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Chapter 37: Dirty Schemes
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The Strategic Investment Headquarters within MH Group steadily grew in prominence.
At the same time, a large-scale reorganization led to the Strategic Investment Operations Division 1 expanding to over 30 members, whereas Division 2 was reduced to just three. This created significant commotion.
Thirty versus three. Despite the tenfold difference, the profits generated by Division 2 consistently surpassed those of Division 1.
Naturally, Strategic Investment Operations Division 1 tasted the bitterness of defeat every time such results emerged.
Ding―
At that moment, in Division 1’s office, Team Leader Jang Doo-jin invited the deputy managers and team leaders to a group chat.
[Strategic Investment Operations Division 2 (6 Members)]
.
.
[Team Leader Jang Doo-jin]: It seems Director Myung Un-seok is in a bad mood today, so let’s all be careful.
[Team Leader Heo Tae-woo]: Is this some kind of perpetual rainy season or what…
[Team Leader Kim Guk-hwan]: Honestly, I can’t understand how Division 2 manages to work with only three people.
[Team Leader Jang Doo-jin]: Team Leader Kim, Team Leader Ji, you both worked under Director Baek Shin-woo before. Don’t you have any insights?
The chat among Division 1’s team leaders moved quickly.
Since their performance was always overshadowed by Baek Shin-woo’s results, they were desperate to come up with countermeasures to improve their own standing.
Kim Jong-soo, who had worked in the operations department until recently, joined in the conversation.
[Team Leader Kim Jong-soo]: Director Baek Shin-woo never shared details about the projects he handled personally.
[Team Leader Heo Tae-woo]: Not a single one?
[Team Leader Jang Doo-jin]: Come on, really? They worked in the same office.
Kim Jong-soo was just as frustrated.
What if he hadn’t opposed Baek Shin-woo’s proposal to handle projects independently back then?
Perhaps the position now occupied by Lillian Foster, who had abruptly arrived at MH’s headquarters alongside Jang Man-soo, could have been his.
[Team Leader Ji Young-sook]: Team Leader Kim Jong-soo is right. Director Baek Shin-woo has never disclosed anything.
[Team Leader Kim Guk-hwan]: That’s seriously impressive. I heard their third-quarter profits are expected to be high again.
[Team Leader Heo Tae-woo]: At this rate, there’ll be another uproar when the third quarter ends.
[Team Leader Jang Doo-jin]: Where does Director Baek Shin-woo even get his investment information? Could he really be engaged in insider trading?
[Team Leader Kim Guk-hwan]: If that were the case, it would’ve been a huge scandal already.
Even the team leaders weren’t naive. They understood the invisible war within the owner family of MH Group.
If Baek Shin-woo, the chairman’s illegitimate grandson, had engaged in illegal activities, the other family members wouldn’t have stayed silent.
[Team Leader Jang Doo-jin]: I heard the chairman thinks very highly of him. Could he be protecting him?
[Team Leader Kim Guk-hwan]: As if that’s so easy to do.
[Team Leader Jang Doo-jin]: But why is Deputy Manager Na so quiet today?
It was unusual for Deputy Manager Na Jung-hyun, usually the most talkative, to remain silent.
As the conversation continued, the door to the private office opened, and Myung Un-seok stepped out.
Everyone froze, their hands halting above their keyboards.
A tense silence filled the room as Myung Un-seok walked past, completely ignoring the atmosphere, and left the office.
Only then did the employees let out sighs of relief.
Breaking the silence, Jang Doo-jin turned to Na Jung-hyun, who sat near the office door.
“Deputy Manager! Is something wrong today?”
“Huh? What do you mean?”
“You’ve been unusually quiet in the chat.”
“…Chat? What chat?”
A chilling sensation ran down Jang Doo-jin and the other team leaders’ spines.
They quickly checked the participant list of the chat window on their computers, their faces turning pale.
