Chapter 37. Apartment Collapse (5)
For a moment, Harok thought he had misheard.
The head of Handong Group’s PR office had called him out first thing in the morning just to tell him to stop being angry?
“Director, what are you talking about? Stop being angry?”
Instead of answering, Mun Byeonggeol poured more soju into the beer glass.
“Aren’t you drinking a little too much on an empty stomach? Explain first.”
Thud.
Mun Byeonggeol poured the rest of the soju into the glass without holding anything back, then slammed the empty bottle down on the table.
“Please rein in Reporter Seol Yubin.”
What kind of nonsense was this out of nowhere?
Harok understood why Mun Byeonggeol might feel that way, but was this really something to drag him out at the crack of dawn to say?
“How am I supposed to rein Yubin in? And what exactly do you want me to stop her from doing?”
“The one coaching Seol Yubin from behind the scenes is you, Reporter Baek.”
Mun Byeonggeol glared at Harok while gripping his glass.
“Coaching her? What are you talking about?”
“Don’t play innocent.”
“No, explain yourself properly. What are you talking about?”
“Then why were you at the accident site last night? Weren’t you directing Seol Yubin’s reporting?”
Ah.
How did he know that?
Mun Byeonggeol came straight at him, and Harok was momentarily lost for words.
“There are no secrets in this world.”
“Fine. I went to the accident site yesterday. My junior was having a hard time, so I went to encourage her.”
“Then you should’ve just encouraged her. Why were you giving her reporting instructions too?”
“What’s wrong with a senior giving advice to a junior?”
Gulp, gulp.
Mun Byeonggeol drained the beer glass in his hand.
“Ahhh. Reporter Baek, aren’t you in the Culture Department now?”
“I am.”
“Then stay in Culture and report on your own beat. Why are you still hanging around Social Affairs... Ah. That came out wrong. Sorry.”
That wasn’t a slip.
He had clearly drunk an entire bottle of soju on an empty stomach precisely so he could talk like this.
“What does it matter to you whether I report or slack off? And if a junior I care about is struggling, isn’t it natural for a senior to suggest a solution?”
Even as he said it, Harok suddenly wondered why the hell he was making excuses to this man.
“You’re doing all this because you have a grudge against Vice President Kwon Jaegwan. Please, let go of your anger now.”
The moment Kwon Jaegwan’s name came up, the conversation that had been circling around the issue suddenly snapped into focus.
“A grudge?”
“Isn’t that what it is?”
“Let’s call it the belated realization of justice that was never carried out.”
“No matter how nicely you dress it up, it looks like a grudge to me.”
Mun Byeonggeol.
Harok had sat across from this man drinking just like this three years ago.
In the end, Harok’s article had never been published.
Mun Byeonggeol had won.
A grudge?
Fine.
That case had been the greatest frustration of Harok’s journalism career, so perhaps it was fair to say some resentment had remained.
But he wasn’t reporting because of a grudge.
He was exposing a member of the privileged class who committed outrageous acts and then toyed with the law using money.
“I can’t do anything about your assumptions. Think whatever you want.”
“I’m asking you. Please stop here.”
“I can’t. And honestly, this isn’t even something I’m in charge of anymore.”
“Then why don’t you just report the accident? Why are you trying to take this in a direction that affects the group’s succession structure?”
This bastard.
Was he asking to get cursed out?
“That’s a good question. Let me ask you something in return. Do you really think Vice President Kwon Jaegwan is the right person to be responsible for the livelihoods of hundreds of thousands of Handong Group employees?”
“What?”
Mun Byeonggeol was caught off guard by the counterattack.
“I’m saying this out of genuine concern. If Kwon Jaegwan becomes the next chairman, Handong Group will collapse. If anything, I’m helping your company.”
“That’s going too far.”
“Either way, I have nothing more to say to you. In my opinion, cutting the safety budget amounts to murder through willful negligence.”
Harok abruptly stood and left.
“What? They might request an arrest warrant?”
Kwon Jaegwan lost control of his temper and hurled the phone in his hand.
Legal Team Head Song Guk, standing directly in front of him, barely managed to dodge it.
Smash! Crash!
The phone struck the wall and shattered its screen, ending its life then and there.
Apparently this happened often enough that the secretary beside him calmly took out a replacement phone and placed it beside Kwon Jaegwan’s hospital bed.
“The atmosphere right now is somewhat...”
“Hey, you fucking idiot. I pay you to deal with things like that. So you get paid while I go to prison?”
Song Guk lowered his head and couldn’t answer properly.
“Did you find a new law firm?”
“Yes. Hwain Law Firm. They’re also one of the country’s Big Four.”
“They can stop me from getting arrested, right?”
“...”
“What? Why aren’t you answering? Does this only end once I go to prison?”
“We’ll do everything possible.”
Kwon Jaegwan was about to throw the new phone too when someone knocked.
Knock, knock.
“Who is it?”
“PR Director.”
“Come in.”
Click.
The door opened, and Mun Byeonggeol hurried into the room with Kim Hyeongseok.
“Good morn—”
“Forget it. Get to the point. I’m already pissed off, so report properly.”
Of all times to walk in...
Mun Byeonggeol immediately regretted his timing.
Then again, lately the mood was always like this.
Whatever.
Whether you died on Hansik or Cheongmyeong, dead was dead.
He needed to stay sharp.
The situation had already happened.
Better to report it quickly and get yelled at quickly.
“The fallout from the apartment collapse is continuing.”
“What? People die at construction sites sometimes. And I heard the dead weren’t even Korean?”
“Three Chinese workers and two Vietnamese workers.”
The secretary beside him answered in a flat tone.
Two of the three workers who had been buried had been found dead, raising the confirmed death toll to five.
The search continued for the final missing worker.
But even though the body hadn’t been recovered yet, both the media and police were already treating the final death toll as six.
Mun Byeonggeol was stunned to hear the person with ultimate responsibility say something like that.
No wonder nothing ever changes after accidents when the man at the top thinks like this.
“The issue has expanded into inadequate safety measures, and now they’re digging into the reduction of the safety-management budget.”
Kwon Jaegwan, lying on the bed, opened his eyes sharply.
“We cut the safety budget?”
You bastard.
I heard you personally ordered the cuts.
And Ahn Changwan, who had been in charge of overall safety management, had eventually resigned after opposing them.
Mun Byeonggeol was amazed by Kwon Jaegwan’s shamelessness.
He had seen it countless times before, yet somehow it remained astonishing every time.
“Last year, Vice President, you personally instructed that the budget be reduced—”
“Hey!”
Mun Byeonggeol flinched and stopped.
Kwon Jaegwan’s eyes had turned bizarre, almost like someone under the influence of drugs.
Don’t tell me he used drugs again in the hospital.
