The Youngest Grandson of a Chaebol Family
Filming ended after the sun had gone down and the sky had turned pitch-black.
Woo Cheong, who had collected every team member’s number and made a group chat, thrust his smartphone toward Neoul.
“Hey, Neoguri Hyeong! Punch in your number! I’ll add you to the group chat!”
“I do not know my number....”
Neoul fiddled with the phone he’d just gotten back, turning it over in his hands. The Sea Witch had handed it to him and told him that if he pressed speed dial 0, it would call her. She’d said they could hear each other’s voices through it no matter how far apart they were.
But she had never told him what the phone number itself was.
“Huh? You don’t know your own number? You should at least memorize that much!”
Woo Cheong took Neoul’s phone, entered his own number, and called it. At once, Neoul’s phone number appeared on Woo Cheong’s screen. Woo Cheong showed it to him.
“There, that’s Neoguri Hyeong’s number!”
“Ah.”
Neoul narrowed his eyes and studied the line of Arabic numerals. Just as he had thought of Hangul as pictures when he first saw it, numbers, too, registered in his mind as images.
“How strange indeed.”
At his words, spoken while he was looking at the numbers, Woo Cheong flinched and stopped his busy hands.
While saving Neoul’s number, he had been typing [Neoguri-Gu-ri Hyeong] into the name field. He paused mid-prank and, carefully watching Neoul’s expression, asked, “Weird? Would you be mad if I saved you as Neoguri-Gu-ri Hyeong?”
“Hmm?”
What was this, with the perfectly good name already there? Why “Neoguri-Gu-ri” now?
“Whether it be Neoguri or Neoguri-Gu-ri, I do not feel offended. Yet I say again, my name is Neoul.”
Neoul corrected him kindly.
Seeing no sign of annoyance or irritation, Woo Cheong’s suppressed mischief rose right back up, and he broke into a heeheehee laugh.
“Then Hyeong can save me as Cheong-Gu-ri, too!”
“…?”
And what, exactly, was Cheong-Gu-ri supposed to be?
Neoul understood only that the term had unknown origins and somehow sounded ridiculous.
“Ah! Dad’s calling me! I’ve gotta go! I’ll invite you to the group chat later, so come in when I add you! See ya, Neoguri Hyeong!”
Woo Cheong dashed off with a light spring in his step. He had no idea that Neoul’s smartphone did not even have the messaging app TtokTtok installed, much less an account.
Neoul stared at Woo Cheong’s number in the recent call list for a moment, then came outside and looked around in a daze.
The production staff had said the next schedule, a few days later, would be the production presentation, and the contestants were all going home....
Neoul’s home was in the sea.
What am I to do now?
There wasn’t enough time to return to the Dragon Palace and come back again, and since the Sea Witch had gone to the Dragon Palace, he doubted she would answer even if he called.
Neoul raised his head and asked the Grim Reaper drifting around nearby, the little earrings on his ears jangling, “At sea, it is dangerous to sleep just anywhere, for one might be bitten to death or eaten. On land as well, if one sleeps on the roadside, might one become the prey of a land beast?”
“What the hell, man? You were gonna sleep rough?”
Baek Namu, who had come to see whether his disciple had performed well onstage, smacked the back of Neoul’s head in disbelief. His hand went straight through Neoul’s body as if it weren’t there.
“Why are you worrying about that? Go crash at Baek Yuri’s place. You know your situation.”
With a tilt of his chin, Baek Namu pointed toward the building entrance.
Baek Yuri was coming out with Baek Gi-yeom and talking to someone on the phone.
“Yes, Mom. You’ve almost arrived? Yes. Baek Gi-yeom is with me too. Sorry for being so late.”
“Auntie! I beat Baek Yuri!”
Baek Gi-yeom suddenly shouted into Baek Yuri’s phone while he was still on the call, then laughed mischievously.
Baek Yuri shot a flying kick at him, and Baek Gi-yeom dodged it with infuriating ease.
After ending the call, Baek Yuri scolded him, “I told you not to spoil the broadcast. You’re going to get yourself kicked out like that.”
“Haha! I only told Auntie! We just have to keep it quiet inside our own loose-lipped family~”
“Honestly.”
Baek Namu gestured toward Neoul to hurry over and ask already.
