Chapter 1507 Taking Place (2)

“Good morning, sir! Chairman!”

“Great to see you this morning, sir!”

Kang Jin-Ho stepped inside MK’s building while receiving greetings from various people. He then passed his car keys over to the security.

“Here. Take care of it.”

“Of course, sir! Leave it to us!”

After briefly nodding, Kang Jin-Ho headed straight to the elevators. The security guards tilted their heads in confusion.

“Did something happen?”

“Looks like it.”

It was rare to see Kang Jin-Ho handing over the car keys and walking away without saying anything else like that.

“Even his expression didn’t look good, either.”

“Right, right. Even though he was expressionless, like usual.”

The security guards stared worriedly at the closing elevator door.

***

Kang Jin-Ho pushed the door open and entered the conference room. The people sitting inside hurriedly got up in sync.

“Chairman, welcome back.”

After sharing a brief greeting with them, Kang Jin-Ho strode toward the seat of honor and settled down on it.

“Okay, tell me what happened.”

Unlike his usual self, he went straight to the topic at hand. That alone conveyed what his current mood was.

Lee Hyeon-Ju sneakily exchanged glances with Hwang Min-Su before starting her briefing.

“Sir. We have an incident of assault in one of our stores.”

“Assault...”

Kang Jin-Ho’s voice grew weighty, causing Lee Hyeon-Ju to swallow her saliva nervously.

Every Martial Assembly-affiliated person knew how terrifying Kang Jin-Ho could be if he got angry. Since Lee Hyeon-Su usually took up the role of the Assembly’s demonic bastard, everyone defaulted to treating Kang Jin-Ho as a good-natured workplace superior, but they still hadn’t forgotten what would happen once their Assembly Master lost his cool.

Of course, that also included Lee Hyeon-Ju.

Kang Jin-Ho glanced at her. “Details.”

“Of course. The store in question is in the city of Bucheon. A heated argument developed between a customer and the franchisee, and things escalated to the point where the customer allegedly started assaulting the franchisee behind the counter, and the angry franchisee fought back.”

Kang Jin-Ho subtly furrowed his brow. “Our side got attacked first?”

“Yes, that is what the franchisee is claiming. But the customer is arguing that they got assaulted one-sidedly.”

“Hmm...”

Kang Jin-Ho scratched his cheek. When his expression softened a tad, the tension choking the office’s atmosphere relaxed instantly. Hwang Min-Su, who had been holding his breath almost instinctively, finally started breathing again.

Holy sh*t! What was that?!

To think he’d get this nervous just because Kang Jin-Ho was making a stiff expression! This was several times scarier than back when Hwang Jeong-Hu was trashing the conference room out of uncontrollable rage.

Even though Kang Jin-Ho hadn’t done anything!

Click!

Kang Jin-Ho mouthed a cigarette and lit it up with a lighter before addressing the people in the room. “If you smoke, go ahead.”

“Oh, uh... No, we’re fine, sir.”

They all craved a bit of nicotine in their system right now, but none of them could work up the courage to mouth a cigarette in Kang Jin-Ho’s presence today.

Kang Jin-Ho didn’t urge the others and simply puffed away at his cigarette. “So? How are we handling this?”

“For the time being, we’ve left the store to operate as usual, sir. Closing it when we haven’t established all the facts yet will only give off the impression of admission of guilt,” said Lee Hyeon-Ju.

“Sure. But it doesn’t change the fact that the franchisee was at fault,” Kang Jin-Ho said, his voice firm. “No matter the circumstances, it is wrong to lay your hands on a customer. Isn’t that right?”

Lee Hyeon-Ju cautiously replied, “Yes, Chairman.”

“And? What else?”

Hwang Min-Su replied instead of Lee Hyeon-Ju. “We don’t have any other response in place yet, sir. That will come after we’ve concluded our investigation. That’s why we’re reporting to you first.”

Gu Jeong-Beom chimed in, anxiety filling his expression. “Shouldn’t we prepare a public apology and release it to the public? Whatever happened, this incident still took place in our store. Before the matter balloons in severity, it might be better to get on top of the...”

“No, that won’t do.” Hwang Min-Su firmly rejected the idea. “Did you forget what kind of era we’re living in? Hyenas will pounce on whatever little opening you’ve exposed to rip you apart until they are certain of you never getting back up again. Even innocent people would get destroyed in unwarranted witch hunts, and when it’s proven they haven’t done anything, all the vocal critics would go back into hiding as if they had never been a part of the hate campaign, to begin with.”

