Chapter 51
Yoo Sanghun.
Yoo Seolha's father and the president of a mid-sized Korean semiconductor equipment company.
I don't know whether a company like this existed in Korea in my previous life, but in any case, Yuseong Semiconductor, Yoo Seolha's family business, was an insanely powerful, ultra-successful mid-sized company with a market capitalization exceeding 100 trillion won.
Strictly speaking, it was a major corporation rather than a mid-sized company, but perhaps because it was a single group with no affiliates, the public strangely treated it as being on the level of a mid-sized company.
“I've heard a lot about you.”
“Haha…! D-Did Seolha unnie talk about me a lot?”
“Every time she contacted me, she talked about you.”
In my previous life, I had met quite a few important people.
Not only the heads of the Big Three entertainment agencies, but also the heads of companies with even greater clout.
However, I had never met anyone at the level of a major corporation's chairman.
Yoo Sanghun was a remarkable self-made figure who had inherited his rather unremarkable father's semiconductor equipment company and grown it into a global enterprise.
He possessed the assets and abilities of an unmistakable major-corporation chairman.
‘The spiritual pressure coming off him is no joke.’
In any case, the reason someone like him had descended upon an orphanage in such a remote neighborhood was quite simple.
“How is the newly built dormitory?”
“Of course… It's good. Really good.”
The newly built annex had dramatically solved Neulneul Orphanage's housing problem, where four or five children had been sleeping in each room because the place was overcrowded.
And Yoo Sanghun alone had shouldered the entire cost of constructing that dormitory.
It might have been pocket change to him, but to the orphanage, it was an unrealistically large sum of money.
That was why, from my perspective, the motive behind this investment felt painfully obvious.
“So the reason is recruitment, as I expected? I can't really believe it's out of pure goodwill…”
“You're perceptive. If not for your talent in music, I'd be tempted to sponsor your education at the corporate level.”
“I'm not smart. I just matured faster than other people.”
Considering that I had been thirty in my previous life, I did have a somewhat childish side, and I was hardly a particularly mature person.
Even in this life, the limits of what my mind could understand probably only extended through the middle-school curriculum.
“Well, to put it bluntly, yes. You seem to understand your own value quite well.”
“…I don't think my value is high enough to make the chairman come here personally.”
“In every field, a genius like you is special. The time spent drawing someone like that into a company is never wasted. Especially when there are competitors involved.”
We had spent enough time feeling each other out.
The moment someone like me entered the free-agent market, all kinds of companies would be sending me offers.
It was the exact opposite of the situation in my previous life, when every company had rejected me at the PC café.
‘The bosses who rejected me are now obsessed with me? That sounds like a web novel already.’
That was why my value was higher now than at any other point.
Given the circumstances, I could afford to take a somewhat strong position with Yoo Sanghun, who wanted to recruit me.
“First of all, I need to have absolutely no interference in my own activities. I don't want you bringing in famous producers from here and there just to increase the company's stature.”
“I guarantee that.”
“And if possible, I'd like to have the authority to produce Blooming and any idols we debut in the future.”
“I guarantee that as well.”
“…Could you also guarantee me the authority to recruit artists?”
“That too, I guarantee.”
I immediately screwed up my face at those words.
What did he mean, everything was fine? Did he actually intend to negotiate?
Honestly, even if I accepted the first condition, the second and third were absurd.
What company in the world would be crazy enough to put a nine-year-old child in charge of producing and recruiting artists?
Those two things were effectively the alpha and omega of an entertainment company.
“Is there some problem?”
“…Isn't it absurd for someone my age to have both producing and recruitment authority? If I had those two powers, I'd effectively have the same power as the president of the company…”
“Well, since the funds involved will be negligible from the corporate perspective… taking a chance once might not be a bad idea.”
“……”
“Of course, by entertainment-industry standards, it would still be a substantial investment. In fact, it would be enough to count as an investment in my daughter… I simply want to see how far a young genius can go.”
I seemed to have momentarily forgotten the identity of the person sitting before me.
The entertainment industry was not nearly as profitable as it appeared, and the investments required were similarly not all that enormous.
I remembered being surprised in my previous life that even when K-pop was at the height of its golden age, people said the scale of its capital was only a handful compared to the Korean game industry.
Even games beat it down that badly… and compared to the profits and scale of the semiconductor company run by the man before me…
‘To this man, the cost of entering even a mid-sized entertainment company, let alone one with barely any employees, would be nothing but pocket change.’
