Let's Have a Conversation
"Kyaak!"
"Kkiyak!"
"Hey, stop bothering me and get out of the way, you two!"
Unable to hold it in any longer, Dojin finally yelled.
He was already frustrated because his kite wouldn't fly the way he wanted.
To make matters worse, Hwindung-i and Cheongdung-i were circling near the kite, teasing him.
Dohee, who was watching peacefully from the side, let out a soft chuckle.
"Don't they think they're playing with you? You've been neglecting them a bit lately, Oppa."
"How is that playing? That is one hundred percent pure interference."
Dojin pointed at his kite.
Whenever the kite caught the wind and seemed to stabilize, the two birds would fly close and flap their wings furiously.
Then, as if by some curse, the kite would plummet straight down.
If it had happened just once or twice, he would have let it go, but this had been repeating for thirty minutes. Even a fool could see what they were doing.
"Is that so? You should have paid more attention to them. You didn't even bring them along on our last outing. If I were them, I'd be sulking too."
"..."
Dojin shut his mouth.
He had no reply to his girlfriend's words.
Just then, a voice called out to him in his predicament.
"Boss."
"Huh? Shan-hun, what's up?"
Dojin turned around gladly at the voice, only to be taken aback.
Shan-hun had an unusually gloomy expression on his face.
Dojin had never seen him look like this since they met, which made him feel tense.
But the moment he heard Shan-hun's next words, Dojin froze for an entirely different reason.
"By any chance, do you know another meat merchant?"
"A meat merchant? Ah, a livestock supplier? No, I don't. Why? Did something happen?"
Dojin asked, hoping his suspicion was wrong, but cold sweat began to run down his back at Shan-hun's reply.
"The merchant we deal with says it's hard to get mutton. He said he doesn't handle more than one sheep a month. We can't make enough khorkhog for everyone with just that."
At the mention of the dish, Dojin closed his eyes tightly without realizing it.
"Khorkhog..."
It was a traditional Mongolian mutton dish cooked by steaming a whole sheep with hot stones.
It was so famous that it was practically synonymous with Mongolian cuisine. Recently, many versions had been adapted to suit the palates of foreigners, but...
Shan-hun's family makes the traditional version.
In the past, spices were rare and precious in Mongolia, so traditional khorkhog used almost no spices at all.
A few vegetables and salt were the only seasonings.
The problem was that mutton was incredibly difficult to eat without spices.
The gamey smell unique to mutton was strong enough that even some locals avoided it.
And that was even with the youngest lamb we could buy...
The mutton sold at the Paju Wholesale Livestock Center was lamb, meat from sheep less than a year old, which barely had any smell.
According to the livestock center employee, if you added just a little bit of spice, the texture and taste were so similar to beef that you wouldn't even know it was mutton.
The problem is that they don't use spices.
Dojin still had a vivid memory of the day they ate that mutton.
Ugh!
The moment he put a piece of the khorkhog Shan-hun had specially cooked into his mouth, Dojin almost screamed.
The smell of the meat was that repulsive.
Did something go wrong?
Barely managing to control his facial expression, Dojin looked at Shan-hun.
After serving Dojin, Dohee, and Seung-wan, Shan-hun was just putting a piece of meat into his own mouth.
If there was a problem with the meat, Shan-hun would naturally realize it now.
Rather than making things awkward by speaking up, it seemed better to wait for Shan-hun to notice the issue himself.
However, Dojin was quickly forced to revise his thoughts.
"Mmm! Mmm! Haha..."
"Sh-Shan-hun. Is it good?"
Shan-hun savoring the meat as if it were a heavenly delicacy was not what Dojin had envisioned.
Dojin asked just in case, but...
"Yes! It's delicious! It's been a while, but it cooked very well. The meat is great. It's delicious, right, Boss?"
"Huh? Oh, yeah... of course. It's delicious."
Seeing Shan-hun's bright, innocent reply, Dojin barely held back his tears.
This was simply how the dish was supposed to taste.
In fact, going by his words, it was a highly successful batch.
"Please eat a lot! We bought plenty of meat!"
With those words, Shan-hun pointed behind him.
There, Shan-hun's family was busy preparing more khorkhog.
It wasn't for immediate consumption, but for refills.
They were preparing it in advance to replenish the plates as soon as Dojin and the security team finished eating.
Gulp.
Looking at the whole sheep roasting on the wide grill, Dojin swallowed hard.
Of course, it wasn't out of hunger.
