12 Hours After

Translator: Khan

Editor: Aelryinth

After changing the setting of my future news to the United States, I received US news for about a month. I had only received the future news of Korea before, but I began to receive the future of the United States. So even if it was the news of 12 Months After, a year later, there was a lot of amazing and fresh news. The interesting thing was that there was news in the US after 2026. It was just one. And… it was pretty weird news.

[Politics – General Duke’s forty-second birthday party is held.]

That was really strange news. Most of the time, the political news in the U.S was like this:

[Claudia Moritz of the Senate condemned Trump’s tweet] or Defense Secretary Howard said, [“The military tension in the South China Sea…”]

However, suddenly, the story of a general’s birthday party was in the news.

‘What is this? What the hell? Why is the general’s birthday on the news?’

I clicked on it.

[General Duke celebrated his forty-second birthday on July thirteenth, 2030. After the Great Recession of 2026, General Duke, who has built up our army at the top of the South with outstanding leadership…]

After reading the article, it seemed that a general named Duke was establishing a position in the south of the United States, and pretending to be a king.

‘It is a story that can only take place in a dystopian movie, but it is worth playing king if he is a general who commanded a mechanized division when a nuclear war broke out and the government collapsed. In other words, he will become president without having to go through a coup.

‘General Duke’s army must have avoided the nuclear weapons…

‘Now that the U.S. has become this way, there is nothing else to say. If Seoul and Pyongyang are destroyed by nuclear weapons, the military might take control of one or two metropolitan cities and establish a military regime. To elect the president by vote is the story when it’s peaceful. In wartime, guns soon become power.

‘But a general’s birthday is political news… This is no different from the old hostile North Korea.’

Anyway, it was alright, as there were many useful things in US news. In particular, the People Search was very effective. By far the two most frequently used figures in the U.S. were U.S. President Donald Trump and Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell. These two were literally superpowers that controlled world politics and the economy, and if I searched under their names, I would find such news.

[It’s obvious that Donald Trump is strengthening his sanctions against Iran, and oil prices are rising.]

[Jerome Powell, chairman of the FRB, remarks hinting at more dollar releases to ease the financial crisis.]

Every word they said had a tremendous impact on markets around the world, with international oil prices rising and dollar indexes falling. And in fact, it was like finding a treasure trove to me. I realized that their words and the market actually became synchronized, so I called in Vice President Jang.

“Did you call me?”

“Oh yes. I’d like to set up my own team.”

“Team?”

“Yes. An international futures trading team. They should be quick-handed and quick-witted. About ten people?”

Of course, I used to do futures trading sometimes, when I was lucky to have news to bet on in the “Economy” section. But now that I was able to search for names in English, I needed to actively trade. This was because I was able to earn a lot more than what I used to receive from the Korean news, and make forty to fifty million dollars a month by buying and selling the KOSPI and KOSDAQ in advance. Compared to the futures market and the foreign exchange market, KOSPI and KOSDAQ were just small mom-and-pop stores.

“Ah… yes. I’ll go ahead and get twenty people’s applications.”

“Yes, please.”

——————

Jang brought in twenty profiles around three days later. “When I said it was the boss’ team, everyone was dying to join it.”

“Oh, was that so?”

There was a rumor going on across the investment industry, beyond our company: If CEO Han Sang-hoon is pleased with you, an annual salary of a few hundred thousand dollars is basic.

The rumor was true, although there had been many false rumors in the investment industry. Vice President Jang, some directors, and the secretaries who had stayed by my side had all become rich with millions of dollars. Therefore, working on my direct team was no different from a high-paying, high-speed promotion.

“That’s just twenty people. I’ll pick only ten people who I like.”

“Yes, boss.”

———-

I made my own futures trade team through interviews. What these people did was trade futures all day, twenty-four hours a day. I gave them an account, each containing a hundred million dollars, and set up a strategy based on news from the United States.

“By February next year, the dollar will go down, and the oil prices will go up. Only sell and liquidate dollars and buy and liquidate oil prices. I’ll settle the profits at the end of each month and give you one percent. Anyone who loses for two months in a row will be fired immediately. Go run.”

I let go of ten traders, as if to untying the hounds. My hounds traded frantically for a 1% bonus. Since the seed money was a hundred million dollars, they could make tens of thousands to hundreds of thousand dollars in just one or two months. In fact, some members of the team made me ten million dollars in a week. They earned a hundred thousand dollars at the end of the month just by their share of this profit. It wouldn’t be necessary to say that other members around them were stimulated, and burned to perform.

