Chapter 25. Suspicion (2)
Lee Jinbaek seemed skilled at keeping a poker face.
Then again, maybe he truly had nothing to do with the dumpling scandal.
"Interesting."
"You think this is interesting?"
"You're saying someone deliberately engineered the garbage dumpling scandal?"
"Something like that."
Lee Jinbaek's expression shifted slightly.
For the first time, his poker face seemed to reveal some emotion.
"For what purpose?"
"I'm not sure yet. At first, I thought it was to dominate the dumpling market, but now even that seems questionable."
"Dominate the dumpling market?"
"Yes."
"Puhahaha."
Lee Jinbaek burst into laughter.
"Are you seriously saying that?"
Harok had deliberately thrown out bait to see how Lee Jinbaek would react.
But Lee Jinbaek looked genuinely dumbfounded.
"Why else would I chase you all the way here?"
"Hm? What does that mean?"
Harok didn't answer.
He simply stared straight at Lee Jinbaek.
"Don't tell me you're saying TS Group is behind it."
Harok shook his head.
"Then?"
"Not TS Group. I was actually suspicious of you, Senior."
"...Me?"
"Yes."
Lee Jinbaek looked incredulous, but when he saw that Harok wasn't joking, he straightened in his seat.
"Why would you think that?"
"I heard about the existence of someone who planned the dumpling scandal from a source whose identity I can't reveal. They're not the kind of person who would joke about something like this."
"And?"
"They told me to suspect the major corporations entering the market after everything was shaken up."
Only then did Lee Jinbaek seem to understand.
He nodded repeatedly.
"Okay, okay. I get it."
The slight tension that had appeared on his face disappeared completely.
"But TS Foodnet had already been considering entering the dumpling market, and then there was yesterday's MBS broadcast..."
"So you think I engineered all this just to take over the dumpling market?"
Accusing someone to their face of being the culprit wasn't easy.
Do it wrong, and it could easily turn into a fistfight.
But Harok never hesitated in situations like this.
That was one reason his sources often revealed things to him.
People made mistakes when they were flustered.
And in those moments, important clues often slipped out.
But Lee Jinbaek seemed to understand exactly what Harok was trying to do.
He smoothly brushed it aside.
As expected of a former ace reporter from Daehan Daily.
"Right now, you're the most likely candidate."
"For what reason? What would taking over one dumpling market do for my career? Even if my company monopolized the whole market, what exactly would I gain?"
He suddenly became much more talkative.
Why?
Until now, he'd mostly answered with short phrases or brief sentences.
"Don't you want to return to the Strategic Coordination Office at headquarters? From your perspective, being sent to a small company like TS Foodnet looks like a demotion."
"A demotion?"
Harok didn't hold back.
Bringing up someone's demotion right in front of them was about as rude as it got.
But Harok did it deliberately to observe his reaction.
If he kept poking, eventually something might slip.
"Reporter Baek, you don't know much about corporations, so I can understand why you'd think that."
"What do you mean?"
"Just because someone has the title of managing director at a conglomerate doesn't mean every managing director is equal."
Lee Jinbaek explained.
In the past, executive ranks progressed through assistant director, director, managing director, and executive director.
But recently, companies had increasingly merged assistant director, director, and managing director into one title.
Because of that, two people both called managing director could actually be at very different internal levels.
"Internally, we classify them as G1, G2, G3, things like that. Outsiders don't know."
"Then what are you?"
"I was promoted to G3 and moved to TS Foodnet. If you spend your entire career at group headquarters, you never learn things like sales and operations at affiliates."
"So it's like field training?"
"You could put it that way."
There was no way Harok, who had lived an extra ten years, didn't know this.
He had simply created an opening to make Lee Jinbaek talk more.
A journalist's job was to listen and write.
Not to do all the talking.
"Then you'll return to group headquarters later?"
"Probably around the time I get promoted to executive director. That's what I agreed on with the head of the Strategic Coordination Office before I came here."
The head of TS Group's Strategic Coordination Office.
That had to be Vice Chairman Bae Jaegwon.
Chairman Hyeon Wonsik's right-hand man and closest confidant.
Later in life, he had lost face after being repeatedly summoned to National Assembly hearings.
But right now, he was one of the most powerful people effectively controlling TS Group.
