12 Hours After

Translator: Khan

Editor: Aelryinth

I answered the phone, “Yes?”

“Boss, I have a call from senior superintendent Shin Hyun-chul.”

“Put him through to me.”

“Yes.”

While Secretary Park was connecting him, I cleared my voice for a moment. Shin Hyun-chul, who had a thick voice, greeted me, “Hello? CEO Han, this is Shin Hyun-chul.”

“Ah, yes. What is this regarding? While you’re busy, you call me like this.”

“No, please don’t say that.” The more he talked to me on the phone, the more he took a submissive attitude. I didn’t know if it was simply because I was the richest person in Korea or because of pressure from the Blue House, but somehow, I could see more and more of him trying to be nice to me. “I’m fine. Rather, I am afraid of taking your time.”

“No, I’m fine. But for what?”

“I’m calling to report on the progress of the investigation. As you said, I’ve looked for connection points with Suyeon Group and I found that he had the experience working there. He’s keeping his mouth shut right now, but I’ll work hard and get him talking.”

Although it hadn’t spread to the media yet, this was quite a surprise case for the police, as well. It was a murder case aimed at the head of a company, who was in a fight for a stake with another company.

“That’s what I thought, too… Suyeon Group… All right. Please keep digging.”

“Yes, sir, keep taking care of yourself. Since it’s an attempted murder case, I’ll take responsibility for making him confess.”

“Please do your best.”

After finishing the call, I looked at the phone for a moment. ‘Let’s see how competent the Korean police are.’

Anyway, he would say everything, since right after the incident, I put Crow, who came back from the Cayman Islands, on this case. It would be better for the police to do it, but if they couldn’t get him to confess, I would.

———————

On September twelfth, Suyeon Electronics’ extraordinary shareholders’ meeting was held. I was there, accompanied by Vice President Jang. However, Tak Mun-su, the current president and the main character of the dismissal of the CEO, did not attend the meeting. It was somewhat foreseen. Now that Deep Blue Corporation turned out to be Tak Woo-kyung’s paper company, the outcome of this vote was no different than what was already obvious.

Tak Mun-su seemed to have decided to concentrate on forming his own defense team rather than coming here and getting fired. He was accused of illegal inheritance, tax evasion, and even attempted murder. The extraordinary shareholders’ meeting went on. Because of the Tak family, there was no unanimous vote, but the suggestion to dismiss the CEO was overwhelmingly passed.

After this, Tak Mun-su was completely out of Suyeon Electronics. The person who took the seat was Kim Jang-hoon, who was a little further away from the center of Suyeon Electronics. According to the story, he had spoken directly to Tak Mun-su and incurred his hatred, so he was close to losing his position. I rather highly valued that and decided to appoint him as temporary president. His life was part of the irony of fate. After a little more time, I thought I’d bring in a professional manager from the outside and put him in the position.

With this, anyway, I got what I wanted. It was one of the top companies in Korea, and had global competitiveness. The process was quite rough and complicated, but it paid off. Finally, Invictus Investment had set the stage for a leap into the world.

———————

On September twentieth…

In the end, Tak Mun-su was arrested. Police eventually obtained three letters of the name “Tak Mun-su” from the criminal, although they did not say exactly how, according to police chief Shin Hyun-chul. Now he had a fight in court over the sentence, which was for the maximum of life imprisonment. Of course, he hired a top judge-turned-lawyer. So I wrote an article on the Oracle news: ‘We should show the strictness of the law; we should not accept one law for the rich and another for the poor.’

‘Even if Korea is divided into three powers, it is true that the president is the most influential person in general. Even if the National Assembly is not currently an opposition party, it is widely believed that the ruling party has no choice but to give in to the president’s power, and that the court and the case law have come to the president’s attention.’

A few months ago, I kept shouting to President Joo Sung-won, ‘I will attack Suyeon Group. Hit it and arrest Tak Mun-su1’; he would understand my intentions. If he joined me on to this point, I would keep him in the presidency for another four years.

———————

Two days after Tak Mun-su was arrested, on September twenty-second, Secretary Park called me. “Boss… There’s another person on the phone.”

But his words were a little strange because there were a variety of people calling me.

“Another person?”

“He’s called Tak Woo-sung, but he is from the Tak family…” It made sense. The other Mr. Tak had called me.

‘Tak Woo-sung… If it’s him, he must be…’ I quickly move my keyboard to search for him. ‘As might be expected.’

I recalled some old memories. Tak Woo-sung, as I roughly guessed from his name, was Tak Woo-kyung’s brother, Tak Mun-su’s uncle, and Tak Joon-gi’s father. After Tak Mun-su’s arrest, he seemed to be the head of the family, or its spokesman.

