Chapter 38
“What a blessing it is to have such rude siblings. Truly, a blessing.”
Inside the private room of a very high-end Korean beef restaurant. Se-rang clicked her tongue as she waited for her guest.
“Still, how is this supposed to be a reply?”
She opened her phone and checked the reply that had come earlier.
[Yeon Entertainment Yeon Sae-byeok]
[CEO Yeon?]
[Shall we have a meal together?]]
[9 p.m., Won Hanwoo. You make the reservation.]
(Translator’s Note: Hanwoo / Korean beef (한우) — Premium native Korean beef, highly prized in South Korea for its marbling, tenderness, and high price.)
The Yeon family’s lack of manners was probably hereditary. Se-rang irritably put her phone away again.
At that moment, the door slid open. Yeon Sae-byeok appeared in a perfectly neat three-piece suit.
As if he had just come from a meeting somewhere, he reeked strongly of whiskey.
So he already finished round one before coming. Se-rang snorted. What a busy man.
“Oh my, CEO Yeon. Seeing you this often makes me so happy.”
“Act the way you usually do. Don’t make yourself ridiculous.”
“Should I? That’s more comfortable for me too.” Se-rang shrugged, then immediately pressed the bell.
A waiter soon served the Korean beef and wine. After even the chilling was finished, Se-rang looked at the wine filling her glass and smiled happily.
Mm. It already looks delicious.
“I’ll grill the meat myself, so you don’t need to come in.”
“Yes, understood.”
Anyway, he’s the older one, and I’m the one closer to being desperate, so I guess I’ll grill the meat.
Se-rang immediately placed the Korean beef on the grill.
“It looks like you already had a drink, but nothing beats Korean beef for sobering up. Eat a lot. I’m buying, okay?”
“Is that your money?”
“If you start acting this picky from the beginning, it puts me in a difficult position. Still, unlike you, I don’t sneak around using a corporate card like a cheapskate. I proudly spend my own money.”
“Cheapskate? More like foolish.” Se-rang wrinkled her nose and smiled before holding out her wine glass. “Instead of getting so worked up, shall we drink some wine, CEO Yeon?”
“You don’t want to call me oppa, but you can’t offend me either, so you’re calling me CEO Yeon. It’s obvious.”
“You caught me? Then you should’ve pretended not to know.”
“I thought about it, but it was too pathetic for that.”
With the sound of glass hitting glass, the wine in their glasses rippled.
Annoying bastard. Se-rang took a sip of wine. Mm, I’m letting it slide because of this wine.
“So. What is my youngest sister’s intention in pathetically trying to please me?”
“I’m glad you’re at least more reasonable than Yeon Si-ho.”
“That remains to be seen.”
“Yeon Si-ho doesn’t have a thing called intelligence. All he does is eat grass meals and suck down alcohol. Aren’t you a little better than that?”
“Grass meal” was slang for golf. There was no one in the industry who didn’t know that Yeon Si-ho practically lived on golf courses instead of at the company.
“Stop talking about someone who isn’t here. What do you want?”
“I’ll ask first. What do you want, oppa?”
“Nothing.”
Damn bastard.
Se-rang quietly ground her teeth.
“Have you never negotiated before? How does a company even run when you do business like that?”
“The fact that you think I’d want something from you is proof that you’re not ready to enter this competition.” Yeon Sae-byeok answered calmly.
Mm, wine after whiskey? I wonder if he can handle tomorrow’s hangover.
…Anyway, this bastard isn’t easy. He’s definitely different from Yeon Si-ho.
He was hard to read too.
“Realistically. Tell me what you want.”
At those words, Yeon Sae-byeok remained silent for a while.
Se-rang didn’t hurry him either. She simply grilled the meat quietly and popped pieces into her mouth.
After some time, Yeon Sae-byeok opened his mouth.
“If there’s only one chair but several people want it, what should be done?”
“…You’d have to knock them out one by one, right?”
Instead of answering, Yeon Sae-byeok only tilted his head slightly.
Arrogant bastard.
“Since one variable called you has been added, reducing one other variable would balance things somewhat.”
