Establishing the Pecking Order (2)
A few days later, Oh Il-mu submitted his resignation to the QS Group on Chairman Kwon Byung-do’s orders and threw himself into preparations for opening the law firm. He leased an entire floor of a newly built building in a prime location within Seocho-dong’s legal district. The structure had been designed from the ground up with law firm tenancy in mind, so the layout was acceptable, but the interior design clashed with Oh Il-mu’s taste, so he had it redone.
Thinking back, this was the first time Oh Il-mu had ever possessed an office space he could shape entirely to his liking. As a judge, he obviously could not remodel the courthouse at will, and even as head of the QS Group legal team, the most he had managed was swapping a few decorative items in his own room. Had he tried to renovate the entire floor where the legal team worked, he would surely have drawn strange looks from within the company.
Of course, it was not that he disliked the interior design of either the courthouse or the QS Group offices. Still, having an entire space under his complete control felt deeply satisfying. The large sign hanging outside bearing his name was also pleasing to the eye.
— Oh Il-mu Law Office
What pleased him most, however, was the colleague he would be working with: Kwon Ho-gyun. At Chairman Kwon Byung-do’s request, Oh Il-mu had forced the boy—who had shown no academic promise—into law school, never imagining he would prove so useful. For decades while working at the QS Group, Oh Il-mu had thirsted for something. No matter how hard he searched, he could never find a way to reach the true core of corporate power. Even after he had personally removed Chairman Kwon Byung-do’s two older brothers, Kwon Gap-do and Kwon Eul-do, Oh Il-mu had remained on the periphery of the company’s power structure.
Then, at last, an opportunity had appeared. Kwon Byung-do’s third son, Kwon Ho-gyun, had come to work under him. The chairman was a crafty old serpent; even after decades together, Oh Il-mu could not tell how much of what he said was sincere. Still, the chairman had mentioned the possibility of giving Kwon Ho-gyun the position of head of the Central Management Division.
If the boy I trained and raised becomes head of the Central Management Division, wouldn’t that put me on equal footing with the chairman above him?
It was a delightful thought. And perhaps it would not remain merely a thought. Chairman Kwon Byung-do was seventy-eight this year. Honestly, no one could say with certainty how many years he had left. If something happened, it did not seem impossible to place Kwon Ho-gyun at the forefront and seize control of the QS Group.
Oh Il-mu’s lips curved into a smirk. The idea of installing Kwon Ho-gyun as a puppet chairman while he himself became the power behind the throne was genuinely amusing.
* * *
Thud.
I entered the office and tossed the documents onto the desk. These days, as Chairman Kwon Byung-do and I had discussed, I was working at the newly established law firm alongside Oh Il-mu.
From the very beginning, something had felt off. Without consulting me at all, Oh Il-mu had renovated the office interior and, in the end, had pushed through something I had explicitly opposed. I had suggested not putting any individual’s name on the law firm’s signage, yet he had gone ahead and hung up a sign that read “Oh Il-mu Law Office.”
Up to that point, I had found it irritating but still tolerable. I figured the interior design was acceptable as long as it did not interfere with work. As for the firm name, since I had not yet received my attorney’s license and the paperwork listed the firm as Oh Il-mu’s sole practice, it was understandable. The sign could always be changed later when we converted to a law firm partnership.
But just now, Oh Il-mu had crossed the line I had drawn in my mind.
The documents I had just placed on the desk were covered in thick red marker lines, with several hastily scribbled words in the margins. Under the pretext of teaching me legal practice, Oh Il-mu had made me sit right in front of him while he reviewed the documents I had written and turned them into this mess.
If there had been a logical flaw in my documents or an incorrect application of law, I could have accepted it. But there was none of that. Instead, Oh Il-mu had repeatedly tried to nitpick the legal reasoning in front of me, only to swallow his own words each time. What he had actually pointed out were things like “you shouldn’t use this word” or “it would be better to phrase the sentence differently”—the kind of feedback one might expect from a basic essay-writing class.
Legal documents are ultimately writing. Unless the meaning is being distorted, the choice of words and sentence structure should be left to the person writing them, using whatever feels most natural. What Oh Il-mu had done was nothing more than petty nitpicking. In this case, should I call it “text nitpicking”?
I was not naïve enough to fail to understand why he was doing this. This was the sort of thing senior attorneys typically did to junior associates when they first joined a firm. There was only one reason for the red-pen treatment: to assert dominance by picking on someone for no real reason.
When I first started working with Oh Il-mu, I had intended to show him the respect due a senior colleague. Given his career and contributions to the QS Group, that level of acknowledgment seemed appropriate. But if Oh Il-mu insisted on a clear hierarchy, then I would have to make it unmistakably clear who stood above whom.
It was not merely a matter of pride. This law firm was the forward base from which I would seize the QS Group. If the person meant to serve as my stepping stone tried to take control of that base, then I needed to make it perfectly clear who the true master of this place was.
Oh Il-mu was nothing more than a stepping stone for my rise as the QS Group’s successor. No one carries a stepping stone on their head.
Screech.
I pulled out a chair and sat before the desk piled high with documents. First, I intended to show him that even in the realm of law, where he was so confident, he would never surpass me. With the ability to see future court rulings, there was no reason I should fall short of Oh Il-mu.
