Spend a Little More, Boss
The man before me was Cheon Taewoo, CEO of the Cheongang Group and the de facto mayor of Cheongang Special City. In the original webtoon, he was the one who hung a bell around Last's neck and yanked the chain, dumping an entire cartload of frustrating plot developments onto the story. That was what sparked Chapter Two—Nadja revealing herself as a First Generation Enhanced Human and declaring war on Cheongang, vowing to turn the whole city into a wasteland. At least, I think that was how it went.
Just thinking about it made a dull ache bloom somewhere deep in my chest. Was it because of that ending in Chapter Two? The one where Last pierced Nadja through the heart and killed her without ever realizing who she really was.
It feels bitter.
I had no reason to feel sad. It was probably because of her. It seemed the emotions this girl felt were leaking over and affecting me too. Yeah… that’s right. You really hate that guy, don’t you? Then be happy. I owe that bastard a debt myself.
“Excuse me~ Just a moment.”
I cracked my neck with a loud pop and walked over to Cheon Taewoo.
*
Among the opportunists you could find anywhere in society, Cheon Taewoo was an especially nasty piece of work. He was a shrewd businessman who could calculate exactly when to ride a trend for maximum profit. People around him called him a parachute hire, a miser, and all sorts of other insults. Taewoo, of course, believed every last one of them was nothing but slander from jealous rivals.
I created this opportunity. I created this flow of power. So why am I the parachute? Why am I the miser?
He had gone from being just one executive on the board to the man who ruled an entire city. Naturally, that didn’t sit well with the others. Because of that, lately he’d been trying to pin the cause of all the recent incidents on outside forces rather than himself.
In a way, he wasn’t entirely wrong. All he’d wanted was to become a successful businessman. He’d simply picked up an Enhanced Human research sample by chance and finished developing it. Who could have imagined that tiny snowball would roll into an avalanche like this?
He had already handed the CEO position to his daughter. These days, all Cheon Taewoo wanted was a little rest. The Cheongang Group had always been showered with contempt and ridicule, but the fact that they had grown one city to this level in just over a decade was undeniably thanks to his skill. Anyone who had run at full speed for ten years without stopping would be exhausted.
But misfortune, it seemed, had a habit of coming in waves. Ever since he stepped down as CEO, nothing had gone right. His beloved daughter had taken over the position only to half-kick him out, telling him he had no talent for the job and should go waste time somewhere else. When he tried to use his obscene wealth to attract the attention of young, beautiful influencers, he was blocked with warnings about impersonating a corporate executive. When he decided to make his own videos and logged into Channel Ark, he discovered his IP itself had been blacklisted. And when the mounting stress drove him to a casino for a quick visit, he lost a hundred million in the blink of an eye.
It really was hard to fail this spectacularly.
But even a mouse hole has its day in the sun, as they say. A beautiful woman with a lovely smile was speaking to him. Of course, the woman was me—Chae Yuha—currently disguised through Nadja’s optical camouflage visual tracker. But to Cheon Taewoo, whose brain had been thoroughly pickled in stress, that was completely irrelevant.
His interest in the woman before him ignited instantly, and he began listening attentively to her words. She said it was her first time in a place like this and that she would appreciate it if someone who knew their way around could show her the ropes.
Someone who knows their way around!
How sweet those ordinary words sounded. Cheon Taewoo, whose masculine need for validation had been completely dried out by continuous stress, immediately accepted the proposal.
The challenge was the slot machine. She really did seem to be a complete beginner; her skill was even worse than his own, which was limited to the occasional hospitality visits he’d made back when he was an executive. Just as a frustrated urge to give her advice began to rise—
“Could you show me how it’s done?”
The smiling woman asked at the perfect moment. Cheon Taewoo promptly sat down and took over the slot machine she had been playing.
And then—jackpot.
A jackpot he had never seen or heard of before she spoke to him suddenly burst forth. The woman cried out in delight. Taewoo’s mood soared along with hers. Yes! Even a man’s life needs days like this! It was just pocket change—less than five hundred million—and if he could enjoy himself this much, it was a total steal!
Dopamine flooded Cheon Taewoo’s brain.
