Should I Go All-In on Thai Stocks?
“……Should I leverage everything and dump it all into Thai stocks? This?”
That was Nene’s first reaction as she stared straight into my face.
The way her mouth refused to close suggested even Nene-ssi had been completely overwhelmed by the TS girl’s beauty.
“Uh…… Nene-ssi?”
“What? Yeonwoo-ssi?”
……Setting aside the question of how she even knew I was Ha Yeonwoo for a moment.
“……How exactly did you get up here?”
I looked out past the terrace at the sweeping view.
The breathtaking scenery of the CEO’s mansion, perched on a steep hillside.
Which meant, conversely, that the terrace I was looking at was in a spot no ordinary person should be able to climb.
“With this.”
What Nene-ssi pulled out was a piece of gear only a specialist would use.
A rope with a grappling hook at the end—the kind you’d see in movies, the sort you could whirl around and fling until it caught with a solid thunk.
“……And how did you even get in with that?”
Even looking at it, I still couldn’t picture the route up.
Peering down from the terrace, there was nothing visible below.
“The second floor of this house is free to come and go from anyway, right?”
“Well, yeah?”
The second floor of the CEO’s house was basically a shared house any of our members could enter whenever they wanted.
The CEO herself had even said outright that if anything ever happened at home, we should just come stay here.
But the third floor was……
“From the second-floor terrace right under here, you lean out just a little like this……”
Whoosh whoosh whoosh—!
Nene-ssi mimed whirling the hook lightly, then flicked her imaginary grappling hook upward just as she had done it for real.
“……I threw it like that and kept trying until it caught clean.”
“Whoa……! Are you some kind of special forces veteran?”
“I’ve got an older brother who’s in that line of work. There’s a special forces experience center near our place, so I practiced a lot when I was little.”
“Uh……”
What? I had only asked as a joke, but she answered completely seriously……
“Is that answer enough for you, Yeonwoo-ssi?”
“……Yes.”
Hard as it was to believe, she said it herself, so I had no choice but to take her word for it.
And even if I tried to deny it, I had no way to prove otherwise.
“Then it’s my turn to ask.”
Nene-ssi’s expression hardened into something frightening.
“……Who took it off you. That thing of yours, Yeonwoo-ssi.”
“Um……”
“Was it the CEO? Or one of the other seniors?”
Even for a junior in the same group, I never expected her to sound so much like Eo.
“W-well……”
Just as I was about to launch into the explanation I had already grown used to giving—
Beep-beep-beep-beep-beep—!
The password to my room was punched in at high speed.
The door opened.
“Nene, you……!”
The CEO burst into my room and bit her lip as she looked at Nene.
“……Pretty sharp, aren’t you? CEO? I didn’t think you’d be back already.”
Nene grinned at her.
“Um……”
A fierce chill swept through my room.
……Scary. Whimper.
“Holy shit…… You crazy bitch, you actually climbed up here?”
“The seniors probably shouldn’t try copying me. One wrong step and it’s a one-way ticket to hell.”
“You mean heaven.”
“No. The second you try to monopolize Yeonwoo-ssi among yourselves, it’s hell. None of the four of you get a defense.”
“As if you’re any different, you little—?”
“Everyone shut up. Don’t fight in front of Yeonwoo. All of you, out.”
The CEO shut down the argument in one stroke and led the members out of my room.
“We’ll handle the talking. You just stay here and pull yourself together.”
“Whimper……”
But…… even if she told me to pull myself together……
“Don’t worry too much. Nene’s still a person with common sense, so she should be open to reason.”
“Bweeeeh……!”
What kind of person with common sense throws a grappling hook and pulls a window-infiltration stunt!!
“……Or you can just tell her flat-out yourself. That you don’t want to be around her and she needs to get out of here.”
“I-if I say it like that, my relationship with Nene will……”
“If working together is going to be awkward going forward, I’ll assign a different staff member to handle her. Want to talk to her yourself?”
“……No.”
Nene wasn’t a bad kid.
