Because It Looks Like a Twisted Smile from the Underworld
As April rolled in, the company kicked into high gear for yet another reason.
…Though, to be fair, the company was always busy for some different reason every month.
March and April for the new school year season. May and June for Family Month. July and August for summer vacation. September and October for Chuseok. November and December for Christmas. January and February for the lunar new year holidays.
Still, I had to put in a solid day's work today.
"Fuck."
Ah.
My thoughts and my mouth switched places for a second.
Again.
"Fuck."
…I should stop.
"What the hell are you doing by yourself?"
"…I just came back from the Hyperbolic Time Chamber."
"You absolute idiot."
While I was having my little meltdown alone, Park Humin came up, clapped me on the back, and coaxed me into going out for a smoke.
To which I said:
"…And HR?"
"We're surprisingly free, actually."
"Why?"
"You don't know?"
I launched into a rant about the completely unreasonable reality of it all.
"Ah, fuck… Just do what we always do, right? I don't get why they keep insisting on trying weird new shit."
"Who?"
"The team leader."
Even if every season had its established reasons for being busy, those were annual events with a clear playbook. There was always a formula.
It was early April now.
Any campaign you could come up with for the new school year season was going to be painfully obvious — but our kindhearted, slightly dim team leader was throwing a fit about cooking up something "a little unique" this year.
Though calling that pure idiocy might have been a bit harsh.
"Guess he finally knows the score."
"Ahh… yeah, at that rank, not knowing how the company works would be a real problem."
Team leader was by no means a low position. It varied by company, but at ours… it sat right under department head, so it was actually pretty high up.
And if you hit that rank and still couldn't contribute to the company?
You were done. Immediately.
"That's probably why. Lately he's been thrashing around trying to rack up results, but every single idea is pure garbage."
"What kind of stuff is he floating?"
"You know that ad campaign we're running? He wants to cast Park Jongwon. Is that even a real pitch or is he just shitting out of his mouth?"
"Park Jongwon?"
The restaurateur every single person in Korea knew by name.
Ah, of course.
For a major corporation our size, casting someone like that as an ad model wasn't a huge stretch.
So why not just bring him on, you might think… except there was one fundamental problem.
"…Isn't he our competitor's model?"
"Exactly, you dumbass."
…About ten minutes after that little "slip of the tongue," he shoved some other random celebrity at us.
Obviously.
He had zero actual interest, zero grasp of industry trends, so he just casually spewed nonsense without a care in the world.
And that was the man sitting as our team leader…
"Aaaah… what a complete fucking idiot."
The words came out on autopilot.
But Park Humin, that bastard, was snickering like it was the funniest thing he'd ever heard.
Because it wasn't his problem, right?
And then, mid-laugh:
"Oh, hey. Hey hey hey hey."
"What?"
"Over there — Seon Yeonwoo."
I was about to ask what his problem was, but when I followed Park Humin's chin-nod, I had to admit…
"…Holy shit, for real."
"……."
…I couldn't exactly blame him for that reaction.
Height… a little shorter than Park Eunseo, maybe.
Hair… a medium cut that just brushed her shoulders.
Face… a delicate, rabbit-like look.
But the real reason Seon Yeonwoo drew so much more attention than her looks alone could explain came down to one thing.
"Why did the world have to birth both me and Seon Yeonwoo?"
"Why are you suddenly being so dramatic?"
"No, think about it. Fuck, she looks like that and she's a third-generation chaebol? How am I supposed to make a living?"
"Your salary."
"Ah, shit…"
Third-generation chaebol.
Meaning… that Seon Yeonwoo over there was the granddaughter of the Gaon Group chairman.
Which was probably why men approached her less often than they did Park Eunseo, Chu Yeonju, or An Jihye.
The sheer intimidation of the "third-gen chaebol" label had a way of keeping people at bay.
"…But what kind of balls does that guy have…"
"What?"
"Ah, nothing. I'm heading in first."
"Hey, good luck."
I left Park Humin behind, returned to my desk, and scrolled through the Office Romance Management App.
Administrator:Choi Jichan
Management Targets:Seon Yeonwoo, An Jihye!, Park Humin!
Special Management Targets:Park Eunseo!, Chu Yeonju!
Seon Yeonwoo was the very first person Manager Kim Yuhon had registered in the Office Romance Management App.
Whether he'd registered her before getting married or after, I had no idea.
If it was before, I wondered what kind of confidence that took. If it was after, I wondered what kind of guts.
Think about it.
Park Eunseo was in the secretarial team — get close to her and you could snag high-level intel.
Chu Yeonju… just looking at her, she was so pure and innocent that if some shady guy reeled her in, you'd risk losing a capable subordinate.
An Jihye was easy enough to understand. To break that fucking bitch in, the Office Romance Management App was pure miracle medicine.
"But Seon Yeonwoo… why…"
What had Manager Kim Yuhon been aiming for? What had he hoped to get out of putting Seon Yeonwoo's name in there?
Park Eunseo, Chu Yeonju, An Jihye.
I'd already built some kind of relationship with those three, so establishing and adjusting our "relations" hadn't been all that hard.
They were just people you kept bumping into in the course of office life.
But Seon Yeonwoo was different.
Her department barely overlapped with mine.
The "class" gap, as modern society would put it, was enormous.
We knew each other by face… sort of, but it wasn't anything substantial.
So honestly, when it came to Seon Yeonwoo… I'd only thought about her in vague terms. I hadn't planned on actively doing anything.