How on earth are we going to eat all that?
Even at a glance, more than ten sheep were being prepared for khorkhog.
If I knew it would be like this, I would have stopped him when he said he was buying mutton.
Of course, Dojin had tried to stop him.
But that was because Shan-hun wanted to buy thirty whole sheep, which cost 300,000 won each.
At the time, he had stopped him because it seemed like too much money to spend on meat at once, but now he realized money wasn't the issue.
"Thanks, I'll eat well."
Words contrary to his true feelings slipped from Dojin's mouth.
He put another piece of meat into his mouth.
Ugh!
He could feel his body violently rejecting the khorkhog, but Dojin did not stop his chopsticks.
He couldn't bring himself to disappoint Shan-hun and Sun-jam, who were watching him with sparkling eyes.
However, Dojin's good intentions unintentionally resulted in friendly fire.
"Ugh!"
"Khh!"
Seeing Dojin eat so calmly, Dohee and Seung-wan had put the meat in their mouths without suspicion, only for muffled groans to escape them.
Then, in unison, they began to glare at Dojin.
Glare.
What? Why? What was I supposed to do?
Despite the sharp glares from his girlfriend and employee, Dojin kept chewing steadily.
Was the sight too shocking?
The glares directed at Dojin slowly turned into concern.
"Oppa...?"
"Mr. Dojin...?"
Dojin shook his head slightly, making sure Shan-hun couldn't see.
If he didn't, he felt like the two of them would try to stop him right then and there.
And as expected, seeing Dojin's signal, the two stopped what they were doing and quietly raised their chopsticks again.
They had realized why Dojin was eating the khorkhog without a word.
Instead, Dohee carefully asked Shan-hun.
"Shan-hun, by any chance, is there anything to dip this in or sprinkle on it?"
At Dohee's words, Seung-wan, who was barely holding her chopsticks, and Dojin, who was silently chewing, perked up their ears.
If they could just use a sauce or some spices, it would be much better than this.
But Shan-hun shattered their hopes completely.
"Huh? No. Traditional khorkhog is eaten without anything else. But... is it not good?"
Shan-hun's face darkened rapidly as he spoke.
Seeing the man who had looked prouder than anyone in the world just moments ago look like this, Dohee hurriedly shook her head.
"Oh, no! It's just that it's my first time eating Mongolian food. I-I was just curious! Ahaha..."
And that was the end of it.
With their brief but desperate plea for survival crushed, the group had no choice but to silently put the khorkhog into their mouths.
And that sight was producing even more victims.
"Ugh! What is this..."
"Ack! S-something is wrong..."
The groans and protests rising from various spots around the schoolyard were immediately suppressed by those sitting at the same tables.
Afterward, as if they had planned it, everyone glared at the table where Dojin's group sat.
They, too, had eaten the khorkhog without suspicion after seeing Dojin's group eat it.
Of course, Dojin's group had their own excuses.
What? Why do you keep glaring over here?
Then what were we supposed to do? Shan-hun is standing right in front of us!
Do you think you would have done any different? It's torture for us to be sitting here like this too!
If the meat party at Sekki House was supposed to be a festival, the current atmosphere felt more like a corporate dinner.
And a highly rigid corporate dinner at that, where one could barely breathe.
To make matters worse, the highest superior was walking around, encouraging the employees.
"It's delicious, right? Please eat more. There is plenty of meat."
"Ah, yes... thank you."
"W-we will eat well."
At Shan-hun's words, the faces of the security team turned pale.
The superior at this corporate dinner was not Dojin, but Shan-hun.
"Boss? Are you okay?"
Dojin, who had been reminiscing about the most brutal dinner since his regression, snapped back to reality at Shan-hun's voice.
"Huh? Oh, yeah... I'm fine. Sorry, what did you say?"
"Please look for another meat merchant. We need mutton. A lot of it."
"No."
The rejection slipped out of Dojin's mouth before he could even think.
It was a purely reflexive response.
"Pardon?"
"Ah, no. I mean, I've been looking into the livestock centers lately, and they say mutton is hard to get in Korea. They have cut pieces, but they said it's hard to get whole carcasses like last time."
"Ah... I see..."
Seeing Shan-hun's disappointed face, Dojin let out a sigh of relief without realizing it.
Although he had reacted impulsively, he had managed to smooth it over.
He felt sorry for Shan-hun as he walked away with slumped shoulders, but for the sake of everyone, this was the right choice.
Just then, Dohee, who was standing beside him, sighed and spoke.
