Chapter 45

Chapter 45. The Commercial District Analyst Who Revives the Years (1)

I think I finally slept properly for once.

Bright sunlight poured through the window.

I stretched and checked the time.

Eleven.

And that smell...

Ramen?

“Ugh. I’m dying.”

Had I slept badly?

My entire body ached.

Groaning, I walked into the living room.

The only thing I saw was an empty pot inside the sink.

Did these guys cook ramen without waking me?

Or was I sleeping so deeply they couldn’t?

I laughed to myself, threw on some clothes, and went outside.

The sea had looked beautiful last night.

But the morning ocean glittering beneath the sunlight was breathtaking.

What do they call this? Yoonseul? I think that’s it...

I looked around while walking toward the grandmother’s noodle restaurant we had visited the previous night.

Instead of ramen, I wanted to cure my hangover with cold noodles full of thin ice.

I also had a feeling the team members might be there.

After seeing how fired up they were when we left yesterday, they were probably wandering around the noodle shop trying to find a solution.

I should go help.

I inhaled the fresh air and stepped onto the coastal walking trail.

Then—

Bang! Clang!

Heavy machinery noises mixed with the waves.

I rubbed my eyes and looked into the distance.

An excavator and forklift were clearing the construction waste piled along the coast.

Are they doing construction on the walking trail?

I tilted my head and tried to pass.

Then Jongil suddenly jumped out.

“Team Leader! You’re awake?”

“Yeah. What are you doing out here this early?”

“Hehehe. Take a look at this, Team Leader.”

Jongil showed me a sign with surprisingly decent handwriting.

[TIRED FROM WALKING?
FORTY-YEAR-OLD ICE-COLD NOODLES FOR ONLY 4,000 WON!
WE GUARANTEE THE REAL TASTE OF TONGYEONG.]

Beside the words was a laminated picture of the noodles from last night.

Pale broth with thin ice floating across the surface.

A picture that made me want another bowl immediately.

“You made this in the morning?”

“Haha. Do you like it, Team Leader? Once they clear the waste, I’m fixing this right here.”

I looked between the pavilion and the alley where the noodle restaurant stood.

I immediately understood what Jongil was planning.

A good decision.

This was exactly where the eyes of tourists naturally stopped after resting at the pavilion and walking down the stairs.

He intended to place bait precisely in that line of sight.

Something I had repeated in the field for ten years.

Always find where the customer’s eyes stop.

Jongil had finally understood it completely.

“Good job. But change one thing.”

“What?”

I pointed at the writing.

“Remove the 4,000 won.”

“...What? But isn’t that the strongest selling point? Four thousand won is practically free!”

“That’s exactly why you remove it. Tourists don’t move just because something is cheap. Sometimes an overly cheap price makes them assume it’s low quality. So what should you write instead?”

“...”

“Forty years. Make that big. Focus on the emotion of cold noodles from an old restaurant that has remained in the same place for forty years.”

Jongil clapped.

“Ah! You’re right! If someone wants to treat their companions to delicious food, a price that’s too low could actually make them hesitate.”

“Exactly. Let them discover the price after they enter. Once people have already walked inside, they rarely turn around and leave.”

The low price shouldn’t be the advertisement.

It should be the surprise.

When customers tasted noodles unlike anything they had eaten before, received a generous serving, and then discovered the absurdly low price, they would spread the word themselves.

If you go to Tongyeong, you absolutely have to eat this.

“Thank you, Team Leader! I’ll remake it right away.”

“But you’re seriously lucky. The city just happened to remove this garbage at exactly the right time for your plan.”

“Ah, about that... It isn’t luck, actually...”

Jongil scratched the back of his head.

I followed his gaze.

Senior Staff Choi Iseul was talking to some city employees.

The moment she saw me, she hurried over with a bright smile.

“Team Leader! You’re awake! Sleep well?”

“Yeah. But what are you doing over there?”

“Ah. I was asking how long it’ll take to clear everything. Seongun agreed to cover the workers’ wages. The city is only paying the waste disposal fees.”

Was I still half asleep?

Why was the company suddenly paying for this?

I blinked blankly.

Senior Staff Choi delivered surprising news.

“I talked to the division director. He asked whether everything was okay, so I told him about this. I didn’t expect him to move this fast.”

She and the director had seemed close in the car yesterday too.

Were they really that familiar?

No.

The director had never once mentioned Senior Staff Choi in front of me.

That meant Senior Staff Choi’s social skills were extraordinary.

She might even be better than Jongil.

“Ah! Team Leader! Want to see this?”

Almost as though she was deliberately changing the subject, Senior Staff Choi thrust out her tablet.

“Since we were clearing the waste anyway, I did a little company promotion too. Ta-da! What do you think?”

It was her social media page.

[Tongyeong’s beautiful sea. And the best restaurant I discovered there. I think I’d come back just to eat these noodles again.

#40YearOldRestaurant
#IceColdNoodles
#MustVisitInTongyeong
#NeverTastedAnythingLikeThis]

“What do you think? Anything I should improve?”

She was using her personal account for company-related work.

A commendable employee.

I gave her one suggestion.

“Looks good. But are you only going to post once today and end it there?”

“...What do you mean?”

