Ilhyeon Electronics' working hours had been fixed at seven o'clock back when Chairman Tak-hyeon Lee was president of Ilhyeon Electronics, on the principle of coming in earlier than anyone and working more.

Because of it, the Ilhyeon Electronics commuter buses bound for Suwon were famous for moving at the same hour as the first trains of the dawn.

The meeting times were famously peculiar as well: the major meetings began at six, before the start of the working day, and sometimes earlier still.

As a result, the companies doing business with Ilhyeon Electronics had no choice but to work at matching the ferocious speed of Ilhyeon Electronics' clock.

They had to be standing by from seven to take a call from Ilhyeon Electronics, and to meet with Ilhyeon Electronics they would arrive there by six.

And so, naturally, the start of the working day for the people and the firms dealing with Ilhyeon Electronics shifted to seven, and the start of the working day in the area around the Suwon Ilhyeon Electronics plant had shifted to seven as well.

"Is this right…?"

The man looked up, and into his eyes came a sky already bright, the sun risen at some point without his noticing.

"Something feels off about this…"

Still looking up, the man spoke to the colleague walking beside him.

His colleague looked up at the sky in the same way and let out a helpless laugh.

"Coming in to work while the sun is up… you have to wonder whether it's allowed."

"It's allowed."

The man said it in a voice of conviction and clapped his colleague on the back.

Then, walking ahead toward the company, he said:

"It's our company that was strange."

"…Something was wrong with it, and badly wrong at that."

His colleague agreed, and the man raised his voice further and began listing the things that had rankled all this time.

"The plant runs twenty-four hours on three shifts anyway, so that's beside the point, and I'll grant there's an upside in getting to come in when the roads are clear, outside rush hour.…