1. Regression (1)
[With the succession war among the third-generation heirs of Taeseong Group, the so-called “War of the Princes” of Taeseong, coming to a close...]
Jang Doyun leaned back in his chair and closed his eyes. The news of victory coming through the announcer’s voice made his heart race more than any movie he had ever seen.
[On July 15, the War of the Princes of Taeseong, which began with an announcement by Song Hogyeong, Director of Planning and Coordination at Taeseong Heavy Industries, lasted eight months. The announcement concerned Taeseong Heavy Industries transferring its 14.1% stake in Taeseong Securities to Taeseong Energy, a surprise move made while Choi Jeongwon, President of Taeseong Electronics, was away in Vietnam......]
“That’s why we won.”
Jang Doyun opened his eyes and looked at the empty chair in front of him. It was the chairman’s seat where Choi Wonchang had sat before stepping down as honorary chairman.
While he was lost in strange sentiment looking at it, the door opened, and a man with a bright smile on his face entered and spoke. He was the third son of Choi Minjae, who had died without becoming chairman, and the man who would soon become Chairman of Taeseong Group—Choi Myeongwon.
“Good work.”
“Thank you.”
Jang Doyun bowed his head. They had been friends until the group succession, but it was now impossible to treat Choi Myeongwon the same way as before—not when he had become the chairman of the group ranked second in the Republic of Korea’s business circle.
Choi Myeongwon, who had flinched slightly at that attitude, smiled faintly and tapped Jang Doyun’s shoulder. He knew that if it weren’t for him, he could never have become the master of Taeseong.
Even while the two were steeped in their sentiments, the announcer’s report continued.
[......Taeseong Chemical Director Choi Myeongwon secured 31.3% of Taeseong Communications, the holding company; General Manager Jang Doyun, known as Director Choi Myeongwon’s secretary, held 4.2%; and Daeyang Industries, Director Choi Myeongwon’s wife’s family company, secured 3.6%. With this, excluding the 22.7% held by the National Pension Service, which declared neutrality, Director Choi Myeongwon, having secured more than half of the remaining shares, is all but certain to be inaugurated as Chairman of Taeseong Group......]
“My brothers must be in hell right now.”
“They probably are. They pulled in loans from Jongno all the way to loan sharks......”
“Talk casually. I haven’t officially taken office yet.”
Choi Myeongwon radiated an aura more generous than ever before. Considering the impatience and irascibility he usually showed, it was a change so drastic it was hard to comprehend, but thinking that he had just achieved the goal he had chased his entire life, it didn’t seem all that strange.
Jang Doyun thought for a moment before opening his mouth.
“Congratulations.”
“It’s all thanks to you.”
Choi Myeongwon approached the display cabinet in the corner, opened the lower drawer, and took out a bottle inside. It was a 1995 Penfolds Grange, selected as the wine of the century.
After placing glasses in front of Jang Doyun and himself, Choi Myeongwon uncorked the bottle and poured the wine.
“I really didn’t like you when I first saw you.”
Jang Doyun gave a bitter smile. Had he been in Choi Myeongwon’s shoes, he wouldn’t have felt good either.
Because he was an outsider brought in by his father’s concubine, and one with different blood to boot.
After filling the glasses, Choi Myeongwon continued, raising his own.
“But thanks to you, I’ve become the master of this seat. Guess that’s what makes life interesting.”
“......Maybe so.”
Jang Doyun also raised his glass and brought it to his lips. The faint fruity aroma and the scent of aged oak barrels pleased his sense of smell, but a bitterness that he normally wouldn’t have noticed lingered slightly at the tip of his tongue.
“So. What are you going to do with your brothers?”
“If it were up to me, I’d create a branch office on Ulleungdo and send them there.”
Choi Myeongwon snickered. It was something he wanted to do all the more because it would never happen, yet something he couldn’t do because he still had to watch his grandfather’s temper.
After holding a laugh for a while, he spoke in an annoyed voice.
“Damn old man. Why won’t he hand over the ledger to the end?”
“What if someone hears you?”
“It’s just you and me here. I emptied out this entire floor.”
Choi Myeongwon emptied his glass in one go and refilled it as he continued.
“We’ll have to choose a few suitable affiliates and split them off for my brothers. What do you think would be good?”
“Retail and Security. Separate the convenience stores from Retail and take them, and instead bundle together a few regional factories to send them.”
“Why?”
“Because both are industries that will wither and die if you cut off their transactions.”
