Chapter 10
Could it really be this easy to get pulled along by an algorithm, no matter how capable you were?
I was still scrolling through the comments, half convinced I was missing something, when one line caught my eye.
-bright_mirae : I found this through a community post, but there’s only one post here T_T That’s such a shame!
“Oh, someone shared it.”
It looked like the piece hadn’t drawn much attention at first, but someone who liked my writing had apparently posted it to a community forum.
I hadn’t set any restrictions on scraping, so there wasn’t anything to complain about.
People found it from there.
And thanks to that, the view count went up, which in turn seemed to drag it into the algorithm’s current.
-Hyunah4132 : I really like the mood here. I’ll stop by often ^^
-Sunsun77 : I’m hooked even after reading just a few lines. You must be really good with words......!
“Reading the comments is fun······.”
It had only taken me about another hour to finish the piece, yet I was grateful that people liked it this much.
Ding-!
And then another email arrived.
[I’d like to sponsor a sushi omakase meal. Would that be possible?]
“Oh······?”
Not just hotels, then. Restaurants too?
And a pretty good one, at that.
I looked it up and found that, sure enough, it was expensive.
“It’s over 100,000 won for one meal······?”
And they were even offering a free seat for one companion.
“It looks delicious even from the photos······.”
There didn’t seem to be any reason to refuse.
Making money from side jobs and watching my bank balance grow was nice, sure.
But it also sounded good to experience little corners of the world I’d never tried before.
[Hello, this is Side-Hustling Teddy Bear. I’m replying to the email you sent. First of all, thank you for looking kindly on my work······.]
***
The next day.
I headed to the office in high spirits.
Since an iron needs to be struck while it’s hot, I’d already booked the sponsored restaurant for this Friday evening.
I didn’t have to think much about who to go with.
‘I might as well go with Assistant Manager Park.’
He was the closest to me among the people my age, and if something good happened to him, he’d buy a round too.
Last time, when we were in China, he went on and on about how his coin had made a technical breakout, and then he paid for everything through the fourth round all by himself.
‘Honestly, besides Assistant Manager Park, I don’t really have anyone to go with.’
I didn’t have a girl I was seeing.
And I hadn’t dated in a long time.
It would be awkward to contact college friends or old high school buddies just to drag someone along for a sponsored meal.
“Good morning.”
“Oh, Assistant Manager Kang, you’re early. How was the China trip?”
Section Chief Kwak, who was always there before everyone else, greeted me warmly.
“It was better than I expected.”
“Was it? Good.”
He smiled and asked, “So you’re reporting to the TF team starting today?”
“Yes, that’s right.”
“When Assistant Manager Park gets here, take him with you.”
“Understood.”
I’d already set my things down and was waiting when I spotted Assistant Manager Park coming into the office from afar.
“Assistant Manager Park, good mornin-... no, I guess not.”
His expression was off.
“Why do you look like death? Didn’t you sleep last night?”
“I didn’t really sleep······.”
“Why not?”
China was only an hour behind.
“I’m completely screwed······.”
“No, seriously, what happened? Something come up?”
“It’s all red······.”
Only after I looked at the phone screen clutched tight in his hand did I understand what he meant.
“You mean coins?”
“Uh······.”
He let out a deep sigh.
“It’s been cut in half. No, while we’re talking, it’s down to one-third.”
“You idiot······. Why not sell already?”
“How could I sell here? I’ve got to hold on until it goes back up.”
Looking into his eyes, I could tell he was completely gone.
“Seriously, senior too?”
Kim the assistant manager, who had come in behind him, rushed over with a pained look of her own.
“I’m in a full emergency here too.”
“You got cut in half too?”
“Yes······.”
She sighed heavily.
“I woke up in the middle of the night yesterday and checked the coin charts, and suddenly everything was red. Some of them were up 400%······.”
“Right. It was a bull market out of nowhere by evening.”
“And there was even something going up in real time, so before I knew it I got bewitched and bought one.”
“Don’t tell me you bought Ripple?”
