Debut or Die - Chapter 244

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com

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A Fatal Illness if I Don’t Debut – Episode 244
A fanfare erupted from the semi-transparent popup that materialized before me.
[Successful Meeting!]
You have successfully met with an audience of ‘400,000 people’!
!Time Limit: Satisfied (Success)
!’Death if not an audience member’ – Removed!
With just a single free online Concert, I had eliminated the status ailment requiring me to reach an audience of 400,000 people.
It was deserved.
After VTIC appeared, the vote count had nearly reached 300,000.
And I had watched the count climb on the display board with my own eyes. It was no different from directly confirming the real-time audience reactions.
‘I knew this would be recognized.’
Besides, this platform allows video viewing without registration. People who were just killing time would have watched without signing up.
I heard that among VTIC’s international fanbase, there were many unregistered users. The actual viewership numbers must have been… astronomical.
Even with just the registered users actively participating in the live performance, reaching 300,000 would have been a close call without VTIC alone.
“….”
So, my basic plan to bring in VTIC had succeeded comfortably.
Though the results came out somewhat different from my predictions.
: ‘Truth’ Verification ☜ Click!
The coin option had disappeared.
‘I thought it would be given as a default now.’
This meant the previous coin was an irregular option.
‘…Was it given after predicting the situation?’
A strange thought crossed my mind.
More precisely, this system had deliberately identified and prepared against the danger that the Former Manager could cause trouble.
‘The fact that the same ‘audience’ status ailment appeared again with only the numbers inflated seems to fit perfectly here too.’
Since a coin value appeared instead of just ‘Truth Verification’, it seemed as though the same status ailment was performed once more to return to its proper state.
I recalled the anomalies in the status window from back then—all sorts of status ailments popping up and crackling away.
‘There was definitely some kind of error.’
Interpreting this… the status window had deviated from its normal path just to force a coin into my hands, even if an error occurred.
‘But why?’
I had never detected any trace of emotion or intellect in this system before.
Yet starting from gacha probability manipulation to this… what was this larger pattern that could be interpreted as goodwill?
“….”
I thought quickly and reached a conclusion.
‘It wants me to clear the status ailments.’
Perhaps this status window was implemented so that I would somehow survive and clear this insane situation.
Because the one without a status window had… several times.
“What are you looking at?”
“…!!”
When I lifted my head, Chung-ryeo was gazing intently into my eyes.
I answered reflexively.
“I took a moment to think.”
“Is that so?”
He responded casually, then turned his gaze to stare directly at the empty space I’d glanced toward.
In other words… where the status window was.
‘Damn it.’
I dismissively closed the popup.
But it shouldn’t have been visible, yet he was smiling without any sign of alarm.
He’d simply read my gaze.
‘He caught that from just a glance?’
The instincts of someone who’d lived through multiple lives hadn’t dulled—this guy’s perception was sharp.
‘…He asked if I got what I wanted.’
I discarded the unnecessary tension and gave a textbook answer.
“The concert seems to have gone well.”
“Yes, it did go well.”
Chung-ryeo nodded, understanding the nuance of what I meant.
Then he extended his hand.
“I enjoyed today.”
“The pleasure was mine.”
So he was confident about this.
I extended my hand and shook his. His glove was cool.
“I hope the remaining concerts go smoothly~”
“Fighting.”
The VTIC guys grinned widely and joined in the handshake. They seemed to think they’d deepened their connection through this opportunity.
And it looked like some of our guys were thinking similarly.
For instance, Kim Rae-bin, who’d managed to find out about the arrangement program.
“Seniors, I hope you have a pleasant journey home…! Thank you so much for your guidance!”
“Oh, what did we even teach you~”
“We’re heading overseas, but thanks. We’ll get back safely!”
“Yes! Thank you~”
“Thank you!”
The conclusion ended warmly with multiple handshakes exchanged.
Well, we hadn’t fought or anything, and it’s natural for people in the same industry who don’t know when they’ll see each other again to end things on a good note.
The problem was that this only applied to us—the fandoms were a different story entirely.
‘The Internet… is going to be chaos.’
In any case, both sides had definitely broken even. Neither could claim a one-sided victory.
So at worst, I hoped it would end with people saying we’d had a little rivalry at the charity event.
“Sae-jin, the scoreboard voting has four minutes left.”
“I’m going!”
Bae Sae-jin, who was handling the next voting announcement, sprinted down the corridor. With that eyesore VTIC gone, his movements became even more energetic.
I roughly anticipated the concert’s reception, but seeing their response, I simply shrugged my shoulders.
‘Let me just finish the remaining stages well.’
The next stage was one where I had to spray fake blood from my mouth. For now, I needed to focus on quality.
And it turned out this was a good decision.

