Tax Collection System
* This novel is a modern fantasy based on hypothetical situations. All characters, organizations, and events appearing in this work are entirely fictitious and unrelated to reality.
***
“Dream as if you'll live forever, live as if you'll die tomorrow.”
- by James Dean
***
The Anti-Corruption and Civil Rights Commission complainant-only parking lot.
I had just submitted evidentiary documents regarding Goryeo Group's tax evasion, nominee accounts, slush fund creation, and money laundering to the ACRC’s Anti-Corruption Office and was on my way out.
I had steeled myself before coming, but the moment I stepped out of the ACRC, my chest began pounding like waves.
‘Did I really do the right thing? Can I really win against Goryeo Group, which surpasses Cheongwadae in power and exceeds the National Intelligence Service in information capabilities?’
It was something I had done after dozens of torments, yet I hesitated over whether my choice was truly right.
“Whooo~”
Walking quickly to the parking lot, I sat in the driver’s seat. When I took a deep breath, the waves rising from deep within my lungs vanished like a lie.
I checked the original evidentiary documents inside the briefcase on the passenger seat once more.
‘The materials submitted to the ACRC were copies. These original documents are like my lifeline. With these alone, it’s worth fighting Goryeo Group.’
Documents that could prove Goryeo Group’s corruption.
Looking at the evidence that was no different from my life, my fluttering heart grew cold as ice.
As of today, my tortuous ties with Goryeo Group were over too.
Following the public interest report to the ACRC, next was meeting a reporter from MBS Broadcasting.
I drove the car and headed to the promised location with the MBS reporter.
A quiet coffee shop at the foot of Juwolsan Mountain.
When I arrived in the coffee shop parking lot to meet MBS reporter Choe, I was kidnapped by thugs like a lie and lost consciousness.
When I came to my senses, I was bound hand and foot inside a warehouse reeking of fish.
“It’s time for the VIP to arrive. Wake that bastard Yi Ganghan up.”
At the same time, ice-cold water struck my face and body.
Splash-
“You bastards, you don’t seem to know who I am. I’m Deputy General Manager Yi Ganghan of Goryeo Group’s Corporate Restructuring Headquarters. If I go missing, the headquarters will move at the organizational level. When that happens, you guys...”
I squeezed out my last strength and shouted at the thugs.
But what returned was only the sneer of the man in sunglasses.
“Ah, is that so? Keke, this bastard. Still acting innocent. You know better than anyone that we are exactly that Sajik-dong team of Goryeo Group you’re talking about, don’t you? Anyway, since you’re going to die soon, let’s not do this between professionals.”
A hulking man with muscles threatening to burst his suit grabbed my thumb and pressed it onto various documents.
“You bastards. Do you think I’ll die like this? Even if I die, I will definitely have my revenge.”
If these hulks were really the Sajik-dong team as the man said, the possibility of getting out of here alive was less than 0.5%.
I surveyed the surroundings with a sidelong glance.
While the hulk stamped my thumbprint on the documents, the underlings poured cement into a drum.
“Let me have just one phone call with the Vice Chairman. If not him, then Headquarters Chief Byeon Munu... just one call. Then I won’t beg pathetically anymore...”
It was then.
A familiar face, a familiar voice, gradually revealed itself from the darkness.
“Deputy General Manager Yi Ganghan. Wouldn’t it be better to speak in person rather than over the phone?”
Yeo Myeongjae, Vice Chairman of Goryeo Group and son of the group’s Chairman Yeo Mujun.
He walked out together with Restructuring Headquarters Chief Byeon Munu.
“Vice Chairman. Why on earth are you doing this to me? To me who has worked hard silently? If you just spare my life, I’ll go to Japan or Taiwan, no, to some remote corner of Africa and never appear again. Please spare me.”
“Our Deputy General Manager Yi Ganghan. They say even though you graduated from a third-rate university, you got in on scholarship, and if your family circumstances had been better, you had the grades to get into Seoul National University. So I thought you were quite smart, but what is this, you’re just an idiot. You still don’t know why I’m doing this?”
Yeo Myeongjae laughed with his mouth and cursed with his eyes as he took a step closer.
“Did you think we didn’t know that Yi Ganghan here had been photographing the group’s accounting books with his phone and accessing the AEC system multiple times?”
“Th-that’s...”
I was at a loss for words. I had thought I had perfectly breached the security system, yet they knew about it.
“That’s why you should have just stayed at the National Tax Service. Do you know where chaebols like us fear the most? The prosecution? The National Intelligence Service? No. It’s the National Tax Service. Since you’re from the NTS, you should know well.”
Yeo Myeongjae smiled slyly.
“Honestly, if the prosecution summons you, you can put on a patient gown, ride a wheelchair, and act roughly, and more than 90% of the time you get a suspended sentence. But the National Tax Service is different. They take our money away. My money, which is like blood, I mean. What was it? America’s legendary mafia... what was it... Al... Al... what was it... Al... Al-Qaeda? Is that right?”
It seemed the word ‘Al Capone’ didn’t come to mind, so Yeo Myeongjae looked at Byeon Munu.
“Al Capone, Vice Chairman.”
“Right. Al Capone. Al Capone, they say that friend was caught not by the FBI but by the IRS (US Internal Revenue Service).”
“That is correct, Vice Chairman.”
It was an all-too-famous story.
The legendary mafia Al Capone was caught not by the FBI but by the US Internal Revenue Service. Al Capone was sentenced to 11 years in prison for violating federal income tax laws in 1931.
