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# 03. Dad Is Trash (2)
“I'll wash until I smell like a human being, and then I'll start over.”
I had just made that resolution and was about to move when—
Bzz. Bzz. Bzz.
The old smartphone in my pocket began vibrating frantically.
The relentless vibration felt like the hand of hell grabbing hold of my ankle and refusing to let go.
I eventually stopped walking and sank onto a nearby park bench.
“……”
I took out the phone.
Notifications poured across the screen.
23 missed calls.
47 unread text messages.
112 chat messages.
My fingers trembled slightly.
I didn't want to check them, but I had to.
This was the reality I had created.
I opened my messages.
【[OO Capital] Your loan is 90 days overdue. We will begin legal proceedings.】
【[XX Savings Bank] Notice of impending seizure.】
【Hey, Kang Cheolhyun. You not answering your phone? The interest payment hasn't come in.】
【We're sending someone to your house tomorrow.】
【Was it Seolhee? Looks like you've got money to pay your daughter's daycare fees, huh?】
My breath caught in my throat.
More frightening than the simple insults was the fact that they knew every detail of my daily life.
“Crazy bastard…”
The curse slipped out on its own.
I wasn't cursing them.
I was cursing myself for creating this situation.
I opened my banking app.
Account balance: 12,340 won.
Loan history.
Credit loan limit exceeded.
Entire cash advance limit used.
Three overdue Capital loans.
Even my legitimate debts alone amounted to 70 million won.
But that wasn't the real problem.
‘President Kim.’
The most troublesome name in my memories.
A big shot who was known for moving money around in the underworld.
I opened our chatroom.
As I scrolled upward, the shit my past self had left behind was laid bare.
【…Hyung, please let it slide just this month.】
【Let it slide? You said the same thing last month. We're not running a charity.】
【I'll definitely pay you back next month.】
【Kang Cheolhyun. Credit isn't built with words. This is the end.】
That much I had expected.
But the reply I had sent beneath it stabbed straight through my heart.
【Then is there any other way?】
【Can't I take out a loan under my wife's name? She has a job, so she'll have some credit.】
My hands began trembling.
President Kim's reply followed.
【Your wife? If she has a job, then she'll have credit. But do you think your wife will agree?】
【I'll convince her. No, I'll beg her if I have to.】
【Hey, I feel sorry for your wife. She met the wrong husband and now she's about to have her life ruined.】
【…It can't be helped. I need the money right now.】
“……”
I felt sick.
Pathetic.
Cowardly.
Trash.
No insult was enough.
The loan shark hadn't threatened her.
I had personally dragged my wife into the pit of debt with my own mouth and my own fingers.
I remembered.
The day I came home carrying the loan documents.
I remembered clinging to my wife as she shook her head, saying she couldn't do it.
I remembered spending the entire night persuading her, pleading with her, begging her until she finally agreed through
tears.
*“Once I pay this off, it'll be over. This is the last time. Please…”*
I had lied to her like that.
Then I had taken those documents to President Kim, collected the money, and used that money to go gambling again.
“Ugh…”
My stomach turned.
I dry-heaved.
I scrolled farther down.
The most recent messages.
【The interest payment hasn't come in.】
【Ah, Hyung, please! Just give me a little more time…!】
【I've given you plenty of time. You were the one who proposed it yourself. A loan under your wife's name.】
【That… I said I'd pay it back…】
【Huh? But you aren't paying it back. Then I have to collect from the actual debtor. I'm going to your house tomorrow. I
need to have a little talk with your wife.】
“Uaaaaaagh!!!”
A scream burst from my throat.
I hurled the smartphone onto the bench and grabbed my hair.
I had dragged them into this.
I had dragged my wife, my family, into the pit of my gambling debts.
A hero?
An S-rank Hunter who saved the world?
Don't make me laugh.
What kind of hero was a bastard who put his own wife under a mountain of debt just to pay off his gambling debts?
I was more pathetic than the Demon King.
“Krr…”
I gritted my teeth.