“That scene over there. The construction waste being removed. Why not make that the beginning of an ongoing story?”

Maybe my explanation was too vague.

Senior Staff Choi blinked and stared at my mouth.

“Let everyone spread the story of this alley coming back to life. People returning to a dying alley. The process itself becomes content. You start it. After that, customers who discover the place through social media continue spreading the story.”

Iseul’s eyes sparkled.

“Ah! That’s amazing. It could become a relay event showing the changes day by day.”

“Exactly. I noticed yesterday that all the other buildings were empty. If it works well, this could even become a noodle alley.”

Manager Park’s sign would draw the attention of people at the photo spot.

Senior Staff Choi’s social media would create a story about growth and revival.

The diary app hadn’t reacted.

Still, I was certain.

This would work.

Even if it never became a full noodle alley, those empty buildings would eventually fill naturally.

Which meant that even after our initial buzz disappeared, the restaurant would remain visible.

Good kids.

They had created all this while I slept.

“Ah! Where’s Assistant Manager Oh?”

Jongil grinned suspiciously and pointed behind me.

Oh Ilman was standing there holding a large board.

In his hands was a newly laminated menu.

[Ice-Cold Noodles - 4,000 won
Sliced Pressed Pork - 8,000 won]

“I added one item. She absolutely refuses to raise the noodle price, so we make profit through the pressed pork. People will probably order more alcohol with it too.”

Pressed pork.

It wasn’t something labor-intensive like bossam.

Once an order came in, all she needed to do was slice and serve it.

And with that broth?

Ice-cold noodles with a plate of pressed pork.

The kind of combination that practically demanded a glass of alcohol.

I decided I would be the first to taste it.

Three in the afternoon.

The truck carrying the final construction debris drove away.

The work was complete.

It was hard to understand how something that could be finished in a single day had been abandoned for more than a year.

Still, at least it was fixed now.

“Wow... Team Leader. Look at that.”

Standing at the pavilion, Jongil looked across toward the alley.

The straight-line distance was only about one hundred meters.

And now, the sign hanging over the alley was perfectly visible.

[GRANDMA’S NOODLES]

It had always been there.

Nobody had ever been able to see it.

“...You can finally see it.”

Iseul spoke quietly.

Something tightened inside my chest.

It hadn’t been invisible because it didn’t exist.

It had been there all along.

People simply couldn’t see it.

When speaking with small business owners, I often met people who underestimated the importance of signage.

I always told them the same thing.

First decide which people, standing where, need to see your sign.

Then choose the position and letter size accordingly.

“All right. Let’s put up the sign. We probably can’t get one today, but order a large standing sign for the entrance of the alley too.”

“Yes! Team Leader!”

Jongil firmly installed his rewritten wooden sign near the pavilion.

[FORTY YEARS IN ONE PLACE.
TONGYEONG ALLEY’S ICE-COLD NOODLES.]

One photo.

One sentence.

A rough wooden sign.

But that was enough.

“All right. Should we go eat a bowl now? We need to explain everything to Grandma too. And we’ll have to order the pressed pork.”

“Yes! Let’s go!”

On the way to the restaurant, we stopped at the market and bought some pressed pork.

It didn’t look like a factory-made product.

Apparently an elderly merchant made it personally.

If it tasted good, we could source it from here.

Jingle.

As expected, the restaurant was empty.

We ordered four bowls of ice-cold noodles and filled our stomachs first.

Still delicious.

Cold food usually dulled flavor.

But Grandma’s broth somehow preserved the deep scent of the sea even when chilled.

The pressed pork from the market was good too.

If it had been dropped into hot noodles, it might have become soft immediately.

But with the cold broth, its springy texture remained intact.

It paired beautifully with the noodles.

After finishing everything in an instant, Assistant Manager Oh carried his new menu toward the grandmother.

“Grandma, would you sit down for a moment? We prepared something.”

[Ice-Cold Noodles - 4,000 won
Sliced Pressed Pork - 8,000 won]

When she saw the menu, Grandma narrowed her eyes and focused.

“What’s this?”

“A new menu. We actually work in a field that helps struggling stores. You saw the construction waste being removed earlier, right? That was done so tourists could see this restaurant.”

“Huh... I wondered why they were finally cleaning it. So that was because of you. But what is this pressed pork?”

“We thought it would pair well with the noodles. You only need to slice it when an order comes in, so it doesn’t add much work. The elderly merchant at the market makes it personally.”

We deliberately didn’t say that she should make her profit from pressed pork and alcohol instead of the noodles.

She might reject the idea if we framed it that way.

Still...

Something felt strange.

She was smiling.

But she didn’t look happy.

She looked troubled.

Senior Staff Choi noticed too and showed her the tablet.

“This is called social media. Think of it as free advertising. It already has twenty thousand views. That means you could start getting busy as early as tomorrow. You won’t have to worry about rent anymore.”

A photograph taken from the pavilion across the water.

The newly installed sign.

The elderly woman rubbed her dim eyes and stared at Iseul’s tablet.

Then she sighed deeply and looked out the window.

Her wrinkled hands repeatedly clenched and released the apron.

Only after a long silence did she finally speak.

What she told us was shocking.

After finishing business for this month...

She had already decided to close the restaurant and move to Seoul to live with her son.