After the Storm

"Chairwoman, how on earth did you come up with that idea?"

At the admiring question from Choi Dong-soo, Kim Ja-young set down her teacup with a faint smile.

"The press and public opinion have turned remarkably favorable toward our group. I was just looking at the clippings the PR office sent up — the phrase noblesse oblige has even started appearing."

Choi Dong-soo gestured toward the stack of morning newspapers spread across the table.

The headlines were plastered with the wounds Typhoon Maemi had raked across the peninsula.

The typhoon that had torn straight through the peninsula overnight had been nothing short of a nightmare. A monstrous tidal surge had swallowed whole city blocks, and port facilities had crumpled like paper. With the entire nation drowning in grief and fear, the one company being hailed in heartwarming human-interest stories was Sunjin Group.

"Just a ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠moment ago, the government sent urgent coordination letters to the luxury hotels and resorts in downtown Busan. The shelters for displaced residents are running short, so they've asked for rooms to be opened up."

"How are the others responding?"

"Chaos. It was such a sudden request that they have neither the staff nor the food supplies, and they're all crying that it'll take days just to get ready. They're already tearing their hair out over refunding the guests they have to turn away."

He looked at Kim Ja-young.

"But we finished every preparation before the typhoon even made landfall. Thanks to that, we received the relief workers without a hint of confusion, and the authorities are deeply grateful for our proactive measures."

Those who prepare, and those who merely get swept along. The difference between them was unmistakable.

Choi Dong-soo still looked as if he couldn't quite believe it. A housewife who had never taken a proper business class had demonstrated a crisis-management instinct that decades-old veterans had missed entirely.

"Your swift decision-making, Chairwoman—"

Kim Ja-young shook her head.

"It wasn't me. My son ordered it."

"…I beg your pardon? You mean your son?"

Kim Ja-young said it matter-of-factly.

"He ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠was watching the news and said — the resort won't be able to operate for a while anyway once the typhoon hits, so wouldn't it be better to offer the rooms first? He said the optics would be far better than handing them over later because we were forced to."

Choi Dong-soo's eyes went round.

"Your son… isn't he still in high school?"

"He is."

"I can't believe that's the judgment of a high schooler. His political instincts — turning crisis into opportunity — seem absolutely exceptional."

"He's remarkable, isn't he."

Kim Ja-young gave that reply, and in her mind she saw her son Seon-woo's face.

The day her husband passed, the day of the funeral. Ever since her son had collapsed — and then woken up — something about the boy had changed. It was more than simply having grown up.

— You can do it, Mother.

— Go compete with your club friends.

— If you borrow someone else's hand, what's yours ends up belonging to someone else too.

Her son's eyes, which had once seemed so fragile, had hardened into something unshakeable without her noticing. If anything, it was her eighteen-year-old son who was steadying her when she wavered.

If Seon-woo could overcome it, I have no right to be weak either.

Kim Ja-young brushed the thought aside and switched back into work mode.

"How are things on the ground? Are you making sure the relief workers want for nothing?"

"Yes, I've received the reports."

Choi Dong-soo opened his notebook and recited the status.

"Some three hundred firefighters and rescue workers dispatched from all over the country are currently staying at Sunjin Resort's Busan branch. For them, sleeping in mud-caked uniforms for a few hours a night is simply routine — they keep saying it's the first time they've ever slept in a bed, and they're deeply grateful."

"And the meals?"

"Given the round-the-clock nature of rescue work, mealtimes are impossible to schedule, so the dining hall is running at full capacity, twenty-four hours a day. Cooks and staff are rotating in three shifts, and we've hired residents from the surrounding area to cover the shortfall."

Kim Ja-young nodded, satisfied. It would cost a fair amount of money — but in return, they had bought a reputation that money couldn't buy.

"Well done. From now on, keep supporting them generously so no one is inconvenienced. You may pull from the summer season's advertising budget if you need to."

"Understood, Chairwoman."

Choi Dong-soo bowed and left the office. Left alone, Kim Ja-young gently caressed the family photograph on her desk. The young Seon-woo in the picture was smiling brightly.

"My son… you've really grown up."

Chuseok holidays were over and I was back at school, but the atmosphere in the classroom was anything but cheerful. Every break, the kids huddled together and chattered about one topic only: Typhoon Maemi. Someone's grandmother's house had flooded; someone had seen a crane on the news bent like a taffy stick — nothing but grim tidings.

The damage really is bad.

I packed my bag with a heavy heart as well and headed for the annex. When I opened the clubroom door, a leaden silence greeted me first.

"Hey, you're here."

Han Jae-yi greeted me flatly, her eyes never leaving her monitor. Min-jae sat slumped beside her.

"You're here early?"

"Chuseok was long. Figured I should check the market mood."

The fatigue was written all over Han Jae-yi's face.

"How is it? The market?"

