Chapter 41

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Translated by Sylph

Read it only at Novelbyu.com & Utoon.net

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In the idol industry, school violence is a truly hopeless scandal. The data accumulated from the incidents that had broken out so far had proven it.
Especially the moment bullying or physical violence entered the list, it was over. I had never seen any other method work besides just withdrawing and going to the military.
But of all things, it broke out for a participant on the same team?
‘…Let’s check it first.’
First, I clicked on the posted article. In the meantime, more comments had been attached.
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[3rd place! I’m accusing Lee Sejin from Idol Inc. of school violence. (491)]
: I’m writing this because I feel like I’m going to die after holding it in and holding it in.
Participant Lee Sejin of , who uses the nickname Big Sejin, bullied people throughout his time at Cheongsol High School.
Seeing posts on the internet that made him look like a model student because he ran for student council president in high school, I couldn’t sleep because I felt wronged and cried.
Lee Sejin drank and smoked since middle school, and while hanging out with a group that played around while pretending to be kind, he bullied me.
…….
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The long text that followed claimed Lee Sejin’s subtle history of school violence in detail.
The description of the one-on-one bullying, including detailed examples, was elaborate. Even to me, who was just skimming it, it felt persuasive.
‘This isn’t just a rumor for the sake of attention.’
Whether it was true or not, it was a post uploaded with determination. There was even a photo attached at the bottom.
The graduation album of the person who wrote the post.
And a photo of Lee Sejin with a cigarette between his fingers.
The following text was added below the photo.
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[I have many other photos. If you have any sense of the situation, withdraw now. I don’t know about anything else, but I absolutely cannot stand a kid like you becoming an idol.]
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‘…Even if it’s not true, once a label is attached, it’s hard to remove, but they even uploaded a photo.’
In an audition program, it was almost a death sentence. And it was also a huge misfortune for this team.
Even if Lee Sejin persisted, the team editing was finished, and if he withdrew, it was hell. Because we would have to re-adjust everything from part distribution to movement and practice.
“…….”
I held back a sigh and looked up.
‘Check first.’
“I just saw the post.”
“…….”
A heavy silence flowed.
No one even asked back what was going on.
‘Apparently, the others are also looking at it.’
Lee Sejin was hanging his head over the smartphone screen without a word.
“Is it certain that the person in the photo here is you?”
“……I don’t know.”
Lee Sejin muttered with a dazed voice.
“I’ve never taken anything like this…”
But he couldn’t give a firm answer that it wasn’t him.
I asked again.
“Did you smoke?”
“Wait, in my first year of high school… something happened. …But, I quit immediately. And I’ve never done anything like this. Really, why would I do this in school…”
Lee Sejin’s voice, which was getting louder, was cut off as if his breath was stuck. And he lowered his gaze to the smartphone again.
‘He’s looking at the comments.’
It was certain that it would be terrible without even looking. Gold 1 sensed the situation and quickly stopped him.
“Hey, don’t look at that. Turn it off for now. Try turning it off.”
“……I have to look at it to respond. But… yeah, it’s already over.”
Lee Sejin put down the smartphone. The hand putting it down was trembling.
“Honestly, even I wouldn’t believe it? If I say I smoked but never took a photo, and everything except the smoking is a lie… it won’t be persuasive.”
As he spoke, Lee Sejin was gradually becoming calm. No, rather than becoming calm… he was resigning himself.
“…People won’t believe me, right?”
“…….”
Since a photo was attached, it seemed hard to turn it around.
Separately, Lee Sejin really did look wronged. And the actions described in the accusation post were quite different from Lee Sejin’s direction so far.
‘With his personality… even if he bullied someone, he wouldn’t leave behind any future trouble.’
Unless he subtly manipulated the situation so that the person didn’t even know they were being bullied and made them suffer as their own consequence.
He wasn’t the type to use a method that could result in such backtalk.
However, this was also just a guess. We haven’t known each other for long, so I can’t jump to conclusions. Originally, people have various sides.
Don’t we see many cases where someone is a trashy kkondae boss to me but a dependable father to their own son?
“…….”
I pondered for a moment, then turned on my smartphone screen again. And I began to read Lee Sejin’s accusation post thoroughly from the beginning.
In the meantime, Lee Sejin and the teammates began to flounder in despair and sadness.
Lee Sejin muttered in a low voice.
“I… I’ll withdraw tomorrow.”
“…!!”
“Hey, wait a minute.”
“C-C-Calmly, t-think about…”
“I’ve already thought about it enough. It’s true that I smoked… If I keep holding on here, the controversy will only grow.”
Lee Sejin seemed to be trying hard to steady his voice.
“After it subsides a bit, if I explain well, won’t I be able to debut in a year or two? And… I really have no memory of taking it, but since it came out, it’s also a bit scary.”
“…….”
Since Lee Sejin, who always had a bit of composure left, spoke like that, the other teammates seemed unable to bring up anything else.
I responded to those words while still looking into my smartphone.
“I don’t think that’s a very good idea.”
“……Why?”
“The person who wrote this post wrote, ‘If you’ve grasped the situation, withdraw now.’ If you withdraw now, these words will be solidified as an established fact.”
Lee Sejin seemed to be getting angry as I kept talking back when it wasn’t even my own business.
