Chapter 8
Lunchtime at the KJ Group cafeteria.
"There's a seat here."
Lee Ju-hee sat down first with her tray, followed by Park So-young and Choi Yu-ri, who took the seats across from her.
Though they worked in different departments, the three usually ate lunch together.
"Ugh, I thought I was going to die today."
Lee Ju-hee sighed as she took a spoonful of soup.
"Why?"
Park So-young looked up.
"Our team leader's at it again."
"What is it this time?"
"Revising the proposal. I'm so sick of it."
"How many times now?"
"Nine."
"...That's insane."
Park So-young let out a dry laugh.
"Tell me about it!"
Lee Ju-hee waved her chopsticks as if she'd been waiting for the cue.
"He said it was good yesterday, but today he says it lacks emotional appeal."
"It lacks emotional appeal? What does an ad proposal need with emotion?"
"Exactly!"
As the two continued their back-and-forth,
Choi Yu-ri, who'd been quietly eating beside them, chuckled.
"At least your team leader actually tells you what's wrong, Ju-hee unni. Our team just tells us to bring it back."
"That's even worse."
"I know."
All three burst out laughing.
It was an ordinary lunch break.
It was almost always like this.
When the talkative Lee Ju-hee started a conversation, Park So-young would respond here and there, while the youngest, Choi Yu-ri, laughed and chimed in.
"Oh, right."
Then Lee Ju-hee's eyes suddenly lit up as if she'd remembered something.
"Did you guys hear?"
"Hear what?"
At Park So-young's question, Lee Ju-hee started to speak.
"The CEO—
"..."
But her words abruptly cut off.
'Oh.'
She'd belatedly remembered what had happened during their last lunch break.
Back then, when Kang Tae-seong had come up, Park So-young had shown an unusually blatant hostility toward him.
'Why did I bring it up? Ugh... idiot.'
Lee Ju-hee bit her lip for a moment.
Choi Yu-ri also glanced at her, gauging her reaction.
Reading the mood, Park So-young spoke first.
"It's okay. You can talk about the CEO."
The two looked at her at the same time.
Park So-young picked up a side dish with her chopsticks and spoke calmly.
"...From what I've seen, he isn't that bad a person."
"Huh?"
Lee Ju-hee's eyes widened.
Park So-young quietly continued.
"What you said before, Ju-hee. That people might have changed."
"...Yeah."
"When I thought about it, I realized that might really be true."
"..."
Silence fell over the table for a moment.
Lee Ju-hee and Choi Yu-ri glanced at each other.
They were both thinking the same thing.
'That's unexpected.'
No, "unexpected" didn't even begin to cover it.
Ever since joining the company, Park So-young had kept a certain distance from male employees.
Of course, she did have a boyfriend.
Lee Jun-ho from the company's Sales Team.
With him around, she had no reason to get unnecessarily close to other men.
She kept a proper distance at company dinners, and naturally cut off conversations when male employees tried to get friendly.
She never brought up other men first, either, apart from her boyfriend, Assistant Manager Lee Jun-ho, and she rarely praised other men.
She'd always say Jun-ho oppa was the best—
It was something she said all the time.
And now Park So-young was speaking well of Kang Tae-seong?
"Wait, wait."
Lee Ju-hee leaned forward, as if she'd caught a whiff of something.
"Why the sudden... change of heart about the CEO?"
Choi Yu-ri nodded too.
"I know, right? It's really surprising to hear you say that, So-young unni. Did something happen between you and the CEO?"
"...!"
At that moment, that night came back to Park So-young.
Her late walk home from work, the deserted alley.
The thugs who'd surrounded her.
The massive back that had silently stepped in front of her.
'I'll walk you right to your door.'
Since that day, whenever she worked late and happened to finish at the same time as him,
Kang Tae-seong would naturally ride the elevator with her and walk out of the company.
-You're working late again today. Let's go.
And without saying anything more, he'd walk her right to her door.
At first, it had felt burdensome and uncomfortable.
Maybe he had some ulterior motive.
She'd suspected him several times.
But nothing had happened at all.
When they reached her door,
-Good work today. See you tomorrow.
He'd leave after saying just that.
Just like a longtime office couple walking home together after work.
‘W-w-w-what!’
When her thoughts went that far, Park So-young's face turned bright red in an instant.
"N-Nothing happened!"
At her sudden reaction, the other two blinked at the same time.
"I mean!"
Park So-young raised her voice for no reason.
"It's just... he's working hard."
She continued, desperately coming up with an excuse.
"The company has changed a lot, too. That's all I meant."
"...Really?"
Lee Ju-hee gave her a curious smile.
"Well, he does seem to be working really hard lately."
Choi Yu-ri nodded too.
"Right. Everyone in Management Support says so, too. The CEO's been reviewing approvals really carefully, and he immediately rewards people who get good results."
"Same with our team. They say he's changed. Everyone's way more motivated thanks to him."
Park So-young nodded slightly in agreement.
That was true.
With the company's leader changing, the atmosphere inside the company had changed.
It wasn't just CEO Kang Tae-seong; Kang Tae-seong himself seemed... different from before.
"..."
