Chapter 12 — Dorano Dating Manipulation Squad
What on earth did Yeo Eunju lack that made her date a goblin like that?
At least goblins had big ears.
That bastard’s eyes, nose, mouth, and ears were all tiny, like buttonholes. He was ugly among the ugly.
I wasn’t trying to defend judging people by their looks.
What mattered more than appearance was what was inside.
But wasn’t Nam Wonsu ugly both inside and out?
He had no pride in his life, and all he did was throw around the authority he had gained through pathetic means.
If he had been born during the Japanese occupation, he probably wouldn’t even have been competent enough to work as an informant for the Japanese army before getting his head chopped off.
But what about Yeo Eunju?
Her looks could easily compete with almost any celebrity.
She could act, she could sing, and I had heard there were barely any instruments she couldn’t play.
Even if someone looked like an unfinished piece of trash like Nam Wonsu, I knew one extreme cheat code that could let him date a goddess like Yeo Eunju.
There was a cancerous practice in this industry that nobody openly approved of.
Giving schedules to celebrities who weren’t under your agency.
Even I had received offers like that a few times after becoming a team leader at Pantheon.
They offered me a large amount of money in exchange for redirecting schedules meant for Victory toward their people instead.
Of course, I had never taken that money.
Handing out Pantheon business cards, then inserting people like Astra when someone contacted me would have been a kind of fraud.
More importantly, I thought it would lower my value in the industry.
Looking back, maybe that sense of justice was what helped Victory grow.
And that same Victory later caused the Club Area scandal.
I almost got kicked out of the industry because of it too.
Damn bastards.
There were also people who received things other than money.
Sometimes they received “dating services” from pretty but unknown theater actresses or trainees from other agencies.
There were apparently incompetent people in the industry who thought romance would never happen naturally in their lives, so they took advantage of desperate girls who wanted to become famous and demanded relationships from them.
Or so I had heard.
There were plenty of people in theater companies and agency practice rooms who had pretty faces but unfortunate circumstances.
That was why I called those relationships “forced dating.”
It wasn’t some secret only I knew.
Anyone who had worked in this industry for long enough had probably heard urban legends about it.
Apparently, things like that happen too.
Still, very few people had probably experienced it firsthand.
Come to think of it, I had wondered why that bastard was always running around so busily after dumping all his work onto other people.
Now the pieces were starting to fit together.
In the end, didn’t this mean Victory was something I had built by pouring everything into a bottomless jar all by myself?
I quickly searched Yeo Eunju’s name.
Four years ago, she had been forced to leave a drama midway through filming because she was undergoing cancer treatment.
She had been inactive for about a year after that.
But after that, she gradually began appearing in musicals and movies again.
That was probably around the time she met Nam Wonsu.
[National Big Sister Yeo Eunju Makes a Glamorous Return to the Big Screen in Director Kwon Seonghak’s Next Film, Yeongwol Romance]
[Yeo Eunju Confirmed to Return to Musical Devil Note After Two Years!]
I gathered articles from around that period.
It didn’t take long to understand.
This was practically certain.
Director Kwon Seonghak frequently cast idols in supporting roles and had close ties with Pantheon.
Nam Wonsu had probably sweet-talked him somehow when he asked whether Pantheon had any good actors, then inserted Yeo Eunju into the project.
I had also been working at Pantheon at the time, yet I hadn’t even known there was a movie casting opportunity.
Then again, Nam Wonsu could only give that opportunity to Yeo Eunju because he hadn’t told anyone else about it in the first place.
But I knew about Devil Note.
Because I was the one who had originally secured that opportunity for Victory member Cha Hoon.
How much money had I poured into training that bastard Cha Hoon just so he could survive in Korea’s musical industry, where casting an unskilled idol was practically treated like a crime?
If Yeo Eunju had also appeared in Devil Note, then Nam Wonsu’s method was obvious.
He probably went to the producer and said he would give them Cha Hoon if they cast Yeo Eunju too.
Of course, it wasn’t as though Yeo Eunju lacked skill.
She had once been considered an ace in the musical industry.
The producer would have had no reason to refuse her.
And after arranging it, Nam Wonsu probably bragged endlessly to Yeo Eunju about how much he had done for her.
Poor Yeo Eunju had probably convinced herself that she had managed to make her comeback thanks to Nam Wonsu.
Otherwise, there was no way she would still be dating someone that pathetic.
Even if Yeo Eunju herself didn’t realize it, reality could be cruel.
If I took a picture of the two of them together and showed it to Ji Cheonwoo, he would lose his mind and fire Nam Wonsu immediately.
Nam Wonsu’s appearance alone was enough to serve as objective evidence for forced dating.
Yeo Eunju walked eastward, while Wonsu got into her car and drove toward the parking structure.
After parking, he returned to the front of the building and waited for her.
Not long afterward, Yeo Eunju came back down.
This time, she had a dog with her.
It was the same Bichon I had seen in the photo.
“What the hell? Why’d you bring that damn dog out again?”
I moved closer, curious about what kind of conversation they would have.
I wanted to confirm my suspicions.
But the moment I heard Wonsu’s thin, slightly slurred voice, my mood dropped immediately.
He was trying to sound intimidating by forcing his voice louder, which only made it tremble even more.
Every time his voice shook, my heart seemed to twitch along with it.
She was actually dating a guy whose voice alone was unpleasant to listen to.
Well, I guess you needed that level of mental strength to survive as a celebrity.
“You said we’d take Syongsyong for a walk today… He’s been resting too much lately, so I’m worried his joints are going to get bad.”
“You can walk him when I’m not here.”
“I’d like to. But is there ever a day when you don’t come over, Wonsu?”
Of course forced dating wouldn’t be romantic.
Wonsu pushed Yeo Eunju lightly on the forehead with one finger.
“Hey. If people notice us, who loses more, you or me? You’re the celebrity, remember? And what? You don’t like me visiting so often? Guess you don’t love me anymore.”
“That’s not what I meant, but…”
If I only looked at what they were doing and listened to the words themselves, they might have seemed like an ordinary couple having a small argument.
But their tones told an entirely different story.
She had been completely deceived.
Yeo Eunju was perfectly capable of standing on her own without Nam Wonsu.
She didn’t need to shrink back and say, That’s not what I meant…
Her career wasn’t going to disappear again just because she stopped relying on him.
“I told you I’ve been walking him regularly, didn’t I? Whatever. Put the dog back inside and come out. We don’t have time.”
“No, but…”
“You know that thing. The treadmill dogs run on at home. That. I’ll get you one soon, so just put him inside for now. His fur gets everywhere.”
Yeo Eunju carefully picked up Syongsyong and protested quietly.
“I told you those machines are only for large dogs. Syongsyong is too small to use one.”
“You always have to talk back about every little thing, damn it…”
Wonsu raised his right hand as though he was about to hit her.
Yeo Eunju flinched in surprise.
But it didn’t look like she was trying to dodge.
It looked more like she was trying to make sure he hit a place that would hurt less.
Maybe because they were outside, Wonsu didn’t actually strike her.