“Stop it. It only makes me feel bad. Even if I refute in this situation, the result will be the same.”
“It’s important to catch the subject of refutation well.”
“What?”
I picked up the smartphone and turned the screen toward Lee Sejin.
On the screen, the last photo included in the accusation post was enlarged.
“This is a composite.”
“……!!”
Your eyes are gonna pop out. Stop being surprised.
In fact, if he had thought calmly, he would have guessed it was a composite himself first, but he must have been unable to do so because he was scared.
I handed the smartphone to Lee Sejin. And with my index finger, I pointed out the parts that stood out in the photo on the screen.
First, the hand holding the cigarette.
“Here, if you enlarge and match it with a design program… the pixels are slightly broken. They probably lowered the resolution on purpose, but still, a few points stand out.”
And the cigarette.
“The brightness of the cigarette alone doesn’t match. With this photo’s exposure value, it should be brighter than this, but since it looks too white, they lowered it a bit more in the process of lowering it.”
It was a mistake easy for a beginner to make when putting a white object into a photo. White objects do stand out, so they blur it because it looks awkward.
My smartphone performance was quite low so it stuttered a bit, but there was no problem with this kind of confirmation.
‘…To think I’d see the benefit of having done data correction work.’
I briefly recalled the past when I accepted requests like ‘Please erase that fucking pattern on the clothesㅠㅠ’ while receiving additional fees.
“Y-You, how do you know this? Are you sure?”
“Yeah.”
Lee Sejin looked into the smartphone without a word.
When I thought I saw a flash of hope in those eyes, Gold 1 shouted.
“Hey!! Then post an explanation right now! That it’s a composite!”
“A-Ah… That’s right! I should post…”
“No, wait a minute.”
Maybe because he was a guy who was doing well in reality, he didn’t seem to know the biology of the internet well. I explained calmly.
“I’ve looked into it too, and among your fans, there must be those who recognized it was a composite.”
“Ah!”
“T-Then if we just wait, the f-fans will…”
“No, what I mean is… even if there are points that look like a composite, people won’t believe it because cursing is fun. They’ll sarcasm that they’re claiming that because they like Lee Sejin.”
“……Ah.”
Before the atmosphere in the room was destroyed, I should immediately add a supplementary explanation.
“So find it.”
“Huh?”
“The original photo. If you post it together with the original, they won’t be able to refute the claim that it’s a composite.”
Seeing that Lee Sejin in the photo was staring at the lens, it meant he already knew the existence of the camera.
If so, there was a high possibility that someone among his acquaintances took it.
‘But in this situation, it’s dangerous to contact all acquaintances.’
Because an acquaintance might have uploaded it.
‘Seeing that the person who uploaded the accusation post put the photo in confidently, they seem to be sure that few people have the original of this photo…’
No, wait. Since this is easy to be specified, it might rather not be so.
‘Hmm, if not that…’
I was lost in thought, then asked Lee Sejin.
“When you take photos with other people, do you tend to save them all?”
“The ones I’m in, yes.”
“Then first… how about looking through the album starting from the days you took a large number of photos for some event or gathering.”
If they cropped only Lee Sejin from a group photo taken in multiple shots and then changed the background, they would be triumphant enough to think the original photo wouldn’t be found.
“Moondae-ya, what on earth were you originally? Actually, you’re an NIS employee, right?”
“No way.”
I quickly passed over Gold 1’s nonsense.
The other teammates had already stuck to Lee Sejin’s side and were looking through the photos together with eagle eyes.
“Don’t just look at solo photos, look at group photos too. It might be an enlargement.”
“Okay.”
Lee Sejin, who finally returned to his usual way of speaking, quickly opened the gallery with his smartphone.
And an eye-straining search time followed.
Just how many photos did this guy Lee Sejin take. High school photos came out endlessly.
Even though the first year hadn’t ended yet, half an hour had passed.
“S-Sejin has a lot of friends.”
“…Haha.”
It was to the point that Seon Ahyun muttered like this with a fed-up voice. Lee Sejin let out an embarrassed laugh and flipped through the photos.
And around the time the photos from the first semester of the second year came out.
“Hyung, this!”
“…!”
Kim Raebin pointed at a photo that was passing by. Lee Sejin quickly checked the photo.
It was a photo where five or six people were standing together, smiling at the camera. There were several photos taken at the same place before and after this photo, with only different poses.
Lee Sejin was slightly away in a corner. And upon enlarging his upper body, it was clearly visible.
It was the photo included in the accusation post.
“……Ha.”
Lee Sejin bowed his head deeply and let out a long sigh of relief.
And he muttered with a somehow despondent voice.
“…It’s a photo from the election campaign.”
“Hm.”
Come to think of it, there was something about running for student council president in the beginning of the accusation post. I don’t know who it is, but this must have been quite offensive to them.
‘Should I have told him to look for photos from this time first?’
But anyway, we found it, so it’s fine.
“Heo…”
Lee Sejin sprawled back as his tension loosened. He almost hit his head on the wall behind the bed, but he certainly wouldn’t be able to care about such things now.
“What a relief. That it was in my photo album.”
“Right.”
I nodded.
Beside me, Gold 1 said vigorously.
“Great! You had an agency, right? Send it to them! Let’s tell them to issue a refutation!”
It was a sensible piece of advice. Since the matter had already grown, it would be cleaner to respond officially along with the evidence.
However, a lukewarm reaction came back.
“To the agency?”
Lee Sejin stroked the back of his neck with a mysterious expression.
“Hmm… That’s a bit.”
“…?”
The agency is there to do this kind of thing, so why?