Chapter 51: The Demon God Leaves His Mark

In the live broadcast video, MC Zion was smiling broadly.

– Congratulations! The winner of the Best New Male Artist award is… Pantheon!!

Not just Zion, but the members of Pantheon also embraced each other in joy.

Only Sun-woo stood there looking slightly unimpressed while being hugged, while the other members were so happy they were on the verge of tears.

The camera briefly panned to the audience, showing that most of them were also celebrating Pantheon’s win.

As Pantheon’s acceptance speeches continued, it finally reached the center member.

– Do thou worship me?

The man watching the video up to this point contorted his face and turned off the tablet.

“Damn it.”

The director’s office at Izm Entertainment.

Director Jang Young-bae, who kept a well-groomed beard, spat out a harsh curse.

He had tried to crush them through a battle of nerves at Music Trouble, but he had failed.

He had only ended up losing a PD who had a decent relationship with him.

Afterward, he had barely managed to block them from public broadcasts and felt relieved, but they had participated in MAMA based on their other activities alone.

He had used a viral marketing firm to spread comments calling them a ‘group that only has buzz,’ planning to bite them the moment they made a mistake, but even that became impossible after the MAMA stage was broadcast.

Because they were good. They were far too good.

“And they even take the Rookie Award?”

It was unpleasant enough that they participated, but the result was also too good.

With the title of Rookie of the Year attached to them, they would receive even more attention in the future.

Furthermore, he had heard stories that they had secured investment funds.

“Has the Chairman of Samkang gone senile or something?”

A large number of Izm singers were also participating in MAMA, so he was able to hear roughly what had happened.

Apparently, the Chairman treated him like a savior just for finding some people who got lost in the theme park.

“Whew—.”

It was a day where irritation welled up in many ways.

“I should have trampled those bastards before they got entangled with our rookies—”

A new rookie group including Kang-yul, who had transferred from Pantheon, was preparing for their debut.

It was by no means a good thing for Pantheon to be the center of attention like they were now.

“Tsk, I suppose I should take more serious measures.”

Jang Young-bae reached for his phone, thinking of places he could contact.

The moment he picked up the phone.

Whirrrr.

The phone vibrated.

“Ack, you startled me!”

Startled, Jang Young-bae checked the name on the screen and answered the call even more surprised.

“Yes! CEO! Pardon? That’s right. I was working on Pantheon— well, the thing is—”

Apparently, the CEO on the other end was reprimanding him in a low but powerful voice.

After listening for a long time, Jang Young-bae replied while biting his lip.

“Yes, I will pay more attention. I will report on every matter, yes, understood.”

With that, the call ended.

Putting down his phone, Jang Young-bae sat dazed for a moment.

The CEO had been watching personally.

Pantheon had somehow grown enough to catch the CEO’s eye.

“Damn it, I’ll have to be ruthless.”

Jang Young-bae resolved to enter full-scale operations.

***

“Do thou worship me?”

The Demon God stood on stage and asked the audience.

He knew that not all of these audience members were fans of Pantheon.

However, among them, there must be fans he had not yet met in person, and there were surely people who had become fans at this very moment.

– YES!!!!

As expected, a quite loud response was heard.

“I shall worship you all as well.”

“KYAAAAAA—!”

‘Truly adorable fans.’

‘That level of noise would not be inferior even when compared to a war cry.’

While he smiled with satisfaction at the shouts coming from the front, the sound of cracking also began to be heard behind his back.

Creeeeak— creeeeak—

The sound of chains breaking apart as much as he had gained fans.

‘At this rate, it might soon be possible to get my hands on another Authority?’

He was still a long, long way from reclaiming the ‘Original Power’ that had made him a Demon God, but it was just a matter of obtaining them one by one.

Had he not already presented great joy to the fans with [Deep Sleep Inducement]?

He wondered what kind of Authority he would surprise the fans with next.

“Hmph.”

The Demon God concluded his acceptance speech with a small chuckle.

– Yes! Congratulations, Pantheon! Congratulations, Sun-woo!

“Ah.”

The Demon God raised his hand to acknowledge Zion, who had mentioned Sun-woo again along with the group name, and headed off the stage.

MAMA was a system where artists sat in audience seats near the stage to enjoy the performances and award ceremonies together and show their reactions.

