A Dagger in the Back
"...Report."
The briefing began under an atmosphere thick enough to choke on.
"It has come to light that Wire Credit committed accounting fraud on the order of 5 trillion won, and the authorities have launched an immediate investigation. However, everyone from the CEO on down to the majority of the executives had already fled abroad in advance, leaving Wire Credit effectively... a company with no management at all."
In other words, it had taken a blow from which there was no recovering.
"Are you telling me there's truly nothing to be done? The scale is massive, sure, but accounting fraud happens all the time. Plenty of companies have patched themselves back together after worse."
"There isn't a single person left to take responsibility and clean up this mess. And above all, Wire Credit is drowning in debt. The remaining staff have already concluded it's beyond them and filed for bankruptcy."
"Those insane bastards! Bankruptcy? Absolutely not! Then what are the shareholders supposed to do? And our 300 billion... our 300 billion!!"
At President Joo Yongwook's venomous shriek, the executives of Ilseong Securities held their silence. Seeing their reactions, Joo Yongwook understood that there was nothing left for the company to do.
"...How much of this product did we actually sell after making it?"
"The product only just cleared review at headquarters and the 300 billion was disbursed, so..."
"Hold on. Don't tell me it hasn't even gone on sale yet?"
"...No, sir."
Joo Yongwook squeezed his eyes shut. Soon even his voice was trembling.
"Th-then everything we're holding is worthless scrap paper? And we paid a full 300 billion for it?!"
"...We're sorry, sir."
If they had packaged the product and sold it into the market, they could have recouped some portion of the damage. But they hadn't even managed to begin selling, and now the bonds in their hands had turned entirely into wastepaper. 300 billion won had literally disintegrated into thin air.
"How in God's name did this happen? Someone should have caught on long ago that Wire Credit was this dangerous!"
Joo Yongwook hammered on the table. A disaster this enormous had erupted, which meant someone — anyone — had to answer for it.
"Division Head Kim. You're the one who brought this in, aren't you? You couldn't properly vet a single deal, and this is the disaster you cause!?"
"W-well, you see..."
The division head felt wronged too. After all, it had been President Joo Yongwook himself who had rammed this deal through, haggling over the fees to boot.
"Daeseong Securities abruptly dropped the contract, so we had no choice but to take it."
Daeseong. That name again.
In truth, had Daeseong not dropped its contract with Wire Credit, Ilseong Securities would never have spent 300 billion won in the first place.
"I was told they dropped it as a gesture of reconciliation toward us. Are you saying that wasn't the reason?"
"It was the opposite. It appears Daeseong knew about this in advance. If they deliberately dropped the contract in order to spring a trap on us..."
At that, another executive rose in objection.
"Sir, that's pure speculation. It isn't as though Daeseong abandoned the contract and then pressured us to take it, did they?"
"But everyone in Yeouido knew that if that contract slipped away, Ilseong would snatch it up without fail. Which means this was deliberate from the very beginning. To stab Ilseong in the back!"
Joo Yongwook was the sort of man who liked to interpret every situation however it suited him. Rationally, he surely knew better — but with his emotions running this hot, his judgment had clouded over, and his mind was spinning wild theories of its own accord.
Daeseong... setting a trap?
That Daeseong had lured Ilseong into a trap. There was a certain logic to it. Granted, Daeseong had never come out and said, we'll hand over the Wire Credit contract, so let's make peace. They had merely made the gesture. And so Ilseong, standing above Daeseong, had taken the contract like a magnanimous elder brother extending grace.
But those bastards had known. They had known Wire Credit was a bomb primed to detonate. They had known perfectly well that dropping the contract at that precise moment would send Ilseong greedily scooping it up — and they had let it go without a single word of warning. They had driven a dagger into their backs, cold and deliberate.
First the short-selling liquidation incident, and now Wire Credit. The thought that he had been outmaneuvered by Daeseong's cunning sent fury boiling up to the tips of his hair.
"CEO Kwon. That son of a bitch...!"
He snatched up his phone to call the man right then, but soon lowered it again. If he called now, the other side would obviously play dumb — did we ever tell you to buy it? Besides, he had no intention of being laughed at by a man who'd been born a commoner.
"Division Head Kim. Why are you still sitting there? You cause a catastrophe of this scale and expect to keep that title? Get out. Now!"
At Joo Yongwook's thunderous rebuke, the division head fled the conference room as if hurled out.
"The rest of you had better wake up. You think headquarters will quietly sit back and watch us get played by Daeseong twice? If we don't pay them back, every last one of you gets flushed out too. Understood?"
