How to Use Superpowers - Chapter 1
The superpowers bestowed by Goddess Tara struck me as rather ambiguous.
- Teleportation: I could teleport about two meters at once. But usable only twice a day.
- Remote Touch: While physically touching a target's skin, I could read their mind.
- Remote Gesture: I could perform hand gestures or apply tactile stimulation remotely. But only within a ten-meter range.
I found them strangely vague. Was a two-meter jump really a superpower? What use could I even put it to?
Still, I'd received three of them from a goddess who'd saved me. That alone made it worth the trouble.
And not long after I'd been given those powers, word came that my father had passed. It hit me like a bolt from the blue.
While I was stationed overseas, I had no clue what had happened at his company. I'd never imagined his business would fail. Now I had to take leave, barely handle the funeral, and fly back. Only after finishing my military service could I finally dig into the mess my father had left behind.
After he died, I scoured the internet for the full story. But it was packed with suspicious details. Nothing he supposedly did seemed believable. Then, once I returned, I found a message and files my father had left me personally. Those finally gave me the truth.
At his planning agency, my father had been a hardcore PD. His company, Luna Planning, had launched a girl group and, once they hit with a hit song, it became a star agency. He'd poured everything into it. In the end, he'd claimed honor and wealth.
That was the extent of what I'd known before my overseas posting.
Once I was abroad, the situation spiraled out of control. Luna Girls—the girl group my father had raised—started a PR war and filed lawsuits. Sudden, insane chaos. Rumors flew, public opinion turned on my father, and he lost everything. But every single smear was orchestrated by the executives of his own company. They teamed up with blind girl group members to steal the profits. In the end, my father was robbed of his company and died young from a heart attack.
'The superpowers that suddenly appeared from Goddess Tara. Maybe she gave them to me to take revenge on these bastards.'
I believed it. The gift from the god who wanted those who betrayed my father punished. Even if the powers were vague, the possibilities were endless. I was certain I could use Tara's gifts to exact revenge.
Simply exposing the truth wouldn't soothe the anger my father and I both felt. I had to take everything from them and make them suffer even worse than the pain he'd endured.
'The first order of business is to recover the property my father lost. The bastards who stole his company are Yoo Seok-yeon, the representative of Mercury Planning. Mercury Planning is just Luna Planning under a new name.'
I scoured the electronics district, buying everything I needed. The only remaining step was infiltrating the guy's office. Fortunately, he'd only changed the company name and hadn't moved it. The building layout was familiar. I'd worked there before my posting, helping my father.
It was late after everyone else had gone home. I headed for the Manseong Building where Mercury Planning was located. Of course, I planned every route to avoid the street CCTV cameras.
I changed into disguise and moved from spots not covered by cameras. I descended to the seventh floor and took the emergency stairs to the sixth. A camera sat at the corner of the emergency stairs. I stuck the prepared bug on it. I lightly smeared water on the bottom and used a stick to attach it. It would cling to the camera for a while thanks to the water.
'The CCTV tech will know a bug is stuck there.'
With that, the cameras were taken care of. Now all I had to do was slip inside.
Tap-tap-tap.
'This must be the representative's office.'
Just a hallway and a wall. The entrance to Mercury Planning's office was another ten meters away. Of course, the glass door was firmly shut, surrounded by security gear. But the office itself was pressed right against this wall.
'Teleportation!'
Instantly, my location shifted. From the empty hallway, I stepped into the cluttered office packed with office supplies.
'Depending on how I use it, this is a complete scam superpower.'
Truly insane power. I could slip through walls. At first I hadn't known what to do with a mere two-meter teleport. But now it was perfect for breaching walls. An ambiguous superpower became a powerful one depending on how I applied it.
'Anyway, I'm in. Representative's office of Mercury Planning.'
Even that vague two-meter teleport was incredibly useful now. It let me pass through any thick wall. In an instant, I was inside the representative's office of Mercury Planning.
'This is my first visit in a long time.'
It had been since I'd left the country. A new feeling stirred in me. But now was not the time to linger.