Therefore, it was a path to briefly reorganize and return to their seats.

“Whew….”

Tae-young let out a long sigh as soon as they came down.

Unlike the Demon God, who didn’t have much feeling about the Rookie Award itself, the word ‘Rookie Award’ inevitably felt different to the four members.

The one thing that can never be missing from the rosy dreams of a rookie idol is the Rookie Award in their debut year.

Countless idol groups debut every year.

Most of them harbor the heart of ‘Could it be us?’, but the teams that can actually receive this award are few and far between.

Once the debut year passes, that’s it.

Due to the condition of being a [Rookie], the opportunity was much rarer than for other awards.

And Pantheon, although no one had said it out loud, had considered that opportunity gone.

Even when they succeeded in their comeback and drew buzz, they were happy for that itself; they never thought they would actually be able to win the Rookie Award at MAMA.

“We got it.”

Tae-young spoke quietly while holding the trophy.

Yoon-seo, Ha-gyeom, and Ji-ho gathered around him.

“Yeah….”

“For real!”

“We won it.”

They couldn’t even speak at length and just stared at the trophy.

Resurrected Rookies.

Pantheon was both a rookie and resurrected at the same time.

‘You all died once in the utterly fierce idol competition and then came back to life.’

The trophy was the proof of that.

As silence flowed—

“Give it to me.”

“Oh?”

Unable to bear the atmosphere that had turned soft with welling emotion, the Demon God quickly took the trophy.

A gold-plated cube-shaped trophy.

Apparently, the various faces and lines of the cube symbolized the evolution of K-pop, challenge, and the connection between fans and artists.

To Pantheon, this wasn’t just a simple trophy, so they should probably make a display case at the company and enshrine it carefully.

“It resembles an angular mace.”

In the Demon God’s eyes, it reminded him of a square mace with a short handle.

“It is proper to write one’s name on a trophy of war.”

He hadn’t had this thought when seeing music show trophies, but seeing a trophy shaped like a mace brought back the Demon God’s old common sense.

He took the cube and scratched it with his exceptionally hard fingernails.

“Does it not peel off? It seems I can just scratch it to engrave.”

“Stop!”

“Sun-woo hyung, stop it!”

“Uwaaaa! That’s precious!”

“That’s property damage!”

However, the Demon God did not stop.

A powerful fingernail scratched down the top dot of the character ‘Cho’ (meaning ‘First/Rookie’).

“Oops.”

He had almost written his True Name.

Realizing his mistake, the Demon God drew a long line from the dot to create the ‘s’ sound of ‘Sun,’ and drew the remaining lines to complete ‘Sun-woo.’

While the members watched in horror.

The Demon God’s hand moved to another face.

“What, are you going to engrave names on every face?”

“S-stop it!”

“T… Tae…”

The Demon God was engraving the character ‘Tae’ meticulously, with even more care than his own name.

“Hmm?”

Watching Demon God Sun-woo work hard to engrave his name, Tae-young paused for a moment.

“Young… look, how is it?”

Tae-young checked his name, which was deeply engraved into the trophy.

In the midst of this, Sun-woo had engraved it in a quite cool font.

“Somehow, a little bit more, the trophy feels like mine now?”

The leader, who always kept his common sense, uttered a strange impression.

“Really?”

Tae-young nodded at the members’ question.

In the meantime, the Demon God had already moved on to the next name.

“Yoon- seo-”

“Ha- gyeom-”

“Ji- ho-”

The Demon God was engrossed.

“But Sun-woo’s fingernails are really hard.”

“He must consume plenty of calcium.”

The work ended along with Ha-gyeom and Ji-ho’s admiration.

The names of the five Pantheon members were engraved on the five faces, excluding the face with the handle.

“How is it?”

Yoon-seo, Ha-gyeom, and Ji-ho also looked at their respective names.

“As Tae-young hyung said…, it really feels like it’s mine….”

“Right! Sun-woo, you did well!”

“Hmm…. This, I’ll acknowledge.”

The Demon God laughed.

“One simply needs to think logically. Names should be written on objects.”

““Logic…….””

Though they were all tilting their heads at that point.

Regardless, it was good.

