Chapter 204: Sing for Me (3)

The living room of Stardust’s dorm.

The two oldest members were sitting close together with serious expressions.

Ha Junseo bit his lower lip, then lowered his voice.

“Do you have a hunch why?”

“He’s been through a lot. He kept getting hurt recently. He must’ve been shocked when the lighting rig fell, too.”

Cha Seongbin rubbed his chin as he listed several plausible reasons.

It made sense, but…

Ha Junseo let out a short sigh and spoke.

“Still, isn’t he sleeping for way too long?”

He wasn’t completely unconscious, but like someone drunk on sleep, the Youngest was completely out of it.

From a distance, Seo Haim’s chatter could be heard.

“Seochi, eat for your hyung!”

“See? Even the kids are losing it….”

Cha Seongbin frowned and whispered into Ha Junseo’s ear.

Then he glanced at Kang Siwoo and asked.

“Let’s wake him up now.”

They had agreed to let him sleep more earlier, but now it was dinnertime.

Since it seemed he’d gotten plenty of rest, Cha Seongbin thought it was time to wake him.

‘Yeah, it’s about time to wake him.’

But.

Before Kang Siwoo could even respond—

Creeaak—

“Oh, Seohan!”

“Hey, you finally woke up?”

Do Seohan opened the door and came out on his own.

“It’s been two days… like that?”

“Yeah. I almost took you to the hospital ‘cause you wouldn’t wake up.”

“I’m not sick.”

“Then you should’ve at least gotten up and eaten!”

My head throbbed from all the sleeping, and I held it while enduring the hyungs’ nagging.

I thought I had just collapsed after all the tension from the concert finally released.

Apparently, I’d been nodding off non-stop except for meal times.

Judging from how I barely remembered anything that happened in between, I guess they were right.

“Nothing happened, right?”

“No.”

Ha Junseo looked at me with a worried gaze.

“The manager was really worried, too.”

“I figured.”

“Though… he was worried in a different way… mmph!”

Cha Seongbin, who had been chattering while eating salad, had his mouth covered by Kang Siwoo.

Huh?

“What was it?”

Now I was even more curious since he stopped mid-sentence.

Kang Siwoo shook his head, looking at Cha Seongbin with a cold expression.

“You were so out of it and staggering around, he wondered if you were on something….”

“…Yeah. That’s what it was.”

“Hyung, is that something you should say in front of him?”

“He’s not a kid!”

Ah.

Manager Lee Jaeyoon’s imagination had made it all the way to the social news section.

I chuckled and let it pass, but Ha Junseo added quietly.

“Actually, the artist our manager was in charge of before was Lee Rip….”

“Ah, that explains it.”

“So that’s what it was?”

Lee Rip, the singer who was famously kicked out of the entertainment industry after getting caught doing drugs not once, but twice.

That led to a whole slew of arrests among nearby celebrities, and for a while, the entertainment industry had its own drug scandal gate.

He had been a pretty well-known ballad singer when I was a kid, but the drug scandal ruined him.

So he was the manager’s last artist, huh.

“He must’ve had PTSD….”

I understood.

Seo Haim nodded enthusiastically with sparkling eyes.

“So I told them that Seohan is just a sleepy little hamster!”

“Hamsters sleep all day anyway.”

“Seohan, it must be hard being born a human!”

How did it get to that?

In any case, I should clear up the misunderstanding properly another time.

“Don’t worry. I don’t do drugs.”

“Of course not. We weren’t even worried~.”

“If anyone does drugs, they’re getting kicked out of Stardust!”

“They’d get forced out anyway…?”

“Ah!”

Seo Haim and Jin Sehyun exchanged nonsense and came to their own realizations.

Wait a second.

Kevin, who used to be a member of Stardust, was actually a druggie….

Manager Lee Jaeyoon must’ve really gone through hell back then.

I figured Ha Junseo wasn’t the only one who had been wasting away.

Just as I chuckled at the irony of the situation, Kang Siwoo spoke up.

“Oh, Seohan. Actually, there’s something I need to tell you.”

“Yes?”

Did something happen while I was asleep?

I looked up at Kang Siwoo with wide eyes.

His lower lip moved cautiously.

“You know Kim Woochan.”

That senior whose title had been upgraded to “Kim Woochan-nim” ever since he shielded me from the falling light.

I wondered why his name came up now, but it was kind of what I expected.

“He said he really wanted to meet you once you woke up.”

“Ah.”

I was planning to visit him anyway.

I went to Kim Woochan’s company, Abit Entertainment, in person.

Our nonstop schedule had finally calmed down a bit, and since Stardust was about to enter a hiatus, it wasn’t hard to set a day aside.

The official reason for meeting Kim Woochan was a joint song project, but I wasn’t really here just to leisurely write music.

“Hello, sunbaenim.”

“Come this way~.”

On the surface, they looked like the friendliest of senior-junior pairs.

We entered the studio Kim Woochan had personally set up,

Creeeak—

The door closed in a place with top-tier security.

“Maybe it’s ‘cause you slept so much, but your complexion looks amazing!”

“Ah, thank you.”

Those ever-glossy eyes today, too.

As soon as I faced Kim Woochan’s smiling face, I jumped straight to the point.

“I’ve been thinking over the past two days…”

“You said you were sleeping.”

“I was thinking in my dreams…”

“Ah!”

