By Zephyria 
While I was still bewildered, Seo Yun-chae huffed and stormed out of the recording studio.
“I asked you to help me practice, but what is this? I didn’t need any help from the start. If you want to mess with me, just say so! Are you sure you really lost your memory?”
“No, I told you I did, like, how many times now…”
“Enough. I think I need practice more than you do, so leave me alone from today. If you ask me to help you practice singing one more time, I’ll consider it a declaration of war.”
“…Huh?”
‘What on earth is he talking about?’
Confused, I turned to the other members.
“When did you guys get here?”
“Just now.”
Ra Ho-yeon answered. His ears were slightly flushed, which was strange.
‘Hmm? Cha Si-yoon and Shin Tae-beom too?’
The difference was that Shin Tae-beom was as red as an erupting volcano, while Cha Si-yoon had a faint blush on his cheeks.
I wondered if these guys had been drinking in the middle of the day.
It was a common occurrence in the front lines. Whether they had given up on life or were trembling with tension at the thought of clashing with monsters, day drinking was practically a habit.
So, I just asked.
“Did you guys have a drink? You’re too young to be reaching for alcohol already…”
But as soon as they heard my question, the gazes of the other three turned cold.
“Um… never mind. Sorry.”
“…What do you see us as, anyway?”
Shin Tae-beom erased his red face and immediately shouted.
“Um, still bitter rivals who can easily kick each other in the gut if an accident happens?”
“…Never mind. It’s my fault.”
[…Poor Shin Tae-beom.]
Potato sighed from above my head. I was the one who couldn’t understand. I was the one who got scolded out of nowhere, but Potato, who belonged to me, was taking their side.
‘What’s wrong with you too?’
[Tsk, tsk. Poor members.]
Potato didn’t respond to my injustice.
While I was silent, Shin Tae-beom, Ra Ho-yeon, and Cha Si-yoon avoided eye contact with me, looking somewhat sulky.
‘No, seriously, what is it?’
“So, how was the song I sang? How many points do you think it would get on a karaoke machine?”
“……”
“……”
Ra Ho-yeon and Shin Tae-beom didn’t say anything.
‘Was it that bad?’
I wanted to gauge how many hours I would have to lock myself in the practice room, so I asked again.
“Is it… that bad? Was it so insignificant that you don’t even want to give it a score?”
‘That wouldn’t do.’
Since I was doing it anyway, I had to desperately imitate ‘Yeon Yujin’.
So that the old habits of my past life as a combat doll wouldn’t show.
‘Why am I so nervous about this?’
As I fidgeted with my fingers, waiting for their evaluation, a hand landed on my head.
“…What?”
“…It was listenable.”
Ra Ho-yeon said, ruffling my hair into a bird’s nest, and then left the recording studio.
“Hey! Wait! Ra Ho-yeon! You have to tell me whether I need to practice more or not!”
Shin Tae-beom answered that for me.
“It wasn’t bad. Just refine the practice a little more.”
“Oh? Really?”
“…I didn’t know you were this good.”
“What? I couldn’t hear you because you were talking so quietly.”
“Keep improving, you idiot.”
Shin Tae-beom also ruffled my hair as he pleased and left.
‘These guys!’
Considering my age in my past life, I’m older than them!
I was thirty years old, but being treated like a twenty-year-old didn’t feel good.
As I was trying to fix my hair with a scowl, even Cha Si-yoon, who was slightly taller than me, messed up my hair.
Then, he leisurely ran away.
“Hey! Cha Si-yoon, why are you doing this too!”
“…Because it’s me.”
“What?”
“Your skills are terrible, so improve more. Yujin Hyung.”
“You little punk?!”
As I was about to chase after him in a fit of anger, Cha Si-yoon stopped and pointed to the microphone.
“The recording of what you sang should be there, so make sure to listen to it again. Then you’ll know best.”
It was a pretty good idea. The moment I was about to thank him, Cha Si-yoon quickly disappeared from sight completely.
“…They’re all gone.”
Speechless, I plopped down alone in the recording studio and listened to the song I had sung earlier.
“Huh…?”
My song, which I listened to again with headphones on… wasn’t bad. The clear, beautiful tone that rose appropriately was listenable.
