Assistant Manager Park's Fury

Assistant Manager Hong had also been counting down the days to the bid results.

At this point, Assistant Manager Park had the results report fully drafted — all that remained was to fill in the final figures and a few lines on why the bid had succeeded or failed.

If the bid had gone down in flames, Hong wouldn't have given the report a second glance. But with a win on the table, things were a different story.

This would become his achievement, plain and simple.

And as luck would have it, word of the successful bid had just reached Deputy General Manager Cho from Manager Kim moments before.

From this point on, it was his credit — which meant he had to step up and take charge of it personally.

"Assistant Manager Park, couldn't you hand that bid results report over to me?"

When Assistant Manager Hong spat out this absurd request, Park could hardly believe his ears.

He should have seen it coming back when the guy was lounging around the office instead of showing his face — but still.

Not even in his wildest dreams had he imagined Hong would pull something this shameless.

What Hong was doing right now was beyond the pale, even by his standards.

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"I'm sorry, what? What are you even saying? I've already finished the whole thing. If you wanted to write it, you should have said so this morning — why are you asking for it now?"

"Ah, well, you see… I wasn't feeling well this morning, but I'm fine now. Besides, when you think about it, New Seoul Distribution is your dealership, isn't it? I'm offering to write the results report for my own dealership — why are you getting so worked up about it?"

"Even so, this is crossing a line. I couldn't get to my own work and spent the entire morning grinding on that report."

"I understand that, but come on, Assistant Manager Park. If a senior asks for something, you hand it over without a word. Why all this arguing? Email me everything you've written so far, exactly as is. I'll review it, polish it up, and submit the report myself."

Deputy General Manager Cho, who had been listening to the exchange from the team leader's seat, chimed in as well, ordering Park to hand the report over to Hong.

Assistant Manager Park found himself in the position of a dog chasing a chicken that ends up staring at the roof — utterly staked out with nowhere to go.

He was well and truly screwed.

Park was seething, but with Deputy General Manager Cho siding with Hong as well, he had no choice but to hand over the report materials.

Meanwhile, President Park of New Seoul Distribution, blissfully unaware of any of this, approached Young-hoon to offer his thanks.

"Thank you. It's thanks to you, Assistant Manager Kim, that we won the bid."

"Oh, come on, I didn't do anything. Though the construction costs look awfully tight — will you even turn a profit?"

"That's exactly what's been bothering me, actually. I'll just have to move the schedule up, that's all. It's labor costs we're skimming off anyway. I'll worry about that tomorrow — today, I'm going out for a drink. You'll come along, won't you, Assistant Manager Kim?"

On any ordinary day, he would have happily joined the dealership staff for a round, but tonight he was due to meet Chairman Jang and the director of Chunghyo General Hospital in the evening, so attending was out of the question.

So Young-hoon offered up a convenient excuse.

"The higher-ups at the company are taking a personal interest in this bid, you see. I need to get back to the office quickly and file the results report."

"Well, can't be helped then. Next time, we definitely grab that drink."

"Absolutely. Just say the word, any time."

Young-hoon was leaving the bidding hall and heading back to the office when a call came in from Secretary Byun.

With nothing pressing left on his plate, Young-hoon took his time driving back to the office, enjoying the scenery of late autumn along the way.

When he opened the office door and stepped inside, Deputy General Manager Cho and Assistant Manager Hong were nowhere to be seen — only ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠Manager Kim and Assistant Manager Park remained.

But there was something seriously off about Park's expression.

"What's wrong? Did something happen?"

Park answered by pointing upward without a word.

Not the break room — the rooftop. He was telling him to come up to the roof.

So something really had happened.

The moment they stepped onto the rooftop, Park unleashed a typhoon of curses at Assistant Manager Hong.

"You son of a bitch! That bastard Hong — if I let that piece of garbage get away with this, I'm not a human being!"

And the tirade went on for a good long while after that.

In moments like these, the best policy was to stand quietly and wait for the storm to blow over.

Once he seemed to have calmed down somewhat, Young-hoon asked.

"So what did that bastard Hong screw up this time?"

"That son of a bitch hijacked my results report."

"Huh? What are you talking about? Explain it to me, from the top."

"Here's the thing. I'd been doing the groundwork for the results briefing, sizing everything up in advance and prepping the report, remember? It was polished up real pretty — finished to the point where all anyone had to do was drop in the bid figures. Then the second he heard the results from you, he announces he's writing the report himself and tells me to send everything I've written so far to his email. Says the dealership is his, if you can believe it. And Deputy General Manager Cho — that bastard — tells me to hand my bid results report over to Hong too. Those two are exactly the same brand of scumbag."

"……"

"So the guy went and changed the report author to his own name and submitted it. Absolute rat bastard — if that's how he felt, he should have written it from the start. He wouldn't even let me go on my field trip, ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠made me slave away on it, and then he just swoops in and snatches it? Is that a human being, or a dog?"

"Unbelievable — what kind of son of a bitch even does that! So if the bid had failed, the report goes up under your name, but since we won, it goes up under his? Which means you and I just got handed the short end of the stick. We worked two days for nothing?"

"That's exactly it! That bastard stole the credit. Where in the world is there a load of garbage situation like this?"

"Ha… this is seriously infuriating. Well, look, it's not the first time he's swiped something, right? Let's just let it go. It burns me up too, but still."

"And you can just forget it that easily?"

"What choice do we have? That guy's royal family, and you and I are commoners… no, wait, slaves. Anyway — putting that aside, we've got a real problem."

Young-hoon was not normally the flighty or melodramatic type.

