O'Connor Burger (4)
I had breakfast at the hotel with Trish.
I was wearing beige slacks and a white knit sweater, with my red curls tied back and a pair of glasses on. If you looked at us like we were siblings, she did, in fact, resemble Sean quite a bit.
She didn’t look anything like her father, though.
Come to think of it, if a daughter like that came from a man like him, maybe her mother was an absolute beauty?
Trish piled her plate high with food, snapped several photos on her phone, and even took a few selfies.
“The breakfast here is really good.”
The way she lit up made her look oddly cute.
“Is it tasty?”
“Yes. If I get up in the morning and eat like this, I think I could work even harder.”
“Then why didn’t you stay at the Blackwood Hotel?”
“If my travel budget had been that generous, I would have. I even flew economy.”
So she was staying at a decent business hotel nearby, something more budget-friendly. She liked to brag that the company was doing well, but it seemed she was still feeling the pinch.
“It’s free for up to two people anyway, so come back and eat here tomorrow too.”
Trish tilted her head in confusion.
“Why is it free? Don’t you still have to pay separately?”
“Blackwood gave me a card to thank me for helping them out this time. It covers everything from lodging to the use of the facilities.”
“Wow! Really?”
“Yes. The room I’m staying in has three bedrooms.”
Trish’s eyes widened.
“Oh! Then can I sleep there too?”
“What?”
What on earth was that supposed to mean?
For an instant, Trish’s face went scarlet.
Realizing how that had sounded, she flailed her hands in alarm.
“Ah, no. I mean, that’s not what I meant.”
“What did you mean, then?”
“I-I mean... my hotel is kind of shabby, and I just thought if there are several bedrooms...”
“I see.”
“Don’t misunderstand me.”
“Of course. I don’t misunderstand.”
“……”
Then Trish stared at my face for a moment.
“Why are you looking at me like that?”
“Nothing.”
As if she wanted to change the subject quickly, she brought up something else.
“Your brother drove the food truck to San Francisco, didn’t he? I hear the lines were insane.”
“I saw the video too.”
It was already famous online, so everywhere it went, it drew an explosive reaction. In fact, the traffic was so heavy that the app that showed the food truck’s location even crashed.
Since Fernando was staying behind here to get the first franchise location ready, we had hired someone else to work the truck.
“Actually, my dad hates franchises. Even when he goes to other restaurants, he won’t choose a chain. If somebody else had told him they were going to turn O'Connor Burger into a franchise, he probably would’ve blown up on them right away. But because it’s you and Miru working on it together, he says he thinks he can trust you with it.”
“I can understand trusting his son, but me?”
Trish winked.
“Because of you, both my brother and I are doing well.”
Even in the first timeline, Sean became the founder of O'Connor Burger, made a fortune, and grew wildly famous. There had been no mention of Trish, though.
Come to think of it, if I hadn’t been around, WST would have remained just another forgettable internet outlet, and she never would have become a famous reporter either.
Human connections were strange that way.
I sipped my coffee and asked, “How’s the Snow Crash coverage going?”
“Very well. Oh! But could I ask you for one more favor?”
“What is it?”
“I got permission to cover the company, but they turned down my request to interview CEO Lucas.”
“Syd doesn’t usually talk to people he doesn’t know.”
Trish clasped her hands together and bowed her head.
“Please, I’m begging you. Before I came here, I already bragged to Vanessa that I’d land an interview with CEO Lucas. If I go back empty-handed, she’ll never stop laughing at me.”
“Who’s Vanessa?”
“Just some girl.”
“……”
Why was she working herself up into such a frenzy over it?
Still, judging from her expression, she really did seem desperate.
I nodded.
“All right. I’ll talk to him.”
“Thank you. I’ll buy you something delicious next time.”
“Forget the food. Just write a good article.”
“Well, obviously.”
Trish drizzled maple syrup over her pancakes and asked casually, “So what’s Continue Capital’s next investment plan?”
“That’s confidential.”
“Come on, just tell me a little.”
“Are you asking as a reporter, or are you just curious?”
“Both.”
“Can you keep an embargo?”
“Of course. I won’t say a word until you tell me it’s okay to publish.”
It wasn’t some earth-shattering secret, so I told her the truth.
“We’re planning to acquire a game publisher.”
“A publisher?”
“Yes. We’ve invested in a game company, and now we need a place that can publish the game they made.”
“Ah! You mean Purple Games?”
“Exactly.”
Trish cocked her head. “You’re going to buy a publisher just to launch one game? Don’t people usually just hand that part off to someone else?”
I gave a small grin.
“Because this isn’t an ordinary game.”
I sat at a terrace café near the hotel and reviewed the report sent over from headquarters.
The weather was a little chilly, but the sun was so strong it poured down with the force of a city nicknamed after light, bright enough to make my eyes ache.
Maybe that was why so many people were walking around in sunglasses.
The report neatly organized everything about game publishers and ESD companies — Electronic Software Distribution.
In the past, if you wanted to buy a game, you had to go to a physical store, just like you would for a record or a book. Even if you bought it from an online mall, you still had to wait a day or two for delivery.
But now, just like other software, you could buy it online and download it immediately.
That was what people called ESD, or Electronic Software Distribution.
Thanks to ESD, anyone could buy a game, install it, and start playing without ever leaving home.
Developers made the games, publishers distributed them, and ESD companies sold them.
But the boundaries between those three roles were never all that clear. Large developers often handled their own publishing and even ran their own distribution platforms.
On the other hand, publishers sometimes made games directly, and ESD companies sometimes handled distribution themselves.
