Incheon Triad warehouse.
A large trailer carrying a container pulled up in front of the warehouse the Triad had newly rented for D-Sand distribution.
As soon as the vehicle stopped, Mao Qin, who had been waiting, ran over first.
Lin Jiawei and Xu Haiping followed after him.
“Open it.”
“Yes.”
Mao Qin handed over the key as he spoke.
Xu Haiping took the key.
“Understood.”
Xu Haiping inserted the key into the padlock.
But the lock would not turn.
It would not open.
“This... doesn’t seem to fit.”
“No way. It was sent by international express.”
“But it doesn’t fit. It won’t open.”
“That shouldn’t be possible...”
Xu Haiping inserted the key into the padlock and tried turning it several times, but it would not open.
Lin Jiawei, who was beside him, took the key and tried opening it as well, but the result was the same.
For a moment, an ominous thought flashed through Mao Qin’s mind, but he shook his head and brushed it off.
He thought it was a minor mishap.
The key might have been switched at the site, or it might have been warped during transit.
He thought it was something that could happen.
“Just break it.”
“Yes.”
Lin Jiawei brought over a tool and broke the lock.
The lock broke apart feebly.
When they opened the door, the inside of the container was packed full of all kinds of goods.
Starting with nuts brought in from China, it was filled with various cookies and snacks.
Cheap home appliances were stacked toward the back.
But none of that mattered.
What they truly needed was D-Sand.
As long as D-Sand was there, that was enough.
To be honest, he had been on edge.
He had been worried it might get caught by customs.
It was the route they used every time, and they said it was safe, but still.
He could not relax until it was in his hands.
A problem could arise at any moment.
Especially in Korea, where customs enforcement was particularly strict.
But...
D-Sand. There was no D-Sand in sight.
Thinking he might simply not be able to find it, Mao Qin told Lin Jiawei and Xu Haiping to search as well.
But they could not find it.
It was not there.
The driver watched them with an displeased look as they searched only through the goods inside the container without unloading the cargo.
“If the container hasn’t been switched, hurry up and unload, will you? I’ve got a schedule to keep.”
The driver spoke while smoking a cigarette.
Annoyed by his words, Lin Jiawei glared at him.
They were the Triad.
The Triad was working right now, and someone was urging them from the side?
That was the same as saying he wanted to die.
In Southeast Asia, at least.
But the driver did not even blink.
Instead, he took an even deeper drag on his cigarette.
He was a max-level driver who, while hauling freight, had tasted the bitter, the sweet, and even the shit.
“Hey. Don’t glare. If you’ve got time to glare, hurry up and unload.”
He actually scolded the Triad.
Mao Qin decided to unload the cargo first.
They would unload everything, then check slowly once more.
Mao Qin was not the one who had packed it.
He had only received the goods.
It might have been hidden tightly among those items.
They unloaded all the cargo from the container.
The trailer left, and the goods were moved into the warehouse.
“Open them and check if the goods are inside.”
“Yes.”
“Check every last inch.”
“Yes.”
At Mao Qin’s order, Lin Jiawei and Xu Haiping diligently tore off the plastic wrap and checked inside.
But D-Sand was nowhere to be seen.
For the appliances, they opened them up and checked the inside, and they overturned all the foodstuffs as well, but D-Sand was nowhere to be found.
“Wh-what do we do?”
He had boasted that the samples were arriving, but the samples had vanished.
He could not believe it.
First, he had to check again.
He called the uncle who had sent the goods.
“Uncle. You loaded the D-Sand, right?”
“Yeah. I loaded and sent one million of them.”
“They’re not here.”
“What?”
“They’re not here.”
“What do you mean? Not there?”
“No matter how much we search, we can’t find the D-Sand.”
Mao Qin’s voice trembled as if he were about to cry.
One million D-Sand had disappeared.
At the Triad’s distribution price, that was 1.7 billion won.
At market price, it was an amount he could not even begin to estimate.
Even at cost, it was not a sum that could be ignored.
And it had vanished.
The greater his joy had been, the greater the shock was.
Every day, he had been living on vain fantasies about what he would do once they took over Korea.
