Harlem's King
The King of Harlem. The Real Gangster. Hip-hop incarnate. The man who ended the hip-hop wars. The icon of success. The defender of colored rights. The advocate of non-violence. The man who changed Billboard. The emperor of the American label industry.
The number one most influential Black man in America.
King. MK.
He sat across from Lee Shin, flashing a wide grin that showed off his gleaming white teeth.
“Check it out. White, right?”
“Damn, they’re ridiculously white.”
“Kekeke, my pride and joy. These pearly whites and this manly beard.”
“Whoa… swag…!”
“Swag? What’s that?”
“Ah, how do I put it… style? Swagger? Something like that?”
“Oh! Swag. Yeah, I’m dripping with it. I am the swag.”
Pahahaha!
Lee Shin and MK laughed face-to-face.
When MK first walked through that door, he looked every bit the Black mafia boss. With his massive frame and the two black-suited bodyguards flanking him, it was straight out of a gangster movie. Hard to believe the man was a rapper.
Yet despite that intimidating first impression, MK turned out to be an incredibly cheerful guy.
“The translation magic working fine? I got the highest-grade one.”
“A bit of English slips in here and there, but I’m pretty good at it myself.”
“Good! Lucky me. I heard Korea’s the land of etiquette, so I was scared shitless. Born crude as I am, anything too ‘formal’ gives me hives.”
“No wonder you froze up during the greeting earlier.”
“Was it that obvious?”
“You looked like a total rookie.”
“Fuck!! It’s all because of you. Everyone around me kept hyping you up, saying I had to be careful, that you were that big a deal. So I got all tense like some newbie. Felt just like the first time I kissed Mary.”
“Mary?”
“This, this.”
MK mimed holding a joint between his thumb and forefinger. Lee Shin burst out laughing and clapped.
His speech, his gestures—everything was as free-spirited as his music. It could easily be dismissed as frivolous.
Yet there was something about the subtle aura he exuded that made it impossible to take him lightly.
Charm? Dignity? Charisma?
It was like…
‘They’re alike.’
‘Hmm.’
Chae Dong-ha and Yun Cho-a’s gazes turned toward Lee Shin.
Yes. MK was the person most similar to Lee Shin that they had ever seen.
Seemingly lighthearted yet thorough, casual yet dignified.
And both Lee Shin and MK recognized each other for exactly what they were.
“You seem to hate wasting time as much as I do, MK. Let’s get straight to business.”
“Knew you were a bro. I’m liking you more and more. We can get to know each other after the deal’s done.”
MK took a sip of coffee before speaking.
“Bro, do you know how guilds work in our country—the States?”
“I know quite a bit.”
“……Oh, really?”
“It’s all about money. Money.”
“Ooh!! Exactly!”
What kind of country was America?
The continent God messed up.
The center of the world economy.
And the ultimate expression of capitalism.
That culture had carried over into the American guild scene.
Of course, money mattered in every country’s guilds, but in America the degree was extreme.
“Character gets valued by marketability, skill by commercial potential. How well this guy swings a sword, how powerful a spell he casts, how much to pay him based on how fast he kills a single monster—everything gets a price tag. That’s why it’s the biggest market in the world and also the most bloated with bubbles.”
“Only China beats it.”
“Heh, let’s talk about our normal leagues.”
“Pahah! Fair enough.”
“Well, the fact that I, the owner, am sitting here myself is probably unusual in this country, right?”
Correct.
No need to look far—the way MK, the owner, actively involved himself in guild operations was different from the Korean mindset.
“I bought the Mets last year. Even though they were dead last, being New York made them pricey. Naturally there was already a CEO and a General Manager in place. Back then I trusted those guys. They showed me a vision, after all.”
“That’s a shame. Guess they didn’t do their jobs properly.”
“Not doing their jobs? Suck! Even a Harlem drug dealer would’ve gotten shot doing business like that.”
There was a reason they’d been dead last in the East for years.
No real plan, sloppy internal affairs, reckless decision-making—every system was worse than a street gang’s.
How could good recruits come out of such a trash system? Every single person they picked was a bust, and even the ones they verified tanked the moment they joined for all sorts of reasons.
At this point, MK waiting a whole year made him look less like a saint and more like a sucker.
