The Cult Leader Han Suhyun
"Hello! Did you get home safely?!"
"Yes~ You got home safely too, Secretary Eun?"
"Yup! I got home ve~ry safely!"
In his office, he was wearing a stiff expression. Whatever he had thought about alone yesterday was one thing, but now he was waiting for the woman who had kissed his lips without permission—and who had even claimed she knew the fact that they were divorced—to storm into his office.
"Executive Director! ...Good morning...!"
She started off loud, then realized her mistake and tried to speak in a hushed tone, but she couldn't seem to suppress her excitement by the end. Looking at her now, even that was somewhat positive. Since she was bright about everything, the way people around her treated her had definitely changed. Usually, there would be an awkward phase for about a month, but employees were already greeting her first and engaging in small talk whenever they saw her.
He looked at his monitor and said, "I told you to organize the schedule, so why haven't you..."
"I don't think you've turned on your computer yet."
As soon as the booting finished, all the tasks he needed to do were written on Post-it notes. Even her cheeky bits of advice were included. He smirked, wondering what kind of nonsense she had written down.
[Executive Director, I think it would be better to proceed with Maersk Line rather than KMTC for this. I looked into it, and European shipping companies are lowering their transport costs.]
'I really didn't know that.'
He didn't even have time to think, 'When did she write all this?' and at the same time, he wasn't interested in the fact that she was grinning beside him. He focused only on the monitor.
[Executive Director, the Seoul Metropolitan Government wants to expand the route. The contact number for the official in charge at the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport is 044-...]
'No, why are they expanding this again?'
[The UN is going to sanction Middle Eastern rare earths. Environmental pollution. I think you should place more orders.]
'Really? It hasn't hit the news...'
"Hey, how did you know this?"
"Please refrain from using wording like 'hey' or 'you' to your secretary. That's too much."
He glanced at the monitor once.
"...? Oh, right. Sorry."
He had no choice but to tuck his tail.
"No, seriously, how did you know this? Even I didn't know."
"I wake up at dawn and watch international news with my father. I think I woke up at 5 today... So while I was watching the news and working on my laptop, I thought it would be good to write it down, so I did. How is it?"
He said without a shred of hesitation, "I've never seen you give a thumbs up before, Senpai... no, Executive Director."
"What is all this... I mean, I watch the news sometimes too, but not to this extent..."
"It actually appeared as a headline. The rare earth issue was about 15 seconds? So I looked to see if there was any related content, and since you had a request in for the purchasing team, I wrote it down quickly. Either way, both are essential for semiconductor production, and holding a lot of inventory won't be flagged as a bad asset..."
No, she’s a real gem. This isn't a level a secretary should be thinking at.
"Maersk... do you know Maersk?"
"You see it every time you ride the train. You used to preach about how you need to know many companies, what all those logos do, and why industrial engineering is necessary for them..."
"You remember all that?"
"I have a good memory."
Her playful wink wasn't hateful. On top of that, without even being asked, she added, "And KM... Goryeo is a domestic shipping line, so it's expensive. Also, the marine insurance premiums are high. I thought Europe would be better, so I did that."
"...And the calculation for the transport costs to bring the ships to Korea?"
"I proceeded according to the process flow analysis from the Introduction to Industrial Engineering. I tweaked the formula slightly—not for calculating production costs, but simply to calculate the average fuel efficiency for industrial crude oil supply prices. And the Maersk FPSO has a schedule going from near the 7th Mining Zone to Saudi Arabia, which is the day after tomorrow. I called at dawn, and they said they were only moving 40% of the load due to the territorial dispute, so I told them I'd contact them after I got to work."
He stared at Eunbyul in astonishment. "You... you did that at dawn..."
"It’s the basics of being a secretary. Hehe >_<"
"..."
Still, being a meticulous person, he asked again, "No, and it's strange. It's a Danish company. The conversation..."
"They have branches in many places anyway, so I called Russia. The ships are close, too. I called the External Cooperation Department, and they gave me the number."
"The language..."
"I’m pretty good at Russian. Pretty cool, right? Phew... this popularity of mine, seriously."
A series of surprises. He didn't know who she had learned from, but she had come prepared with full-scale readiness. As he was thinking that, he recalled what had made that woman into what she was—
"...You're being very naive. If you think that way, you'll only get the wrong answer."
"You always have to think about the next move while solving problems. Our exam questions have multiple items attached to a single case, don't they?"
"If you play games, you won't get the answer. Now, junior. For this, just push through blindly using a Gantt chart..."
He thought about the past for a moment and wondered if this was a good thing or if he had raised her wrong. Meanwhile, she stood straight, wearing an expression expecting him to praise her quickly, but—
"Okay. Get to work. I need to process this quickly."
"...? Ex...ecutive Director?"