Everyone’s name, engraved by Sun-woo.

It made what they had accomplished feel even more vivid.

And every time they see the names on the trophy in the future, they will recall this moment beneath the stage.

“Excuse me, guys?”

Just then, there was a voice calling out from the side.

Turning their heads, they saw the CEO and the Team Leader standing there.

The two were standing in the same pose—the pose of pointing at themselves with their fingers.

“Isn’t there one face left? The face with the handle.”

“Don’t you think the CEO and I deserve to have our names there too?”

The CEO and the Team Leader stared with hopeful smiles.

And, without anyone telling them to, the members turned their heads to look at the Demon God.

Receiving everyone’s gaze, the Demon God spoke without a moment’s deep thought.

“The merit of you two is deep.”

“Ooh!”

“However, putting your names on the trophy is not fitting.”

“Eh?”

“Therefore—”

The wise judgment of the Grand Commander, the Demon God, who was thorough in rewards and punishments, dropped.

“I shall engrave your names on the display case.”

““Gasp.””

Well, regardless of whether they wanted that.

“Hmph.”

Admiring his own judgment, the Demon God looked down at the trophy again.

Although he must not mention it with his current power.

‘Since the fans are constantly increasing, surely the day will come to bring out my True Name?’

Thinking of his True Name, which contained his Original Power, the Demon God turned around.

.

.

Pantheon, who was already creating buzz, won the Rookie Award at MAMA and finished their stage perfectly.

That meant they had appealed to both the general public and idol fans.

Upon returning to Korea, both the quality and quantity of scouting offers had changed.

“A clothing brand advertisement? Us?”

“Yes, you guys.”

The eyes of Pantheon widened at Management Team Leader Oh Dae-ho’s words.

A proposal for a print advertisement model had come from a clothing brand whose name anyone would know.

It was a brand popular from students to adults because its designs were clean and its prices were reasonable.

“Wow…. That’s a brand I buy and wear often.”

Yoon-seo pointed to the boxy shirt under his knit vest. The pants that narrowed toward the ankles were also from that brand.

“Is that so? To think it is clothes that Yoon-seo wears, it feels a bit more real now.”

Yoon-seo smirked at the Demon God’s words.

“Team Leader, then are we starting preparations for the next album soon?”

There is a saying: row when the tide is in.

Unless it was an agency that specialized in shelving artists, they had to spur on their activities at a time like this.

“That’s right. Investment money has come in too—”

The Team Leader continued his words after glancing at the Demon God.

“We should prepare the next album before Izm pulls some strings again while we’re stalling. Right?”

The final question was directed at the CEO, who had been just listening to this conversation.

“Uh, yeah? That’s right, yeah.”

““????””

Everyone’s gaze turned to the CEO at the somewhat suspicious answer.

“Ahem, hmm.”

The CEO deliberately looked away as if he didn’t know anything.

“CEO.”

The Demon God was not one to stay still in this situation.

“Must I provide assistance in opening thy mouth?”

“Eek.”

The CEO flinched, not knowing what that ‘assistance’ would possibly be.

“No, I’ll tell you. I’m telling you.”

“Quickly.”

“My goodness. How do you pressure the CEO like this?”

“Quickly!”

At the Demon God’s shouting, the CEO opened his mouth.

“The thing is. Sun-woo provided me with a lot of composition sources like last time….”

[ Worship ] was also a song the CEO created after being inspired by the humming of the believers who worshiped the Demon God.

To follow the same process, the Demon God provided sources like war songs.

“Well, the song just isn’t coming out.”

The Demon God tilted his head.

“Hmm? That cannot be?”

The CEO had already overcome the Shadow once. There was no room for the Shadow to interfere again.

“CEO, don’t think too urgently.”

“Yes, that’s right. We all trust your skills anyway, CEO.”

Pantheon sent their trust to the CEO.

Because it was impossible for the CEO, who had made a name for himself as a producer since his time at Izm, to not be able to produce a song when he even had sources.

They thought it must be a bit difficult because it had to be done suddenly.

““CEO, fighting!””

Pantheon shouted ‘fighting’ to the CEO with deep trust.

In that way, at that time, they thought it would be a matter easily resolved.

Without knowing that the supply of songs would be resolved in a completely unexpected place.