When the music video of Better Me was played, the first thing seen was Park Moondae staring at the camera.

Wearing a black hood with purple eyes, it was the same appearance as in the trailer.

Park Moondae silently reached out his hand toward the camera. And operated it.

Clack.

Whirrr.

As the video rewinded, scenes from the trailer began to play backwards.

The water tank. The sewer. The mannequins. The gun being dropped. The biohazard sign.

And the video finally showed a worn-out doll with a cogwheel attached to it.

It was a small scene, where the rewinding stopped.

Then the song started.

//TN: The lyrics in cursive were originally in English

At that moment, the scene changed to Cha Yujin holding a clean and new doll instead of the old worn-out doll. And the scene zoomed out, extending all the way to show the full shot of the entire surroundings.

It was an ordinary classroom where students were attending classes. TeStar members could be seen sitting in different parts of the classroom. The ordinary appearance of attending classes in daily life was captured on the camera.

However, immediately after, the atmosphere in the classroom completely changed when the rhythmic moombahton instrumental began to play.

Whizz.

All of the students except for TeStar disappeared, and an 'X' graffiti was drawn on each desk with luminous paint.

Then, the scene of an intense group choreography began in the dark classroom.

In between the choreography scenes, there were different scenes of members being alone in distinct places such as the school's music classroom and the gym for each part.

However, each space had changed to a strange ambiance that seemed to be related to each member's abilities that had been revealed since 'Magical Boy'.

Therefore, similar to what was seen in the concept photos, TeStar members, who were wearing techwear outfits, seemed to have created their own areas similar to a game's mid-boss room.

Singing in their own space, they each seemed conceptual and looked bored.

However, the moment the trailer's thunderous riff melody fell, the atmosphere changed completely.

Dweee-!!

The image of TeStar in school uniforms fleeing and running away from monsters passed by in a quick cut-scene, and the scene stopped at a class slogan above the blackboard of the classroom.

Rough red graffiti was painted over cliched black writing.

The blood was splattered over the English word 'Goodbye'.

And then the chorus began.

A desperate game of survival that didn't match the melancholic chorus continued.

The lyrics in the music video began to have a fully specific meaning.

And as the song progressed, TeStar's circumstances became more and more extreme. Fighting cutscenes became more frequent than them acting together, and the moment the last monster fell, the tension peaked.

The moment Kim Raebin looked behind him and lifted the piercer, Ryu Chungwoo shot him in the back.

Afterwards, the music video centered on more intense performance scenes, and the cutscenes of them hunting each other were changed to a vaguely frightening composition.

And then came the song's bridge.

During the 2nd verse, Bae Sejin, who didn't receive many scenes, got a close-up. Bae Sejin suddenly got up while singing his part and left his space which was the school entrance.

Bae Sejin ran down the hallway and stood at the end of the door. When he opened the door, a normal classroom appeared. However, when the camera rotated, the red graffiti paint was dripping down from the class slogan on top of the board.

The moment Bae Sejin tossed something he was holding in his hand, the final chorus burst out.

What was in Bae Sejin's hand was a heavy metal lock. The lock flew in an arc, shattered the class slogan, and fell. The shattering frame of the class slogan was captured in slow motion.

And the moment the frame fell to the floor, the moombahton instrumental started to play.

Bae Sejin grinned.

Along with the showy choreography, the timeline in the video began to change.

Kim Raebin's piercer, which was being lifted after the last monster fell, was blocked by Park Moondae's smartphone shutter flash, and TeStar disbanded in anger with each other.

Their faces looked relieved.

Then the scene went back to the cut of Cha Yujin holding an old doll.

But this time, Cha Yujin did not turn the cogwheel.

Cha Yujin whistled and tossed the doll into the corner, then started walking down the destroyed hallway.

The still camera caught the cheerful walk from behind, and 'BETTER ME' emerged as a white caption on the screen.

The video ended with that last hook of the song.

TeStars fandom was entering the era of unexpected music videos.

* * *

"What are you watching, hyung?"

"Interpretations about our music video."

"Why interpretations?"

"...Umm. Do you want to watch it too?"

"Yes!"

It was better to let Cha Yujin in than to be trapped in the loop of endless questions and answers.

I connected the WeTube video I was watching to the TV and launched it.

A duck character appeared on the screen.

//TN: I believe Haeori means 'black-crowned night heron', which is a type of bird.

The duck introduced the summary of 'Better Me' music video's plot and explained the overall story.

The video was mainly like that.

'Good observation'

I listened to the duck with quite an interest.

However, as soon as the music video contents were sorted out, the duck suddenly threw out something extreme.

"Pfft."

Bae Sejin, who was drinking coffee while leaving the kitchen, choked. Cha Yujin was waiting for the duck's next words with his eyes glimmering.

"What does 'on the same line' mean?"

"Something that's similar but not exactly the same."

Bae Sejin answered and sat down next to us on the sofa. It seemed that he was interested in the interpretation of the music video.

On the screen, Park Moondae, who was standing at the front gate of the school with his hands covering and taking off the camera, was showing.

And the video continued with me opening and running into the school. The scene was from the 'Airplane' music video.

The scene of Bae Sejin running down the school hallway was repeated in the video. The composition was certainly the same.

That detail was put there for people to notice.

And the evidence continued.

The members were amazed.

"Ooh."

"...Sounds plausible."

That was right.

However, the problem was that this was just a misunderstanding.

The lock was removed from the front door, but due to time constraints that scene was cut out, and the director just happened to like the composition of the hallway, so it just went like that.

The fact that there were no cuts of me talking to other members... No, I don't think Seon Ahyun had scenes like that either.

However, the number of views and comments was great, as this theory seemed to be quite well-known among fans.

'...Should I suggest that we take advantage of that setting in the next album?'

Shouldn't we offer what the consumers like and not what the supplier likes?

In any case, it ended with the 'Park Moondae and Bae Sejin are the same person theory' and went back to explaining the connection of the worlds.

The screen showed a scene from the trailer video in which Cha Yujin's doll blew up and then a scene from the music video in which it didn't.

'They guessed that correctly.'

It was a plot device made so that we wouldn't be too involved with the game. We didn't want to be dragged by the game's lore, and the people on the game's side probably didn't want it to be revolved all around us either.

'We treated it as an IF version.'

Looking at people's reactions to the game now, it seemed this was a good choice. Even so, there were quite a few people who already went crazy so there couldn't be a bigger shock for them

And then a caption appeared at the bottom.

It seemed like the influence was stronger than I expected.

"See you~"

"The duck is smart."

I handed over the TV to Cha Yujin and checked the video comments on my smartphone.

Looking at it, it seemed that this person had almost firmly established the theory. No one seemed to criticize or ridicule it even if you sorted it by the latest comments.

'It's fun.'

It was interesting to see it being interpreted in a new way with the parts getting connected to each other even if it wasn't intended to be that way.

And the gaming community who came in by chance also stood out.

"Hmm."

That reminded me. Come to think of it, there was going to be an additional release this week. It was just content released as fan service but I wasn't sure if they'll respond unexpectedly.

'It might be a little embarrassing.'

I turned off my phone while touching the back of my neck.

And the next day at 10:31 in the evening, another new video was uploaded to TeStar's official WeTube channel.

It was a Halloween costume version of the choreography video of TeStar dressed as the early companions of .