The triumphant final chord of Ahn Da-eun's anthem died, but the sound that replaced it was not applause. It was a confused, horrified, collective gasp from ten thousand people. On the massive screens flanking the stage, the two silent, looping videos played out their poison. On the left, a respected executive in a sordid, illegal tryst. On the right, a beloved rising star sobbing in a police interrogation room. The concert had become a public execution.
Da-eun stood frozen for a single, eternal second, her mind struggling to process the visual assault. Her victory, her raw, defiant joy, curdled into ash in her mouth. The faces in the crowd, once upturned in adoration, were now a sea of shocked, morbidly curious expressions, their phones held high not to capture her glory, but her humiliation.
Han Yoo-jin's voice, raw with panic, ripped through the security team's earpieces. "Get her out of there! NOW! Form the diamond! Move, move, move!"
The stage, which seconds before had been her kingdom, became a trap. Kang, his head of security, and three other guards swarmed around her. Their movements were brutally efficient. They didn't ask; they commanded with their bodies, forming a tight perimeter around her, shielding her from the thousands of camera lenses that were now pointed at her like weapons. Da-eun, still in a state of profound shock, stumbled as they practically carried her off the stage and into the chaotic darkness of the wings. The last thing she heard from the plaza was the ugly, rising murmur of a crowd that had just been handed the scandal of the year.
In the chaos, the core team that had weathered so many storms together, fractured.
Director Oh Se-young, who had been watching from the side of the stage, saw the video of the Stellar executive appear. A flicker of cold, grim satisfaction crossed her face. This public detonation was exactly what she had argued for in the war room. Ryu had done her dirty work for her. She saw not a disaster, but an opportunity. Without a word to anyone, she turned and melted into the backstage shadows, pulling out her own phone and making a call. Her objectives were now entirely her own.
In the cramped security van a block away, Oh Min-ji sat ramrod straight, staring at her useless monitors. Ryu's digital ghost was gone, leaving behind only the wreckage. She frantically typed commands, trying to sever the connection to the jumbotrons, but it was like trying to unplug a waterfall. He had locked her out completely. She was forced to listen to the panicked radio chatter and watch her own failure play out on a massive, public scale. For the first time in her young, brilliant career, she was utterly and completely outmatched.
And miles away, in the squalid gloom of his subterranean hideout, Nam Gyu-ri watched the livestream on a new, high-end laptop. He saw the videos appear. He saw the crowd's reaction. He saw the chaos erupt. And he threw his head back and laughed. It was not a chuckle of amusement; it was a deep, genuine, joyous roar of pure aesthetic appreciation. This was not just hacking. This was art. It was beautiful, destructive, operatic chaos. He saw not a defeat for his new, temporary partner, but a glorious opportunity. The board wasn't just in disarray; it had been set on fire. And he was a master of playing with fire.
The Aura security team's black SUV tore away from the curb, leaving the circus behind. The moment the heavy, soundproofed doors closed, sealing them in a cocoon of tense silence, Ahn Da-eun's shock finally shattered. It was replaced by a raw, molten fury that was directed entirely at the man sitting opposite her.
"You knew," she said, her voice low and trembling with a rage that was more terrifying than any scream. "You knew about those videos. The one with Kwon Ji-hyuk. And that… that other disgusting one. You knew about all of it, didn't you?"
Yoo-jin, exhausted, battered, and still reeling from the cascading disasters, could only nod, his face grim. "It's complicated, Da-eun. It was part of the threat. I was handling it."
"Handling it?!" she exploded, her voice finally breaking free. "Handling it?! You let me walk out onto that stage! You let me sing, you let me pour my entire heart out to thousands of people, all while you were sitting on secrets that could destroy this entire company! You used me! You used my concert, my defiance, my moment—you used it as a shield to hide your own dirty games!"
"That's not what happened!" Yoo-jin shot back, his own frayed nerves making him defensive. "This was Ryu's attack! He did this to us!"
"This happened because the secrets existed in the first place!" she cried, tears of rage and betrayal streaming down her face. "You want to know the difference between you and Chairman Choi? He's just more honest about being a monster! You talk about building a better company, about a new way, about trust and transparency, but you're just like them! You manipulate people, you keep secrets, you play dirty! You're just better at hiding it behind a noble cause!"
The accusation struck him harder than any of Ryu's attacks. It targeted the very foundation of his mission, the core of his identity.
"How can I ever trust you again?" she asked, her voice cracking with the genuine pain of a believer who has just discovered their god has feet of clay. "Everything we've built, everything I thought we stood for… was it all just a lie you told to get what you wanted?"
The trust that had been the bedrock of Aura Management, the unwavering faith between the infallible producer and his first, most iconic artist, shattered in the tense, suffocating silence of the speeding car. For Ahn Da-eun, Yoo-jin's sin wasn't the failure to stop their enemy. It was the discovery that, in the dark, he had been keeping the same kinds of secrets as them all along.