James’s Weakness
The man who left the office early headed straight home.
“I’m home.”
“You’re home early today?”
The woman who seemed to be his wife took his jacket from him.
“...I’ve got an important golf engagement tomorrow, so I’m just making sure I’m in good shape.”
“Good.”
“......”
He had not met his wife through romance, but she was devoted to him. She had grown up in a wealthy family and received an excellent education from a young age, and carried the knowledge and refinement expected of a chaebol family.
She had also borne him two sons, and her family had been a considerable help in his rise to the TY Group’s inheritance.
I still haven’t taken over the TY Group.
He had risen to the presidency of TY Telecom, one of the pillars of the TY Group, but his younger brother, who was competing with him, was serving as president of TY Chemical. If the matter of his out-of-wedlock child came out in a situation like this, his father, the chairman, would not hesitate to erase him from the company.
And if his wife found out, it would not be enough to call it the worst possible outcome.
This is an even worse time than back then!
Things were far worse now than when the woman he had once been involved with had confessed that she was pregnant.
Why the hell did she wait until after giving birth to tell me!
If she had told him before the child was born, he would at least have been able to make it disappear. But because she gave birth first, the child had to be sent to an orphanage, and in the process...
Because of you, I’ve got another mess to clean up!
For a man who had made the TY Group the purpose of his life, James was nothing more than unnecessary noise and a problem that needed to be swept aside.
“Honey, how about we eat out tonight?”
“Oh my, are you thinking of me?”
“Thinking of you... it’s not that. The kids aren’t here, so let’s just eat casually, the two of us. We can do some shopping too, since it’s been a while.”
“Heehee. All right. I’ll get ready right away.”
Men were always extra kind when they had something to feel guilty about.
For now, I’ll keep an eye on it...
The moment anything looked like it was going wrong, he was prepared to wipe it clean, put everything back to zero, and start over.
Go quietly back to America and live as if you’re dead.
But even if the boy went to America, that did not mean the matter was finished.
If James returned to America, the problem would still remain.
...I’ll probably have to deal with the real cleanup separately in America. That way there won’t be any loose ends.
“Honey, did you wait long?”
“No. I’ll call the VIP room at the department store on the way.”
“Oh my. Did something good happen today?”
“We’ve been staying home so much lately that we haven’t had time to shop.”
“You say that, but you’ve had me order in plenty of times and buy everything we needed.”
“Still, there’s something nice about picking things yourself.”
“Heehee. That’s true too. Where are we having dinner?”
“We’ll eat something simple at our hotel near the department store, then head over to the store after that.”
“Sounds good.”
“Shall we go, madam?”
“Heeheehee.”
* * *
James sat in front of a PC set up in the hotel lounge, staring at the monitor.
“......”
Reflected in his eyes, the screen scrolled through articles, company history, and background information on TY Telecom, and his search was now reaching the company’s financials.
The company’s reputation is decent enough...
TY Telecom had begun as Taeyoung Telecommunications, named after its founder, Choi Tae-yeong. Later, in the name of global expansion, it changed its name to TY Telecom and, like ordinary Korean conglomerates, continued its spiderweb-like expansion. Whether due to good timing or strong management, TY Group had gone from strength to strength. Now, with founder Choi Tae-yeong suffering from old age, his two sons, Choi Jeong-san and Choi Jeong-pil, were competing to inherit the Taeyoung family’s legacy. The man James suspected to be his biological father was the elder son, Choi Jeong-san.
“......”
James checked the representative photo on the company homepage, where Choi Jeong-san was smiling brightly, then moved on.
Recent revenue is... 1.3 trillion won? How much is that?
Used to thinking in USD, James had to convert the amount in his head, and soon realized just how enormous 1.3 trillion won really was.
“...Ten billion dollars. Shit...”
And that was not even the revenue of the entire TY Group, but the annual revenue generated by TY Telecom alone. The thirty million dollars he had received from selling the Texas land meant nothing by comparison.
“......”
James was not surprised that the company was large. Rather, now that he could feel its scale, it only helped him make sense of everything that had happened until now.
Did money make human lives feel like flies to you? Even if that child was your own blood?
Understanding was not the same thing as forgiveness.
Beep.
The heat from the computer James had shut down cooled away, and the wizard’s heart settled just as coldly.
...So this time, are you going to understand when your life and your family’s lives become nothing more than fly lives too?
The wizard was forcing an understanding the other side had never agreed to.
* * *
“-Oppa... did something happen yesterday?”
“Something? No, nothing in particular.”
Suzy thought James’s voice sounded oddly flat.
“-Your voice doesn’t sound very good...”
“I’m fine. I’m just relaxing at the hotel and eating well and sleeping well.”
“-Then why did you reject my date invitation today?”
Suzy had missed James yesterday, so she had playfully asked him out on a date today. But James had refused and said he was staying at the hotel. That was why she kept wondering whether something had happened yesterday.
“......”
Yesterday, James had used magic to shake off the people tracking him, but today, after going outside, he had once again felt eyes on him. New people had taken over the surveillance.
James did not want Suzy to see any of that.
“Suzy. I’m only going to explain this once, so listen carefully.”
“-...Oppa, why are you lowering your voice like that? You’re scaring me...”
“Don’t come running over here just because you’re worried.”
“-...That sounds really suspicious, you know?”
“Until I call you and say I want to meet, it’ll be hard for us to see each other for a while.”
