12 Hours After

Translator: Khan

Editor: Aelryinth

The content of the article was quite different from what I had expected.

[Lee Soo-won won the twentieth presidential election with 38.8% of the votes, Joo Sung-won 36.1% and Kwak Ji-won 21.2%.]

The president was changed from Joo Sung-won to Lee Soo-won.

‘What the hell is going on?’

Lee Soo-won was a sixty-two-year-old third-term politician who had competed with Han Sang-hoon in the opposition party for the next presidency. His district was Gongju, in South Chungcheong Province, and he was a typical wealthy local farmer. His father was a lawmaker in Gongju, but he was elected three times from the same place. Unlike Han Sang-hoon, a former prosecutor, he was considered a politician to the bottom of his bones.

I thought with my hands on my chin. ‘Well… it’s the butterfly effect. This guy… pressed Mayor Joo Sung-won… It’s ironic that someone who didn’t even beat Han Sang-hoon comes out in the presidential election and beats Joo Sung-won. Is there some sort of human relativity?

‘It’s not uncommon. Just as characters in a game are bitten and bitten like scissors and rocks, there’s nothing strong about someone in the real world, instead of someone weak. Joo Sung-won is a decent and good-looking man. When he faces Han Sang-hoon, the image of a fighting chicken, it feels like he’ll score even if he laughs.’

‘However, he doesn’t look good when he plays against Lee Soo-won. Lee Soo-won is really good at “politics,” is different from Han Sang-hoon, who is a little stiff. He has the power to bring the decent Mayor Joo Sung-won into the mud.’

Come to think of it, Mayor Joo Sung-won seemed a little weak in that regard, too. In the past, he had had a hard time in the Seoul mayoral election because he had been stricken by the Me Too movement.

‘Well… if I do this, the president changes… But Han Sang-hoon would have been better. Lee Soo-won is not a character for the president… Well, that’s great. I was going to punish him too, so… I’ll have to punish Lee Soo-won first.’

Lee had been involved in controversy over military service corruption for several years, both himself and his son. Crow had found out that he and his son had dodged military service by subordinating a doctor. In the ’70s, he simply failed the medical examination for military service with the diagnosis of skin disease by a doctor who was a tenant of his father’s building. It was an unlikely way to do so these days, but that seemed to have been enough at that time.

In the ’70s, the doctor in charge was over 50 years old, so he had soon been dead and it was difficult to take issue with him again, but his son was different. His son broke his limbs and had surgery on his right crossbar ruptured, but it was all a lie. He gave $400,000 to a doctor in charge and $100,000 to a nurse, put on another person’s X-ray photo, and changed the video of the surgery, so he was exempted from military service. I’d seen it all in real time by the eye patch.

“Wouldn’t it be too much for my son to go to the military and spend two years there?”

“Yes, sir, there should be a difference in military service. Is it possible to stick them together with someone from Harvard and someone who didn’t even go to college?”

“Anyways, please do a good job, Dr. Kim.”

“Don’t worry, Mr. Lawmaker. I’ll do it for you well.”

“Yes. If you make my son get through this, you will have a lot of patients in this city.”

“Don’t say that. I am going to do it from my heart.”

Crow’s research showed the list of the hospital, the doctor, and the real patient who was swapped in for his picture. They were all listed. If this went off, of course, Lee Soo-won would also be defeated. Military service corruption was an issue that would inevitably cause anger for people like me, who had spent two years in the military.

I called Lee Won-jae again right away.

Tiriri~ Tiriri~ Tiriri~ Tiriri. This time, when the phone rang four times, he answered the phone, “Ah, CEO Han.”

“Yes. Have you received the email?”

“Yes. As soon as I got it, I moved it to the posting department. Now that your document will be posted by someone, the article will be published sometime this week.”

“Have you done it already?”

“Yes, sir. I took care of it without delay.”

I slapped my forehead. ‘He is faster at times like this.’

“Do you have a problem? I can deal with your document as just ignoring it…”

“No, no. Just proceed. Someone must have seen what I sent you.”

“Yes, I moved it and all the people in the political department have already…”

‘Crow’s information is believed by everyone who has seen it, as it’s too accurate.’

“Well, then, don’t force them to stop it, but first… just let it proceed.” I decided to punish Han Sang-hoon first. I could send Lee Soo-won right away, but if political issues erupted too much at once, the public’s eyes could be distracted.

“Well, then… I’ll do that for now,” CEO Lee Won-jae spoke to me in a rather trembling voice. Still, it would be burdensome for him to blow a candidate for the next presidential election.

I spoke to him, “CEO Lee Won-jae.”

“Yes?”

“When this is over, you and I will probably be on the same boat with the next president. Then, your position in the Daewon Daily News will be elevated, right? Trust me and proceed.”

CEO Lee Won-jae listened to me and his trembling voice subsided a little. “Oh, yes, sir. I know that and will proceed.”

After I finished my phone call with Lee Won-jae, I put it down. Then, I searched for Lee Soo-won in the portal window. A man in his sixties was grinning.

‘This guy’s the next president? No way.’

After Han Sang-hoon, the next would be Lee Soo-won. I decided it like that.

————————

That evening, the sniper article of Rep. Han Sang-hoon that I had planned appeared in the Daewon Daily News.

[The affair with Han Sang-hoon’s secretaries.]

It was a much lower-level article compared to the sex story Crow had brought, but it was still enough to arouse public attention.

– Wow, in Yeouido? Awesome!-

– Not one, but three. Are you a lawmaker trying to fuck?-

– Mr. Lawmaker, I’m disappointed as you’ve talked about women’s rights… Isn’t this sexual violence caused by power pressure?-

Rep. Han Sang-hoon denied like that, ‘I never did.’ But the story was so detailed that few believed it.