Granted, I hadn’t known she was the type to invade someone else’s terrace with a grappling hook, but she was still a friend I felt a strong sense of kinship with as a fellow member of Iseo-gyeon.
And she had only pulled this absurd stunt because she was genuinely worried about me.
If I had truly been in danger or something had been done to me, she would have reported it—she had risked her life climbing up here for that.
“Tsk…… You’re going to get stabbed someday, you little shit.”
“Me?!”
“Don’t come crying if only your head ends up on a boat later. I warned you.”
“Hoehh……”
“……I’m going.”
The CEO glared at me for a moment with an irritated look, then headed for the living room.
“Ah, if you’re having a hard time calming down……”
She backstepped briefly and rummaged in her pocket.
Whoosh—!
Something flew toward me.
Thwack!
“Gah!”
I failed to catch it and took it square in the forehead.
……It was the card the CEO used whenever she spent real money on games.
“Use that as much as you want and cheer yourself up. Don’t worry about the limit. The PIN is your birthday.”
“Yeees……”
And then the CEO really did leave for the living room.
“……Use it as much as I want?”
I looked down at the card she had given me.
“……For real?”
Bang!
“You expect me to believe that?!”
After hearing the full explanation, Nene shot up from her seat with the fork still stabbed into a piece of fruit.
As expected of the most grounded, common-sense member of Star Live, she was having a hard time accepting the current situation.
But what could you do……
“Sit down. Put the fork down.”
“Common sense says that can’t possibly—!”
“It’s because the situation isn’t common sense that we’re dealing with it. We can’t believe it either. That that’s Yeonwoo.”
“……”
That disbelief was shared by Kang Haneul and every member present.
If it hadn’t been for the occasional Ha Yeonwoo-like moments, they would have called the police instead of confining anyone.
But after living together for a few days, they were certain.
That really was Ha Yeonwoo herself……
“The only thing I’m sorry about right now is that we didn’t tell you the truth. What happened to Yeonwoo has nothing to do with us, so don’t take it out on us.”
“……Can I go ask her myself?”
“Go ahead.”
“……”
“……”
Their eyes met for a moment.
Nene held her gaze, then sat back down and set the fork on the plate.
“……So it’s true.”
“I told you it was.”
“Then why lock her up and hide her in there? Yeonwoo-ssi?”
Nene glared at her again, eyes hard.
“Why do you think?”
“……Because of her identity.”
“You already knew and still asked……”
Unlike the others, Nene’s head worked a little better; she grasped the situation quickly and stabbed her fork into the next piece of fruit.
She seemed to need a moment to cool down.
Kang Haneul didn’t miss the opening and pressed on.
“She wanted to quit and go back to her family home because of her identity. We stopped her by force and brought her here.”
“Even so, with us……”
“It’s not that I don’t trust you. It’s that there’s a chance someone might slip up.”
“I would never—!”
“One slip of the tongue and Yeonwoo’s entire life is ruined. You think I’d share that when she doesn’t even want it herself? Are you insane?”
“……”
At the words “she doesn’t even want it herself,” Nene stopped whatever she had been about to say and looked toward Yeonwoo’s room.
Then her gaze returned to Kang Haneul.
“Then what about Woo Yeonha? Why pull something that dangerous……”
“Uh…… that……”
On this particular point, Eo—who actually had something to answer for—raised her hand and took over.
“……I didn’t know Yeonwoo had turned into that and I just went and did it. Tehe~?”
“……”
As Nene stared at Eo with pure disbelief, Karen continued.
“But I don’t think it’s a bad thing. It means we have a fake identity ready for when Yeonwoo’s existence leaks outside.”
“We’re a VTuber company. Even if it gets out that there’s no actual employee named Woo Yeonha, people will just assume it’s some other staff member’s stage name.”
“……”
Rina chimed in as well.
The perfect teamwork finally made Nene, who had been grilling Eo with her eyes, turn a resentful look on her seniors.
“……So the seniors used that as an excuse to quietly muscle in on the monopoly too?”
