Chapter 185: An Egg Against a Rock?
The next day, at DM Entertainment, in Lee Ji-eun's practice room.
Jiang Shu arrived at Lee Ji-eun's practice room early. As her comeback approached, Lee Ji-eun's schedule gradually became lighter. Aside from necessary activities to maintain her popularity, most of her time was dedicated to preparing for her comeback.
Therefore, when Jiang Shu arrived at the practice room, Lee Ji-eun had already begun her practice for the day.
Upon seeing Jiang Shu, Lee Ji-eun and the others in the practice room immediately stopped and bowed to him.
"Chairman, why are you here?" Lee Ji-eun asked, looking at Jiang Shu in surprise.
Lee Ji-eun's condition looked much better than yesterday; at least her spirit was significantly improved.
"You're under a lot of pressure, so I'm here to accompany you during practice. The company will be your strongest backing," Jiang Shu said with a smile.
This tactic was effective. Even though Lee Ji-eun knew it was a way to win people's hearts, she still felt a warmth inside.
There was no other way; he had indeed come, and it was the Chairman himself.
"Yes!" Lee Ji-eun nodded heavily. The pressure hadn't decreased, but her motivation had certainly increased significantly.
"You may continue."
After speaking, Jiang Shu found a place to sit down, stopped the assistant who was about to "serve" him, and sent a message to Qu Fan.
Approximately a few minutes later, the Marketing Director arrived.
"Boss." Qu Fan glanced at Lee Ji-eun, who was practicing singing, and greeted Jiang Shu.
"How's the online buzz about IU clashing with Kim Hyun-a now?"
"Overall, it's still mostly ridicule, but the buzz has decreased; it's not as high as last month," Qu Fan immediately replied.
When Jiang Shu called him to Lee Ji-eun's practice room, Qu Fan realized something was amiss, so before coming, he specifically checked Lee Ji-eun's relevant data and marketing progress.
"Her comeback is soon. Create some buzz for her. Let Kim Hyun-a's fans continue to mock Ji-eun, and let more and more people know about this. Can you do that?" Jiang Shu instructed.
A big question mark appeared on Qu Fan's forehead.
"Chairman, if we continue to invest, even if IU and Kim Hyun-a's results are close, it will be difficult to recoup the cost."
The strategy of 'touching porcelain' to gain buzz is common, but it's not used like this.
"What if Ji-eun wins?" Jiang Shu said with a smile.
"Win..." Qu Fan thought about the buzz he had generated during this period. If Lee Ji-eun really won, her status would truly skyrocket.
If Lee Ji-eun unexpectedly beat Kim Hyun-a, it would at most increase her popularity, and her status would rise, but only to a limited extent.
But in a situation like this, where it has been meticulously set up for a long time, and everyone believes Kim Hyun-a will surely win, if Lee Ji-eun truly achieves an underdog victory...
The image was too beautiful.
"Can she win?" Qu Fan hesitated.
"Don't worry, it's a guaranteed win," Jiang Shu said confidently.
A guaranteed win?
Qu Fan could only nod helplessly.
"I'll go arrange it now."
"Mm, go ahead," Jiang Shu said with a chuckle.
Qu Fan could only leave Lee Ji-eun's practice room with a head full of confusion and unanswered questions. He needed to go back and figure out how to increase the buzz.
With the Chairman so confident, what could he do? He was just a Marketing Director; of course, he would do whatever his boss told him to do.
After Qu Fan left, Jiang Shu turned to look at Lee Ji-eun.
Looking at Lee Ji-eun practicing diligently, the smile on Jiang Shu's face was irrepressible.
An egg against a rock?
Heh heh!
...
As the comeback dates for Kim Hyun-a and IU approached, a piece of news appeared on the hot search lists of major websites.
According to an insider at DM Entertainment, for IU's and Kim Hyun-a's clashing comebacks, DM Entertainment Chairman Jiang Shu personally accompanied Lee Ji-eun in practicing the title track "BBIBBI" for her comeback album. This anonymous insider also stated that their Chairman was determined to win this comeback and believed that Lee Ji-eun had a chance to win this clash.
As soon as this news broke, it quickly attracted widespread attention both within and outside the industry. People had almost forgotten about this matter, but now it was brought up again, so what were they waiting for?
Mockery!
Because Jiang Shu had previously sent talent to the SKT club, he had a certain reputation in the esports circle. Additionally, the overlap between the Korean esports and idol fandoms is extremely high, and it happened to be during the League of Legends World Championship, so many Kim Hyun-a fans created an image.
They Photoshopped IU challenging Kim Hyun-a into G2 challenging SKT.
As the notorious European 'big spenders', even though TL kicked out last year's world champions IG at this year's MSI, LCK viewers still didn't think much of the European and American regions.
In fact, Kim Hyun-a's fans already highly recognized IU; not Photoshopping her as a wildcard team was an acknowledgment of her status.
But it was still essentially mockery, after all...
Could G2 beat the dynasty SKT?
Impossible!
Absolutely impossible!
So, Kim Hyun-a would lose to IU?
How could that be!
This time, the buzz was, of course, created by DM Entertainment, and the so-called insider who leaked the news was also arranged by Qu Fan, all for the final warm-up of IU clashing with Kim Hyun-a.
He didn't favor IU, but the Chairman demanded it, so he had no choice but to do it.
Under the watchful eyes of many, September 1st arrived as scheduled.
In fact, for an artist of Kim Hyun-a's stature, she generally doesn't perform on music shows. Even without performing, music shows would still give her a first-place trophy. But this time was different; Kim Hyun-a had publicly stated that she would begin performing on music shows on September 8th, as soon as IU announced her comeback date.
Why September 8th?
Because under the current rules, a song can only win first place one week after its release.
This meant she would directly compete with IU on stage.
However, compared to Kim Hyun-a, who would start performing a week later, IU was much more straightforward. After releasing her song on September 1st, she immediately began performing on music shows.
Compared to Kim Hyun-a, who debuted at number ten on Melon, "BBIBBI" only entered the top fifty after its release. Although its growth rate was very fast, it was far from Kim Hyun-a's tenth-place debut.
And during the following week of music show performances, Lee Ji-eun also received countless taunts. In the backstage area, others looked at her with subtle disdain.
Time passed little by little until the 8th, which was the day of Kim Hyun-a's first music show performance.
At this time, in terms of digital chart performance, Kim Hyun-a's new song was ranked ninth on the daily chart, while IU had risen to tenth place.
In terms of album sales, the gap between them was not significant; Lee Ji-eun was only tens of thousands of copies behind Kim Hyun-a.
From the data of this week, both parties could be considered to be at the same level, but many people still believed that these two were not opponents of the same caliber. However, more people were watching this seemingly non-crushing confrontation.
September 8th arrived as scheduled. This episode of Inkigayo attracted countless onlookers. Would IU be an egg against a rock, shattered by Hyuna, or would IU achieve an upset victory, overcoming two major female solo artists?