Accumulated (4)
Kim Cheoljung, who had been glaring at Kang Jaeha standing in front of him, lowered his gaze again. The photographs stretched out right before him.
“······”
With a grave expression, Kim Cheoljung reached out and picked up the photos. He examined them slowly, one after another. One, two, three. No matter how many he looked through, the one at the center of every shot was him, and the people on the other side were all the ones slipping him backhanders.
In other words, the patrons.
Connections built up over a long time. Wealth that had been his own for years, maintained before he ever rose to the director’s seat and after he took it. Of course, there was no direct image of money changing hands in the photographs.
But the man standing before him had said it plainly.
You must be full, getting fed so much off kickbacks.
He did not know exactly who the man was, but he clearly knew something. Kim Cheoljung wasted time by looking over the photos again and again. This was not something he could brush off lightly.
One wrong move and I’m done for.
He worked his brain hard. And yet it did not help. An unforeseen crisis, pressure closing in from every side. In moments like this, the ones who stayed calm were the real deal, but Kim Cheoljung was not that kind of man.
Fuck, fuck!
His mind had frozen solid. The only thing he could do was keep cursing inwardly. Who the hell was this bastard in front of him? Had someone sent him? Was it perhaps CEO Han Taeseong? No. Kim Cheoljung knew all of Taeseong’s people.
He did not know.
The more he thought, the deeper Kim Cheoljung sank into the mire. Then the man standing in front of him, Kang Jaeha, gave a small laugh.
“I can hear the gears turning in your head from here.”
“······”
Kim Cheoljung, his thoughts cut off, lifted his eyes from the photographs.
“Who the hell are you? I’ve seen you somewhere before.”
“You’ll figure that out in time.”
Jaeha shoved both hands into the pockets of his padded jacket and went on. His tone was mildly bored.
“That contest Leon held this time. You were taking kickbacks there too.”
He was referring to the short story contest. Kim Cheoljung’s eyes widened. Jaeha did not stop.
“You probably set the rankings from first to third according to how much money you took.”
“······”
“The meetings are all in those photos, so don’t try to talk your way around it.”
“Hey, you.”
“You even had a lover.”
“!!!”
“Do your family know? Probably not. You’ve been quite industrious.”
“Y-you little—”
“So that’s how you got your seat as director?”
By then, Kim Cheoljung’s hand had started to tremble faintly. This was the process of a hidden weak point becoming an exposed disgrace. Jaeha shrugged.
“I don’t care if you have a lover. Just that—”
He took a phone from his jacket pocket and operated it briefly. A moment later, male voices spilled from Jaeha’s handset.
[“I-I’m telling you, Director Kim Cheoljung contacted us first!”]
[“Yeah! We just did whatever Director Kim Cheoljung told us to do!”]
Nam Cheoljin’s voice. Yoon Dayeon’s name, adult films. Even the scenario Kim Cheoljung had laid out. By then, it looked as though his eyes might burst. Why were their voices coming out of that bastard’s phone?
How?
Worse, Nam Cheoljin was pouring out the whole scheme built around Yoon Dayeon. After letting him hear just enough, Jaeha lowered the phone and exhaled softly.
“I don’t care if you’ve got a lover or if you’ve been taking kickbacks. It’s not my business. That stuff isn’t rare.”
“······”
“But you getting in my way is irritating.”
“W-what do you want?”
Jaeha’s mouth curved faintly.
“What do I want? Nothing.”
“···Nothing? That can’t be it. Just say it. Money?”
“Money? Sure. Give me about a hundred billion won.”
“Quit joking around.”
“I’m serious.”
The smile vanished from Kang Jaeha’s face.
“You don’t have it, do you? A hundred billion won.”
Of course he did not. Kim Cheoljung shut his mouth, and Jaeha stared at him.
Even a rat bites when you corner it.
For eighteen years in the other world, Jaeha had handled countless men like Kim Cheoljung. So he knew the answer. Whether it was a rat or a bastard dog, you had to drive it toward the place with no exit. No matter how insignificant a mutt might be, corner it to the very end and it would thrash.
And that was a pain in the ass.
He could always rip Kim Cheoljung’s throat out later. Hell, he could do it whenever he wanted. But killing him in one clean strike would be too neat. He could work him like a slave, like a dog, and when the time came, reduce him to a worthless heap.