“Now, now. The farewell has gone on too long. The slush fund set up in your mother’s name—I'll put it to good use. You must feel wronged, but what can you do. I am a noble, and you are a servant.”
Yeo Myeongjae exhaled a long stream of cigarette smoke into my bound face.
“A noble? A servant?”
Whether courage had surged from somewhere, or perhaps having resigned myself upon seeing the Sajik-dong team.
I poured out the words I had harbored toward Yeo Myeongjae.
“Yeo Myeongjae. And Byeon Munu. People like you are not nobles. Noblesse oblige. Haven’t you heard? What kind of nobles create nominee accounts and slush funds in the name of a restructuring headquarters employee’s mother? An old mother living in a nursing home at that? Such deeds are what thugs do.”
I had tried to endure as much as I could.
I had tried to endure, thinking that since they were chaebol, they might naturally do things like golfing with National Tax Service officials, circulating fake tax invoices with clients, and squeezing subcontractors to create slush funds.
But those who were worse than beasts...
They had approached my aged mother who was hospitalized in a nursing home with lung cancer and dementia.
And deceiving her that they would send her on an overseas trip with her son, they took my mother’s resident registration card and seal.
Like that, they secretly created nominee accounts in tax havens and formed slush funds and laundered money without our knowledge.
After learning that fact, I protested to Byeon Munu, and from that moment, I began to be ostracized at Goryeo Group’s Restructuring Headquarters.
After pouring out the words I had kept in my chest, Yeo Myeongjae stroked his goatee.
“Ho, our Deputy Manager Yi. Quite the spirit. Is that all you have to say?”
Yeo Myeongjae exhaled his last cigarette smoke toward my face and whispered to Headquarters Chief Byeon Munu.
“Chief Byeon, take care of the rest. I have a prior appointment with the Economic Deputy Prime Minister...”
Yeo Myeongjae flicked his cigarette butt and left the warehouse.
After Yeo Myeongjae left, Byeon Munu slumped into a chair.
“Deputy General Manager Yi Ganghan. That’s exactly why you’re the problem.”
Byeon Munu shook his head side to side as he looked at me.
Goryeo Group Restructuring Headquarters Chief Byeon Munu.
Called ‘the tongue inside Chairman Yeo Mujun’s mouth,’ he was the closest confidant among confidants to the group’s Chairman.
Though called the best in the industry for planning, execution, and government relations, he was a man who couldn’t receive good evaluations due to his vileness that didn’t hesitate to use any means for his goals.
Such a Byeon Munu was now sneering at me.
“Yi Ganghan, when you were scouted from the Corporate Tax Bureau of the National Tax Service to our Goryeo Group Restructuring Headquarters, do you remember what I said?”
“What words? What the hell did you say to me?”
“I told you to live a little more smoothly in this world. That people with sharp corners like you are bound to stab someone... do you remember?”
“So, when you told me to live smoothly, was it by making me offer bribes during government relations work and launder money?”
“Most salary workers in the Republic of Korea, the majority of servants in our country, all live like that, you fool. Look at this. Even on the verge of death, you’re tearing into and stabbing your superiors with those sharp corners. Isn’t that right?”
“Fuck! Cut the bullshit. Ptui.”
I spat on Byeon Munu’s face.
I didn’t know how much I had been beaten since being dragged to the warehouse, but my mouth was full of congealed blood.
A mixture of dark red blood clots and saliva stuck to Byeon Munu’s face.
Byeon Munu took out a luxury handkerchief and wiped the spit on his cheek as he commanded the Sajik-dong team.
“What are you all doing? Throw him in as fish food.”
“Yes, Chief.”
The moment Byeon Munu’s order ended, the man in sunglasses approached me and pushed the drum with all his might.
“Fuck...”
The drum teetered, and with a splash, I was thrown into the cold seawater.
‘You bastards... even if I die, even if I become a ghost... I will definitely have my revenge.’
In an instant, the drum sank into the abyss, and salty seawater rushed into my nose and mouth.
As I stood on the verge of suffocation, rather than fear of death, rage at the world exploded.
‘I will have my revenge... definitely...’
That was how I drowned.
***
And, I was born again.
But this life too was ultimately that of a dirt spoon.
It took considerable time to accept a second life that seemed like something out of a novel.
However, the regressor Yi Ganghan differed from the previous life’s Yi Ganghan in two major ways.
First, he retained the memories of his previous life, and second, he possessed the [Tax Collection System].
[Tax Collection System]
[Level 1: Grade 9 Public Official - 0.05% of collected amount rewarded as points]
[Level 2: Grade 8 Public Official - 0.1% of collected amount rewarded as points]
[Level 3: Grade 7 Public Official - 0.15% of collected amount rewarded as points]
[Level 4: Grade 6 Public Official - ............]
.
.
.
.
[Level 9: Grade 1 Public Official (Senior Civil Service) - 0.5% of collected amount rewarded as points]
Regression is an incredible cheat key that can turn a dirt spoon into a gold spoon, and on top of that, he was equipped with the [Tax Collection System].
‘If I collect taxes, I get point rewards, and through those points, I can raise my stats or purchase skills. Every time I get promoted a rank, the point reward rate goes up too, and there are even special rewards.’
I thought it was the will of heaven.
The will of heaven to become a National Tax Service investigator that those chaebols fear so much and take revenge on them.
“Since it’s come to this, second life. I’m going all the way to the Commissioner of the National Tax Service.”