Chapter 37
***
Hwang Seok-chan is the eldest son of the Hwang family.
The eldest son was given authority befitting that position, but he also bore responsibilities just as heavy.
He hated it.
By nature, he was gentle and liked a peaceful life.
For someone like him, the responsibilities thrust on him simply because he was the eldest son were far too great and terrifying.
That was why he had no desire to become chairman or anything of the sort.
But.
The expectations around him.
The gazes of his family.
And the countless employees.
Were waiting for his decision.
In the end, he had no choice but to sit in the position of Somyeong's head.
It was a poisoned chalice, a throne of iron and blood.
The position of chairman of a massive conglomerate.
One bad decision could cost thousands of people their jobs and even shake the country's economy.
Every time he put his signature on a document, it felt like his lifespan was being shaved away.
His forehead seemed to grow wider with age.
His insides rotting away little by little under stress he could no longer endure.
All of it was gnawing away at his life.
He wanted to quit.
He wanted to hand it over to his younger brother and escape from this seat.
But he couldn't.
Because he was the eldest son of the Hwang family, and a chairman who had to shoulder the expectations of countless people.
He.
Could not run from his responsibilities.
Even though he knew his body was dying from stress and pressure.
***
Hwang Seok-gyu is the second son of the Hwang family.
The second son of a great father who had become a chaebol with nothing but his two fists when he was young.
Not as much as the eldest son, but even the second son's responsibilities and authority were too great for one person to bear.
'Still, that's a relief.'
Whenever things got hard, he looked at his older brother.
His brother, who was always tied to the company because he was the eldest son.
At least he had even gotten married for love, hadn't he?
Of course, instead of the sweetness of their dating days, she had evolved into a terrifying wife who nagged him mercilessly.
Still, he thought he was happy.
After all, his brother would be the captain leading this huge ship.
He just had to coast along, living the sweet life as a subsidiary president.
If the subsidiary got rough, all he had to do was ask his brother for help, right?
So.
He thought the chairman's seat would never come to him.
From the start, he believed his capacity and talent were lacking compared to his brother's.
“Congratulations on becoming chairman! Sincere congratulations!”
And then, the chairman's seat was suddenly handed to him.
Because his father had named him the next chairman.
He couldn't believe it.
Of course, as a subsidiary president, he had earned the respect of many by running the company steadily with a simple, down-to-earth manner unbefitting a chaebol.
But wasn't this the sort of thing anyone could do?
Him, the captain who had to steer this giant ship?
But.
But the captain's hat was already in his hands.
That.
Made him unbearably miserable.
Once he became captain, there was far too much to do.
So much that even meeting his family had become difficult.
He would have preferred to hire a professional manager, but there was no one capable of running such a huge company.
They just looked like hyenas trying to tear this ship apart and fill their own bellies.
So he did it.
He abandoned himself, abandoned his family.
And, becoming nothing more than a part of the ship called the company, he kept it moving forward.
“...I'm sorry.”
“...Ah...”
In the midst of it all, his wife fell ill.
Raised in an ordinary family before marrying into a chaebol household, she couldn't bear the weight of being the chairman's wife.
She had already struggled even when she was just the wife of a subsidiary president.
She had always lived as if she were wearing clothes that didn't fit and tried to help him run the company.
He hadn't realized that it was eating away at her body.
Because he himself was a part of the company.
Because he had to lead countless employees.
Because he could only watch his wife grow more and more exhausted under the excessive stress and schedule.
“Aaaaaah!!!”
When he saw the haggard face of his wife, who had always been by his side, despair surged up inside him.
Why had it been him?
Why had it been him?
He had never had the slightest interest in the chairman's seat.
Why me...!!
He despaired.
The poisoned chalice called the chairman's seat.
The price of sitting on a throne he had never wanted.
***
Wow. This is a total mess.
Is being chairman really that hard?
The chaebols you see on the news all look like they're living in their own world.
“What do you think?”
“Hmm...”
How should I say this?
Under Old Man Hwang Pil-joong's expectant gaze, I just told the truth.
“...What?”
He looked like he couldn't believe it.
Well, he couldn't help it.
He'd just heard that one of his sons had to be sacrificed for the company.
“H-Hold on. What do you mean? Those boys are all capable and ambitious.”
“Then how about asking them at dinner?”
In the end, Old Man Hwang Pil-joong nodded.
And so, mealtime came.
The two sons, seated at one side of the table, seemed quite curious about me and Hong Si-yeon.
“I'm Kang No-ah. I'm a streamer broadcasting on Chajajak. Please subscribe and like.”
“...What?”
“A streamer?”
The two of them looked baffled.
Come to think of it, I would too.
A streamer had suddenly shown up at their house, after all.
“...Are you trying to attack our family?”
“Or maybe attack our company...”
The two sons.
The presidents of large companies glared at me, but I didn't care.
That wasn't what mattered.
“Gentlemen. Are you interested in the chairman's seat at Somyeong?”
“.......”
“What do you want to know that for?”
They're openly on guard.
Let's leave this to Old Man Hwang Pil-joong here.
“Mr. Kang No-ah is an extraordinary fortune teller.”
“...Pardon?”
“Father, didn't you get a health checkup the other day? A fortune teller, seriously...”
“I'm telling you, it's true.”