Dragging his suitcase behind him, Neoul approached Baek Yuri and Baek Gi-yeom. Baek Gi-yeom spotted him and asked, “Huh? Neoul, what’s up? Can’t get a taxi? Is someone not coming to pick you up?”
Neoul nodded.
“Might I impose upon your household for a time?”
* * *
Right after Neoul left with the Baeks in Baek Yuri’s mother’s car.
A black luxury sedan stopped in front of the building. The man sitting in the back-left seat wore a suit and, despite it being night, black sunglasses.
He was Won Hasin, the youngest grandson of the UJ Group chairman, whose companies owned the cable broadcasters Unet and tvD. He was also the representative of the well-known large agency H.A.D.
His family was in competition with the MN Group, which owned PLu, the cable broadcaster currently filming Idol Travel.
And yet there was only one reason he had come here.
“Neoul, 192 centimeters tall. Black hair, a little long. Bring him.”
At Won Hasin’s order, the secretary in the driver’s seat got out of the car. He swept a quick look around the building, then went inside to search for Neoul.
But he came back without finding him, only saying that all the participants had already gone home.
“He’s not here?”
At Won Hasin’s baffled question, the secretary lowered his head.
“No, where would a fish with nowhere to go have gone? Get back in for now.”
Won Hasin took off his sunglasses and pulled out his smartphone, opening a location-tracking app. Neoul’s phone location, moving somewhere, appeared on the screen.
It had been Won Hasin’s family that made Neoul’s identity card at the Sea Witch’s request, and the one that procured and delivered a smartphone for him.
To carry out the Sea Witch’s instructions smoothly, Won Hasin had preinstalled the tracking app on Neoul’s phone in advance.
But after a moment, an alert appeared saying the location could no longer be obtained.
“Damn. Looks like the phone’s off.”
Won Hasin pinched the bridge of his nose as though he were at a loss, then ordered the driver to head for the last confirmed location.
However, the spot they reached five minutes later was the middle of an eight-lane road, and there was no way to tell where Neoul had gone.
“This is bad. The Sea Witch is going to tear me apart.... Wait, what if he’s been kidnapped? Should I just run away tonight?”
At the muttered words, the secretary asked cautiously, “Representative. Why is it that even the chairman is so respectful toward that person? Is she truly that formidable?”
Song Bi-seo, who had only recently transferred in from another company and become Won Hasin’s secretary, did not know much about the Sea Witch.
The name Jo Geum-yeong.
An appearance that looked no older than her twenties, though her official registration put her well into her mid-thirties.
Despite looking impossibly young, there was something in her gaze, something deep and aged, as though it held a long span of years.
The fact that the UJ Group chairman, the vice chairman, and even the boss he served, Won Hasin, all addressed her with the utmost deference and called her “Madam Shaman.”
That was all Song Bi-seo knew.
Though his superiors and their family all called her Madam Shaman, he had never once seen her do anything that looked remotely like a shaman’s work, such as arriving with bells in hand to divine fortunes, write talismans, or perform a ritual.
Who would think of her as a shaman when she appeared now and then in elegant, refined clothes, like an actress on her way to an awards ceremony, issuing orders and receiving reports?
A strange woman with a dangerous, seductive air.
Song Bi-seo was a quiet secretary who did his work well, but as for curiosity about that suspicious woman, he could not restrain himself.
Won Hasin averted his eyes from the secretary’s suspicious stare.
“I don’t know the details.”
“......”
“My grandfather keeps insisting that we treat her with respect, so I’m just stuck doing it.”
It was a lie.
Sensing the bright-red falsehood in his boss’s words, Song Bi-seo spoke carefully. “…For something you describe that way, you seem rather afraid of Madam Shaman, Representative.”
“W-What? I’m not! Hey! Watch the road! The road! Why do you keep looking at me in the rearview mirror while driving? That’s dangerous!”
Startled for no reason, Won Hasin raised his voice and snapped at him.
“Tch. What’s so scary about that shady old woman!”
“Old woman? She isn’t much older than you, Representative. Four years is more like an older sister, isn’t it?”
“There are things you don’t know! Don’t be curious! You’ll get hurt if you know!”
“Understood.”
Seeing that Won Hasin had no intention of telling him anything about her, Song Bi-seo closed his mouth.
He had no intention of pressing further after being told not to be curious. Nor was he supposed to.
