The Coin Millionaire
“Whoa, whoa. See, this is why I don’t talk to just anyone. You don’t believe me, do you, Jun-ho? You’re thinking, ‘Is this bastard drunk on expensive booze, or is he just messing with me?’ right now?”
Kang Baek-ho wiped the serious expression off his face and clicked his tongue.
“It’s not quite like that, but…”
Even though he’d been hit right in the bullseye, Jun-ho denied it for the time being. Kang Baek-ho shrugged, giving him a look that said he knew everything.
“Well, it doesn’t matter what you think. But it’s the truth. I just got a gut feeling. ‘This guy has something special; I need to make sure I’m on good terms with him.’”
“……”
“My intuition is top-tier, you know? And it’s never once been wrong. You don’t seem to believe me, so should I give you some solid proof?”
Before Jun-ho could even answer, Kang Baek-ho poured another glass of whiskey and continued.
“I’ve gone to see almost every debut match for the guys at our gym. But strangely, right before the first round starts, I get this feeling. Whether they’ll win or lose. So I tell Yoo-chan hyung. And I’ve been right every single time. Sounds like a lie, right? Make sure to ask Yoo-chan hyung tomorrow. He’s my witness.”
“Yes.”
“Look at you, saying you’ll actually ask. Haha! But it’s the truth, so go ahead. And, though it sounds like I’m bragging, don’t you think I look pretty decent, even from your perspective? For a third-generation chaebol, I’m not a jerk, I’m reasonably competent, I manage myself well, and I seem to handle people well, too. Ah, maybe you don’t know that last part since we just met today?”
“No. I got a similar impression.”
“Right? I’m not joking, but if I’d really wanted to, even if I couldn’t have taken over the whole group, I could have carved out a much bigger piece. But do you know why I just quietly took the Food and Resort divisions and stepped back? I could have easily taken the hotel if I’d just pushed aside my middle sister, who’s a pushover.”
Kang Baek-ho’s face hardened in an instant as he continued.
“My gut feeling was terrible. I had this overwhelming sense that if I took it, I’d be in 100% trouble. So I backed off. That was a little over two years ago. And what happened?”
Jun-ho thought for a brief moment before answering.
“The COVID-19 pandemic…”
Thwack! Kang Baek-ho slammed the table hard and raised his voice.
“That’s it! Look at you, coming up with the answer right away. If I’d pushed my sister aside and taken that hotel back then? It would be bankrupt right now. Even the resort is barely on life support as it is… Ugh, I still get goosebumps thinking about it.”
“Then, what about your middle sister now…?”
“Don’t even ask. She and her husband are at the main house every other day, kneeling before my father and crying their eyes out. But it doesn’t matter; she’s already out. Sooner or later, the hotel is going to go to my eldest brother or me. Ah, this is family business, so pretend you didn’t hear that. Anyway.”
Kang Baek-ho’s face became serious again as he looked straight at Jun-ho.
“But today! For the first time in a long while, my gut told me this: ‘You absolutely must get to know this guy. It would be good to get close to him. It would be even better to see him often.’ Okay?”
At Kang Baek-ho’s tone, which seemed completely convinced, Jun-ho nodded quietly.
In the apocalypse, ‘that Kang Baek-ho’ of Gwangju was certainly no ordinary person. And while he wasn’t sure how much of what he’d shown today was sincere, one thing was certain.
‘His intuition is the real deal.’
Getting close to a regressor who was the only one who knew about the impending apocalypse and was trying to prepare for it. That was never going to be a losing proposition.
“Ooh, I’m getting a bit tipsy. Hey, Jun-ho, today was really fun.”
“I enjoyed it too, Hyung-nim.”
It was ironic, considering they had agreed to drop the formalities the next time they met, but from the moment the whiskey was half-empty, Kang Baek-ho had naturally started speaking casually. Jun-ho, feeling a sense of affinity toward him, gladly called him ‘Hyung-nim’ and they had already finished exchanging numbers.
