Tap.

The moment of going up on stage, taking our formation, and waiting until the music started—even though I’d already experienced it dozens of times, it was still a moment I couldn’t help but get nervous.

'It’s quiet.'

Even the fans who normally cheered us passionately.

Even the staff who’d been talking about this and that for filming.

In the very short moment right before the stage began, everyone stopped talking and focused.

All eyes were fixed on me and the members, and when I thought about the viewers watching us now beyond the venue, on TV and smartphones, it would’ve been strange not to feel tense.

But,

♬

I liked this moment.

I was nervous, but that perfect amount of tension warmed my body and made heat rise—yet my blood felt colder, this feeling.

My gaze was definitely locked on the camera in front of me, but what I saw with my eyes was our stage, like I was looking down from the air.

Swallow your breath, it’s already too late

When you lift your head, your gaze is locked

A whisper like a warning sound

Your chance to run away is only once

At last the song started, and Ryu Ayeon, who had the first part of Hydra Venom, danced her way out to the center of the formation with a voice like she was whispering.

Ryu Ayeon, showing waves that felt like they were snapping off in pieces as she sang.

-This Hydra Venom is about pushing away an intense temptation and refusing it, and then finally getting conquered. So for this choreography’s key point, we built it around control and resistance.

I knew how hard it was to bring to life choreography that, if you messed up even a little, could just look stiff and jerky—exactly the feeling she’d described.

In fact, every member besides me had tried the part Ryu Ayeon was doing right now at least once, and none of them could bring that feel to life perfectly.

In the mirror, the shadow that multiplied

The more I cut it, the more it spreads, hello

A lie that looks like truth

Sweetened poison stays on my tongue

And then Lee Gahyeon’s part.

"Wow..."

Seeing Lee Gahyeon come out to the center of the stage as if trading places with Ryu Ayeon, I caught the audience in the seats letting out an exclamation.

'Up to now, Gahyeon has been getting the short end of the stick.'

All the songs we’d sung so far had a strong, cheerful feel.

Because of that, among the members, Lee Gahyeon—who especially had a strong adult vibe—had a hard time showing all her charm, but on today’s stage, like she wanted to finally release that resentment, she was dominating the stage with flashy choreography and an intense expression.

Lee Gahyeon’s hand motions, burrowing in as if there was prey right in front of her.

Watching those hand motions burrow in like a snake, it really felt like there was an invisible target in front of Lee Gahyeon.

-What if we do it like this here?

-I like it, Gahyeon!

-Yeah?

Lee Gahyeon, who, unlike usual, showed an eager side while preparing for this stage, even offering opinions on the choreography for her own part.

Now it was shining.

You said you’d end it by setting fire

That’s just your way

We survive and evolve

Put a crown on top of scars

Reach out, the door of trial

Faith is bait, doubt is a rune

At the boundary of good and evil

I steal a look at your choice

Following behind Lee Gahyeon, Shinyu and Yunkyung appeared to the left and right like twins, alternating as they delivered their parts.

With both arms stretched long to the left and right as if tearing the space open as they appeared, their gazes stayed fixed straight ahead, and the sight felt like they were threatening someone.

-Let me do it again!

-I’ll try again too!

If Lee Gahyeon benefited from preparing for this stage, then on the other hand, the ones who suffered the most because of this concept were Shinyu and Yunkyung.

No matter how you looked at it, the two of them were closer to cute than intense, so it wasn’t easy to digest the stage’s intense concept.

But even so, they didn’t give up—they gritted their teeth and worked to bring that feel to life somehow.

Changing their expressions, getting help from makeup, even adjusting the angles of the choreography, until they finally got Ryu Ayeon’s approval.

Now, seeing the changed versions of the two of them, I could see not only the audience seats, but even the three judges sitting at the judging table widen their eyes.

'They’re going to be even more surprised later.'

I barely held back a smile and kept doing the choreography.

More than anything, our stage right now needed to feel intense but also alluring, so like on our usual stages, I couldn’t smile or make a playful expression even by mistake.

And then,

Cut it clean? No, grow more

We’re Hydra, bind ya with a kiss

Come mesmerized, fall deeper

Trial is a gift, your fever

Seo Ryujin stepped out slightly on a diagonal instead of dead center, picked up Shinyu’s rap part, and started inching closer toward the audience.