‘It’s not bad.’
I listened to the song again and again, checked the awkward parts, and sang it again.
The marks indicating mistakes on the printed lyrics gradually decreased.
‘How much would Jae-ha have laughed if he had seen this?’
But ‘An Ga-hyeon’ was dead, so that day would never come again.
Come to think of it, when I sang a song I knew for fun, Jae-ha seemed to have come over and listened at some point. He sometimes even asked me to sing for him.
‘If I get to go on a cable TV music show, maybe Jae-ha will hear this song too?’
If so, what would he say?
Even though he wouldn’t recognize ‘me’.
Would it be too greedy to hope that he would smile brightly again…?
I hummed the last part of the song.
“Even if I lose myself at the end. I Will Always Love You. I’ll give myself to protect you.”
And the day before the cable TV music program recording.
An official document from the Ability User Management Bureau flew to me.
A document stating, ‘It is expected that you are not a D-Class Guide, but an A-Class or higher Guide, so we request a re-examination of your awakened abilities.’
“W-W-W-What is going on?”
President grabbed the back of her neck as soon as she heard that an official document had arrived from the Ability User Management Bureau.
“It’s not a bad thing, but…”
“It seems like we’ve gotten a lot of attention. Because of the Dungeon Break incident.”
The Director and Manager were whispering with serious expressions.
“If they went to the trouble of packaging the grade re-examination as an official document and sending it by express, doesn’t that mean we should get the examination done quickly without delay?”
“Our Yujin was such a talented individual with outstanding abilities as a Guide?”
“He did play an active role during the Dungeon Break… But weren’t the Esper kids the ones who stood out? Like Ho-yeon or Tae-beom.”
‘I can hear you, you know.’
The Director and Manager Hyun-soo Hyung were looking at me and saying everything so obviously, it was really bothering me.
‘Haa.’
I didn’t think the government would let it go quietly.
‘Even though the members are Espers and I did Guiding with kisses, it was strange that nothing was said, so I thought they would take some action…’
If there was even one Ability User who could read related memories, they wouldn’t have been able to miss what I did.
‘I knew this day would come eventually.’
But now that it was a reality, my throat felt dry.
“What should we do?”
The Director and Manager asked President, who covered her forehead and groaned.
“What else can we do? We have to do what the country tells us to do, of course. But what I’m worried about is…”
“What are you worried about?”
As I intervened with anxiety, President looked at me with worried eyes.
“Until now, Yujin, you were the weakest of the weak, a D-Class Guide who wasn’t particularly useful in battles with monsters, so you could be assigned as an idol group member, but…”
This person, who looked so soft, spoke like a viper.
If the real Yeon Yujin had heard that, he might have vomited blood from all seven orifices.
I wasn’t affected at all, so I just nodded.
“Yes. So?”
When I asked in a sarcastic tone, President sighed and explained to me.
“The world is much safer now than it used to be, so you can live in various professions like this… But the Management Bureau, which represents the government, always wants to take away Guides with abilities because the number of Guides is always insufficient.”
“So, you’re saying.”
“If you are judged to be A-Class or higher when you undergo the re-examination, they will seriously want you to quit being an idol and belong to the Management Bureau or a private guild.”
‘That’s understandable.’
I could understand.
The public sentiment had become turbulent due to the recent Dungeon Break.
In this situation, the appearance of a new Guide with a high grade was a good bait that the government could use to create an issue.
Since the target was ‘Yeon Yujin’, an idol who had worked hard to prevent the Dungeon Break, it would be good to gather more attention.
If my skills were really good, they would definitely offer excellent conditions and tell me to follow them.
‘Whether it’s the government side… or a private guild, it’s not a bad choice for me right now.’
I’ve only ever belonged to the front lines of the military, where I was thrown away to die, so I don’t know how the Management Bureau or guilds work.
‘It would be best to find the culprit quietly without being noticed by the government.’
But now that I’m in a crisis where my abilities are about to be exposed, it might be a better choice to join the government or a guild.
If you want to catch a tiger, you have to go into the tiger’s den.
It might be easier than finding Jae-ha while doing unfamiliar idol work, and furthermore, finding the bastard who tried to kill me. It would also be easier to access information.
In some ways, it was a good thing.