Chapter 267: Mam-Seohan’s Coming-of-Age Ceremony (1)
[Stardust Maknae Member Choi Han Announces Surprise Marriage]
[Marriage With Fan, Stardust’s Choi Han “This May Be Sudden, But Please Understand”]
The shocking article sat right at the top of the entertainment news page.
The hand gripping the phone trembled uncontrollably.
Right beside him came a sharp voice.
“Wow, legendary…. I had to find this out through an article?”
Ha Junseo turned his head with a complicated expression.
Jin Sehyun, the team’s main vocal.
Back when they debuted together, he had been bright and innocent, but after surviving countless hardships together, he had grown sharp-edged.
“What does this bastard think the team members are? I have to learn about his shotgun pregnancy scandal through an article?”
“…….”
“Hyung, I don’t think we can renew our contracts anymore…. Let’s all just go our separate ways. You can act, so I guess you can become an actor.”
Ha Junseo lowered his head deeply with a dark expression.
In situations like this, he couldn’t even straighten his shoulders, because everything felt like his fault.
Wasn’t the reason the team had fallen apart this badly because of an indecisive leader?
That thought kept creeping into his mind.
A powerless sentence slipped from Ha Junseo’s lips.
“I’m sorry….”
“For what?”
“I’m just sorry for everything.”
His weak mentality had collapsed long ago.
The mental state that had barely endured through nonstop scandals finally shattered apart completely.
Now he was simply exhausted.
Turning to stare outside the window, Ha Junseo spoke calmly.
“I’m not going into acting.”
He had already earned enough money, and he never wanted to set foot in this industry again.
The days when he loved dancing, loved singing, and felt endlessly happy standing on stage had already passed.
“I just want to rest now.”
Ha Junseo quietly muttered while slowly closing his eyes.
Jin Sehyun didn’t respond.
It had been a journey exhausting enough to justify that choice.
After all, the things they’d gone through weren’t just one or two incidents.
One bastard assaulted another member and a manager at a fansign event.
Another got caught in drugs.
One mentally collapsed and halted activities.
And finally, the maknae’s premarital pregnancy scandal.
The one always apologizing wasn’t the people causing problems—
it was the leader.
As someone who could roughly understand the weight of being a leader, Jin Sehyun had no choice but to support that decision.
“…….”
And so, the two sat in silence for a long time.
The sudden scandal had left them too mentally drained to even exchange meaningless chatter.
Ha Junseo stared blankly into space with his lips tightly shut.
As he spent another unusually exhausting day wondering how they should conclude tomorrow’s contract renewal discussion—
Bang.
Manager Lee Jaeyoon burst through the dorm door.
“Junseo-ah.”
The manager rushed in with a pale face and urgently spoke.
And then came the ominous words.
“Junhyuk got into an accident.”
“…Lee Junho?”
At the familiar name, Jin Sehyun frowned.
Once, they had been members of the same group.
But their relationship had never ended well.
He was the first culprit who had dragged the group’s name across the public through the fansign assault incident.
Standing before them now, Manager Lee Jaeyoon had been the victim of that assault incident.
And Ha Junseo had also gotten hit while standing nearby.
Jin Sehyun frowned sharply.
“What does it matter whether that hyung got hurt or not?”
“I think it was a major car accident. Sounds like it’s pretty bad…. But he was still part of the same team once. We should probably visit him…. Junseo-ah, what do you think?”
Even Jin Sehyun fell silent at the words that the situation was worse than expected.
A deeply exhausted voice came from Ha Junseo’s lips.
“Which hospital?”
“Hyung, you’re going?”
“…I should.”
While hurriedly grabbing a thin outer jacket, Ha Junseo thought to himself.
Looks like resting peacefully was impossible after all.
Because that was the fate of the leader inside a collapsing group.
.
.
.
.
“So I brought up the idea of a dome tour. I don’t know if it’ll happen, but if we’re doing this tour, I want us to go as big as possible.”
“Me too…! If we’re doing it, we should do it properly.”
The members’ chatter buzzed noisily through his ears.
Ha Junseo slowly lifted his heavy eyelids and let out a groan.
“Ugh….”
His eyes snapped open.
“Hyung, you’re awake?”
“Wow… I totally dozed off.”
It was the practice room.
He had only meant to close his eyes briefly before the members arrived, but apparently he had fallen fully asleep.
“Wow, people serious about practice really are different~. Even when sleeping, you sleep in the practice room.”
Cha Seongbin laughed slyly while patting Ha Junseo’s shoulder.
“I wasn’t practicing, I was literally just sleeping.”
“You had every reason to be tired though. You came back to the dorm the latest yesterday too.”
“That’s because vocal lessons ended late.”
Ha Junseo waved his hands awkwardly with a sheepish smile.
Once he woke up a little more, he became curious about the conversation he had vaguely heard while half-asleep.
“So what were you guys talking about? I kind of heard it in my sleep….”
“Ah. The Japan dome tour.”
“You got permission from the CEO for that?”
The unusually energetic maknae smiled brightly and added on.
Over the past few days he had looked strangely troubled, but apparently he had gone directly to the CEO regarding the overseas tour and already reached a conclusion.
“Yep. We got permission for now! He said he’ll try pushing for it. Of course… it’ll probably only be possible if our Japanese debut does well….”
“We should do it properly.”