"Exactly as expected. The whole market's flashing red. KOSPI is down more than 2% — the fear that typhoon damage would choke off consumer spending hit hard."

She clicked her mouse and paged through the screens.

"The typhoon-related stocks, though? They're a wall of fire. Like clockwork, the reconstruction theme is running the market."

I nodded, pulling a chair over and sitting down.

"Then where's our team rank?"

"…We slipped."

Han Jae-yi clicked her tongue bitterly.

Second place before the holidays had dropped a step. The return itself wasn't bad — the competition had simply charged past us.

I frowned.

"We're down to third?"

"Yeah. I looked at the top two teams' portfolios — they hit the jackpot."

Han Jae-yi pulled up the second-place team's holdings.

"They were holding construction and cement stocks. Probably just bought them at random — but the moment the typhoon struck, those names got lumped together as the leaders of the reconstruction theme. They're up over 10% in a single day."

Daejin Bio, which we had bought right before the holidays, meanwhile, was flat. Up nothing, down nothing — 0%. The market simply hadn't realized yet how important disinfection and fertilizer would become.

"The market's making a mistake."

I murmured quietly.

"A mistake?"

"Yes. Don't get me wrong — the typhoon damage is severe. Buildings got wrecked. But nothing on the scale that would require major construction firms and massive civil engineering projects."

I explained the reasoning calmly.

"Most of it is damaged farmhouses in rural areas and washed-out roads. Those get repaired not by a big corporate name like Sunjin Construction, but by small and mid-sized regional builders and interior contractors. It won't even register on the revenue of the listed construction giants."

At my words, Han Jae-yi nodded.

"Fair point. Honestly, that part had me puzzled too. If the theme collapses, that bubble pops instantly."

"But…"

Min-jae cut in uneasily.

"It's not just construction climbing right now. The waste-management and ready-mix concrete companies are hitting their daily limit-up too. The debris has to get hauled away, no question."

Just as Min-jae said, waste companies like Inseong E&T were already pinned at limit-up.

"That one's on target. It's debris people can see with their own eyes."

"Then should we… sell one of our defensive stocks and rotate into waste management right now? Daejin isn't moving an inch today."

Min-jae's voice was trembling. With the rankings published every single day, the daily fluctuations were clearly eating at his composure.

Han Jae-yi also looked at me with a troubled expression.

"Seon-woo, what do you think? Should we chase-buy now? There are still a few waste stocks that haven't locked at limit-up."

I shook my head firmly.

"No. If we jump in now, we're the ones left holding the dishes."

"Holding the dishes?"

"What's rising right now is nothing but expectation. There's no long-term momentum. If you focus on waste disposal, the party's over within days — that's the tail end of the trade."

I looked between the two of them and put force into my voice.

"The core is recovery. And the most urgent, most important part of recovery is bringing the dying land back to life."

"But…"

Han Jae-yi was convinced, but Lee Min-jae still looked anxious. No matter how sound the logic, if the account didn't grow today, faith wavered. The first-place team was running away into the distance while we stood still.

We just have to hold out a little longer.

The mood sank into heaviness. Han Jae-yi habitually hammered the refresh button, scanning the news, while Min-jae gnawed at his fingernails.

Just as the suffocating stillness had stretched on for a while—

"…Huh?"

Han Jae-yi's eyes went wide at her monitor.

"What is ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠it? What's wrong, unni?"

"Look at this. Breaking news just dropped."

Han Jae-yi clicked the article in a hurry.

Han Jae-yi read down the article in a shaking voice.

"The government… has started securing disinfectants and fertilizer. They're making the restoration of flooded farmland their top priority…"

She turned her head and looked straight at me.

"Hey, Kang Seon-woo. Daejin Bio—"

"Is it going up?"

"Going up? It's at limit-up in after-hours trading right now!"

Daejin Bio's order book on the screen was dyed red. The sell orders had withered to nothing, while buy orders queued up in the hundreds of thousands of shares.

"Holy crap… it's real. The construction stocks are ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠bleeding out in after-hours, and ours is the only one rocketing."

Min-jae sprang out of his seat with a shout of triumph. I clenched my fist under the desk.

My memory didn't fail me.

Construction and waste management were one-dimensional fake themes. The real payload was recovery. When the market opened tomorrow, first place would be ours again.

September 29th. One day before the end of the mock investment competition.

The air in the clubroom was sweeter than it had ever been — and not just because of the autumn breeze drifting in through the window. It was the overwhelming numbers floating on the old computer monitor.

"Wow… this is just…"

Min-jae stared blankly at the monitor, murmuring.

"Look at the gap with second place. We're ahead by over 30 percentage points? At this point, isn't our championship basically locked in?"

"Locked in, unless the world ends tomorrow and the market doesn't open."

Han Jae-yi leaned back in her chair and laughed, thoroughly at ease.

"This is insane. A 42% return in a single month…"

She shook her head slowly, then looked at me.