“-Not just today?”
James had already decided that the TY Group was his enemy.
I know my enemy, but my enemy doesn’t know me.
The first thing he had to do to win was hide his weakness.
If I have a weakness, it’s Suzy and Colt.
That was why he was putting off his date with Suzy.
“-Oppa. Why are you doing this, exactly?”
“......”
James considered telling Suzy about the TY Group, but he could reach a simple conclusion.
Who knows how far things will go with those TY Group bastards...
It was already a given that James used magic, and the chance of him causing some kind of incident because of it was close to one hundred percent. There was no need to tell Suzy, who had no idea he was a wizard, about those people’s identities or his connection to them.
I’ve got more than enough excuses.
“Suzy...”
“-Yeah, Oppa.”
“I got the result from yesterday.”
“-The result? What... huh? You went there yesterday?”
The first excuse was the fruitless search for his biological parents.
“Yeah. They said the orphanage where I was left had already disappeared, and all the records had been destroyed.”
“-Ah...”
He thought that alone should be enough reason not to meet her.
“-...What am I going to do about you? Hiiing...”
“It’s fine. I’ll take a few days to rest and sort out my thoughts...”
“-Oppa! That’s exactly when you need to stay active and keep moving so you can forget about it! Don’t sit there being depressed by yourself!”
“......”
“-I’ll come over right away, so stay put at the hotel.”
“Easy there, Suzy. I haven’t finished talking yet.”
James brought out his next excuse.
“I never expected much from finding my biological parents in the first place. It’s fine. I’m not depressed at all.”
He had never had depressed feelings to begin with. Right now, all that remained in James’s heart was irritation and anger toward the man from TY Group.
-Then why do you want to be alone?
James still had another excuse left.
“I told you I’m selling my collectibles to Sotheby’s because I’m trying to find a house in Seoul, right?”
“-Yeah, I know. I also heard Uncle Colt is selling a meteorite...”
Suzy knew James was selling valuable gold coins to raise the money for a house. She had also heard through Ho-jung about Colt’s meteorite, which had been valued at seven million dollars. Only the matter of King Arthur’s crown remained secret. The amount was far too large, so James had been careful even in the way he spoke.
“I need to be a little cautious because of the Sotheby’s auction. The items are pretty expensive, after all. If word gets out...”
-Ah.
“So I’m trying to be careful until the auction is over. It would be a disaster if something happened and you got kidnapped or something.”
-Hah. That kind of thing doesn’t happen in Korea. Maybe in America.
“......”
Public safety in Korea was generally better than in other countries, and as a result most Koreans were numb to violent crime. But James, who had lived for years in America where gun ownership was legal, was always aware that he could be exposed to crime, and there had also been the incidents he’d gone through recently in Britain and the Vatican.
“Suzy. The world is a little rougher than you think. It’s not safe all the time. Colt even got pickpocketed in Britain.”
-Come on. But kidnapping in Korea...
“Want me to tell you what happened in the Vatican?”
-Something happened there too?
James told her how criminals had kidnapped a Vatican cardinal in order to rob the Vatican Museums, even going so far as to undergo plastic surgery to infiltrate the place. It had happened in the Vatican, a place almost as sacred as holy ground, so there was no guarantee Korea would be safe either.
-...Whoa. Are you kidding me? You’re saying that actually happened, not in some movie script?
“Yeah. I was stuck in the Vatican for quite a while because of it. Until those guys were arrested...”
-Wow. Good thing they were caught.
“Now, let’s think about our situation again. I put ancient relics worth tens of millions of dollars up for auction.”
-...You did.
“What do you think would happen if my identity got out to a criminal organization? Me, the guy who might have more ancient relics than just the auction items?”
-!
“And what if they also picked up on the woman I love?”
James pressed on with more detailed hypotheticals so that Suzy would have no choice but to give up.
“They’d think I had more relics, kidnap you, and...”
-Gasp.
“Then they’d blackmail me with you as leverage, and I’d hand over everything to them. If that’s the only way I can save you...”
-Oppa...
If such a situation really happened, James was certain he would find those bastards in a matter of minutes. And he was just as certain he could make sure they lived and died at the same time.
“But that doesn’t mean I’ll never get to see you again. I’m only saying let’s be a little careful until we know it’s safe.”
Truthfully, even if he met Suzy and showed her his weakness, he was confident he could handle it. He was simply removing variables and aiming for absolute completeness in his plan.
-Can I be moved by that?
“As much as you want.”
-Ah, but maybe this isn’t the time for me to be moved.
“Why not?”
-Because you still haven’t found your parents in Korea...
Her lover, who had lost his adoptive parents in America and was left alone, had also failed to find his parents in Korea.
“Come on. That kind of thing doesn’t matter.”
James intended to pay back, in full, the pain of every year he had spent living as an orphan. He could let some things go, like hiding his own information by spending money to do it, but he could not forgive the fact that they had even been willing to kill him.
What the hell did I even do? Did I ask for money? Did I ask them to acknowledge me as their son?
All James had wanted was to hear why he had been abandoned. There was no mercy left for a man who would not even allow him that much.
-...Now that I can’t see you, I miss you even more today, Oppa.
“......”
James felt the same way. The fact that he couldn’t see her made him miss her even more, and when he thought that the reason was that bastard from TY Telecom, resentment rose in him.
So I’ve got to miss the girl I love because of that asshole?