Episode 4. A Strange Parachute Hire 3.
Yang Gyeonghun said,
“Chief Song, you’ll be fully in charge of training the new hire.”
“M-me?”
It felt burdensome, but training new employees was originally her job as a chief, so she soon bowed her head.
“Yes, understood.”
“Good. Chief Song, put in a little effort for us. And since we’ve got a new member of the family, let’s have a team dinner sometime soon.”
Assistant Manager Kim Byeongjun smiled brightly with an innocent face, while Song Gaeun answered with a reluctant expression, as if she was inwardly unwilling.
“Yes, Team Leader.”
Hyeonu stayed by Song Gaeun’s side all morning.
He went to the supply room to pick up office supplies, and learned how to use the copier, the company intranet, how to answer the phone, and the various document formats.
As he learned tasks that felt entirely unfamiliar, lunchtime arrived before he knew it.
Yang Gyeonghun and Kim Byeongjun had gone out on business to Mancheon Food Distribution, an affiliate under Mancheon Corporation, because of an issue with the proposal they were preparing. So only Song Gaeun and Hyeonu left the office to have lunch.
When they pressed the elevator button to go to the company cafeteria on the eleventh floor, the doors opened a moment later with a ding.
Inside the elevator was a white-haired man in his mid-to-late sixties with a pleasant impression.
Seeing him, Song Gaeun hurriedly bent at the waist.
“Hello, sir.”
Hyeonu also bowed after her.
The man gave a generous smile and dipped his head slightly in return, and Song Gaeun, looking extremely tense, stepped into the elevator and stood pressed to one side.
Judging by the atmosphere, he seemed to be a high-ranking executive.
But for some reason, he looked familiar.
As Hyeonu searched his memory, the man asked,
“Which department are you in?”
“I’m Kim Hyeonu, a new employee who started today in Sales Team Nine.”
“Is that so?”
The man tilted his head.
“Today is your first day… Hmm… But for some reason, you look rather familiar.”
“I also…”
Just then, it suddenly came to him.
“Didn’t you come to my father’s funeral together with the chairman?”
Hearing that, the man seemed to remember as well.
“Ah— the chief mourner from back then.”
“Yes, that’s right.”
Hyeonu bowed again.
“Thank you for coming then. Though it’s late, please allow me to greet you again.”
“Yes. You saw your father’s funeral through properly, I hope?”
“Yes.”
“Heh heh, if this is fate, then it’s fate. To think the young man from back then would end up joining Mancheon Corporation… Just as your father was the chairman’s benefactor, I hope you and I may have such a connection as well.”
“If such a situation arises, then of course I should.”
Before they knew it, the elevator stopped on the eleventh floor and the doors opened.
Hyeonu bowed, and the man nodded with a benevolent expression.
“All right, enjoy your lunch.”
As Hyeonu turned around, the man’s voice came again.
“You said Sales Team Nine, Kim Hyeonu, correct?”
“Yes.”
The elevator doors closed.
When he turned back, he saw Song Gaeun staring fixedly at him.
“What is it?”
“H-Hyeonu, how do you know the president?”
It seemed that man had been the president of Mancheon Corporation.
“You just heard. He came to my father’s funeral.”
“Together with the chairman?”
“Yes.”
“……”
Song Gaeun did not say a word throughout the entire meal.
Hyeonu, whom she had only thought of as a parachute hire from the chairman, also had a connection to the president of Mancheon Corporation, where she herself worked.
Hyeonu, who had already made her uncomfortable, had become even more uncomfortable to be around.
But the president of Mancheon Corporation actually had no relationship whatsoever with Hyeonu or Hyeonu’s father.
That day, while on his way to have dinner alone with Mancheon Group Chairman Min Yanghong for work, he had heard of Hyeonu’s father’s passing and simply gone along with him.
Hyeonu did not know these circumstances, and Song Gaeun knew them even less.
To her, Hyeonu merely looked like someone from another world.
After all, he had a father whose funeral the chairman of Mancheon Group and the president of Mancheon Corporation had attended together.
And she had also vaguely heard that Hyeonu’s father was the chairman’s benefactor.
With Song Gaeun like that before him, Hyeonu simply ate his meal with an indifferent face.
As they left the company cafeteria, Song Gaeun said,
“Hyeonu, you go ahead first. I have something to take care of for a moment.”
“Really? Then I’ll look around the company a bit to help digest.”
“Well, do whatever you want.”
Hyeonu stared blankly at Song Gaeun’s back as she passed him by.
What Hyeonu heard in his ears was, [I should go see Assistant Manager Park’s face.]
* * *
Yang Gyeonghun and Kim Byeongjun returned to the office after finishing their outside work.
Yang Gyeonghun asked Song Gaeun, who was absently fiddling with a coffee cup.
“Where’s the new hire?”
“After lunch, he said he was going to look around the company.”
“Mm.”
He was about to sit down, thinking that must be the case, when Song Gaeun called him.
“Team Leader.”
“Yeah?”
“Um… You said Hyeonu came in riding the chairman’s line, right?”
“I did.”
“Do you happen to know what kind of person Hyeonu is?”
A guy who had taken the high school qualification exam, had no TOEIC score, and had no experience whatsoever to write on his résumé.
And who, in his self-introduction, had scribbled that he was good at grasping situations.
That was everything he knew about Hyeonu.
But he had not told the team members these facts yet.
