A/N: Here's the new Chapter! Which also means the next FIVE chapters are up on my Patreon for early access!

Back to Jinu and the girls! I'm sure Bobby and Celine will be fine in the interim.

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"Oh! Bobby just sent me a message for Jinu!"

It's been a rather lazy morning in the HUNTR/X Penthouse, admittedly. When Jinu had woken up before all of the girls, he'd discovered that they were all very, very clingy sleepers. Rumi had the strongest grip of the three, but that wasn't stopping Zoey or Mira from holding onto him quite tightly as well.

Fortunately for Jinu, he had access to magic. First, he'd created a solid yet hollow illusion of himself covering his actual body. Then, he'd teleported away from the trio, leaving them clinging to the illusion instead of him. After that, it was a simple matter of slowly collapsing the illusion inward, until they were hugging each other (mostly Rumi because she was in the center) rather than him.

To be fair, it wasn't like he'd gone anywhere. When Rumi woke up a couple hours later, she'd initially been a little frantic at his absence… which Jinu had gotten a full view of as he'd been sitting across the room in a chair, running his hands through Derpy's blue striped fur.

Once she realized where he was, she'd been annoyed with him at first, especially because her panicking had woken up Mira and Zoey who had both teased her for it each in their own way. But by the time they had all eaten breakfast, she'd calmed down a fair amount.

After breakfast, they'd sort of just been lazing on the couch with Rumi, Mira, and Zoey all glued to their phones still, keeping an eye on everyone's reactions to the announcements surrounding him. Jinu, who didn't have one of those devices, simply sat next to Rumi and enjoyed the way she was leaning against his shoulder the entire time.

Or he had been… until now.

Zoey and Mira both perk up from their own screentime at Rumi's words.

"Yeah? What's it say?"

Rumi makes sure to show him her phone, but frankly Jinu mostly just pretends to read it since she's telling the girls what it says anyways.

"Basically, Bobby is asking for us to take Jinu down to the studio today to re-record all of his covers of our music from the park so they can upload them officially on the socials, both to hype up his eventual debut and also to hype up our performance at the Idol Awards. Oh, and he says we need to look into getting Jinu a phone sooner rather than later."

Jinu frowns.

"What for?"

All three hunters give him deadpan looks, with Rumi gently smacking his chest with the back of her hand.

"Because, even if you're a super old man from the Joseon Era, you still need to get with the times and learn to use a smartphone if you're going to be an Idol in the Twenty-First Century."

Both Mira and Zoey are nodding fervently at this. Jinu just rolls his eyes.

"That's not what I was asking. Why do we need to re-record the covers? Aren't they already 'online'? Bobby showed me a video when he came for me in the park, it's how he found me in the first place."

Rumi blinks and actually looks a little apologetic.

"Oh, sorry… that's actually a fair question given you don't know how any of this works. So basically, the fan who uploaded all of those recordings of you playing our music did it under their own accounts without your permission. And now that you're signed to Sunlight Entertainment, it's like they did it without SE's permission as well."

Jinu furrows his brow, slowly nodding along. Truth be told, he's barely following.

"Basically, we technically have the legal standing to get those videos removed… but even if we're in the right where the law is concerned, there's still something called the 'court of public opinion' to worry about."

Zoey chimes in here.

"The 'court of public opinion' is essentially everyone who wants to weigh in on any given thing at any time. If the majority opinion is positive, then yay, we're winning! But if the majority opinion is negative, then we're basically boned."

Grunting, Mira nods.

"Right. That's why Bobby and Celine were in such a rush to get the leak fixed yesterday, to swing things back in our direction."

Hm… okay, Jinu could follow all of that, he thinks. Fortunately, Rumi takes back over. He loves listening to Rumi explain things.

"Essentially, we don't want to upset our fans, so we're leaving the fan-recorded versions of your covers up online for everyone to enjoy. However, we also want to be able to reclaim those performances… and having you perform them in the studio where we can make them sound as amazing as possible will give us new versions that should hopefully be even more popular than the unauthorized fan versions."

Right. He understood popularity, at least in so far as it's importance to the girls and the Honmoon. Of course, with the Honmoon now iridescent, Jinu couldn't say how much such things mattered anymore… but he can at least tell that this is important to Rumi, Mira, and Zoey. So he nods and shrugs.

"Alright. Bipa or no bipa? I was playing my bipa back in the park, after all."