“Yes······.”
“Oh no. Same as me.”
“At what level did you get trapped, Assistant Manager?”
“I’m at 32. What about you, Kim?”
“49. The rescue team will come, right?”
“······I’m not sure.”
Kim gripped her hair.
“I bought a designer bag at the duty-free shop yesterday, but I don’t think I’ll be able to return it······.”
“I think I’m going to miss this month’s car installment too······.”
“This is bad.”
“Should we look into loans first?”
“Still, there’s such a thing as a J-curve, so let’s wait and see.”
“Is there really such a thing?”
“Well, you see······.”
The coin talk was getting deeper by the second, so I stepped away from the conversation.
If I stuck around here any longer, I’d only get splashed with the fallout.
“Assistant Manager Park, I’m heading out first. Come find me later.”
“Yeah, sure.”
He barely heard me, fixated on the chart with Kim the assistant manager.
“I mean, even if it’s drawing a straight vertical line here······.”
It was hard not to feel sorry for them when I saw their capital getting wrecked.
At the same time, I also felt a wave of relief.
Along with the simple thought, Good thing I didn’t do it.
And, This is exactly why I can’t invest.
Coins and stocks might let you make money easily, but they also carry the risk of losing it just as fast.
Compared to that, how good is side-hustling?
Unlike those two, who were sweating bullets and wearing down their minds staring at charts,
my bank balance was already nice and solid.
I’d earned more than enough from selling that Joseon-era white porcelain moon jar to buy my way into Chinese fluency, and when I added in the extra income from translation, I was already past 8 million won.
And on top of that, I’d landed a high-end omakase meal and a free hotel stay, hadn’t I?
Without taking on even a speck of risk.
Side jobs are the best.
I could keep earning little by little without ever having to worry about losing it all.
Still, the truth was, I was worried too.
No matter how messed up he looked, he was still one of my precious coworkers.
At this rate, there’s no way I can even ask him to go out for a meal.
He’d obviously refuse, saying he had to work the coins after work and all through the weekend.
And even if he did go, he’d just bury his face in the coin app and stare at the chart the entire time.
***
“Oh, it’s already lunchtime.”
“It is. Time really flies when you’re just sitting in meetings.”
“Let’s continue in the afternoon after lunch.”
“Yes, enjoy your meal.”
“You’ve worked hard. Have a good lunch.”
Since we were in the TF team, lunch timing was a little awkward.
“I’m eating with my original department people······.”
“I’m on a diet, so I’m skipping.”
They might have had prior plans for all I knew.
But the team had only just formed, so everyone was still awkward with one another, and rather than eat in discomfort, they all made excuses and slipped away one by one.
Six out of ten people vanished like that.
One of the remaining four was still trying to recruit others.
“Anyone want to come get naengmyeon with me?”
“Isn’t naengmyeon cold now that it’s autumn?”
“There’s bibim-naengmyeon too.”
“Still, naengmyeon is a bit······.”
That man was a lunatic naengmyeon fanatic.
Even in China, he’d spent the whole time hunting for naengmyeon, and when I asked him about it, he said lunch had to be naengmyeon, absolutely, no matter what.
Once or twice was fine. Any more than that, and it got old.
“What a shame. You don’t know the deep flavor that comes from the plain simplicity of Pyeongyang naengmyeon. I’ll just go eat alone.”
That left three of us now.
Team Leader Han Su-a, me, and Assistant Manager Park.
But the problem was...
“Assistant Manager Park, are you okay?”
He’d looked bad the entire meeting.
“······I’m not eating.”
“Why not? Don’t tell me it’s because of the coins?”
Nod.
He answered with a jerk of his head, as though he didn’t even have the energy to speak, and kept staring at his phone.
“That’s exactly when you need to eat something.”
“No, I need to save every penny and put it into coins. I’ve got to grow my seed money.”
“······.”
He was half out of his mind.
Even now, his empty eyes were rolling over the chart on his screen.
“Did it drop that much?”
