I Just Wanted to Tell You
Jo Sudeok looked over the renovated department store and could not, for the life of him, hide how pleased he was.
Could anyone have made it better than this?
Tell me to do it over and I still couldn't make it like this.
That was not the only thing that satisfied him. There was a space aimed squarely at Jo Sudeok's own taste: the men's wear zone on the fifth floor. Ordinarily a floor like that was a thoughtless jumble of brands shoved in together. Not this one. Thanks to the president's open-handed decision, only three distinctive shops filled the great space, and they filled it with room to spare.
First, Ralph Warren.
Now that is how it's done.
Leave those gentlemen out of men's wear and the whole thing would feel incomplete. They had launched the LLR line new, and only here in London—the romance of the Western frontier pushed as far as it would go. The quality went without saying. Their modern reading of Western wear was nothing short of art.
Perhaps that was why Jo Sudeok had spent a full ten million won before the doors even opened. His wardrobe was considerably the richer for it. His wallet was considerably the thinner.
If even a miser like Jo Sudeok was willing to part with that kind of money, LLR's success was as good as sealed.
Ralph Warren had taken half the fifth floor. The remaining half was split between the pinnacle of bespoke shoemaking, John Green, and Sir Lewis's tailor shop, the house that had long been responsible for the uniforms of the Royal School.
This part was a secret. In Sir Lewis's case, it may have been because they had let him open a Queensman store on a shop-in-shop basis. President Park Jihoon had answered with a characteristically bold reward: he would not take a penny of rent for the rest of the man's life.
On the money alone, it looked like a losing trade. But to have brought in a master chosen by the royal household—there was a symbolic weight to that, no question.
Our president always looks a long way ahead.
Practically astronomical-telescope range. The people under him suffered a little for it, but where else was there a man as worth trusting as President Park Jihoon?
At any rate: Ralph Warren, John Green, and Sir Lewis besides. The fifth floor of the London department store was about to become holy ground for the English gentleman.
Jo Sudeok was smiling to himself in private satisfaction when a voice found him.
"President."
A title that still felt awkward, however often he heard it.
"President Park Jihoon is waiting on the line."
Jo Sudeok scrambled back to his office. He did not even pause to catch his breath before he snatched up the receiver.
"P-President. Did you arrive safely?"
"Of course. Thanks to you."
His voice sounded good. Had the talk with the Chairman gone well?
Then an answer he had not expected came back.
"I've decided to acquire the Ferrari team."
"What? F-Ferrari?"
He did not ask whether such a thing was even possible. If it was the president, there would certainly be some extraordinary idea behind it.
"We have to mount a Hyeon-gang engine and win with it. Before I graduate from high school."
"You'll be busy for a while, then."
Jo Sudeok waited for whatever came next, certain there would be instructions. Park Jihoon's answer was simplicity itself.
"I just wanted to tell you."
"Yes?"
"You've been with me from the very beginning. I thought I ought to say it."
Honestly, that was the line that caught in his throat. He knew the world was full of fine words. I trust you. I'll put you to noble use. You've suffered, so I'll see you richly rewarded. And yet that one sentence, set down so plainly—I just wanted to tell you—and the true feeling inside it, that he had been there from the start, hauled the loyalty of Jo Sudeok the man up to its very limit.
President! I don't know how long I have to live, but until the moment I close my eyes, I will give you every ounce of loyalty I have!
Jo Sudeok forced the surge back down and asked.
"Once this project is finished, you'll have your freedom?"
"That's the idea. It'll cost at least a trillion won... If Grandfather has any conscience at all..."
At the word trillion, he very nearly choked—and right then the voice went on.
"Still. Grandfather gets his dream, and I get to be a free man. A trillion won is worth spending for that, more or less. That's how I'm choosing to see it."
"President, I'll do everything I can to be of help as well..."
"It's all right."
"I'll raise the department store's sales somehow..."
"Money from the department store ought to be spent on the department store."
"...!"
He had forgotten. Conscience in management was another of their president's specialties.
"Then whatever it is, I'll make certain I'm of help..."
"A phone call now and then is already more help than I know what to do with."
Something broke in his chest. The loyalty that was supposed to last until the day he closed his eyes—
Even if I'm born again, I will look to no one but you, President!
—had just been extended. All the way into the next life.
Park Jihoon's room.
It really would have been nice if the professor were here in Korea with me.
I swallowed the regret and lay back on the bed. Only one person. Even so, I was genuinely grateful to have someone I could empty myself to, all the way down.
Just wait until I turned twenty. A wine party with the professor—I was doing it. Me.
That aside.
"......"
I had lain down to sleep, and my eyes were stubbornly wide open. Maybe the bed was different. Or maybe a worry had appeared.
Ferrari.
It was going to cost a great deal. Someone like me, with plenty of fixed income, had a powerful weapon in paying by installments...
I can hardly tell people who are refusing to sell that we'll pay in installments.
Which meant the purchase price, plus a year's operating costs, might have to go out as a lump sum—a generous trillion won, all at once.
Jihoon, with money like that, couldn't you just retire and live in comfort?
Tsk.
The best cash cows I had were Capsulemon and Mad Bull. True enough. But if I started stamping out Capsulemon merchandise without restraint just because I needed cash...
The quality would drop, people would get tired of the characters, and the value of the IP would fall straight through the floor.