The metallic taste of blood filled my mouth.
I had no right to cry.
There was no time to despair.
Even at this very moment, the interest was piling up, and those bastards were after my family.
My family had fallen into the trap I had dug myself.
“I have to get them out.”
With trembling hands, I picked up the smartphone again.
70 million won in legitimate debt.
Loan-shark debt… At least 1 billion won, including principal and interest.
300 million of that was under my wife's name.
One billion won.
An amount that would be difficult to repay even over an entire lifetime.
But I had to repay it.
No.
I had to resolve it.
I needed to find a way.
My advantage as someone who had returned to the past.
Future knowledge.
Stocks?
Bitcoin?
Real estate?
There were plenty of ways to make money.
But I had no seed money and no time.
Those bastards could come barging in tomorrow.
When was I supposed to grow my money?
“I need to buy time.”
Whether through negotiation or a deal, I needed to make sure they couldn't lay a finger on my family and buy myself some
time.
For that, I couldn't show up empty-handed.
“I need a card.”
I checked the date on my smartphone.
March 12.
I searched through my memories.
March 2025.
The biggest event to explode in the financial world around this time.
“…There is one.”
The fragments of my memories clicked into place.
The corner of my mouth twisted upward.
I had one sure card.
A card that a businessman like President Kim couldn't refuse.
I stood up.
My body ached, and I was still feeling the effects of the alcohol, but my eyes were clear.
I'll clean up the shit I made.
It was time to step into hell.
---
Thirty minutes later.
A building in Yeongdeungpo.
An office without even a sign.
Two heavily built men stood at the entrance.
President Kim's office.
The men's eyes narrowed when they saw me.
“What do you want?”
“…I'm here to see President Kim. I'm Kang Cheolhyun.”
“Kang Cheolhyun?”
They looked at each other and snickered.
“Oh, the guy who put his wife up as a loan guarantor?”
“You here to pay back the money? Looks like you're empty-handed.”
One of them gave my shoulder a light shove.
“Go on in. The boss was looking for you anyway. And look at that, you came here on your own two feet.”
The contempt in their eyes was only natural.
I was the bastard who had dragged his own wife into debt just to pay off his gambling debts.
I entered without saying a word.
The inside of the office was surprisingly neat.
Rather than a gangster's hideout, it looked more like the office of a venture company.
One wall was lined with monitors displaying stock charts.
On the sofa in the innermost seat, a middle-aged man was reviewing some documents.
President Kim.
He wore a neat suit and had sharp eyes.
His appearance was closer to that of a cool-headed businessman than a gangster.
But his gaze was cold as a snake's.
“Boss, Kang Cheolhyun is here.”
President Kim raised his head.
He slowly removed his glasses and looked at me.
“Kang Cheolhyun.”
His voice was polite, but the contempt contained within it was impossible to hide.
“I thought you'd run away. You've got some nerve.”
“I'm not running.”
“Then did you bring the money?”
“No.”
“Then?”
“I came to make a deal.”
“A deal?”
President Kim's eyebrows rose slightly.
The men standing around us let out hollow laughs.
“Looks like you don't understand the situation. You're a debtor right now. And not just any debtor—you're the scumbag
debtor who dragged even his wife into your debt. You're in no position to propose a deal.”
“I can make you money, Boss.”
I spoke calmly.
“I'm not talking about squeezing a few pennies out of interest. I have information that can legally make you tens of
billions of won.”
For a moment, President Kim's eyes changed.
“Information.”
He tapped his fingers lightly against the table.
“What kind of information could come out of the mouth of a drunk?”
“Hear me out and decide for yourself.”
“No.”
President Kim shook his head.
“My time is expensive. Prove you're worth my time first.”
He gestured with his chin.
“Give him a little education.”
Scrape.
The sound of chairs being dragged across the floor rang out.
The men around me approached.
One, two, three… six of them.
“Hey, buddy. You really don't understand what we're saying.”
The closest man reached out to grab me by the collar.
