The Debt Comes Due
Thirty minutes earlier.
First floor, the knowledge industry center. In the corridor on the ground level, where three elevators were shuttling up and down in nonstop cycles, people hurried back and forth with the air of a place that was busy earning its keep.
Then a group of men passed through the revolving door in the first-floor lobby and headed for the elevators.
"W-what the hell...?"
"Are they gangsters...?"
"Hey, who are those guys?"
"Shh. Don’t make eye contact."
The lively mood in the lobby vanished in an instant, replaced by a thick, uncomfortable tension.
"Boss, this way."
Ignoring the stares around them, the youngest man in Bulgom’s group checked which elevator would reach the first floor the fastest and took the lead. As he did, the people nearby unconsciously drifted away and made room for them.
"Bulgom, boss."
"What?"
Watching the elevator descend, the man with the smallest frame in the group, but still enough standing to speak for the others, asked on behalf of his men.
"What you said a little while ago—is it true?"
"What part?"
"Boss."
Wild Dog took a breath, then asked Bulgom, "You said that bastard Kim Donggeon had the nerve to disrespect the Chairman. I’m angry, sure, but more than that, I don’t even understand how that’s possible."
"You don’t understand?"
"No, boss. We’re not ignorant of Chairman Do, and sure, he’s a gentleman, but he’s not the kind of man who’ll swallow a hit and let it end there. He’s the type to send it back with plenty of interest on top, isn’t he?"
Bulgom said nothing. He just kept waiting for the elevator to come down.
Ding!
A moment later, the elevator stopped on the first floor, and the uneasy eyes of the people inside turned toward the gangsters.
"Don’t block the way. Move aside and let them through."
"Yes, boss."
Once everyone else had gotten off, the gangsters loaded the large burlap sacks in first and stepped into the elevator. It was a proper freight-size elevator for a knowledge industry center, big enough to hold at least fifteen people, but not a single person in the lobby even thought about boarding with them.
Ding.
"Wild Dog."
As the doors closed and Wild Dog reached for the fifth-floor button, Bulgom called him in a low voice.
"Yes, boss."
Wild Dog’s hand froze over the button.
"Is the Chairman a thug? The same as you lot? If the Chairman says something, then you just take it as it is and leave it there. Since when do you talk back when your elders give an order? Is that how I taught you?"
"I’m sorry, boss. I messed up."
"Don’t do anything embarrassing in front of the younger ones."
"Yes, boss."
After finishing his brief lecture, Bulgom jerked his chin toward the fifth-floor button on the elevator wall, and only then did Wild Dog press it.
"Pressing five, boss."
With just a few clipped words from Bulgom, the gangsters’ lax discipline tightened back into place. As the elevator began to rise slowly, Bulgom spoke again.
"Don’t think we’re here to handle business like usual. We can call each other brother when it’s just us, but outside, don’t go around acting like gangsters. You remember what I told you, right?"
"Yes, boss."
The gangsters answered in a single booming voice and bowed their heads.
"Lower your voices, you worthless bastards. How long are you planning to live like this?"
Even as he scolded them, Bulgom kept his own voice low, the words coming out in a rough mutter.
"This is the Chairman’s order. Brother Museong was adamant about it too. When we’re inside and it’s just us, fine, but when we’re outside, act like ordinary people doing office work. Watch what you say, and don’t do anything that breaks the law."
"Yes, boss. I messed up again. I’ll keep my head straight."
Ding.
The elevator stopped on the fifth floor and the doors slid open. Unlike Bulgom, who stepped out at once, Wild Dog held the doors open so they wouldn’t close and ordered the others, "Get the money out first."
"Yes, boss."
Watching them answer every sentence with that neat little "boss," Bulgom felt his stomach turn, but now was not the time to tear into his younger men. He swallowed the rising anger and took a cigarette from inside his jacket.
The moment he put it between his lips—
"L-light. Right here, boss."
The youngest man, who had been hauling a burlap sack full of ten-won coins out of the elevator, dropped the bag on the floor and ran over so fast his soles must have been sweating. He flicked a lighter and lit Bulgom’s cigarette.
"...Go on and do your job."
"Yes, bro—"
The youngest man had instinctively dipped his head and started to answer in chorus, but the moment he caught Bulgom’s burning stare, he swallowed the rest of it, bowed his head in a tiny voice, and ran back toward the elevator like a mouse fleeing to its hole from a cat.
"It’s all out, Director."
Apparently learning from the youngest man’s mistake, Wild Dog used Director instead of boss, and Bulgom’s face loosened just a little.
"Mm... warn the others again, and don’t call people by their names or nicknames. And never put your hands on anyone. Don’t touch any of the furniture or fixtures unless you have to."
"Yes, Director."
"Hobin."
The instant he used his real name instead of his nickname, Wild Dog’s shoulders gave a sharp twitch.
"Yes."
"What’s your rank? Are you the manager?"
"Deputy general manager."
"And the younger ones under you?"
"The youngest is an assistant manager, and Kitchen Knife... no, Joo-young is a deputy manager."
"Kim Joo-young is a deputy manager, and the youngest one?"
Sensing that the youngest man was about to step forward, Yoo Hobin shot him a sharp look.
The kid hadn’t been in the organization long enough to keep his mouth shut, and if they left him alone, he would probably shout his name loud enough to send it echoing down the whole hallway again.
"Assistant Manager Ha Tae-seon, Director."
"Good. Yoo the deputy manager, Kim the deputy manager, and Assistant Manager Ha. Remember that well from now on."
"Yes."
Now that even the "Director" was gone and he was answering in short, clipped words, Hobin was impressively quick on the uptake. It was the kind of instinct he’d built by following Bulgom around for five years and serving as his right hand while Bulgom blundered through life by sheer temper and momentum.
