The Truth Realized
5:30 p.m.
Quitting time was drawing near.
Tap. Click.
He hit the final Enter key.
> Chapter 60.txt — Save complete.
"Hoo…"
A short sigh escaped him as he dusted off his hands.
Writing in secret at the office was more of an ordeal than he'd expected. He couldn't sink into the work the way he did at home. He had to keep one ear tuned to every footstep nearby, and the moment someone approached, he had to snap the screen back to an Excel window.
Still, not a bad haul for a day's work.
He'd stockpiled another ten chapters before quitting time. That had only been possible thanks to the trust he'd built up over the years.
Kang's always so efficient. Kang never goofs off.
That loose, casual faith had become the perfect camouflage. There had been a few close calls when he got so absorbed that his keyboard clacking nearly gave him away — but luckily, no one had caught him.
He glanced around. Managing Director Choi still wasn't at his desk.
Might as well check the reactions.
He opened a browser and logged into Munpia. The moment he clicked the notification icon —
> You have 99+ notifications.
A red number greeted him. Most of them were comment alerts.
A smile crept across his face at the readers' outcry.
But mixed in among them were notifications of a different kind.
"…Huh?"
Sponsorships?
He checked the full list. Scrolling down revealed quite a few names. Most belonged to industry people — management agencies and planning firms. A handful of pure-reader nicknames were mixed in as well.
He tallied the total.
About a hundred and fifty bucks.
It wasn't a fortune. Compared to his monthly salary it was nothing, and it was nowhere near the multimillion-dollar figures his hyung had been daydreaming about yesterday.
But still.
This… this means something.
The amount itself wasn't what mattered. This was a free serial — a debut novel with only five chapters up. For people to open their wallets for something like that meant the story had delivered more than enough entertainment to justify it.
Especially those management agencies. They were office workers who moved on numbers, not feelings. Unlike pure readers who simply enjoyed a story, these people worked for results. They never did anything that would lose them money — and yet here they were, tossing a few dollars, a few tens of dollars, just to leave their mark.
This thing actually makes money.
He'd started writing for his own satisfaction. He'd twisted a frustrating original out of sheer frustration, writing on impulse. And now the market was recognizing it as a product with real value.
The community posts he'd read about thousand-dollar-a-month authors, six-figure authors — their stories flickered through his mind. Had they all started like this too?
Something fluttered in his chest. A quiet hope that this might not remain a mere hobby.
That was when it happened.
"Kang!"
A familiar voice from right behind him. He startled and flipped the monitor screen.
Managing Director Choi. Back from his off-site meetings, apparently.
"Ah — welcome back, sir."
"What are you doing? Just staring at the monitor like an idiot. Did you finish everything I assigned today?"
Choi stood at an angle, looking down at Minjun's desk with that trademark snide tone of his.
"I figured it was about time for your report, but you never brought it over."
"Ah, yes. I just wrapped it up."
Minjun opened a folder he'd prepared in advance — the files he'd finished in thirty minutes that morning and left sitting all day.
"Let's see."
Choi leaned in toward the monitor. His eyes narrowed. He was probably hunting for something to nitpick — the font was too small, the colors were tacky, some nonsense like that.
But then —
"…"
Choi said nothing. His hand moved faster across the mouse, flipping between drafts one, two, and three.
Because there was nothing to criticize. Minjun had transferred the absolute best result in his head straight onto the computer. He'd even perfectly captured that "MZ vibe" and "funky sensibility" Choi had mumbled about like a half-baked fool.
Go on. Find something wrong.
Minjun swallowed a smirk. Even if Choi's taste was garbage, the man could still tell a masterpiece from trash.
A moment later, Choi's expression twisted oddly — then settled into an awkward smile. He clapped Minjun on the shoulder.
"See?"
"…"
"When you actually take my advice, it comes out great. You should've done this from the start."
Choi nodded with a deliberately smug look.
"My directing really is spot-on. I told you to go for impact, and you finally got it, right? You should know this is all thanks to me."
Ha.
Unbelievable. Minjun had done everything. If he'd actually followed Choi's instructions, the whole thing would have been a rainbow-colored mess.
He swallowed the words rising in his throat.
"…Yes, sir. All thanks to your eye for design."
"Good, good. Excellent. Send it straight to the client."
Choi hummed a little tune, clearly pleased with himself.
"Looks like no overtime tonight. What's gotten into you, finishing everything on time for once?"
"Thank you, sir."
Minjun bowed his head. It was absurd — but somewhere underneath, a thread of relief. At least he could be grateful there was no overtime.
Go ahead and live in that delusion for the rest of your life.
Because he might be leaving soon anyway.
6:00 p.m.
On-the-dot departure. In three years at this company, he could count the clean getaways on one hand.
At the elevator, he ran into Manager Park Do-hun — or rather, hyung. Looks like Do-hun had also finished his work without incident today.
"Oh, Kang Minjun. What's the occasion? Choi didn't grab you?"
"Nah. He saw the final product and practically wet himself."
"Ha, lucky you. I was waiting for you, actually."
Do-hun jabbed him in the ribs. They left the building and headed for the subway station. Do-hun's face was more flushed than usual.
"Hey, so this afternoon I did a little slacking and looked into industry practices and stuff."
"You weren't working either?"
"Hey, that was time invested for you. Just listen."
Do-hun lowered his voice.
"I know martial arts novels inside and out, but fantasy? Not so much. So I did some digging, and that story you wrote… you've got real talent."
"Out of nowhere?"
