Side Story Chapter 7
The next day, I texted Goo Yangmo.
[Are you free this evening?]
A reply came almost immediately.
[Come to the studio.]
A little after seven that evening, I headed to Goo Yangmo’s workspace in Hapjeong-dong.
I knocked on the metal door beneath the sign that read [Baduk Club].
His voice came from inside.
“It’s open.”
When I stepped in, Goo Yangmo was sitting at a desk in front of the blue backdrop, staring into his laptop.
Empty coffee cans and various energy drinks were scattered across the desk.
It looked like he had been sitting there like that all day.
“Dinner?”
Instead of greeting me, he asked about food.
“Not yet.”
“Jajangmyeon? Jjamppong?”
“I’ll have seafood fried rice.”
“What the hell.”
Goo Yangmo stared at me as if I were unbelievable, then ordered two portions of seafood fried rice through an app.
“So, did you find anything?”
“You said you were going to look deeper into the CEO of Haeseong Investment.”
“Ah, nothing.”
“He’s retired now and living somewhere in Gangwon Province.”
“I had a hell of a time finding his personal number and called him.”
“He had to think for a while before even remembering that he was technically the CEO of Haeseong Investment.”
Goo Yangmo gave a hollow laugh.
Then his expression turned serious.
“But I did find something on the JNC side.”
“JNC?”
“There’s a woman who streams on AfreecaTV and Nutube under the nickname ‘Sleeping Beauty.’”
“Well... this is a bit harsh to say, but she’s the type who’ll do pretty much anything for star balloons.”
“She even strips sometimes.”
I found it strange that he was suddenly talking about some female streamer, but I listened.
“About two years ago, she once turned on a livestream while drunk.”
“And during the stream, she said that around three years before that, she had been an acting trainee at JNC Entertainment.”
The words JNC Entertainment trainee made me lean forward without realizing it.
“And?”
Goo Yangmo smirked, clearly pleased that I had reacted.
“She said that one time, a decent supporting role opened up.”
“JNC told her they’d push her for it.”
“But in exchange, she had to go to a private drinking gathering with someone who was close to the CEO and pour them a drink.”
As I listened, a question immediately came to mind.
“If that’s true, wouldn’t it have caused a huge scandal?”
“Why have I never heard about this?”
“That woman has a reputation for lying.”
“She’s always claiming she’s close with famous male celebrities.”
“She used to show off clothes and bags she said were luxury brands, only for people to find out they were fake.”
“You know the type.”
“An attention seeker who lies every time she opens her mouth.”
“Ah....”
I wasn’t sure how I was supposed to react to that, so I simply nodded.
Goo Yangmo continued without caring.
“So nobody believed her.”
“The stream was deleted a few hours later.”
“And more importantly, JNC completely ignored it.”
“That made people even less likely to take her seriously.”
“What?”
“Don’t tell me that’s the end of the story.”
Curious about where this was going, I urged him on.
“Seriously, you’re impatient.”
“Of course that’s not the end.”
“I sent her a DM, just in case.”
“I asked whether it was true and whether I could use the story.”
“And?”
“She replied?”
Instead of answering, Goo Yangmo nodded and grinned.
“She said she hadn’t lied.”
“She contacted me and said we should meet in person.”
“So we’re meeting this Saturday.”
“Really?”
If her story was true, and if she had any proof, that alone could be enough to put serious pressure on JNC Entertainment.
“Can I come with you on Saturday?”
“You?”
“Yes.”
Goo Yangmo thought for a moment, then shrugged.
“I don’t care.”
“Oh, right.”
“What about you?”
“Didn’t you say you knew someone in the investment industry?”
“That’s actually why I wanted to meet today.”
“Really?”
“Did you find something big?”
“Not exactly.”
“It’s not certain yet, but... something smells off.”
I told him everything Ha Sangdo had discovered.
“Wait.”
“What did you say that law firm was called?”
Goo Yangmo’s eyes suddenly sharpened.
“CV Law & Partners.”
“Don’t tell me you mean the CV Law & Partners run by Cha Hyunwoo, the former prosecutor from the Special Investigation Division of the Seoul District Prosecutors’ Office?”
“Huh?”
“How do you know that?”
“Ha... hahaha....”
For just a second, Goo Yangmo’s eyes changed.
They looked like a predator had spotted prey.
“About ten years ago, remember the illegal succession and slush-fund scandal involving Doosung Group?”
“The media went crazy over that one.”
“The prosecutor in charge was Cha Hyunwoo.”
“Really?”
“Yeah.”
“And about seven years ago, there was the Boom Boom Club sponsor scandal.”
“The law firm defending the accused was CV Law & Partners.”
Goo Yangmo explained that both cases had drawn enormous public attention.
He knew the Boom Boom Club case especially well because he had written a special feature on it himself.
“Ha.”
“And Cha Hyunwoo is behind Haeseong Investment?”
“Now I’m getting a feeling.”
“A really strong feeling.”
He rubbed his palms together excitedly.
I still didn’t understand why he was so worked up.
“So you think Cha Hyunwoo is the one actually controlling Haeseong Investment?”
“No.”
“JNC Entertainment itself?”
