TOIGC 45

Chapter 45 …

Stress Relief, Corporate Style (1)

“Cheol-kyu, please, just let me crash at your place for a single day. Come on?”

Choi Cheol-min begged his younger brother with desperate eyes.

However, Choi Cheol-kyu had zero intention of granting his brother’s request. Helping out a hyung who had already thoroughly fallen out of Yoongi’s good graces offered literally zero upside.

“Hyung, I’m genuinely sorry, but you saw how furious Father was. If I help you out, I have no idea what kind of blowback I’ll catch, so I just can’t do it. I’m sorry…”

Faced with Cheol-kyu’s deeply apologetic expression, Cheol-min pleaded all over again.

“Please… We can’t possibly sleep out on the street in this blistering heat…”

“I’m sorry… I’m just too terrified of Father… Really, I’m sorry…”

With that, Cheol-kyu slammed the front gate shut and bolted it tight. Cheol-min stared blankly at the closed barrier as hot tears welled up in his eyes.

[Even Cheol-kyu won’t help me…]

Because Cheol-kyu handled the rejection so smoothly, Cheol-min felt a twinge of bitterness, but he couldn’t quite muster any real anger. Of course, the moment he eventually discovered that Cheol-kyu was one of Yoongi’s closest confidants, he would probably want to strangle him.

“Honey, at this rate, we’re genuinely going to be sleeping on the pavement.”

Lugging their fast-asleep son, Choi Jeong-gi, on her back fell entirely to Park Gyeong-ja, and her voice was thick with bone-deep exhaustion.

“Shut your trap! Do you think I’m having a grand old time here?!”

“Stop shouting. What are you going to do if you wake the kid up again…?”

“Ghk!”

Knowing that the instant their son Jeong-ja woke up, a fresh wave of whining would follow, Cheol-min swallowed a groan and clamped his mouth shut.

“Let’s just keep walking and see what we can find.”

In the end, Cheol-min had to trade away his passbook to his second younger sister just to cash out its meager contents.

It amounted to barely two weeks’ worth of a starting salary. Desperate to stretch the cash as far as possible, high-end accommodations were completely out of the question, forcing them to check into a filthy, rundown flophouse for the very first time in their lives.

“What the… What is this place… This isn’t even the army barracks…”

Having lived a life entirely untouched by hardship outside of military service, Cheol-min stared at the cramped room in utter despair. Gyeong-ja felt the exact same way.

“Oh… I can’t believe I’m back in a dump like this…”

Since Gyeong-ja had been a struggling, unknown singer before hitting it big, she was unfortunately well-acquainted with this kind of squalor. But that was all before her marriage—ever since tying the knot, she had lived a life of absolute luxury backed by her husband’s powerful family. Consequently, the claustrophobic room reeking of stale mold and damp mildew was nothing short of a psychological shock.

An even bigger problem, however, was waiting right behind them.

“No way! I don’t want to sleep in a place like this!”

The moment their son Jeong-ja woke up, he started hammering his fists against his mother’s back and throwing a screaming fit, forcing Gyeong-ja to stagger and lower the boy to the floor.

“Hoo…”

It was a situation that inspired nothing but heavy sighs.

Yet Cheol-min chose a much faster, far less patient method than sighing.

Smack!

“Waaaaah!”

As the boy clutched his stinging cheek and wailed at the top of his lungs, the expression twitching across Cheol-min’s face could only be described as pure, boiling irritation.

“H-Honey!”

Horrified, Gyeong-ja checked her son’s red cheek and glared up at her husband, but Cheol-min showed not a shred of remorse.

“How long are we supposed to coddle his tantrums in our current situation?! Sometimes you have to drop the hammer!”

“We’re barely holding it together ourselves, so imagine how hard this is for a child. How can you call yourself a father…”

“Isn’t this all because you spoiled him rotten with your garbage parenting?!”

“What did you say?!”

While Gyeong-ja certainly wasn’t winning any mother-of-the-year awards, the cold truth was that Cheol-min simply lacked any genuine paternal affection for the boy.

Before long, both of them sprang to their feet and began screaming at the top of their lungs, only to be cut off dead by a violent kick slamming against their door, followed by a harsh voice from the hallway.

[Keep your traps shut before I kick this door off its hinges! You hear me?]

It was the unmistakable voice of a local thug.

Without needing to exchange a word, Cheol-min and Gyeong-ja slapped their hands over their mouths, swallowed their remaining fury in shivering silence, and collapsed onto the lumpy mattress. The relentless cacophony echoing through the ceiling and thin walls branded the wretched room into their memories as an absolute nightmare.

At least, as far as ‘memories up to this point’ were concerned.

“Look, Department Head… Please, I’m begging you, can you lend me just 200,000 won…?”

For the very first time since joining Samwoo Trading, Choi Cheol-min spoke to his department head with uncharacteristic, fawning politeness. Of course, having been fired, he was no longer an employee of Samwoo Trading at all.

“Well, you see… Orders came straight down from the top…”

The department head’s nervous, sweating voice echoed through the office while the other employees cast anxious, sideways glances, closely monitoring the unfolding drama from a safe distance.