“Alright, get home safe. But are you really sure you don’t want a ride?”
“No, Hyung-nim. I’m going to walk to sober up a bit. You go ahead.”
“Alright, then. Make sure to keep in touch. Even if it’s not often, let’s see each other occasionally. I’ll reach out too, so don’t ghost me.”
“Yes, yes. Please go on ahead.”
“Yeah. I’m off.”
Kang Baek-ho waved his hand once and climbed into the backseat of the mid-sized SUV with the three-pointed star emblem. Yoon Seol-hee, who was about to get into the passenger seat, made eye contact with Jun-ho and gave a light nod, and Jun-ho bowed his head slightly in return.
‘Yoon Seol-hee, Park Cheol-woo. With people like that by his side, that’s how he must have built his power.’
He was a third-generation chaebol, after all; those two probably weren’t the only ones. With people who were former special forces and had plenty of real-world combat experience, they could have survived that chaos and built a force of thousands. Of course, there was no guarantee that the two attendants and bodyguards he saw today would remain by Kang Baek-ho’s side until the point Jun-ho had regressed from. However, for some reason, Jun-ho had a strong feeling that they had survived and served Kang Baek-ho until that time.
Vroom.
The vehicle Kang Baek-ho was in drove away, and Jun-ho entered the public restroom of a nearby building. A moment later, when he emerged, a weighted vest was tightly fastened around his torso, arms, legs, and abdomen under his sportswear.
“Let’s go for a slow, light run.”
The total weight he was carrying was 18 kilograms. It was by no means light. But Jun-ho had been running with this weighted vest for over half a month already. His younger brother, Jun-hyeok, had asked in surprise why he would bother adding weight when just running the 16-kilometer round trip every day was already excessive exercise. He’d brushed it off, saying he’d tell him later, but there was a clear reason.
‘Because once you put on a plate carrier with ballistic panels, set up your gear, and carry a rifle, you’re easily over 20 kilograms.’
On top of that, if you carried an operational backpack, you added another 5 to 10 kilograms. To move freely while equipped with such heavy gear, he had to get used to the weight starting now.
Tap-tap-tap-tap—
Since he’d had a bit too much to drink, Jun-ho intentionally ran through the night streets at a slower pace than usual. Normally, exercising after drinking is a no-go. But Jun-ho was certain it wouldn’t have much effect on him. It was because he didn’t really feel intoxicated, and his vision and physical condition were no different from usual.
“Hoo… ha… hoo… ha…”
And so, after drinking a bottle of soju and half a bottle of whiskey, and even wearing an 18-kilogram weighted vest, Jun-ho sprinted through the night streets of Bucheon with a light step.
“It’s all because of the intuition~ It’s all because of the intuition~ Everything is because of the intuition~”
To Kang Baek-ho, who was sitting in the back seat humming the liver supplement commercial song out of habit, Park Cheol-woo, who was holding the steering wheel, asked,
“Representative, you seem to have taken quite a liking to Mr. Lee Jun-ho.”
“Jun-ho? Ah, I like him. At first, I just thought I should talk to him because my gut feeling was so good.”
Sucking on a straw in a 5-pack of yogurt, Kang Baek-ho continued.
“The kid is legit. Earlier, he asked me why I was drinking alone with an unemployed guy like him. He said he couldn’t figure it out no matter how much he thought about it. Ha, some guys are just happy to have me buy them a drink and go ‘hehe~’, but Jun-ho is different. He’s definitely legit.”
“He may be unique, but he seems like a person of good character. Even so, it’s not easy for someone his age to be like that.”
“Right? Plus, the kid didn’t say a single useless word, did he? I really tried to scout him for our company. But he refused. ‘I’m really grateful for the offer, Hyung-nim, but I have work I absolutely must do. Thank you so much for thinking highly of me.’ Kyaa! So cool, so cool.”
Park Cheol-woo, who saw Kang Baek-ho mimicking Jun-ho’s tone in the rearview mirror, smiled and agreed.
