Free Web NovelHyunseong’s reaction was amusing.
“What? Why aren’t you answering? Is it true?”
“It’s not.”
“So you’re saying you’re thinking about it?”
“······.”
Hyunseong downed the soju in front of him in one gulp, hesitated for a long time, then finally confessed.
“My heart does lean that way. But because of work and everything... I’ve never confessed to a girl before either...”
He was a guy who had never once given his heart to a girl since childhood.
I poured him another glass and laughed.
“Well, I’ve lived long enough to see this. Seeing the almighty Park Hyunseong struggling over a girl.”
“······.”
“I’m sure you’ll do what’s best, but if your heart’s really in it, don’t hesitate because of the aftermath—just go for it.”
“Do you think that’s okay?”
“That’s up to you, but I think it’s better to go for it.”
“Got it.”
We tilted back our soju glasses and spent time reminiscing about the past.
On the way home—
‘So Myungsoo’s finding his match, and now Hyunseong too. Should I try dating someone too?’
I snorted and shook my head.
“Dating, my ass.”
“Sorry?”
Manager Ma turned his head and asked.
“It’s nothing. Just talking to myself.”
Kang Mijin, huh...
I was curious to see whether Hyunseong’s first love would work out.
* * *
As soon as Yoon & Jang were retained as her attorneys, Jo Seonghee was granted bail.
She wasn’t allowed to leave her residence, but at least she was released from the detention center.
The day Jo Seonghee was released, Lee Sanggeun came to the Myeongdong office to inform me of the negotiation outcome with Zhuliánbāng.
“They said they’ll have their people fly in and surrender within a few days. Along with them, a couple of domestic distributors will take responsibility.”
“Surrender?”
“Yes.”
I just chuckled.
“As soon as they enter the country, secure custody. Can’t let them waste that golden opportunity on a voluntary surrender.”
“I’ll make sure it’s handled with Zhuliánbāng.”
“So the negotiations went well?”
“They did warn that this would be the last time, but yes, we got them to concede.”
Still left a bad taste in my mouth.
“This all went a bit too smoothly.”
Lee Sanggeun also nodded, looking displeased.
“There isn’t a single country where organized crime ➤ NоvеⅠight ➤ (Read more on our source) isn’t involved in drug distribution. I think they just didn’t want to risk their current business by causing unnecessary conflict with us.”
“What do you think, Chairman Lee? Are you interested in managing drug distribution?”
Eradicating drugs was impossible.
No country had ever succeeded.
Even China executed those who manufactured and sold drugs, but the flow of drugs still didn’t stop.
That’s why I asked—maybe it would be better if domestic syndicates handled it instead.
“To be honest, for people in our position, no business is as profitable as drugs. But I’m not sure if it’ll really be helpful in the long run.”
“Why?”
Lee Sanggeun let out a small sigh.
“Greed. With the kind of money involved in drug trafficking, conflict is inevitable. No matter how much you shield us, once we start distributing drugs, it’ll be impossible to avoid the eyes of law enforcement.”
“Still, make sure we have intel on every criminal syndicate currently operating inside Korea.”
“Understood.”
“You did well on this.”
“Thank you.”
Lee Sanggeun bowed and left the office.
“Manager.” freewebnøvel.com
“Yes, boss?”
“What’s the current distribution of power inside Geukseong Group?”
“The main faction is still Park Dongsu’s line. Led by Lee Sanggeun, they’ve filled most of the key positions.”
“And the others?”
“The Honam faction comes next, followed by the Seoul faction.”
Geukseong Group was currently a coalition of the Park Dongsu gang that had moved up from Busan, the elder-led Honam faction, and the existing Seoul-based forces.
Although the elders had been pushed back thanks to Lee Sanggeun’s extensive purge, the Honam faction had too many members to eliminate entirely.
I needed to make Lee Sanggeun strong enough that no one would dare challenge him.
“We’ll have to connect Chairman Lee with the American and Russian mafia. Got it. And Jo Seonghee was scheduled for bail today, right?”
“Yes, she should be out by now.”
I decided to use Jo Seonghee’s case as a prelude to launching Myungsoo into politics.
I was already using the media, including Koryeo Daily, to report on how unjustly she had been treated.
At the same time, I planned to portray it as though Myungsoo was personally arresting the domestic drug traffickers—keeping his name in the public’s consciousness.
The more media exposure, the more the people would remember Myungsoo’s name.
“We only have the meeting with Yoon Changho on the schedule today, right?”
“Yes.”
“Then don’t make any other appointments.”
“Understood.”
“You did good today. We’ll head out to meet Yoon Changho in an hour.”
Once Manager Ma left the office, I called Han Kyungyeong.
“Hyung, you busy?”
― Not really. Ever since I pulled out of Joongwoo Group, there’s nothing major going on.
“You’re still investing in U.S. IT companies, right?”
― Most of the acquisitions are done. But the atmosphere’s starting to shift. Stock prices are going insane.
“They’ll go even higher. Stop acquiring for now.”
― Got it.
Stock prices for Apple and other IT companies were rising abnormally.
My first plan was to profit from the rise by selling the stocks, then later short the Nasdaq index to profit from the crash.
But that wouldn’t happen until next year, so there was no rush.
Right now, China was more urgent.
“What about the China trip?”
― I’m scheduled to enter next month to coincide with a Chinese Communist Party event. I’ll stop by Beijing and then tour Shanghai.