“I bought in right before the meeting, and then it fell another 5%.”
“Oh dear······.”
Click.
Team Leader Han nudged me with her elbow.
“Let’s just go by ourselves.”
“Yeah. That’s probably better.”
***
We went to a rice soup place near the office.
“One squid rice bowl and one seafood kalguksu, please.”
As soon as Team Leader Han finished ordering, she set out the chopsticks herself.
“I can do that, Team Leader.”
“It’s fine.”
She shook her head as if to say it was nothing.
“What’s the big deal about setting out chopsticks when we’re about to eat?”
It was enough to keep hierarchy in the office.
“How old are you, Assistant Manager Kang?”
“I’m thirty this year.”
“Hmm, just one year younger than me.”
“Ah, so you’re twenty-nine?”
Pfft-!
Before I’d even finished speaking, she burst out laughing.
“You’re really good at socializing, Assistant Manager Kang.”
“Excuse me?”
“I’m thirty-one.”
“Ah, I’m sorry.”
“Thanks for seeing me as younger.”
I felt awkward all over.
She was the youngest section chief, and her face was pretty youthful too, so I’d naturally assumed she was younger than she was.
“How many years have you been working, Assistant Manager Kang?”
“This makes my fifth year.”
“I’m in my eighth, so we’re exactly three years apart.”
Add a few years of military service and it was a perfect match.
“TF team work isn’t easy, is it?”
She asked that with a apologetic look.
“I recently learned you don’t really like this kind of intense work. I heard you prefer work-life balance.”
“Ah······ well, that’s true. But since I’m here already, I might as well do my best.”
“Don’t worry. I’ll make sure the results are covered, so just do your part. Especially the fact that your idea worked in China this time means you’re doing well already.”
“Thank you.”
“So how did you end up in advertising?”
“It wasn’t that I was especially interested. I just drifted into a place where I could get hired······.”
We talked about this and that.
Starting with office work,
moving on to how she and I had ended up in advertising,
and eventually to how I’d started learning Chinese.
Of course, I glossed over that part and said I’d taught myself.
But the conversation kept circling back around to work.
“Still, I’m worried about Assistant Manager Park.”
“If you leave him alone like that, he’ll bounce back.”
“Has he done that before?”
“He does it now and then, but once he recovers his principal, his condition gets better again.”
“I see.”
Then something occurred to me.
“Do you invest in anything, Team Leader?”
Even as I asked, I started worrying.
It felt like everyone in the world except me was investing in something.
I liked side jobs, sure, but I was also afraid I’d be left out for no good reason.
“Invest?”
But Team Leader Han didn’t even hesitate.
“Not at all.”
“Really?”
“Yes. Paying off my jeonse loan comes first.”
“Oh······!”
That was the best news I’d heard in a while.
“Investment is basically a game where you can lose money too. I don’t want to throw away the money I worked myself to the bone for.”
“Right? I think the same way! People only talk about the money you can make, but underneath that there are countless little investors lying dead, aren’t there?”
“Exactly. Ninety-nine out of a hundred people lose, so betting on the one percent is just gambling, in my view.”
For the first time in a long while.
No, for the first time ever, I found someone who spoke my language.
“Then do you save money in installment accounts too, Team Leader?”
“Of course. Multiple ones, split up by high interest rates.”
“Ohhh, me too!”
I felt like I’d found a comrade.
“By any chance, did you open one at HanSang Bank? The rate was 7.4% this time.”
“Ah, the one with the 200,000 won limit?”
“Yes, that’s the one.”
“Of course I did. Do you know you can get an even better preferential rate on that?”
“Really?”
“You just have to make a card······.”
Maybe it was because I’d met someone with the same wavelength as me.
Talking to her made me feel completely at ease.
Or maybe I was just in a good mood.
“Team Leader, do you like sushi?”
“I like all seafood.”
“Oh, right. You just had seafood kalguksu.”
“Haha, that’s right.”
“Then I happened to get a ticket······ no, a free coupon, I guess. Would you like to go eat together?”