Coin Boom!
The car changes.
"Wow! Is this your car, oppa?"
"Of course it's mine."
"It looks expensive… You're not renting it, are you?"
"Why the hell would I do something that lame just to look cool!"
Dokyeong used to drive a Sonata. It had been his precious first car, a gift from his parents.
Beep!
To the man he was now, that car felt painfully shabby.
He had bought a new one—the kind that started with "Lam."
"The wings open automatically? That's so cool…"
"Haha, if you're already this impressed, we're gonna have a problem."
"Really?"
"The ride itself is even more insane~."
A Lamborghini.
Even he had only ever heard of the thing in stories. The price tag had made him hesitate hard, but—
With the money I've made, I damn well deserve to drop this much.
Buying some mid-tier Audi or BMW would have been an insult to how rich he had become.
Liquid assets alone sat at two billion won. In just a few weeks the number had more than doubled.
The explosive rise of crypto had made it possible.
Vroooom~!
The engine roared as the car rolled forward. The reaction of the girl in the passenger seat was instant.
"Kyaaaa~~!!"
"Want me to make it even more fun?"
"H-how?"
"It's a sports car. The top comes off, you know~."
Moments like this made the big spending feel worth it. Nine times out of ten, one drive was all it took to have a girl completely hooked.
Three hundred fifty million. Worth every won.
Truth be told, it had still stung a little. That much cash in one lump was no joke. More than the sticker price, though, he kept thinking about its value as seed money. Dump that sum into coins and he could grow it even bigger.
That was exactly the dilemma he had been chewing on. Thanks to the friends who actually traded coins, the worry vanished in an instant.
There's a little interest, sure… but I can just make that back and cover it.
He was in a coin group chat—not ordinary retail investors, but people like him who had already made over a billion. All kinds of juicy intel flowed through it.
Lately the hottest topic of conversation was—
"You into luxury brands?"
"Luxury? I'd wear them if I could afford them."
"Ahem! Should oppa buy you one?"
Luxury goods. Not just cars—clothes, watches, everything else.
And women, too.
The easiest, fastest way to reel a girl in was simply buying her luxury items.
They arrived at Gusegye Department Store Gangnam.
The moment they stepped out of the car, every pair of eyes in the parking garage locked onto them.
"Whoa…"
"What is it?"
"Everyone's staring so hard. Is it because we got out of a Lamborghini?"
"It's because Jiyoon is so pretty."
"Oppa, stop~!"
Of course people stared. Back when he was just another pedestrian, he used to gaze at sports cars with pure longing.
I always wondered what kind of amazing person was driving that thing.
Now that person was him.
Dokyeong walked with his shoulders squared, casually draping an arm over Jiyoon's shoulder. At first he had tensed up, wondering if he was allowed to do this, but—
This much is fine, right?
He had discovered that girls didn't actually mind. His grip tightened a little more.
"Oppa, I really like this one!"
"Ah, Gucci?"
"Is it expensive…?"
"Nah. If Jiyoon wants it, I can buy it."
Having the money to shop made everything easier. Even a complete fashion illiterate like Dokyeong had at least heard of Gucci.
I bought one for Jisoo too, once.
He had purchased before. A tiny bag that somehow cost over a million won—an absurd price.
"Oppa, how does it look? I think it suits me."
"Y-yeah, it does?"
"I really want this one."
"Alright. I'll get it for you."
Girls who received gifts always lit up. The price still felt alien to him, but—
Compared to the Lamborghini, this isn't even one percent.
Whatever. He closed his eyes and bought it.
At the counter Dokyeong swiped his card for the full amount in one go. Jiyoon pressed even closer, so close he could feel the soft press of her chest against his arm.
"Oppa, there's an outfit I want too."
"Fine. Just one more."
"Yay!"
The more luxury he bought her, the closer she got—body and heart both.
This much is nothing.
Dokyeong tapped at his phone, checking the exchange he used. The scowl that had formed over the unexpected spending melted into a bright grin. His money had actually grown.
"Oppa, what are you looking at?"
"Coins."
"How are they doing?"
"Obviously making money~."
"That's my Dokyeong oppa!"
Even while he was out on a date, the coin market kept turning. Bitcoin was earning for him all by itself.
Hell, with how much I'm making…
A few million won of shopping was nothing to feel small about. Spend it, then just make more. Dokyeong was savoring these dazzling recent days. He had stepped into a world that felt like pure fantasy.
The car changes.
The women change.
His entire life is changing.
"We've been getting a lot of customers like that guy lately."
"Like what?"
"That couple just now—that couple!"
"Ah~."
Inside the boutique after Dokyeong and Jiyoon left, the staff were already trash-talking the customers. Business as usual. Working a luxury floor was pure mental stress.
At that age, how…
Rich people coming in was one thing. The world had its wealthy. But watching golden spoons younger than themselves throw money around made the staff's guts twist.
"The guy was here the day before yesterday too."
"Really? I was off that day."
"He totally fits the type."
"Right~?"
And then there were the weird ones. The trash who treated women like accessories.
