Chapter 154
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 154
Chapter Title: Highway Reflections
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On the Incheon International Airport Expressway stretched a luxury Japanese sedan, gliding along quietly and refreshingly.
No one would ever imagine that Oh Hanam, the vice president of Ilha Group, was eating a meal inside it. Especially not if that meal consisted of a convenience store lunchbox and cup ramen.
"Mmm! This is tasty?"
Oh Hanam, who had been ready to hand it off to his bodyguard if it wasn't to his liking, marveled at how half the lunchbox had already disappeared after just a few bites.
"I've heard that food quality across Korea has leveled up overall these days. Even accounting for that, this is genuinely good."
Korea was undoubtedly an exceptional country. Competitive, you could say?
Well, more precisely, it meant you couldn't survive without at least this level of performance.
A barren land that produced scarcely any usable resources.
A small nation to begin with, where 70 percent of the territory was mountainous.
"A place where only the lucky and the strong survive, truly."
Oh Hanam muttered to himself that he was both lucky and strong.
The bodyguard listening quietly beside him reported a new development.
"Lee Gin-hyung has blown through all the money as of today."
Who was Lee Gin-hyung again?
After racking his brain for one or two seconds, Oh Hanam recalled and let out a sigh of admiration.
He was one of Oh Hana's ex-boyfriends.
"Ha, that guy's something else. Already spent the ten million won?"
"Yes. We checked the transaction history—none of it went toward overdue interest or immediate problems. It was all lost to gambling. And the spending at clubs we operate or in entertainment districts was even more..."
"Enough. Stop there."
"Understood."
Oh Hanam tapped the folding table he'd set up for his meal with his index finger.
"I gave him cash precisely so he'd do that. Still, I figured he'd give at least some to the family whose lives he ruined along with his own. But no, he followed my expectations to the letter. Not even a tiny deviation. How boring."
Oh Hanam recalled what he'd witnessed since childhood.
How powerless and wicked people could become in the face of money.
If Han Aebom had learned about people's ugliness and malice from handling complaints at her agency, Oh Hanam had learned it up close and personal, trailing after his father.
"This feels oddly unpleasant."
As the tapping on the table grew louder and he muttered that, tension gripped the driver's hands on the wheel. The bodyguards held their breath as if chemical weapons had been deployed.
"Hm. I never used to feel disgusted by people blowing money on this kind of thing."
It had been his one stress reliever, after all. So why did it bother him today?
With his objective analysis and quick mind, Oh Hanam pinpointed the reason in under three seconds.
"Is it because I met Kim Hyunwoo?"
Pfft!
He flinched at the involuntary chuckle that escaped, brushing his mouth with one hand.
"What a truly bizarre guy, in every way."
Oh Hanam knew exactly how crazy he was—and how cautious.
His public image of warmth and kindness was thorough acting, a safety device he'd designed to protect himself. He layered those safeguards multiply, avoiding dangerous matters altogether.
In fact, though no one knew, in his 27 years, he'd never even held a woman's hand in a personal relationship. That stemmed from his near-obsessive caution.
Women, money, power...
He analyzed such perilous things objectively, guarding against hubris. Thus, he wasn't one to court trouble or stress—playing with people was how he vented.
Even toward his one comfortable companion, his little sister.
"Like I said earlier, that guy seems so pathetic and insignificant that I let my guard down without realizing it?"
Oh Hanam tilted his head. Just from that?
He, who never relaxed even before a senile old man on the verge of death tomorrow?
"I genuinely wanted to kill him at first."
He meant it.
Due to his odd personality, Oh Hanam hated nagging or meddling even from his parents. So he obeyed them readily, as a rule.
But for a non-blood relative—an ill-tempered old geezer—to summon him at dawn, mock his very way of life, belittle him, nag endlessly, and top it off with eight hours of standing in the hospital room for granddaughter boasts and self-indulgent ramblings disguised as lectures?
"Ha, fuck."
Just recalling it made curses spill out.
Those hearing his profanity for the first time nearly stopped breathing. Even the smoothly cruising car jerked briefly.
'I've stabbed him to death a few hundred times in my head already.'
In reality, the man was old, experienced, and had far greater achievements, so he'd listened objectively and calmly to Han Se-ryong's words.
'Live like me, or the country perishes.'
Demanding he shoulder needless risks.
Insisting on sentiment over sense.
"Now you're saying that because living like that would bankrupt the company, aren't you, Chairman Han Se-ryong?"
