How to Spend Money in Style (1)
‘If things keep going like this, I’ll have to do a stock split soon.’
When the price per share of a stock becomes excessively high, companies divide one share into two, effectively halving the price. Of course, depending on the popularity of the stock, the price might end up higher or lower than half after the split, but looking at Microsoft’s current situation, increasing the number of shares through a stock split was the right move.
“Wait, why?”
At Merrill’s indifferent reaction, Yoon-gi brought his thoughts back from their detour.
“Ah, I’m a major shareholder of Microsoft. I hold 35 percent of the total shares.”
“I see.”
Still the same indifferent reaction.
“Aren’t you surprised?”
“Um… am I supposed to be…?”
At Merrill’s genuinely confused response, Yoon-gi felt a bit flustered.
“Well… it’s a signal that I’ve now officially become a world-class chaebol.”
In truth, he was already on the fringes of being a global tycoon just from his existing assets, but now that he held Microsoft stock, he could definitively claim the title. Only then did Merrill seem to understand, and she congratulated him.
“Really? Congratulations!”
However, Yoon-gi could feel it. He could tell that Merrill was just being considerate.
“Be honest with me. You’re not really impressed, are you?”
At Yoon-gi’s playful question, Merrill hesitated for a moment before carefully nodding.
“Honestly, from my perspective, you’re already so rich that you have more than enough without that…”
‘Merrill really has a limit when it comes to greed for money.’
Once money reaches a certain level, it becomes an amount you couldn’t spend in a lifetime even if you tried. Yet, most people try to hoard all the money in the world by any means necessary. That is exactly why wealth polarization occurs. In this regard, Merrill was in the minority, not the majority. Of course, Yoon-gi was similar to Merrill in that sense. His reasons for wanting to accumulate the world’s wealth were different from those of typical rich people.
“I thought it was pretty good news, but I guess I thought wrong.”
“I, I’m sorry… I’m not very observant…”
Yoon-gi shook his head at Merrill, who was genuinely apologetic.
“No, it’s fine. It’s similar to giving you a robot toy as a gift. In that sense, let me give you something else.”
“A gift? Really?”
Merrill looked at Yoon-gi with sparkling eyes.
“Yeah. Let’s stop being just engaged and actually get married. Within this summer.”
For a moment, Merrill wore a blank expression.
“Merrill?”
As Yoon-gi tapped her cheek with his index finger, the light returned to her pupils.
“Really…?”
“Yeah. I’m finally at the age where I can get married under Korean law. We like each other, so why wait for a ‘good date’?”
Looking at it this way, it was a marriage proposal without any grand event. However, Merrill smiled brightly and was overjoyed. No, her eyes were actually welling up with tears. An engagement and a marriage were worlds apart. Merrill took Yoon-gi’s hands in her small ones and pulled them toward her chest.
“I’ve waited for this day for so long…”
“Me too.”
The two embraced for a long time.
“Oh, but didn’t you say there were three things?”
At Merrill’s words, Yoon-gi nodded.
“Yeah. The other one is about our honeymoon.”
“Oh, my. Already…”
As Merrill blushed, feeling shy, Yoon-gi got straight to the point.
“I’m thinking of going to space. What do you think?”
“Huh?”
How many people in the world would ever hear someone say they were going to space for their honeymoon? Merrill shook her head, wondering for a moment if she had misheard.
“You meant Spain, right?”
Since ‘space’ and ‘Spain’ sounded similar, she thought of the closest word.
“No, I’m going to space. S-P-A-C-E. Let’s go to a place where we can look down at the Earth at a glance.”
“…Is that even possible?”
Yoon-gi bent one knee toward Merrill, who couldn’t easily believe him. Like a prince taking a princess’s hand.
“I shall escort you to the moon, my princess.”
Finally, Merrill realized Yoon-gi wasn’t joking and smiled brightly.
“My grandson is finally getting married!”
Choi Ki-hyun tried to lift Yoon-gi up with a bright laugh.
“Ugh!”
Choi Ki-hyun was quite elderly now. He was still younger than Guster, but by the standards of this era, he was at an age where it wouldn’t be strange to say he had lived enough.
“Grandfather, I’m too big now.”
At Yoon-gi’s bitter smile, Choi Ki-hyun nodded.
“R-right. Hmm…”
Yoon-gi spoke to Choi Ki-hyun, who couldn’t hide his lingering regret.
“But you have to lift your great-grandchild, right?”
“Hehehe, that’s right. I have to live until I see my great-grandchild. Since you’re getting married early, I’ll be able to see their face before I go.”
“Please don’t talk about dying…”
Yoon-gi made a sad face, but Choi Ki-hyun just laughed and shook his head.
“At my age, isn’t it considered a ‘blessed death’? I heard there aren’t many people in our family who live long, so I’ve lived quite long enough.”
In reality, Choi Ki-hyun had lived a rather short life in the original history. But in this timeline, even though Yoon-gi was 18, he was still quite healthy. Of course, as he aged, he inevitably suffered from some geriatric diseases, but at least he wasn’t experiencing any discomfort in his mobility or mental state.
“…”
When Yoon-gi couldn’t answer, Choi Ki-hyun stroked his hair.
“Everyone is destined to die. It is because we die that we try to live fiercely while we are alive. So you don’t have to be too sad. Those who must go, go, and those who remain must work hard. Isn’t that the way of the world?”
Choi Ki-hyun continued.
“And I respect your choice. No, I learned it through you. A society where everyone wants to make an effort. General capitalism eventually makes people give up on effort due to extreme wealth inequality, but I believe ‘your capitalism’ can make it possible.”
