Chapter 1
Chapter 1
Osaka Izakaya (1)
Dotonbori, a bustling district in Osaka, Japan.
Today as well, the street was packed with people.
Moving away from the crowd toward Nipponbashi Station, an izakaya came into view. It was an izakaya called Mogami River, with a red lantern hanging outside.
Inside, five people who appeared to be office workers were drinking. They were employees of Korea’s H Group.
Three of them were on a business trip from Korea, and two were local branch staff.
A man in his late forties seated against the wall spoke to a man in his early thirties sitting across from him.
“Drink up. Does Japanese sake not suit you?”
“Ah, yes. I’m drinking.”
“Is it because it’s too cold? Should we ask them to warm it up a bit?”
“No, it’s fine.”
“When did you join the company?”
Another man in his late forties sitting nearby spoke.
“Mr. Kim Chi-rok here is in his second year at the company.”
“Is that so?”
“He still hasn’t built up much experience, so it seems he’s not good with alcohol. So don’t push him. You just drink more yourself.”
“Well, since I’m acting as the Osaka branch manager, it’s drinking every day for me. These days, because of the Osaka Expo, things are especially hectic. Sometimes I have to handle two rounds of evening entertaining.”
“Two rounds? Still, I envy you being a branch manager.”
“What are you talking about! Being an executive at H Chemicals in Korea is better than this.”
“An executive is an executive, but I’m not working at the headquarters of the group—I’m at an affiliate factory. What’s so great about that?”
“You’re not even in some remote province, you’re in Incheon, aren’t you? When the GTX B line opens, they say you’ll be able to get to Seoul in 20 minutes.”
“I envy you for being good at both English and Japanese. Thanks to that, you get to travel abroad, so isn’t that nice?”
“Traveling around in another country is tiring too.”
“Tiring?”
“My wife is in Seoul, and my son is just entering middle school. Being separated isn’t good.”
“Won’t high-level people visit here often? Seems like a good opportunity to curry favor. If things go well, you might even get promoted to managing director. Then you could return to Korea after getting promoted.”
“Managing director, my foot!”
The director who had come from Korea and the Osaka branch manager seemed to be close. It looked like they were either from the same hiring cohort or had some prior connection.
Seeing them speak informally to each other, it seemed that way.
The Osaka branch manager of H Group took a sip of Japanese sake and said,
“By the way, the employee who came with you—is his name Kim Chi-rok?”
The man in his early thirties shifted in his seat and replied,
“Yes, that’s correct.”
“That’s an unusual name. Chi-rok, is it?”
“My father gave me that name.”
“Is that so? It seems to have some meaning.”
“He said he named it that while thinking one should manage their blessings well.”
“Manage blessings? Haha. Your father sounds quite clever.”
At this, Kim Chi-rok briefly thought of his father who had left home.
The director who had come from Korea spoke again.
“Mr. Kim Chi-rok graduated from Seoul National University, majoring in business administration.”
The Osaka branch manager looked slightly surprised and said,
“Really? He graduated from Seoul National University? In that case, he should be working in something like the group’s strategic planning office. It’s a waste for him to be working at an affiliate in Incheon.”
“He’s working in the planning team of an affiliate due to bad luck, but he’s a valuable talent.”
“You need to be well connected... Once you’re assigned to an affiliate, it’s hard to get back to the group headquarters. Unless you have some strong backing behind you.”
Kim Chi-rok thought of his fellow hire, Jeong Chan-young. He had graduated from one of the middle-tier top universities, but because his father was the president of an H Group affiliate, he was immediately placed in the group’s strategic planning office.
He had studied hard, clenching his teeth, believing that graduating from Seoul National University would lead to success, but now it felt like he was falling behind, which left him feeling hollow.
Still, his mother and relatives were happy that her son had landed a job at a large corporation.
His mother even went around bragging about it to people around her.
Kim Chi-rok had been poor, but thanks to his mother, he was able to attend school in Gangnam’s elite school district.
