Chapter 9
Chapter 9
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 9
Chapter Title: The Watchmaker's Ambition
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“......You’re my relative’s older brother?”
Raffaello scanned Hae-jin up and down with an utterly incredulous look on his face.
It was understandable.
Just like the employee at the Panelleria Milan branch had said earlier, he couldn’t wrap his head around it either.
And for good reason—Hae-jin was unmistakably Asian-looking, yet here he was claiming to be Raffaello’s relative. No one would buy that easily.
Raffaello himself, the one directly involved, must have been even more baffled.
Some Asian guy he’d never even seen in his life suddenly shows up claiming to be his relative’s older brother.
Hae-jin spoke to Raffaello, who was reacting just like that.
“Of course not.”
“What?!”
Raffaello’s face twisted in confusion at this new bombshell.
He yanked the baker’s cap down over his face to hide it and snapped in frustration.
“Damn it, do you know how much I had to sneak around just to come out here?!”
Raffaello grumbled irritably.
Unlike the other hotshot party members Hae-jin had met so far, Raffaello was just a part-time cleaner scraping by.
He’d finally landed a job at the luxury Italian watch store Panelleria, only for this so-called relative’s older brother to show up, forcing him to sneak out—and now the guy was saying he wasn’t family after all.
Anyone would be pissed.
Hae-jin addressed the fuming Raffaello.
“Let’s make a deal.”
“What kind of deal?”
Raffaello pulled his baker’s cap back up onto his head, his face still covered in bewilderment at this sudden talk of a contract after the relative charade.
What the hell was this guy’s deal?
But Hae-jin chuckled inwardly.
For all his prickly attitude, this guy was actually one of the easier ones to convince compared to the others.
Unlike those whose livelihoods were already secure, Raffaello desperately needed help to get by in the early days.
“I’m putting together a Player team, and I want you to join me. Come to Korea with me, and I’ll make sure you never have to worry about making ends meet.”
But for Raffaello, simple survival wasn’t the only thing that mattered.
Hae-jin knew that but brought up livelihood first anyway.
“Ha, you think making a living is my problem right now?”
Raffaello shot back as if Hae-jin was looking down on him.
Hae-jin smirked at the reaction.
“I know. I know you’re working here because you’re into watches.”
Raffaello flinched!
He stared at Hae-jin in shock.
He had no choice but to.
Most people took one look at him and assumed that was the case.
How much of a failure do you have to be as an adult to be wearing grubby clothes and cleaning someone else’s store?
On the surface, it was the perfect setup to think he was just slaving away at Panelleria because he was broke.
But there was a reason Raffaello was cleaning at Panelleria.
‘I’m doing it to pick up watchmaking skills over their shoulders—or at least catch a chance to learn while cleaning.’
Raffaello’s passion for making watches was the real deal.
Luxury watches, though, all had their headquarters in Switzerland.
For a penniless Italian like Raffaello, getting a foot in the door there wasn’t easy.
Since his pockets weren’t exactly overflowing, he’d settled for working at the famed Italian luxury watch brand Panelleria, just to be around the timepieces.
By doing menial jobs like cleaning, he could work under the repair techs fixing Panelleria watches in the back and pick up some skills.
If things went well, he could become an official repairman, and from there, maybe even get sent to headquarters.
Raffaello’s plan had one more step.
If he shone there too, it’d build his resume enough to land a job at a Swiss luxury watch company.
With dreams that grand, he couldn’t help but be stunned that Hae-jin knew about his very first step.
He’d never told anyone he was working at Panelleria because of his watch obsession.
Hae-jin spoke to Raffaello, whose face screamed *how the hell do you know that?*
“If you sign on with me and come to Korea, I’ll buy up all the watches you want and let you tear them apart to your heart’s content.”
“......Why?”
Raffaello couldn’t make sense of it.
This guy shows up pretending to be family, and now he’s offering to cover not just his living expenses but his hobby too?
Hae-jin answered Raffaello’s question.
“Because I think you’ve got what it takes to stand out as a Player.”
“Me?”
Raffaello pointed at his own face with his index finger.
His expression said *what the hell are you talking about?*
Hae-jin spoke to the baffled Raffaello.
“Yeah. Follow me, and you’ll live a completely different life. If you can’t decide right now, just give me your answer by tomorrow.”
Hae-jin had time to spare until the next Trials’ Arena on February 1st.
So if Raffaello needed a day, he could wait.
But Hae-jin knew better.
*According to the Leader, he accepted right away......*
Joo-hyuk had made the same pitch when recruiting Raffaello, and the guy had grabbed his hand without needing even a day.
Sure enough.
Raffaello double-checked Hae-jin’s offer.