Harok had poked from every direction, but nothing fit.
Was Lee Jinbaek really completely unrelated to the dumpling scandal?
Or TS Group as a whole?
"Can you tell me who your source is?"
"Even if it's you, Senior, I can't do that."
"Right. Can't be helped."
It didn't look like Harok had gained much.
But he had at least confirmed that Lee Jinbaek was someone trusted by the head of the Strategic Coordination Office.
"Thanks for making time for me."
"You're leaving without even having a drink?"
"I've been drinking nonstop lately. My liver's not doing too well. Let's drink with Senior Seongun next time."
"Sure. Let's do that."
The next day, Harok went to the newsroom and sat in an empty seat in the culture department.
Ever since joining the company, he had always worked only in the crime reporting or legal affairs teams.
Actually coming into the office like this felt strange.
If this had happened before his regression, he would have considered the culture department assignment a demotion and fallen into despair.
But Harok was now a hardened sixteen-year veteran who had tasted more than enough despair in his previous life.
The moment he booted up his laptop, the company messenger started blinking.
[Yubin: All three terrestrial broadcasters named Kwon Jaegwan yesterday.]
[Harok: Seriously?]
[Yubin: You didn't watch the news?]
[Harok: I had an important meeting yesterday.]
[Yubin: Wow.]
[Harok: You'll have to keep following up from here.]
[Yubin: What happened to your solemn promise that you'd keep helping?]
[Harok: You still need help?]
[Yubin: Don't you want to see how Kwon Jaegwan ends up?]
[Harok: Okay. Tell me if anything important happens.]
[Yubin: Got it.]
After ending the messenger conversation with Yubin, Harok quickly searched the portals.
There weren't as many articles using Kwon Jaegwan's name as he'd expected.
Handong Group was clearly treating this as a company-level crisis and doing everything possible to suppress coverage.
The dam is already cracked and leaking.
How long do you think you can hold it back?
As Harok searched through the articles, the corners of his mouth rose so high they looked ready to touch the ceiling.
Pat, pat.
Someone tapped him on the shoulder.
When he turned around, it was Department Head Jang Junyeol.
According to rumors, Kim Yeonghwan had tried every trick imaginable to drive Harok out of the newsroom entirely.
But Culture Department Head Jang Junyeol had stopped him.
Even if Kim Yeonghwan held personnel authority as editor-in-chief, he couldn't completely ignore the advice of a senior.
In the end, Kim Yeonghwan had grudgingly approved Harok's move to the culture department.
"...After a rather eventful process, Reporter Baek Harok has joined the culture department. Let's all welcome him."
Clap, clap, clap.
Before the morning meeting, Jang Junyeol gathered the culture department reporters and formally introduced Harok.
The average age of the department's reporters was nearly fifty.
"For now, Seongun will take Harok and work with him on the Popular Culture Team. If you're interested in performances, art, music, publishing, literature, anything like that, let me know."
At the mention of performances, art, and music, Harok shook his head.
"Even if you're not interested, just think of it as doing gakkemochi for now."
Gakkemochi was newsroom slang for temporarily covering an additional beat beyond your own.
After the department meeting ended, Harok went down to the first-floor smoking room with Yu Seongun.
"Department Head Jang really has influence."
"He's the classic soft-on-the-outside, strong-on-the-inside type. He has a lot of backbone."
"I honestly thought I'd get kicked out of the newsroom."
"The editor-in-chief was pretty determined."
"If I'm on the Popular Culture Team, what exactly am I covering?"
"We aren't divided as finely as sports papers or entertainment outlets. Think of popular music, movies, and television as all part of your beat."
...Isn't that beat way too broad?
"You can analyze pop-culture trends, interview K-pop groups, review movies, review dramas. There's plenty to pitch, so you don't have to worry about finding stories."
"Understood. I'll work hard."
Near quitting time, Jang Junyeol suddenly asked Harok to accompany him to a dinner appointment.
Harok had only just transferred.
How could he refuse his department head?
"What kind of appointment is it?"
"With someone from a foundation run by TS Group."
"TS Group?"
What a coincidence.
Of course Harok agreed.
Yubin had planned to come pick up her car that evening.
But it looked like he wouldn't be able to keep his promise to remove the parking stickers.
The place Harok visited with Jang Junyeol was Yeouljae, a cultural foundation operated by TS Group.