“Of course.”
Seohan smiled brightly while giving a thumbs up.
And right at that moment—
Ha Junseo absentmindedly followed the members’ gazes before freezing slightly.
A strange sense of dissonance suddenly washed over him.
Completely unaware, Jin Sehyun laughed and spoke.
“But hyung, aren’t you way too comfortable sleeping in the practice room? The floor’s so hard.”
“You look refreshed enough that it feels like you had a dream or something~.”
“I did.”
Something felt unsettling.
Ha Junseo tried thinking about what exactly the strange sense of dissonance rising from deep inside his chest had been….
“Why are you smiling?”
“…Huh?”
No, saying it like that sounded weird.
Ha Junseo hurriedly waved his hands like it was all a misunderstanding.
“No, that’s not what I meant.”
“What is this now, some kind of innovative provocation….”
Jin Sehyun scratched his head while laughing.
Quietly listening nearby, Cha Seongbin burst into laughter and added,
“Sehyun-ah, the elder says he doesn’t like seeing you smile around.”
“No, I mean…. It just suddenly felt unfamiliar.”
“Ahahah! Ahahahah!”
Ha Junseo awkwardly coughed before correcting the misunderstanding.
“Actually, you guys appeared in my dream.”
“What kind of dream-yong? A dream where we become huge in Japan?”
Seo Haim smiled brightly with sparkling eyes.
“No, not that….”
The group name had been the same, but the member lineup was different.
And somehow, he himself had even been the leader.
‘It was a really disorienting dream.’
Ha Junseo awkwardly smiled while looking at Jin Sehyun.
“Anyway, you definitely weren’t smiling.”
“…I’ll make sure to smile more from now on.”
“Sehyun-ah, let’s smile brightly!”
“He says your expression looks rotten-daeng.”
“That’s really the conclusion we reached?”
Jin Sehyun and Seo Haim noisily bickered back and forth.
Ha Junseo let out a hollow laugh and added,
“Forget it. It was just a meaningless dream.”
It was unnecessarily vivid, and Jin Sehyun’s face staring back at him still lingered uncomfortably in his mind.
But in the end, it really was just a meaningless dream.
Still—
At the casual comment, Seohan’s obvious gaze landed on him.
“What?”
Ha Junseo tilted his head with a puzzled look.
“Ah, it’s nothing.”
Seohan merely shrugged and smiled like it was no big deal.
---
The winter weather was chilly enough to make the tip of your nose sting pleasantly.
This was an outdoor shoot where everyone should’ve worn thick padded jackets, but I refused to abandon today’s concept and wore a coat instead.
As I confidently strutted across the barren field of weeds in my gray coat like it was a runway, I could already hear people trying to hold back laughter.
Ignoring them lightly, I took my place in the center.
Smiling gently, I spoke smoothly.
“I’m Stardust’s Do Seohan.”
“W-Whoa, Do Seohan, stop pretending to look cool!”
“Wow…. He wore a coat in weather this cold….”
Judging by the flood of criticism, today’s styling must’ve looked pretty decent.
“Leave him alone. Seohan’s excited because he became an adult.”
“Mmm~. Even so, he’s still just a kid~.”
Ignoring the jealousy and envy like a mature adult, I smiled calmly.
Likewise dressed up nicely, Kang Siwoo walked out from behind.
“I’m Kang Siwoo, today’s host. Thank you.”
Kang Siwoo adjusted his sleeves and bowed politely.
Seo Haim let out a shrill scream.
“Kyaa, Leader-nim looks so cool!”
“Leader-nim is cool, but Do Seohan isn’t!”
“Seohan’s an aduuuult now. Tell him he looks cool.”
The new self-content scheduled as Stardust’s first activity after the New Year.
All the members had gathered to film <Mam-Seohan’s Coming-of-Age Ceremony>.
Holding the microphone, Kang Siwoo stared directly into the camera.
“First, today’s coming-of-age ceremony main character, Mr. Do Seohan, please give us a brief self-introduction.”
“Wow, it’s a hamster!”
The jealousy was truly severe.
Shaking my head repeatedly, I stepped up in front of the microphone.
“Hello.”
“Waaaaah!”
Still, once I actually stood in front of them, the members kindly cheered for me.
Smiling brightly, I gripped the microphone.
“Instead of a hamster, I’m the gangster of Stardust, Do Seohan.”
“You look way too weak for that though?”
“That is simply your imagination.”
At this rate, I couldn’t even properly introduce myself.
Watching the members tearing into me like hyenas, I clicked my tongue briefly.
The only reliable person here was our dependable leader.
“So what’s today’s schedule?”
At those words, Kang Siwoo checked the script.
“Yes, for the first part of today’s coming-of-age ceremony, we’ll begin with Do Seohan’s adulthood verification.”
“Waaaaah!”
“To prove that Seohan has finally become a true adult, we’ve prepared missions submitted by the members.”
…Hm?
“Please don’t prepare things like that.”
“No, Seohan-ah. Prove to us that you’re truly an adult!”
I was twenty-eight years old inside, you know?
At an age where bars would probably stop checking my ID altogether.
But of course, there was no way the members could hear the screams inside my heart.
“Yes, and so for the very first mission! We’ll begin by having Seohan watch a horror movie rated for ages 19 and up.”
“…?”
Can I just go home?