“Even I acknowledge it.”
Father and Uncle nodded, but the two sons still looked unconvinced.
In that case...
“Gentlemen. Please turn over these cards.”
The two, still reluctant, flipped the cards over.
Then let's begin.
“President Hwang Seok-chan. You were practicing putting in the office today.”
“.....!!”
“Wasn't that putter a little bent today?”
“...H-How did you know?”
“The one who bent it is right beside you.”
Hwang Seok-chan snapped his head around.
Hwang Seok-gyu hurriedly looked away.
“You... I told you not to touch my golf club...!!”
“S-sorry.”
“And President Hwang Seok-gyu?”
“........”
“It's fine to prepare a surprise party for your wife, but don't put the ring in the cake. She'll swallow it.”
“.....!!!”
He had been planning to secretly put the ring in the cake for next week's wedding anniversary.
It was the same way he had proposed to her.
Since his wife had seemed to be having a hard time lately, he'd wanted to prepare it to bring back old memories.
But it would end in disaster.
“...I-Is that true?”
“Yes.”
“...Then I absolutely shouldn't do that.”
“Because your wife gets extremely angry.”
“Then what does my wife like...”
“Hey, hey. This isn't the time to talk about that.”
Coming to his senses, Hwang Seok-chan looked at me.
“Th... did you say your name was Kang No-ah?”
“Yes. Just call me whatever's comfortable.”
“Ahem. Then, Mr. Kang No-ah. What is it that you want from us?”
“It's not me who wants something; it's the old man here. Both of you, please answer honestly.”
Was there anyone who wanted the chairman's seat?
The atmosphere at the table quickly sank.
Then all this jeyuk-bokkeum is mine.
While they remained silent, I happily kept eating the jeyuk-bokkeum.
Wow. The housekeeper here really can cook.
“...Father. Since it's come to this, I'll say it. Honestly... the chairman's seat suits Seok-gyu better than me.”
“No, no. I'm not confident. And if my brother becomes chairman, wouldn't we be able to get help from my sister-in-law's company too?”
“Do you think your sister-in-law would do that?”
“Couldn't we just ask her nicely? Our Yejin is already struggling just being a president's wife.”
“What's so special about being a president's wife...”
“She has to go along to every event, do volunteer work and attend gatherings, it's exhausting! More than anything like that, she just likes staying home and keeping house!”
The brothers' eyes turned sharp.
Seeing that, Old Man Hwang Pil-joong let out a sigh as though the floor had caved in beneath him.
“I... never knew...”
He seemed quite shocked that his two sons might not actually be interested in the chairman's seat.
At having talent but no ambition.
And at his own carelessness for not knowing what was in his sons' hearts.
He looked thoroughly dejected.
“Then... what happens to our company now?”
Someone had to become chairman.
A vast empire like Somyeong needed an emperor.
Hong Si-yeon raised her hand slightly.
“Can't you just hire a professional manager?”
“If you hire a professional manager, there's a high chance they'll focus on short-term results rather than long-term vision for self-preservation.”
I could understand that.
I know a game company that hired a professional manager, and he shut down the very games that had made the company possible because they weren't popular.
I'd also heard there were many cases where they drained a company's lifespan by chasing immediate profits instead of R&D.
Maybe that's why Old Man Hwang Pil-joong was so against professional managers.
“I can't entrust the company to someone like that.”
“There are surely proper professional managers too...”
“Among the people I've seen, if they had to choose between the company's future and their own skin, they'd always choose their own skin.”
The old man was cold.
His firm resolve not to trust others didn't seem likely to change.
“Then let's leave it to Uncle.”
“Uncle is already running a subsidiary too.”
When the arrow came back his way, Hwang Pil-jeong panicked.
“N-no, I was planning to retire and go fishing myself.”
“You still owe me for your spinning top.”
“You're bringing that up here?!”
In that instant, Hwang Pil-jeong's future changed.
The old man, who had originally been meant to retire and spend his days leisurely fishing, had become a slave—no, an emperor—leading a giant company.
The company?
It was running well.
The Hwang family itself also had no real problems.
Later, Old Man Hwang Pil-jeong's only son became chairman, but perhaps because he had talent too, the company kept running smoothly.
“Yes. That sounds fine.”
He'd need to take a look at Hwang Pil-jeong's child too, but joy filled Old Man Hwang Pil-joong's face.
In the end, Old Man Hwang Pil-jeong called his son.
Hwang Seok-ju, executive director and Old Man Hwang Pil-jeong's son, who had been called in while working overtime at the company, was a man with both ability and ambition.
Maybe that was why.
When he heard that they were asking whether he was interested in the next chairman's seat, and that he might even sit in that seat, his future changed.
Into one where he became Somyeong's chairman and ran the company properly.
“No, Chairman... no, Uncle. Can you really trust a fortune teller's words and hand it over like that?”
And his gaze fell on his cousins.
“And it's not like those two are incapable, so it doesn't make sense to hand the chairmanship over to me all of a sudden. Also, I don't think I have that kind of talent.”
He said it with complete calm.
That was certainly true.
“Executive Director Hwang Seok-ju. I know that yesterday, in the bathroom, you looked in the mirror and shouted, 'Ah~! I want to be chairman!'”
A brutally accurate statement.