As they talked about Kang Tae-seong, she suddenly remembered his firm forearm.
The large hand that had shielded her. That dependable, warm hand—
'...I'm crazy. What am I thinking?'
Park So-young quickly lowered her head and took a spoonful of rice.
Seeing this, Lee Ju-hee shot a glance at Choi Yu-ri.
Choi Yu-ri met her eyes with the faintest glance.
Neither of them said anything.
Even so, they understood each other.
'Well, well?'
'Something definitely happened!'
If it were the usual Park So-young,
she would never defend Kang Tae-seong that much.
Besides, that reaction just now, even turning red...
The two didn't ask anything more.
They didn't want to pry into something their friend didn't want to talk about.
Still, their curiosity had grown much stronger than before.
*
"Good evening, sir!"
The information desk employee smiled brightly and bowed.
"Welcome!"
I smiled lightly and returned the greeting.
"Thanks for your hard work today."
"Haha, not at all! Enjoy your workout!"
It was a sight I never would have imagined in the past.
The original Kang Tae-seong would have taken the employee's greeting for granted, or ignored it whenever he wasn't in the mood.
But things were different now.
What was so hard about returning a greeting?
I scanned my membership card and entered the company gym.
"It's been a while."
It had been a long time since I'd worked out in the evening.
Right after possessing this body, I'd exercised twice a day.
Before work in the morning, and after work.
I worked out twice a day without missing a single day.
It was a kind of obsession, driven by the need to lose weight as quickly as possible.
Thanks to that, my body had changed noticeably.
My protruding belly had shrunk a lot, and my stamina had improved considerably from the days when I used to be out of breath after barely moving.
The problem was that after that, I got too busy.
"There was too much work at the company."
The work had piled up as I tried to get the company back on track.
Reviewing reports, meetings, approvals, and all that. The days passed so quickly I couldn't even tell how.
With weeks of overtime piling up, I naturally had to give up evening workouts.
I could barely keep up my morning workouts.
Today was the first time in a long while that I'd had an evening to myself.
'Finally, I'm getting off work on time.'
Lately, work had started to settle down little by little.
I still had a long way to go.
At least I had enough breathing room to make time for an evening like today.
I left the locker room, stretching as I walked toward the exercise machines.
Then Park So-young came to mind.
'Looks like she's working late again today.'
These days, whenever our schedules lined up, leaving the company together had become a natural routine.
At first, it was simply because I was worried about her.
This was the world of an eroge, after all.
If my precious labor resource got into trouble on her way home late at night, that would be upsetting and a huge loss for me, too.
So whenever our schedules lined up, walking her home had become part of my routine.
'She should be fine today.'
I'd taken precautions so she could get home safely even if she left work alone.
I'd signed an additional contract with a security company. We'd installed streetlights, too.
It should be much safer than before.
And above all—
'I want to take it easy today, too.'
I wanted to work up a good sweat for the first time in a while, go home, take a shower, and sleep soundly.
That alone would make this a perfectly happy day.
I was walking toward the treadmills when—
"Ms. Yu-ri, I'm telling you, I'll show you how to do it properly."
An oddly sleazy man's voice.
"You could get hurt if you start working out by yourself, right?"
"Um, well..."
"You can't use the treadmill every day. I'll show you how to use each machine, one by one."
My gaze turned that way without thinking.
"...."
It was a familiar face.
Long, straight hair and neat workout clothes.
A beautiful woman smiling awkwardly.
'Was that Choi Yu-ri?'
An employee who always had lunch with Assistant Manager Park So-young.
She was known as one of the prettiest women at the company, so I remembered her name, at least.
On the other hand, the man standing close beside her was someone I'd never seen before.
I didn't know which department he was in, but he looked quite a bit older.
Above all, he seemed to have a higher rank than Choi Yu-ri.
"...Haha."
Choi Yu-ri gave an awkward laugh.
"Then... would you show me?"
Her words said one thing, but her expression was not bright at all.
If anything, her discomfort was written all over her face.
The man either didn't notice or was simply ignoring it, and excitedly kept talking.
"That's right. Everyone has to learn when they're starting out. I'll check your form, too, every step of the way."
"...."
I watched them for a moment.
It didn't look like he was approaching her with good intentions.
The evidence was in the man's gaze.
Throughout the conversation, he spent far more time looking over Choi Yu-ri's body than her face.
His eyes were less like those of someone offering to teach her how to work out and more like a beast sizing up its prey.
"Haha..."
Choi Yu-ri was smiling.
But to me, it looked forced.
'Is she the type who can't say no?'
That was entirely possible.
The age difference, the rank difference.
And on top of that, though it was a gym, it was still a company space.
The pressure of worrying that firmly refusing him might make things awkward.
It was a common situation for new or junior employees.
'You have to draw a firm line with that type.'
I couldn't help being concerned.
I was the only one who knew what kind of world this was.
On the surface, it looked like an ordinary everyday encounter of the sort you might see at a gym.
But this was a world where, given the slightest opening, an event straight out of an eroge could happen at any moment.
‘This is bothering me for no reason.’
Even as I stepped onto the treadmill, I kept one eye on Choi Yu-ri.