"Whose, did you say?"

"The son of Chairman Ha Cheolgon's youngest boy, sir."

"His youngest boy? Isn't the youngest a daughter?"

"Ha Donghwi. There is one son who was taken off the family register a long time ago."

"Ah! That's right. Ha Donghwi."

One of the ordinary penthouse units of the Signiel. It is in use in the Latte Group's name.

The tallest building in the Republic of Korea, the lifelong wish of the late honorary chairman Jo Gyeongho.

The wish had been met, but the blow was heavy. The sunk costs were not small.

Above all, the failure to get the distribution business into China had dealt the group a serious further blow.

A political problem nobody had foreseen, coming to the surface.

Which is why Jo Seongbin, chairman of Latte, has been feeling markedly low-spirited of late.

In the past the group had sat squarely inside the top five of the chaebol rankings; now it is somewhere around sixth or seventh.

His elder brother had picked at Jo Seongbin's present position, called it incompetence, and attempted a revolt.

Trouble within and trouble without!

At weekends he sometimes spends time, as he is doing today, in the Signiel penthouse that had been his father's lifelong wish.

He drinks a little sake and thinks of his father. He had no need of anything to eat alongside it.

Drinking sake neat and looking out at the night view beyond the window was enough by itself to mend him.

Today his attending secretary had come in with news.

As it was, he had felt on arriving at the hotel that the air of the Signiel was up today, more than usual.

It was a signal from the animal sense that only an owner can feel.

"Is he somebody you know, sir?"

"He is. Director Myeong, you would have been a new recruit at the time, so you would not know. It was the talk of this trade back then. Chairman Ha Cheolgon's youngest boy went against his father's wishes and was thrown out of the house."

"So there was a business like…