Two Options!
Can someone locked in a detention center get out? The answer is yes. Regulations may exist in this world, but if there is a punishment for not following them, it implies that there will always be cases where they are ignored. If everyone followed the rules, there would be no need for penalty clauses in the first place. Therefore, it was by no means difficult for Jung Jaewoon to slip out of the police station and meet Ma Seokil. Besides, what did it matter if the police themselves were the ones bringing him?
“Thank you… thank you so, so much…” Jung Jaewoon bowed his head toward Ma Seokil, tears streaming down his face.
“Of course you should be thankful. Hmm! Hmm!” Ma Seokil chuckled, putting on a show of being jovial. Jung Jaewoon looked at him with a blank expression, slightly taken aback.
“What’s wrong? Why’d you stop thanking me? Did you run out of gratitude after just a few times?”
“Ah, no. It’s not that…”
Ma Seokil grinned, naturally grabbing Jung Jaewoon by the shoulder and seating him across from him at the reception table. “Sit down, man. Want a beer?”
Without waiting for an answer, Ma Seokil skillfully popped open a cold bottle of beer and poured it into a glass. “The one happiness a salaryman can never truly enjoy: drinking on the job. Do you know the easiest way to judge if you’ve lived a successful life?”
“Uh… is it seeing if you’ve become a salaryman who can drink while working?”
At Jung Jaewoon’s clever answer, Ma Seokil clinked their full glasses together and handed one to him.
“Exactly! That’s it. Which means I’ve lived a successful life. And so have you!”
Ma Seokil provided a level of comfort and levity that Jung Jaewoon had never experienced before. ‘Are all the executives at YK like this…?’ Until now, Jung Jaewoon had lived fiercely, loyal to his company just to survive. He lived in constant fear that he would be discarded the moment he made a single mistake. But Ma Seokil felt completely different. Furthermore, Jung Jaewoon’s favorability toward YK had skyrocketed. It was only natural, as his wife had told him that YK had moved their daughter, Daeun, to the best hospital in the country. To top it off, his wife had reported just yesterday that Daeun’s pneumonia symptoms were showing signs of improvement. Thanks to that, Jung Jaewoon had been able to breathe a sigh of relief even while in detention.
‘They even treated my daughter after I confessed to being an industrial spy…’ He didn’t know the reason, but he was so grateful to YK he could cry. Manager Park and his company had tried to keep him tied down in the Soviet Union with lies, even knowing his daughter was critically ill, yet YK had bestowed infinite grace upon him, their enemy.
“What are you doing? Drink up.” Ma Seokil urged him, bringing his own glass to his lips, and both men downed their beers in one go.
“Ahh! You know, a beer while working is way better than a beer after work. This sense of guilt! It’s thrilling!”
Jung Jaewoon couldn’t help but smile at Ma Seokil’s incredibly cheerful demeanor.
“Now, since we’ve had a refreshing drink, let’s get to the point. How about it? Good, right?”
“Y-yes, yes!” Jung Jaewoon straightened his posture, instinctively becoming reverent. Even though Ma Seokil had a pleasant, easygoing impression, he possessed a way of speaking that made people strangely nervous.
“First, I want to tell you one thing: our YK has known you were an industrial spy for a long time.”
“Y-yes? Yes?!”
For a moment, Jung Jaewoon felt the light buzz of alcohol vanish completely.
“Hey, you didn’t think we were that naive, did you? Why do you think people are leaving for the Soviet Union during this period? The answer is obvious. We also already know that you are in close contact with Kim Mujin, who is currently at the pharmaceutical company YK established in the Soviet Union.”
Jung Jaewoon swallowed hard. All his movements had been exposed.
“Why? Surprised you weren’t dragged off to the Soviet intelligence agency and tortured?”
“Gasp!”
There was no longer an ANSP like the old days in South Korea. However, the Soviet Union ‘still’ existed. That was why Jung Jaewoon had been reluctant to go to the Soviet Union. One wrong move, and he could have ended up a cold corpse in a freezing land thousands of miles away.
“Now, we knew you were an industrial spy, and we knew the person you were contacting was Kim Mujin. If so, what is your value to us?”
In Ma Seokil’s grinning expression, it felt as if a cold, icy blade was ready to be fired at any moment.
‘My… my value?’ Jung Jaewoon felt his head go numb at those words. ‘It’s true I asked to meet with a YK executive…’ Calling out that he was an industrial spy in the detention center was a move to make contact with YK’s leadership. He had intended to propose a trade: after revealing which company he was a spy for, he would prove his value to get himself out of detention. Even though the era of the military regime had ended, he thought that YK, with its connections to the political world, could easily make his assault case disappear. But YK already knew everything. In this situation, he had no conditions left to offer.
“W-wait a minute. If you know everything about me, why did you treat my daughter?”
“Why? You don’t like it?”
Jung Jaewoon hurriedly waved his hands. “N-no! I’m honestly in a state where I want to shed tears and slam my head into the ground right now. If it weren’t for YK, my daughter would have died. But I can’t believe YK would use their influence for a useless guy like me. Do you intend to send me back to the Soviet Union to use me as a double agent?”