I had been completely out of it during the concert, but that didn’t mean I’d been sitting idle.

Kim Woochan had predicted that my regression was an enormous variable, and that until I turned twenty-five, crises like before would keep coming.

Having already died and come back, maybe hoping for anything more was just greed.

But on stage, the thought suddenly came to me.

The moment I saw that blue wave spreading before me, I wanted to live.

For as long as possible, I wanted to shine like a star on stage.

Honestly, even if I was a massive variable—

At the end of the day, I was still just a speck of dust floating in the universe, so was there really any need to act so petty?

It’s not like anyone was going to crush me just because one speck of dust was floating around bothering them.

Since I’m already here, I figured I might as well live long as an exceptional speck of dust.

So I was thinking of finding a way.

After a moment of hesitation, I carefully opened my mouth.

“Wouldn’t it be possible to cover a variable with another variable?”

“Ooh…?”

Kim Woochan reflexively admired the idea, though he didn’t seem to fully grasp it.

His deep black eyes sparkled for a moment.

“What kind of nonsense is that?”

“……”

“Like overwriting? That kind of thing?”

Overwriting?

What I had in mind was to create so many unpredictable variables that the existing variable—death—would be overwritten.

But it seemed Kim Woochan interpreted it a bit differently.

“I was thinking about overwriting~. Looks like your idea’s different from mine, Seohan!”

“Have you been thinking this over?”

“It felt like my own problem, so yeah, I’ve thought about it. Want to hear?”

A guy whose true intentions I couldn’t quite grasp.

I couldn’t trust Kim Woochan one hundred percent, but there was no harm in hearing what he had to say here.

Instead of replying, I slowly nodded.

Kim Woochan smiled brightly and began.

“So. This is just my theory. Let’s say each parallel universe is a type of data.”

I looked directly into his strangely shimmering eyes.

“Basically, with data, if you overwrite it, it gets restored to the latest version, right?”

“Yes.”

“But in a parallel universe, the concept of a ‘latest version’ doesn’t exist. Since they all exist simultaneously on different timelines.”

When you overwrite a file with the same name, it gets replaced by the most recently created one.

Kim Woochan claimed that such a concept didn’t exist in parallel universes.

“So, what I’m saying is. Just because Seohan has regressed, we can’t say this universe’s data is newer than the previous one.”

From my perspective, the time after regression was more recent…

But from the universe’s perspective, it was just a different timeline.

“So, theoretically, you can’t overwrite a past death with current data.”

I quietly looked at Kim Woochan, who was saying all this.

“…Let me ask again.”

“Ask what?”

“Are you the universe?”

Cough.

Kim Woochan let out a brief cough, then returned to his usual smile.

“Just listen. While you were knocked out sleeping, I got hit with inspiration. That’s why I called you as soon as you woke up!”

“Yes.”

“This sunbaenim isn’t doing this with any bad intentions~. It’s all to help you live a long life, Seohan!”

That sounded a lot like a classic gaslighting line I’d heard before.

“It’s true!”

“Yes, I understand….”

Even from my STEM major’s perspective, this was starting to drift off into outer space.

But since this already felt far removed from modern common sense, I decided to treat it like visiting a shaman and kept listening.

Kim Woochan grew serious again and slowly stroked his chin.

“What I just said is something I had already thought of before. So then I wondered—could there really be no way to overwrite this variable?”

“Yes.”

“And I reached a conclusion.”

My eyes widened.

From Kim Woochan’s mouth came a carefully spoken idea.

“I think the universe might only be overwritten by data with larger capacity.”

That, I understood instantly.

“If I survive until twenty-five, the data becomes larger, so from then on, no more variables will arise?”

“Yes! That’s exactly right!”

Kim Woochan nodded fiercely and continued.

“So I’m saying, how about holding your breath and living quietly until you’re twenty-five?”

I was wondering what he meant by that…

“First off, don’t get in any cars. You might get into a traffic accident!”

“Ah…”

“And don’t perform in concerts. The lights could fall again.”

“Excuse me?”

“Don’t do fan meetings either. Who knows? A lunatic might show up again!”

“That…”

“Don’t eat anything either—someone might poison it.”

“Excuse me.”

“Oh, and no schedules at all. Just stay holed up in your room where it’s safe.”

“You’re telling me to retire from the entertainment industry?”

“That would be so ideal!”

I nearly grabbed him by the collar.

How is that supposed to be living?

“Then I might get bitten by a mosquito and die from malaria while holed up at home.”

“…What if that really happens?”

You’ve got no plan!

I shook my head with a bitter laugh.

“This is the reason I live, so if I’m going to die, I’ll die on stage.”

Wanting to live, wanting to stand on that beautiful stage just one more time.

It wasn’t about trembling in fear in a room, trying to cling to life by force.

So I was able to reject Kim Woochan’s suggestion without hesitation.

At my firm refusal, Kim Woochan blinked slowly.

That cheerful face from earlier was gone, replaced by a deeply serious expression.

“…….”

Kim Woochan bit his lower lip nervously, as if this was about him.

Only after a long pause did he finally raise his head.

In a soft voice, he spoke carefully.

“Then there’s only one way left. Do Seohan, you have to make a miracle happen.”

His dark, deep eyes stared straight at me.

“More dangerous variables will keep appearing, and who knows how many years are left…”

“……”

“But in that time, you just have to achieve one great accomplishment.”

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