Mad Bull, by contrast? Mass production was no problem, and the more it sold, the easier distribution became. Selling a great deal of it would never wear the image thin.
For the time being, I ought to concentrate on Mad Bull.
A plan to earn a trillion won by selling soft drinks. I really was something else.
I scratched at my head. And yet it was strange. Far from feeling the weight of it, I was looking forward to it. Honestly, it almost felt as if I were enjoying the situation. Was I, just the tiniest bit, starting to find management fun?
Bah.
What am I even saying!
Enough of that. Sleep, and soon. I kept my eyes shut.
"......"
For a long while I courted a sleep that would not come.
The next morning, the moment I woke, I showered, changed into workout clothes, and left the house.
How long has it been since I exercised in Korea?
Unlike London's sullen sky, Seoul's morning was still clear and blue. I grinned.
Shall I run?
The neighborhood was so quiet and still that all I could hear was birdsong. Because of that, I could give myself over entirely to my own breathing.
"Hoo. Hooo."
The virtue of a run was that it emptied your head completely. I went for about thirty minutes without a rest, then stopped and dragged in a rough breath.
"Hahh. Hahhh."
I lifted my head.
The office. It's been a while.
Before I went abroad to study, I had come in here every day. That aside—there was still a long time before the workday, and the lights were already on?
I climbed to the lit third floor, thinking I might as well say hello. The face beyond the glass door was Martin's. The prodigy who had graduated first in his class at MIT.
"Oh? President!"
"Have you been well?"
"Of course. Thanks to you, I've made plenty of money and lived in comfort."
Comfort, he said. That was the face of a man who hadn't gone home today either, and had spent the night in the office.
Had he read my look?
"Is this your work, Martin?"
"Well, it's a little embarrassing to call it a work. Haha."
His expression said that once this was finished, he meant to rest properly for a while. He had clearly suffered over it.
"The truth is, testing finished a long time ago. I've just kept holding on to it out of worry. I'll check for another day or two, and if there's no problem, I'm thinking of releasing it."
"Right. That military one you showed me back then..."
"Ah."
The one Jack had torn to pieces with his feedback. Still, thank goodness it was finished. Heh.
After that we caught up on everything that had piled up. Martin said he had followed my news steadily through the international reports. Hearing that he had gotten word of me from the news itself felt strangely off.
Anyway. Since the conversation had already started, I slipped in a little business.
"By any chance, could you introduce me to an engineer among your MIT classmates?"
"There are quite a few kinds of engineer..."
"The automotive kind. Salary up to two million dollars a year, after tax. MIT doctoral level, and able to move workplaces flexibly—Korea, Italy, and so on."
"At that level, you mean you need someone near the very top."
"Yes. Someone any company would stand in line to bring in."
"What would the work be, specifically?"
"Developing an engine to be used in F1."
"F1?"
In an instant, Martin's eyes changed completely.
"So... you're looking for people to put on an F1 engine project?"
I nodded.
"If... if you don't mind..."
"......?"
"Could I... apply as well?"
An answer I had not seen coming.
"I don't need a salary."
"......?"
"F1, robots, rockets. Every person of science dreams of them. If you'll only let me, I'll work until I drop."
I was grateful for the offer. But could Martin, a student of physics, really develop an engine—the very flower of mechanical engineering?
"I'll have to study. I don't expect to be thrown in right away, either."
"Ah... I'm sorry, but there isn't time. I need results within two years and six months..."
"What?"
"Give me six months and I'm confident people will already be calling me an expert."
That confidence... where is it coming from?
Well. This was Martin, the one they had called a genius even at MIT, where only the gifted gathered. More than that, he was not a man who would puff himself up just because greed had blinded him.
"I really am confident."
Right. What was the use of agonizing? I was about to make the decision when he spoke again.
"But, President."
"......?"
"There are quite a few teams in F1. If I may, do you know where I'd be assigned?"
"It's still only in the planning. Nothing in particular has been decided."
"Even so, your plans always come true, don't they?"
Martin was laying the flattery on thick. He really did want this.
"For now, I'm watching Ferrari."
At that single sentence, the corners of his mouth climbed in a wide grin.
I hadn't even considered Martin joining.
I had just taken an unexpected win, and I was stepping out of the office when a racket rose from the building entrance. Loud voices. It was my brother Yugeon's.
Coming to the office first thing in the morning was one thing.
Hm?
He wasn't alone. Every one of them neatly dressed. At a glance it looked like a gathering of model students—all except one, the only one carrying nunchucks.
Huh. A face that seemed familiar. Where had I seen him?
"Jihoon!"
"Hey, hyung."
"Say hello. This is my little brother."
If they were my brother's friends, the ordinary thing would have been for them to talk down to me. Most high schoolers would have done exactly that. Instead—
"Ah... th-the person... we've only heard about..."
"You seem really grown-up in person."
They must have heard the rumors. Every face looked a little intimidated. They seemed to see me less as Yugeon's younger brother than as the president of a company, or as someone who had been on the news.
But exactly one of them—the fellow with the nunchucks—gave me a bright smile.
"So you're Jihoon?"
I hadn't known that easy, casual speech could be this welcome.
"It's a pleasure to meet you. I'm Park Jihoon."
He tucked the nunchucks under his arm and offered his hand.
"Good to meet you. I'm Yoon Taejun."
Ah... I knew I'd seen him somewhere. So you're TJ.