“Stick with Wen Jiabao while you’re there and start building connections. You remember the companies I told you about, right?”
― Uh... Baidu, Alibaba, Tencent?
The future BAT—China’s three tech giants.
At this point, they were either just founded or still preparing to launch.
“Baidu probably hasn’t started yet. The other two have launched but don’t have much influence yet.”
― How the hell do you know about these companies?
“Baidu will become China’s Yahoo. Alibaba will dominate e-commerce, and Tencent will be a full-spectrum IT powerhouse.”
― Okay. I’ll set up meetings and see what I can do. But if they’re that good, won’t investors be swarming them already?
“Not yet. Just meet them. Don’t worry about the investment amount—focus on getting as much equity as possible. I believe in you.”
― I can’t tell if that’s encouragement or pressure.
Han Kyungyeong grumbled, but if anyone could succeed, it was him.
Plus, his name carried weight in China too.
When Masayoshi Son invested in Alibaba, even Ma Yun—who was hesitant—took the deal because of Son’s reputation.
“Oh, and what about Google?”
Last year, I’d told him to invest in Google, which had just been founded by Larry Page and Sergey Brin.
― I looked into it. It’s basically a college club project. This company’s gonna beat Yahoo?
“Yeah. Did you invest?”
― Got 30% for $20 million. They said they won’t accept more because they want to maintain control.
I broke into a wide smile.
“Nice. How much Yahoo stock do we own?”
― About 10%. Why?
“Connect Google and Yahoo. Jerry Yang and Larry Page know each other, so it should be easy. Yahoo’s probably struggling with their search engine right about now.”
Yahoo had been working on their next-gen search engine but couldn’t finish it in time. In the end, they ended up using Google’s temporarily, since the founders were both from Stanford.
― I’ll talk to our U.S. team.
“You’re really working hard, hyung.”
Yahoo’s temporary use of Google search would become the launching point for Google’s meteoric rise.
By 2004, Yahoo would panic and switch engines again—but by then, Google would have already dominated the U.S. search engine market.
Google would go on to become the No.1 search engine in every country... except the few where Baidu (China), Chorok.com (Korea), Yandex (Russia), or Yahoo Japan (Japan) held dominance.
― After China, I’m heading straight to the U.S., right?
“I’m leaving Korea to Eva for now. You focus on the U.S. until next year. At the end of this year, we’ll start selling off all our U.S. tech stocks—slowly enough not to affect the price.”
It was best to start offloading shares before initiating options trading.
After the call, I checked the time.
It was time to meet with Yoon Changho.
Just then, Manager Ma returned to the office.
“Didn’t realize how late it got. Let’s go.”
Even meeting with me now, Yoon Changho had to be cautious.
Instead of the traditional Korean restaurant we used to go to, we’d arranged to meet at a secret private venue.
“You’re already here?”
When I arrived, Yoon Changho was already waiting.
“I just got here. I’d heard about places like this, but this is my first time visiting one.”
“You’ll be coming here often from now on.”
Yoon Changho nodded at my words.
“Let’s sit.”
“Yes.”
We sat across from each other and began our conversation.
“I heard the news. You’re giving lectures at universities now?”
“That’s right. You told me, didn’t you? That I should get closer to young people.”
“You did well. How have things been lately? I assume that’s not all you’ve been doing.”
“I’ve been meeting with politicians, building a foundation.”
“You’re practically a politician now.”
The food soon arrived.
I instructed Manager Ma not to let anyone near our room, then picked up my chopsticks.
“Let’s eat first. The food here’s pretty decent.”
“Sounds good.”
We continued eating, exchanging casual updates.
With Yoon Changho, the real conversation always started after the meal—once tea was served.
“Now, tell me what I need to do.”
“If you were to form a new party, how many sitting lawmakers do you think you could bring over?”
“Somewhere between five and ten.”
That was more than I expected.
“They’re all from the Conservative Party, right?”
The internal conflict within the Conservative Party was severe. They had split once and re-merged thanks to Cheongpunghoe’s mediation, but the resentment still lingered.
Their recent crushing defeat in the by-election had brought those conflicts to the surface.
The media was all over the Conservative Party’s factional strife.
“With the public’s favorability toward you, gathering the necessary party members to form a new party won’t be difficult. And if current lawmakers join, the organizations under their influence will follow too.”
“Wouldn’t it be better to start as a negotiation bloc?”
“You focus on the Conservative Party. I’ll handle the Progressive side.”
“Understood. I’m planning to form a centrist party.”
A centrist party—one that had never succeeded, in the past or the future.
But with the Conservative and Progressive camps already entrenched, centrism was the only viable option left.
“I’ll fund the entire launch.”
“That won’t be a problem?”
“I’ll funnel it through hundreds of people, disguised as special party membership fees. Shouldn’t be an issue. But you’ll need to put in quite a bit yourself too.”
Politics was money.
While we couldn’t go back to the blatant cash-for-votes days, it still took a lot of money to move people.
“I’ve already prepared.”
“Whatever you do, don’t accept money from anyone else but me. You must have no weaknesses.”
This man had to become a president for me.
I had no intention of sharing Yoon Changho’s power with anyone else.
“If you ever think of anything different... I’ll do what I must.”
It wasn’t that I didn’t trust Yoon Changho at all.
But anyone could change once they became a politician.
Dry persimmon leaves floated beneath the light green tea.
Sensing the gaze studying my face, I gave a faint smile.