[The Chairman made it crystal clear: anyone caught associating with former Deputy Choi will regret the day they were born.]

Though the secretaries had already passed down strict warnings, this was still the Chairman’s second son. Fearing that treating him too harshly now might backfire catastrophically if he somehow managed to claw his way back into favor later, the department head found all his escape routes completely blocked.

“Look, you can just lend it to me in secret. I won’t say a word, so who’s ever going to find out?”

The department head desperately wanted to scream, ‘Look at how many people are sitting in this office right now!’ but he swallowed the words and forced out another evasive dodge.

“200,000 won isn’t exactly spare change… I’m afraid it’s just not going to work out…”

Back in 1980, a starting salary for a new recruit at a major conglomerate or public corporation hovered around 300,000 to 400,000 won. For the department head, 200,000 won was far too hefty a sum to casually hand over on a whim.

“Do you really not trust me? Please, I’m begging you. I don’t even have a place to sleep tonight.”

Though he wanted nothing more than to shout ‘Correct, I don’t trust you!’ right into his face, the department head was left with no choice but to stall once more.

[Oh, for the love of God, please just disappear…]

After half an hour of this agonizing tug-of-war, the office door flew open with a violent crash, and Choi Kihyun strode into the room.

“What the hell do you think you’re pulling?!”

“Ah… Father.”

Staring at his second son, who looked up at him with wide, startled rabbit eyes, Kihyun bellowed at the top of his lungs.

“Didn’t I explicitly tell you not to come near this place! Chief Lee! Did you fail to deliver my exact instructions to the offices?!”

Chief Secretary Lee Seong-won stepped forward, bowing deeply at the waist toward Kihyun.

“My apologies, Chairman. I will ensure the instructions are re-issued immediately.”

“Drag him out of here right now! If I ever catch anyone in this office associating with this punk again, I’ll tear this entire department apart from the studs up! And you—Department head, you bastard. You’re fired!”

Security guards swarmed forward, hauling Cheol-min out of the office while the poor department head narrowly avoided taking a direct slap to the face from Kihyun.

“I’m letting you off with a warning because you used to be on the same payroll, but if I catch you pulling this stunt one more time, consider your cheek permanently numb!”

As Kihyun stormed out in a towering rage, the department head collapsed into his chair, trembling with lingering terror, while the office staff let out collective sighs of relief and scrambled back to their work.

Yet, barely forty minutes later—

“Uhm… Department head…?”

Crawling right back into the office as if he possessed zero survival instincts, Cheol-min poked his head in, prompting the department head to roar.

“Get lost! Are you completely incapable of reading the room, you idiot?!”

“Oh, so he actually managed to land a job?”

Studying at his desk, Yoongi turned his head with a look of genuine amusement at Choi Deokbae’s report.

<That’s But He’s I’m Should a and as at be? chewed clerk down every five getting he’s him just leave local minutes. out rice saying. shop. so that useless we weak what working>

Yoongi shook his head firmly.

“Nah. Even if he’s getting chewed out, the fact that he’s actually earning money means we can’t just let him coast. He needs to suffer a lot more. What’s the name and location of the rice shop?”

<Huh? ‘Mandeok I Oh, Rice Store’? The called is… it’s location think>

Deokbae quickly decided it would be unwise to push Yoongi’s patience any further. Judging by Yoongi’s current demeanor, if he crossed the line, he felt like the boy might force-feed him several hundred jujubes a day.

“Let’s see, time to make a phone call.”

Stepping out into the living room, Yoongi picked up the rotary phone and dialed.

[Hello?] “Uncle, it’s me, Yoongi.” [Oh, Yoongi. What’s up?] “Did you hear the news? Eldest Uncle managed to land a job.” [What? Where?] “A rice shop.” [A rice shop? Wow, that’s got to be brutal labor.]

Listening to the voice coming through the receiver, Yoongi broke into a slow, dark smile.

“I personally feel it’s still way too early for Eldest Uncle to be enjoying gainful employment.” [Ah, I catch your drift. Want me to track down the exact shop?]

Yoongi gave him the name Mandeok Rice Store along with its address, and Choi Cheol-kyu promised to handle it swiftly before hanging up.

[You heard that, right?]

Hovering in the living room, Deokbae tilted his head at Yoongi, who was addressing him mentally.

<Heard what?> [Go check out how the situation plays out.] <Good Does a age…? bone. even family ghost grief… have mandatory not old retirement right the this to working>

As Deokbae grumbled and groaned, Yoongi casually started fiddling with his pocket.

<Hey don’t jujubes—! kid, out pull those you> [Huh? You don’t want these?]

At the sight of the plump, glistening deep-purple plums—wait, jujubes—that Yoongi pulled from his pocket, Deokbae let out an audible gulp.

[Guess he doesn’t want them.]

As Yoongi deliberately lifted one of the fruits toward his own mouth, Deokbae panicked completely.

<Hey! Don’t I don’t eat it! said>

Chuckling softly at the spirit’s frantic antics, Yoongi retreated to his room, set the jujubes down neatly on his desk, and offered a mock bow of reverence.