Just go with the flow.
If we ran into each other, fine. If we talked, great. If talking led to getting closer, even better. If we got close enough for her to pop up in the Office Romance Management App, then I'd figure something out from there.
Follow that fantasy all the way to the end and I could even dream of marrying Seon Yeonwoo and marrying into a chaebol family as a live-in son-in-law.
"…Seeing her in person is a whole different story."
But Seon Yeonwoo, after months apart, had wiped those thoughts clean and jammed her presence straight into my skull.
If I could make that small frame bend over for me.
If I could restrain those slender wrists.
If I could dirty that little face.
If I could make that woman mine.
Third-gen chaebol or whatever the hell else —
In the crudest possible terms, I just wanted to fuck Seon Yeonwoo.
Which meant I somehow had to break the ice with her…
"Sunbaenim, I'm heading over to the Finance Department — any messages you need me to pass along?"
"Huh? Oh."
I'd been lost in thought and got caught red-handed by my junior.
"Why Finance?"
"Just delivering some documents. Nothing's wrong."
"No, I don't have anything."
"Alright, I'll be back."
"Yeah, sure."
I briefly considered going myself…
"It's Wednesday today, so… let's see."
Last Friday.
A few days had passed since my "relationship" with An Jihye had been adjusted.
"Hmm…"
From then until now, every time I went to Finance and saw An Jihye, I'd piled on the praise for just about everything.
You handled that well.
Work's been so much easier thanks to you lately.
I really appreciate it.
I'd even complimented how good her suit looked today.
…Ha. I had no idea brown-nosing was this exhausting. Fuck.
Still, I figured the results were pretty solid.
An Jihye — Relationship
Annoying piece of shit, A guy who's interested in me, The superior who holds my life and death in his hands — 19
Her affection had dropped a little, but I preferred to think of that as within the margin of error.
The real point was that "relationship" line.
She'd apparently misread why I'd been treating her so kindly lately, and now she thought I was interested in her.
Didn't really matter.
Thanks to that second "relationship," the third one was going to shine even brighter.
"Hello, Jihye-ssi."
An Jihye flinched at the person calling her name.
Isuyen.
"These are documents from the Planning Team. Could you check them over, and if everything looks fine, pass them along to the department head?"
"Ah… sure."
She felt a faint flicker of relief that the person handing her the papers wasn't Jichan, but someone else.
Why?
Because that piece-of-shit bastard —
The same bastard who'd looked at her with pure disgust every time he saw her had, out of nowhere, started treating her warmly.
If it were any other guy, she might have just shrugged it off.
But a man who'd never once bothered to hide how much he hated her suddenly flipping like that only drove An Jihye's opinion of Jichan even further into the ground.
At the same time, though —
The thought that she needed to stay on that bastard's good side had quietly grown, until it brushed up against the fear that he might destroy the entire "career" she'd built at this company.
What if he snitched to the Planning Department head?
And the Planning head tore into the Finance head?
And then the Finance head tore into her?
"Um, Suyen-ssi."
"Yes?"
"That… Assistant Manager Choi Jichan…"
"Assistant Manager Choi is at his desk. Did you have a message for him?"
"Ah, no. It's nothing."
After about ten minutes of work, Isuyen came back from Finance.
She gave me a light nod of greeting and sat down, and then…
"Ah, Assistant Manager."
"Yes?"
Before I could ask her anything, Isuyen spoke up first.
"Did you maybe have something you needed to tell Jihye-ssi?"
"What message?"
"When I went to deliver the documents, she seemed like she was looking for you. I asked if she had anything to pass along and she said no, but…"
"Ahh…"
…Things seemed to be unfolding more or less the way I'd expected.
"…I'll head over later."
"Alright."
I casually cut off the interest Isuyen was showing and got back to work.
…I don't want to work overtime, fuck.
Around four o'clock, I actually ended up with a reason to visit Finance.
"Hmm…"
Judging by what Isuyen said, the "relationship" adjustments were starting to show some effects.
Which meant that before long… the kind of reaction I was hoping for might start to surface.
I couldn't say exactly when, but it didn't feel far off.
Of course, An Jihye's affection level was still practically rock bottom…
"Jihye-ssi, that email you sent me — who was the source on that?"
"That was… the Planning Team 1 leader."
"……."
"…W-why? What's wrong?"
"No, that wasn't what this was supposed to mean."
"Excuse me?"
Regardless of the full context —
An Jihye felt like I held her lifeline in my hands.
And in that state, if I used the gap in our ranks to apply pressure, what kind of reaction would I get?
"Hmmmmm…"
"…I-I'll redo it."
About five minutes later.
"H-here."
"Thanks."
I snatched the documents she'd printed with a sharp snap, left the barest minimum of a goodbye, and walked off.
And behind me…
"Ch-Choi… Assistant Manager Choi."
An Jihye hurried after me.
"Y-you must be really tired, right?"
"Huh?"
"I mean, um… you've looked a little exhausted lately…"
The words alone sounded like she was concerned about an overworked colleague, but her expression was more like…
"…I am tired, yeah. But you look even more exhausted than I do, Jihye-ssi."
"What?"
"Your eyes are twitching and everything."
"……."
…Because it looked like a twisted smile from the underworld, that's why.
The moment I pointed it out, An Jihye realized the state of her own face and hurriedly fixed her expression.
Back to something normal, she said:
"Th-then, if you're free… I was thinking I could buy you lunch tomorrow. W-would that be… okay?"