The aides gathered in the Blue House annex were in the middle of a heated argument.

“We’re better at exports. So hand over your electronics division. You people can barely keep up with domestic sales, but we sell to five billion people worldwide — of course we should be the ones to keep it.”

The Sunwoo Group representative needled the KF Group representative.

The KF Group man laughed in disbelief, rolled up his sleeves, and shot back.

“Hey. You’ve only existed for twenty years — where do you get off lecturing anyone? We’re sixty. Sixty years. When your group’s chairman was still toddling around in diapers, our founding chairman was out selling goods door to door. You understand that?”

“If being old made you good at business, why bother drawing up sales strategy at all? Just hang a sign out front and coast.”

“What did you say?”

As the tension climbed, Seong-ho Kim sat quietly, eating an apple.

The argument only grew rougher.

“Let’s be blunt — is there anyone in this room who doesn’t know your company’s rotten from the roots up even while you’re moving units? Everyone in this business knows Sunwoo Group sells at a loss.”

“We sell at a loss? Says who? Have you even looked at our actual financials? Our annual operating profit runs into the hundreds of billions.”

“Is there anyone who doesn’t know those financials are fake?”

“What? You little—”

“Little what? Have you lost your mind?”

“What is all this commotion?”

At the rising voices, the Blue House secretary who had briefly stepped out returned to the room.

He moved to separate the Sunwoo and KF representatives, who were now on their feet, glaring at each other.

The Mirae Group representative, watching the standoff with no idea what to do, glanced over at Byeong-jin Jo — who was calmly eating an apple — and hesitantly spoke up.

“Um…”

Byeong-jin Jo, in the middle of putting another apple slice in his mouth, turned at the sound of someone addressing him and looked at the Mirae Group man.

“Yes? Were you calling me?”

The man turned his whole body toward Byeong-jin and greeted him.

“Hello. I’m Jong-hun Han of Mirae Group.”

“Ah — yes.”

At Jong-hun Han’s greeting, Byeong-jin extended his hand.

“Byeong-jin Jo, Ilhyeon Group.”

The two exchanged a brief handshake.

Byeong-jin let go and looked at Jong-hun Han with an expression that asked why he’d been called over.

Jong-hun Han glanced once at the Sunwoo and KF representatives, who had settled somewhat under the secretary’s mediation, and spoke.

“How does Ilhyeon feel about all this?”

“Feel about what, exactly?”

“What are you thinking of doing, is what I mean.”

Jong-hun Han of Mirae Group asked Byeong-jin plainly.

“Honestly, I just think things would go more smoothly going forward if everyone spoke frankly about what they actually want, without hiding it.”

Jong-hun Han lowered his voice further as he spoke to Byeong-jin.

“If we could line up what we’d give, what we’d take, and the price for each…”

He glanced again toward the Sunwoo and KF men, who were now back in their seats, cooling off, and added:

“Wouldn’t that spare us scenes like that?”

Byeong-jin followed his gaze to the Sunwoo and KF representatives and nodded.

“Certainly, knowing each other’s thinking in advance would head off a lot of unpleasantness.”

“Exactly. What reason would there be for anyone to lose their temper? So… what is Ilhyeon thinking?”

Jong-hun Han studied Byeong-jin with a meaningful look.

He’d come along as an aide to Head Seong-ho Kim, but he’d assumed there was still something to be gained here.

What came out of Byeong-jin’s mouth, though, was nothing he’d expected.

“You’re not wrong, but… that’s really not something that concerns us.”

“Sorry? Not something that concerns Ilhyeon?”

Byeong-jin popped another apple slice into his mouth and said,

“We don’t intend to take anything, and we don’t intend to give up anything.”

“…What?”

“We were told to come by the Blue House, so we came, but our Head said he has no interest in the Big Deal. We’re only here to listen. You don’t need to worry about us.”

“Just… listen?”

Jong-hun Han stared at Byeong-jin with a baffled expression.

He had no idea what to make of the fact that the largest company in South Korea claimed to have no interest in this Big Deal.

And the very same reaction was playing out in the room facing theirs.

“You’re saying Ilhyeon Group won’t be participating in the Big Deal?”