And in an instant, it had all shattered.
Hearing his nephew’s tearful voice, Zhang Chen did not feel good.
“First, I’ll look into it more.”
Zhang Chen hung up.
Mao Qin remained sitting in the warehouse, looking utterly devastated.
A short while later, a photo was sent to Mao Qin.
It seemed to be a photo taken after the container had been loaded.
Every item in the photo was here in this warehouse.
Except for the D-Sand.
The D-Sand was clearly visible in the photo.
But it was not here.
He wondered if the container had somehow been switched, but that was not it.
The number matched, and the goods matched.
The container was the same, but only the D-Sand had disappeared.
It was truly enough to make one think a ghost had done it.
There was no way to know where it had disappeared from.
They could not complain to the port or the shipping company either.
Those candies had been omitted from the itemized list.
In other words, they were smuggled goods.
Feeling stifled, he let out a sigh deep enough to sink into the ground.
Looking at Mao Qin, Xu Haiping spoke.
“Team Leader. The key didn’t fit earlier. Couldn’t it have been stolen? If you think about someone taking it out in the middle...”
Mao Qin was truly startled when he heard that.
Because of D-Sand, he had been in such a hurry that he had failed to check that part.
There should have been a seal, too, but they had already torn everything open, so that was impossible to confirm now.
But if someone had targeted the D-Sand and taken it in the middle, then his words were correct.
But who would have done that?
Why?
His head grew complicated.
Just then, Mao Qin’s phone rang.
It was Alex.
He did not want to answer.
Still, he had to.
“Yes. This is Mao Qin.”
“This is Alex.”
“Yes. What is it?”
“We’d like to change the location where we receive the goods. That’s possible, right?”
“Yes?”
“Now that I think about it, there’s no need for us to receive them in Incheon. Please send them straight to Seoul.”
“That...”
“If the delivery fee is a burden, we’ll cover it.”
“No.”
“Then I’ll take it that you’ll send them to Seoul. We’ll be counting on you. Around what time will they arrive tomorrow?”
Mao Qin agonized.
What should he do?
He tried to think of an excuse.
But no suitable excuse came to mind.
He had to deliver them by tomorrow, but even if they manufactured and sent them again from the factory, it would take twenty days.
A sigh escaped him.
He decided to just be honest.
“I’m... sorry, but... it seems the goods have been st-stolen.”
“Yes? What did you say?”
The surprised voice on the other end of the phone came through vividly.
“St-stolen?”
“I’m sorry. I’ll take steps so that the samples you didn’t receive can be sent again as quickly as possible.”
“Haa... We planned every event around that date.”
“I’m sorry.”
Alex’s voice on the other end softened slightly.
“Where were they stolen? We’ll find them for you. If we set our minds to it, we’ll find them in no time.”
“Th-that’s... we haven’t been able to determine where they were stolen.”
“Then are you saying they can’t be found?”
“That’s probably the case.”
“This is difficult. Then what are we supposed to do? When can we receive the goods again?”
“...I think I’ll have to check the schedule again.”
“For now, understood. Let me know once anything is decided.”
“Yes.”
“But personally, I’m extremely disappointed.”
“...”
“The incident is one thing, but the attitude Zhonglian Tongda Trading is showing after the incident is deeply disappointing. If they were stolen, isn’t it basic to contact us immediately and say they were stolen, that they likely won’t arrive on the scheduled date, and that you can get them to us again by such-and-such a time?”
“I-I’m sorry. We only just received the news ourselves, so we were flustered. I’m sorry.”
“Haa... This isn’t easy from the very start. Contact me once anything is decided.”
“Yes...”
When the call ended, Mao Qin collapsed to the floor once more.
.
.
.
Triad chairman Zhang Chen felt uneasy after receiving Mao Qin’s call.
Seeing his cherished nephew struggle made his heart ache for no reason.
But first, he had to grasp the situation.
After checking, he heard that the padlock had not matched.
That it seemed to have been stolen.
One million D-Sand.
To be honest, the one million itself was not the problem.
They could produce that much again.
The cost and shipping fees would be considerable, but they could manage that much.
The problem was that Mao Qin would look incompetent.