[Director Myung Un-seok]
Instead of Deputy Manager Na Jung-hyun, they had mistakenly added Director Myung Un-seok to the group chat.
“Team Leader Jang!!”
“What were you thinking?!”
The team leaders erupted in panicked complaints.
.
.
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Meanwhile, outside the office, Myung Un-seok stood in front of the elevator with a grim expression.
He had just seen the entire chat conversation after being accidentally added.
Of course, nothing they said was wrong.
If Baek Shin-woo had resorted to illegal methods, they would have already found a way to bring him down.
Just then, the door to the Strategic Investment Headquarters opened, and Lillian Foster stepped out.
Noticing her, Myung Un-seok offered a slight nod, which she returned with a silent, subtle bow.
Still surprised by her quiet demeanour, Myung Un-seok cautiously spoke.
“Are you managing the work well?”
“…More or less.”
A moment of silence passed before Myung Un-seok spoke again.
“I thought you were someone who pursued practical benefits… It’s disappointing.”
Lillian smiled faintly.
“…Are you saying you represent practical benefits?”
“It’s not too late. I don’t know why you decided to work under Director Baek Shin-woo, but it’s still possible to change sides.”
“That’s odd.”
Her cryptic reply made Myung Un-seok frown slightly.
“What’s odd?”
“I chose Director Baek Shin-woo because I find him more practical than you.”
“Your judgment seems to lack clarity.”
“To me, it’s Director Myung Un-seok’s judgment that’s questionable. The results so far speak for themselves.”
Myung Un-seok clenched his fists tightly.
Her words directly compared his performance to Baek Shin-woo’s.
Ding―
The elevator arrived on the 32nd floor, and the doors opened.
As Lillian stepped inside, she lifted one corner of her mouth into a smirk.
“Aren’t you coming?”
“…I just remembered something I need to do. You go ahead.”
Without hesitation, the elevator doors closed.
Left alone, Myung Un-seok stood in thought for a moment before pulling out his phone to check his messages.
[Tonight at 8. Cheongdam-dong, Artemis. You’ve been skipping these meetings lately. If you don’t show up this time, everyone’s going to cut you off.]
The message was from Ahn Seung-joo, the son of the chairman of S-One Finance, a massive financial corporation, and a friend since high school.
They used to meet frequently for drinks, but after the revelation of Im Hee-yeon’s existence as the chairman’s illegitimate daughter, Myung Un-seok avoided him, knowing what kind of gossip might surface.
“Sigh…”
Still, he couldn’t ignore these social ties. Especially not with S-One Finance, one of the leading private lending companies in the country. Ahn Seung-joo was its heir.
Despite his violent temper and excessive indulgence in alcohol and women, their high school friendship had been beneficial precisely because of his family’s wealth and connections.
Besides, the gatherings Ahn Seung-joo mentioned were attended by many other second-generation chaebols.
[Why aren’t you replying when I know you’ve read it?]
Another message popped up, prompting Myung Un-seok to sigh deeply as he typed his response.
[I’ll come.]
[Great! See you there.]
Resolving himself, Myung Un-seok turned and resumed his steps toward his next task.
***
Unlike the noisy Strategic Investment Operations Division 1, the office of Division 2 was quiet, with only the sound of keyboards filling the air.
Suddenly, Jang Man-soo, seated to the right of Shin-woo, sprang to his feet, waving his yellow tie.
“Done!”
Startled, Shin-woo frowned.
“What’s done? Did you win the lottery or something?”
“Decryption program!”
It was for decoding the encrypted messages on the phones that Nam In-hwang and Moon Tae-beom had carried when they tried to kill Shin-woo but were instead captured.
“Already?”
It hadn’t even been a week since the incident.
“It was quicker than expected. As always, my brain is extraordinary! Hmph!”
Jang Man-soo propped one foot on his chair and rested his chin on his fingers with a smug expression.
Seeing this, Shin-woo glanced at him with a mix of pity and amusement before approaching his desk.
