A viper had just been thrown into their nest, and it was wearing a Starforce Entertainment tracksuit.
The silence in the small office was absolute, thick with a history of bad blood. Mina instinctively took a step back, her fragile, newfound confidence crumbling at the sight of her tormentor. Eun-bi looked like she'd seen a ghost, her face pale. Min-hyuk, who had been leaning back in his chair, now sat rigid, his hands clenched into white-knuckled fists.
Yoo-jin was the only one who didn't move. His mind was racing, trying to process this impossible, insane turn of events.
"This is a mistake," he said, his voice flat and cold. "You're not on my team roster."
Lee Hana held up the transfer order, a bitter, triumphant sneer twisting her lips. It was the first real emotion he'd seen on her face besides contempt. "It's no mistake. It's my 'punishment'." She spat the word out like it was poison. "Director Park's orders. I'm your team's new 'assistant'."
The crumpled paper in her hand didn't look like an official document. It looked like a declaration of war.
Yoo-jin turned, walked to his small desk, and immediately dialed Director Park's extension. He didn't even get through. The director's secretary, the same woman with the voice like ice, cut him off.
"The Director's decision is final, Producer Han," she said, a smug, infuriating satisfaction in her tone. "Lee Hana's public image requires… rehabilitation. What better story than having her humbly repent by assisting the very trainee she wronged? The press will love it. It's good PR."
Yoo-jin hung up the phone, a cold, sickening fury washing over him.
This wasn't a punishment for Hana. This was a spy. This was a leash. This was Director Park's way of reminding him who was in charge. Park had given him a new department, but he'd also planted a bomb in the middle of it on day one. He didn't trust Yoo-jin's sudden rise, and this was his way of keeping him in check.
He glanced over at Hana, who was watching him with resentful, hateful eyes. He activated his ability, scanning for any change, any weakness.
[Name: Lee Hana]
[Potential: A-Rank]
[Emotion: Humiliation (Extreme), Resentment (Critical)]
[Hidden Status: Under intense pressure from her powerful family to maintain her position at Starforce, despite the recent scandal.]
That last line was new. It was a crack in her perfect, arrogant armor. 'Pressure from her family'. She wasn't as untouchable as she pretended to be. She needed to be here, as much as she hated it.
And that gave him an idea.
Yoo-jin walked back into the center of the room, into the thick, tense standoff. The rest of his team was looking at him, their eyes begging him to throw her out, to fight this.
He did the opposite.
"Fine," he said, the word cutting through the silence. "You're on the team."
Hana's eyes widened with a flicker of triumph, but it died instantly as Yoo-jin continued.
"But let's be very clear about your role. You are not an 'assistant'. You are an intern. My intern. That means you will fetch our coffee, you will make our copies, and you will schedule our appointments. You will not speak in a creative meeting unless you are spoken to. Your opinions are not required."
Hana's face turned a dangerous shade of red. Her eyes blazed with pure, undiluted fury. "You can't be serious. Do you know who I am?"
Yoo-jin took a step closer, his voice dropping to a low, icy whisper that only she could hear. "I know exactly who you are. You're the girl who almost threw her career away. You're the girl whose family is forcing her to clean up her own mess. And right now, you're my employee."
He straightened up, his voice returning to a normal, commanding volume for the whole room to hear. "This is not a negotiation. You will do your job. If you don't, I will document every single instance of your insubordination and submit it directly to Director Park. And just for fun, I'll leak it to the same reporter who buried you last week, with a personal quote about how your 'repentance' is a complete and utter sham. Your choice."
It was a brutal, public checkmate. For the first time, Hana was left speechless, her mouth opening and closing with no sound coming out. She was trapped. He had used her own weakness, the pressure from her family, to forge her chains.
This was the first time he wasn't just her victim, or even her rival. He was her boss.
An hour later, they held their first official album production meeting. It was a surreal sight. The four of them—Yoo-jin, Mina, Eun-bi, and Min-hyuk—were crammed around a small, cheap folding table.
And in the corner, sitting on a stool with a notepad and pen, was Lee Hana. She was silent, her face a thunderous mask of humiliation, forced to take notes as they began to build the future of her greatest enemy.
Eun-bi presented the core concept. "The album needs to follow the emotional arc that 'Echo' started," she said, her passion reignited. "It should feel like a journey. From loneliness, to finding a fragile hope, to a final, cathartic release."
Min-hyuk grunted in agreement. "The sound needs to be raw. Acoustic. We lean into what makes her unique. No plastic idol garbage."
Mina, surprisingly, spoke up, her voice timid but clear. "The lyrics… they should feel like secrets someone is telling you."
For a moment, it was perfect. The synergy, the shared vision—it felt like they could actually conquer the world from this tiny, ugly room.
Then Eun-bi let out a sigh, tapping her pen on her notebook. "It's a great concept. But 'Echo' is a ballad. It's our soul, but it can't be our weapon. To hit 500,000 sales, to compete with a monster like Aurora, we need a title track with more public appeal. Something with the same emotional depth, but a different energy."
The unspoken truth hung in the air. "And we have absolutely no budget to commission a top-tier producer to make a song like that."
They were stuck. They had one perfect, beautiful brick, but Director Park was demanding they build a palace.
From her corner of the room, Hana let out a tiny, almost inaudible scoff. A sound of pure, unadulterated contempt for their hopeless situation.
Yoo-jin ignored her. His mind was already racing, scanning a mental map of Seoul's hidden, vibrant music scene. He grabbed his jacket from the back of his chair.
"Then we won't look for a producer," he said, a new, determined light in his eyes.
"We'll go hunting for a genius."