The director of Yeouljae was Madam Lee Seongeum, wife of Chairman Hyeon Wonsik.
"What should we do?"
When Harok and Jang Junyeol arrived, an employee looked troubled.
"The director suddenly had something urgent come up..."
"Would it be all right if I treated you to dinner instead?"
A woman in her twenties wearing a black suit stepped forward and dismissed the employee.
She wasn't exceptionally beautiful, but an unmistakable air of wealth and refinement seemed to radiate from her entire body.
"If our planning director is buying dinner, we'd be honored. Reporter Baek, introduce yourself. This is Hyeon Jiyeon, Director of Planning at Yeouljae and Chairman Hyeon Wonsik's daughter."
No wonder she looked so refined.
A fourth-generation chaebol heiress.
"Nice to meet you. I'm Baek Harok."
"Hello. I'm Hyeon Jiyeon."
The three walked through the five-story Yeouljae building while talking.
"We were informed that the president will attend today's ceremony for the construction of TS Electronics' new appliance factory. My mother had to leave suddenly because she and my father are attending the dinner together."
"Ah, today's the appliance factory ceremony."
Jang Junyeol and Hyeon Jiyeon chatted enthusiastically about Yeouljae's scholarship programs and upcoming art exhibitions.
Harok couldn't focus on any of it.
Luckily, they were walking around the building while talking.
If they had been sitting down, he probably would have fallen asleep.
As they looked around, a black ribbon displayed along one side of an exhibition room caught Harok's attention.
He gently rubbed it between his fingers as if testing its texture.
"Did someone die?"
The moment Hyeon Jiyeon saw him touching the ribbon, she hurriedly stopped him.
"That... you shouldn't touch that."
Harok suddenly felt like a mischievous child touching an exhibit in a museum despite being told not to.
Embarrassed, he quickly withdrew his hand.
"Yesterday was the third anniversary of my older brother's death."
Only then did Harok remember.
The heir to TS Group, Hyeon Seongmo, had died in a traffic accident in the United States.
Afterward, TS Group would be thrown into turmoil over the succession.
Chairman Hyeon Wonsik had three children.
The deceased Hyeon Seongmo and two daughters, Seyeon and Jiyeon.
The succession crisis began because of the Hyeon family's outdated tradition.
Daughters had no right to inherit control of the company.
TS Group was an old-fashioned company that had stubbornly maintained the eldest-son succession principle since its founding.
In the end, Hyeon Wonsik adopted one of his nephews, Hyeon Yeongmo, and made him his successor.
At this point in time, Hyeon Yeongmo had not yet been adopted.
In Harok's previous life, Hyeon Wonsik was already dead, and Hyeon Yeongmo had become the fourth chairman of TS Group.
"I'm sorry. I didn't know..."
"It's all right. You didn't know... I think I reacted too sensitively. I'm sorry if I startled you."
Despite being a chaebol heiress, Hyeon Jiyeon struck Harok as surprisingly polite.
Their dinner destination was Chaigong 34, a Chinese restaurant inside the Parma Hotel, in which TS Group held a stake.
Hyeon Jiyeon had originally been studying in the United States.
After her brother died, she returned to Korea.
She wanted to stay near her grieving parents and comfort them.
"...I'm sorry to ask something like this, but who will take over TS Group in the future?"
Jang Junyeol suddenly asked an extremely sensitive question.
It was a natural curiosity for a journalist.
Still, asking a younger sister who had lost her brother felt somewhat cruel.
"That's a rather uncomfortable question."
Hyeon Jiyeon gently rebuked him.
But Jang Junyeol did not back down.
"TS Group doesn't belong only to the Hyeon family. Hundreds of thousands of employees work there."
"Of course..."
"The head of TS Group holds their futures in his hands. Naturally, people are curious."
Only then did Hyeon Jiyeon seem to understand the intention behind his question.
She nodded.
"My father plans to adopt one of his three cousins."
"What? Adopt?"
There had once been a tradition of adopting another male descendant of the same generation when the eldest grandson's line became vacant.
But in modern society?
Jang Junyeol could only blink in surprise.
"Yes. Whoever becomes his adopted son will naturally become the successor."
"That's no ordinary position... All three of them must want to be adopted. How does he plan to choose?"