He had departed after declaring he would conquer Korea, but he had no results.
The only thing he had barely achieved was a verbal contract with the Daehoon Faction.
But even that had failed.
Because the D-Sand had disappeared.
No matter how he thought about it, the only people who would do something like this were the old foxes of the Triad.
It seemed those bastards had finally done it to make Mao Qin fail.
It looked like he would have to clean house.
He would absolutely not let them be.
But before that, he first had to produce the D-Sand to send to Mao Qin again.
They were producing it even now, but he had to increase production even if it meant running the lines at full capacity twenty-four hours a day.
After sorting out the D-Sand first,
he would have to think of a way to cut out the old foxes.
Zhang Chen’s worries deepened.
*******
“This is the man.”
Scott handed over a tablet.
Displayed on it was one person’s résumé.
A face that looked familiar.
“Hwang Onyu... Huh? I know this bastard. He’s that bastard from Haegwang Industrial.”
Seeing the photo on the tablet, I was certain.
The guy who had come all the way to the Philippines looking for Shin Junggi.
There had been a team leader besides this guy too, hadn’t there?
“But why are these bastards marking me?”
“I’m not sure about that much. But when Chen Zhihao hacked them, he found that they had gathered information on you, boss, and that there were records of them running immigration records and facial recognition.”
Park Dojin had run facial recognition through every airport, but he had not found Alex.
There was only one place.
He had not run it through the Seoul Gimpo Business Aviation Center.
Because he had not expected him to arrive by private jet.
“They even checked immigration records and ran facial recognition? They’re pretty serious, aren’t they?”
Only then did I feel that this was not something I could just laugh off.
“Should we bring him in?”
“Who? Hwang Onyu?”
I laughed at Scott’s words.
They would be lucky if they didn’t get caught themselves.
“Yes.”
“That bastard is NIS black ops.”
“Is that a problem?”
But he was still full of confidence.
These bastards were disregarding formal training.
No matter how much they had learned by improvising, they should not underestimate a formal curriculum.
“If you guys go at him determined to kill him, you could kill him, but bringing him in is different. He’ll be hard to subdue.”
“Is he that good at fighting?”
Scott asked in surprise.
“No? He’s really good at running away. He’s frighteningly good at protecting his own skin.”
Scott laughed as if he found it absurd.
But it was true.
“We’ll bring him in somehow.”
“Forget it. I’ll go. If you’re thirsty, you dig the well yourself.”
.
.
.
Hwang Onyu finally returned home after getting off work.
He was tired.
He had no idea how much scolding he had taken from his team leader after losing Gong Inbae.
The man had chewed him out thoroughly.
Asking if he could not even bring in one person.
Asking if he was really NIS.
Normally, if a subordinate gets into a car accident, shouldn’t the first thing you ask be whether they’re all right?
He had gone straight there without even stopping by the hospital.
All that came back to him was reprimand and humiliation.
To be honest, he could not understand it.
Why was he so obsessed with Gong Inbae?
At the time, Gong Inbae had done everything he could do.
He had booked a hotel for them when they had been unable to reserve one, and he had found Shin Junggi as well.
It was not as if they could ask Gong Inbae for the ten million dollars even the state had given up on, could they?
It was frustrating.
He opened the refrigerator and took out a beer.
The refrigerator light briefly illuminated the dark house, where he had not even turned on the lights, then vanished.
Pop—hiss.
Gulp, gulp, gulp.
Kyaa—
He emptied an entire 500ml can of beer in one go.
With the cold beer going down, he felt a little better.
“If you’ve got beer, give me one too, will you?”
Startled by the sound of a voice in the house where he lived alone, Hwang Onyu pulled a knife from the kitchen.
“Who’s there!”
“What are you making such a fuss about? Sit down. And bring the beer.”
“I asked who you are.”
“You followed me around that much and you still don’t know my voice?”
“Huh? Gong Inbae?”
“Yeah. I said come sit down. And bring a beer.”
Hwang Onyu looked at Gong Inbae.
He wondered if he should subdue him right now.
But if he’d made it all the way here, that man didn’t seem ordinary either.
