Little Pink Starfish

One common prejudice people have is that classical musicians look down on popular music.

Of course, there are people like that. They consider themselves connoisseurs of sophisticated music culture and treat pop music like cheap fast food.

But there are even more who simply enjoy popular music purely.

There was even a classical musician who, when asked “Who’s your prima donna?” answered, “Madonna.”
It was a tongue-in-cheek joke, but still, someone who thought pop music was inferior couldn’t have answered like that.

Likewise, many classical musicians in Korea also enjoyed popular music.

Especially among classical majors attending music school, many liked K-pop idols.

Because before being classical majors, they were young people who were excited about stars.

That didn’t mean they praised the musical perfection of the idols they supported.
Honestly, there were often areas that left much to be desired.

But that didn’t matter.
They weren’t cheering for perfected musicians, but for people who were working desperately hard.

And then… Sedalbaekil appeared.

At first, no one paid attention to this ambiguously named group.

But as Coming Up Next slowly gained popularity, and as the songs released there began charting, things changed.

“What’s with the main theme rhythm?”

“I’ve never seen counterpoint like this in pop music.”

“Who’s the guitarist?”

“This is in sonata form, isn’t it?”

Music that even classical majors found surprising kept coming out.

Of course, Sedalbaekil’s music wasn’t musically difficult or esoteric.

There were plenty of typical loops, and the melodies clearly aimed for easy listening.

Even so, the subtle techniques embedded in the songs were impressive.

But the most astonishing thing was that the public loved it.

Studying theory doesn’t necessarily mean you can write good pop music.

There are plenty of star composers with no formal education, purely relying on their natural talent.

In that sense, Sedalbaekil’s music was fascinating.

It exuded sophistication without showing off, while captivating the masses.

So the music students didn’t believe that Han Sion had taught himself music.

This wasn’t something you could learn on your own.

He must have studied formally but chose not to reveal it for some reason.

And in fact, they were right.

Han Sion had once tried classical music.

Herbert von Karajan sold over 200 million records, and Luciano Pavarotti, the prince of high C, sold over 100 million as a tenor.

But that world was truly for geniuses.

Even a regressor couldn’t dominate it.

And in the classical world, where teacher-student relationships are crucial, it was nearly impossible for a twenty-year-old aspirant to enter the mainstream.

After only three regressions of trying, Han Sion gave up.
But during that time, he had achieved a great deal musically.

Of course, in the current timeline, this hadn’t happened, nor was it very important.

In any case, what mattered was that the music was good.

By now, Han Sion was being called “the idol of music students” among classical majors.

Many began their first experience as fans thanks to Han Sion, and even those who had other favorites always had Han Sion as their second favorite.

It was the same for male musicians too.

Listening to Sedalbaekil’s songs felt like learning how to apply classical techniques in a way the public would enjoy.

There was no reason not to like it.

Park Sang-woo, a violin major at a famous music school, felt the same.

He definitely liked Han Sion’s music.

His feelings toward the group Sedalbaekil were close to fondness.

But he had never once considered joining a boy group’s fan club in his life…

Yet somehow, he ended up joining.

That “somehow” was to naturally have conversations with his crush, a fellow student.

“Umm.”

So when Park Sang-woo saw the package arrive at his dorm, his expression was complicated.

It looked like the fan club kit had arrived.
He needed to open and hide it quickly before his roommate saw him acting like a crazy person.

After that, he would text his crush, pretending to be excited.

“What am I even doing…”

Muttering to himself, Park Sang-woo grabbed a box cutter and stabbed it into the large package.

Hardcore fans would faint seeing this.

He had no idea what might be inside, yet he was recklessly slicing the box!

Without much thought, Park Sang-woo dismantled and tore open the box.

And inside…

“Huh?”

There was a deep blue box, with an extremely elaborate design.

On the outside, it said TIME LOCK.
It looked like a time capsule — the kind you bury and open years later.

‘Why a time capsule?’

Park Sang-woo, unfamiliar with Sedalbaekil’s lore, idly stroked the box.

The material looked sturdy and luxurious.

It could even work as storage for socks and underwear?

But on closer inspection, the box opened by turning a gear on the right side.

It even had a spring mechanism; turning it made it open automatically.

“Hmm…”

Looking at it, it felt too nice to just store socks.

It seemed better suited for meaningful items like a diary or photographs.

If he ever dated his crush, it’d be nice to store exchanged letters inside.

Thinking such thoughts, Park Sang-woo started inspecting the contents of the automatically opened box.

Though he had no prior knowledge of what a fan club kit included, he could tell it was a lot.

His crush had been upset about negative online reactions saying Sedalbaekil’s merchandise was disappointing.

‘Could this still be considered lacking?’

Maybe.
He had no idea how other groups’ fan club kits were usually composed.

Anyway, since there was so much stuff, he started with the smaller, easier items.

A high-end keyring, cardholder, and stickers, all in deep blue.

Same color as the box — maybe one of the members really liked deep blue.