“Honestly, I was gonna let it slide. Oh, I’m not joking. Between you and me, the Mets were like a trophy to me. An upgraded Grammy Award or something? Anyway, something like that. A bum from Harlem owning his hometown guild…… that’s got swag, you know!”
That was the mindset of someone who only cared about the glory the guild brought, not someone planning to get involved—until everything shattered.
Right then, just as he was about to speak, Lee Shin beat him to it.
“Was it because of that ‘secret SNS account’ incident a while back?”
“Huh?! How’d you know?”
“What kind of owner wouldn’t know? The GM was badmouthing the raid teams on his secret account. ‘Don’t come to the stadium if you’re a dumb Black or a smelly Asian.’ Pretty big scandal, as I recall.”
“It was insane. I never thought there’d be someone openly racist. Fucking great America! Goddamn freedom of expression!! That’s why I love this country.”
Was this the class of the superpower?
A GM openly racist on a secret account—something unimaginable in Korea.
But it was too early to be surprised.
This wasn’t the end. There was more that made the Mets hopeless.
Because……
“The CEO liked the post. And his profile picture had the KKK symbol on it, didn’t it?”
“……You even know that far?”
After the GM, the CEO was rotten too.
This was a completely hopeless situation. Because if those two were corrupt, it basically meant the entire front office was compromised.
Lee Shin continued with absolute certainty, as if he knew everything.
“CEO and GM in name only—you’d have to fire the entire line connected to them. And that’s not easy. Weirdly enough, those kinds of people are usually good at politics.”
“Maybe it’s only natural. If they didn’t have a lot of followers, they wouldn’t have kept their positions with a perennial last-place record. If you cleaned house, at least half—maybe more—would get cut.”
“And among them would probably be the raid captain too.”
With that kind of GM, that kind of CEO, of course the raid captain would be the same.
Obvious. If the front office was this broken, there was no way the raid captain was normal.
Essentially, the entire league plan was gone.
What could an owner do in this situation? Especially one who’d only recently bought the guild.
“Forfeit the season. In American terms, ‘hit the reset button.’”
In countries like Korea that had relegation, this was unthinkable. But in America, teams occasionally hit the season-end button for various reasons.
A full rebuild.
By the time Lee Shin finished, a heavy silence had fallen over the representative office.
“……”
“……”
How the hell did he know all that?
The bodyguards, MK, even Chae Dong-ha and Yun Cho-a who were assisting from the side—all stared at Lee Shin like they were seeing a ghost.
“……And after that—”
“Yeah?”
“What happened after. Why I’m here.”
“Well, the season’s long and you had to do something, so you looked toward Asia. Like you were testing the waters. And lo and behold? It worked. This is it! Since the entire front office was getting replaced anyway, might as well benchmark these guys!”
“Fuck. Look at this. I’ve got goosebumps.”
MK spoke seriously.
“Hey, Bro. Wanna represent our guild?”
“Heh, you’re joking, right?”
“More serious than I’ve ever been.”
Hitting the reset button, reluctantly copying Mir Guild’s strategies—it all matched Lee Shin’s words exactly.
Of course, the reason Lee Shin knew this so precisely wasn’t complicated. Beyond simply deducing from information, he had already known about the Mets Guild from the start.
‘MK, MK…… I was wondering who that was. Michael Keaton.’
He wasn’t an extremely major character. A man known as America’s laughingstock and the icon of misfortune.
Someone who was the Midas of his label company but somehow turned everything he touched in the Mets Guild into a minus—famously called “Poor Mr. Keaton” by American users.
‘And yet he had strangely good instincts, which made it even funnier.’
What to call it…… He started things well but couldn’t finish them? Always missing that last two percent, a perpetually frustrating person—that was MK.
“Alright, Mr. Genius. If you’ve figured out this much, you probably know why I came here too, right?”
“You want to transplant Mir Guild’s systems and management methods into the Mets Guild.”
“Exactly. I want that winning DNA of yours.”
“Why?”
“Because you guys feel like the future.”
He wanted to receive that undefeated winning DNA and escape being a perennial last-place guild!
Because Mir Guild was the future of this era.
While other guilds were still watching, the fact that MK had actively adopted Mir Guild’s strategies showed he wasn’t without instincts.
