While the Goliath crane was being installed at Ilhyeon Heavy Industries' Ulsan shipyard, Byeong-jin visited an apartment in Ulsan.
It was the downtown apartment where Director Beom-mu Kim lived.
"Who's this? Isn't it Director Jo?"
Beom-mu Kim, seeing Byeong-jin outside his door, greeted him with startled eyes.
"Surprised you, did I?"
Byeong-jin smiled and approached.
"Of course I'm surprised — how could I not be? Director Jo, waiting right outside my home."
Beom-mu Kim ran a hand down his chest and looked around.
"But what brings you here? Don't tell me… you came all this way to see me?"
Unable to think of any reason Byeong-jin would seek him out, Beom-mu Kim felt puzzled.
"Of course. I came to see you, naturally. Only… surely you don't intend for us to keep talking standing out here?"
"That's…"
Now that Byeong-jin had come this far, there was no way to avoid inviting him in.
But letting Byeong-jin — Seong-ho's closest confidant, of all people — into his home made Beom-mu Kim uncomfortable, and the invitation didn't come easily.
Realizing at last there was no other way, he forced the words out.
"…Since you've come all this way, come in."
Beom-mu Kim managed the words and went inside.
As they entered, the voice of a middle-aged woman in a cardigan reached them.
"Dear. What brings you home at this hour?"
"Say hello. This is Director Jo, from our company."
"I'm sorry. I know it's rude to call at such a late hour, but here I am."
"Not at all. Please, come in. But…"
Beom-mu Kim's wife stood by the shoe cabinet, studying Byeong-jin as he came in with her husband.
"You seem awfully young to be a Director?"
Finding it strange that Byeong-jin looked too young to be an executive, she'd raised it before she could stop herself.
Having taken off his shoes first, Beom-mu Kim, worried his wife might make some blunder, spoke up.
"He came down from Seoul with the President."
"The President — you mean the Chairman's—"
"Yes. He came down from the group with the President, so leave it…