“What did you say just now! Moved to the royal suite??”

The director’s office at the DMC agency.

Yang Docheol, who had been sitting in his chair with his legs crossed, let out a roar.

Gu Miryeo, shaking in every limb as she reported the previous night’s business, did not know where to put herself.

“Yes…….”

“Why?”

“That is…….”

“Don’t tell me Seo Dahui turned out to be some upstart’s daughter we didn’t know about?”

“That is not it.”

“Then?”

“There was…… a man.”

“What!!”

“And right next door, at that.”

“A man? Next door? Who?”

Yang Docheol’s eyes glittered.

It is astonishing news.

Seo Dahui the singer-songwriter, who had done nothing but music and played the innocent.

And there is a man next door?

She has been shelling pumpkin seeds behind everybody’s back properly.

“The man’s name is Ha Tae-ung, they say…….”

Gu Miryeo, shoulders drawn in, held her breath.

She knows Yang Docheol’s usual character well.

He is an entertainment-world punk of a producer, a leftover from the past.

To this day he lays hands on his managers, and on the artists under contract who have nobody behind them.

Particularly frequent is picking out women artists he has marked and putting them into entertaining.

Yang Docheol, whose conduct is a gangster’s, got past the MeToo issue as well.

That is how thoroughly he holds the weak points of the artists under him as his final card.

To a man like that, the Seo Dahui business is the best news there could be.

“A sponsor?”

“Sorry?”

“That’s it! That bastard took the hotel for her, didn’t he?”

“Yes…….”

“Puhahahahahahahaha.”

Certain of the situation, Yang Docheol let out a laugh loud enough to lift the director’s office off its base.

“Holding her head up haughtily, playing the innocent, and what she’s actually doing is the demimonde?”

Yang Docheol reached his answer out of the varied experience he has behind him.

What sort of madman would provide a woman with a royal suite for nothing in return.

A hotel stay costing several million won a night, and taken for a whole month — it is obvious.

Unless it is a sponsor arrangement it cannot be explained.

“Miryeo-ya.”

“Yes. Director.”

“What did I tell you to do?”

“……Drive Dahui out.”

“And what is this result? The manager didn’t even notice?”

Yang Docheol, raising the corner of his mouth sourly.

Gu Miryeo trembled.

“The Signiel is nice, is it?”

“…….”

“Use it for a while, as promised.”

“Th— thank you!”

“Thank me for what……. It’s coming off your wages.”

“Sorry??”

“Isn’t that obvious? Am I the one living there? You are. Heh heh heh heh.”

“…….”

Gu Miryeo was thrown.

A manager’s wages, no bigger than a rat’s tail.

That money cannot carry the Signiel’s monthly rent.

And the service charge on top of it…….

“Hk…… hk.”

Gu Miryeo, hiccupping in her confusion.

She had not known Yang Docheol would come at her as meanly and as filthily as this.

Gu Miryeo, who in trying to catch Seo Dahui by the ankle had ended up caught by the ankle herself.

Trickle, trickle, trickle.

Gu Miryeo let hot tears run without meaning to.

“Don’t snivel, get out! I can’t even stand the look of your face, you jinx!”

Yang Docheol’s abuse went on without mercy.

Gu Miryeo turned away without wiping her tears and without a squeak out of her.

Seo Dahui came up in her head as she turned.

Fucking bitch! This is all because of that bitch!!

Once things had gone wrong, all Gu Miryeo’s resentment turned toward Seo Dahui.

I’ll finish you! Uwaaaaaah!!

“Are you all right?”

“With what?”

“Today…….”

School, as though peace had settled on it.

Really rather good.

Yesterday I went over the investment schedule until dawn.

I was busy setting it up so that it could all be handled with the one smartphone.

The hour of fate has come right up in front of me.

The heart responds first.

The first fruit of what I invested straight after the regression.

It is the result of holding my concentration through the middle of a run of incidents.

Fortunately the butterfly effect did not work to any great extent.

Today I had notice of a Management Studies Society meeting.

We gathered once the regular lessons had finished.

Lee Hyoju asked after me.

“Why, are you worried?”

“No — aren’t you?”

“No.”

“Haa…….”

Lee Hyoju shook her head.

Anxiety can be read in her face.

There is no longer anybody in the classroom who provokes me.

The canteen is the same.

The pupils only steal looks at me with complicated eyes.

Those who come up to me easily, without watching how it will look, are not many.

Good in every respect.

The rumour that I am a crown prince thrown out of the Haryun Group family goes about, but it does not matter.

The privilege of a bloodline that cannot be denied is not small.

However much everybody would like to disregard it, I am Chairman Ha Cheolgon’s grandson.

And on top of that my financial strength is solid.

And a man like that is going to shrink?

“Heh heh.”

“What’s that laugh?”

“Confidence with grounds under it.”

“Woow…….”

A gasp broke out of Lee Hyoju’s mouth.

This cool nerve of mine was completed by military service.

During Special Forces training I drove myself to the limit, moment by moment.

I picked out and took the training that most of the Special Forces branch shrink from as well.

I stood shoulder to shoulder with the UDT and the Marine Corps reconnaissance.

I was hard enough that even they put a thumb up when we parted.

It is the largest reason I was not afraid when my girlfriend dumped me and the company cut me loose.

And now, on top of that, I have the money I did not have then.

“Let’s go in.”

Lee Hyoju is a Management Studies Society member too.

A society within the school, and at the same time a gathering not in the least like a society.

I opened the door and went inside.

And in that moment!

Snap-snap-snap!

Looks driving straight into my face, and stinging.

There are some I know by sight, but the greater half of the members are meeting me for the first time.

“You’ve come?”

From the head of the table, in the president’s chair, Kang Junu welcomed me with a smile.

“…….”

But the faces of the others are not glad in the least.

Lee Jeongjun, the son of the parents’ association president, glared coldly, perhaps because of his defeat by me.

The ones related to Lee Hyoju as cousins catch the eye first.

Lee Jeongho’s eyes are fierce as well.

The Management Studies Society, where membership is given only to the children of the country’s hundred great chaebol houses.

I met the eyes of every one of them, slowly.

The members number about twenty.

The smile at the corner of my mouth thrown in.

“……!!”

“…….”

They show a range of feelings — confusion, or anger, irritation, curiosity, turning away, and the rest.

The eyes and the faces holding their various feelings are a sight to see.

Cute little bastards!

Meeting eyes with a good many of them, my gaze collided with one girl’s — snap!

A bright smile.

A girl pupil who smiled the moment her eyes met mine.

That personage, whom I too knew well already.

The third year’s queen, of Cheonghwa High School’s three great beauties, and…….

“Oh my~ so you’re Tae-ung?”

(End of Chapter 109)