“He certainly didn’t seem like an average guy. Do you know what the first thing he did when he entered that bar earlier was?”
“Hm? What did he do?”
“He checked the locations of the aisles, the restrooms, and the emergency exits. Because of that, I thought he was one of our kind. But he said he was just an army veteran from the search team… I found that quite strange.”
“Ho-ho. Does he learn something on the side? Or is he just interested in that sort of thing? Anyway, I like Jun-ho. Like, like.”
With that, Kang Baek-ho, who had finished sucking down the last of his yogurt, suddenly went quiet. As soon as a light snoring sound was heard, Park Cheol-woo, who glanced at the back seat through the rearview mirror, quietly opened his mouth.
“Seol-hee, you look into that guy. How his work life was, what his reputation is.”
“Yes, Sunbae-nim.”
“I think he’s a decent guy too, but you never know, right? It’s been a really long time since the Representative has taken a liking to someone like this.”
“As far as I know, this is the first time for a man. Understood.”
Yoon Seol-hee’s gaze, which had answered firmly, turned toward the car window. The face of the young man, who had an impressive, solid, and sturdy physique, and eyes that were sometimes sharp like a whetted blade despite his indifferent appearance, floated over the rapidly passing scenery of the Olympic Expressway.
Heavy snow fell, the snow melted, and it snowed again. Time passed quickly amidst the ongoing bitter cold. As if to signal that the presidential election was soon, the faces of politicians appeared on the broadcast every single day. Meanwhile, a new variant virus that had swept the world became an issue. Because the infection rate was high but the mortality rate had dropped significantly, the number of deaths did not increase as much as expected. People were continuing their daily lives, more or less, in anticipation of the endemic that was expected to be declared within the year.
In the meantime, Jun-ho’s fighting skills improved by leaps and bounds to the point where he could spar on equal terms with his coach for 3 minutes and 3 rounds after completing his routine. The coach and the gym owner went beyond just recommending that Jun-ho enter competitions and were secretly encouraging him to go pro, and during that time, his younger brother, Jun-hyeok, achieved the feat of winning a TKO victory in 32 seconds of the first round in an amateur tournament.
He met Kang Baek-ho again that day. Although it was a tournament held without spectators due to quarantine rules, Kang Baek-ho gave a special bonus to Jun-hyeok, who had won while wearing trunks with the Kangho Resort logo on them. Afterward, Kang Baek-ho invited the Jun-ho brothers to his residence to drink together, and at that spot, they exchanged contact information not only with Jun-ho but also with Jun-hyeok.
Meanwhile, as if to prove why Jun-hyeok called him a genius dog, Purdy completed his training at the kennel with excellent results. The trainer, a former sergeant in charge of military dogs, even evaluated that Purdy would be good enough to support search dogs in frontline units. The dog ran the 16-kilometer round trip with Jun-ho almost every day, and spent time at a dog daycare or training center while Jun-ho was exercising. It was a bonus that he naturally took the position of the leader of the pack there as well.
The brothers also became quite accustomed to drone flying. Of course, they didn’t possess the acrobatic-level flying skills of an expert, but they had acquired enough skill for practical operation in an apocalyptic situation. All that remained were their hunting licenses and firearm permits, so the two focused on that.
Then, one day in early March, when the cold had subsided to some extent and the presidential election was just around the corner.
“It’s craaaazy…!!!”
Jun-hyeok’s wild scream echoed loudly through the house. While the startled Purdy jumped up and perked his ears, Jun-hyeok, who had burst out of his room, grabbed Purdy’s front legs and shouted, unable to hide his excitement.
“Purdy! We’re rich now! We’re coin millionaires, you dog! 18 billion won! It’s 18 billion won, you rascal! I’ll buy you all the snacks you want to eat!”
He didn’t know what was going on, but when his little master got excited and mentioned ‘snacks’, Purdy jumped around here and there, wagging his tail wildly.
Selene Coin had finally broken through the 100,000 won mark.