"No, I'm serious. I usually can't stand modern-setting stuff or hunter novels — too juvenile. But yours? I actually got into it. Sailed right through."
He was dead earnest.
"If a guy who's only ever read martial arts is sitting there dying to know what happens next, that says everything, doesn't it? You've got real talent."
Minjun nodded without a word. It wasn't empty flattery. The comments and sponsorships already backed it up with hard evidence.
"Actually… some management agencies already sent sponsorships."
"For real? Publishers?"
Do-hun stopped dead, eyes wide.
"Yeah. About ten of them? The amounts are small, but it feels like a signal they want to make contact."
"Whoa… that's insane."
Do-hun thumped him hard on the back. Genuine congratulations — not a shred of jealousy or envy mixed in. The kind of celebration a real older brother would give.
"Hell yeah. This is great. Seriously great."
Then his eyes turned serious.
"But Minjun. You've got to be careful with that stuff."
"Careful?"
"Yeah. I looked into it — there are management agencies that fleece rookie authors. They hammer the split down from 70-30 to 60-40, or they snatch up every secondary right in a slave contract."
Do-hun clicked his tongue.
"You just write. I'll handle the complicated stuff. Your hyung's a wizard with Excel and contract reviews, remember?"
"You will?"
"Yeah. Your time is gold. You need to pour every ounce of energy into creating — if you're wrestling with contracts, the writing dies."
It was reassuring. And true. Even at the company, Do-hun was a master at sniffing out poison clauses in contracts. Besides, Minjun was already maxed out just writing. Even with the AI, the story planning and quality control were still on him. If Do-hun took over the headache of the business side, Minjun would be more than grateful.
"Thanks, hyung. I'll leave it to you, then."
"Don't thank me. Of course your hyung's got this."
Do-hun grinned warmly. Then he swallowed hard — as if the real point was only just arriving.
"So…"
"?"
"Send me whatever stockpile you've got left."
"…"
"I'll do the hard work. You just hand over the manuscripts, yeah?"
Do-hun's eyes sparkled. Pure reader eyes, desperate to know what came next.
"I mean, I trust you enough to hand it over, but…"
"Promise me. Send it right now."
"Hyung, don't you have to do childcare when you get home? Your wife will be waiting — do you even have time to read manuscripts?"
Do-hun grinned slyly.
"I'll just lie and say I had overtime, hit the PC bang for two hours, then go home."
"…"
"If I bring home something tasty, she won't yell at me. Just send it already. Your hyung's getting lightheaded."
He looked desperate. Lying without a second thought — all for an escape from childcare and his one pure joy.
Minjun snorted a laugh.
"Alright. I'll send it when I get home."
"Okay! That's my little brother!"
Do-hun cheered like a kid. Looking that happy, there was no way Minjun could refuse.
They parted at the subway turnstiles.
"Hang in there! See you tomorrow!"
Watching Do-hun's back as he bolted toward the PC bang, Minjun thought: if he ever really hit it big, he was going to pull hyung out of this miserable company too.
He got home. He washed up in the barest sense of the word and sat down at his desk.
First order of business: the manuscripts he'd promised Do-hun. The files through chapter twenty.
The moment he sent them, a KakaoTalk message arrived.
He didn't reply. No point interrupting.
He opened Munpia again. Before leaving work, he'd caught a glimpse of the Today's Best rankings. It had been somewhere in the top twenty then.
"…Holy shit."
The curse slipped out the moment he checked the ranking board.
Eighth place. Single digits.
Views and favorites had climbed even higher than before. Comments were refreshing by the second.
Only five chapters. In just five chapters, he'd leapfrogged established veterans into the top ten.
He swallowed hard. His heart hammered.
Apparently he was greedy after all.
Money. And recognition. Both shimmered right in front of him.
According to Munpia's system, management agencies could formally offer contracts once you hit around ten chapters. And his hard drive already held a stockpile through chapter sixty. Getting to ten was nothing.
I heard the standard is one chapter a day.
Drip-feed it, keep the readers desperate, and the view counts stay healthy — that was the conventional wisdom.
But.
I want to know.
This reaction. He wanted to see more of the readers going wild. He wanted to make it explode even harder.
Backing down now wouldn't be Kang Minjun.
He put his hand on the mouse.
> Chapter 6 — Uploaded
> Chapter 7 — Uploaded
> Chapter 8 — Uploaded
> Chapter 9 — Uploaded
> Chapter 10 — Uploaded
Five more chapters. Ten total, dumped in a single day.
Some would call it insane. Pouring water into a bottomless bucket.
But he was certain. The water he was pouring wasn't being ladled out of a pail — it was an endless ocean.
He hit upload, then refreshed. The view count started rocketing upward like mad.
Do-hun's words came back to him.
Even if only half of them stick around, you're set.
No. If even ten percent of these readers paid, it would be a real jackpot.
He started to open a calculator, then stopped.
Doesn't matter.
This wasn't the time to calculate earnings. His writing speed was unmatched — with the AI, he could knock out ten chapters a day. Speed wasn't the point.
What mattered was how much more entertaining a story he could tell, and how much more thrillingly he could tell it.
A thousand thoughts whirled through his head, but they all landed on one conclusion.
If it's fun, they read it.
That simple truth. The truth he'd learned over ten years as a reader.
Write a story that's fun, and money and fame will follow on their own.
He opened Notepad again. Leaving the readers' praise glowing on the other screen, he sank into the world of chapter sixty-one.
Tonight, too, sleep was out of the question.