The out-of-wedlock story spread among people even faster than the Doa Motors bidding had.

"Come on, wouldn't a chaebol have a lover or two on the side?"

"Well, that's true. With that much money, he'd have plenty of women too."

"Right. It's not some wild, far-fetched tale."

"But the problem is he got caught."

The two men seated at the drinking table were passing the time with talk about Mun-jong.

"Whether he meets a woman outside or a man, what's it matter? If no one knows, it's no matter at all. But this time he got caught. And with a child, no less."

"Well, that is the problem. The child's the problem, all right."

Nodding as if in agreement with his friend, the man tipped his glass, threw back a shot of soju, and asked,

"But is this story even true?"

"If every outlet is blaring it, isn't it true? Would they blare it with no evidence at all?"

"That's true too. Blaring it without evidence, they'd have all of Ilhyeon Group's ads yanked. But it's strange. Usually a chaebol blocks stories like this, no? How'd they leave it alone until it got this far?"

"That's a mystery to me too. Even if it isn't true, a bad story like this is a pure minus once it spreads, so they should've blocked it before it got out—what on earth were they thinking, just leaving it?"

Tipping their glasses, the two expressed their puzzlement with faces that didn't understand. And this puzzlement wasn't felt by those two alone. It was the feeling of everyone who'd heard of the Ilhyeon Group scandal. And because of that feeling, the scandal spread among people more and more as if it were the truth.

The members of Tak-hyeon's family gathered at Pyeongchang-dong showed their dismay at the scandal.

"Now it's not just the broadcasts—my friends have started calling to ask too. Whether I really got a new niece or nephew. I'm so embarrassed I can't even answer."

Recalling the moment a friend had phoned, Jeong-eun felt the shame again, flushed, and turned to Chang-jong.

"What…