"Kang Seon-woo, be honest with me. You came from the future, didn't you?"

I flinched inwardly, but kept my shoulders nonchalantly shrugged.

"Come on, unni. We just got lucky, that's all."

"Lucky? Don't make me laugh. It was flawless design."

She was right. The two weeks of trading that had just passed had been nothing less than a private stage built for our team.

Our ace: Daejin Bio. This stock's performance could only be described as insane.

Two consecutive days of limit-up.

The moment the government's disinfection measures were announced right after Typhoon Maemi passed, the price shot up like a rocket. Two whole days where it opened at limit-up and simply shut the door.

But that wasn't the end of it. Normally, a theme stock collapses the moment its catalyst burns out. Daejin Bio was different.

"The government's stockpiles alone didn't come close to covering it."

I added the explanation.

"The damaged farms realized that if they just sat around waiting for government aid, their land would rot entirely. So private demand exploded. Everyone started snapping up fertilizer and disinfectant, even at a premium."

Thanks to that, Daejin Bio had transformed from a mere theme stock into a genuine earnings-growth story. The brokerage reports tripped over one another raising their target prices, projecting 300% revenue growth for the next quarter, and with institutional and foreign buying flowing in, the stock climbed relentlessly toward the upper right of the chart.

Min-jae's Hyunbo Computer position was much the same.

"My Hyunbo play did nicely too. The flooded PC bangs were all in an uproar about replacing every single computer."

Min-jae smirked. The typhoon damage was tragic, but it had spurred a wave of IT hardware replacement that proved a godsend for the PC parts market. Min-jae's logic had landed dead on.

But the hidden hero of this victory was someone else entirely. I raised a thumb toward Han Jae-yi.

"More than anything, your portfolio was the masterstroke, unni."

"Mine?"

"Yes. Look at the KOSPI index over the past two weeks. It got demolished."

Consumer sentiment gutted by the typhoon, plus the resurfacing of credit-card debt worries — the stock market as a whole had been in a downtrend. That was exactly why the rival teams that had been leading collapsed. They'd had their flash of fun with construction stocks, but when the market caved, they were swept down with it, helpless.

"But the KEPCO and telecom stocks you'd laid down never budged. If anything, the market's anxiety funneled money into them, and they ground quietly higher."

Han Jae-yi's absolute-defense strategy. It had acted as the dam that kept our team's returns from being chewed away — protecting them completely. The striker, me, was free to score goals at will precisely because the defender, Han Jae-yi, had sealed the back line perfectly.

"Only now do you recognize my true worth?"

Han Jae-yi said it with her nose in the air, haughtily — but she couldn't hide the smile spreading across her lips.

"Honestly… I'll admit it."

And then she fixed me with a serious gaze.

"At first I thought you were just some rich pretty boy. I figured you were challenging me on a dare. But you weren't."

"…"

"From selling Zenith Games at the exact peak to unearthing Daejin Bio — there wasn't a single crack in your logic. Same with steadying Min-jae's nerves. If it hadn't been for you, we wouldn't have even broken even, let alone won."

Han Jae-yi held out her hand.

"Thank you, Kang Seon-woo. Thanks to you, I'm going to get the scholarship too."

I took her hand.

"No — it's me who should thank you. It would've been impossible if you hadn't trusted me."

"Me too, me too!"

Min-jae wedged in and grabbed my hand as well.

"Whoa, we're seriously first? We get computers? The club doesn't have to use those junk boxes anymore, right?"

The three of us looked at each other and burst out laughing.

Han Jae-yi, who had feared real investing because of her poverty. Min-jae, who had always cowered for lack of confidence. This one month of racing had gifted the two of them the finest asset there was: a sense of achievement.

And me as well.

I proved it.

I took in the return on the monitor. This number was not mere cyber money. It was my ticket past the shell of being a child and into the adults' world.

And the account's fattened up nicely too.

The club account, traded strictly according to the portfolio, had posted a return in the 42% range — but my personal account was pushing past 80%. The original 5 million won had grown to 9 million.

From here on out, I just keep growing my personal assets like this.

"Alright — no letting your guard down until the market closes tomorrow. It'd be a bitter pill if we got flipped at the finish."

"Don't worry. I'll be watching every closing auction to the very end."

Leaving Han Jae-yi's reassuring answer behind me, I picked up my bag and rose from my seat.

"Oh? You're leaving first, Seon-woo?"

"Yeah. I've got somewhere to be."

"Where? Got a date?"

Min-jae asked mischievously, but I just snorted and waved a hand.

"No. I have homework to turn in for inspection."

"Homework? You go to a cram school?"

"Something like that. There's a very scary teacher waiting for me."

I slipped out of the clubroom and walked down the corridor. The autumn sky beyond the window was unusually high and blue.

The sky after a typhoon passes, as always, was clear.