Choi Myeongwon set down his wine glass and clapped. It was a solution that neatly resolved his dilemma.
“That’s amazing.”
“Why?”
“I didn’t think of that.”
Taeseong Retail, which handled the logistics of Taeseong Group, and Taeseong Security, which protected all the group’s assets and key personnel, were affiliates boasting considerable assets and sales in the trillions of won. It meant they weren’t companies too small for the banished princes to establish themselves.
But on the other hand, both were half-finished enterprises that had to rely on the headquarters for almost all of their sales. Even if they became independent, they couldn’t avoid the control of Chairman Choi Myeongwon at headquarters.
Reading that intention, Choi Myeongwon continued in admiration.
“That’s why you made someone like me chairman.”
“What’s wrong with you?”
“Are you asking because you don’t know?”
Jang Doyun said nothing. Even if it was something he admitted himself, it wasn’t good to bring up words bordering on slander.
Smirking at him, Choi Myeongwon fanned his slightly flushed face with his hand and spoke.
“By the way. You know it’s not all over yet, right?”
“Huh?”
“The regional factories.”
Jang Doyun nodded. He recalled that the labor unions of the manufacturing affiliates, represented by heavy industries and automobiles, had respectively taken the sides of Choi Hyeongwon and Choi Jeongwon.
“They haven’t surrendered yet?”
“The union executives seem to be continuously agitating. Having gone from conquerors to rebels, they probably can’t come in quietly.”
“What are you going to do? Crush them?”
Choi Myeongwon shook his head. Considering his usual temperament, it was a reaction strange enough to be puzzling.
“Then?”
“We have to persuade them.”
“That’s not like you.”
“That’s why I’m not going.”
Choi Myeongwon sent the shimmering wine in his glass down his throat. His demeanor suggested that choosing persuasion was not his own decision.
“Grandfather said so. If I set up an adversarial stance with the unions from the start of my inauguration, it’ll become a headache.”
“It’s also almost election season.”
“Well, there’s that too.”
He set down the empty glass and stared at Jang Doyun. His expression seemed to say this was his job.
“Me?”
“Yes.”
“Do you think they’ll listen if the chief of staff goes and talks?”
“That’s why I’m telling you to become vice chairman starting today.”
“......What?”
“I said become vice chairman.”
Jang Doyun was bewildered. It was all the more so because it was something he had never once considered.
“Me?”
“Thinking about what you’ve done, even that’s not enough. You’re the one who made me chairman when I only had 5% inherited shares.”
“The other groups won’t like it.”
The son of another family brought in by a concubine, not even an illegitimate child of a chaebol family. For such a person to rise to become the group’s number two was the perfect fodder for gossip among the other chaebols.
Though he couldn’t be unaware of that, Choi Myeongwon waved his hand dismissively and answered shortly.
“What does it matter what others say?”
“......That’s so like you.”
“Hold the inauguration ceremony after you get back, but for now, take the business card.”
Choi Myeongwon tossed a newly printed business card onto the table.
Jang Doyun, Vice Chairman of Taeseong Group.
It was a sentence he had never imagined even once.
Jang Doyun, who had been blankly touching it, came to his senses at Choi Myeongwon’s words.
“Are you happy?”
“I’m bewildered, actually.”
“You brat.”
Choi Myeongwon scoffed and rose from his seat.
“Can you leave today?”
“Today?”
“I want to wrap it up before the inauguration ceremony.”
Jang Doyun set down his glass and nodded. There was no benefit in dragging out such matters.
Looking at him, Choi Myeongwon opened his mouth amiably.
“I’m counting on you.”
***
[······I was alone. This bird had flown. So I lit a fire······.]
Jang Doyun hummed along to the flowing song as he drove down the road. It was “Norwegian Wood,” sung by the Beatles—a song now called a classic, with few people listening to it anymore.
He drove cheerfully down the open West Sea Coast Highway. Perhaps because it had less freight traffic than the Gyeongbu Highway, there was no problem driving at the speed limit.
Driving on the deserted road, he glanced at the clock.
11:20 PM.
It was now a two-hour drive to Yeongam, where the shipyard belonging to Taeseong Heavy Industries was located.
‘I’ll be crossing over into the next day.’
Jang Doyun gave a bitter smile. He had made an appointment with the union chairman who wanted to negotiate in secret, but the fact that he would have to start negotiations before the crack of dawn wasn’t exactly pleasant.
“isn’t it good? Norwegian······.”
