“Everyone ready?”
“Of course we are~”
“Let’s do it right away!”
Confident answers came back in response to Ryu Chungwoo’s question.
The PC café we had rented out in its entirety for this ‘TeSTAR Tries Booking Tickets to Their Own Concert’ content had no one inside except us and the staff.
And the guys who had each claimed a PC for themselves were sitting there with faces so delighted they might as well have been shouting, ‘Our concert is happening soon!’
“The seats we book today will be raffled off and sent to Loviewers along with our autographs!”
“I’ll try to get a good seat!”
There was tension, but not a hint of solemn determination.
‘They probably think that even in the worst case, they’ll at least manage to grab some seat in a corner.’
To be fair, from their perspective, it wasn’t unreasonable to think so. The total capacity available across the two concert dates this time was 26,000.
In other words, there were thirteen thousand seats available for booking per concert date.
A peculiar confidence seemed to hang among them: ‘Surely, if we seriously try booking tickets on the latest computers, we can get at least one out of thirteen thousand seats.’
Naturally, I was skeptical.
‘Looks like every single one of these guys is going to fail.’
I could tell just from listening to the conversation.
“Oh, it opens at eight… so we just go in right at eight, right?”
“I think so.”
“I’m going for the first floor!”
“……”
Looks like they’d get stuck loading at the entrance before they even saw the seating chart.
At best, maybe one or two of them would accidentally manage to get a seat somewhere in the back.
‘…Should I be the one to get one, after all?’
It would look strange if all of us failed. For the sake of variety, it would probably be better if one or two succeeded.
But actually, I had hardly ever attended concerts myself. At most, I had gone a few times after taking one-on-one commissions to get data for someone.
Still, I had tried proxy ticketing quite a few times.
And my success rate had been pretty decent.
‘It was good for getting treated to expensive meals.’
I stopped before turning it into anything more serious because the odds of getting caught in the law were high. Scalping wasn’t even a gray area. It was simply illegal.
Anyway, that meant I figured I could probably manage to get something decent this time too.
At that moment, Seon Ahyeon, sitting beside me, quietly spoke up. Looking at his screen, he seemed to have only just managed to access the ticketing site.
“M-Moondae. Which section… are you going for?”
“Hmm… I was thinking maybe section eight on the second floor.”
“S-Second floor?”
“Aren’t you making it too easy on yourself, Moondae~?”
“Let’s do the first floor together!”
The guys nearby, who had overheard us, butted in. Brave words born of ignorance of reality poured out.
Only Seon Ahyeon nodded eagerly.
“Th-Then maybe I’ll… try the second floor too? H-How do I do it?”
His willingness to admit his lack of experience and ask for advice stood out.
‘…I should probably tell him what I know, at least.’
I briefly gave him some advice about server time and setting up the site.
“First, if you go onto this site and click the Afterpark address……”
“Oh, Moondae’s teaching something!”
“I would also like to listen attentively!”
“Will you tell us too?”
“…It shows you the ticketing site’s server time. Use that as the basis for the opening time.”
Too many interruptions. I finished what I was saying for now.
“O-Okay!”
Seon Ahyeon immediately started working on his PC, and soon the Afterpark server time appeared together with the server name.
[Magical Boy TeSTAR’s Magical ‘Seat Already Taken’]
[February 26, 19:47:49]
“Ooh!”
The guys who had picked up on what I said excitedly copied the site. Even Ryu Chungwoo and Bae Sejin started peering over and learning how to do it.
‘Hmm. Better than charging in blind, at least.’
There were only ten minutes left until ticketing began. I quickly unloaded everything I knew.
“And open multiple tabs for the ticketing site in different web browsers, then starting at fifty-nine seconds just before the hour……”
By the time I finished my condensed explanation, a faint sense of grim determination had started appearing on their faces.
“S-So… you need to prepare a lot……”
“If Moondae hadn’t researched this beforehand, we might all have failed.”
Apparently, the tips were more detailed than they expected, and a certain desperation must have seeped through my tone.
And as the announced time approached, that mood only intensified.
“Three minutes left.”
“Gasp.”
“Let’s definitely get good seats and send them to Loviewers~”
“I will do my best!”
“F-Fighting…!”