If you wanted to think about it simply, you could just hand publishing and sales over to someone else. After all, a game would only succeed if distribution and sales succeeded too.
But if you did that, you might end up giving away as much as half your profits.
The success of Block Valley was already guaranteed.
Was there any reason to make somebody else rich? I intended to handle distribution and sales myself and keep the whole thing in-house.
“The problem is the money.”
The game market was already growing by twenty percent a year.
Compared to other industries, that was absurdly fast, but in a few more years, the market would begin moving like a thing gone mad.
The reason was simple: it was one of the industries that benefited most from digitalization.
I needed to move before it was too late.
In fact, I had already picked out the company I wanted to acquire.
I just didn’t have the money yet.
“I wonder when the Saudi prince will make up his mind.”
Come to think of it, around this time the U.S. would probably start economic sanctions against Turkey. Once he saw that, wouldn’t he want to join forces with me sooner rather than later?
As I was thinking that, my phone rang.
“Hello.”
I answered pleasantly. “Long time no see. How have you been?”
The caller was none other than Sarah Avery.
It had been quite some time since I’d last seen her in Korea.
She asked, “Are you in Silicon Valley right now?”
“Yes.”
“And you’re staying at the Blackwood Hotel?”
“Uh, how did you know that?”
“GIP told me.”
I nearly jumped at that.
“What?”
GIP was Saudi Arabia’s General Intelligence Presidency — roughly the Saudi equivalent of Korea’s National Intelligence Service.
The idea that a place like that was tracking my movements made my scalp prickle.
Sarah laughed.
“I’m joking. They wouldn’t do something like that.”
“Then how did you...?”
“I called Dongho and asked him, and he told me.”
“Ah, I see.”
Come to think of it, why would they drag an intelligence agency into something they could find out with a simple phone call?
“Are you free tonight? I’d like to meet. I can come over there.”
“You’re in the States?”
“Yes. I’m in California too. How about 7 p.m.?”
“Sounds good.”
I stepped into the pub and someone raised a hand.
“Over here.”
Her features were sharp, and her brown hair fell to her shoulders. She wore a silk blouse under a tailored suit, with her coat set aside beside her.
I sat down across from her.
“It’s even nicer to meet you here. Did you really come to the States just to see me?”
“Partly. I also stopped by home for the first time in a while.”
“Home?”
“My parents live in LA.”
She was, strictly speaking, an American born and raised in the United States. Of course she probably had Saudi citizenship too. Still, I hadn’t known her home was in LA.
We drank beer and caught up on everything we’d missed.
“Continue Capital’s gotten even more famous since then. I never would have imagined you’d solve ransomware in three days.”
“It wasn’t even something I handled personally.”
“I also heard Continue Capital invested in that trendy O'Connor Burger.”
“I happen to have some ties with the founder.”
“That’s amazing.”
“What is?”
“That everything you touch seems to turn out well.”
“I’ve just been lucky.”
Sarah let out a soft laugh.
“Then I hope that luck keeps holding. I’ve thought about your proposal from last time.”
“You mean the joint fund investment between Continue Capital and PIF?”
“Yes.”
Sarah didn’t beat around the bush.
“I’ll accept the proposal.”
“The U.S. hasn’t even started sanctions against Turkey yet.”
“The atmosphere already feels like it has. Even before that, I was worried about President Sahin’s moves, so I’d already started slowly selling off Turkey-related assets.”
“So you were gathering related intelligence after all.”
Turkey’s situation would affect the entire Middle East, so from Saudi Arabia’s point of view, it made sense that they’d been watching closely.
Sarah gave a bitter smile.
“To be honest, I was planning to take some time and adjust the terms to our advantage.”
The one under pressure, in truth, was me.
Snow Crash’s final payment deadline was approaching fast. That was why I’d been planning to sell off the Nextrogen stake first.
She must have been dragging her feet because she knew that.
“And now?”
“After seeing the profit we made from investing in Blackwood this time, I decided it would be better to move quickly.”
Until recently, Continue Capital had only had two billion dollars in cash. But thanks to buying when Blackwood was collapsing and selling when it soared, that had grown to sixteen billion dollars.
I nodded.
“Good call. What size fund are you thinking?”
“Fifty billion dollars.”
I was shocked inside.
The amount I had originally proposed was ten billion dollars. Even that was worth over eleven trillion won.
And yet they had quintupled the size.
At this point, it wouldn’t be an exaggeration to say PIF was throwing in every cent of cash it had.
“Why? Is that too much?”
“It’s larger than I expected. They say with big money comes big responsibility.”
“If you’re not confident, say so now.”
I shook my head.
“Not confident? Money is always better in larger amounts.”
For PIF to invest that much, it would need Prince Rashid’s approval. If the fund went wrong, the blame would inevitably land on him.
Even knowing how much he trusted my ability, he was still willing to invest this boldly. As expected, he really wasn’t an ordinary man.
“What about the investment structure?”
“The same fifty-fifty setup I suggested before.”
A new fund would be created, and the sovereign wealth fund and Continue Capital would each put in fifty percent. The money Continue Capital invested would be lent by the sovereign fund in the form of a loan.
“So Continue Capital would be borrowing twenty-five billion dollars.”
“Yes. Repayment would be due when the fund is liquidated, and how do you plan to handle the interest?”
The rate was an eye-watering ten percent a year.
Ten percent on twenty-five billion dollars meant two and a half billion dollars in interest every year.
“……”
Come to think of it, wasn’t this insane?
“I’ll pay it all at once later, with compound interest.”
“In seven years, the interest alone will equal the principal.”
“That’s fine.”
As long as I made more than that from the investment, there was no problem at all.