Chapter 21 — Last Week (1)
Han Jia went home.
She left behind braised short ribs, braised beef, budae jjigae seasoning, and many other dishes.
The one-room was still filled with the smell of the food she had made.
The room, which was now unusually clean and sparkling.
The fridge full of delicious food.
The laundry neatly folded and organized like in a hotel.
Did a devoted wife come by?
That was how spotless my one-room had become — it felt like a clean hotel room.
“……Why does it feel so empty?”
Han Jia, who had been acting all cute.
Han Jia, who diligently cooked, cleaned, and took care of me.
Because she had made such a big fuss, her absence felt especially large.
A wave of loneliness hit me.
“She really is a fox. I almost fell for it.”
Today, Han Jia didn’t show any signal light above her head. That meant everything she did today was without sexual interest.
Of course, not everyone who likes someone shows sexual interest… Yeah, right!
That only applies when you’re ugly!
With my current appearance, if she liked me, she should have shown sexual interest.
The fact that there was no signal light meant it was correct to assume she had some kind of purpose.
“What the hell is your goal?”
Do you want me to cling to you?
Do you hate seeing me next to Kim Ain, so you want me by your side?
Are you trying to erase the humiliating memories from yesterday?
I couldn’t figure it out no matter how much I thought, so I erased it from my mind.
“She’ll do whatever she wants.”
Thinking about it felt like I was already getting caught up in it, so I gave up.
“Kim Ain is much more comfortable in comparison.”
A purely instinct-driven relationship.
Yet one where we subtly take care of each other.
Well, not subtly — I’m the one taking care of her like a housekeeper.
“Seeing things like this makes me think Han Jia isn’t bad either.”
Cleaning. Doing the dishes. Cooking.
I didn’t need a maid. But having someone do these things for me with a smile felt really good.
It was an experience I never had in my previous life, so my heart kept fluttering.
I fell into another hallucination. My mind was all over the place.
“Should I take care of her a little too?”
I looked at the calendar.
This was the last week of training at the institute. On the last day, Han Jia would face a rather difficult situation.
I didn’t know the exact details. I only knew that something like that would happen.
“I should at least give her a warning.”
I sent Han Jia a KakaoTalk message.
[It’s cold these days. Watch your ankles.]
[Ankles?]
[Yeah. Someone I know slipped on a cold day and hurt their ankle.]
[Really? Was it bad?]
[Not too bad.]
[That’s a relief. Hehe. You be careful too, Oppa! Ah! Make sure to eat the food I made deliciously and see you on Monday. And thank you for Friday.]
……Even her KakaoTalk messages are pretty. If I didn’t have memories from my previous life, I probably would have fallen for her completely.
Then, a KakaoTalk message came from someone else.
It was Kim Ain.
[Hey. What are you doing?]
Why is this one so spicy in comparison.
[Did you graduate from engineering by any chance?]
[What?]
[I had an engineering senior who was like you.]
[What are you talking about? Why did you contact me yesterday?]
[You reply so fast. A lot happened.]
[Not interested.]
[This bitch?]
[What are you doing tomorrow? Let’s meet.]
[Now that I think about it, you do want something.]
[What are you saying? Stop talking nonsense. I got the money. Tell me where to invest.]
Ah. Right, it was about time for this conversation too.
[Okay. See you tomorrow.]
I decided to put complicated matters aside and take care of the money first.
***
The next day. Evening.
I met Kim Ain at a café in Gangnam.
But did you do this on purpose?
She was wearing tight jeans that clung to her legs and a thick parka on top. Underneath the parka, she wore a top that revealed a lot of her cleavage.
What is she, Jeomsun from that old story? As if taunting me with a “You don’t have this at your house, do you?” she blatantly thrusts her chest in my direction.
“Hey. Where are you looking?”
Funny. You wore it for me to look and now you’re calling me out.
She seemed to enjoy seeing me desperate. She lightly pulled her top down with her fingertips, showing more of her breasts.
Gulp. Gulp. Gulp. Gulp. Gulp.
It wasn’t just my swallowing sound. It was the sound of countless men in the café swallowing their saliva. Of course, mine was included too.
Ah. I won’t be able to touch those breasts for a while!