At that moment—
My body reacted first.
I didn't even have to think.
A body that had gone through thousands of battlefields remembered.
Tap.
I caught his wrist and twisted it.
Crack!
“Ugh?!”
Before he could even scream, I struck his jaw with the palm of my hand.
His brain rattled, and he lost his balance and collapsed.
“You bastard!”
A fist came flying from the side.
Slow.
The trajectory was so straightforward I could have yawned.
I ducked slightly to avoid it and drove my fist into the exposed side of his abdomen.
Thud!
“Urgh…”
The man dropped to his knees, the breath knocked out of him.
The third man charged at me, but I shoved the man who was falling toward him as a shield and slipped into the opening.
I struck the solar plexus, twisted a joint, and destroyed his center of gravity.
I didn't kill them.
But I subdued them so thoroughly that they wouldn't even think about attacking me again.
The sixth and final man reached into his pocket to pull something out.
“You shouldn't take something like that out in here.”
I was already right in front of him.
I grabbed his wrist, slammed him against the wall, and drove my fist into him.
Kehuk—
Thud!
Silence.
It hadn't even taken a minute.
I panted heavily.
“Haa… haa…”
My heart felt as though it would burst.
My alcohol-ravaged body was screaming in protest.
But I stood straight and looked at President Kim.
“……”
President Kim watched the entire scene without changing his expression.
Only his gaze had changed.
From contempt to interest.
“You're not ordinary.”
President Kim clapped his hands.
Clap, clap.
“I thought you were nothing more than a pathetic bastard who put his wife up as a loan guarantor. You had some hidden
talent?”
“You pick things up living in this world. If you spend enough time rolling around in street fights, you get better.”
I stepped over the men sprawled across the floor and walked toward President Kim.
“Good. Sit down.”
President Kim pointed to the sofa opposite him.
Once I sat down, he asked,
“So. You said you could make me money?”
“Yes.”
“How?”
“Arche Pharmaceuticals.”
“What?”
“It's a stock. A biotech stock that's crawling along the bottom right now. Exactly one week from now, they'll announce
that they've passed Phase 3 clinical trials.”
President Kim narrowed his eyes.
“Stocks. That's a common tip. Are you sure?”
“I'm sure.”
“Your source?”
“Don't ask where it came from. Just look at the results.”
I looked directly into President Kim's eyes.
“One week. One week from now, the stock price will jump more than threefold. If it doesn't…”
“If it doesn't?”
“I'll sign a written waiver surrendering my body as collateral. Without a single complaint. You've seen my skills.
Whether it's an assassination job or an underground fighting ring, I'll do whatever you want.”
“……”
President Kim fell silent.
His eyes looked like he was calculating.
This man wasn't a gangster.
He was a thorough businessman.
If there was little to lose, he was the type who knew how to bet on the side with the higher probability of winning.
“Fine.”
President Kim closed the file.
“I'll give you one week.”
“Thank you. But I have a condition.”
“What?”
“During that one week, don't touch my family. No calls, no messages, and don't go to their home.”
“……”
“If you break that promise…”
My gaze turned cold.
“Then there is no deal, no matter what. I'll rip your entire organization out by the roots.”
President Kim chuckled.
“Interesting. After dragging your own wife into debt, you're suddenly going to protect her now?”
He nodded.
“Fine. It's business. I'll treat you like a gentleman for one week. But…”
President Kim's eyes glinted coldly.
“If you don't produce results after one week, then the law won't matter anymore. You'll have to pay your wife's debt
yourself. I'll decide how. You understand?”
“…Understood.”
I stood up.
I opened the door and stepped outside.
The cold night air filled my lungs.
My legs were trembling, so I braced myself against the wall.
Now that the tension had left me, my entire body ached as though I'd been beaten all over.
“Haa…”
At least I could breathe for a moment.
One week.
I had bought myself time to protect my family.
This one week would change my fate.
No.
It would change my family's fate.
I limped into the darkness.
I had only just taken my first steps.