“Grandfather…”
Yoon-gi’s eyes welled up with tears. The family love he had never received even once during his days as a laborer. And the intense love for his grandson he had experienced since gaining a new life. That was why Yoon-gi truly hated the thought of a life without his grandfather.
“Ouch!”
Yoon-gi suddenly screamed. The reason was that Merrill had pinched his side.
“Why, why are you doing that…!”
As Yoon-gi touched his side and shed a tear, Merrill clicked her tongue with a pathetic expression.
“If you show that kind of face, will Grandfather feel at ease?”
“That’s right, my granddaughter-in-law says wise things.”
At Choi Ki-hyun’s hearty laugh, Yoon-gi realized he had only been thinking about his own emotions and gave a bitter smile.
“I’m sorry…”
“It’s alright. If you had said, ‘Yes, it is a blessed death!’, that would have been disappointing in its own way. That’s why human interaction is difficult. In that sense, you two seem to suit each other very well. Because you can help each other.”
Choi Ki-hyun looked at Yoon-gi and Merrill with a benevolent smile.
“By the way, how are you planning to hold the wedding?”
As the realistic problem of an engaged couple with different nationalities was brought up, Yoon-gi said carefully.
“I think we’ll probably hold one in Korea and one in the United States.”
“Indeed, there’s no other way.”
“Actually, neither Merrill nor I really want to have a wedding, but the elders don’t see it that way.”
There is one case in life where you must have a wedding. That is when your parents have spent a lot of money on congratulatory gifts for others. In this case, you have to hold a wedding to get a ‘refund.’ Not doing so is economically stupid. On the other hand, if the amount to be refunded is small, there is practically no reason to hold a wedding. Of course, if the couple getting married wants to have one, they can. However, if they are poor and have no one to receive gifts from, but their parents force them to have a wedding, it would be absolutely maddening for the children. In that sense, Yoon-gi was checking the intentions of the family elders first.
“Come to think of it, is my granddaughter-in-law okay with it?”
Merrill basically had social anxiety. Although she had improved a lot while working as a model, the feeling still remained, so Choi Ki-hyun was also cautious.
“Um… I think it’s right to do it in Korea as well, since we have to do it in the U.S. It feels a bit… wrong to only do it in the U.S. and not in Korea.”
Merrill’s complexion turned slightly pale, but her voice didn’t tremble much, as if she was mentally preparing herself.
“If you think it’s too hard, just say so. Anyway, all the congratulatory money I’ve given so far is nothing compared to the money Yoon-gi has.”
“Thank you.”
At Choi Ki-hyun’s playful remark, Merrill seemed to find stability and smiled.
“By the way, I find this even more amazing than your wedding. Yoon-gi, you really are an attention seeker, a total attention seeker.”
Choi Ki-hyun, laughing heartily, held today’s morning newspaper in his hand.
Space travel. Even for a normal overseas trip, various preparations are needed, so space travel goes without saying. Therefore, Merrill also had to enter the Soviet Union and undergo training for space travel. Even if it wasn’t at the level of an astronaut, she had to receive at least some training to deal with any unforeseen situations. Of course, Guster was quite opposed to Merrill entering the Soviet Union at first, but Merrill eventually won.
[If you keep opposing it, I won’t have the wedding in the U.S.!]
From Merrill’s perspective, the wedding in the U.S. was a part she had conceded quite a bit to Guster, so Guster had no choice but to give in. Thus, the training began. Sergei, who worked at the Soviet Space Agency and was in charge of this training, spoke to Yoon-gi and Merrill.
“First, to travel to space, you must have no history of surgery.”
Then Merrill made a troubled expression.
“Um… I’ve had an appendectomy…”
“When?”
“When I was 7.”
“Then there is no problem. It only needs to have been a year.”
“Phew…”
Merrill, sighing in relief, was so cute that Yoon-gi wrapped his arm around her waist.
“Don’t worry too much. I’m right here with you.”
“Oh, my… ‘That’ can wait until later…”
‘Later? Laaaater? LAAAAATER?!’
Sergei, who felt like he was going crazy having to watch the two of them flaunting their affection, shouted only in his mind and continued speaking.
“Do you have any cavities?”
Merrill shook her head.
“That’s fortunate. Lastly, let’s see your physical characteristics…”
Sergei measured Merrill’s height, sitting height, and foot size, then nodded.
“There are no disqualifying factors. Welcome. We will now begin the full-scale training.”
As Sergei had said so far, there are numerous disqualifying factors for space travel. And the biggest disqualifying factor among them is, of course, ‘money.’ However, Yoon-gi and Merrill, for whom everything was resolved, could enjoy the training for space travel to the fullest. Of course, Yoon-gi was receiving it to enjoy this situation with Merrill. Although it wasn’t easy, it was a tremendous opportunity to see the Earth in person. That was why the two felt as if this was their honeymoon.
“Are we going to be in this zero-gravity state during our honeymoon too?”
At Merrill’s words, Yoon-gi nodded.
“Yeah, that’s what they say.”
“Then…”
A blush appeared on Merrill’s face, and Yoon-gi, understanding what that meant, also smiled.
“Ahem! Ahem!”
Sergei had to watch the world’s greatest display of affection right next to him. However, because he had received an order from Gorbachev to ‘prioritize the two over all other missions,’ he couldn’t leave his post.
‘Sob sob…’
While Sergei was suffering, shedding mournful tears inside, a large-scale troop movement (?) was already taking place in the United States.