Debut or Die - Chapter 483

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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 483
Cha Yu-jin returned and spent an incredibly vibrant day.
Not that he was simply playing around.
“I’m going to practice!”
He reviewed choreography, worked out, and even had a direct call with the Manager, who was crying his eyes out.
After talking with his family in America, he started enjoying racing games with Kim Rae-bin.
“Yeaaah!”
“Wait, hold on!”
“Left! Press the jump button on the left!”
The members were swept up in his whirlwind momentum.
It was as if he were putting his daily life back in order while checking off a bucket list.
He even had a video call with Mung-ge, who was at Bae Sae-jin’s hometown in the middle of it all.
[Woof!]
“Ooooh. Hi, buddy!”
The furry little ball that had once fit in one fist had somehow grown to overflow across both hands. Though his belly-up antics remained unchanged.
‘Still looks silly as ever.’
On the screen, the white head and tail shook relentlessly.
“Since we moved to a new place anyway, should we call Kkami too?”
“I’d love that!!”
He was even calling his own dog from his house in America via video chat, as if orchestrating some kind of group housewarming party for all the members’ dogs.
“….”
And so… I quietly observed him.
What was interesting was that an unexpected person had taken the bait.
“Hey, Moon-dae. Are you… feeling sad about it?”
“…?”
Sun Ah-hyun had gently broached the subject.
“Me?”
“Yeah,”
He blushed slightly and nodded firmly.
“Of course I’m really happy and relieved that Eugene came back… but it’s also natural to feel sad about the parting.”
“….”
“I think that’s only natural.”
No, that’s exactly the point—I was in the middle of wrestling with that ambiguity.
In any case, Sun Ah-hyun seemed quite concerned about STier’s Cha Yu-jin, who had simply vanished.
‘I gave a rough explanation, at least.’
The situation had ended when Cha Yu-jin himself directly sensed my change and made the request.
But from the members’ perspective, it was no different from him suddenly disappearing without any real goodbye.
This morning, we were too relieved and happy to notice that our member Cha Yu-jin had returned safely, but now it was starting to feel a bit off.
Hmm.
“…Yeah. Thanks.”
“No, that’s not it!”
So maybe I should bring up the topic after all.
“Yeeees!!”
“Ugh!!”
I watched Cha Yu-jin holding up a game controller and doing a victory celebration, and decided to seize the moment.
And that moment came sooner rather than later.
That evening.
“Oh, our Eugene’s doing great~”
“Hehe!”
After a whirlwind of a day, Cha Yu-jin was checking out a guitar in Big Sae-jin’s solo room.
In other words, he’d deliberately slowed his pace as if on cue, now relaxed.
I called him over.
“Eugene.”
“Umm?”
“I need to talk to you about Water Bomb.”
“OK!”
After luring him out to the balcony like that, I planned to actually discuss Water Bomb while slowly gauging his mindset.
‘If he seems reluctant, I can stop right away.’
Carefully, that is.
But there was no need to proceed that far.
Because the moment Cha Yu-jin stepped onto the balcony, he opened his mouth.
Bluntly.
“I remember it.”
“…!”
What?
I turned my head.
“Bad Cha Yu-jin.”
Cha Yu-jin’s expression was calm.
He shrugged and stretched. Then, passing by my rigid form, he stood by the balcony window.
“But it’s not exact. It feels more like some kind of vivid dream, or perhaps a childhood memory.”
He slightly squinted one eye, as if trying to recall a word that wouldn’t come to mind.
“But the emotions that ‘that’ Cha Yu-jin felt—moving? touching? overwhelming? Finding the right words is harder than I thought, but anyway—”
And leaning his body against the balcony railing, he turned his gaze toward me.
Like the STier Cha Yu-jin from that day.
“I remember that.”
“….”
I looked at him.
His positive and clear way of thinking, his proactive and affable demeanor, his attitude of laying out facts bluntly as if striking through—all still there.
This is Cha Yu-jin, a member of this group who debuted with Testa.
But he didn’t seem to merely know “STier Cha Yu-jin” as abstract knowledge.