“Ninety percent, based on my gut.”
“If it’s Cha Hyunwoo, he’s capable of it.”
Goo Yangmo explained that while covering the Boom Boom Club sponsor scandal, he had learned quite a bit about CV Law & Partners and Cha Hyunwoo, who represented the defendants.
“Wait.”
“I should still have the old materials saved on my laptop.”
He quickly began opening folders.
His computer contained all kinds of files from cases he had investigated over the years, sorted by incident.
“Here.”
Old articles filled the screen.
Bribery.
Illegal lobbying.
Sexual entertainment allegations.
Scandals that had shaken the country throughout the early and mid-2010s.
“Were all these cases handled by Cha Hyunwoo when he was a prosecutor?”
“Yeah.”
“Apparently, he volunteered for every single one of them.”
Goo Yangmo pointed at the screen.
“Look.”
“These are all dirty cases other prosecutors would rather avoid.”
“Sensitive, complicated cases.”
“The kind where no matter whose side you take, you get criticized.”
“But Cha Hyunwoo deliberately chose cases like this.”
“Isn’t that strange?”
I silently scanned the articles.
Then something suddenly clicked.
“Don’t tell me... he was collecting information during the investigations....”
“Bingo.”
Goo Yangmo gave me a thumbs-up.
“Your instincts aren’t bad either, Vice President Min.”
“This is just a theory that goes around among veteran reporters.”
“But there’s a rumor that while Cha Hyunwoo was still a prosecutor, he deliberately excluded some evidence he obtained during investigations and kept it separately.”
“So he could use it after retirement.”
Goo Yangmo told me about the Doosung Group illegal succession and slush-fund case from ten years earlier.
According to the rumor, Cha Hyunwoo had deliberately omitted decisive evidence from the case.
The prosecution lost in court.
But after Cha Hyunwoo resigned and opened his law firm, one of his very first major clients was Doosung Group, which hired him as outside counsel.
Only then did I understand why Goo Yangmo was so convinced that Cha Hyunwoo was capable of something like this.
“There are plenty of law firms that operate that way.”
“But even in that world, CV Law & Partners is pretty notorious for this kind of thing.”
“Then do you think Cha Hyunwoo invested in JNC Entertainment from the beginning with the intention of using actors like that?”
“Probably.”
Goo Yangmo spoke with near certainty.
He believed that after defending the accused in the Boom Boom Club sponsor scandal, Cha Hyunwoo may have realized just how useful actors and entertainers could be for collecting compromising material on political and business figures.
I remembered what Moon Changsoo had said.
JNC Entertainment hadn’t always been like this.
Right.
Then maybe Cha Hyunwoo really did plan from the beginning to use JNC Entertainment that way.
But....
“We need evidence.”
I pointed out that everything we had was circumstantial.
There was no proof.
“That’s true.”
“That’s actually why I never wrote an article about Cha Hyunwoo back then.”
“I didn’t have evidence.”
Goo Yangmo thought for a moment.
“I’ll dig into Cha Hyunwoo again.”
“He might have left something behind since then.”
“For now, let’s meet again on Saturday after we talk to that streamer.”
“Okay.”
Two days later, I finished an afternoon meeting and picked up my phone.
I had a few messages I hadn’t been able to check during the meeting.
[Met with Baek Ina today. He’s much better than I expected.]
The message was from Song Jaehyun.
I immediately replied.
[Really? What about the agency?]
[Maybe because you told me beforehand, but the way they treat Baek Ina definitely feels less like they’re taking care of their artist and more like they’re monitoring him.]
On the day Song Jaehyun’s first meeting with Baek Ina had been arranged, I told him the reason Baek Ina had originally rejected the film.
He wanted to leave his agency.
I had also told Song Jaehyun that JNC Entertainment was currently monitoring Baek Ina in an effort to keep him from leaving.
So he already knew what kind of situation Baek Ina was in.
[Anyway, please keep an eye on him going forward.]
[I will. Next time, you should come too.]
[Of course.]
Just as I finished exchanging messages with Song Jaehyun, my phone rang.
Speak of the devil.
It was Baek Ina.
“Yes, Ina.”
“I heard you met Director Song today.”
“How was it?”
“It was great.”
“Director Song is such a good person.”
“And especially... he told me the rough story for the film.”
“I loved it.”
“Really, really loved it.”
“My heart was racing.”
“If I had turned this movie down... I think I would have regretted it for the rest of my life.”
“Thank you so much, Vice President.”
Baek Ina sounded genuinely grateful that I had stopped him from walking away.
“I’m glad you liked it that much.”
“That means you can focus entirely on the project.”
“I’ll handle everything else.”
“Understood?”
There was a brief silence.
Then Baek Ina answered in a noticeably brighter voice.
“Yes.”
“Thank you.”
“You’ll come to the next meeting too, right?”
“Of course.”
“I wanted to go today too, but an urgent meeting came up.”
“Next time, we’ll meet together with Director Song.”
Time passed quickly.
And on Saturday, I headed to a café in Bundang that Goo Yangmo had texted me the day before.
We were there to meet the female Nutuber who went by the nickname ‘Sleeping Beauty.’