* * *
Testa’s charity concert ended in spectacular success.
[Total Donation Amount for This Concert]
[!! 252,096,000 !!]
[We are grateful for your passionate participation and warm hearts.]
The real-time donation amount exceeded 140 million, and the peak concurrent viewers surpassed 1.12 million—a remarkable feat.
The platform wiped cold sweat from its brow, relieved that the temporary server expansion investment hadn’t gone to waste.
Public reaction was overwhelmingly positive.
-Insane
-It was so fun lolol
-I donated 10,000 won and it feels really good. I feel like I saw a good performance and did something goodㅠㅠ
-I wish they did this more often
-Testa, the kids were really good. Do they have any in-hearts? I want to follow you ㅠ
Everyone who watched enjoyed themselves, and they were even more delighted to hear that the stages would be uploaded to YouTube one by one.
The platform’s decision to sell the full video as VOD went through smoothly without much resistance, since individual stages would be available for free viewing.
-Yeah, they need to make a living somehow
-Testa worked hard~
-VTIC was really cool, rooting for the friendship between the two groups! *^^*
Fans wanted to see all the little fun details hidden throughout the full video, so the purchase rate was decent.
And there was one more thing—news appeared on SNS.
[Testa will donate the same amount that our audience donated! (photo)]
[All funds will be safely transferred under the name of 【As Our Hearts Lead】.]
Testa had simply added an equal amount to match what the audience had personally donated.
In the photo, Testa, having just finished performing with sweat-drenched faces, was smiling while holding a hastily scribbled donation amount sign marked with a marker.
‘Why are you getting tax deductions from the audience’s money’ and similar criticisms were preemptively neutralized with this flawless, clean conclusion.
Actually, the additional donation seemed almost excessively ‘virtuous’—perhaps more than necessary.
But there was a reason for this decision.
In online communities deeply interested in idols, people were already discussing VTIC and Testa from every angle.
Initially, it was praise for the performances.
Because VTIC made an unexpected surprise appearance and delivered such an overwhelming performance, they nearly monopolized the trending posts and dominated the Internet.
[9-year veteran idol level cover]
[An idol that truly showed first-tier dignity]
[VTIC – Royal Procession]
Numerous comments poured in, reaching the point of direct comparisons: ‘Better than Testa’s original’ or ‘Testa is still better.’
But as Testa took the stage next, the atmosphere shifted slightly.
-Testa is great
I like this feeling lol
-Both of them really did well, the planning is great too
“Mmm… ahh… this is the taste I’ve been craving…”
Testa freshly interpreted VTIC’s song while stripping away any sense of direct confrontation, instead emphasizing the feeling of a ‘connected setlist’.
As a result, the atmosphere that had been burning with comparison cooled somewhat, but instead, fans whose feelings were hurt and those trying to exploit it kept popping up sporadically.
-Is it just me? Testa seems to have aimed for that kind of production—like turning off a VTIC song coming from an old-fashioned radio…
└It would be petty not to mention that I sang along to that song haha. Anyone can see that it was respect.
└It’s an 80s concept so the clothes the kids wore are old-fashioned too, what are you talking about
└Why are fans silencing me like this? That’s just how I felt
└Well, I felt like you were being provocative
Honestly, if you just look at the stage scale, VTIC’s was bigger, but like… it felt uncomfortable because they seemed to be trying too hard to outdo it.
└If they had just done it normally, you would’ve complained it was insincere
└I’m sorry. Our kids performed so well on stage that the Testa fans must have been very offended.
└From now on, I’ll tell them at fan meetings not to show off their skills so the juniors don’t feel embarrassed!
“└ and it’s seriously brutal lolololol”
└Please stop, they all did great, why are you like this please..
Beneath the surface, all sorts of excessive interpretations and ridiculous speculation about Testa’s intentions and VTIC’s intentions were circulating.
There was a tense standoff between the atmosphere of wanting to pit two massive fandoms against each other and the atmosphere trying to smooth things over.
The two fandoms, already conscious of each other, couldn’t help but love the performance while finding the other side extremely irritating.
“Ugh, this is so frustrating!!”
Here too, a College Student who had been arguing with a VTIC fan in an article’s comments was fuming.
She was a fan of Kim Rae-bin, who acknowledged placing Park Moon-dae as her second favorite.
– I was the one who invited him as a guest even though I couldn’t handle it, so I didn’t accept it..ㅠㅠ
└Wait, didn’t the guest end up at a disadvantage? Even with all the dancers, they seemed a bit outmatched
