In the Face of True Skill
A private business café in Gangnam.
Soft lighting and mellow jazz filled the space, yet a peculiar tension hung in the air.
Park Do-hun took a leisurely sip of his coffee, a relaxed smile on his face.
Across from him sat professionals who had made names for themselves in the webtoon industry through backgrounds, coloring, and post-production — so-called S-tier supporters. Arms crossed or chins propped on hands, they studied Park Do-hun as if sizing him up.
"The terms… honestly speaking, they're top of the industry."
One of the men spoke up. He was a background team lead notorious in the field for being exacting.
"I have no intention of pinching pennies when it comes to bringing in talent."
Park Do-hun answered with confidence. Their expressions, however, remained lukewarm. The money was good — but that wasn't everything, and their faces made it plain.
"CEO. I'll be frank. The salary is excellent. The incentives? Outrageous, in a good way. But we're people who move based on the future, not just immediate income."
"The future?"
"Our careers. Our portfolios."
The background team lead cut straight to it.
"For technical specialists like us, which projects we've worked on is our market value. The reason we prefer major agencies and studios is simple — at least there, you're guaranteed work that won't collapse under you."
The others nodded in agreement.
"I'm sorry, but Muse is a startup, isn't it? No track record, no idea what project you're even preparing. We can't just charge in blind."
"Exactly. If we join and the project falls apart or tanks, it only leaves a stain on our careers."
It was a cold assessment. But Park Do-hun didn't flinch. He nodded as if he'd expected every word.
"And if we had a rock-solid IP?"
"Well. I don't know how solid it could possibly be…"
The background team lead continued, skepticism written across his face.
"No matter how good the original is, adapting it into a webtoon is a completely different problem. Adaptation, direction, art — the gap between heaven and earth comes down to who the main artist is, the one overseeing the overall storyboards and pacing."
"Why don't we start by hearing what the project is."
Park Do-hun didn't drag it out.
"The Regressed Hunter is Merciless."
"…"
"The one currently serializing on Munpia."
Silence dropped over the table. Eyes went wide.
"Holy—"
Someone let out a stunned breath.
"That IP… a startup has it?"
"Isn't that the hottest thing right now? There's been nothing but rumors about a webtoon adaptation."
Their attitudes flipped in an instant. They leaned forward, locked onto Park Do-hun.
"How did that happen? Did you buy the rights?"
"No."
Park Do-hun smiled faintly.
"He's the actual owner of our company. The original author."
"…!"
Their pupils shook hard.
"W-wait, so an established author founded the company? There was a lot of talk about him being a rookie…"
"Or is he from a management background?"
Interest lit up their faces. A company founded by the original creator of a smash hit — that was a foundation of an entirely different caliber.
But that interest didn't convert straight into contracts. If anything, the background team lead's expression darkened further.
"Ha… this actually makes it more stressful."
"Stressful?"
"The expectations are sky-high. The original is such a masterpiece, and the fandom is massive. If the webtoon so much as stumbles, we're the ones who eat all the hate."
"He's right. If we get branded as the people who ruined a masterpiece… that could be the worst thing possible for a portfolio."
They were afraid. Afraid of the weight of a major work — and of an unproven startup's production capacity. No matter how brilliant the source material, if the vessel meant to hold it was cracked, it was worthless. They knew that better than anyone.
Park Do-hun savored their reactions as he slowly pulled out a tablet.
"Seeing is believing."
He opened a saved file and set it in the center of the table.
"This is through episode three of the webtoon we're preparing. Take a look."
Every gaze snapped to the tablet screen. At first, their eyes were full of doubt — the look of people expecting some half-baked artist dragged in to do a cheap imitation.
But then the fingers scrolling down began to slow.
"…"
"This is…"
The background team lead's eyes trembled as if hit by an earthquake. He was dissecting the screen with a professional's gaze.
"The composition is… insane."
"Look at this coloring technique. How are they even using the layers? The light rendering…"
"The line density doesn't make sense. You're saying this is for a weekly serial?"
Low murmurs spilled out one after another. The rational minds that had come ready to analyze went numb under the sheer overwhelming quality. Before they knew it, they had simply become readers, sinking into the work.
The scroll through episode three came to an end. A long silence followed.
"Ha…"
The background team lead scrubbed his face dry and lifted his head. His voice was shaking.
"I must be losing it… Who on earth drew this?"
"'Top of the industry' doesn't even cover it. This is… just a monster."
"That part is still under embargo."
Park Do-hun pressed a finger to his lips.
"Either way — will you join us?"
"…"
"For reference, this main artist is also quite fast. If you all back him up on backgrounds and coloring, we can serialize without any drop in quality."
Gulp. The sound of someone swallowing hard cut through the quiet.
Hesitation was gone. Fear? With an artist like this, fear wasn't even a factor. What ruled them now was pure desire — the hunger to get even a spoonful of credit on this project.
"I'm in."
The background team lead answered on the spot.
"If I can work with just this person… no, please let me do it. This will be the crown jewel of my portfolio."
"Me too! I won't even haggle over terms. Just hire me!"
Their attitudes had flipped a full one-eighty. Park Do-hun cheered inwardly.
This is the power of Minjun's work.
Talent money alone could never buy, lining up of their own free will on nothing but raw skill. Park Do-hun calmly produced the contracts.
"Welcome. To Muse Co., Ltd."
The talent acquisition had been a success. All that remained was to widen the stage for them to run wild on.
A few days later, Kang Suk-woo sat down for another round of meetings.
Across the table were representatives from the two major domestic platforms — Sirius and Macao Page. Meeting both at once would have been a breach of industry etiquette, and more importantly, locking each one down separately was far more advantageous for negotiations.