After glancing over the stickers, he unwrapped the thick photobook.

The hard-cover photobook design was quite luxurious.

If he dated his crush, it would be nice to store their photos here.

The photos of Sedalbaekil inside didn’t leave much impression.

Except that Lee Eon was insanely handsome.

But personally, Park Sang-woo preferred Goo Taehwan or Han Sion over Lee Eon’s overwhelming handsomeness.

Goo Taehwan looked like the cool ace from a sports manga, and Han Sion like the leader of a school band.

‘What would it feel like to look like that?’

Next, Park Sang-woo opened a small brown leather case about the size of his palm.

They were photo cards.

He had heard enough from his nerdy friends to know about photo cards.

You get random ones when buying albums or merch, and fans buy or trade them to collect their favorite members.

He’d even heard that for famous idol groups, there were huge price differences between popular and unpopular members’ photo cards.

Now that he thought about it, when joining Sedalbaekil’s fan club, there was an option to choose which member’s photo cards you wanted.

At first, he tried to pick three Han Sion cards, but that wasn’t allowed, so he selected Han Sion, Goo Taehwan, and Lee Eon.

Han Sion and Goo Taehwan were his personal favorites, and Lee Eon was his crush’s favorite.

Wouldn’t she like it if he gave her the card?

Checking the cards in the leather case, there were six instead of three.

Looking closely, there were two per member: one close-up, one full-body.

But there were strange numbers on the top left corner.

Han Sion: 1997.
Goo Taehwan: 2007.
Lee Eon: ????.

It seemed like a concept year.

Han Sion wore clothes that looked like they were from 1997, and Goo Taehwan wore skinny jeans popular back then.

Even their makeup styles subtly matched the era — a detail Park Sang-woo wouldn’t have thought of.

But Lee Eon was different.

He wore a massively oversized basketball jersey, probably XXL, with nothing underneath.

“Ugh.”

His male instincts reacted in disgust, but thinking of his crush who would love it, he looked closer and saw he had quite a good physique.

If this wasn’t photoshopped, he worked out more than his appearance suggested.

Park Sang-woo continued checking the other items.

There were Sedalbaekil figurines, a deep-blue tumbler, and a mini humidifier.

‘Is it okay to give away this much?’

Even if mass production lowered costs, this felt worth way more than 40,000 won.

He double-checked, but yes — only 40,000 won was charged.

Tilting his head briefly, Park Sang-woo just accepted it.

They wouldn’t run this at a loss.
There must be ways to recoup.

But still, it felt good.

He tried to think why, and realized it was surprisingly fun to unbox everything.

Except for the photobook, everything else was wrapped in opaque packaging, so every opening was unexpected.

And the quality was genuinely usable in daily life.

“Ugh.”

He noticed scratches on the kit box from his box cutter.

As he was inspecting it, something he hadn’t noticed before caught his eye.

At the entrance of the auto-opening box, there was still another deep blue envelope.

It looked just like a wedding invitation.

Inside were a membership card and a laminated handwritten letter.

On the back of the letter was a QR code.

The letter itself didn’t interest him, but scanning the QR code led to a signup screen for what seemed like the official fan club website.

“Wow.”

The site looked fancy too.

Clearly a lot of money went into it.

He was debating whether to register when his phone vibrated.

“…!”

It was a text from his crush.

Leaping to his feet reverently, Park Sang-woo checked the message.

[Hey hey hey hey hey did your kit arrive?]
[Did you open it??]
[What photos are inside??]

Photos?

He sent a picture of the photobook, but she replied asking to see the photo cards.

‘Are they all different?’

Without thinking much, Park Sang-woo snapped all six photo cards and sent them.

Soon after, a call came in.

His heart dropped, and after taking a deep breath, he answered.

And that’s when Park Sang-woo realized just how lucky he was.

It turned out the photo card years were randomized with differing probabilities.

90% chance for 2017.
9% chance for 2007.
1% chance for 1997.
And 0.1% chance for a special cut.

In other words, Park Sang-woo had drawn one card each at 9%, 1%, and 0.1% odds.

Lee Eon’s card, marked with ???, was the special cut.

Out of curiosity, he calculated the combined odds — an astounding 0.00009%.

Even rarer than pulling the rarest item in his online games.

Park Sang-woo agreed to give all six photo cards to his crush in exchange for chicken and beer.

-Thank you thank you thank you! I’ll buy you chicken and beer ten times! No — every time you ask! And I swear I’ll never sell them! I promise!

Her voice sounded close to crying.

No, she was crying.

After hanging up, Park Sang-woo grew curious and searched online.

Since she promised not to sell, there must be demand — what were they worth?

The moment he searched “Sedalbaekil fan club kit,” an overwhelming number of results appeared.

It was even trending at number one in real-time searches — the entire world was talking about it.

‘What the…?’

He was confused.

The last time he saw anything online about Sedalbaekil, they were supposedly poor idols who couldn’t even get into mid-tier companies.