"Go check whether we can just walk in."
"Yes."
Yoo Hobin nodded toward the youngest man, and the kid immediately kicked off the floor and ran. He cut the corner in a crisp right angle just outside the elevator doors, and the sign for AK Capital came into view.
"Son of a bitch..."
The youngest man, who had been sprinting down the hall, eased up once his bosses were out of sight and carefully surveyed AK Capital.
Damn, this place is huge. What kind of loan-shark outfit is this wide? I swear to God, this is insane.
AK Capital used the entire fifth floor, turning a corridor that had to be at least fifty meters long into office space, and there were five separate entrances as well.
It looked as if they had taken five separate offices, knocked down the walls between them, and claimed the whole floor as one massive unit.
"Fuck... all they had to do was walk in, so what the hell are they wasting time on?"
Even while he grumbled, the youngest man carefully checked the corridor from one end to the other. Glass doors split to either side bore the name AK Capital, and the entrances appeared to open only if you scanned a fingerprint or tapped a badge against them.
The two doors in the center could also be opened by ringing a bell, but the people who came out from there were all female employees, and they didn’t even glance at the youngest man before disappearing toward the elevator on the opposite side from Bulgom’s group.
At the very least, he needed to find out where the bastard named Kim Donggeon, Team Leader of Personal Credit Management Team 1, was sitting in this huge office.
The youngest man hurried over to a female employee who was just stepping out and, with the broadest, friendliest smile he could manage, said, "Excuse me... just a second."
"Yes? Me? What is it?"
Even with a smile on his face, most women would have flinched or failed to hide their disgust when a rough-looking guy who obviously resembled a gangster called out to them. But the ordinary-looking employee answered him calmly.
"Do you happen to know a Team Leader Kim Donggeon?"
"Oh—Team Leader Kim from the collections department, Management Team 1?"
"You know him?"
"Of course. But this is the review team. Are you new here?"
"What?"
"Huh? Weren’t you here for an interview? I thought they were hiring specialist collectors for visit collections, so I assumed that was it..."
The employee gave the youngest man a puzzled look from head to toe.
Shit. She thought I came here to learn money-grubbing for a living. No wonder she was so calm. Wait—does that mean there are plenty of guys like me in here too?
For a moment, the youngest man drifted into unrelated thoughts. The employee, who had been watching him with a dissatisfied expression, called out in a slightly irritated voice, "Hey."
"Yes?"
"You are looking for Team Leader Kim Donggeon, right?"
"Ah, yes."
"See the end of that corridor over there?"
"Yes."
"If you turn left there, you’ll find the elevator."
The end of the corridor she pointed to bent at a right angle, where Bulgom and the others were waiting.
"The glass door on the right as soon as you get off the elevator is the office used by Personal Credit Management Team 1 and the collections staff. You can go in through there."
"Ah, yes. Thank yo—"
Before the youngest man could even finish thanking her, the employee had already turned away with the look of someone who had said everything she intended to say. And though she probably knew he could still hear her, she didn’t care at all; she trotted toward the opposite elevator and muttered under her breath,
"The collections team should stop hiring only scary-looking people and bring in some gentle, intelligent types like Mr. Jaehyun used to be. What is wrong with them, one and all? It’s not like they’re holding a reunion for neighborhood thugs, and it’s not as if they decided to recruit nothing but the dumb, brute-force, violent type."
If Wild Dog hadn’t warned him earlier, the youngest man would have started with, "You fucking bitch," grabbed her by the hair, and showered her with curses. But this was not the situation for that.
"What a fucking bitch. No manners at all."
Grumbling, he returned to where Bulgom was waiting, and the moment he rounded the corner at the end of the corridor, the annoyed look on his face was replaced like a mask by one of perfect politeness.
"It’s confirmed, Manager."
"Where?"
"If we go through that door right in front of us, we can get inside."
After receiving the report from Yoo Hobin, Bulgom asked Gong Hyeongtae, "So... should we just go in?"
"No. We wait here until someone comes out."
"Understood, Director."
"Light up a cigarette each."
"We’re fine."
"It’s necessary, so smoke."
"Yes."
Bulgom and his men waited there for twenty minutes. By the time they finally ran into a male employee who seemed to belong to Team Leader Kim Donggeon’s group, the gangsters were on the verge of exploding with irritation.
"You came looking for Team Leader Kim Donggeon?"
"Damn it, seriously. Did you stuff an eraser in your ears? Didn’t you hear what the boss just said?"
Kim Joo-young, one of the men accompanying Gong Hyeongtae, rolled up his sleeves and bared the tiger tattoo running across his cheek in an X-shaped slash.
"You came all this way to do something decent, and you’re asking so many questions? Hey, man. So what is it—do you know Kim Donggeon or not? If you don’t, then just open the door and get out of the way. What’s with the fingerprint access for some tiny little office like this?"
"...Watch your language. He’s our team leader."
"So what? We came to pay back money. Are you just going to send us away, or are you opening the door?"
"Which customer’s debt repayment are you here for?"
"Kim Yoojin. A younger acquaintance of ours. You guys lent him money, didn’t you? The kid’s been having a hard time, so of course he might fall behind a little. What, you couldn’t even wait for that and had to chase him like a stray dog?"
At the name Kim Yoojin, the male employee’s face brightened. He had been the only obstacle blocking a perfect collection, and now that the debt was being repaid, these burly gangsters suddenly looked like a blessing from heaven.
"Please, come in."
Thrilled at the thought of recovering a delinquent debt, the employee had no idea what kind of catastrophe was about to unfold. He had no idea that it would be neither violent nor threatening, but a completely lawful debt repayment incident that would go down in legend at every loan-shark office in South Korea and be talked about for years to come.
"I’ll take you to Team Leader Kim Donggeon."