Phase 1. That Bitch Hui-gyeong (2)
It was a fair distance from the university to home, so it took me about an hour to get back.
“Why the hell are you so late!”
This man who called himself my father probably didn’t even know which university I attended. He was the kind of person who had zero interest in whether I went to college at all, or what I did with my days if I said I didn’t.
“The traffic was bad…”
“Traffic? You got a car?”
“No, I took the bus.”
“At your age and no car? How do you expect to pick up girls?”
Then buy me one. Not having a car was fine, but the dig about not being able to pick up women hit pretty hard.
The state of the house told me everything. Dad was sitting cross-legged in front of Hui-gyeong’s door, baseball bat in hand. The door was caved in, so they’d clearly been trading insults before I got here until Dad finally took a swing at it with the bat.
“Gyeong-hun’s home? I’m sorry… I shouldn’t have called you.”
Mom looked crushed, yet the relief that I’d arrived was written all over her face. Like mother, like daughter—Hui-gyeong’s mom was a genuine city-girl beauty—but that passive streak of hers had ruined her whole life. Times were different back then, sure, but she’d ended up with a man like Dad, never able to say a word, living in total obedience. She knew full well she was dumping everything on her son, yet she still leaned on me completely. All she ever offered was empty apologies.
Her attitude irritated me a little, but the real problem was the two people locked in a standoff with nothing but a door between them.
“Dad, let me talk to her.”
Seeming glad someone who would actually back him up had shown up, Dad immediately thumped the baseball bat on the floor and jerked his chin.
“That fucking bitch in there—who the hell raised her like that? Was it you? Did your brat do this, Gyeong-hun?”
Well it sure as hell wasn’t Dad. The man had never lifted a finger for childcare in his life.
“You never once hugged me when I came home as a kid! What the fuck do you care how I grew up!”
“You little shit—hey! Get out! Get out of my house!”
“I said I was leaving and you’re the one who won’t let me go!!”
“You…! You…! Open this door, you fucking slut! How dare you talk back to your father!”
When he ran out of comebacks, Dad raised the bat and smashed it against the door again and again. He hit it so hard splinters flew and the door buckled even further inward.
“Aigoo, Dad! You know Hui-gyeong’s always been like that. Why are you doing this?”
“You little shit! You think I’m doing this for fun? You have any idea what I hear when I walk around this neighborhood for business?!”
No way…
“Dad… don’t tell me…”
My expression must have looked dangerous, because Dad flinched and lowered the bat.
“Gyeong-hun, you little… Don’t tell me you…”
“The other dads around here are talking about Hui-gyeong too?”
“Talking? They’re not talking—they’re damn sure of it…! Aish, fuck…”
Clatter. Dad flung the baseball bat to the floor, muttering as he turned away.
“I went and raised a decent-looking face, and now she’s not even worth the price of the meat.”
Was that something a father should say about his own daughter?
I could guess what had happened. He’d gone somewhere trying to sell his daughter, gotten turned down the second they heard the neighborhood slut rumors. Yeah, that explained why he’d been hanging around the house for two whole weeks. He’d burned through another business and was looking for cash, then remembered his pretty-faced daughter. Only it turned out that daughter was the biggest slut in the neighborhood.
Honestly, this couldn’t have been the first time Dad heard those stories. He’d walked past the neighborhood kids and ajummas whispering about her for years. He’d probably figured that since Hui-gyeong was grown and those wild school years were long past, things had quieted down—then the other side brought it up point-blank and the rage exploded right out of his chest.
Still. She was his daughter. What kind of father said that to her face, right in front of the family?
The moment the words left his mouth, stomping sounds erupted inside, then a heavy bang shook the door.
“You little bastard!”
“Dad, Dad! This is pointless. Just go cool off outside for a bit.”
“How the hell did you raise a kid to turn out like that!”
Yeah, you should’ve helped raise her yourself. What’s the use of regretting it now?
I swallowed the chimney-full of things I wanted to say, grabbed his shoulder, and personally steered him to the front door.
Right before stepping through the wide-open entrance, he just had to twist around and shout back into the house—classic dad move of that generation.
“Aish, this goddamn house! Just wait and see if I ever come back!”
“Aigoo, Dad, please calm down. Calm down.”
“Aish! Hey, you got any money on you?”
“I’ve just got one tutoring gig, so this is all…”
I slipped a fifty-thousand-won bill from my pocket and showed it. Dad clicked his tongue.
“You’re tutoring and you’re broke? You bullshitting me?”
“These days everyone’s switched to online lectures, so tutoring rates are way down. Plus the agency takes a cut in the middle…”
“Kid, just go work in a factory. No car anyway—get room and board there and save some money.”
I nodded bitterly. Dad wandered off muttering about his worthless, futureless kids.
I smirked at his retreating back.
Broke? Who the hell was broke. I had enough money on me alone to take care of my future wife and kids and still have plenty left over.