They seemed to have forgotten that even if they didn’t book the seats themselves, those seats would still go to Loviewers anyway.
Well, if we messed up, they might end up in a scalper’s hands instead… so statistically speaking, there was some possibility that we were improving things.
I shrugged and adjusted my grip on the mouse.
From a blind spot outside the camera’s view, a staff member gestured the countdown signal with one hand.
“Ten! Nine! Eight! ……Three! Two! One!”
Repeating the numbers aloud, I began refreshing the tabs one by one just before the clock struck eight.
“……!”
And then…
Nothing happened.
Because the screen froze.
‘I’m screwed.’
No, there really wasn’t any other way to describe it.
Endless loading continued on every tab. Thinking the situation might change once the traffic eased a little, I spent about seven minutes switching back and forth between browsers and watching, but nothing changed.
It was noisy around me too. None of the others seemed to have managed to see a page either.
‘Looks like the server crashed.’
I abandoned the PC and opened the mobile app.
[People Ahead of You: 41,502]
It was a declaration of defeat.
“……”
I had been trying not to use my phone because we were filming, and checking the app late seemed to have been the fatal mistake, but……
‘…I failed?’
Not the others.
Me…?
I couldn’t get even one seat?
I couldn’t believe it.
‘…I’ve even succeeded at VTIC concerts before.’
Granted, that had been three years earlier from the current point in time, but those bastards had already been top-tier back then too…!
I clearly remembered their server crashing then as well, and somehow switching tabs until I brute-forced my way inside.
I had no idea why it had failed specifically now.
‘……And this is my own concert.’
Frankly, I was a little dumbfounded.
Only after checking the PC and app several more times did I finally accept the reality of the blank white screen in front of me.
‘Can’t be helped.’
…Though it was a little disappointing that I wouldn’t be able to send anyone a ticket.
Since even I had been helpless against it, the chances that any of the others had managed to succeed were extremely low—
“Uh, uhh?”
At that moment, Seon Ahyeon cried out from beside me and began moving his mouse.
I glanced over.
His screen had already reached the payment page.
“……!”
“Whoa, Ahyeon did it?”
“What kind of brilliant trick did you use to get in?!”
“I-I don’t know either…. I-I just did what Moondae told me…!”
Even as Seon Ahyeon answered the guys swarming around him with a flustered expression, he steadily proceeded through the steps exactly as I had taught him.
He entered the personal information he had copied beforehand, correctly selected bank transfer as the payment method, and moved on to the next page.
Even the location was right where he had planned: the center of the second floor.
“Wow, amazing!”
“Ahyeon’s going to succeed.”
“…Thank goodness. At least one of us did.”
The members started patting Seon Ahyeon’s shoulders and practically celebrating already.
“……”
But I looked bitterly at Seon Ahyeon’s screen.
Big Sejin abruptly smacked me on the back.
“Whoa, Moondae-Moondae, are you upset because you prepared so hard but only Ahyeon succeeded?”
Seon Ahyeon jolted.
“M-M-Moondae explained it really well…! I-It’s basically the same as Moondae doing it hims—”
“No, that’s not it……”
Before I could explain, Seon Ahyeon’s PC screen changed.
Exactly the message I had expected appeared.
[An error occurred while processing your payment.]
“……”
“……”
A deathly silence descended.
I knew it.
‘…The loading took too long.’
When loading was either too short or too long, this sort of thing usually happened.
Seon Ahyeon froze, unable to process the situation. The others didn’t look particularly capable of processing it either.
‘…There were probably quite a few tickets that got released after people were kicked out during payment.’
On the off chance, I checked the ticketing page a few more times.
It was still nothing but a white screen.
‘Shit.’
Had anyone actually succeeded at this?
It seemed like the ticketing site had gone down after failing to predict the traffic. If so, everyone else might be looking at the exact same screen.
I calmly made a guess.
‘Maybe hardly anyone has actually booked tickets yet.’
Of course not.
The booking page that finally loaded three minutes later proved it.
[0 seats]
“……”
An astonishing number of people had successfully broken through that garbage server and booked tickets.
“For real?”
“That’s… it?”
That was it.
And as if on cue, articles announcing that the concert had sold out began appearing.