Deputy Prime Minister Jang-chul Hwang frowned at Seong-ho Kim.

“Is there some dissatisfaction with what the government is doing here?”

“Dissatisfaction? Not at all.”

Seong-ho Kim glanced around at the representatives of the various groups — faces he now recognized from several prior meetings — and said,

“We simply don’t want for anything. And we don’t have much worth putting on the table, either.”

“Nothing worth putting on the table? So you mean to hold onto everything and offer up nothing?”

The head of Sunwoo Group’s Restructuring Headquarters raised his voice at Seong-ho.

Seong-ho glanced toward the Sunwoo side, smiled faintly, and said,

“Very well. Then let’s put Ilhyeon Petrochemical on the table. Would Sunwoo Group be interested in acquiring Ilhyeon Petrochemical?”

“Of course.”

Sunwoo answered loudly, as if afraid Seong-ho might take the offer back.

Seong-ho, as though he’d expected exactly this reaction, smiled and continued.

“Good. We’ll set the price at ten percent above the current market valuation. Will you proceed with the acquisition?”

“Certainly. We’ll—”

The Sunwoo director, about to commit, hesitated.

At that moment, the head of Mirae Group’s Strategic Planning Office spoke up, looking at the Sunwoo director.

“Ilhyeon Petrochemical’s market cap is ten trillion won. Does Sunwoo Group actually have that kind of capacity?”

Considering the company had once been valued at over twenty trillion before the currency crisis hit, ten trillion almost sounded like a bargain.

But factoring in Ilhyeon’s forty-percent stake, the acquisition price alone would run to 4.4 trillion won.

The Sunwoo director had no answer for the question.

4.4 trillion won was a sum that towered far beyond anything Sunwoo Group could realistically raise.

Seong-ho watched the Sunwoo director fall silent, then turned back to Deputy PM Jang-chul Hwang.

“As you can see, what we hold isn’t small. Rather than us offering things up first, I think it makes more sense to hear what others actually want, and then sell if the price seems reasonable. That would be the better approach.”

“…That would be the more rational approach.”

Deputy PM Jang-chul Hwang had no choice but to concede the point.

The scale is different.

Jang-chul Hwang looked around at the representatives of the five major groups gathered together and let out a low sigh.

Ilhyeon Group might be lumped in with the other four under the “five major groups” label, but he was reminded all over again just how different its actual scale was.

Even before the currency crisis, Ilhyeon had consistently held the number one spot in Korea’s corporate rankings.

And having weathered the crisis so successfully through restructuring, the gap between it and the rest had only widened further.

Ilhyeon Group was no longer at a scale where it could simply be handed something and expected to take it — nor, if it decided it wanted something, could the other groups do anything to stop it.

Jang-chul Hwang shook his head lightly and said,

“Then let’s sort out the other groups first, setting Ilhyeon aside. KF Group, what about you? What are you willing to put forward?”

“Rather than offering something up, we want Sunwoo Group’s Sunwoo Electronics.”

“Nonsense.”

At the words of KF Group’s chief secretary, the head of Sunwoo’s Restructuring Headquarters snapped.

“What’s nonsense about it?”

“What would KF Group even do with Sunwoo Electronics? If anything, we want KF Electronics.”

“KF Electronics? As if you could actually hold onto it if we gave it to you.”

The two men, worked up, forgot even to keep up polite speech in an official setting and started shouting at each other.

“Could we hold onto it if you gave it to us? Do you think we’re Ilhyeon Electronics or something?”

The Sunwoo director gestured toward Seong-ho, sitting quietly, and said,

“Ilhyeon Electronics is worth over forty trillion. You people are what, three or four hundred billion at best? You think we couldn’t swallow that too?”

“That’s—”

“So hand it over.”

“Don’t talk nonsense. We’ll acquire Sunwoo Electronics at the same price — you hand it over.”

“Hand over what? You’re the ones who said you’d give it up first.”

“I asked if you could even hold onto it if we gave it — when did I say we’d give it?”

“It’s not like you’re farting out of your mouth — how are you talking such nonsense with a straight face?”