The second I entered university, outside of classes and club time, Gyeong-jun and I had worked every possible part-time job until he enlisted. There wasn’t a single type of side job we hadn’t tried. The reason we scraped that cash together was for the one-night stand that might, just might, happen with a girl someday.
When it was just the two of us drinking, we cracked cans of beer on the street in front of a convenience store. But if a pretty girlfriend ever appeared in our lives and we got the chance for a night together—what if she wanted to go to the beach that night? What if she wanted a valley? What if she wanted Jeju Island? We saved for those emergency scenarios.
None of that ever happened.
The emergency fund still piled up nicely. Roughly a few thousand.
Then Gyeong-jun told me about this thing called coin. Something about blockchain—I didn’t really get it—but people were paying huge attention and the trading volume and money flowing in kept growing, so I dumped everything into the most famous one: Dit-coin.
What kind of balls did I have?
It was money I’d earned from part-time jobs, so I figured it was fine even if I burned it all as a pure bet.
Ignorance is courage. I went in without a shred of fear and made more than twenty times my money.
I stacked it until it hit the hundred-million range. When it started hitting the news and talk of regulation began, I got scared and pulled everything out.
I successfully cashed out.
Next I tried the classic of investing: stocks.
I only remember starting with mask companies because some nasty epidemic was spreading overseas. It went pretty well. The market was so bullish that whatever stocks YouTube or TV said were good, I bought them and rode them almost to the limit-up.
After more than ten-xing my money in the early days of the pandemic, I got a little bored.
Then Gyeong-jun introduced me to Melon Musk and Shiba Coin.
It was under a hundred won, but a world-famous CEO was paying attention, so I went all-in immediately.
That world-famous CEO must have been deeply moved by Shiba Coin, because he kept mentioning and promoting it nonstop. Around three months later it was up nearly twenty times.
It looked like it could go higher, but I got cold feet and pulled out completely.
Finally Gyeong-jun said coins were hitting their halving cycle, so I went back into Dit-coin.
Another ten-bagger.
And one day I looked at my own virgin account and saw over fifty billion sitting there, so I quit investing for good.
Calling it investing was generous. It was straight gambling.
Did I become rich because I was skilled? Absolutely not.
I got lucky and rode the times perfectly.
Even as a fifty-billionaire, I had zero confidence claiming I’d analyzed the market and built that fortune myself. If I lost my memory and went back to that time, I don’t know if I’d even try investing at all.
That’s why I treated Gyeong-jun so well.
That guy got greedy and barely made anything in the end.
Bottom line: I was genuinely rich, and my family had no idea.
The funnier part was that Dad cut off my living expenses the moment I finished military service.
Just getting out of the army isn’t enough. A real man feeds his household with his own strength. You get me?
Anyone listening would’ve thought I was the one married to Mom. While I stood there speechless, Dad winked and clapped me on the shoulder.
I know it’ll be hard. But you’ve got to pull it off like this father of yours. Our family’s always raised them tough, generation after generation.
Pull what off exactly? Knocking up kids and running around outside like him?
That was right when my money was all tied up in investments.
We’d done so many rough part-time jobs that both Gyeong-jun and I, young as we were, ached all over. With nothing but sighs and tears I kept tutoring, and I was the one actually earning money—handing Mom the living expenses while pretending Dad had given it to me.
Maybe seeing me put cash directly into her hand made me look reliable, because from then on Mom started treating me as the person she could depend on in place of a husband.
Of course, once I got rich I cut it down to one tutoring gig and only sent a million won home each month.
All kinds of thoughts rose up watching Dad’s back. I shook my head to clear them and went back inside.
Mom was sweeping up the wood chips scattered across the floor.
“Mom, leave it. If I talk to her she might kick them all over the place again.”
“I should clean while I can see them.”
“I’ll clean after I finish talking.”
“Then let’s clean together~.”
As she said it, Mom casually pressed her chest against my side, like she was making a sexual appeal to a husband. Mom’s breasts were bigger than her daughter’s; they spilled out the sides of her brassiere.
As a son it wasn’t welcome—the kind of skinship that made me misread things—but I played it cool like a man and knocked on the door.
“Hey. Open up.”
“Dad’s gone? Can I come out?”
“You crazy bitch, where the hell do you think you’re going!”
“What’s it to you, you virgin loser!”
“You little—!”
I couldn’t take the cheap provocation and yanked the doorknob hard. It opened with pathetic ease. From the way it was barely hanging on, the bat had already finished it off when Dad was smashing it earlier.
Hup…!
Inside my little sister’s room—which I hadn’t entered in ages—the thick, aged scent of a woman filled the air. Too heavy to call a fragrance, too intoxicating to call a stench. The kind of smell that went straight up your nose and made a man’s cock stand rigid, pure pheromone.
“Ah, fuck, nasty. Why are you taking deep breaths in someone else’s room?”
I finished the long inhale and opened my eyes fully. There stood my little sister, Jo Hui-gyeong, wearing a loose top that left one shoulder bare, glaring straight at me.