Originally, Kim Chi-rok had lived in Goyang, Gyeonggi Province. But his mother insisted that for her son’s education, he had to attend schools in Gangnam’s prestigious district, so she decided to move. As a result, they relocated to a semi-basement unit in a row house behind Dogok Elementary School in Gangnam.
Living in Gangnam didn’t mean everyone was rich. There were semi-basements too.
After moving to Gangnam to replace her incompetent husband, his mother worked two jobs. She worked as a cleaner in a high-end apartment complex in Dogok-dong and also worked as a visiting caregiver.
Now that Kim Chi-rok had been accepted into Seoul National University, his mother’s plan had succeeded.
However, while he was in school, how much scorn had he endured from classmates for living in a semi-basement? His mother would never know the bruises in his heart. And he himself didn’t want to show it.
Now his family’s situation had improved somewhat. This was because Kim Chi-rok had landed a job at a large corporation. Recently, they had moved to Bongcheon-dong, to a row house. Not a semi-basement, but the third floor of a somewhat more spacious unit.
Having joined a chaebol company, Kim Chi-rok naturally wanted to work in a core department of the group.
But society was not so easy. Connections seemed to matter more than ability.
A section manager in his late thirties who had come on the same business trip as Kim Chi-rok said,
“Branch Manager! In society, it seems connections matter more than ability.”
“What are you talking about? Those very connections are ability. Being competent means you’re good at managing connections.”
The director added,
“Connections are ability, that’s right. Look at our company’s executive Jeong. When his older brother was elected as a member of the National Assembly last time, he was immediately promoted to managing director.”
Kim Chi-rok felt depressed again.
[Then does that mean I’m incompetent because I have no connections?]
As the son of an apartment cleaner, even though he had graduated from Seoul National University, he felt he would fall behind those with connections.
He even thought it might be difficult for him to get married. First of all, he would need to own a home, but that felt impossibly distant.
The director dipped a fried shrimp into wasabi soy sauce and looked up. Then he glanced at a poster on the wall of the izakaya and said,
“What’s that poster? The woman in the poster looks like a geisha?”
On the poster, a beautiful woman in a kimono was smiling under a cherry blossom tree at a temple.
The Osaka branch manager looked up at the poster and said,
“Oh, that’s a promotional poster for Kyoto City.”
“By the way, is the woman in the poster drawn by artificial intelligence? Where could there be a woman that perfect and beautiful?”
“No, it’s not AI. She’s currently the most famous geiko in Kyoto.”
“Geiko?”
“In the Kansai region, geisha are called geiko. Among Kansai areas, Kyoto is especially famous for geiko.”
“I’ve heard that Kyoto is famous for geisha. So it seems the city also made promotional posters like that.”
“Do you know how many tourists Kyoto attracts each year because of geisha? Hundreds of thousands come. The tourism revenue alone is enormous.”
“Should we go see geisha tomorrow?”
“It’s hard for ordinary tourists to see real geisha.”
“Really? But if that poster were real, she’s incredibly beautiful.”
“She’s a famous woman. Hirose Yoshiko, the most beautiful geiko in Kyoto.”
Kim Chi-rok also looked at the poster.
A woman who looked like a celestial being was wearing a seductive smile. Her face looked like something out of a classical painting of beauties from China.
[Is that photo really of a real person? She truly looks like a goddess. Her name was Hirose Yoshiko, right?]
Kim Chi-rok stared, captivated by her beauty. It was the first time he had ever seen such a stunning woman.
The director tapped the back of Kim Chi-rok’s head and said,
“Hey! Why are you staring so blankly? A beauty from another country is like a flower in a mirror, beyond your reach!”
“No, I was just looking.”
“Women like that will never have a chance to meet ordinary people like us. Just drink.”
Saying this, the director poured sake into Kim Chi-rok’s empty glass.
Kim Chi-rok took a small sip of the drink the director had poured, then looked at the poster again. She was truly a woman as beautiful as a sculpture.
But, but.
No one there knew that this woman would one day approach Kim Chi-rok like fate itself. Not even in dreams could anyone have imagined it.