It was a part she’d been picked for unavoidably, since they needed two people to take rap parts on stage even though rap wasn’t her main strength.

But she looked so natural you’d think Iam’s rapper was Seo Ryujin, not Shinyu.

In fact,

"Kyaaaah!!!"

When Seo Ryujin rapped as she walked toward the audience seats, I heard the cheers for her cutting through my in-ears and ringing right by my ears.

Even if I close my eyes, I see more

Temptation looks like truth

The more the heads multiply

The bigger both love and fear grow

And cutting through those cheers, a sharp voice that filled the stage—no, the entire studio venue—echoed out.

It was Yuri’s voice, starting to sing the buildup into the highlight, one step in front of me.

'How much did she practice, seriously?'

Not only was it a much higher range than our usual songs, it was a completely different vocal style too, and Yuri’s back as she pulled it off had none of the light, silly feeling she usually had when she cracked dumb jokes.

A precarious voice, hanging on the brink of splitting any second.

But inside that voice was a hardness that felt like it would never break.

I could feel how much she’d practiced—her diction, every single syllable coming through clearly, and her pitch so exact it drilled into my ears.

Before I knew it, even the cheers stopped, and everyone in this space was just staring blankly at our stage.

From Ryu Ayeon to Yuri.

I could feel the baton the Iam members had all passed perfectly being handed to me.

***

Hydra, hydra, bite the night

Desire smeared into moonlight

Hydra, hydra, stay alive

The more you cut, the more fire

Raon couldn’t take her eyes off the stage.

'This is cheating.'

Even Raon, who’d already seen the stage rehearsal, was stunned by how perfectly Yuri handled the buildup into the highlight.

And it wasn’t just Yuri—every single Iam member perfectly carried out the role they were given, making it a great stage.

Even though the stage wasn’t over yet, the thought naturally came that even compared to the LYNX and VYNNIA stages earlier, it didn’t fall short.

-They’ve grown so much more than Agbaek.

To the point that even Park Taesu, sitting next to Raon, watched Iam’s stage and let out admiration with a pleased smile.

Even to Raon’s eyes, Iam’s skill level had improved to the point it was unrecognizable compared not only to Agbaek, but even their debut.

Aside from Ryu Ayeon, Seo Ryujin, and Yuri, who’d been outstanding from the start, the growth of Lee Gahyeon, Geum Shinyu, and Im Yunkyung—who’d been called the inferior class among antis—made Raon feel proud, not as Iam’s producer, but as a senior singer.

But,

'Lee Sion is outside the standard.'

Looking at Lee Sion standing alone in the dead center of the stage now, Raon could understand why Iam’s members had insisted so strongly that the main of this stage had to be Lee Sion.

Hydra, hydra, bite the night

The more you cut, the more fire

The moment Yuri’s part ended, the six members besides Lee Sion scattered to the left and right as if connecting to each other.

Between them, Lee Sion, who’d been kneeling alone, swept her hair back with one hand and surged up.

Slowly, but not sluggishly, she rose, and the camera framed Lee Sion alone in the center of the stage.

And when Lee Sion’s figure zoomed in on the screen—

-···.

The judges, who up to now had at least been exchanging brief impressions about the stage, couldn’t say a word.

Staring blankly at the stage in such intense focus you couldn’t even feel their breathing—the audience was the same.

Because Lee Sion, who had dyed her hair a pale gold instead of the long, draped black hair from before, was giving off a completely different atmosphere than before.

If when she dyed her hair silver in the Agbaek final round it had felt mysterious, like she wasn’t even human, now it felt noble.

It was common for idols to dye their hair.

It was good for planting a character, and creating an atmosphere depending on the stage concept was essential.

But Lee Sion hated dyeing her hair, and black hair suited her so well, so she hadn’t really dyed it at all until now.

'It suits her too well.'

It made you lament inside that there was no bigger waste of talent—why hadn’t she dyed it until now?

And that wasn’t all.

"Did she put in a circle lens on only one side?"

Park Taesu asked Raon the question, but his gaze stayed fixed straight ahead.

"Yes. Since this concept is Hydra, she said she wanted to look a little special."

As Raon answered Park Taesu, she could understand how he felt.