That was when a quiet murmur reached his ear.
“The payout isn’t that high because I bet the minimum credits…”
What? Minimum credits?
I’m Cheon Taewoo. I still have my pride. Was he supposed to be satisfied with a jackpot won on minimum credits? His competitive spirit ignited. This time, he shoved his own money into the machine. After all, if a jackpot had appeared once, it could appear again.
Of course, after that the slot machine never spat out another jackpot. Whether it was because the casino had rigged the machine or because of some scheme by the person standing nearby, he didn’t know. But the increasingly disappointed look on the woman’s face spurred him on, and he kept spinning the slots without pause.
In the end, the amount Cheon Taewoo lost at the casino that day was a staggering 1.1 billion. If his daughter, who was working hard over at Cheongang Tower, saw this, she would faint on the spot.
“Damn it!”
Bang! Bang!
With stress piled to the limit, Cheon Taewoo pounded the slot machine in frustration. The guards immediately swarmed in and surrounded him.
“Let go! Do you know who I am?!”
Spouting the classic lines of a third-rate villain, Cheon Taewoo made a dramatic exit from the stage.
Meanwhile, Chae Yuha, who was still standing in the same spot, wore a sly, wicked smile.
Why did you have to make such a scene in court and complicate everything?
In that final moment, it felt as if someone’s voice had brushed past Cheon Taewoo’s ear.
*
Meanwhile, at the detective agency Haedream located in Cheongang’s bustling downtown, requests were pouring in nonstop thanks to Last’s skyrocketing fame. There were so many that they were seriously considering rejecting even the minor ones. The sheer volume was overwhelming.
“Please find my pet robot… Pass. Can you power-level my game account… Pass. Help me find my lost item… Pass.”
“No way!! I’ve been thinking this for a while, but why the hell does a detective agency get so many errand requests?! We’re not a damn delivery service!!”
Han Yujin and Han Cheolho shouted at the top of their lungs, their eyes bloodshot from exhaustion. The root cause of this chaos—Jinhyun—avoided responsibility by staring out the window at the distant scenery.
Thanks to his newfound fame, the agency’s income, which had previously been rather tight, had grown to a respectable level. The crime rate in the downtown area had also dropped exponentially. So honestly, getting a little busier wasn’t such a bad thing… or so he thought. But if he said that out loud right now, Yujin would probably beat him to a pulp. So Jinhyun kept the thought firmly to himself.
That was when something familiar caught Jinhyun’s eye as he gazed out the window. It looked remarkably similar to the S-class hero he had met two weeks ago aboard Wunhwa’s airship.
“Hmm?”
Tracing its path, it seemed to be heading straight for the detective agency. Yujin had told him that if he didn’t know something, he shouldn’t struggle alone but should ask the people around him. Following her advice, Jinhyun took out his phone and sent a message to Handsome.
Knock knock.
A rather crude knock, somewhat out of place in this era, echoed through the room. Instead of the two people who were busy handling requests, Jinhyun—who had been prepared in advance—walked over to the entrance.
“Who is it?”
“…”
There was no answer. Assuming it was Athena, Jinhyun flung the door open.
But standing there wasn’t the three-meter-tall walking suit. Instead, it was a tall, slender woman with an expressionless face.
“…Who are you, really?” Jinhyun asked, visibly flustered.
Then a small Vitaloid peeked out from behind the woman.
“I am Kilos! And this person here is the S-class hero, Lady Athena!”
“…Athena?”
Jinhyun looked at the woman in front of him again. The person who had been piloting that massive suit… was this delicate-looking woman? No matter how often people said the world wasn’t what it seemed, this was still a bit…
“Who’s here?”
Yujin poked her head out as well. After blinking rapidly at the sight of Athena and Kilos standing at the front door, she guided the mysterious visitors inside the agency.
“So, what brings an S-class hero from Wunhwa to a small detective agency in the downtown area?” Jinhyun asked as he poured tea and offered it to Athena.
Athena, who had been staring fixedly at Jinhyun the entire time, answered in a low, quiet voice.
“I’m… interested in you…”
At that moment, the entire detective agency flipped upside down.