“So, how long will it take to decode?”
“It’ll be done in no time!”
All the data on the phones had already been transferred to LEUCO’s server by Jang Man-soo.
He immediately ran the decryption program on LEUCO, connecting it to the server.
[LEUCO Cryptography Program Booting]
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.
The encrypted messages were entered into the program.
Just then, the elevator doors opened, and Lillian walked in with a look of extreme displeasure.
“What happened?”
“I stopped by the Strategic Investment Headquarters and ran into Myung Un-seok on my way to the Management Headquarters.”
Ever since meeting Lillian at Livio Soft, Myung Un-seok had shown personal interest in her.
Even after she chose to join Division 2 under Shin-woo, his behaviour hadn’t changed.
“You didn’t lose your temper and punch him, did you? That would cause unnecessary trouble within the company.”
“Do you think I’m a child? He started something by bringing up your name, so I just ignored him. But honestly, can’t we get rid of him quietly? We could place an IED in an appropriate spot and make him disappear without a trace.”
An IED (Improvised Explosive Device) is a makeshift bomb created using everyday items.
From this, Shin-woo could sense how deeply Lillian detested Myung Un-seok.
“Do you want to end up on Interpol’s Red Notice list?”
“I wouldn’t get caught.”
At the moment, Lillian was just a fresh graduate from Stanford, newly starting her career.
She didn’t yet have the career history of working in CIA EOD teams, counter-terrorism units, or as a mercenary demolitions expert, which would make her a suspect.
“This isn’t a battlefield; it’s South Korea. Whether it’s guns or bombs, one explosion here would cause chaos.”
“Ugh, fine.”
Hearing this, Jang Man-soo clicked his tongue as he continued his work.
“Honestly… all you think about is blowing things up.”
“What? Jang Dumpling! Do you wanna die?”
“I’ve told you not to call me ‘Dumpling’!”
“And why do you call him ‘Captain’?!”
As usual, the two of them bickered like children having an argument.
“Both of you, stop it.”
“But she keeps picking fights with me!”
“And you keep talking about blowing things up! Is that appropriate workplace talk?”
“Hey! Don’t lecture your senior…”
Their petty fight resumed, causing Shin-woo to shake his head.
‘Seriously, they’re unbelievable.’
Just then, the content on Jang Man-soo’s screen changed.
“Ah—! It’s done! It was a 3-column alphabetic transposition cipher. Pretty outdated compared to the encryption methods used by Unit 666 in our time.”
Everyone nodded in agreement.
On the screen, one of the decrypted messages appeared.
[CQNMGMQEYHH]
▷ Decoded: SONECEOKILL
The 11 characters, once decrypted, clearly spelled out the English phrase: SONE CEO KILL.
“When did this come in?”
“It was received late last year and then deleted.”
Other decrypted messages also contained ominous phrases like KILL, WAIT, and CLEAR.
“Can you find information about this ‘S-One’ company?”
“Hold on.”
With quick keystrokes, Jang Man-soo pulled up information on his screen.
“S-One Finance, a financial company. Last year, its founding chairman, Ahn Geun-seok, and the second chairman, Ahn Byung-in, both died in a car accident.”
“Who’s running it now?”
“The daughter-in-law, Yoo Ji-young, and she has one son, Ahn Seung-joo.”
The screen filled with news articles and records about the car accident.
“The case was closed as the result of drowsy driving by the chauffeur. The inheritance, either through a will or as a substitute succession, all went to the daughter-in-law.”
“That makes sense. But given that these messages were on their phones, it means it wasn’t an accident.”
The likely scenario was obvious.
In a situation like this, the person who benefited the most would have been in league with them.
“Yoo Ji-young is the most suspicious. Check the other messages for company names. If there are any, search them all.”
“Got it.”
Jang Man-soo began pulling up names one by one.
On the screen, the number of articles about changes in company leadership or related incidents continued to grow.
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