└Are you blind? Obviously the guest did better;
“It’s all obvious, you bastard.”
Kim Rae-bin’s fan gritted her teeth and commented that ‘those VTIC bastards are so pathetic’.
└Because the guest is about to jump out, aggro is inevitable. It’s amazing that they naturally made that part of the performance.
But at the same time, I suddenly became aware that I was leaving comments about this ‘skill’ aspect.
‘The atmosphere has definitely changed because of this.’
In fact, Testa’s recent image was closer to ‘unfortunate victim’. The comments on their activities were more ‘admirable’ than ‘cool’.
The story surrounding the incident was far too big compared to Testa as idols.
And the same was true for VTIC.
The image of the main vocalist from the news section and the pitiful remaining members, or the suspicious declining group, had stuck to them.
But all those images gained from the news section flew away with this topic.
Instead, both groups became hot through their main work.
Everyone interested in these groups had an opinion on ‘who did better’.
They became hot in the sense of being idols.
All this conflict felt very much like top-tier popular idols.
‘That’s actually kind of entertaining….’
Lol the Reviewer’s vibe is way too obvious~
“You bastard!!”
Kim Rae-bin’s fan immediately deleted her comment and replied below it.
“Oh, so it was Nimm Tica? The fan driving is still going strong. Aren’t you ashamed? lol”
And she realized it.
‘If even one thing goes wrong here, this is going to blow up into a full-scale war.’
Right now, the two fanbases must be absolutely grating on each other’s nerves.
Kim Rae-bin’s fan had a gut feeling that somewhere out there, people were desperately digging for dirty rumors about the rival group.
‘This is going to give me such a headache!’
The moment she clicked her tongue.
Ding!
[Hello, this is Moon-dae…]
“…!?”
A notification popped up on SNS. It was from Testa’s account.
“Hey, Park Moon-dae!”
Kim Rae-bin’s fan abandoned the keyboard battle and immediately clicked the notification.
=======================
Hello, this is Moon-dae (emoticon)
It was a wonderful concert. There were so many great photos that I’d like to share some of the ones I took as well.
Thank you to all the Reviewers who attended, and to everyone in the audience.
♡
========================
The photos attached below the post were… VTIC.
“Hey!!”
She let out a sharp cry.
‘This makes it look like we’re losing! I should’ve waited until VTIC posted first….’
And she immediately calmed down. Because in the next post, Park Moon-dae had released photos of Testa themselves all at once.
“Kim Rae-bin looks handsome.”
She carefully saved the photo of Kim Rae-bin awkwardly winking with bandages wrapped around him for the 【Call】 stage.
‘Yeah, that’s right. If anything, VTIC would just look petty and small-minded compared to the Junior Members.’
She coldly scrolled past VTIC’s photos.
‘Ugh, Park Moon-dae is so annoying—they took such amazing photos of these guys too!’
Especially Chung-ryeo’s solo shot seemed better than some of the Home Ma photos!
Of course, thanks to this, she couldn’t give VTIC’s fans any ammunition to claim ‘they deliberately posted unflattering photos’.
‘Why don’t they post more of their own selfies.’
Even as she grumbled, she found herself looking forward to saving the edited photos from various fans.
And similar things were happening among many fans.
The era where the premise ‘I like it because my idol likes it’ held universal sway had long passed, but it did have the effect of refreshing the atmosphere.
It allowed the opinions of those crying out ‘See, don’t sleep on good events and amazing stages!’ to gain strength and emotional weight.
Even beneath the surface, reluctant acknowledgment emerged.
-Bear actually knows what he’s doing
-When the gloomy bastard’s on my side, it’s reassuring
-Photo quality is insane
The Internet entered a temporary ceasefire, consumed by the bait.
Moreover, an announcement appeared on Testa’s official account.
Precisely the bait from this concert—about the ‘abandoned choices’.
[We’ve prepared this for those curious about Testa’s other decisions.]
[Wednesday night at 11 PM, the final week of September. Pin the channel on CVN!]
While the specific details remained hidden, it was unmistakable that this doubled as promotion for Testa’s new program!
“…They’re doing well.”
The Agency had been incompetent as hell; once they backed off and let the group operate independently, things ran this smoothly without fail.
Kim Rae-bin’s individual fans, rare as they were, found themselves at a loss for words, alternating their gaze between the bait and the photograph Park Moon-dae had taken.
However, the orchestrator of all this was not monitoring with his usual peace of mind.
“We have to make a choice.”
“…That’s true.”
“Whether it’s a lawsuit or our next activity.”
Instead, he was engaged in an intense discussion with the leader about their next move.

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com

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