<Khaaa!>

Intoxicated by the phantom richness of the fruit, Deokbae didn’t even notice as Yoongi whispered a final instruction into his mind.

“Next time, I’ll make sure to chill them in the refrigerator first…”

Before Yoongi could even finish his sentence, Deokbae had already scooped up the spiritual essence of the remaining jujubes and bolted out of the house.

[That’s what I call high cost-efficiency.]

Eyeing the fruit—which would soon become edible even for living mortals—Yoongi swallowed a sudden wave of saliva of his own.

“Hey, are you seriously going to call yourself a worker when you’ve got about as much strength as a wet noodle?”

Back during the Japanese colonial period, dock laborers in Joseon were expected to haul two full sacks of rice—roughly 160 kilograms—with a traditional ji-ge frame without breaking a sweat. If you couldn’t pull that weight, nobody would even hire you.

While heavy manual labor had dwindled significantly by the year 1980, causing overall physical conditioning to drop, working at a rice shop still required easily hoisting and carrying around 40-kilogram sacks.

Of course, Cheol-min could lift them. The problem was that his arms shook so violently he looked like he was suffering from a neurological disorder.

As a result, Cheol-min was cursed out dozens of times a day, yet he stubbornly forced himself to endure because he couldn’t afford to walk away from the only job he’d managed to scrounge up after just two days.

[Damn it, just a week ago, a punk like this wouldn’t even dare make eye contact with me…]

Muttering curses under his breath as he hauled another sack of rice, Cheol-min suddenly caught the sound of the shop owner chatting with a visitor.

“Officer Kim, how’s business treating you lately?”

Involuntarily turning his head, Cheol-min’s gaze landed on a man wearing a police patrolman’s uniform.

“Ah, geez, people aren’t buying as much rice these days, so it’s a grind. Anyway, Officer Kim, you look a bit slimmer lately—are you not eating right or something? You’ve got to keep your strength up in this kind of heat.”

The shop owner scooped a generous mound of rice into a small burlap sack and handed it over to the officer.

“I keep coming back here precisely for this kind of hospitality. If any local thugs give you trouble, just let me know. I’ll smash ’em flat.”

“Appreciate it. Thanks to Officer Kim, those punk gangsters don’t even dare step foot near my shop.”

“That’s how it should be. By the way, who’s the new guy?”

At the patrolman’s casual query, the shop owner tilted his head slightly in confusion.

“Huh? Ah, just a clerk.”

“Kim, are your ears going bad or something? That guy got hauled in by the military boys over communist ties just the other day. If I were you, I’d be terrified of getting mixed up with him.”

“Wait? C-C-C-Communist?!”

“That’s right. Anyway, watch your back. In fact, I probably shouldn’t be dropping by here too often either starting soon.”

With a casual wave, Officer Kim turned and walked away, while the shop owner whipped his head around to glare daggers at Cheol-min.

“You filthy commie bastard! What kind of place do you think this is to come crawling in looking for work?!”

Before Cheol-min could even react, the shop owner drove a heavy kick straight into his ribs, sending him stumbling forward to crash face-first into a massive wooden basin piled high with loose rice.

“Whoa there!”

“Get lost! Get the hell out of my store!”

Grabbing Cheol-min by the back of his collar, the shop owner dragged him outside and snatched up a thick wooden club.

“Boss! W-What about my wages for yesterday…?”

“Wages, my foot! Consider getting fed and housed as payment enough! Are you going to clear out or do I need to use this?!”

Faced with the swinging club, Cheol-min had no choice but to turn tail and run, hot tears streaming down his face.

Another two weeks flew by.

Cheol-min desperately tried to find another job, but no matter where he applied, local police officers would invariably show up shortly after, dropping the word ‘communist’ and getting him fired almost on the spot.

Consequently, his two weeks’ worth of cash vanished in the blink of an eye, leaving him on the verge of getting tossed out onto the street by the flophouse landlord as well.

“Cheol-kyu, please, just help me out this one time. Come on? I’m genuinely trying every way I can to survive, but at this rate, I’m going to drop dead. What are my wife and kid supposed to do…”

With tears welling in his eyes, Cheol-min actually felt a faint shred of genuine family affection—mostly because Gyeong-ja and Jeong-gi were the only anchors he had left clinging to his side.

Of course, whether that affection existed or not was a matter of total indifference to Choi Cheol-kyu.

[Is it about time…?]

Though Cheol-min felt no actual pity for his brother, recalling Yoongi’s specific directives, Cheol-kyu nodded with a subtle, dark smile.

“It might be tough for you, hyung, but I think I might be able to hook your wife up with a job.”

“What? Really?”

Since Park Gyeong-ja was trapped in the exact same destitute situation, a burst of wild hope illuminated Cheol-min’s face.

“Yeah. How about she tries working at the construction site’s field cafeteria? After all, I’m the one helping manage operations down there from the ground up.”

Following Yoongi’s explicit instructions, Choi Cheol-kyu delivered the kind of proposal guaranteed to make an enemy out of anyone with a shred of self-respect.