'That odd-eye concept is insane.'

Blond hair was something you could tell from the start, but a small yet big change you could only notice after the camera close-up.

Lee Sion’s eyes—her original blue eyes, and a black circle lens in one eye—were looking at people, so your gaze couldn’t help but get snared.

'Did black eyes always have this much character?'

One side blue, one side black.

The interesting part was that usually, the colored lens is the blue eye, but with Lee Sion it was the reverse—the black side was the one wearing a lens.

In truth, black circle lenses were something idols wore a lot.

Not for color, but because they created a black line around the iris, making the eyes look bigger and clearer, so many people used them.

And Lee Sion’s eye with the black circle lens was showing a strange charm, like a truly dark pearl.

It was like she was bringing to life the full charm of black eyes—something so common people didn’t recognize its value.

Lee Sion’s eyes looked like they could suck your soul out just from looking.

"The members are amazing."

"...Yes, they are."

Seyon murmured low as he watched Lee Sion’s solo.

At a glance, it sounded out of nowhere, but Raon, who understood exactly what he meant, nodded without realizing it.

"It wouldn’t have been easy to build a stage just to make one person shine."

"The members decided it themselves. They said they really wanted to do it like this."

Lee Sion, drawing an S shape centered on her arms and wrists as she danced a solo and seized everyone’s eyes.

Her expression too—one eye half-lidded, making even her gestures feel faintly sensual—made it easy to get captivated and miss it, but—

It was only possible because the Iam members were all stepping away from the center to form identical symmetry on the left and right, bending their upper bodies and extending their lower bodies as they danced, so Lee Sion could stand out.

If it weren’t for the members erasing their own presence, standing like the stage background with the sole goal of making Lee Sion stand out, the aura Lee Sion was giving off right now would definitely have dulled.

-It has to be Lee Sion. Out of us, Sion is the one who can grab people’s eyes the most.

Raon remembered what Ryujin, the leader and the team’s representative, had told her when Ryujin explained this stage plan.

'Is it because they’re still young? How can they give up that easily?'

Sacrificing yourself to make someone else shine.

It sounded nice, but if you were the one being sacrificed, the human heart couldn’t help but feel slighted, even if you tried not to show it.

And that was even more true if it was idols in the same group who, subtly, were conscious of each other.

But the Iam members proposed putting Lee Sion forward as the main as if none of that mattered as long as it made a better stage—starting with dyeing her blond, even suggesting the odd-eye concept.

And then,

"Haa..."

Lee Sion, # Nоvеlight # who, with the members’ help, made it to the very end of the song, stood in the center of the stage with her body turned slightly.

Even so, her head was angled toward the camera in front.

To Raon’s eyes, it looked like heat haze was rising off Lee Sion’s body.

***

"Hoo..."

I carefully let out a breath so it wouldn’t get picked up by the mic.

"You did well."

"This is me."

"I really want to punch you, but since you did well today, I’ll let it slide."

While we held the ending pose for a moment, the members swarmed back in toward me and patted my back.

Ryujin added words she didn’t need to, but her expression as she told me good job looked completely satisfied.

'It wasn’t easy.'

I’d never thought facial acting was easy, but at least smiling brightly or making lively expressions, I had some sense of how to do it.

But on this stage, I needed an expression that could capture the other person.

In other words, a tempting expression, so it was extremely tricky.

-There’s nothing about tempting in Three Kingdoms, though?

-You crazy—have you seriously only watched Three Kingdoms your whole life?

-How did you know!

Even my Three Kingdoms analogy method—something that had carried me through countless hardships—couldn’t come up with something properly fitting this time, so I was stuck.

But it wasn’t like I could give up, so I had no choice but to practice over and over in the mirror.

'It was interesting.'

Practicing how much and at what angle I had to move my facial muscles to look a certain way to people was more fun than I expected.

I watched drama scenes on YouTube and tried copying the actors, and I kept studying what expressions the original artists, VYNNIA, used as I watched their stage.

And then,

"Waaaahhh!!!"

"This is crazy!!!"

"Lee Sion, take it all!!!"

Hearing the cheers and applause pouring toward us after we finished the stage—something you couldn’t even compare to before—

It felt like that effort hadn’t been for nothing.