Holding the phone, I wondered what he was going to do…

“Okay, put him through.”

Before long, a heavy voice flowed into my ear. “Ah. Are you CEO Han Sang-hoon?”

I was wary of him for a moment. ‘Is this old man trying to play the second round in a nasty way?’ Fortunately, however, such concerns were soon resolved.

“… We think there was a mistake on the part of our family. I’d like to negotiate with CEO Han Sang-hoon.”

“What kind of negotiation?”

“A kind of… surrender negotiation? We no longer intend to fight with CEO Han. Who’s stronger… has already been revealed. Just let us take care of some of our work.”

What he brought was the surrender document of the Tak family. At the same time Tak Mun-su was arrested, the Tak family seemed to realize that the game of power was all over except for the shouting.

I asked him, “What are the specific conditions?”

“I’ll email it to you right away. Please look it over and review it. Can I get a reply?”

“… yes, I will.”

—

I received an email from him. The contents were long, but to sum up, I could say it said, ‘The Tak family will sell all of its stakes in Suyeon Electronics, Suyeon Construction, and its affiliates, and withdraw from its authority. Please leave the insurance and chemical lines to us.’

Now that Tak Mun-su had been arrested, they no longer had the heart to resist me, and they seemed to have decided to split the remaining shares between the two. I thought they might be covering their faces right now. It was a big crack in the status of Suyeon Group to lose Suyeon Electronics, but it was no exaggeration to say that Suyeon Group without Tak Mun-su was a completely new place of opportunity.

I consulted with Vice President Jang for a few days and then accepted the offer. It was necessary for the Tak family to leave without any noise to run Suyeon Electronics and Suyeon Construction smoothly in the future. No matter how the fight ended, an enemy could not live in the same house.

I wrote back to Tak Woo-sung and sent him back a roadmap for the settlement of the shares. With my stamping them, the long and fierce fight between me and Tak Mun-su lasting for nearly half a year ended with me buying Suyeon Electronics and Suyeon Construction.

———————

I searched Tak Mun-su in the news in 12 Months After. His trial began shortly after, and after a year’s preview of the news, it was unlikely that he would be able to look outside while he was alive.

‘This time justice was implemented, though it was justice with a little pressure behind it.’ I closed the future news email after reading it. After doing that, I breathed a long sigh, because there was a mountain of reports next to me. The financial crisis from China was gradually coming to an end, and there was a need to quickly normalize Suyeon Electronics, which had gained a new owner.

‘Let’s work hard then.’ While I was reading those reports, Vice President Jang came in to see me.

“Vice President Jang is here.”

“Please let him in.”

Vice President Jang came in and greeted me, “You have a lot to review, boss.”

“Well, I should do at least this much work. Isn’t it Vice President Jang and the directors who are busier than me?”

Vice President Jang smiled and nodded. The remark was true. Suyeon Electronics and Suyeon Construction were both dinosaur companies with a market capital of thirty billion dollars. There was a lot of work to do after the war.

“We are looking for key personnel for Suyeon Electronics. Suyeon Construction is in the process of acquisition; the two sisters of Tak Mun-su, Tak Jin-hee and Tak Sun-young, agreed to pay off the inheritance tax with the stake in Suyeon Construction. We can buy the shares from the government. We’re going to get the status of a major shareholder right away.”

I asked him when I heard that, “When will that be?”

“It should be early in November.”

“Oh, I see. Please proceed as quickly as possible.”

“Yes, boss.”

I hastened him because of the Grandmaster Class. The conditions for attaching the Grandmaster Class were “ten billion dollars in equity value, and ten listed companies.” The condition of ten billion dollars in equity value was easily exceeded when I acquired Suyeon Electronics, but as for the ten listed companies, the number of companies I owned was short, since Suyeon Electronics had only one listed subsidiary.

That was seven companies. Suyeon Construction was the parent company of typical octopuses, so there were a lot of subsidiaries, such as Suyeon Fashion, a clothing brand; and Dream Box, which was in the movie theater business, as listed companies. If I put those three together, the total number became ten. As soon as the acquisition of Suyeon Construction was completed, I would be given the Grandmaster Class.

‘I wonder what kind of skills there will be when I become Grandmaster Class…’

Come to think of it, there was only one thing I knew, what I had seen last time: the news of 12 Years After.

So far, there had been no need to do so because of the idea of “a year at a time of investing,” but there was a need to move looking five or ten years ahead to run a large group like Suyeon Electronics.

‘And besides… I’m curious about what will happen ten years from now. At that time, there may be things such as electric cars becoming mainstream, the smoke disappears, general space travel becomes possible, VR technology develops, and the game is passed on to later generations.’

I sat on the chair and imagined for a moment about what would happen ten years from now with joy.