Rina grinned and gave a light shrug.
“These things go by ability, junior.”
Karen immediately smacked the back of her head.
Thwack!
“Bullshit. You got seen through by me right away, you scrub……”
“Hey?! That was because you—!”
“Yep. And even then, you’re all still under me, right?”
Eo snickered as she cut in, and Kang Haneul reflexively pressed a hand to her forehead.
“……So, Nene.”
“……What.”
Nene responded with an expression that said she still couldn’t accept any of this, and Kang Haneul finally got to the real point.
“What are you planning to do about this.”
“……”
The sudden question left Nene silent, staring at her as if she hadn’t finished thinking yet.
“I’ll say this in advance: Yeonwoo is someone who cannot be known to anyone right now.”
“……”
“The identity of Ha Yeonwoo can no longer be used. Even Woo Yeonha is too dangerous if she becomes too visible.”
“……”
“If Ha Yeonwoo’s true nature is exposed and Yeonwoo is put in danger, I’ll have no choice but to pick one of two options.”
“……And those are?”
To Nene’s half-hearted question, Kang Haneul raised one finger.
“Either send Yeonwoo back to her family home.”
A second finger joined the first.
“……Or hide her so thoroughly that no one can ever find her.”
“……Is that a threat?”
“No. It’s persuasion.”
“……”
“……”
A complicated mix of emotions passed between their eyes.
“Haa……”
Nene let out a sigh of resignation, then finally smiled and held out her hand.
“……I won’t tell anyone. Not the other kids.”
But she continued as if there was one thing she absolutely refused to give up.
“In exchange, give me a key to the third floor too. That’ll settle this.”
Eo, who had been quietly watching the conversation, muttered with a look of pure disbelief.
“……You could just keep coming and going through the terrace.”
“……”
That day.
Kang Haneul got her first look at Nene’s real-life regulations.
“CEO!! CEO!! I’m dying!!”
“Then just die!”
……And her first look at insubordination, too.
“Ah, I’m already in a foul mood. Might as well go bully some newbies.”
After getting off work, he stripped out of his suit and sat down in front of the computer.
He moved the mouse quickly and double-clicked the icon in the corner of the monitor.
『All-Out Baseball』
Nickname: “AOB.”
It was a foundational Korean baseball game that had been around for nearly twenty years now.
A user base that had stagnated into pure fossils.
Overseas licenses that had vanished for various reasons.
Absurd pay-to-win demands.
An environment so hostile that newbies simply could not break in had formed, and by now it was impossible even to guess how many live players were left.
Thankfully, a mobile game using the All-Out Baseball IP had become a massive hit lately, so they supposedly wouldn’t shut the servers down for IP-management reasons.
And yet they kept quietly adding more pay systems that actually made money…… Truly a company without a shred of conscience.
“Oh……? What’s this? Matching shouldn’t be catching this fast.”
Strange.
Even with an alt account and expanded matchmaking turned on, getting a match instantly was odd.
“22 National Team? Pretty solid deck for a newbie.”
But that was all it was.
The team power displayed above was high for a newbie, sure, but All-Out Baseball was a game where hands mattered more than money spent.
There was no way a low-level newbie like that could pull off cut jumps, high-jump catches, or any of the advanced techniques.
……Or so he thought.
Crack—!
“……Huh?”
He rubbed his eyes at the leadoff home run that came on the very first pitch.
He had thrown a true, full-power fastball that even most veterans would struggle to touch……?
“Lucky swing?”
Second pitch.
Whoosh—!
Just in case, he threw a different high-speed breaking ball as a bait pitch, but no swing came.
Then the third pitch.
“Go ahead and try hitting it again, you little shit!”
He jammed another full-power fastball right onto the edge of the zone.
Crack—!
“……Huh?”
The home-run effect exploded again.
As he sat there speechless, the game commentary delivered the news.
And beneath that—
Crack!
A four-lane highway of pure rage opened up across his forehead at the opponent’s chat.
“……You’re dead. You son of a bitch.”