The Heart of a Beast
"Intern Kang. How was your first day? Must have been absolute chao—huh?"
Deputy Yoo froze mid-sentence, then smacked my back with a crack.
"Wh-what is this?!"
I jolted awake right alongside him.
"Huh?"
"What is this? Why is all the money in here?!"
"......."
"Oh no. I should have come in earlier. You looked so gentle I figured you'd chicken out and barely buy anything at all. This isn't the heart of a beast—you're just plain insane."
Deputy Yoo shook his head slowly, one hand pressed to his throbbing temple.
"Did you not look at the documents I gave you?"
"I did."
"You were the ace of the Research Center, weren't you? Even a glance at those papers should have given you an idea of what to buy. And if you really had no clue, buying Gwangmyeong Electronics wouldn't have been a bad move. Right?"
"That's true."
"Then why did you buy *this*? All one billion won of it!"
Utterly baffled, he jabbed a finger at the screen.
[Han-seong Steel]
South Korea's flagship steelmaker.
That was the stock I'd bet on.
"You know the steel sector is in a brutal recession right now. Do you even know where Han-seong Steel's share price peaked back in 2007?"
750,000 won.
I remembered it well—it was a case study that came up constantly back when I was deep in my stock market obsession—but I kept my mouth shut.
"It went over 750,000 won. And what's it worth now?"
"....About 150,000 won."
"Right. In ten years, it's been slashed to a fifth of its value."
A truly staggering loss.
If I'd been holding that stock at its peak, I'd have been dizzy with dread.
"The real problem is that this isn't even the bottom. You know the saying—there's a basement under the floor. According to the report that just came out, some are saying Han-seong Steel could drop below 100,000 won."
The reason Han-seong, Korea's representative steel company, had fallen so far was China's insane price offensive.
Hoping to dominate the world market, China had launched the Belt and Road Initiative, a massive infrastructure project, and poured itself into the steel industry.
Armed with overwhelming labor, they'd tried to swallow the market not with quality but with rock-bottom prices.
The quality might be inferior, but once you dump goods at prices nobody could match, the sheer volume becomes more than Han-seong Steel could withstand.
"So in the end, China's price war crushed the world's steelmakers, and fear that Korea's steel era was over took over the entire market. And that fear is still running the show. It got so bad people started whispering that Han-seong Steel might shut its doors for good."
"That's right...."
"And someone who knows all that goes and buys it up—not a portion of the funds, but the whole thing? Are you out of your mind?"
"......."
Just because it was my first time in the Trading Division didn't mean I lacked the basics.
Obviously, I understood the fundamentals of trading.
"People assume we're gamblers addicted to returns, but that's not it at all. Honestly, we're the biggest cowards in the building. When you buy a particular stock, you *always* manage your risk. Even if you're certain it's going up."
Risk management.
That was the foundation of trading.
Even when you predicted a stock would rise, you hedged against the possibility that it would fall instead.
"It's like insurance. Inverse ETFs, put options, short selling, and so on. You spread your risk management across all kinds of instruments, and even if it eats into your returns, you absolutely cannot lose money."
Never lose money. Ever.
The most important commandment of all.
"Why do you think our traders set monthly return targets of just one to five percent? When the market's bad, most people do nothing at all or aim for zero percent. If they don't, they hit a loss cut and their desk gets pulled out from under them."
Loss cut.
The automatic suspension of trading authorization the moment your monthly losses hit five percent.
"And yet someone who knows all of that just went all-in on a dying steel stock...!"
I had been drunk on that moment's fragrance when my finger pressed the buy button.
'I had no idea it would end up being the entire amount.'
Honestly, after buying, I'd considered undoing it—selling right then and there to restore everything to how it was.
But I couldn't.
'The moment my hand moved toward the sell button, that overwhelming stench came rushing back.'
It was the kind of paralyzing stench that froze your entire body, so much that a single finger couldn't twitch.
So I'd just sat there, staring blankly at the screen.
"Unbelievable. What am I supposed to do with you? The equipment team bent over backward to set up that desk, and now it looks like we'll have to take it back tomorrow."
"......."
"But you never know. Once the market opens tomorrow, you can sell it all and recover your principal. The real problem is the Risk Management Team... and I don't think they're going to let you off easy. Because you dumped everything in with zero hedge whatsoever."
"Will my desk be gone when I come in tomorrow...?"
"It might be."
I knew deep down that disaster had struck—but what could I do?
The arrow had already left my hand.
'Should I have somehow forced a sell back then?'
If I'd grabbed hold of my senses and squeezed out every ounce of strength, maybe I could have pressed the sell button.
But I hadn't.
Was it simply because I was afraid of that stench?
No. I'd lived my entire life surrounded by foul smells. Why would that one moment scare me?
'...Something told me it would work out.'
It was the same insane thought I'd had at the Research Center: what if, just maybe, it happens again this time?
Apparently, Deputy Yoo was right. I wasn't just the heart of a beast—I really was a madman.
"......."
Team Leader Oh had barely been able to trade at all today.
And whose fault was that?
That young master who'd dropped on us like a tactical nuke, of course.
"Excuse me, Team Leader."
"Hm? What is it, Deputy Yoo?"
"It's about... the intern who started today."
The word *intern* alone pulled a sigh out of him.
"What about the intern?"
"Well, the intern made a huge mistake today. He dumped a full billion won into Han-seong Steel with no risk management whatsoever."
"......."
"I'll liquidate everything the moment the market opens tomorrow. But the Risk Management Team is likely to push back. If you could just handle them, I'll sort out the rest. I should have kept a closer eye on him sooner. I'm sorry."
Deputy Yoo.
I remembered telling him before that he was too soft-hearted for his own good—that he needed to toughen up.