"..."
If they failed to pay Daeseong back, he would see to it that everyone in this room ended up just like the division head who had just been cast out. That was how thoroughly the venom had risen in Joo Yongwook. Wasn't that simply how the world worked? An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth.
"Hahh..."
I kneaded my stiff, aching shoulders. Even my thighs were sore for the first time in ages — apparently I'd climbed a little too enthusiastically at the hiking club gathering. I had no idea how our Chairman kept himself in such shape at his age, but I'd cheerfully kept pace with him up the mountain, and now my entire body was paying the price.
"Nice watch."
"Sorry?"
"I've been thinking for a while now that you have a real eye for watches."
"Ah, I didn't pick this one myself... It was a gift."
"Oh really?"
"Yes. Team Leader Cheon Doa gave it to me a while back as a promotion present."
"Team Leader Cheon did?"
Team Leader Song tilted his head, looking mildly surprised.
"Is something wrong, though? You've been frowning and kneading your shoulder this whole time. Is it because of me?"
I waved my hands in quick denial.
"Not at all. I just climbed a little too hard over the weekend."
"A mountain?"
"Yes. We had a hiking club outing."
"..."
Team Leader Song stared at me as if that were the last thing he'd expected to hear.
"I like breathing mountain air."
"...I see."
The team leader went back to eating his meal slowly. For the record, this was a lunch for just the two of us — Team Leader Song had abruptly insisted on buying. Honestly speaking... it was a little suffocating. It's hard enough to eat comfortably with any superior, but with Team Leader Song it was far worse. Even the simple act of eating carried an edge of madness you could feel in every bite, if that makes sense. So I was matching his pace, unable to speed up or slow down. And somehow, my stomach didn't seem to be digesting anything at all.
"...About Wire Credit."
Then the team leader spoke, his tone heavy.
"Did you know in advance, Associate Kang?"
Wire Credit. The topic that had set all of Yeouido ablaze. You couldn't imagine the uproar when the accounting fraud erupted out of nowhere — the European markets had convulsed, and our own domestic market had wobbled because of it.
"..."
But how was I supposed to answer that? I still remembered the foul stench that project had given off. That was why I hadn't recommended it, and had instead pushed the rare earths — the option with the sweetest scent. I had known nothing about Wire Credit's illegal dealings. Still, I had sensed something rotten, so did that count as knowing, or not?
"You don't have to answer. That silence just now told me enough."
"Ah..."
"Thank you. If you hadn't stopped us that day, we'd have taken a devastating loss. From what I hear, Ilseong — the ones who picked up that contract — lost all 300 billion, just like that."
"That wasn't my doing. The final decision was yours and Managing Director Park's."
It wasn't a lie. I was the one who had smelled the rot and steered clear, but it was the people above me who had ultimately killed that massive contract.
But had that eased the atmosphere at the table? It had not.
"Sure, we saved 300 billion — but the problem is that the entire sum went straight into rare earths. Even now, at this very moment, Daeseong is structured to be losing money."
"..."
The capital that should have gone into Wire Credit had been swept wholesale into rare earths instead. The problem was that the board had ballooned far beyond anyone's imagination.
And this is partly my own fault.
That day, because of my dinner plans with Juim Han, I'd rushed through the report without examining it properly. I'd skimmed just deep enough for my nose to react, and the one I'd picked had turned out to be an ultra-high-risk product. Then, to make matters worse, the people above me — trusting the track record I'd built — had pushed the investment through exactly as presented. Straight from headquarters, no less! They did say that in Yeouido, once you prove your ability, the support that comes pouring down is staggering. That was exactly the right phrase for it. I'd thrown myself into the role of this investment's lead and gone so far as to stamp Team Leader Song's name on it.
"Honestly, I still have a lot of doubts about this investment."
"..."
I couldn't bring myself to say I felt the same.
"But I remember vividly the face you made when you handed me that strategy report, Associate Kang."
"My face?"
"Absolutely brimming with conviction and confidence... That was the look."
Had I really looked like that?
"Watching this Wire Credit affair has given me a great deal to think about. There's something to your decisions, shall we say... With analytical instincts that sharp, no wonder you've earned recognition and come this far."
"My analytical skills really aren't anything special."
"Modest, too."
"..."
Only then did the team leader finish his meal and wet his throat with a glass of water.
"This time too, we'll sit back and hope a miracle happens. And if it doesn't..."
"If it doesn't...?"
"Then the two of us pack our bags and walk out together, nice and friendly."
"!?"