Ten in the morning. First up was the Sirius representative.
"This is the proposal we've prepared."
The rep slid a document across. The terms had definitely improved. With the Munpia performance so overwhelmingly strong and a solid backlog of chapters stockpiled, most of the clauses that used to lowball them under the pretext of "rookie risk" had disappeared.
But then—
"However… there is one concern."
The representative spoke carefully. Here it came again.
"To persuade upper management, we need solid grounds."
"Grounds?"
"Yes. As you know, no matter how well a novel does, if the webtoon adaptation doesn't successfully back it up, you might get a hit — but a mega-hit becomes difficult."
The logic was clear. The core of IP expansion was the webtoon. The webtoon had to explode for the drama deals, the games, the global push to follow. And that webtoon, they were saying, looked unstable.
"Word around the industry is… that things fell through with Toonmix, and you're producing it in-house."
"…"
"Frankly speaking, it's risky. A startup maintaining that level of quality is close to impossible. If you were willing to work with one of our subsidiary studios, we could smooth some things over to a degree, but…"
He was gently steering them into their own cartel. It was as good as telling them to hand over the IP rights.
Kang Suk-woo simply listened. He understood their logic and their worries. In ordinary circumstances, they would have been right a hundred times over.
But—
"You do worry a lot, don't you."
He gave a short laugh and pulled a tablet from his bag.
"Better than a hundred words. Take a look at this."
He pulled up the first episode of the webtoon the author had produced and handed it over.
"What… is this?"
"A webtoon produced by the company we're collaborating with."
The representative took the tablet with a puzzled look. And then—
"…?!"
His reaction was so intense that just watching it sent a thrill through Kang Suk-woo. Pupils dilated. Mouth fell open. Breathing turned rough.
"This is impossible… the quality…"
He looked back and forth between the screen and Kang Suk-woo as if he couldn't believe it. This wasn't "might turn out okay if things go well" territory. This was quality that would shatter the ecosystem the moment it hit a serialization slot.
"The way I see it,"
Kang Suk-woo leaned back into his chair, completely at ease.
"the webtoon adaptation isn't a risk — it's going to serve as yet another massive round of promotion. Wouldn't you agree?"
"…"
The representative had nothing to counter with. A weakness? It was the opposite. This was a nuclear weapon. From a platform's perspective, this was a prize you showed up with bags of money to court.
"Ah, and for reference—"
Kang Suk-woo drove the spike home.
"I have a meeting with Macao Page this afternoon. They've been quite proactive as well."
"…!"
The representative's face went ashen. The dread of losing a catch this big to a competitor — and knowing a written apology wouldn't be the end of it — crashed over him. He frantically pulled out his phone.
"W-wait just a moment, sir. The terms again… I'll report to upper management immediately. No — I'll call the division head right now and get approval!"
"You don't need to wait until tomorrow. I'll be back today with a blank check!"
Urgency saturated every word. The glass ceiling that had been blocking them — the limits of being a rookie, the prejudice against a startup company — all of it shattered lightly under a single webtoon manuscript drawn by the author.
The afternoon meeting with Macao Page played out the same way. The moment they saw the webtoon pages, they flipped their stance and scrambled to offer better terms than the competition.
Watching it all, Kang Suk-woo thought:
Of course.
In the face of true skill, every convention becomes meaningless.
The studio.
Clack-clack, clack.
The bright rhythm of the keyboard stopped.
"Hoo…"
I let out a deep breath and stared at the monitor. Between the consecutive uploads, I was already at episode 120.
"That was fast."
Episode 130. The point where the Munpia exclusive serialization period ended — and the promised episode where simultaneous launches on other platforms would begin. Just ten episodes left.
"I should ease off the pace a bit."
The contracts with the other platforms still hadn't been finalized. According to CEO Kang Suk-woo, blank-check-level offers were flying around, but administrative procedures were still administrative procedures. Until a proper launch schedule was locked in, I needed to conserve the backlog.
"Shame, though…"
I clicked my tongue. Pouring out chapters and watching reader reactions in real time — having to step away from that dopamine addiction, even briefly, stung. But it was fine.
"I'll get to see it soon enough with the webtoon."
According to a message from Do-hun, the webtoon background artists had all been recruited. Before long, my drawings would be out in the world. A different kind of thrill from the one I'd felt with the writing was waiting for me — what readers would say about every single panel, how scorching hot the comment section would get. Just imagining it made my heart race.
And then I turned my gaze to a folder sitting on the desktop.
Next work concepts.
"Once the webtoon wraps up successfully…"
I hovered the mouse cursor over the folder.
"I'll pull out the one I've really been saving."
The Regressed Hunter is Merciless.
This work had been planned thoroughly for success. To survive as a rookie author, I'd pushed the trending hunter genre, regression, and satisfying payoffs to their absolute limits. Not that there was anything wrong with that — I'd enjoyed writing it myself. But it was true that I'd sacrificed some character depth and worldbuilding narrative in service of the thrills.
"I've earned a bit of a name now."
Once this work ended, I wouldn't be a rookie anymore. Maybe not quite a "trust-the-name" author yet — but at least someone who could generate interest in a next project. And when that time came, the story I'd truly wanted to write. A vast world. Multidimensional villains. A weighty narrative. A story that didn't have to win on pure stimulation alone — one readers would willingly follow anyway.
"Just thinking about it gets me excited."
Something swelled full in my chest. It wasn't simply about making a lot of money. It felt like I'd been given permission to unfold the world inside my head as freely as I wanted. At some point, I realized I had become a real creator.
"Alright then. Shall we run with it again today?"
I set my hands back on the keyboard. I could almost hear Muse whispering.
Our golden age hadn't even begun yet.