Well, he's not quite on that guy's level.
Every luxury-floor employee knew one particular VVIP. When someone dropped tens of millions every month, you remembered the face.
"That one spends on a whole different dimension."
"He doesn't even come to Gucci. He just swipes a few pieces at Hermès."
"For real?"
To the staff, VVIPs were blessings. The more they spent, the more incentive hit their accounts. The problem was the method. Being a golden spoon was fine, but the woman on his arm changed every single time.
"There's been a bunch of guys like that lately."
"Exactly!"
"Where the hell do these garbage men keep crawling out from? Welcome!"
Out loud they cursed. Inside, every salesgirl was secretly hoping.
I'm prettier and better dressed than those girls. Why doesn't a guy like that ever come for me?
Deal with the rich every day and your standards climb. Half-assed success no longer satisfies. And then something new reached their ears.
"Girls, girls! I heard this on my way in!"
"What is it, unnie?"
"What's going on?"
"That golden-spoon couple earlier—turns out he's not a golden spoon at all…"
Coins grow by feeding on desire.
Late November.
Click, tap!
Coins were surging. In barely a month the price had nearly doubled.
9,567.5 USD ▲200.9 (+2.09%)
And it was happening in real time. Even now, in the space of a single hour, it had climbed nearly two percent.
Money is literally copying itself.
The kind of vertical spike you only saw in the absolute garbage stocks of the domestic market was now playing out across the entire coin scene. If relatively stable Bitcoin was doing this, the rest of the altcoins needed no explanation.
It was a full-blown casino.
—Ethereum is going completely berserk!
—Ripple cannot be stopped!
—Litecoin is legendary…!
Anyone who had just stumbled onto this information—no matter how rational—would lose their minds the moment they saw it.
People who started with tiny amounts…
…were now increasing their buy sizes. That flood of liquidity was setting the whole coin market ablaze.
Korea was especially extreme. The phenomenon known as the Kimchi Premium had taken hold.
Our country is hypersensitive to trends.
In both the good and the bad sense. If everyone else is doing it, you have to do it too. People obsess over fashion and hygiene—positive sides exist. On the other hand—
13,010,892 KRW ▲273,228 (+2.10%)
Prices here ran more than twenty percent higher than overseas. Done right, you could even chase arbitrage.
But now was not the time.
When the coin bubble had swollen almost to twenty thousand dollars—
That was probably the absolute peak.
To me, coins are just one more indicator. I don't bother memorizing every number. But the 2017 market was so special that later textbooks would feature it as a textbook bubble.
—A Chinese whale just sold Ethereum!
—The program just bought Ethereum!
Until then I simply enjoy trades where victory is already certain. The earlier zero-sum games I played against the program had meaning.
Yeah~ keep propping it up.
The goal of the Illicit Stock Manipulators: inflate the bubble even further. With the fire already this hot, they won't mess around for no reason. No—they can't.
Because I know, I feast.
Every time a correction hits I deliver a shock and turn that volatility straight into profit.
How do you like that, you little shits?
From the manipulators' side it must be infuriating, but there is nothing they can do. Are they really going to burn the whole house down just to swat one ant? And maybe it isn't even an ant. Simply showing that possibility makes them handle me with far more caution.
I bulked up a lot by screwing around exactly like this.
In my previous life, too. I became a master at snatching windfall profits from the cracks between the big players. The grudges that piled up because of it… hard to say they don't exist at all. But in the financial markets, the one who makes the money wins.
An operation of historic scale.
"Team leader!"
"What is it this time? Another problem?"
"Not exactly trouble, but…"
Fabian had been feeling the full weight of it lately. What they were doing was like climbing Everest with basic gear.
Succeed and you harvest enormous wealth and glory.
One wrong step? You tumble all the way down and end up in pieces. The current coin market was exactly that—towering like Everest itself.
"Trading volume in the Korean region has been spiking recently."
"Right. They say a coin boom hit."
"But at certain hours the program losses are huge, so we looked into it and…"
It was a pure operation. Fail to sell at the exact right moments and the losses would be astronomical. Nerves stayed permanently frayed. A subordinate brought the report to Fabian.
Ah, that matter.
He already knew. At first he had dismissed it as nothing. Looking back, though, there had been a reason the pretty superior had overreacted.
"The leakage losses aren't something we can ignore. We need to revise the program or take countermeasures."
"Leave it."
"Sir?"
"Her Highness must have her own thoughts."
"?"
They had already climbed too high for easy countermeasures. Immediate fires that needed putting out were piling up by the dozen.
"…That was the report."
"I believe I already issued instructions on this."
"Ah, yes! Just mentioning it, haha. I was thinking once again how visionary the director's foresight is."
"How tedious."
Some of the programs had been adjusted. Even so, the attacks continued, siphoning their profits. They had simply earned enough to more than cover the damage.
Fabian thought once more that the scale was simply different. But—
I will make you cry. Even if I have to destroy the entire coin market to do it.
Rachel was harboring a slightly different thought.