So… Cha Yu-jin simply looked like Cha Yu-jin.
And he spoke as himself.
“I think I was just exhausted. Really, truly exhausted.”
“….”
[Perhaps Bad Cha Yu-jin wouldn’t have admitted it, but it was a kind of burnout. And anyone can experience that when they hit a wall.]
Cha Yu-jin shrugged cheerfully.
[Even me. So it’s not really a shocking fact or anything!]
I suppose so.
But honestly, realizing that my past self hadn’t succeeded didn’t feel particularly good.
Even though I performed on stage so well, no one watched, so I never got noticed.
The fact that I eventually got tired of being an idol and quit… that’s what gets to me.
“…What do you think.”
“What? About what?”
“Just,”
On a summer night without air conditioning, the balcony air was hot and stale.
“Overall, what do you think about this situation.”
“Oh…. Are you worried about me, hyung?”
I nodded slightly.
Cha Yu-jin seemed a bit surprised, but soon bowed his head with unexpected seriousness.
[I won’t lie to you. Honestly, when I woke up this morning, I was a little confused.]
His answer continued calmly.
[It felt like I was Bad Cha Yu-jin, but the memories of Testa had come back to me.]
“…!”
[But I came back to myself soon after. You’re right, hyung. It was kind of a traumatic experience. Completely unrewarded—five years, no less.]
So it was as I thought.
Cha Yu-jin let out a short sigh. I accepted his words calmly.
But it didn’t end there.
“But hyung, I know something about this.”
He raised his hand.
And gently tapped my back.
“Time heals all things.”
“….”
“So even if you hadn’t come back, hyung, I would have returned to the stage anyway.”
I lifted my head.
Cha Yu-jin was smiling.
“Everyone else is the same as me.”
Surely not.
And before I could even ask, he mouthed the word “STier.”
“…!”
[Five years. The fact that it went unrewarded—that was what that Cha Yu-jin thought at the time. Who knows what happened after that?]
Life was long, and opportunities kept presenting themselves—so Cha Yu-jin shrugged his shoulders.
[Who knows? Maybe in about two years, we’d have gone back to South Korea and debuted again with Kim Rae-bin’s incredible song… Or perhaps we’d have released an album in America.]
He wasn’t talking about some grand success.
Simply that even that Cha Yu-jin—the one who’d scattered to the winds and returned to America with his heart completely closed off from idol group activities—
would never have given up entirely.
[We would have kept doing it somehow. Because we loved it too much.]
“….”
What came to mind reflexively was, oddly enough, my own experience.
My first concert.
-Countless voices wove together, and like shooting stars, they poured down from every direction along with the light.
My breath caught short.
Because I know what kind of impact my mind received there, I understood what Cha Yu-jin was saying.
And I understood his next words too.
[Water Bomb was bad—Cha Yu-jin realized it early because of that.]
‘That’s right.’
So… that’s why he became so much more cooperative after that.
[But even without Water Bomb, whether I was running a repair shop or a surfboard shop in America, I would have figured it out anyway, right? I know myself.]
Cha Yu-jin spoke with confidence, then laughed with a light “hehe.”
“Because I’m like this, I trust you too, hyung. That’s what I like about it.”
“….”
So that’s what he was saying.
That STier would have recovered—we just didn’t see it because Ryu Gun-woo made an extreme choice beforehand.
Having put himself in the other person’s position, Cha Yu-jin spoke without a shred of doubt.
“You’re my fan, hyung.”
“….”
I… don’t know.
Did that STier Cha Yu-jin—the one who high-fived me—return to where he’d been living?
Or, just as I recovered the memories of Ryu Gun-woo, my former employer, did this guy briefly slip back into his past as STier?
And now he’s recovered all his original memories, remembering the STier days the way one recalls something from the distant past?
But one thing is certain.
‘…That Cha Yu-jin became this Cha Yu-jin.’
Because of that, it’s a trustworthy statement.
…I’ll think of it that way.
‘So.’
If Ryu Gun-woo hadn’t died and had held on for a few more years, we could have seen these guys on stage somewhere again.
I’ll believe that too.
Whoosh.