The flashier the backing, the heavier the accountability that came with it. Suddenly, my mother's and my sister's faces floated up before me. Recently, while preparing to open my mother's diner, I'd even brought the hiking club crowd along on the weekend and treated them all to a meal.
"..."
So I wasn't going to retreat easily. If there was risk, I might have to answer for it... but flip it around, and if it hit big, the credit would belong to me and the team leader, wouldn't it?
"...Just as I thought."
He had known something. Kang Suho had.
Back in his office, Team Leader Song sipped bitter coffee and replayed the conversation he'd just shared with Kang Suho over and over.
"Does he have access to information far beyond ours?"
Kang Suho had blocked that project because he knew about the Wire Credit disaster. But had it truly been a matter of intelligence? Or had Wire Credit simply looked somehow wrong through Kang Suho's eyes?
He couldn't tell what Kang Suho's uncanny gift was, but one thing was certain.
"Managing Director Park will move exactly as he intends."
Kang Suho was unmistakably Director Geum Gaho's man. And Managing Director Park had made no secret of his ambition to destroy the two of them on his way up to group headquarters. Because he understood that psychology, it kept feeling as though Kang Suho had deliberately tossed out bait.
He said it was thanks to my decision and Managing Director Park's that we averted the Wire Credit disaster.
On the surface it sounded like modesty, but think it through, and it sounded like a man who had known all along that Managing Director Park would dance to his tune. Kang Suho had known Park was firmly aligned with headquarters — and had exploited that fact to the hilt.
"But for that to hold, something has to blow up on the rare earths side."
If this truly was Kang Suho's deliberate design, it meant he had exploited Managing Director Park's hatred of Director Geum Gaho to swell the board to this size. The problem was that if the rare earths kept bleeding money like this, everything would flow exactly the way Managing Director Park wanted. Worse, rare earth prices were forecast to keep sliding, with no sign of a rebound anywhere.
"T-Team Leader!"
Just then, the door burst open yet again. Lately, every time Manager Yu came barreling in like that, his heart had lurched into his throat.
"What is it this time?"
"I f-found something!"
"Found what?"
"The rare earths, sir. You told me to dig up even the smallest piece of good news that might lift them, remember?"
Something had struck Team Leader Song as deeply wrong, so he had ordered his team to bring him every conceivable catalyst that could push rare earth prices higher.
"This Wire Credit affair is connected to the rare earths."
"What on earth are you talking about?"
"With Wire Credit being picked apart, several facts have come to light — and one of them is that money was flowing into rare earth derivatives. These were over-the-counter derivatives, structured through financial institutions, and they'd taken out massive short positions."
Team Leader Song began by combing through the file Manager Yu had brought. Like so many other companies, Wire Credit had borrowed money against its own shares and sunk it into a number of investments. But the proportion flowing into rare earths was overwhelming. Up to that point, it wasn't really a problem — companies partnering with financial institutions to grow their capital through safe products was business as usual.
"The problem is that Wire Credit's shares are turning entirely into waste paper, the company has filed for bankruptcy, and the damage to the financial institutions is severe. The bonds and collateral that were supposed to hedge everything have all vanished."
As he listened to the report, Team Leader Song's pupils trembled, ever so slightly.
"Which means..."
"With Wire Credit going under, the global financial institutions that lent to them are staring down collateral shortfalls — they're on the verge of entering large-scale forced liquidations."
Short selling is a technique where you borrow an asset and sell it, betting the price will fall. But when the collateral evaporates and you're driven to the edge of a cliff, there's only one option: buy back the rare earths flooding the market like madmen and force those short positions closed.
"Team Leader. If this happens, it's a massive short squeeze...!"
"!?"
A low groan escaped Team Leader Song. Once the buying relay began, the plummeting price of rare earths would quite literally punch through the stratosphere.
"Word of this will spread before long, and anyone holding rare earths will refuse to sell. They'll know the price is only going higher."
And it was self-evident that Daeseong Securities, which had bet on rare earths rising, would reap a staggering profit.
"...Team Leader. It looks like Associate Kang Suho is going to punch through impossible odds and turn a profit after all."
A chill crawled up his spine. Wire Credit's accounting fraud. The chain reaction of soaring rare earth prices that would follow. And a headquarters that had waved this insane investment strategy straight through. Had Kang Suho truly seen all the way to this? Making himself the bait to deceive his enemies, then turning their own greed against them to conjure up profits of this magnitude—
"That madman."
The curse slipped out of Team Leader Song's mouth before he knew it. It wasn't anger. It was pure, unadulterated awe in the face of overwhelming talent.