History Is Made at Night
A genius.
A passionate eccentric entrepreneur.
A man turning delusions into reality.
Currently the world's richest person.
Aaron flicked his fingertips.
"I'll raise."
He leaned back in his chair and smiled at a slant.
But none of them were pushovers.
Aaron, Wilson, Joke, and me.
I was the youngest of the four, but if you took me out of the equation, Joke was the youngest. The man ranked among the world's richest was barely in his thirties. Youth naturally made challenge, boldness, and adventure possible.
Joke watched Aaron's willingness to throw more money on the table. True to his standing as a global businessman, he clearly meant to test the situation himself.
Joke twisted his thin lips into a smile.
"Call and double."
He wore a boyish grin, but his eyes flashed sharp as a blade.
A brief silence.
Wilson Hwang, in jeans and a leather jacket, offered a quiet smile of his own.
"This is getting fun."
Wilson stretched both hands forward.
"I'm all in."
"Alright, show 'em."
"Open!"
"Okay! This round's mine."
We were in the middle of a poker game.
That was when a photographer approached.
"Would it be all right if I took a commemorative photo?"
"Of course."
"Smile~"
Click.
Aaron made a request of the photographer.
"Send me a copy as well."
"Yes, sir. Understood."
The evening after the CES presentation.
I spent some light hours with Aaron, Wilson, and Joke—playing poker, washing down simple fried chicken with beer.
"Oh, this chicken is seriously crispy. Legs are the best part, no question."
Wilson Hwang seemed to like chicken a lot.
While we were horsing around like that, a thought suddenly struck me and I asked,
"But aren't you all busy? Is it okay to be hanging out like this?"
These were CEOs of unmistakably massive conglomerates. Men of their caliber supposedly traveled with truckloads of secretaries and sliced their schedules down to the minute. There was even a saying that if money fell on the ground in front of the ultra-rich, they wouldn't bother picking it up—because saving that one second by walking past was more profitable than bending over.
Wilson explained.
"If I fool around alone at home, people start asking why I'm not working."
"Right. Shareholders hate it when the chairman is seen playing. But when we gather like this, nobody complains."
"Why's that?"
"Because when it's just us hanging out, outsiders see it as work."
"Ah……!"
"Family golf is a vacation. Our golf is business, you see?"
"Hahaha. So if you want to play, you get together. You can go wild and still look like you're grinding hard."
"Facts."
Was this gathering playtime?
When men of this caliber sat down to poker and drinks, was it leisure or labor?
It was a fuzzy question either way.
Time spent strengthening bonds between chairmen.
Was that play, or was that work?
If they grew close enough, a single phone call could solve enormous problems.
Hey, Wilson! I need some semiconductors.
How many?
A trillion.
Okey-dokey.
Something like that could happen. When Joke needed chips, Wilson could handle it; when Wilson was stuck on a technical snag, Aaron might solve it first.
I get to play while everyone else counts it as work.
Not bad at all?
But what about me?
Why was I sitting here with them?
My products were good, sure, but hanging out like this among men who took turns as the world's richest still felt a little unreal.
"Jiho, you're number one in the world too, you know?"
"Me?"
"Yep. Number one in technology."
"Aaron's a genius too, but he spreads himself so thin that in semiconductors he ends up losing to Jiho like this."
"Exactly. Aaron. Narrow your focus. That kind of octopus-style empire-building is something only Koreans do."
Aaron bristled.
"No way. I'm not an octopus. It all connects to one goal."
"Yeah, yeah. Stop. No multi-planetary humanity talk. You've been telling that story for twenty years. My ears are about to bleed."
"Bleed from the ears?! Jiho."
"Yes?"
"Let's talk separately later. I really need to explain why humanity has to leave Earth."
"Oh my god. Jiho! Don't go."
"If you do go, take tissues. Your ears will definitely start bleeding."
Joke looked at me and asked,
"Jiho. Have you thought about scaling the business? I get that the tech is incredible, but you need volume to make real money."
No… I already made a hundred million dollars?
Wilson nodded.
"He's right, Jiho. You need to ramp up production to rake it in."
Wait—Wilson of all people? He was the one who paid me a hundred million dollars.
After everything, a hundred billion won had landed in my Korean account.
Was a hundred million dollars somehow not "making money"?
My head was spinning.
Aaron posed a quiz.
"Between a German luxury car company and a Korean mid-range mass-production auto company, which one do you think has superior technology?"
German luxury versus Korean volume production…
"Well, the German company would be better, wouldn't it?"
"Nope. Not so. Of course it can start that way—making luxury requires outstanding tech. But over time the mass-production company always catches up. Always."
"Why?"
"Because to crank out high-value volume you have to optimize. If you're making just one perfect car you can ignore cost. But when you're making many, the constraints multiply. More constraints mean technology has to advance further."
"I see."
Aaron lifted his beer.
"Exactly. Only those who break through their limits reach the true peak of technology. That's the path a man should walk."