Because if he went that far, it felt like things would become impossible to handle.
After all, he could not completely isolate the chairman’s parachute hire from the team members.
“Why? Was there some problem?”
“No, when we were going to lunch, we happened to meet the president, and the two of them knew each other.”
Yang Gyeonghun’s eyes widened.
“The president and the new hire?”
“Yes. He said the chairman and the president had gone together to Hyeonu’s father’s funeral.”
If the chairman and the president had gone together to pay their respects, that meant he was truly from no ordinary family.
The atmosphere sank coldly.
“What should we do, Team Leader?”
Yang Gyeonghun thought for a moment with a hardened expression, then opened his mouth.
“Is the new hire’s background really that important to us?”
“Pardon?”
“We just need to do our own work. People from that world aren’t interested in people like us anyway.”
“……”
“The reason I warned you all about the new hire in advance was so you wouldn’t make any needless mistakes. Whatever background the new hire has, don’t pay too much attention to it. Just do the work you’re supposed to do. Got it?”
After finishing, Yang Gyeonghun left the office without even waiting for an answer.
At Yang Gyeonghun, who somehow seemed angry, Song Gaeun’s face reddened.
It was because she wondered if she had been making a fuss all by herself.
Kim Byeongjun, who had kept a faint smile on his lips the whole time, looked at Song Gaeun like that and gave a small laugh.
“The team leader is right. There’s no need to worry too much. Those people really aren’t interested in ordinary folks like us.”
* * *
HR Director Gu Hyeongjun and Yang Gyeonghun stood side by side on the rooftop, arms resting on the railing.
Gu Hyeongjun, who was about to put a cigarette in his mouth, flinched and asked back,
“What? That bastard is connected to the president too?”
“That’s what I hear.”
“Fuck, what the hell is that guy… At that level, isn’t he royal family?”
Yang Gyeonghun snorted.
“Is there such a thing as royal family with a GED?”
“You never know. Maybe writing a résumé was just fucking annoying, so he didn’t bother. Those people are the type to do whatever they want anyway.”
For some reason, it sounded convincing.
“Is that so?”
Suddenly, the image of Hyeonu following Song Gaeun around and learning the work with a fair amount of diligence came to Yang Gyeonghun’s mind.
“He didn’t seem like that kind of guy…”
“Tch. Do people who are like that and people who aren’t come with it written on their foreheads?”
Gu Hyeongjun glanced sideways for a moment at Yang Gyeonghun, who stood still with his head lowered as if lost in thought, then opened his mouth again.
“Gyeonghun.”
Yang Gyeonghun lifted his head and met Gu Hyeongjun’s eyes.
“Don’t you think this is an opportunity?”
“What?”
“You’re a team leader in your mid-forties. If you want to climb any higher from here, you need a line. Either that, or you produce some incredible results······. If it’s neither of those, then the day you’ll have to start sniffing around chicken franchises isn’t far off.”
Yang Gyeonghun’s brow furrowed.
“Are you telling me to grab onto that guy’s line and hang on?”
“Why are you getting all worked up? I’m just saying, that’s how it is. Still, think it over. For your own sake.”
Gu Hyeongjun gave Yang Gyeonghun a light pat on the shoulder and walked away.
Even after Gu Hyeongjun left, Yang Gyeonghun stood there for a long while without moving.
The truth was, when Gu Hyeongjun had said those words, his heart had dropped.
He had loudly told Song Gaeun not to worry about the parachute hire, but inwardly, he had thought the same thing.
And perhaps the reason he had called Gu Hyeongjun up to the rooftop to talk was because he had wanted to hear those words from Gu Hyeongjun’s own mouth.
Because in an organization like a jungle, it was true that you needed a line if you wanted to survive to the end.
Or else, as Gu Hyeongjun had said, you had to produce truly incredible results······.
“Haa······.”
For some reason, a hot sigh seemed to burst out from deep within his chest.
* * *
The president’s office at Mancheon Mulsan······.
Shhk, shhk, shhk, shhk······.
It was the sound of Noh Hyeoncheol, president of Mancheon Mulsan, sitting on the sofa and grinding an ink stick.
Slowly, and with care, he ground the ink on an inkstone engraved with a delicate phoenix carving.
Knock, knock, knock.
“Who is it?”
The door opened, and a scholarly-looking man with white hair and gold-rimmed glasses entered.
It was Choi Jeonggeun, executive director of Mancheon Mulsan.
“Are you doing calligraphy?”
“······.”
Choi Jeonggeun sat down on the sofa.
“Want a cup of tea?”
“I’d be grateful for one.”
Noh Hyeoncheol stopped the hand that had been grinding the ink.
“Grind this for me while I make the tea.”
As he rose from his seat, Choi Jeonggeun picked up the ink stick lying there and began to grind it.
Shhk, shhk, shhk, shhk······.
Noh Hyeoncheol walked over to the shelf where the tea set was laid out and pressed the switch on the electric kettle.
“Chrysanthemum tea all right?”
“Yes.”
He placed a few dried chrysanthemum blossoms into the teapot.
“What brings you here?”
Choi Jeonggeun, who had paused for a moment while grinding the ink, opened his mouth.
“Not long ago, the chairman’s youngest son took the president’s seat at Mancheon Shipbuilding. It seems everyone’s been quite busy.”
“Is that something to be busy over?”
“Isn’t it only natural? The structure is perfectly set up for a War of the Princes to break out.”