As I looked at her with regret, she smiled brightly.
“Stop drooling and talk. Where are you planning to invest?”
“Show me the money first.”
“Here.”
She showed me her mobile banking app. The amount was 500 million won.
Seeing the actual number made me swallow hard again.
“You got more?”
“Yeah. It wasn’t easy. So, where are we investing?”
I whispered quietly.
“Bitcoin.”
Kim Ain tilted her head.
“What’s that?”
It was before it became truly famous, so her reaction was understandable.
“It’s a virtual currency that uses blockchain—”
“Should I hit your head with a block?”
“Look at how you talk.”
“It means I have no idea what you’re saying. Anyway, I just need to invest there? Then I should do it tomorrow?”
“Tomorrow?”
“Yeah. Don’t I need to go to the bank?”
“Even my grandmother knows more than you. It’s not like that.”
“Then, should I just give you all this money?”
“How can you trust me so easily? What if I run off with it?”
“You can think that if I get scammed, I learned something about the world.”
500 million won as tuition fee. As expected of a chaebol daughter — different class.
“If you give it to me, I’ll have to pay gift tax. Just buy the coins yourself and send them to my wallet. I’ll manage it, share all the profits, and we’ll split the final returns in half.”
“Got it.”
“If you answer so obediently, it makes me feel like I’m actually scamming you.”
“Do you even have the guts to scam me?”
“No, I don’t. Anyway, we’ll still need to go to the bank to create an account for the coins.”
“It’s complicated, so just handle it. I’ll just follow you.”
I must have been spoiled by Han Jia’s excessive care yesterday.
Trying to serve Kim Ain suddenly feels tiring.
“Why? You don’t want to? Then forget it. We’re done here then.”
She pulled her top down again with her fingertips, showing her cleavage.
What can you even do?
Other than running around like a dog trying to touch my chest?
That was the look in her eyes.
She wasn’t wrong.
“Yes~ Yes~ Princess. I shall attend to you.”
“Be a little more polite.”
“Yes, yes. Understood.”
I bowed my head repeatedly.
She was the person who would make me a tens-of-billions rich man.
I had to serve her with respect.
Just wait until the coin doubles. I’ll get you back then.
***
Monday. After leaving the training center early, saying I had an urgent matter, I headed to Seoul.
I attended to Kim Ain like a queen and handled all the procedures.
After buying over several days, the average purchase price of the coins we acquired was around 1.1 million won each. We bought roughly 450 coins.
If we sold them at 20 million won each by the end of the year, it would be about 9 billion won.
Split with Kim Ain, that would be 4.5 billion each. Adding the money I invested separately, I’d have around 5 billion.
Becoming a 5-billion-won rich man in one year. And with 18 times the return, that would mean Kim Ain becomes my slave 18 times?
It was an incredibly profitable investment.
But that was still the future. For now, I had to live in the present.
First, the training center. I finished the final classes, and now only the finale remained.
For that finale, we headed to Gangwon Province on Thursday night, at a late hour.
***
Somewhere in Gangwon Province.
A large rest area.
The dark night sky was scattered with stars.
On the ground, far more people than usual had gathered.
It wasn’t just the thirty new employees. Over ten senior employees had also come.
Most of them were from the HR team. They were busy moving around to prepare for today’s finale.
Some were talking with the emergency medical team on one side.
Others were preparing water and supplies.
It made sense. The final event of the new employee training was a night march.
We would start from somewhere in Gangwon Province and walk through the night to arrive in Gangneung around sunrise. That was the last part of the training.
Preparations seemed complete. The HR team leader called us over. Other HR staff stood beside him as we lined up facing them.
New employees in tracksuits facing HR staff in hiking clothes under the pitch-black night — it felt like the military.
After a moment of silence in the dark night, the HR team leader spoke up.
“You’ve all worked hard to complete the Sekyung Foods new employee training program excellently. Today marks the end of this long training period.”
Everyone was already a bit nervous since they knew what was coming.
“You must walk approximately 30km through the night and arrive in Gangneung. It’s by no means a short distance, but since all your seniors have completed it, I believe you will do well too.”
He added a sense of responsibility by saying the seniors had done it.