Aaron shouted "man," winked, and drained the glass in one shot.
Joke spoke up.
"So, speaking of which—what if we invested?"
"Invest?"
"The three of us put in a hundred billion each and take about ten percent. Sounds fair, right?"
Wilson laughed.
"Haha. Joke's getting impatient. I already asked him. But he said he's not looking for investment. JH is more researcher than businessman."
Hold on, Wilson.
I'm not a researcher?
I'm just… a sales agent?
Even today's CES presentation was me memorizing the script for a week and then winging it.
"Haha……."
I laughed awkwardly.
Investment? It would be nice.
Like money falling from the sky.
I'd even asked Director Jang about it.
His answer: shareholders have a right to know.
If I took investment, I'd have to open the company's books to them—how money came in and went out, what we made, how much, and how.
Even a five-percent shareholder gained serious authority.
So how exactly was I supposed to explain that I was selling things I brought back from the Nano World?
"I'm still not ready to take investment."
"See? Joke was just being hasty."
"Joke, that's an unfortunate swing and a miss."
"Since I'm Joke, let's just joke it off, yeah?"
Before we knew it, the hour had grown late.
"Alright, it's getting late, so let's wrap today's gathering here. We should make a group chat."
"Then we use my SNS, right?"
"No way. I have one too."
"I just made one for AI use……."
Ah. Even creating a single chat room turned into a turf war between men who each owned their own platforms.
"Then for fairness, let's use the one from Jiho's country."
"I've tried it. It's pretty good."
"Okey."
With that we broke up and returned to our lodgings.
Then my smartphone buzzed.
Jokes poured across the smartphone screen at lightning speed. It was hard to believe these were the people who moved giant corporations—the conversation was pure nonsense.
Aaron posted a link. Following it took me to his SNS, where he had uploaded a photo of the four of us playing poker together.
Anyway, now that a photo of the four of us at the poker table was public, what kind of reaction would follow back home?
My face had already been plastered everywhere after the CES presentation made the news. Once a photo of me hanging out with these men spread, I could only imagine what people would say.
I opened a Korean search window.
"Wow. Articles already."
Clicking the headlines revealed almost no content. Just titles. It felt like the kind of journalism that posts the headline first and fills in the article later.
I left a few more messages in the group chat, then lay down on the bed.
My back was hot.
Even with my eyes closed, sleep wouldn't come, and my back stayed burning.
A seven-star hotel in the States. There was no way the air conditioning was broken.
The reason I couldn't sleep and my back felt on fire was probably dopamine.
Thousands of eyes on me, mingling with world-class entrepreneurs, and even now newspaper articles were being written with my name in them.
A dopamine explosion that made sleep impossible.
Lying there, I briefly replayed everything that had happened today.
"By the way… when Joke said a hundred billion, was that Korean won or US dollars?"
Maybe because I was disabled, Joke had been quietly considerate, which only made it more confusing.
Should I have just asked?
Somewhere in a basement.
The ceiling was low. Moisture had seeped into the cracked cement walls, leaving spreading stains. A single old fluorescent light flickered, barely holding on. In the corners, wires tangled and spilled in disorder.
In the middle of the basement sat a battered wooden desk, an ancient laptop, and a jumble of complicated radio equipment whose purpose was unclear. The devices were running, casting light, and the laptop's glow illuminated the face of the person seated there.
She was an employee of JH Research.
In that damp underground room she was diligently writing a report.
— Observation Target: Z
— Primary Movements: Residence ↔ Lucky Repair Shop (former workshop) ↔ New Headquarters Building
— Special Notes: No standard research institute or large research staff observed. Hidden production and research appear to proceed without external personnel. High probability of a secret laboratory. Location unknown.
In the darkness the woman flipped through the photos stored on the screen.
Kim Jiho leaving home. Stopping briefly at the shabby Lucky Repair Shop to collect something. Entering the new headquarters building only to emerge again soon after.
Throughout the entire process, there was no place that looked like a research lab, no researchers, no support staff, not even a single subcontractor.
"No matter how you look at it, this makes no sense……."
She muttered under her breath.
Designing and producing a cutting-edge 20-layer HBM chip without any visible facility was beyond common sense.
Somewhere there had to be a hidden secret laboratory. Yet where it was and how it operated remained completely unknown.
She typed, filling in the next section.
— Personal Relationships: Recent close contact with Aaron Merks, Wilson Hwang, and Joke.
— Tendency Analysis: Clear pro-American leanings.
— Risk Assessment: High probability of tilting toward an anti-China stance.
After completing the report she encrypted it and transmitted it to China.
Several hours later.
The encrypted communications program flashed as a new directive arrived.
A short, sharp order from the Chinese authorities.
Target: Z
If recruitment proves impossible — ABDUCT
The woman's gaze cooled and settled.
She closed the laptop for the last time and murmured,
"History is made at night, after all."