But that was his side of things. From Lee Shin’s perspective, it wasn’t something he particularly needed to do.
So.
“I’ll be honest. I’m interested in you personally, MK.”
“Oh? I’m not into guys, though.”
“Good. I like women too. Not particularly interested in men or the Mets Guild.”
“Well, well. Got me good. Didn’t back down even once.”
“Because it’s the truth. And because I’m the representative.”
This was basically asking for full-scale rebuilding consulting—completely different from just giving advice.
He was already swamped with league schedules. Doing this out of personal goodwill? That wasn’t something a representative should do.
“I’m a representative before I’m an owner too. I know that much.”
“Then you also know what it’ll take to move me.”
“Not money. With your family background and a guild that has Woongjindan, you’re not hurting for funds.”
“Glad to hear it. At least you’ve got the basics down. If you’d offered money, I would’ve sent you packing immediately.”
“Damn, that stings. I was just starting to like you as a bro.”
When MK snapped his fingers—adorned with a diamond ring—his massive bodyguard handed over a briefcase.
At that moment.
“Not that.”
“……Representative, this was meant to recruit a ranker—”
“Forget it. And cancel that promise too.”
MK’s sharp instincts were telling him.
That Lee Shin was an even bigger person than he had thought, and that today’s meeting was an opportunity that could change his fate.
So after this meeting, he decided to put “that thing” he had prepared to recruit a ranker on the table as the deal.
“I’ll make a formal offer. What our Mets Guild wants is two things. Your know-how running the front office. And the training methods to operate that ‘roaming strategy’ of yours.”
What MK was offering in exchange was this.
Lee Shin opened the 007 briefcase placed in front of him—and was immediately shocked.
◈ A legendary firearm remembered as a mythical existence from the American Wild West era.
◈ Symbolizes freedom, courage, romance, and independence.
◈ Outlaws will tremble in fear at the sound of its cylinder spinning.
“How about it? Tempted now?”
* * *
A short while later.
As MK left the representative office and headed for his car, he kept muttering “Huh, huh, huhuh” in disbelief, laughing to himself several times before turning to Yun Cho-a, who had come to see him off.
“What kind of person is your representative?”
“……?”
“Ah, don’t misunderstand. I’m not asking with bad intentions. I’m just genuinely curious what kind of human can stay that cold even in front of a Legendary item.”
Lee Shin had been momentarily shaken by the Legendary item at first, but quickly regained his composure. It had been chillingly calm.
And the words he’d spoken afterward were the real masterpiece.
— “How about throwing in a little more?”
Up to that point, MK had been disappointed.
Getting greedy even with a Legendary item? He had been about to stand up when the next words came.
— “A song. Throw in a song too. A beat for our guild. I’ve been listening to a lot of MK’s songs lately. Of course, this is a request from fan Lee Shin, not Representative Lee Shin.”
It had been an adorable request.
In a situation where any normal representative would’ve had their eyes glued to the Legendary weapon, he could afford this kind of leisure.
He had wit.
His swag was good.
Yun Cho-a answered with her usual expressionless face.
“Because he’s the representative.”
A faint pride seeped from her blank expression.
A person who could make even the one serving him feel proud……
MK looked back down the path he had come.
In the distance, he could see Mir Guild’s main building where Lee Shin was.
“I’m jealous.”
MK’s evaluation of Lee Shin rose several levels in his mind.
But why were the lights flickering?
·
·
Shake it!!
“Yahoo!!”
The lights flashed and the beat pounded his heart.
Dance! This is the stage of victory!
“DJ Dong-ha! Faster! More flashy!!”
Chae Dong-ha, standing guard by the door, moved his hands even quicker.
Lee Shin twisted his waist in the flashing lights like there was no tomorrow.
“Legendary, drippy, revolver! Ehit!”
A gun ranked among the top three firearm weapons, with a 500% damage boost on headshots.
And.
“Beat, yeap! Yahoo!
On top of that, a cheer song from none other than the King of Hip-hop, MK.
And most importantly of all!
Warning!!
Warning!!
As a representative, you have taken your first step onto the world stage. Consult for the perennial last-place guild and make a name for yourself in the global guild scene.
Rewards will be given based on performance.
Even a surprise quest!!
“Dong-ha hyung, lower the shutters!! I’m not going home today!!”