“So, if I sign on as a Player with you now, you’ll cover my living expenses from here on out and get me whatever watches I ask for? Because you think I’ll make a name for myself as a Player?”
“Yeah.”
“......”
Raffaello fell silent for a moment.
He seemed to be mulling over the proposal.
Finally, he spoke up.
“Fine, I’ll take that bet on you.”
Raffaello declared he was betting on Hae-jin like it was some gamble.
He stuck out his hand.
Hae-jin smirked and clasped it.
“Great. Let’s make it work together from now on.”
“Yeah! So, what should I call you? Big bro?”
“Big bro?”
Hae-jin tilted his head at Raffaello calling him “big bro” before they’d even sealed the deal.
Raffaello grinned.
“You said you’d take care of my livelihood, so you’re my big bro.”
“Then just call me Hae-jin hyung from now on.”
“Got it, Hae-jin hyung!”
“So, you’re coming to Korea with me?”
“Yessir! But, hyung.”
With the contract accepted, it was a done deal that Raffaello would follow Hae-jin.
Still, he called out to Hae-jin like he had a question.
“Yeah?”
“Why aren’t you dropping the formal speech with me, hyung?”
Raffaello was asking him to speak casually.
Foreigners might not have formal speech, but even abroad, there were nuances between superiors and juniors.
The Translate spell conveyed that perfectly.
He was calling him “hyung” but still speaking formally like to a younger brother.
Hae-jin explained.
“Once we hang out more and get comfortable, I’ll switch to casual too.”
“I see.”
“Yeah.”
“Hyung.”
“What’s up?”
“Before we head to Korea, mind if I go say goodbye to the store staff real quick?”
“Go ahead.”
“Be right back!”
Raffaello said he’d go give notice at his job and headed back into the Panelleria shop.
Hae-jin was curious, sure.
This was his first time recruiting a party member in real life, but he remembered Raffaello often badmouthing his store manager.
Hae-jin watched as Raffaello went back inside.
He casually called out to the employee he’d run into earlier.
“Hey.”
“Hey? Raffaello, have you lost your mind?”
“Take off the mask, you disgusting prick.”
“What? Disgusting?”
“Yeah, you disgusting prick. Every time I clean, you dump trash, and when I sort it, you kick it around to mess it up. Was it fun screwing with me like that?”
Once inside, Raffaello exposed the employee who’d been bullying him behind the others’ backs.
The employee stammered in panic.
“Wh...... Who said that?”
But Raffaello just scoffed and kept going.
“What bullshit. You lucked out with rich parents and suck honey from them, so drop the disgusting act. You filthy dickhead.”
“Haah.”
The employee Raffaello called “Dickhead” approached the suddenly foul-mouthed Raffaello.
Then, once he was close enough that the other staff wouldn’t hear, he flipped his attitude and whispered.
“Orphan trash like you should know your place and grovel for your cleaning pennies...... What, did you pop some pills in broad daylight? You’re crazy, you beggar.”
“Yeah, that’s the real you.”
“I told you if you just kept cleaning till the end of the month, I’d hook you up as an assistant to the repair guys. You wanna pull this shit?”
“Bullshit. You’ve been feeding me that line for months while making me clean nonstop. Shove that watch repair assistant crap up your ass, you moron.”
Raffaello flipped off Dickhead.
But it wasn’t enough to vent all the humiliation he’d endured—he gritted his teeth and headed back to the room he’d come from.
As Raffaello, who’d been unloading a torrent of insults, suddenly left mid-rant, Dickhead called after him loudly.
“Raffaello! Where are you going? Raffaello?”
Unlike the whisper, his tone was overly polite now.
But there was no need to fake it.
Raffaello came back out carrying the trash bin he’d cleaned and the bucket he’d been using to wring the mop.
He walked right up to Dickhead.
Then he dumped the entire bin of collected trash right on him.
Rustle-rustle-.
Drenched in sudden garbage, Dickhead was too stunned to even react.
But that wasn’t the end—Raffaello splashed the dirty mop water at his feet.
Splash-!
“Fuck!”
Dickhead jumped back frantically to save his pants.
Seeing that, Raffaello’s lips curled up, his pent-up rage from all of Dickhead’s bullshit finally easing a bit.
As Dickhead scrambled to protect his pants and shoes, Raffaello flipped him off one last time.
“Was a pleasure, let’s never meet again. Dickhead!”
With that, Raffaello stormed out.
Fresh out of Panelleria, he let out a satisfied breath, looking relieved.
“Phew, now I can breathe.”
Hae-jin asked him.
“How’s that? Feeling better?”
Raffaello beamed at the question.
“Yeah, it’s like a weight’s been lifted off my chest!”