"...Are we being too harsh?"
Dojin looked at his girlfriend.
With her kind heart, she seemed to feel guilty about lying to him.
"...I don't know."
Dojin couldn't easily answer his girlfriend's question either.
He didn't find the situation particularly pleasant either.
However, the moment a certain question came to mind, his guilt vanished instantly.
Dojin decided to test this magic question on his girlfriend.
"Then, Dohee, do you want to eat khorkhog again?"
"No, absolutely not."
"..."
It was an instant reply that took less than a tenth of a second.
When Dojin stared at his girlfriend with an incredulous look, Dohee smiled sheepishly.
"Hehehe. Absolutely not."
Embarrassment was one thing, but Dohee knew what she hated.
In the end, Dojin couldn't fly his kite properly.
After Shan-hun left, he received a radio call from Seung-wan.
Initially, Dojin had planned to fly the kite a bit longer before heading inside, but after hearing what Seung-wan had to say, he packed up his kite without hesitation.
Slide.
"You're here?"
"Yes. But what do you mean by saying Bandit King's side contacted us?"
This was the reason Dojin had rushed back to the office.
He couldn't leisurely fly a kite when a YouTuber they had recently done a collab with—and who had split the donation money in a shady way—had contacted them.
Guessing Dojin's thoughts, Seung-wan nodded and spoke.
"To be precise, Bandit King contacted us directly."
"? Is there a difference?"
"Yes. Previously, we communicated with Bandit King's staff. But after speaking with Bandit King's team this time, I felt something strange."
"Something strange?"
"Yes, how should I put it..."
Seung-wan trailed off and stared into space.
It was a habit of hers when organizing her thoughts before speaking.
Once she had gathered her thoughts, Seung-wan looked at Dojin and said,
"He was surprisingly normal. Of course, it's hard to make a definitive judgment just from a phone call."
"Normal? I guess the person you spoke with before wasn't like that."
At Dojin's question, Seung-wan's face grimaced slightly.
That expression alone showed that her phone calls with the staff member hadn't been very pleasant.
"It wasn't to the point of being abnormal, but... a bit of arrogance? Over-assertiveness? I got that kind of vibe. Like the high-handed attitude large corporations have when dealing with partner companies."
"Hmm..."
Hearing Seung-wan's words, Dojin's eyes narrowed this time.
He could easily picture the employee's attitude just from her description.
There were people like that back when I worked at the factory too.
They weren't common, but occasionally there were clients who abused their power.
Of course, most of them were handled by the factory manager, and they never did business with them again, but the attitude of such people was almost always the same.
An attitude of wanting to relish their position as the dominant party.
Even though being the client and contractor didn't make them master and slave, they often treated the contractor like one.
Hearing that Bandit King's employee had shown a similar attitude made Dojin's already poor impression of Bandit King grow even worse.
"Ah, but that was just the employee. Bandit King himself was actually quite polite."
"...So, what did he want?"
"It was about another collab, and this time, he wants you to join as well, Mr. Dojin."
"...A collab?"
At Seung-wan's words, Dojin's expression turned to one of sheer absurdity.
They had already messed around with the donation money, and now they were asking for another collab?
He felt a surge of anger, wondering if they looked down on them that much.
If Seung-wan hadn't added her next words, Dojin might have called them directly and cursed them out, collab be damned.
"I think someone among their staff is playing games in the middle."
"Playing games?"
"Yes. When he asked for a collab, I was just as dumbfounded as you are now. I snapped at him, telling him to calculate the donation money properly before talking about another collab. But he seemed extremely flustered by that."
"..."
"When I told him the amount of donation money we received, he was silent for a while, and then he said he would come to apologize in person."
"In person?"
"Yes. That's why I called you, Mr. Dojin. Since they're asking, I wanted to know if it's okay to give them our address."
"..."
Dojin fell into silent thought at Seung-wan's words.
If he was simply coming to apologize, there was no reason to stop him.
But what if he had other motives?
Dojin had experienced too many painful things to take people at their word.
Bandit King... I didn't get a bad vibe from him when we met face-to-face.
They had exchanged brief greetings before the broadcast.
Of course, they hadn't talked for long since it was right before going live, but his impression of him back then was that he seemed like a decent person...
Even though they hadn't talked much, the fact that Sun-jam hadn't rejected him suggested it might be worth having a conversation at least once.
After contemplating for a long time, Dojin finally nodded and spoke.
"...Let's have a conversation. Give him the address."