian’s eyes as he said that, there was no need to check whether it was true.
“When you simply listen to them, the styles and genres are all so different that it’s difficult to believe the same composer released them.”
Even as he spoke, Killian nodded slightly as though savoring each of Hyunseung’s songs one by one.
“However, when I listen as an engineer, I can tell that the CEO’s unique habits are embedded in every song.”
He added, his eyes shining with absolute conviction.
“But that composer isn’t like that.”
Before he knew it, Hyunseung was listening seriously to Killian.
Although Killian approached him without hesitation, he wasn’t the sort of person who treated others carelessly or allowed personal feelings to influence his judgment.
If he had been that kind of person, he would have dipped his toes into company politics long ago.
Which meant this wasn’t something he had done out of a personal desire to harm someone.
Especially for someone as sincere about music as Killian, he must have thought about it over and over before coming here.
“Who is the composer?”
It should be all right to believe Killian just this once.
After all, Killian had also believed that Hyunseung was someone fit to become CEO of Unice Music Group.
“Well, that is….”
As though it were a difficult name to say aloud, Killian hesitated for a moment.
“It’s Joshua, the internal director.”
An unexpected person….
No.
He had named someone who, for some reason, Hyunseung felt might actually be the one.
‘Is it starting already?’
Since Joshua had been like that in his previous life, Hyunseung had expected him to do it again someday.
He had even planned to use it as a pretext to kick him out of Unice.
He was simply surprised because the timing was a little earlier than expected.
Joshua….
Even in his previous life, he had either commissioned songs from ghostwriters or bought their songs outright and released them as his own.
When even that failed, he plagiarized Hyunseung’s songs.
However, since it was still only conjecture for now, perhaps it would be better for Killian to go and ask him directly rather than for Hyunseung….
“If I went and said it myself, from Joshua’s perspective it would amount to nothing more than provocation, so I came to see the CEO.”
As though he had read Hyunseung’s thoughts, Killian cautiously added that.
It seemed he didn’t simply want to eliminate Joshua.
He was merely burning with a sense of justice, unable to overlook wrongdoing related to music.
“First of all….”
In that case, should he try changing the future?
“Could you send me all the songs Joshua has submitted to the engineering room so far?”
Having said that, Hyunseung simply wore an expression that made it impossible to tell what he was thinking.
Joshua hadn’t visited the studio for a while.
It wasn’t because he was busy.
He had simply been turning a blind eye for the time being.
At first, he had started composing on his own.
However, perhaps because he lacked innate talent, the results weren’t good.
Austin repeatedly rejected the songs Joshua requested to have distributed.
He gave no reason.
If he had at least told Joshua what was lacking and what wasn’t good, he could have worked on improving it.
“How should I put it…”
Austin only offered vague words that seemed like grasping at clouds.
“My heart isn’t moved.”
Whenever that happened, Joshua told himself it was because Austin came from a background as a casting manager.
He thought that if Austin were a professional musician or artist, this wouldn’t be happening.
As much as he had disliked him since Austin first took office, Joshua’s resentment toward him gradually grew.
And that twisted heart had led him to this point.
At first, he had tried to collaborate by finding only a top-liner to handle the melody work he felt he lacked.
Then his greed gradually grew, until he reached the point of bringing in everyone from beat-makers to producers and using them as ghostwriters.
He knew it was wrong, but….
He justified it to himself.
If he could make a song worthy of recognition as a composer, if he could build up the value of his name, then he could put all of this down and return to the starting point.
However, he couldn’t.
It was always the starting point.
Whether it was a song he worked on personally, a song he collaborated on, or a song they made entirely for him.
They were all either scrapped…
Or they were released only to disappear without anyone in the world even noticing.
The more that happened.
The more stubbornly ugly thoughts raised their heads.
But lately, those thoughts had kept bowing their heads again.
Jealousy.
Envy.
Resentment.
Those emotions that had grown twisted over time were gradually being neutralized.
That was why even his visits to the studio had become infrequent.
Knock, knock, knock.
Because of the man who was knocking before walking in right now.
“I have something to tell you. Do you have a moment?”
The instant Joshua faced that man, the conversation he had once had with Killian came to mind.
“Yes, he is someone who better suits the word ‘musician.’”
Yes.
That was what Killian had said back then.
“That’s why I think he would be a perfect fit for the position of CEO of Unice Music Group.”
A man capable of neutralizing even the jealousy and envy that had accumulated over so many years.
A man more suited to being CEO of Unice because he was a true musician.
“Yes, please come in, CEO Min Hyunseung.”
Such a person had come to see him.
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