The Scandal-Proof Producer

Chapter 137: Forging the Trojan Horse



The creative sanctuary of the Aura Management studio was repurposed once again, this time into a forgery. The mission was clear: to create an audio file so perfect, so authentic, that the most advanced data analysis system in the world would welcome it with open arms. The team gathered in the control room, the mood a strange fusion of artistic intensity and tactical precision.

"The file cannot be just any recording," Oh Min-ji began, addressing Yoo-jin and Kang Ji-won with the authority of a military engineer briefing a special ops team. She had a new diagram on her tablet, this one showing a flowchart of OmniCorp's likely data intake protocols. "Their systems will be looking for authenticity markers. A simple MP3 won't work. It needs to be a studio-quality, 24-bit, 96-kilohertz WAV file. It needs to be a raw, multi-track vocal take, which means we provide them with separate files for each layered harmony. No effects, no reverb, no compression. It has to look and sound exactly like a set of master files that a producer would legitimately use, or an artist would steal from a session."

Kang Ji-won leaned forward, intrigued. This wasn't just music anymore; it was a technical challenge of the highest order. "So the bait has to be perfect," he mused.

"More than perfect," Min-ji corrected. "It needs to be tempting. Their software will be designed to analyze vocal dynamics, frequency ranges, and harmonic complexity. The more complex and rich the data, the more their system will want to dig into it. The file shouldn't just be authentic; it should be irresistible to an algorithm."

All eyes turned to the artist standing in the soundproof booth on the other side of the glass. The task fell to Ahn Da-eun. Her mission was no longer just to sing a song. It was to create the most alluring, data-rich piece of bait imaginable. She had to give a performance that would not only move a human heart but would also captivate a machine.

Yoo-jin leaned into the talkback microphone, his voice calm and focused, a director setting the stage for his lead actor. "Da-eun, you heard her. I need everything you have. Forget what you think your 'part' in the duet is. For this take, you are the entire song. I need the whisper-soft lead-in to the first verse, so quiet their system has to strain to analyze the harmonics in your breath. In the chorus, I need that full-throated, ground-shaking roar, pushing the decibels, giving them a massive dynamic range to process. I need the controlled anger from our last session, the raw power, the underlying vulnerability. You're not just singing for us. You are giving them a complete, unabridged encyclopedia of your voice. You are performing for their machine."

Da-eun stood before the microphone, her hands clenched at her sides. She nodded, her expression grimly determined. This was for Chae-rin. This was for them. This was war.

Chae-rin, who had insisted on being present, sat in the control room. She watched Da-eun prepare, seeing the protective fury simmering in her friend's eyes. During a brief pause as Ji-won calibrated the microphone levels, Chae-rin leaned forward and pressed the talkback button, her voice quiet but clear.

"Unni," she said, the familiar, respectful term for an older sister slipping out naturally for the first time. It hung in the air, a testament to their new bond. Da-eun's eyes flickered towards the control room window.

"When you sing the chorus," Chae-rin continued, her voice gaining strength, "don't just think about being powerful. Think of what that man tried to do to us. Think of his smug, smiling face. Sing it at him."

The role reversal was stunning. The fragile ghost was now coaching the roaring fortress, giving her a target for her rage. It was the final piece of motivation Da-eun needed. A fierce, predatory grin spread across her face.

"Copy that," she said into the mic.

What followed was not a performance; it was a detonation.

Fueled by a righteous, protective fury, Da-eun unleashed something primal. She didn't just sing the notes; she inhabited them, weaponized them. Her voice, a living entity, soared from a quiet, menacing growl in the verses that was filled with contempt, to a cataclysmic, world-shattering roar in the chorus that was pure, condensed rage. It was a hurricane of sound, but a controlled one. Every note was perfectly pitched, every dynamic shift intentional. It was technically brilliant and emotionally devastating.

Yoo-jin watched, his Producer's Eye fully active. He didn't just hear the music; he saw it. And the visual representation of Da-eun's voice was unlike anything he had ever witnessed. It wasn't a simple waveform. It was a massive, intricate tapestry of golden light, pulsing with raw, untamed power. It was a solar flare, a supernova of data, so complex and potent that it seemed to overwhelm his own ability. It was, as Min-ji had requested, irresistible.

When the final note faded into a growling sustain, the entire control room was silent, the force of the performance having left them breathless. Even Kang Ji-won, a man who viewed music with a surgeon's detachment, was staring at the soundboard, his jaw slack with awe. He looked as if he had just witnessed the birth of a new star.

He slowly reached for his mouse, his movements almost reverent, and clicked to export the raw, unmixed takes. A series of pristine WAV files appeared in a folder on his desktop. The perfect bait had been forged.

He copied the files onto a sleek, black USB drive and walked over to Oh Min-ji, handing it to her as if it were a sacred relic. "It's all there," he said, his voice hushed. "Every layer."

Min-ji took the drive and plugged it into her laptop. The rest of the team gathered around her, watching as she opened a command-line interface—a stark black screen with a blinking green cursor. Her fingers moved with an unnatural speed, typing out lines of code that were utterly incomprehensible to anyone else in the room.

"The worm is a simple mapping-and-reporting script," she explained, her eyes never leaving the screen. "It's written in a modified version of Python, compiled to be unrecognizable by standard anti-malware programs. I'm embedding it now into the non-audio metadata chunks of each WAV file."

She was a digital surgeon, skillfully hiding her malicious code within the harmless information that detailed sample rates and bit depths. To any normal program, to any audio engineer, the files would look and behave exactly as they should. The code was invisible, a ghost in the shell of the music.

After a few more moments of intense typing, she hit the enter key one last time. A progress bar flashed on the screen and disappeared.

Min-ji ejected the USB drive safely and held it up between her thumb and forefinger. The small, black object seemed to hum with a dangerous potential.

"The Trojan Horse is ready," she announced, her voice flat, but her eyes held a triumphant gleam. "All it needs now is a gift-bearer."


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