In the world of traders, there is no such thing as camaraderie.
Rugged individualism is the only rule, and while we may play as a team, you must never become a burden that drags down everyone's incentives.
That's why dead weight gets rotated out as fast as burnt-out lightbulbs.
And yet this fool, whether out of sheer personality or something else, was pouring his own time into someone else—someone who didn't even require his attention.
Without even knowing who this intern really was.
"I already know."
"Pardon?"
"That young mas—no. That intern dumped everything into a steel stock."
Why else would Team Leader Oh have failed to trade properly today?
He'd been watching that parachute hire's every move from start to finish.
A billion won is pocket change to those people, so he'd expected them to squander it on personal amusement—but he never imagined they'd commit the lunacy of going all-in on a single stock.
And not even on a stock about to hit its upper limit, but on a steelmaker that could collapse at any moment.
Defying common sense like that—yes, that was precisely how an unseasoned member of the Royal Family behaved.
"Deputy Yoo. That intern... just leave him alone."
"Excuse me?"
"Whatever he does, let him be."
"......."
"You didn't scold him or anything, did you?"
"Ah. I gave him a bit of a hard time, asking why he'd traded like that, but nothing serious. Anyone can make a mistake, after all. It was his first time too... Frankly, I don't really understand the company's decision to hand a billion won to an intern in the first place."
I almost snapped at him—what harmless nonsense had he spouted this time to poke at the young master's pride?
But I held my tongue.
"Don't try to understand. That only costs you."
"......."
"Now get out of here."
"Yes, sir."
After sending the hopelessly kind Deputy Yoo on his way, Team Leader Oh quietly stared at the intern's account—empty as a drained well.
"......."
...Should I put more betting money in for him?
Deputy Yoo knew it too.
He knew how cold and merciless the trading world was.
Ruthless individualism and a brutal obsession with results.
This was a place where you couldn't afford to grow attached—a place where your own teammates might stab you in the back without warning.
"That personality of mine. Always the problem."
He knew all that, and yet the human heart refused to cooperate.
Whenever he saw someone who needed help, he wanted to help them, and he wanted to stay close to everyone around him.
"Judging by what the Team Leader said yesterday... it sounds like that intern has really been blacklisted."
If it had been the usual Team Leader, he'd have thrown a fit, demanding whether the man had lost his mind.
Instead, his reaction had been icy cold.
And what did that mean?
It meant the Team Leader had no intention of covering for the intern—that if anything, he'd been *waiting* for the man to screw up like this.
"Come to think of it, that intern was assigned to our team awfully abruptly."
The Team Leader had clearly wanted to clear away that thorn in his side as quickly as possible.
"A shame. He seemed like a decent person."
They'd actually seemed to hit it off yesterday, too. A real pity.
"Morning. Good morning, everyone."
"Oh, Deputy Yoo's here."
Deputy Yoo didn't smoke, but he made a habit of visiting the smoking lounge anyway, just to exchange greetings with the people gathered there.
Wasn't that where you heard every scrap of company news?
At a securities firm, though, it was a little different.
What you picked up here was the latest financial intelligence.
Secondhand smoke was a small price to pay for that.
"Everyone seems a bit on edge today?"
"Ha, Deputy Yoo, you're slow on the news as ever."
"Me? Did something happen?"
"With the environmental crisis getting this bad, the Chinese government is supposedly about to take drastic measures."
"Ahh~."
A country as tightly entangled with ours as China—every time it shifted policy, the nations around it trembled with it.
"Thanks to them, our own fine dust problem is terrible too."
"Well, it's not exactly out of goodwill toward Korea. Anyway, China's own cities are so polluted that they've announced they're going to shut down or clean up their factories on a massive scale."
"So the stocks connected to that are going to be affected, then?"
"Exactly. And the sector hit hardest of all is steel."
"Steel...?"
Deputy Yoo tilted his head, puzzled.
"China was pumping enormous power into the steel sector through dumping, right? But apparently it wasn't making them nearly as much money as they'd hoped—nothing but environmental damage to show for it. So they're going to bulldoze all those zombie factories. And what happens then?"
"....Naturally, Chinese steel production would fall?"
Something was off.
Yesterday, none of this talk would have existed.
"Right. Which means Korea's steel stocks become the beneficiaries."
"Th-then wouldn't Han-seong Steel skyrocket?"
"Now you're getting it. It's Korea's flagship steel stock, isn't it? Naturally, that's the one that'll go on a monstrous rally."
"?!"
Chills began crawling up Deputy Yoo's spine.
"That's why everyone's in such a panic right now, scrambling to figure out how to get their hands on Han-seong Steel. With China's announcement, anyone holding the stock absolutely will not sell at this price."
When there are no sellers and only buyers, the result is an explosive surge in price.
That was how the market worked.
"Haah. Lucky bastards who are holding steel stocks. But how many people in Yeouido are actually holding them? Probably next to none. Up until yesterday, it was treated as complete penny-stock garbage."
Yes, that was true.
Who on earth would buy Han-seong Steel?
Anyone with an ounce of common sense would have steered clear.
It was, to put it crudely, a stock everyone treated like dog dirt.
...And yet, Deputy Yoo knew exactly one person who was holding that dog-dirt stock.
'The intern!'
That lunatic rookie who'd poured one hundred percent of his allocated funds into a steel stock in a single day.
At the time, he'd assumed the intern simply didn't know any better and made an absurd blunder.
'But what if he actually predicted this whole situation?'
Why the company had poached that intern from the Research Center, why they'd hurled a billion won at him—now, at last, it all made sense.
'He's a complete madman, isn't he?'
It seemed a monster of a rookie had just walked through their doors.