Hwang Min-Su was right.

The town square called the internet proved to be a useful tool in so many situations after becoming an integral part of the human race. But there was one unfortunate downside to it, and that was with how the rumors spreading online didn’t need to be substantiated, and the ones spreading said rumors were never forced to accept responsibility for their actions.

“If we were individuals, we could’ve used the law to deal with the ridiculous rumors, but we are a company, Mister Gu. A company suing someone who is basically its customer does not look good on paper.”

Lee Hyeon-Ju nodded in agreement. “Yes, I also believe releasing a public apology without doing our due diligence will not be a sound response in this situation. If the fault really was on our side, we should apologize and rightfully get criticized, but it’s too early for that.”

“Mm...” Kang Jin-Ho nodded. “So, the priority is figuring out what happened. Got it. Where is the franchisee in question?”

“We’ve asked him to come in, sir. He should arrive within an hour. And we’ve also sent people to retrieve the CCTV footage.”

The recorded footage should shed some light on what went down in the store.

Noh Tae-Gwang tutted unhappily. “Why did it have to happen now, though?”

Hwang Min-Su subtly furrowed his brow. “It’s not the case of why now, but more like the time was ripe for a problem to occur. The stores opened only recently, and with how good the business has been, we were bound to deal with some kind of issues sooner rather than later.”

What made the situation worse was the type of issue they were dealing with.

“We’ll get our answers soon enough,” said Kang Jin-Ho while sucking in another lungful of cigarette smoke.

Unfortunately for him and the others inside this conference room, however, the situation ballooned several times faster than they could have ever anticipated.

***

“Wow! The response online hasn’t died down yet!”

Han Eun-Sol muttered in amazement while looking at all the social media posts on his phone.

“Noona! I think you’ve really hit the jackpot this time! The reaction online is even better than when you got that grand prize for that drama!”

Choi Yeon-Ha coolly nodded. “Of course. I’m beautiful, after all.”

Han Eun-Sol stared at her weirdly.

She cocked an eyebrow. “What? Did I say something wrong?”

“Noona.”

“Yeah?”

“Since the dawn of mankind, do you know what is the number one cause of death for someone who always tries to be the most correct person in the room?”

“Not... sure?”

“It’s because they have no luck!”[1]

“Wanna die?!”

Choi Yeon-Ha glared murderously, but when subjected to her glare, all Han Eun-Sol could do was groan loudly.

Well, she’s technically correct, isn’t she?

Indeed, the reaction online was good because she looked good on screen. What a disgusting and unfair world of lookism they were living in!

Han Eun-Sol grumbled. “Why can’t the world become a place where people only care about inner beauty...?”

“What a stupid assertion you have, Eun-Sol. In a world like that, I would’ve never gotten the chance to become an actor.”

“...”

Somewhat shockingly, Choi Yeon-Ha was very much conscious of what she was like.

“In any case, the reactions have been really encouraging so far, noona.”

“Yes, I know.”

The corners of Choi Yeon-Ha’s lips curled up ever so sneakily.

She had been glued to her phone lately. New comments about the ad kept appearing on social media sites figuratively every minute, after all. And reading what the netizens had to say proved incredibly entertaining. Better still, the posts were almost always full of praises, so it made sense for her mood to soar through the heavens.

She glanced at the phone’s screen again, and her lips curled up even more.

Of course, there was this one thing she was not exactly pleased with, which was...

“By the way, why are there more posts about Mister Jin-Ho than me?”

“...!”

Han Eun-Sol noticed the furrowed brow on Choi Yeon-Ha’s face, and cold sweat immediately soaked his back. That expression! She only made that face when her annoyance meter was about to crank up.

“M-maybe because Mister Jin-Ho is a new face on the block? Maybe?”

“New face?”

“Yes, noona. Everyone knows who you are and how pretty your face is, but that doesn’t apply to our chairman, right? In that case, it makes sense that most people are more interested in him instead.”

“Aha! You think so?”

Choi Yeon-Ha’s expression softened a tad, giving Han Eun-Sol a chance to sigh softly. It seemed he had successfully navigated through this tricky patch of...

“Then, what about these comments? Like this one. That dude is more beautiful than Choi Yeon-Ha! And this one. Choi Yeon-Ha’s looks aren’t what they used to be. Or, how about this one? This shameless woman, look at how much she’s drooling over the younger man!”

“...I’m sure the last commenter was just being jealous?”

“Whatever!”