“Hey, no way. You don’t even want to do that yourself, do you?” Ma Seokil’s sly smile contained a gaze that seemed to see right through everything.
“Hmm…” Jung Jaewoon groaned, agreeing with Ma Seokil. It was only natural; his actions in the detention center would have been reported to his superiors, including Manager Park. They would have undoubtedly used him as a ‘disposable pawn.’
“For starters, you’ve effectively been fired from your original job. And now you don’t want to work in the Soviet Union anymore. Not just the Soviet Union, you don’t even want to work anywhere far from home, right?”
“Ah…” Jung Jaewoon blushed, feeling as if he had been stripped bare.
“Well, it’s only natural. Your daughter, who is more precious than your own life, was sick, so how could you go far from home? Right? Even if work is important, family comes first. Of course, that decision isn’t easy. Because families don’t like it when a father who used to bring home 3 million won a month starts bringing home 2 million won and becomes a ‘family man.’”
Jung Jaewoon sighed at Ma Seokil’s words, which hit the nail on the head. He was right. People say they like a family-oriented father, but in reality, they hate it when the money brought home decreases. That was why Jung Jaewoon had unilaterally decided to go to the Soviet Union.
“It’s a hardship every South Korean father goes through. I worry about the future of South Korea. How much respect can retired South Korean fathers expect to live with?”
Ma Seokil was accurately predicting a future where twilight divorces would become a trend in South Korea. Of course, it was just a prediction, not a reality he had witnessed yet.
“That’s why you shouldn’t play the role of an overbearing father. There aren’t many people who can bring money home until the day they die. Ah, I’ve digressed for a moment. My apologies?”
Ma Seokil was a person who could change his attitude depending on the person he was with. Therefore, this behavior was optimal for manipulating Jung Jaewoon’s psychology.
“Ah, no, it’s fine.”
“Anyway, let’s talk again. Why did we help you? Let’s skip the obvious gateway of ‘because I have value to you,’ okay?”
Jung Jaewoon racked his brain desperately. What on earth did YK want from him? But no matter how hard he thought, he couldn’t come up with an answer that would satisfy Ma Seokil. So, Jung Jaewoon bet everything he had.
“My thoughts are shallow, so I couldn’t come up with the answer you wanted. However, I will promise you one thing. I will do whatever you ask. As long as it doesn’t separate me from my family, I will help you even if my social status falls to the very bottom.”
It wasn’t a perfect answer, but it was good enough to pass, so Ma Seokil smiled.
“Well, shall we be satisfied with that much? Good. First of all, the reason we treated your daughter is because our Chairman is generous.”
“I don’t think I could ever deny that.”
“Right? Our Chairman doesn’t like traitors who emerge from his own side, but he doesn’t mind traitors who emerge from the enemy’s side. In that sense, you haven’t betrayed us.”
Jung Jaewoon let out a sigh of relief.
“Therefore, we want you to be a firm ally. Because you have value.”
“I would like you to tell me what that value is.”
“People other than Kim Mujin!” Ma Seokil shouted in a strangely firm voice. Jung Jaewoon tilted his head.
“The only person I planted in the pharmaceutical company was Kim Mujin… Ah! Could it be?!” Jung Jaewoon’s jaw dropped.
“Yeah, you finally caught on?”
“My god…”
The ‘other people’ Yoon-gi wanted from Jung Jaewoon. They were the industrial spies Jung Jaewoon had planted in other companies all this time.
“B-but, the deals with most of them are already finished.”
“That’s why you need to put in the effort. They’ve already betrayed their companies anyway. So, there won’t be any ethical issues if you contact them again, right?” Ma Seokil grinned.
“Hmm… hearing it like that, I suppose so. But I don’t know if they’ll follow my words just because I contact them… They only followed me because of the support from their original companies… Ah!” Jung Jaewoon gasped again.
“Exactly, we’ll provide that support now. They’re just guys who move for money anyway. We just need to give them the money they want, right?”
“Are you really accepting me?”
At Jung Jaewoon’s question, Ma Seokil nodded vigorously.
“Didn’t I say so? You just have to make sure you don’t betray YK. If you do, you’ll regret it immensely.”
“I-I will never do that!”
“Good. Then take a month off and come back. I’ll make sure it ends with a non-custodial indictment and a fine. Spend some quality time with your family, and when we contact you, come running.”
Ma Seokil stood up as if to signal the end of the conversation, sat in the president’s chair, and spun it 180 degrees.
“W-wait a minute! I haven’t even heard your name yet!”
“Me? Oh, right, we haven’t introduced ourselves yet. I’m President Ma Seokil. I started as a regular employee and rose to the position of president.”
A legendary figure even at YK. But the one fact that a regular employee could become president was firmly etched into Jung Jaewoon’s mind.
* * *
Although the specific methods differed, all the industrial spies who had infiltrated YK were uncovered. Among them were those who could not be swayed, but a significant number were won over by YK, and thanks to this, YK was able to hold the hearts of various industry figures that other companies had utilized. Of course, it hadn’t been decided how or when to use them yet. However, there was one thing that needed to be handled before that.
“Excuse me? F-f-f-fired?” Kim Mujin, who had received the notice of dismissal directly from Lee Inhae, dropped his jaw.