The wind blew.
I gazed out at the starlit night view of the balcony and opened my mouth.
“…Yeah. Thanks for telling me.”
“Don’t mention it!”
A more formal expression than Cha Yu-jin usually employed.
I realized it wasn’t directed at Park Moon-dae, whom I knew as a senior, but rather at Ryu Gun-woo, who had cheered me on.
So I nodded quietly and lingered with him on the balcony a while longer, despite the absence of air conditioning.

* * *
“So… I have something to say.”
“What.”
“I’m a fan of yours, hyung.”
“That’s not it.”
“It is! I’ll do fan service! So cook me some dak-galbi in return.”
“You said service—why are you trying to get paid for it?”
“That’s Konglish. ‘Service’ originally means you get paid for it!”
Well, well.
Shortly after, he reverted to acting like the youngest member of the team, as if our serious conversation had never happened, and I stepped back inside from the balcony with a familiar sense of exasperation.
‘Dak-galbi, huh.’
Haven’t we been eating chicken an awful lot lately?
But watching him head back to his room, a sudden thought struck me.
‘Oh right.’
So I asked hurriedly.
“Speaking of which, about your hyung Sae-jin.”
“Oh.”
Bae Sae-jin, naturally.
I was worried about how he’d feel now that his memories had returned….
“I don’t know!”
With the details already slipping from his mind, he seemed to remember only vaguely the chaos surrounding Bae Sae-jin’s drug arrest.
Besides that.
“But I think there was a misunderstanding. Honestly, I bet hyung would’ve enlisted in the military rather than deal drugs.”
“….”
His faith (?) in Bae Sae-jin, built from witnessing his legal struggles over the past few years, was unshakeable.
“You’re right.”
“Sure. I’m always right.”
“You’ve been wrong before.”
“In that moment, it felt wrong. But ultimately, I’m right!”
Ha.
I laughed and hit him playfully.
“Yeah. Let’s see.”
“Hehe.”
And so Cha Yu-jin had truly, completely returned.
The next day, he devoured homemade candy from Bae Sae-jin and posted about it on social media.
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Reviewer Cha Yu-jin here!
Sorry for the delay. I won’t be in pain anymore. T.T
I’m completely healthy now (sunglasses emoji)
I want to get back on stage soon too. Thank you for worrying about me. Let’s find an even more amazing tiger!
(photo)
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‘The response is scorching.’
The comments and share counts updating like crazy were overwhelmingly positive. I nodded in satisfaction, ended the call with the company, and watched Ryu Chung-woo approaching.
Now we were ready.
“The reality shoot is on schedule, right?”
“Yeah. The conversation went well.”
That’s right.
With Cha Yu-jin safely back, the perfect timing had finally arrived to film the group’s own content—the reality show.
“Next week.”
We could proceed as planned.
“Yes.”
I finished my assessment with satisfaction and steadied myself.
All the priority items were done now.
‘What’s left is… just dealing with this.’
A deep breath. Time to face it.
“…Status window.”
Ding.
Brilliant text began to shimmer across the screen.
[New! Update Complete Reward]
[New! New Feature Unlocked]
[New! Survey]
….
The items glinted. The way they seemed to tempt me, looking so appealing—that made it all the more suspicious.
That’s when I was carefully examining them.
An unfamiliar word caught my eye in the middle.
[New! Survey]
“…Survey?”
What does that mean.
I rubbed my chin, weighing several possibilities.
Of course, one thing was certain.
‘Yeah. I’m not falling for it.’
I had no intention of clicking. I’d call Big Dal and have him tear into the system’s internals instead. And there’s no real risk?
‘Just get me out of this room already.’
Let me cancel this damn system already.
‘Big….’
That was the moment.
Ding—
“….”
My smartphone buzzed.
A text message.
‘Hmm.’
Wondering if it might be from the company, I opened it right away….
-VTIC Senior Shin Chung-ryeo : Junior, are you perhaps interested in a featuring opportunity?
“….”
Wait.
Reading it again, both the sender and the content were correct.
‘What?’
It was the beginning of a proposal I’d never imagined.

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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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