The documents before me were lawsuit files from the QS Group that Oh Il-mu had brought over from his previous position. He had given me copies of the case files and told me to write opinion letters for each one. From now on, I would find the cases he had mishandled.
* * *
Hah.
I had expected to stay up all night, but I found it much sooner than anticipated. The case I was currently reviewing involved a land dispute between QS Resort and JB Construction. QS and JB were rival conglomerates constantly vying for the top spot in the business rankings. As a result, both sides were always looking for ways to sabotage each other, and lawsuits between the two groups never ceased.
The facts were straightforward. A land swindler had sold the same piece of property to both QS Resort and JB Construction. Oh Il-mu’s position was that because QS Resort’s contract had come first, the rightful ownership belonged to QS, and JB should locate the swindler and demand compensation. A memo indicated he was confident of victory and planned to request closure of arguments at the next hearing.
In cases of dual contracts, ownership does indeed go to the party that contracted first. The certified copy of the land registry submitted as evidence also listed the property as belonging to QS Resort.
Yet as I read through the documents detailing the case, a court ruling appeared before my eyes.
[Ruling. The defendant shall execute the procedures for transferring ownership registration of the relevant land to the plaintiff.]
In this case, the plaintiff was JB Construction, which claimed ownership of the land, while the defendant was QS Resort, the current registered owner. In other words, if things continued this way, QS Resort—represented by Oh Il-mu—would lose the case and have the land taken by JB Construction.
How had this happened? Based on all the materials submitted so far, QS Resort’s victory seemed certain, yet the future ruling stated the opposite. Something was clearly going to happen at the next hearing, scheduled for two days from now.
Since I needed to know what that something was in order to prepare, I continued reading the ruling that had appeared. Though many parts were blurry, I fortunately caught the key section that explained why the ruling had been overturned.
[Reason. (…) Through the contract termination agreement and remittance records, it is acknowledged that the land purchase contract entered into by the defendant has been terminated. (…)]
What? QS Resort had drawn up a contract termination agreement and even received a refund? If that were the case, then ownership of the land would naturally pass to JB Construction, which had entered into a new purchase agreement after the contract with QS Resort was terminated.
But if QS Resort had terminated the contract, why had they responded to the lawsuit at all? Considering the time, cost, and potential complications involved, even if QS and JB were bitter rivals, litigation was not something one undertook for amusement.
There was something else strange. If JB Construction possessed the core evidence—the contract termination agreement and the record of the land payment refund—why had they withheld it until the lawsuit was nearly over?
The hearing in two days felt ominous. Until I understood JB’s intentions, I needed to delay it.
I picked up the documents I had been reviewing and headed for Oh Il-mu’s office. The moment I entered, he spoke.
“Did you rewrite the opinion letter?”
He was referring to the documents he had covered in red marker earlier.
“No.”
“Then what have you been doing instead of rewriting it all this time?”
Oh Il-mu flinched when I met his gaze without looking away and instead averted his own eyes.
“I don’t believe that opinion letter needs to be rewritten. If you require it, I still have the original file before you made your edits, so I can print it for you.”
“Wh-what did you just say?”
“Let me be clear. Both you and I are here to work, not to play teacher and student after spending a fortune to open this office. You no longer need to provide commentary or corrections on my opinion letters.”
“Then what exactly do you plan to work on?”
I held out the documents containing the lawsuit between QS Resort and JB Construction.
“I have a bad feeling about this case. We should postpone the hearing scheduled for the day after tomorrow and prepare more thoroughly.”
Oh Il-mu glanced at the documents and snorted.
“This case is already over. I’m going to request closure of arguments the day after tomorrow, and after that we just wait for the ruling. We’re going to win, so why delay the hearing? Are you just making up excuses because you don’t want to write the opinion letter?”
“You would do well to listen to me. I’ll look into the details and report back, so for now, please postpone the hearing.”
Oh Il-mu’s voice rose, still unable to meet my eyes.
“If you’re going to ignore the opinion letter I told you to write and spout nonsense, then get out! Get out and either look into that case yourself or find some other work to do since you seem to enjoy it so much. And don’t expect to learn anything more from me from now on.”
He seemed completely unaware that he could end up being kicked out of the very office bearing his own name. Even when I offered to help prevent a major incident, he chose to kick me out instead. Well, at least now I wouldn’t have to waste time investigating the case. I could simply sit back with a bag of popcorn and watch what happened at the hearing the day after tomorrow.
* * *
Two days later, Oh Il-mu and I were summoned to see Chairman Kwon Byung-do immediately after leaving the courthouse. Of course, Chairman Kwon Byung-do had not personally attended the trial of a minor subsidiary like QS Resort. That did not mean he was unaware of what had transpired in court. The incident had been reported as breaking news through journalists who had been present at the hearing, spreading faster than the QS Group could respond.
Just as I had warned Oh Il-mu, a major incident had erupted in the courtroom. To appear as a witness in court, one must submit an application in advance and obtain the court’s approval. Nevertheless, JB Construction’s legal representative had brought an unscheduled individual and requested on the spot that the judge accept them as a witness. Under normal circumstances, the judge could have dismissed the request without explanation, but this witness was central to the case.
None other than the audacious man who had sold the same piece of land to both QS Resort and JB Construction had appeared in court.