"Why."
Eunbyul stared at him, answering with her expression as if asking if there was nothing else to say. He remembered that expression. It was the same look she had when she did well on her midterm exams. So,
"Yes. You did well, Secretary Eun."
"It’s like getting a bow while lying down, but still, it feels good—"
"To expect praise after doing labor commensurate with your salary. Please work harder to make the company shine."
He leaned back in his chair, chuckled, and waved his hand dismissively. It had been a while since he’d seen her looking so dumbfounded and trembling, but it was still fun.
"Is this Electronics? Who is taking the call right now, ah... yes, thank you for your hard work. Could you please transfer the call? To the Tech Planning Department..."
"Manager! This is Han Suhyun. The rare earth approval request from the working-level staff has come up, and the UN is about to impose sanctions. Because of environmental pollution in developing countries... Yes, so I think we need to pull it forward and bring in more now. What’s the capacity like?"
"Oh, Myeongjin, no, it's not like I'm calling because you made a mistake. Oh, are you working well? We had an issue while trying to back up our tanker, yes. No, not that, let's go with Maersk. Maersk is drilling in the 7th Mining Zone and they have excess capacity, so they said we can load ours too. Yes, I approved it. I called in the morning. Yes. Right. Please tell the Team Leader that I said we should do it."
He didn't even have time to trade stocks.
"Where is the Support Team Leader! Team Leader 1!"
"Yes, Executive Director!"
"To my office, quickly-!"
She was tapping away on her laptop outside, and as he called Team Leader 1, he told her to come inside at the same time. Documents kept passing through her hands onto his desk, then returned to her hands to be stored. Time was passing too quickly. If it were usual, he would have just done his work without caring, but with a new secretary who pointed out and delivered important facts, and—
"I'm disappointed in you, Han Suhyun."
Seo Jia. The scratches to his pride and confidence inflicted by her seemed to be starting to recover, fueling a fighting spirit in his heart.
"I heard the Seoul Metropolitan Government is reviewing the expansion request for the Seonyu-Sillim Line."
"Ah, the workload is going to increase."
"If we calculate the costs and present the bill, there won't be a problem. We have to lay a few more routes in that area anyway. Including Yangcheon-gu..."
"Then right now,"
"Eh. I think we need to contact the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport to verify the facts once more, get the route map they are reviewing, and then plan the construction."
"Then while I contact the Ministry, I'll have a team member call Cheongsol and Seongjeong."
"Ask Seongjeong if they can cover the terminal point near Gwanaksan Mountain. If we assume construction up to there, Seongjeong is good at cutting through areas of urban sprawl."
"Understood."
Strangely, things became urgent. None of it was urgent work, but he wanted to process it quickly. The feeling was new. In the past, the morning was a time to ruminate on her words that had nagged at him the day before, feeling sadness and pain, but now, truly, there wasn't a single thought about Seo Jia in his head. He thought there might be at least a speck left, but—
"Executive Director, I told the Process Planning Manager to operate the DRAM production line more."
"...? No, without even telling me,"
"If sanctions are imposed, it’s an immediate super-cycle. Demand will overflow, so Doowon should monopolize it."
"Ah........."
I hadn't even thought of that. I was just thinking of stockpiling rare earths, but if that happens...
"Yes. I sent you an email with the silicon suppliers the Purchasing Team 1 found. They said if you give the word, the Doowon Products China branch will sign the contract."
"...? Even that far? No, you really..."
"'You' wording is prohibited. Please call me Secretary Eun properly."
Yes... Secretary Eun... He could understand why the Purchasing Team Leader had praised her so much at dinner. She was a gem, whoever looked at her. She brought work on her own, and only chose things that weren't useless, handling them competently. A talent who looked like she would be promoted to an executive just by sitting in her seat and moving her hands. Like that, for the first time in a long while, he worked hard as if he had returned to two years ago. He didn't even eat lunch, worked, told her to go eat quickly, and then stayed behind, staring at the monitor and tapping the keyboard. He didn't even know time was passing. No, he was too happy. It felt like he was doing real work. The current situation where the Support Division was moving self-directedly to handle backups for each affiliate, instead of just doing what was requested every day. He was so satisfied he felt like he could fly. Since he was a person who originally liked this kind of thing.
"I’ve finished my meal."
"Oh, right, did you eat well? If you don't have money, should I give you my card? No, I'll give you my employee ID, so do you want to go buy coffee?"
"Aigoo. No, it's okay. I received a high salary."
"Right. You... no, Secretary Eun, I should pay you double the salary. Wait a minute, I'll contact the Finance Team..."
"Ah, that’s burdensome! Ah, seriously!"
He had completely changed. He was truly taking out his phone and searching for the Finance Team Leader—no, the Finance Department Head—in his contacts.