Because once a tiny spark of hope had taken root, the moment that hope proved to be hell, the despair was a hundred times deeper.
Jaeha took one step closer to the bastard dog and said coldly, “All you need to do is become a dog that wags its tail when it sees me.”
“······!”
As if he had said all he needed to say, Jaeha turned away. He gradually moved farther off. Panicking, Kim Cheoljung called after him.
“H-hey! Hey!!!”
Jaeha ignored him with exquisite politeness and disappeared from Kim Cheoljung’s view. There was a process, but no satisfying result. That only drove Kim Cheoljung even more insane.
“Fuck— absolute fucking hell!!”
Standing there, he clawed at his own hair. It was a scream, a fit, a breakdown.
“What the hell is that bastard?!”
On the morning of the third day after that. Leon Entertainment.
Kim Cheoljung parked in the lot and got out of the car. Dark circles stained his face. It was not strange. He had spent the previous night in hell. There was no way he could have slept.
“······”
Even after a night without sleep, the face of the man he had met yesterday still filled his head. And so did every word that man had said, every disgrace he had dragged into the light. Kim Cheoljung looked alive in the sense that he was breathing, and nothing more.
Anxiety, impatience, and frustration gnawed at him.
“Hoo—”
Still, he had to go to work, so he tried his best to calm himself. Then, just as he was about to step forward—
“Director!”
Someone called out to Kim Cheoljung from behind. He flinched and turned around. A woman with a swaying bob cut was walking toward him. It was Song Seonhui, the team leader of Management Team 2, the team Kang Jaeha had once belonged to.
“Good morning, Director.”
“...Yes. Team Leader Song.”
“Oh? Your face looks a little— rough, Director. Are you not feeling well?”
“No. I just didn’t sleep well. Let’s go.”
“Ah, yes.”
Of the two walking side by side, Kim Cheoljung boarded the elevator first, and Team Leader Song followed him in. Each pressed the floor they were headed to, and the doors shut. Team Leader Song glanced at Kim Cheoljung. She had been looking for some opening to make small talk and score a point, but his condition was terrible.
Why does he look like he’s dying?
So she kept her mouth shut for now. Kim Cheoljung said nothing, just stared ahead. No, to be precise, he kept bringing back the man he had seen yesterday.
Then—
Ping.
The ascending elevator stopped on the first floor. As soon as the doors opened, a black-haired man came into view. The moment Song Seonhui saw him, she reacted first.
“Oh? Long time no see.”
Kim Cheoljung’s pupils nearly detonated. His reaction was almost spasmodic.
“Y-you!”
So startled he even got the hiccups, Kim Cheoljung stared. Song Seonhui, wondering what was going on, greeted the man who had just entered the elevator.
“Manager Kang, how’s life in Team 4?”
The man was Kang Jaeha, and he accepted her greeting with a casual nod.
“It’s fine. Decent enough.”
“Oh? I heard Manager Kang had changed a bit, and I can definitely feel it now. Did you go through some kind of training?”
At that point, Kim Cheoljung, his eyes fixed on Jaeha, asked, “Manager Kang... Team 4?”
Song Seonhui turned and introduced him. “Ah, Director Kim, you might not know Manager Kang. He used to be so lacking in presence. This is that Kang Jaeha manager. You know, the one who supposedly told Rayoon to shut up and keep quiet. He’s in Team 4 now.”
“Team 4... Manager Kang Jaeha.”
Kim Cheoljung’s breathing grew rough as he locked eyes with Jaeha. Inside, his mind was full of question marks. What the hell was this situation? By contrast, Jaeha greeted him with a blank face.
“Hello, Director.”
Just then, the elevator doors closed. At the same time, a ringtone sounded. It was Team Leader Song’s phone. As she answered, Jaeha, standing beside Kim Cheoljung, murmured softly. His tone was chilled through with amusement.
“Why aren’t you wagging your tail?”
Only then did Kim Cheoljung understand.
Damn it.
That a leash had been put on him.
After that, Jaeha got off the elevator first. Even as he stepped out, he kept his eyes on Kim Cheoljung. Kim Cheoljung looked like a man whose soul had been deleted, and Jaeha simply turned away without a fuss.
As he walked down the corridor toward Team 4, Kang Jaeha gave a low laugh.
“This is getting interesting. Their faces are something else.”