He had only recently become Won Hasin’s secretary, but as someone with years of secretarial experience at another company, he had more than enough sense for that much.
“......”
“......”
As Song Bi-seo focused on driving, Won Hasin was left alone feeling awkward. He cleared his throat with a fake “ahem” and put his sunglasses back on.
If he had asked just once more, I was going to tell him a little....
Unlike the bosses Song Bi-seo had served before, Won Hasin was not especially strict or exacting. If anything, he was a little sloppy and half-witted. The sort of person who could be easily led around if you cajoled him with charm.
But Song Bi-seo was far from effusive, and tended to be serious and taciturn, so their conversations with each other often broke apart in awkward fits and starts.
Won Hasin regretted making such a big show of things and stole glances at Song Bi-seo.
Anyway, once Song Bi-seo works beside me a while longer, he’ll end up learning about the Sea Witch someday. Maybe I went too far.
He remembered the first time, as a child, when he had sat on his grandfather’s knee and heard stories about her.
Back then, he had vaguely imagined the Sea Witch as some benevolent guardian deity.
“Madam Shaman is a truly wonderful person. She sold off her own jewels to take in children orphaned during the Korean War, feed them, clothe them, and raise them with care until they could stand on their own.”
“Wow.”
“And not just in our country. She traveled everywhere in the world and worked for children who were in hard straits. My grandfather and grandmother were poor orphans taken in by Madam Shaman, too.”
“Really?”
“Yes. Most of the orphans who received her kindness grew up and forgot about her once they were independent, but our grandfather and grandmother resolved to serve her and repay her kindness through the generations. In return, Madam Shaman helped our family with her wondrous powers.”
“Wow! Madam Shaman is amazing!”
“Everything the UJ Group has become and all the comfortable lives we live are thanks to Madam Shaman’s grace. This is a secret of our family, so you must never tell anyone else. Understood?”
“Yes!”
But the Sea Witch he actually met shattered the child’s fantasy into pieces.
“What’s this brat doing here? He wasn’t here the last time I came.”
“He’s my grandson, Madam Shaman.”
“Hmm~ So this little squirt is your youngest grandson? You picked up another grandchild when I wasn’t looking? Well, well. Look at that grin of yours, all split open with joy.”
Petty, sly, rude....
“Hello, child. Want to play tag with Grandma?”
“Waaah! The old lady is scary!”
“Grandma, I said.”
She chased after a six-year-old boy with murder in her eyes, showing him a hellish version of tag without the slightest mercy. No matter what game they played, it seemed her real goal was simply to make the child cry and tease him senselessly.
That much was still bearable. He could treat her as a nasty old lady next door and keep some ease around her.
But one day, when Won Hasin had gone on an overseas business trip with his grandfather and wandered out alone because he was bored, he had been kidnapped.
After passing out under the influence of drugs and waking up, he saw the Sea Witch slowly pouring some chemical over the kidnapper, vaporizing him out of existence. The culprit died in agony and vanished from the world without a trace. Not even bones remained.
He could never forget the expression on the Sea Witch’s face that day. None of her usual playfulness remained, only a look filled entirely with killing intent....
Ever since then, whenever Won Hasin saw her horizontally slitted pupils, cold sweat broke out over him and a chill went down his spine. No matter how human she might look, he knew in his bones that she was absolutely not human.
What was more, that face that never aged was deeply unsettling. He had been seeing her since he was six, and now it had been more than twenty years, almost thirty, yet her face had not changed at all.
His grandfather called her Madam Shaman, but to Won Hasin she looked more like a witch, if anything.
And then, one day, that witch had suddenly declared, “The prince whom the Dragon King treasures dearly, along with his escort, will be coming to land, so make two identity cards,” then abruptly brought him a small, noisy woman and handed her over with the instruction, “This is the escort, so socialize him a bit.”
After that, she had vanished again, leaving behind the words that the prince was now filming a survival audition program and should be treated well when he came to Seoul.
“For now... check everything from the broadcast station to every CCTV in this area. If he was kidnapped, we need to rescue him safely. If the phone only turned off because the battery died, he might answer after charging it, so keep calling.”
They absolutely had to find Neoul and make sure he was safe.
It was unlikely, but Won Hasin imagined the Sea Witch vaporizing him into some unidentified liquid and shuddered.
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