“You mean… knock Yeon Si-ho out?” At Se-rang’s low voice, Yeon Sae-byeok tilted his wine glass slightly toward her.
“If you’re capable.”
“Why this side?”
“…….”
“Weren’t you two joining hands to push me out? Why are you suddenly trying to take my hand?”
“I have no intention of joining hands with either of you. I simply want both of you to quietly step aside.”
“You’ve got no conscience, huh?”
“If I had a conscience, I wouldn’t have made this much money.”
The two of them wore the same face and the same expression.
A smile mixed with contempt, hatred, and disgust toward their own kind.
“But you know, if I strike Yeon Si-ho, Grandfather isn’t going to stay still, is he?”
“That’s your problem.”
“Of course it is. But what if I decide to strike you first? If I’m going to hit a car in a race anyway, wouldn’t it be better to ram into the first-place runner and aim for a comeback? Is there any reason to hit second place awkwardly? No need to do something that only benefits first place.”
“You can’t do that.”
At his far too decisive tone, Se-rang’s smile slowly stiffened.
This bastard has something he’s relying on.
“How do you know?”
“Because you need Min Yeongseo, who I have.”
Ha.
Whether the Korean beef was fully cooked or not, Se-rang irritably tossed it onto Yeon Sae-byeok’s small plate.
“So you came knowing everything? How much did you look into?”
“Secretary Cha isn’t the only one who knows how to work. You’ve been poking around here and there. How could I not know?”
True. Someone like Yeon Sae-byeok had to have at least one information source hidden in various places. Se-rang admitted she had been careless.
“So that’s why you were so confident? Because you had something to rely on?”
“As if I’d only have one thing to rely on.”
Yeon Sae-byeok carefully placed wasabi and salt on top of the beef Se-rang tossed at him, then put it into his mouth.
They said when watching someone eat starts looking like watching them stuff their face, affection has already dried up. Apparently, that was true.
Because watching this man eat really looked like watching him stuff his face.
Se-rang decided not to grill the Korean beef, whether it burned or not. Her appetite was gone anyway, so why would she grill meat for someone else’s benefit?
“Then why don’t you at least give me a hint on the method? Anyway, the two of us fighting each other benefits you. If possible, wouldn’t it be better for you if I won?”
“Why do you think that? If I had to choose, I feel a little more pity for Yeon Si-ho than for you.”
“Pity? You? For Yeon Si-ho?” At that absurd remark, Se-rang put down the tongs.
“He was disadvantaged because he was born just slightly too late. There’s something pitiful about that.”
“Then what about me?”
“You lived like too much of a delinquent for me to find you pitiful. If you had at least done as much as Yeon Si-ho, I would’ve pitied you.”
It was an attitude that thoroughly looked down on people. Feeling that arrogance clearly, Se-rang quietly stared at Yeon Sae-byeok.
Yeon Sae-byeok picked up the tongs Se-rang had put down, then this time handed meat to Se-rang himself.
“It’s all burning. Eat.”
“Let’s not pretend to care about each other.”
“I always cared about you. You were the one who kicked it away countless times.”
Damn it.
I don’t have Yeon Se-rang’s memories, so I don’t know whether that’s true or not. Se-rang swallowed her frustration and put the beef into her mouth.
It’s disgustingly delicious.
No wonder it’s expensive.
“But you know, have you ever thought about why I lived like a delinquent in the first place? Maybe it was because I was pushed aside by you two and couldn’t even enter the succession competition.”
Se-rang tossed it out in a speculative tone. Of course, she only said it that way because it really was a guess.
“You? You were rotten from the roots. So much so that I wonder why you’re acting like this now.”
“Roots? We came from the same root, so saying that only cuts into your own flesh, doesn’t it?”
“Even if branches come from the same root, not every branch survives. Some branches are bound to be cut off.”
“I’m not a branch. I’m the trunk. I won’t be cut off.”
At Se-rang’s words, Yeon Sae-byeok silently stared at Yeon Se-rang.
As if he wanted to read what was inside her.
“…Did something happen that made you want the company badly enough to go against the will of Baek Do-gyeong, whom you’re so desperately attached to? What changed?”