Rumi hums and brings her phone back in front of her, fingers tapping away as she sends a message back to Bobby. She gets a response a moment later and gives him an apologetic grin.

"… Would you mind doing both so we can decide which we like best?"

Jinu chuckles and shakes his head.

"Sounds like fun."

After all, it was a day spent with Rumi. And that would make it a day well spent indeed.

-x-X-x-

Jinu has to admit; he likes the HUNTR/X studio. Back in the original timeline, the Saja Boys hadn't bothered with anything like that. The only technological part had been the social media accounts. Everything else one needed to make some songs had been done with magic instead.

Now though, he had to admit he'd learned a lot about what he'd been missing out on. Technology, especially musical technology, had really advanced a lot beyond what little he'd uncovered while doing research for his plan.

Luckily, it was just audio they wanted. No video, no choreography, nothing like that. Just him sitting and playing his bipa while singing his versions of HUNTR/X songs into the microphone in front of him. He would play, then they would all listen to it back and Zoey would mess around with things because apparently she was something called a 'producer'.

Jinu had to admit, when he'd first heard there was an entire role centered around altering the performance after the musician was done, he'd been a little iffy about the idea. But then Zoey had shown him she could do magic too, because after fiddling with one of his earlier recordings for a while, she'd played it back to him and it sounded ten times better, easily.

In the end, the girls decided unanimously that they liked the versions of his covers with the bipa best. While they could technically put the music in themselves, Rumi said they felt like the bipa added a more organic element to things.

Jinu just shrugged and went along with it. For some, the work might be grueling. It's certainly a long day of playing music and singing his heart out. But for Jinu, it's honestly not that difficult at all. Nothing that compared to having to exist in the demon realm, after all. And he'd much rather be doing this than hearing Gwi-Ma's voice in his ear twenty-four-seven.

Of course, as the final performance winds down and Jinu finishes playing his version of Golden, he steps out of the booth to find Rumi pouting angrily at him and immediately feels something tightening in his chest. What'd he done now?

"What's wrong? Did I mess something up? Do I need to do it again?"

"Nah. Rumi is just sensitive."

"Mira!"

But the dancer just smirks and rolls her eyes. Rumi huffs and pouts harder, crossing her arms over her chest as she looks at him.

"It's just… ugh! Why do you have to make Golden sound so damn sad?! It's supposed to be a celebration!"

Jinu raises an eyebrow and he can tell even Mira and Zoey are a little caught off guard by just how heated Rumi is getting. Truth be told, he would have thought she would have understood at this point given everything else that had happened. Not to mention…

"I told you once before, didn't I? It's because Golden feels like an impossible dream to me. The very idea of the Golden Honmoon scared me because I didn't want to see what it might do to you."

Rumi puffs out her cheeks for a moment at that, trying to hold onto her anger but clearly struggling. Finally, she just waves a hand through the air.

"That… doesn't matter. Golden doesn't have to be about the Golden Honmoon anymore. It can mean something else now. Something better."

It can? Jinu furrows his brow in confusion, causing Rumi to roll her eyes.

"Right. Who am I kidding? Of course the most literal songwriter in history wouldn't understand nuance and how the same lyrics can mean different things in different contexts."

Hey! Now it's Jinu's turn to pout, feeling a little offended even if he's not quite sure what Rumi means. Mira and Zoey are clearly confused as well because they both ask questions.

"What do you mean by that, Rumi?"

"Oooh! Wait, can we finally hear the Saja Boys' songs?!"

Jinu freezes up as Rumi gets this sudden glint in her eye and a smirk on her face.

"You know what… that's a spectacular idea, Zoey. You two should definitely hear Soda Pop and Your Idol."

Frowning more seriously now, Jinu clears his throat.

"… I don't want to risk harming the Honmoon. Those songs did a lot of damage in the other timeline. Soda Pop weakened the Honmoon and Your Idol manifested Gwi-Ma in this world."

He feels like those are very real concerns, and at least Zoey and Mira seem to take them seriously. But Rumi is flippant about it, waving a hand dismissively again.

"That won't be a problem here. For one, you're tied into the Rainbow Honmoon so I'm pretty sure any songs you sing will help reinforce it at this point. For two, there's nobody around to hear your music except for us so you can't steal our fans even if you wanted to. And for three… you're not getting out of this, Jinu. It's time for Mira and Zoey to see exactly what we had to deal with when you put your plan into action!"