-If you get caught in a lie, your hands will be cut off.-

-I’ll know even if this kind of article does not come out. Han Sang-hoon looks like he’s going to cheat on us.-

-No, just speak up, “I did it with my secretary.” I know you used to go to hostess bars freely when you were a prosecutor.-

‘That’s enough. In the first place, this was a preliminary effort to discredit Rep. Han Sang-hoon. As seen in the Clinton and Lewinsky cases, sex scandals are good for the talk, but they are a bit weak to deal a fatal blow. The real one is the list from Goo Soon-gil.

‘All right, well, just let Rep. Han Sang-hoon go like this… for Lee Soo-won, let’s leak it around a month later.’ I was thinking about it, and I had suddenly an idea. I did the People Search again on the email that had come at 8:55 p.m., to make sure that the corrections news was real. By the way, it was real.

[Lee Soo-won, the twentieth president, is elected by a margin of 2% with Seoul Mayor Joo Sung-won. What’s the reason of the difference?]

In 12 Months After, there was such an article to come up.

‘That’s ridiculous…’ I clicked on the article thinking about it. But there was something interesting about the story.

[While there were other factors in the voting, the controversy over an extramarital child of Mayor Joo Sung-won, which was held a month before the presidential election and had largely dislodged supporters, was a major factor. The negative strategy of Rep. Lee Soo-won has accurately worked against Joo Sung-won, who had the image of the model student.]

I looked at it and muttered, “An extramarital child?” Surely it was an amazing story. The right-looking mayor of Joo Sung-won had an extramarital child. To be sure, the share of Joo Sung-won, which had more than 40% of the vote, was only slightly lower.

‘Is this what Lee Soo-won used to attack Joo Sung-won?’ In the last article on the election of Mayor Joo Sung-won, there was no controversy over an extramarital son… But judging from what happened, Lee Soo-won certainly seemed to have dug this way. I went to the portal site and searched for ‘an extramarital child of Joo Sung-won.’ Not a single such story was told. There was not even a rumor. If there had been one, I’d have sent Crow last time.

‘Is it a real one or a fake one?’ I didn’t know. I had met him once, and I’d had a pretty good impression, but I couldn’t tell what was inside.

‘I’ll check this out, too. Crow’s resting…’ Real or fake, I needed to be sure. I arranged a meeting with Crow and sent him for an inquiry over there.

————————

That weekend, Rep. Han Sang-hoon’s sex scandal continued to make headlines, but things got bigger as one of his former secretaries stepped up. One woman, who asked not to be identified, made the revelation by saying, ‘First of all, Rep. Han Sang-hoon tries to reach out to all secretaries.’

As I always felt, touching politics often produced unexpected reactions no matter what happened.

Rep. Han Sang-hoon again tried to get by in that way this time. ‘I don’t know.’ It was rather expected.

I took out the ‘List of Goo Soon-gil’ here. I sent the OK sign and the Daewon Daily News released an article. [Re-investigation of the list of Goo Soon-gil: Rep. Han Sang-hoon received money from Mr. Goo.]

In the last trial, Rep. Han Sang-hoon insisted, “I don’t know. I can’t remember. I’ve never done that,” but everything he had said was completely turned over. He was pushed into a defensive corner. After he’d already been branded as a liar, the Goo Soon-gil List case had been added.

President Park Hyung-joon invoked an independent counsel investigation to determine whether he feared the administration would pass in the next presidential election. Han struggled to escape from the independent counsel investigation, but when a reinvestigation was made, the case turned upside down after a former close aide to President Goo Soon-gil testified under the pressure of the prosecution. So, Rep. Han Sang-hoon, who was considered the next presidential hopeful, died politically just a month after I had shot an article through the Daewon Daily News.

Now, with this, the ‘Han Sang-hoon’ position in the People Search was entirely mine. Rep. Han Sang-hoon would occasionally be brought up as a politician whose career had tanked because of bribes.

————————

By the end of May, when the political death of Rep. Han Sang-hoon was confirmed, I pulled out the next card. Whatever next was, I went to punish Lee Soo-won directly. I didn’t have to hit him twice, because there was already a weak link – a doctor who had received $400,000 and a nurse with $100,000.

‘Rep. Lee Soo-won is a time-tested politician and he can lie to the end, but it is almost impossible for the doctor and nurse to overcome the pressure of the prosecutor’s investigation. The report even shows how they received the money.’

CEO Lee Won-jae also published Crow’s report with provocative headlines this time. [Does the photo of a Cruciate Ligament Tear belong to the son of lawmaker Lee Soo-won?]

It was a fatal article that hit only the exact place where it hurt. Once Rep. Lee Soo-won denied the report like Han Sang-hoon did, “It’s a controversy that’s not worth responding to.” But he had already been eliminated from the presidency in the future. ‘Joo Sung-won 48.2%, So Kang-sup 30.7% and Kwak Ji-won 21.2%.’ Han Sang-hoon was not on the list, and Lee Soo-won’s career would also be dead in a few days.

‘Who’s So Kang-sup? By the way… Mayor Joo Sung-won has become president again.’ His approval rating was higher than it used to be. This time, voter turnout was close to 50%. I removed Han Sang-hoon and Lee Soo-won, and all the remaining political opponents were gone. Because of the butterfly effect, he almost failed to become president, but then he took his place anyway.

I looked at it and thought, ‘Hmm… so shall I just go on like this?’

But then, Crow came to see me with the report on the extramarital child of Joo Sung-won, which had been ordered a month ago.