Girl group ARIAZ (formerly Empire Girls) debuted in 2019 under Rising Star Entertainment. With several members having participated in audition programs, the group garnered significant attention in their early days. However, by 2022, multiple members had progressively left the company and terminated their contracts. The agency never officially announced the group's disbandment, leaving ARIAZ's status ambiguous.
Former member Lee Hyo-jung (이효정), now active under the name Hyokey (효키), has been consistently sharing her experiences from her time as an idol on her personal channel, occasionally revealing shocking industry secrets. Recently, she recounted her dating experiences during her trainee and idol periods, including a story about a male idol simultaneously pursuing two women, which many found incredibly coincidental.
Hyokey disclosed that she once met a male idol at an idol gathering, and the two later became friends. Although they never officially dated, their interactions were quite ambiguous, and they often exchanged flirtatious messages privately.
Unexpectedly, Hyokey later met another female idol. As they chatted about entertainment industry gossip, the other idol mentioned she was currently in an ambiguous relationship that was “hard to define.” As they talked further, they realized something was amiss: the ambiguous person they were both referring to was the same male idol!
Even more astonishing, after comparing their chat histories, they discovered that the male idol had used almost identical flirting tactics on both of them. Upon learning the truth, instead of fighting over the male idol, they decided to team up and “prank him back,” deliberately toying with him.
In the end, neither of them officially dated the male idol. As for whether he ever realized he had been found out by two women simultaneously, Hyokey stated that he likely never knew what happened until the very end.
Hyokey also revealed that due to the small size of the idol industry, there are many opportunities for idols to meet each other. Additionally, many idols long for emotional connections, so similar “ambiguous collisions” have occurred more than once in the past.
From their trainee days to their official debut, idols' romantic lives are often under intense scrutiny. Hyokey's revelations once again show the public that the private emotional world behind the spotlight in the idol industry is far more complex than imagined.