Someone without confidence wouldn’t have come this far.
And on closer look, there was a gun in his hand.
From the weight of it, it wasn’t a toy.
Worrying when Korea had become a country where bringing in firearms was that easy, I picked up the beer and went over to Gong Inbae.
In the dark house, the two sat facing each other.
Only the moonlight shining in through the window illuminated them.
When Hwang Onyu set the beer down, Gong Inbae naturally opened one and drank.
“Korean beer is a little bland, but it has its own particular blandness.”
“...Why did you come?”
Hwang Onyu asked sharply.
But Gong Inbae was still as glib as ever.
“Why else would I come? I was curious.”
“About what?”
“You were following me around so much. I wondered if you were a stalker fan. Thought I might give you an autograph.”
“Pfft. Nice sense of humor.”
Hwang Onyu gave a slight laugh, dumbfounded.
“So why are you following me? You really want an autograph?”
“What power do I have? I’m just doing it because I’m told to.”
Hwang Onyu had been having a hard time lately too.
He hated doing work he didn’t want to do, and being scolded for it only made him hate it more.
So he just muttered to himself.
“Mm... You know. Even if I speak briefly, I’d appreciate it if you could figure it out, package it nicely, and explain it properly according to the five Ws and one H so I can understand.”
“Why should I?”
Hwang Onyu, not even sure who he was angry at, spoke in an irritated tone because he didn’t like the situation.
“If you don’t want to, then don’t. Thanks for the beer.”
I got up just like that.
“Where are you going?”
Hwang Onyu asked, flustered.
“Home. I don’t exactly want to sleep here.”
“You came all this way just to say that?”
Hwang Onyu looked disappointed.
“No, words are meaningless. You know better than anyone what it means that I came here today. A Black got tailed, his identity was exposed, and his house was revealed. What more do you need?”
“Is that supposed to be a threat?”
“It’s not a threat. I’m telling you the facts. Anyway, since you say orders came from above, if I smash someone, something should come out. It’s late. I’ll be going.”
Hwang Onyu grew angry at my confidence.
He was furious because it felt as if the National Intelligence Service was being looked down on.
“Do we look that easy to you?”
Hwang Onyu shouted.
But I didn’t care at all.
Still glib, I said,
“You should be grateful to me. You’re going to get promoted from now on.”
“What?”
“Because all your superiors are going to die.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
At my words, Hwang Onyu’s expression hardened.
He looked like he couldn’t believe it.
“For a Black, you’re awfully slow on the uptake. Makes me think it was a good thing I didn’t go into Black. If I had, I’d be making that same stupid face right now.”
“...”
“Then I’ll see you when you get promoted. I’ll send a congratulatory wreath.”
When I stood up, Hwang Onyu grabbed me in a hurry.
“What is it you’re curious about? I just have to tell you why we followed you?”
“For now?”
“I’ll tell you. Everything. But spare them. They made a mistake this time, but they’re not bad people.”
“We think differently, don’t we? They used state authority however they felt like it, and they’re still not bad people. Are you stupid? Or do you think the NIS is some neighborhood corner store you can use however you want?”
“Th-that’s...”
“Enough. Just tell me why you were following me.”
Hwang Onyu took a sip of beer, then slowly began to talk.
Starting with how they had seen us at Geunsu’s wedding.
How they had wanted to give me a hard time because of the bad blood from the Philippines.
But as they dug around, a forged passport came up, and they wanted to use that to make things even more difficult for me.
“Haa... Why do you people make your work so damn exhausting?”
After hearing that, I was truly dumbfounded.
That they were causing all this shit over something like that.
“I know. I don’t understand it either, but what can I do when I’m ordered to?”
Hwang Onyu spoke as if he had given up on everything.
He emptied the rest of his beer.
“I guess I’ll have to make you team leader.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
Hwang Onyu asked back in surprise.
“Exactly what it sounds like. I’m saying I’ll make you team leader.”
“How?”
“I’m going to try doing the same thing.”
“What?”
“I’m going to give that bastard a hard time. If he’s done something wrong, something should come out. Hehe.”
“...What are you planning to do?”
“You just stay still. I’ll handle the rest.”