Urd
The Shattered Mirror
The silence in the room was no longer the productive, creative hush of a late-night recording session. It was the heavy, suffocating silence of a funeral parlor.
Ji-Yong sat on the edge of the velvet sofa in his apartment, his knees pulled up to his chest. He looked smaller than he had ten years ago. The oversized designer sweater he wore—a piece from his own collection—seemed to be swallowing him whole. His collarbones poked out like jagged ridges, and his skin had a translucent, sickly pallor that no amount of expensive skincare could mask.
On the glass coffee table in front of him, his phone was a glowing harbinger of doom. The headlines were scrolling by so fast he couldn't keep up, but the keywords burned into his retinas: *Burning Sun. Embezzlement. Sexual Bribery. KakaoTalk.*
And the name that tied it all together. Seungri.
"He isn't picking up," Youngbae said, his voice cracking. He was pacing the length of the living room, his hands buried in his hair. "I’ve called him twenty times. I called his manager. I called his mother. No one is saying anything."
Ji-Yong didn't look up. He was staring at a framed photo on the wall—a candid shot of the five of them from the 'MADE' tour. They were laughing, drenched in sweat, arms slung over each other’s shoulders. They looked invincible. They looked like brothers.
"He wouldn't," Daesung whispered from the corner. He looked physically ill, his face ashen. "Ji-Yong, tell me he wouldn't do this. The things they’re saying in these chats… it’s not him. It can’t be him."
Ji-Yong finally shifted, his joints popping with the slight movement. He felt like a marionette with frayed strings. He reached out with a trembling hand and picked up the phone, clicking on one of the leaked transcripts. He read the words—the casual misogyny, the cold-blooded business transactions involving human beings, the utter lack of empathy.
He felt a surge of bile rise in his throat. He pushed the phone away as if it had burned him.
"We knew he was ambitious," Ji-Yong said, his voice a hollow ghost of the authoritative tone he used as a leader. "We knew he was running around with the wrong crowd. I told him. I told him a hundred times to stop playing at being a businessman and focus on the music."
"You told him?" Youngbae stopped pacing, turning to look at Ji-Yong with wide, watery eyes. "We all told him. But did we actually *look*? Or were we too busy with our own shit? You were in the studio twenty hours a day, I was focused on my solo, T.O.P was… T.O.P was struggling."
At the mention of their eldest member, a fresh wave of grief washed over the room. Seunghyun—T.O.P—wasn't there. He was still reeling from his own scandal, his own brush with the abyss of the Korean justice system and the court of public opinion. The group was already limping, and now, this felt like a terminal blow.
The door to the apartment buzzed. A moment later, the heavy electronic lock clicked open. A man stepped in, but it wasn't a friend. It was a representative from YG Entertainment, followed by two stern-faced men in suits.
"Ji-Yong," the representative said, his voice devoid of the usual fawning warmth he used for the agency’s 'Golden Goose.' "We need to talk about the official statement. And the contract termination."
Ji-Yong looked at the man. This was the same man who had praised Ji-Yong’s 'work ethic' when he was fainting from malnutrition. The same agency that had profited off every ounce of his sweat and every nervous breakdown he’d had in a recording booth.
"Where is Seungri?" Ji-Yong asked.
"He is with legal counsel," the representative replied coldly. "The board has made a decision. For the sake of the brand, for the sake of *your* career and the others, he is being removed from the group. Effectively immediately. He is retiring from the industry."
"Retiring?" Daesung let out a harsh, hysterical laugh. "He’s being erased."
"He did this to himself," the representative snapped, turning to Daesung. "And he’s dragged all of you into the mud with him. The stock prices are plummeting. The public wants blood, and they don't care whose it is. Ji-Yong, you need to post something. Something about disappointment. Something about the 'integrity of the group'."
Ji-Yong stood up. He was so thin that his legs shook under his own weight, but he forced himself to stand tall. He walked over to the representative, stopping just inches from his face. Up close, the dark circles under Ji-Yong’s eyes looked like bruises.
"You don't get to tell me what to say," Ji-Yong whispered. "You’ve spent fifteen years telling me what to wear, how to sing, when to eat, and when to sleep. You turned a blind eye to everything as long as the checks cleared. You knew he was getting into deep water. You just didn't think he’d get caught."
"Watch your tone, Ji-Yong," the man warned. "You’re still under contract. We can still protect you, but only if you play ball."
"Protect me?" Ji-Yong laughed, a jagged, broken sound. "Look at me! I’m thirty years old and I weigh less than I did when I was sixteen. My best friend is a pariah, my other brother is hiding from the world because he’s terrified of his own shadow, and now the youngest… the youngest is a monster. Or maybe we made him one. Maybe this place makes monsters."
"Ji, sit down," Youngbae said softly, moving to his side. He could see the way Ji-Yong’s chest was heaving, the way his breath was coming in short, ragged gasps. Panicked.
Ji-Yong ignored him. He was staring at the representative with a terrifying, lucid intensity. "Get out."
"Excuse me?"