More cold sweat trickled down Han Eun-Sol’s back. What the hell?! What do you want me to do about those posts?!

It was true that Chairman Kang Jin-Ho looked even prettier than Choi Yeon-Ha in the ad. Even Han Eun-Sol couldn’t take his eyes off of him, after all!

Han Eun-Sol subtly avoided meeting Choi Yeon-Ha’s glare. “I, uh, I don’t think this is something to be unhappy about. It’s not like you’re losing out to another woman, right? He’s a dude, after all.”

“Don’t you think that’s even worse?”

“Eiii~, no way. We’re talking about our chairman here, noona. If it’s another man, sure, that could be a problem. But not with our chairman.”

“Hmmmm...?”

It seemed Han Eun-Sol’s latest attempt to diffuse the situation was more successful than the last time, because Choi Yeon-Ha began nodding subtly away.

“Right... Mister Jin-Ho is handsome, after all.”

A simple set of presentable clothes, not his usual sloppy attire, was enough to bring out the aura of a top celebrity in Kang Jin-Ho. No, his aura even surpassed that.

Choi Yeon-Ha rubbed her chin. “Geez! At times like this, I really want him as a talent working for our talent agency.”

“Me too, noona. I’ve wondered about that lots of times. The greatest advantage of having him as one of ours is that managing him will be super easy.”

“Yeah, true!”

Choi Yeon-Ha animatedly nodded to display her unreserved agreement.

There was a saying in the Korean entertainment industry about how the most desperate people in this neck of the woods were unsuccessful celebrities, while the most terrifying people were successful celebrities.

Unsuccessful folks who worked so hard and tried everything in their power to get even a minor role would forget about their struggles and go on unbridled power trips once roaring fans and their “love” began surrounding them.

At least going on power trips was somewhat manageable. Ghosting important appointments and disappearing from the face of the earth, going to clubs every night and partying nonstop, hooking up with their adoring fans and going out on dates, or openly enjoying scandalous trysts with their co-workers...

“Yup, there are plenty of loons in our profession,” Choi Yeon-Ha muttered.

Despite doing all these things, though, most talent agencies couldn’t rein the unruly talents in because... Once a talent became successful, they would bring in an enormous amount of money for the agency, that was why!

Since talent agencies couldn’t give up on all those juicy revenue streams, they simply swallowed their tears and tried to protect the public images of their talents and even did their best to clean up the mess left behind.

“But we don’t have to worry about doing that with our chairman,” said Han Eun-Sol.

Kang Jin-Ho was an existence who never had to worry about getting involved in such scandals. For one, he’d never find himself in women troubles as long as Choi Yeon-Ha was around. However, even if she wasn’t, he’d still not have issues in that regard.

Since Kang Jin-Ho’s mindset was almost the same as that of a devout believer of a strict religion, he almost never responded to what people commonly viewed as worldly pleasures. In fact, he was someone who, when given some down time, would head home and cook himself some ramen instead.

Scandals would never plague a man like that.

In the eyes of a talent agency, a celebrity more perfect than him didn’t exist. Leaving him unsupervised didn’t lead to scandals, and putting him in front of a camera created magic that verged on pure cinematic bliss!

However, there was a catch, and that was...

Choi Yeon-Ha tutted. “He can’t act to save himself, though.”

“Yup, and that’s the biggest problem, isn’t it?”

Technically, it wasn’t that Kang Jin-Ho couldn’t act, but more like he couldn’t act when there were lines of dialogue involved, but... That was splitting hairs, really. They weren’t in the era of silent movies, after all. Every role required the actor to read some lines these days.

A talent that couldn’t be used wasn’t a talent at all.

Choi Yeon-Ha shook her head. “Forget it. Let’s leave it as a pipe dream, okay? Besides, Mister Jin-Ho doesn’t have a reason to become an actor, anyway.”

“Yes, that’s true, too.”

“He complained that much during one ad shoot, so imagine what would happen if he were forced into shooting something else. He might actually run away, you know? Let’s leave him be for now. We can always coax him later if we need him, anyway.”

Choi Yeon-Ha chuckled while glancing at her phone’s screen. However, when she saw the latest comments, her eyes opened wider in shock.

“W-what the heck is this? What kinda nonsense are these people even saying now?!”

1. My bad, but there was a Korean pun at play here that couldn’t get translated into English. In Korea, when someone is being hateful or deserving of a slap, they are said to be “unlucky” (jae-soo-eob-da.) Doesn’t literally mean they are unlucky, of course. ☜