Leon Entertainment was becoming more and more interesting, just like the has-beens and Kim Cheoljung himself. Before long, Jaeha met Yoon Dayeon. They were in a van heading toward the set for The Last Man. Chief Manager Kim Daeyong was on a call in the passenger seat, and Yoon Dayeon, her long hair tied back, kept glancing at Jaeha beside her.
Jaeha rested his chin on one hand and looked out the window as he muttered, “If you’ve got something to say, just say it.”
Yoon Dayeon curled her lips and huffed through her nose.
“What are you talking about? I don’t have anything to say.”
“Then don’t.”
“...I’m, uh, ready for free acting now.”
“Good work.”
“That’s it?”
“That’s it. Want me to pat your head or something?”
“Get lost.”
She answered sharply, then debated whether to bring up yesterday’s incident. That lasted for several dozen seconds. In the end, she decided to keep it to herself.
Fine. If I tell this guy, somehow it’ll turn into a huge mess. It was shitty, sure, but I just have to ignore it myself.
Her mentality was solid. And then—
I’m going to make sure that kind of bullshit never happens again. They’re all dead, seriously.
Her fighting spirit surged several times over. Yesterday’s incident had fired her up.
“I’m really going to grind myself down in that dump, so watch me. Don’t just back off because I stink.”
Jaeha looked at Yoon Dayeon for a moment, then turned his eyes back to the window. His face remained expressionless, but inwardly he was quietly satisfied.
Yeah. That’s more like it.
Yoon Dayeon went into filming The Last Man as usual, and a second assistant director approached Jaeha and Chief Manager Kim Daeyong, who were watching from the side.
“Uh, it looks like Yoon Dayeon’s shooting schedule might end sooner than expected.”
She was good at acting, of course, but the bigger reason was that filming was going smoothly, thanks to the main producer not throwing any obstacles in the way.
“If things go fast, it’ll be wrapped up next week. At the latest, the week after.”
And so Kang Jaeha wrapped up his day. After showering, he lay down in his one-room apartment. Around 9 p.m. He looked around the cramped room.
I should probably move soon.
He did not remember feeling this way before, but recently the place had begun to feel suffocating. He had also been having more nightmares lately, usually with his mercenary subordinates or scenes from the other world.
He was thinking he should look for a decent place to move when, without realizing it, he drifted off to sleep.
Then he snapped awake.
“······”
His throat felt dry, so he got up and downed a bottle of water. He checked the time. 11 p.m. He had apparently dozed off for about two hours. Once again, the nightmare had dragged him awake. Jaeha clicked his tongue briefly.
“Tch.”
He lay back down and picked up his phone. In recent days, ever since he had started seeing money-scented deja vu, he had been opening an app quite often. A securities app. He had opened it without much expectation this time, but—
“Oh?”
Jaeha, who had been lying down, suddenly shot upright. A stock on the U.S. market, a company into which he had poured nearly 700 million won, had surged sharply.
-BBMD $178.87(+35.21%)
-Invested principal $618,058 (679,863,800 won)
-Current value $835,680 (919,248,000 won)
-Profit and loss +239,384,200 won (total 919,248,000 won)
It had rocketed upward in one brutal jump. At the current exchange rate of 1,100 won to the dollar, his money had grown by more than 200 million won. A smile slowly spread across Kang Jaeha’s mouth as he recalled Ryu Jinwoo’s line from the money-scented deja vu.
“BBMD’s stock has gone absolutely fucking nuts for two days now!! Thank God I didn’t sell and wait; my judgment was insane!”
He murmured to himself in a low voice. “Two days of a monster run. The first day already broke. Still one more push left.”
The final push would be tomorrow night, probably. Then dawn broke on the fourth day, and while Kang Jaeha was on his way to work in an uplifted mood, several articles were being thrown out into the world. One of them was worth attention from both Jaeha and Lee Chanhoo.
The official opening date of the Busan International Film Festival had been announced.
At this very moment, Leon Entertainment was being mentioned in a conference room at another film company.
“Director... we just got a call. Leon Entertainment has officially refused the investment.”
Upon hearing this, the heavy-browed director’s expression darkened at once. He was Hong Manseop, the director Jaeha had met in the elevator, the one who had seen deja vu. He let out a long sigh.
“...No help for it.”
Thinking of the side he had wanted to avoid at all costs, he spoke again.
“Contact Hwayeon Partners... tell them we’ll proceed with the meeting.”
He had no idea that his savior was already inside Leon.