"Get out of my house," Ji-Yong said, his voice rising. "Go back to the building. Tell the Chairman that G-Dragon is dead. There’s no one left to sell. There’s no more 'BigBang' to market. You’ve bled us dry, and now the blood is tainted. Get. Out."
The representative looked like he wanted to argue, but the sheer, raw desperation in Ji-Yong’s eyes made him recoil. He signaled to the suits, and they retreated, the door clicking shut with a finality that felt like a guillotine.
The moment they were gone, Ji-Yong’s knees gave out. Youngbae caught him, lowering him gently to the floor. Ji-Yong buried his face in his hands and finally, the dam broke. He didn't sob; he wailed. It was a primal, agonizing sound—the sound of a man watching his entire life’s work, his family, and his identity dissolve into ash.
"It’s over," Ji-Yong choked out between gasps. "Everything we did. Every night we stayed up until dawn. Every time I pushed you guys until you hated me… it was all for nothing. We’re going to be remembered for this. Not the music. Not the stages. Just… this filth."
Youngbae held him tight, his own tears dripping into Ji-Yong’s hair. "We’re still here, Ji. We’re still here."
"But he isn't," Ji-Yong sobbed, clutching at Youngbae’s shirt. "How did I not see it? I’m the leader. I was supposed to look after him. I was so wrapped up in my own head, in my own 'genius,' that I let him walk right into hell."
Daesung sat down on the floor beside them, leaning his head against the wall. "He’s a grown man, Hyung. He made choices. You can't take the blame for the things he did in the dark."
"I was the sun!" Ji-Yong screamed, pulling back to look at them, his face wet and distorted. "The fans called us the kings. They called me the sun. A sun is supposed to give light. If I was so bright, how did I let things get this dark?"
The room fell silent again, save for the sound of Ji-Yong’s labored breathing. He looked at his hands—those famous, talented hands. They were bone-thin, the skin stretched tight over his knuckles. He had spent his life building a kingdom, only to realize the foundation was built on shifting sand and the walls were made of glass.
Hours passed. The sun began to rise over Seoul, the light bleeding through the floor-to-ceiling windows of the luxury apartment. It should have been a beautiful sight, but to Ji-Yong, it just felt like an interrogation lamp.
His phone buzzed again. A text message.
He reached for it with numb fingers. It was from an unknown number, but he knew the cadence of the typing immediately.
*I’m sorry, Hyung. I’m so sorry. Don't let them hate you because of me.*
Ji-Yong stared at the screen until the words blurred. He didn't reply. There was nothing left to say. The 'Maknae' he had teased and protected, the boy who used to sleep in the practice room because he was too afraid of the dark, was gone. In his place was a headline, a scandal, a criminal case.
"What do we do now?" Daesung asked, his voice small.
Ji-Yong stood up slowly, wiping his face with the back of his hand. He walked over to the mirror in the hallway. He saw the 'G-Dragon' the world knew—the tattoos, the dyed hair, the expensive clothes. And underneath, he saw Ji-Yong. A man who was starving for something that fame couldn't buy. A man who was tired of being a product.
"We stop," Ji-Yong said, his voice steadying, though it was cold as ice.
"Stop?" Youngbae asked.
"The comeback. The brand. The persona," Ji-Yong said, looking at his reflection. "I’m not going back to that building. I’m not going to be their 'Golden Boy' while they throw our brother to the wolves to save their stock prices. Even if he deserves it… I can't do it."
He reached up and grabbed the edge of the mirror, his fingers trembling.
"I spent my whole life trying to be perfect for them," he whispered. "I let them starve me, overwork me, and break me, all because I thought the music was worth it. I thought *we* were worth it."
He looked at Youngbae and Daesung.
"I’m going to the military," Ji-Yong announced. It was a decision he’d been dreading, a mandatory hiatus he’d tried to delay. But now, it felt like the only sanctuary left. "I’m going to disappear. And when I come back… I don't know who I’ll be. But I won't be this."
He picked up a heavy glass vase from the console table. For a second, he just held it, feeling its weight. Then, with a sudden, violent cry, he hurled it at the mirror.
The glass shattered. A thousand shards of Ji-Yong’s reflection flew across the room, glittering like diamonds in the morning sun.
He stood amidst the wreckage, his chest heaving. A small cut on his cheek began to bleed, a bright red line against his pale skin. He felt a strange, hollow sense of relief. The cage wasn't gilded anymore. It was broken.
"Ji-Yong," Youngbae said, stepping toward him cautiously.
"I'm okay," Ji-Yong said, and for the first time in years, he wasn't lying. He wasn't happy, and he wasn't healthy, but he was awake. "I'm just… done."
He walked away from the shattered mirror, leaving the pieces where they lay. He walked into his bedroom and closed the door, shutting out the light, the headlines, and the ghost of the boy who had once dreamt of being a star.
Outside, the world was screaming for G-Dragon. But inside the darkness, Kwon Ji-Yong simply closed his eyes and waited for the end of the world to finally be over.