That was why he could say he would entrust everything to a child like me.
“However, I think it would be better to limit my producing authority to music and leave everything else to CEO Lee Hajun. Otherwise, the workload would be impossible to manage.”
“CEO Lee Hajun is reliable in that regard.”
“I will give you authority over recruitment, but whenever possible, I think you should consult CEO Lee Haneul.”
“That alone is an enormous amount of authority.”
“Good. Then let's leave things there for now… If you have any complaints about the orphanage, we could also arrange for you to be adopted by a suitable person on our side.”
“…That might be a little excessive. I don't think it's something that needs to be rushed, either.”
Of course, accepting this offer would let me escape my status as an orphan and give me greater freedom in my actions, but at least until I became an adult, I would be tied to Yuseong Semiconductor.
In other words, it would be like swallowing a poison-laced apple.
If a conflict with headquarters ever arose, or if I ended up splitting from Blooming over a difference in opinion, it could become poison at any time.
Since it was such a sensitive matter with so much at stake, I had to approach it carefully.
“Is that so? All right. I suppose you can think it over and contact me about the proposal.”
Yoo Sanghun left the orphanage after saying that.
But I knew that no company could offer me anything better than this.
* * *
“Why do you guys have phones?”
“Huh? Starting this vacation, all the elementary school kids got smartphones too.”
“Naturally, it's thanks to you, Siyeon.”
So had all my desperate pleading with Park Hansu to get me a phone been pointless?
Their phones were even newer models than mine.
‘Once the prize money and music revenue are settled, I'll replace my phone first thing.’
I passed through the computer room on the first floor and went up to the third floor.
For reference, the computer room had fifteen top-of-the-line computers capable of running PUBG.
Compared to how we had previously shared three outdated computers in the main building's living room, this was an incredible development—a truly gigantic leap forward.
On top of that, an insanely huge, modern smart TV had appeared in the living room of the orphanage's main building. There was another one on the first floor of the annex.
It was a change that made me keenly aware of the power of money.
But the biggest change of all was…
“A room of my own. Damn, this is comfortable…”
The fact that I had gotten a private room.
In truth, it was large enough for two people to live in together, but they had given the entire room to me as special treatment.
Naturally, no one voiced any complaints about the arrangement.
It made sense that no one dared complain, since this had only been possible because I had caught Yoo Sanghun's eye.
“Damn. This laptop is starting to give up the ghost too.”
Even though Singerstar was over and I had supposedly regained my freedom, living a leisurely life was still impossible.
Starting tomorrow, I had to go back to school as well.
School had reopened some time ago, and my absences had been excused as field-trip learning until now, so I had to start showing up again.
“But what should I do?”
I lay still on the bed, mindlessly scrolling through YouTube over and over.
“In my previous life, I would watch Reels or Shorts at times like this. Or read webtoons.”
However, this timeline did not have Reels or Shorts yet. TikTok existed, so perhaps Shorts would come out next year.
“Oh. Now that I think about it, should I make an Instagram account?”
The sooner I made an Instagram account, the more it would benefit me. If I milked the buzz while I could and built up as many followers as possible, it would help in all sorts of ways.
The moment I had the idea, I created an Instagram account.
The account name was…
“I want to make it a little more feminine.”
But the only ideas that came to me were putting modifiers like lovely or kawaii in front of the name, so I decided to go with the plain and sensible s.siyeon.
The process of creating an Instagram account was extremely simple, and I was able to make one in an instant.
Naturally, since I had just created it, both my follower and following counts were zero.
‘Should I upload something, at least?’
I held a camera in one hand, made a V with the other, and took a selfie.
“Kind of cute.”
Since my face was so absurdly overpowered, even pictures taken like crap came out decent enough most of the time.
I decided to upload the picture as an Instagram post for now.
“Hmm. ‘Add caption.’”
It was probably the field where I was supposed to type the words that appeared below the picture.
In that case, I decided to write down my honest feelings.
“I really, really hate going to school… This should do, right?”
I posted it as it was, but naturally, no one left a comment. It was a blank account with no followers and no one I followed.
“Should I tell Yoo Seolha?”
I messaged Yoo Seolha to let her know I had created an Instagram account, and we followed each other.
Buoyed by that momentum, I followed all the members of Blooming and had them follow me back, then messaged Lee Hyena and Park Hansu before finally going to sleep with a clear mind.
Naturally, when I woke up the next morning, I could see that several hundred Instagram notifications had already arrived.