[TeSTAR’s First Concert Sells Out Every Seat]
[26,000 Seats Sold Out… TeSTAR Concert Even Causes Server Outage]
[TeSTAR’s First Concert Sells Out Both Dates in Just 10 Minutes]
That’s right.
I had simply…
Lost to the fans at ticketing.
A crushing, complete defeat without even getting to see the seating chart once.
“……”
Another loss added to the data seller’s record.
Read only on MUGEX
TeSTAR’s first concert.
The fans were overflowing with anticipation and happiness, but it wasn’t particularly major news to the general public. Most people didn’t even consider going to an idol concert in the first place.
On top of that, TeSTAR had already announced their comeback date. With attention focused on that news, the concert itself seemed likely to pass quietly without much resistance.
…Until the video of TeSTAR’s disastrous ticketing attempt was uploaded.
========================
[Idols try ticketing for their own concert and get completely wiped out lol.jpg]
: Even Seon Ahyeon, who made it all the way to payment, got hit with an error and that was the end lol
Every TeSTAR member turned into a soulless corpse (screenshot)
========================
-Oh my god lmaoooo
-Aren’t they practically sobbing? LMAO
-It’s even funnier in the video TeSTAR is losing their minds
-The funniest part is them apologizing at the end because they have no tickets to send out, I thought it was a WeTuber apology-video thumbnail lmaoooo
-The server was at faultㅠㅠㅋㅋ
-TeSTAR confidently declaring war on SNS the day before yesterday (screenshot)
└ㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋ
└Reality: every single one eliminated instantly
-No, they’re so cute and relatable lol
-What our boys went through is exactly what happened to me!ㅋㅋ But you guys will be at the concert, right? I… don’t… have a ticket…
└Aah…ㅠㅠ
└Hope you get a canceled ticket..
TeSTAR’s chaotic ticketing failure became a hot topic for comedic reasons precisely because they had failed so spectacularly.
In particular, reactions poured in toward one member who had crashed and burned despite apparently putting a great deal of effort into preparing.
Park Moondae.
-But Park Moondae really did everything he could lol I didn’t think he’d use multiple browsers AND open the appㅋㅋㅋㅋ
└Right, normally he probably would’ve gotten one, he was just unlucky because of the server.. But him looking shocked was cuteㅎ
-Park Moondae was like this with the chicken feet too, he looks like he’d half-ass everything so why is he so serious about every activityㅋㅋㅋ
└The best thing is how he pretends to be calm then breaks when he failsㅠ
└Feels deliberate
└Why would a handsome main vocalist bother going that far on purpose, you psycho…
-Moondeng did nothing wrong, the Afterpark server is the one at fault
-Park Moondae was a sparkly-eyed puppy when he was excitedly sharing all the stuff he researched, then he failed and instantly became a Tibetan foxㅋㅋㅋ
└Fucking hellㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋ
└As expected, puppy is only his public image, the real one is Tibetan fox. Once an emoji comes out, the trend will flip immediately
For quite a while, people mingled with fans and talked about Park Moondae—and TeSTAR’s—cuteness.
The fans enjoyed the rare opportunity to promote them through such a warm and cute situation that everyone could relate to, while simultaneously crying over the garbage ticketing server and their own failures.
Then an unexpected effect emerged.
Content related to TeSTAR’s concert began quietly absorbing attention as well.
-Oh, they’re releasing the unit stages on WeTube too? Post them here when they’re up, thinking about Idol Inc. is making me nostalgic
-So the new songs are being revealed for the first time too, looks like TeSTAR prepared a lot for this concertㅋㅋㅋ
└Maybe that’s why they had an even bigger breakdown when their event failedㅋㅋㅋ
└They were going to send us tickets but there are no tickets..!
└Ah this is seriously hilariousㅋㅋㅋㅋ I’m looking forward to seeing what the concert is likeㅋㅋㅋ
And before that atmosphere could die down, the concert trailer and the reality series showing the production of the unit stages poured onto WeTube.
Even the VOD service announcement appeared early, efficiently absorbing the overflowing demand for the concert.
The atmosphere reached fever pitch.
-T1 keeps doing its job, what the hell is going on
-I’m losing my mind waiting for this concert…
-Changing the division director was the right callㅠㅠ
And so, with anticipation and excitement so intense their hearts felt ready to burst, the fans迎ed the first day of the concert.