Not that he was wrong, of course.
Ilha Group would be among the most reviled conglomerates domestically if not for the image he'd cultivated—traitors to the nation, perhaps.
Unfriendly at home, overwhelmingly courteous abroad. That was Ilha Group.
In return, they earned vast foreign currency, securing top-tier salaries and benefits for employees, unmatched in the industry.
"Who cares if this damn country crumbles? What does it have to do with us?"
The birth rates alone showed it'd disassemble and reassemble itself eventually.
Too late to fix now, yet the once-mighty old fogeys, reading the era's flow perfectly, still clung to stubbornness.
"It'd be less infuriating if they were clueless. Fucking geezers. Ha."
Those elders knew the nation was in decline.
Yet out of loyalty and patriotism, they pressured the young like him to sacrifice and submit.
"What a joke."
Oh Hanam swept back his bangs and gazed out the window. Departing planes dotted the distant horizon.
"I should say it to their faces sometime."
But face-to-face, he rarely voiced such things "unnecessarily." Yet today, he'd said plenty of "unnecessary" things to Kim Hyunwoo.
"..."
One second, two, three... one minute.
After prolonged contemplation, Oh Hanam tilted his head in puzzlement.
"No, really, what an odd guy."
This had never happened before.
He'd truly wanted to kill the man, but meeting him a second time melted that grudge away softly.
"Did he cast some spell?"
Or like Oh Hana's strong fondness, maybe family genes or DNA predisposed them to accept him easily. Ridiculous...
He let out a hollow laugh at the absurd thought when a watchful bodyguard spoke up.
"Uh, Vice Chairman."
"Speak."
"What about Lee Gin-hyung...?"
"What about him? Keep monitoring and leave him be, like always. Just in case, bolster protection around Hana."
"Understood."
"Also, with my appointment with Chairman Han Se-ryong, assign one guard each to Kim Hyunwoo's family and associates, just in case. That lunatic might've learned from watching me."
The bodyguard flinched, then ventured cautiously.
"Vice Chairman, that seems like a huge waste of manpower..."
"I get your intent, but no need to skimp here. Better than risking that 'just in case'."
"Understood."
Confirming the bodyguard's bowed head, Oh Hanam turned back to the window with a bored expression.
'Ignoring those "just in cases" is what made the country this mess.'
The more he thought, the more everyone but him seemed pathetic.
"Fuck."
Amid it all, Kim Hyunwoo slyly dodging the pattern irked him into another curse. Maybe seek counseling?
'Can't rule out hypnosis I didn't notice. Should visit a hospital.'
Meanwhile, the bodyguard who'd been swallowing hard spoke again.
"Th-then, what about Kim Hyunwoo himself? Chairman Han said nothing special needed for him."
"True."
That was the point—he'd wrecked Lee Gin-hyung to secure that very outcome.
"True... but still, just in case, assign one."
"Understood."
With matters settled and silence finally reigning, Oh Hanam habitually tapped the folding table, eyeing the empty convenience store lunchbox plastic under the car's interior light.
'Ten million won buys about 1,265 of these lunchboxes.'
With discounts, even more. And Lee Gin-hyung had squandered it in under a week, just as predicted.
'Everyone does.'
Hand them money. Give them women.
Let them touch the untouchables.
They crumble on their own.
'Humans are so easy.'
Seat them on the throne for a fleeting instant.
They'll thrash desperately, convinced it was always theirs, addicted to that sweetness.
In that vein, the tip he'd given Kim Hyunwoo was the same.
'Easy money corrupts.'
...Muttering that, Oh Hanam pinched his brow between thumb and forefinger.
'But 550,000 won feels too paltry. I meant to give five million.'
In the heat of conversation, he'd gotten carried away, impulsively offering sincere advice instead of the plan.
Well... whether 550,000 or five million.
If Kim Hyunwoo went corrupt over it,
"I doubt it'd feel good."
"Vice Chairman, we've arrived."
"Let's go."
Oh Hanam exited the car with hands out of his pockets, pocketing them only after. He withdrew them again before escalators or stairs.
His bodyguards, protecting him for years, thought how sweet it was: tailing a boss who never slipped—earning 1.5 times peers' pay, with ample staffing for no overload.
Meanwhile, after an all-nighter at work, Kim Hyunwoo stared at the 550,000 won in his hand and finally decided.
"Just treat it as free cash and blow it big. Big time."