Sheesh, Jinu had thought Rumi forgave him for all that. Or at least, she'd put a lot of effort into making sure her girls didn't hate him, even as he'd done everything in his power to make sure they knew he was a monster.

… But if this was what Rumi wanted, well, it wasn't like Jinu had forgotten even one bit of either song. Soda Pop and Your Idol were branded across his thoughts. They were infused into his very being, really. The question is…

"Am I performing Soda Pop myself or just showing Mira and Zoey the memory of the street concert?"

Rumi tilts her head to the side consideringly before looking to Mira and Zoey to see what they want to do.

"Street Concert!"

"Perform it yourself!"

Mira and Zoey share a frown before explaining themselves.

"I want to see the choreo with Jinu and those other four guys he said he created."

"I want a live show, not just a recording where Jinu watches alongside us. Even if it IS the best VR we're ever going to see!"

Both of them tilt their heads to the side at that, clearly considering each other's viewpoints and finding them to be quite fair. Before either can speak up again however, Rumi steps in.

"Can we have both?"

Jinu raises an eyebrow, prompting Rumi to elaborate.

"Can you like… fit yourself into the memory? Perform it alongside the rest of the Saja Boys for us?"

That was… Jinu hums as he thinks it over. Not impossible. Just difficult. And a lot of work. But then… he was always happy to do a lot of work for Rumi.

"Sure, no sweat."

Smiling at the squee of delight from Zoey while all three girls set themselves up, Jinu moves into position and calls upon the Honmoon to bring about the illusion. In an instant, the three girls are sitting in the middle of a crowded plaza filled with people shopping and going about their days.

Jinu, meanwhile, steps back into a pink cloud created by the memory of Romance and slots himself into position amidst the other Saja Boys with remarkable ease. Sliding into his own memory self is maybe a little weird, but it also doesn't necessarily feel bad or anything.

Off in the distance, poking their heads around the corner, the memories of Rumi, Mira, and Zoey make themselves known to Jinu… but he focuses on the music, just as he did last time.

"Hey, hey

Hey, hey

Hey"

The looks on the faces of the real Mira and Zoey as Jinu and company come out of the pink cloud are priceless. Even Rumi blushes a little bit when he makes sure to focus his gaze entirely on her, even as he sings Soda Pop for the first time in weeks, at least for him.

But it all comes naturally, flowing out of him as he plays his part in the memory perfectly. Still, it's amusing to remember that Mira and Zoey from this timeline didn't have the street encounter the other Mira and Zoey had with the Saja Boys. This is their first time seeing his constructs in their human forms, from Mystery with his bangs, to Abby with his abs, to Romance with his hearts. And of course… Baby.

"Uh, make me wanna flip the top, 한 모금에 you hit the spot

Every little drip and drop, fizz and pop, ah, 소름 돋아, it's gettin' hot (whoo)

Yes, I'm sippin' when it's drippin' now, it's done? I need a second round

And pour a lot, and don't you stop 'til my soda pop fizzles out"

Zoey and Mira's jaws drop when Baby starts rapping, startled as can be by his deeper voice. Jinu was pretty proud of that little trick he'd pulled, an idea he'd grabbed from his spying on the K-Pop Industry in the years and years he'd had before he finally put his plan into action.

The memory gets more and more magical as Jinu and the Saja Boys turn everything to pastel and then summon the massive soda can stage from seemingly nothing. Even if they aren't really there, dancing with the boys again actually feels pretty good if he's being honest. Sort of freeing.

And the best part is, he's keeping an eye on the Rainbow Honmoon the entire time. Rumi is right, this much is fine. There's not a single ripple. The lyrics of Soda Pop don't appear to be directly harmful to the Honmoon as Jinu had feared. So in the end… this little performance isn't hurting anyone.

"Ooh, ooh

Ooh, ooh

You're my soda pop, gotta drink every drop"

Although, as he gets to the end and brings the illusion to a close Jinu does raise an eyebrow at the looks on the hunters faces. Their shoulders were bopping to the music with everyone else, though the movements slow down as they all find themselves back in the real world.

Tilting his head to the side, he gestures to them.

"Well? Thoughts?"

-x-X-x-

A/N: Next time, definitely a Mira/Zoey split POV angle I'm thinking~

Feedback is GREATLY appreciated, every comment helps me shape a story like this one!

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