In other words, when Young-hoon said something serious had happened, it was to be taken at face value.

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"What problem?! Bigger than this?"

"I had lunch with President Jung of Gyeongin Distribution today, and they've caught hard evidence of Gyeongin dumping into the electronics market. And apparently Gyeongbuk Distribution, a dealership under the Daegu marketing office, got caught too."

"Gyeongin I can understand, but where did Gyeongbuk Distribution come from all of a sudden?"

"The Dealership Alliance got their hands on phones that had been dumped into the electronics market, and the units they recovered had shipped out through Gyeongin and Gyeongbuk Distribution. And get this — they even know the exact numbers that hit the market. Twenty-five hundred units through Gyeongin, another thousand through Gyeongbuk."

"So what happens now?"

"The alliance is sending an official inquiry and the physical evidence to the audit team. Year-end is about to get messy. We should start preparing well in advance."

"This is bad. So it ends up going to audit after all. If we're not ready ahead of time, we'll get swept away in the typhoon."

"Exactly what I was thinking. Let's go down and brief Manager Kim too. By the way, where did Deputy General Manager Cho and Assistant Manager Hong run off to?"

"Cho left fifteen minutes ago for tomorrow's meeting, and that bastard Hong bolted the second Cho was out the door? He's sulking, obviously. I'll bet my entire life savings he doesn't show up to work tomorrow."

"You think a guy like that shows his face after a day like today? Even you know that bet doesn't count."

Young-hoon and Park went back down to the office and briefed Manager Kim on everything President Jung had shared over lunch.

At once, the once-tranquil office transformed, a tension filling the air like the eve of war.

For the time being, they agreed to keep it quiet and comb through all their ongoing work for anything less than airtight, then fill in whatever supplementary paperwork was needed.

The conference room bore the wreckage of the storm that had just swept through it.

The marketing team leaders had all cleared out of their seats, and there was nothing left to do anyway. It was barely five in the afternoon, but the office had gone completely into full-tilt slacking mode. People could already be seen trickling out toward the exits.

Assistant Manager Park, still fuming, tried to coax Young-hoon out for a drink, but Young-hoon politely declined on account of a prior engagement. So Park dragged off Assistant Manager Hwang from Marketing Team 2 instead.

Manager Kim, apparently having some unfinished business of his own, showed no intention of leaving. Young-hoon hovered awkwardly for a while, then finally left the office around five forty.

Chunghyo General Hospital, where he was to meet Chairman Jang, was located in Pungnap-dong, Gangdong-gu.

From Yeouido, it was a thirty-minute drive along the Olympic Expressway. The one drawback was that if the trip coincided with rush hour traffic, arrival time became anyone's guess.

So Young-hoon mulled over how to kill the spare time he had.

Then it came to him — and he turned the car toward the house he would be moving into starting the day after tomorrow.

Once inside, he checked whether there was anything he still needed. Aside from a few odds and ends, the place was perfectly outfitted.

Having inspected the master bedroom and the room he'd be using as his laboratory, Young-hoon left the house right on schedule.

It was around seven-ten when he arrived at Chunghyo General Hospital.

He had Chairman Jang's phone number, but he hesitated to call the man directly, so he notified Secretary Byun of his arrival instead.

After waiting in the hospital lobby for about ten minutes, he spotted Chairman Jang and Secretary Byun coming through the entrance.

Young-hoon greeted the Chairman warmly.

"Good evening, Chairman."

"We saw each other just two days ago — what's with the greeting like we haven't met in months? And if I'd known you'd come this early, I'd have moved the appointment up. Well, no matter. Let's head up."

Young-hoon, Chairman Jang, and Secretary Byun took the elevator up to the fifteenth floor.

Young-hoon simply allowed himself to be led along by Chairman Jang, entirely in the dark about why.

Only when the Chairman mentioned in the elevator that they were headed to the director's office did Young-hoon realize their destination was the hospital director's own suite.

Inside the director's office, a man in his early sixties was waiting to receive the Chairman's party.

"Welcome, Chairman."

Director Park had never met Young-hoon before, and was about to ask Chairman Jang about him.

But the Chairman moved first.

"Young-hoon, come and greet him. This is Dr. Park Jong-wook, director of Chunghyo General Hospital."

"It's an honor to meet you. My name is Kim Young-hoon."

"Ah, a pleasure to meet you. But — the Taoist master is so young?"

"I'm sorry? What do you mean by that?"

As Young-hoon stood there bewildered, Chairman Jang burst into a hearty laugh and made the introduction properly.

"Director Park, when did I ever say the master himself was coming in person? This young man here is the master's representative. Come now, let's all take a seat and talk."

Once everyone had settled onto the sofas, Director Park had his secretary bring tea, and then the questions began pouring out in earnest.

Young-hoon relayed the story exactly as he had told the two Chairmen, adding nothing and embellishing nothing.

"So let me get this straight — you mixed the elixir powder given to you by the Taoist master of Mount Taebaek into wine and drank it, and that is the miraculous elixir?"

"That's what I'm telling you, my friend. Young-hoon, you brought the elixir with you, didn't you?"

Young-hoon took a bottle of wine out of his bag and handed it to Director Park.

"To look at it, it's just cheap bottom-shelf wine — and you're telling me this is the elixir of the ages… I honestly can't wrap my head around it."

"Are you suggesting that I'm running a con on you?!"

Director Park still looked distinctly skeptical, and Chairman Jang suddenly began to lose his temper.

He had gone to all the trouble of arranging this introduction with the utmost care — how could Young-hoon embarrass him like this, right to his face?

This was, quite literally, a matter of his own prestige on the line.