Jang Doyun’s eyes suddenly widened as he hummed the lyrics. The headlights of a truck that had entered by driving the wrong way at an interchange pierced his eyes.
Panicked, he slammed the brakes. He could only hope that this year’s Volvo XC90 was as sturdy as its reputation.
But no matter how much of a Volvo it was, it couldn’t withstand the full-force charge of a 20-ton truck loaded with cargo without damage.
“Kugh!”
With a thud!, a terrifying impact struck him.
Gathering his wits with difficulty, Jang Doyun unfastened his seatbelt with trembling hands and got out. Thanks to the famously sturdy frame of the Volvo, he had survived, but the pressure from the crushed interior was urging him to get out.
As Jang Doyun, who had barely gotten out, pulled out his phone, a man appeared with thudding footsteps and kicked his hand.
“You’re a bit late.”
“Y-you, who are you?”
“General Manager Jang. You don’t know me?”
Jang Doyun raised his head. His vision was blurred, perhaps because of the impact on his brain, but because the opponent was so close, he could tell who it was.
“Jeong...... Chanwoo?”
“So you do know me.”
The man was someone used by Choi Jeongwon, the second son of the Taeseong family.
Jang Doyun staggered to his feet.
‘I never thought they’d do something this insane......’
Even while feeling dizzy, he couldn’t help but be bewildered. He had known Choi Jeongwon had a cruel personality, but he had judged him not to be so quick-witted as to pull something like this on the very day he lost the chairman’s seat that had been within reach.
As if guessing his confusion, Jeong Chanwoo smiled and spoke.
“You seem surprised.”
“Yes...... I didn’t know...... Choi Jeongwon could be...... this quick.”
“No.”
“......What?”
“The Chairman sent me, not the President. Ah, not Choi Myeongwon, but Honorary Chairman Choi Wonchang.”
Jang Doyun’s eyes widened. He hadn’t expected the old man relegated to the back room to strike him now, after the succession war had ended.
“Why?”
“Isn’t it obvious? It’s because an annoying outsider made the lacking third grandson chairman. What else could it be?”
“Why would he......”
“He thinks you’ll steal the group someday.”
Jeong Chanwoo spoke with an expressionless face and nodded. Judging from what Jang Doyun had shown, he didn’t think it strange that Choi Wonchang had such worries.
With only 5% in the holding company shares, the man who had made Choi Myeongwon—whose reputation within the group had hit rock bottom—into chairman could not easily be stopped if he tried to rise to that position himself.
Moreover, wasn’t he a man who knew all the secrets and dirty laundry of the corporation?
“See, you should have stayed quiet from the start and just lived off the money.”
“If Myeongwon finds out......”
“Ah, he knows too.”
As Jang Doyun made an expression of disbelief, Jeong Chanwoo smiled and continued.
“You clueless fool. If Choi Myeongwon hadn’t agreed, how would I be waiting here?”
Jang Doyun stiffened. He could feel that Jeong Chanwoo’s words were not wrong.
Otherwise, there was no way he could be waiting here for him, who had come down immediately at Choi Myeongwon’s request.
But a question remained.
“If I die... my shares will be gone... so... the chairman’s seat... will be... in danger...”
“The Chairman—that is, Honorary Chairman Choi Wonchang—will take care of that. So there’s no problem at all.”
Jang Doyun’s face crumpled at the answer.
If, as he said, Choi Wonchang’s remaining 5% stake, which had been maintained as neutral, supported Choi Myeongwon, then his own shares being gone wouldn’t be a problem.
Seeing Jang Doyun trembling with betrayal and anger, Jeong Chanwoo put his hand inside his jacket and continued.
“Then it’s time to finish this. Don’t try to run, it’ll be a hassle.”
“What......”
Jeong Chanwoo powerfully swung the baton he had pulled from inside his jacket. For Jang Doyun, who was staggering from the aftereffects of the accident, it was an unavoidable blow.
When Jang Doyun, struck in the head, collapsed, Jeong Chanwoo put the baton back inside his jacket, lifted the fallen Jang Doyun, and crammed him into the Volvo he had been driving. He intended to disguise it as a death caused by a fire after the car accident.
After seating him in the driver’s seat, Jeong Chanwoo took gasoline from the truck, poured it over the Volvo, and lit it. A precise autopsy would reveal the actual cause of death, but if Taeseong Group intervened, such a thing wouldn’t happen.
From the burning car, the Beatles’ song continued to play.
[So I lit a fire······.]