The Scandal-Proof Producer

The backstage area of the "Indie & Rising Stars" stage was a chaotic whirlwind of controlled panic. The air, thick with the smell of hairspray, hot electronics, and nervous sweat, vibrated with the distant, thunderous roar of seventy thousand people. It was thirty minutes to showtime. Thirty minutes until Aura Management's audition for the world.

Han Yoo-jin stood in the center of the storm, a deceptively calm anchor in a sea of anxiety. The "Art vs. Algorithm" narrative he had so brilliantly, and recklessly, crafted had turned their secondary stage into the most hyped, most scrutinized event of the entire festival. He could feel the weight of expectation like a physical pressure. The wings were packed with international media crews and stone-faced industry scouts from every major global label, all of them drawn by the promise of a showdown.

Oh Min-ji stood beside him, her eyes glued to a tablet, her face illuminated by its glow. She had shed her sullen apathy completely, transformed into a sharp, focused battlefield commander. "Social media sentiment is shifting," she reported, her voice low and rapid-fire. "The initial narrative was curiosity. It's now polarizing. Forty-five percent are hopeful, rooting for the 'human artists.' Fifty-five percent are skeptical or hostile. They think you're arrogant. The hashtag #AurasFolly is starting to trend in the UK and US."

Every member of his small artistic army was fighting their own private battle against the crushing pressure.

Ahn Da-eun stood before a tall, dusty mirror, her reflection staring back at her. She was dressed in ripped jeans and a vintage rock t-shirt, looking every inch the star, but Yoo-jin could see the tension in her shoulders. Under the weight of this global spotlight, the old ghosts of her performance anxiety were stirring, whispering their familiar, poisonous lies.

Across the room, Lee Seo-yeon was nervously running through vocal warmups, her hands twisting the fabric of her simple white dress. Her clear, powerful voice was her gift, but it was also her burden. The thought of a single mistake, a single cracked note broadcast to millions, was a terrifying prospect. She was a delicate instrument, and the pressure threatened to throw her out of tune.

Go Min-young, the quiet heart of their operation, stood clutching a binder of lyric sheets to her chest as if it were a shield. She didn't have to perform, but her words did. The memory of OmniCorp's cruel, personal attack—her own worst fears delivered in her mother's voice—was a fresh, raw wound. She was fighting a wave of vicarious stage fright, terrified that her dark, honest lyrics would be misunderstood or, worse, rejected on this massive stage.

Even the unshakable Kang Ji-won was showing signs of the strain. He paced back and forth near his keyboard setup, furiously reviewing a complex piece of sheet music. He wasn't worried about his own ability, but about the audience's. The improvisational duet with the master Kim Shin was a piece of challenging, uncompromising art. "Is it too much?" he had muttered to Yoo-jin earlier. "Will they just think it's noise?"

Yoo-jin knew this was his final, most important production. He couldn't just manage the stage; he had to manage their souls. He moved between them, not with a grand, rousing speech, but with a series of quiet, precise, personal moments, his evolved ability a fine-tuned instrument of support.

He approached Da-eun first, standing beside her as she stared at her reflection. He didn't touch her, but he initiated a low-level, targeted sync, feeling the familiar, cold tendrils of her anxiety.

"Remember the rooftop?" he said quietly, his voice meant only for her. She flinched, her eyes meeting his in the mirror. "Remember the girl who was too afraid to even look people in the eye? You are not that person anymore. You've been through the fire. Tonight, you are the fire. Go out there and burn their stage down." He wasn't just giving her a pep talk; he was reminding her of her own strength, of the journey that had forged her into the artist she was now. He felt the anxiety in her recede, replaced by a flicker of her familiar, defiant flame.

Next, he walked over to Seo-yeon, who had stopped her warmups and was now just staring at the floor. He synced with her fear of imperfection, a feeling as clear and sharp as a crystal glass about to shatter.

"Seo-yeon," he said gently. She looked up, her eyes wide with fear. "Listen to me. If your voice cracks tonight, it just means you're human. If a note is slightly flat, it means you were feeling something real. That's why people love you. That's what they connect with. Don't go out there and try to be perfect. Perfect is boring. Perfect is for machines. Just be real." He had given her permission to be flawed, transforming her greatest fear into her greatest strength.

He found Min-young by the side of the stage, her knuckles white as she gripped her binder. He didn't need to sync to know what she was feeling. The echo of her trauma was still palpable. He stood next to her, looking out at the vast, dark sea of the crowd.

"You know," he said casually, "every word you wrote is our armor tonight. When Da-eun sings about defiance, when Seo-yeon sings about healing… that's your armor protecting them. When they sing that new verse… that's you, fighting back. Of all the weapons we have, yours is the strongest. We are all wearing it tonight." He had validated her role, reframing her not as a source of sadness, but as the creator of their defense. She looked at him, her eyes full of tears, but she nodded, a new resolve hardening her expression.

Finally, he approached Kang Ji-won. He synced with the composer's artistic pride, a feeling as complex and structured as his music. "Ji-won," he said. "Forget about the audience. Forget about the critics, the sponsors, everyone. Tonight, there are only two people in that stadium who will truly understand what you and Kim Shin are about to do. You, and him." He clapped a hand on Ji-won's shoulder. "Don't play for them. Play for him. Play for yourself. If the rest of the audience is smart enough to keep up, then that is their privilege." He had appealed not to his desire for success, but to his unimpeachable artistic integrity.

Just as he finished his rounds, Oh Min-ji rushed to his side, her face grim. "I'm tracking OmniCorp's digital activity," she whispered, showing him her tablet. It displayed a dizzying map of social media activity. "They're not attacking our systems directly anymore. They've pivoted. They've launched a massive, coordinated sentiment analysis bot-farm. Thousands of them. They're poised to flood social media with negative commentary the second our performance starts. They're trying to manipulate the online narrative in real time, to frame our performance as a failure before it even ends."

The stakes had been raised again. This wasn't just a performance. It was a live, active information war.

"Aura Management, five minutes!" the stage manager's voice boomed over the intercom.

This was it. The final hour had become the final minutes. Yoo-jin gathered his team, his artists, his producers, his strategists—his small, strange family. They huddled together in a tight circle amidst the backstage chaos, a small island of unity against the world.

"Listen to me," Yoo-jin said, his voice low and intense, his gaze sweeping over each of them. "Forget the bots, forget the critics, forget everyone but us. What we've built here, in this room, is real. The noise out there doesn't matter." He looked at each of his artists. "Trust the music. Trust the words. Trust each other."

He put his hand in the center of the circle. "No matter what happens out there," he said, "we do it together."

One by one, their hands joined his. Da-eun's, then Seo-yeon's, then Kevin's. Min-young placed her hand on top, followed by Ji-won's. Finally, after a moment's hesitation, Oh Min-ji added hers. They stood there for a beat, a closed circuit of shared purpose. Then they broke, turning as one to face the stage, the deafening roar of the crowd a physical force washing over them, ready to step into the light and face their destiny.