“So far, not a single person has dropped out. I hope the same will be true for all of you.”
Bullshit. I alone know more than ten people who dropped out.
Because 30km was quite a distance, quite a few people had dropped out in the past. Of course, we new employees didn’t know that.
Everyone burned with determination to complete it.
“If anyone drops out, that person will receive penalty points.”
That was also a lie. What were they going to do if someone had flat feet and genuinely couldn’t walk?
Still, they did give penalty points — not to the person who gave up, but to the people around them who abandoned their colleague.
It was an old-fashioned method: unless it was a serious injury, dropping your teammate would result in penalties.
“On the other hand, the person who finishes first will receive high performance evaluation points and a special prize. Also, if no one drops out, a grand dinner will be provided in Gangneung.”
At the word “grand dinner,” the new employees burned with even more passion. They made a big fuss about not dropping out like their seniors.
How naïve. Knowing the truth, I was just annoyed at the thought of walking.
Still, I had no intention of dropping out. It would be a bit embarrassing to enter the actual workplace after failing to complete this.
I’d aim to finish at a reasonable place.
“Anyway, I hope everyone completes it excellently without any dropouts. We will depart in ten minutes. Since it’s impossible to walk such a long distance alone, please form groups with whoever you want to walk with.”
“How many people per group?”
“It doesn’t matter. Just gather comfortably and go together.”
As soon as the HR staff finished speaking, people quickly gathered.
Han Jia approached me. She deliberately walked past me in an obvious manner.
She had been doing this all week. Pushing and pulling me like a push-pull strategy. Today was the same. She walked past me and stood smiling in front of Yoon Jungwook.
Was this a jealousy-inducing operation?
How childish.
In my previous life, I became her slave about two or three years from now.
Clearly, Han Jia at this age was still not very skilled. Her intentions were obvious.
You amateur. I’m already a man who has experienced sex. I’m different from the pure virgin I used to be.
I looked at Han Jia the way a Heavenly Demon would look at late-stage martial artists — clicking my tongue inwardly.
“Ack!!!”
Someone poked me hard in the side.
It was Kim Ain.
“Give me a warning before you hit me.”
“Hey!”
“Have you decided to just call me ‘Hey’ from now on?”
“Yeah. Walk with me.”
“Sure. Park Sanghoon hyung, let’s go together too.”
My roommate Park Sanghoon also stood beside me.
“Yeah, okay.”
Having a member from the Hongdae dance team with us was comfortable.
“Is our goal to finish this time?”
Park Sanghoon asked.
“Yeah. They say the first place gets high performance points and a prize, but what’s the point of that?”
Park Sanghoon nodded in agreement.
“Right. Let’s just focus on not getting injured.”
We matched well in this regard.
“I’m against that.”
But why the hell are you being difficult again, Kim Ain?
“Why? Did you suddenly get motivated and want to aim for first place?”
“No, I’m thinking of dropping out.”
This bitch?
Memories from my previous life came back. She really had given up.
“Why should I do this when it’s so hard?”
She had said.
Even though completing it meant a delicious meal, to Kim Ain it was nothing more than food for servants. Performance points didn’t matter to her since her very existence was already a high score. So she had coolly taken an ambulance to Gangneung.
But that was the previous life. In this life, I planned to drag her along. There was no need to get penalty points because of her.
“Hey. If you’re going to do that, walk by yourself.”
“No thanks? Just walk with me until I give up.”
“I don’t want to either? Just go all the way. Why are you talking about giving up?”
“It’s hard. I’m planning to quit after an hour, so keep that in mind.”
No matter what I said, she wouldn’t budge.
Yare yare, what an impossible girl.
I really wanted to slap her.
While thinking about how to handle her, an idea flashed through my mind. I leaned close to Kim Ain’s ear and whispered.
“What if Han Jia gives up? Are you going to ride in the ambulance with her?”
“Her giving up? As if she would.”
“I said ‘if’. What if she does give up?”
“Then I’ll go all the way to the end.”
Fighting spirit burned in Kim Ain’s eyes.
I had tested it just in case, and it actually worked.
It seemed she still held a grudge from the factory tour day when she lost to Han Jia in grilling meat and looked like an idiot.
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