“What did you say?”

The KF Group representative shot up out of his seat.

The Sunwoo representative rose right after him.

The two men glared at each other as if ready to come to blows, and Deputy PM Jang-chul Hwang buried his face in his hands.

Seong-ho merely watched the scene, looking rather entertained by it.

Looking as though a headache was setting in, Deputy PM Jang-chul Hwang pressed a hand to his head, rose from his seat, and brought the meeting to a close.

“Let’s stop here for today. We’ll be in touch separately about the next session. In the meantime, I’d ask each group to settle on what they’re prepared to give up before the next meeting.”

“Yes, understood.”

“We’ll do that.”

Even as Jang-chul Hwang told them to sort things out in advance, he suspected that people unwilling to let go of what they held while wanting only what belonged to others weren’t likely to change their minds no matter how many more times they met.

Jang-chul Hwang knew this well enough, but he said no more and simply ended the session.

It wasn’t as though he himself had some clever solution in hand.

Before leaving, he turned to Seong-ho.

“Head Kim. If you have a moment, could I speak with you briefly?”

Seong-ho paused for a moment at the request before answering.

“Yes, that’s fine.”

At Seong-ho’s answer, Jang-chul Hwang called over an official from the Blue House’s protocol office and instructed him to see the representatives of the other four groups out properly.

“Shall we follow me, then?”

As the official led them out, the representatives of the four groups glanced once at Seong-ho.

Then they turned and filed out of the annex after the official.

Watching them go, Jang-chul Hwang pressed his thumb and forefinger to his temple for a moment, then turned to Seong-ho with a faint smile.

“I expected it would be like this. It was worse.”

“Everyone was so reluctant to give anything up — I imagine it was frustrating to watch. I understand.”

At Seong-ho’s words of understanding, Jang-chul Hwang lowered the hand from his temple and gestured for him to sit back down.

Just then, the door the four group representatives had exited through opened again, and several people stepped in.

Turning toward the door, Seong-ho rose sharply to his feet.

The people who had entered were President Dae-sang Kim, Senior Economic Secretary Su-myeong Do, and Prime Minister Jung-pyo Kim.

Seong-ho bowed quickly to greet President Dae-sang Kim.

“How have you been, sir?”

“Yes. Head Seong-ho Kim. Have you been well?”

Still bowed, Seong-ho carefully took President Dae-sang Kim’s offered hand.

“It’s been a while.”

“Yes. I had the honor of meeting you alongside my father-in-law, back in your days before the throne — I’m grateful you remember it.”

“Ha-ha-ha, ‘before the throne’… I’m no such thing. This isn’t the Joseon dynasty…”

Dae-sang Kim didn’t seem to mind the phrase, laughing as he lightly clapped Seong-ho’s shoulder.

Once the greeting was finished, Dae-sang Kim gestured for Seong-ho to sit back down and took the chair Jang-chul Hwang had been sitting in just moments before.

Jang-chul Hwang took the seat beside Dae-sang Kim, and the Senior Economic Secretary and Prime Minister filled in the remaining chairs.

“How did the talks go? Did they wrap up well?”

President Dae-sang Kim asked, turning to Deputy PM Jang-chul Hwang.

Jang-chul Hwang shook his head and answered,

“My apologies. I wasn’t capable enough — we made no progress at all.”

“Not at all. Don’t say that. If the Deputy Prime Minister lacked virtue, what would that make me, who appointed him, or the Prime Minister here?”

Dae-sang Kim gestured to himself and Prime Minister Jung-pyo Kim as he spoke.

“Wasn’t this exactly what we expected? So don’t let it weigh on you too much.”

“Thank you, sir.”

As Jang-chul Hwang bowed his head, Dae-sang Kim turned to face Seong-ho.

The moment their eyes met, Seong-ho felt he already knew why he’d been asked to stay.

Seated in a circle around him were the Deputy Prime Minister, the Senior Economic Secretary, the Prime Minister, and the President himself.

In a room where ordinary pressure would have been more than most people could bear, Seong-ho instead found his mind already racing ahead — toward how he might turn this very moment to his advantage.

(End of Chapter 151)