'Heh. As expected, no CCTV in the representative's office.'
Just like a filthy bastard. Originally there had been cameras, installed by my father. But now all that remained was an empty hole in the ceiling. Yoo Seok-yeon had removed them after he took over as representative.
'Helping me out, huh. No time to waste, so let's get to work.'
I installed hacking software on Yoo Seok-yeon's PC and laptop using a multi-boot disk. Then I placed a microscopic spy camera inside the speaker.
Placing it inside the speaker had major advantages. Even if the lens made sound, no one would know. The thin speaker membrane hid the camera. And because it drew power from the speaker, it could communicate. Of course, every detail of the camera's operation would be thoroughly deleted by the hacking program. Only the necessary data would be sent secretly to the cloud, and every log and file would be wiped in real time. Even if the camera was discovered, there'd be no evidence left.
All preparations were complete. Now I just had to wait for the fish to bite into the net.
It didn't take long.
'I knew it. The Mercury Planning representative was embezzling company funds right under my father's nose. But how the hell did he get so many slush funds?'
Yoo Seok-yeon had either transferred the slush funds from his PC after everyone left or checked the deposits himself. He'd accessed accounts under third-party names.
>> 6.5 billion won!
He'd amassed a fortune. No, not amassed—it was money he'd stolen from my father's company. And that money was now mine.
To steal those six-point-five billion, I needed to infiltrate the representative's office again.
'Through the keylogger I found the password, and with the spy camera I got the security card number. But I couldn't snatch the certificate. And I had to make the fund transfer myself on Yoo Seok-yeon's desk.'
I returned to the representative's office. The second infiltration was even easier.
'Teleportation!'
That vague two-meter teleport I once thought useless had become an astonishingly useful superpower when applied properly.
I turned on the PC, logged into the bank, and accessed the shell account under a third-party name.
'As expected, this is a business account without any transfer limit.'
Yoo Seok-yeon's shell account had no transfer limit.
'He needs to pull out money in an emergency.'
Obvious. If anything went wrong, he'd need to empty the shell account in one go, so he set it up that way. If it had a daily limit of ten million won, how long would it take to drain it all? Ten million every day for two years.
Personal accounts wouldn't work for that. So I made it look like a business account. Yoo Seok-yeon's infinite-limit setting was perfect for me. Thanks to it, I pulled out the entire 6.5 billion in one shot.
>> Fund transfer completed!
The money landed in my account. Of course, it wasn't a real-name domestic account. I'd created a shell account in a paper company in a foreign financial haven. The drawback was the fees, but I could eventually turn it back into my own money through loops.
'Just like that, the logs show the money leaving his desk. When he learns the truth, he'll lose his mind. The person most likely to suspect it will be that shrewd bitch Min Hee-jae.'
Only two people could enter the representative's office—Yoo Seok-yeon and Min Hee-jae. Since it wasn't Yoo Seok-yeon's own doing, the only suspect left was Min Hee-jae. The logs clearly showed the money was taken from his desk and PC. Yoo Seok-yeon would have no choice but to suspect her.
'I didn't even have to think about it. They'll turn on each other in suspicion and fight. That'll give me the effect of killing three birds with one stone.'
My prediction was spot on. The screens sent by the spy camera showed the exact moment they quarreled after work. They grabbed each other by the collar and started swinging. But because Min Hee-jae was a woman, Yoo Seok-yeon couldn't go violent anymore.
‘Fuck, you bastard! You think I don't know what your account is? How many passwords, certificates, security cards do you think I need to know? How the hell did I get them? Did you ever tell me? No! So why are you saying I stole from your account? No, wait—how much money did you put in there to begin with? You were embezzling, weren't you? The money from selling the kids' bodies?’
Min Hee-jae was raging full force.
'What the hell is she talking about? Selling the kids' bodies?'
The vulgar words mixed with that line were something I hadn't expected. The "kids" Min Hee-jae had mentioned were the idols under Mercury Planning. Had they really been selling their bodies? If it was true, the story would be shocking.