By all means, it was good for me. This was much more profitable and comfortable than making blind money from individuals on the KOSPI and KOSDAQ. With my guidelines alone, the team could earn at least a hundred million dollars, to as much as five hundred million dollars a month.

Watching them, I recalled the interview I’d had with Forbes before:

‘Do you need more money?’

‘No, I just want more success than more money.’

It was a slightly greasy, beautiful answer, but now things were a little different. I certainly needed more money. To increase my influence in the U.S. and China’s political circles, astronomical levels of lobbying must follow. Therefore, I set a rough road map.

‘Three years to the next collapse… I will make an astronomical amount of money in the first year, start lobbying in the second year, and in the third year, I will lobby all the politicians in the U.S. and China.’

——————–

December, 2022…

Ah-young was brought in to be diagnosed before childbirth delivery. I expected them to put gel on her stomach and look inside with ultrasound, but it didn’t happen.

The female doctor who had become Ah-young’s dedicated doctor after receiving one million dollars in a lump sum payment, told us, “These days, genetic technology has developed, so with the mother’s blood, we can identify her genetic traits.”

Rubbing the stomach for ultrasound testing was only done until the 2010s, and in the 2020s, they were able to diagnose almost any disease by collecting just a drop of blood. Come to think of it, I had heard such news in the future news about two years ago. [The upper limit price of Sejin GC. Patented gene kit for fetal diagnosis.] The future of the past was now the present.

“Well… let’s see.” The doctor, who had seen the results of the test, nodded. “She’s healthy. The baby doesn’t have any genetic modifications or deficits, she’s fit for size and weight, and she is growing well.”

We spoke in chorus, “Good to hear!”

Then she looked at us and brought up a rather abrupt story. “Well, did you buy something like a baby’s suit?”

‘No, we still have a few months to get the baby out, but do we have to buy it already?’ I told her with such thoughts, “No, not yet.”

“Really? You’d better buy pink baby clothes. These days, we have many pretty pink ones.”

As soon as I heard that, I realized why she had brought up the story of baby clothes. ‘It’s a girl!’

“I see.”

In a few months, my daughter would be out, a healthy and pretty daughter. But in order for her to grow healthy, there was something I had to do: world peace. Looking at the future news, the U.S.-China nuclear war did not seem to have happened as planned.

Between them, of course, there were signs of war going the way that it was.

[Increased friction between the U.S. and China.]

[China warns the U.S. not to sell weapons to Taiwan.]

However, there was no specific news like this.

[Because of this, we decided to fight a war.]

[… the destroyer fired first.]

Rather, a week before doomsday, there was some news.

[The U.S. gives a gesture of reconciliation to China.]

[The U.S. and China will meet at the G20 meeting.]

Therefore, it was hard to say it was a planned war. In the first place, neither would have wanted such an ending that would devastate the world. Both of them wouldn’t have wanted it, but it seemed as if one side fired a nuclear weapon, and the other automatically fought back with it, and then brought about the end of the world.

So maybe, if I dug this way, I could stop the future war even if I didn’t have to pay for it. So while I was making money for world peace and expanding my company, I began my own spy campaign, because I had the most capable spy.

———-

“Did you call me, Mr. CEO?”

I saw Crow on the roof of my house. I spoke to him in a slightly heavier tone than usual. “I think you’ll be a little busy in the future.”

“It’s okay. Just give me the order. I’ll be happy to do whatever you want me to do.”

I handed him the data I had prepared. It was a profile of the U.S. president, the Chinese president, and key figures of the U.S. and Chinese forces. That was all I could find on the Internet.

“For these people, please find out details, particularly about political weaknesses, and information about nuclear weapons. I’ll look at the results of the report, and I’ll make a request again.”

“Yes, sir.”

I said one more thing to him as he was about to disappear into the air as usual. “Please pay special attention to this mission. Crow, maybe…”

As I said, Crow paused and looked at me.

I was going to say something to him, but I changed my words for a moment and asked him, “Crow, you said you don’t talk to anyone else, did you?”

“Of course. I don’t talk to anyone else in the world except you.”

That was enough. I told him, “Okay. Crow, to be honest, every civilization on this planet may be destroyed within three years.”

“… I see.”

Crow took the words more casually than I expected. I felt as if he had been through this kind of thing once or twice. I looked at him and instead of asking him anything more, said, “This is to stop it. So, please take extra care and do well.”

Crow listened to me for a moment, thought of something, and then answered, “All right, sir. I’ll do my best, just like the CEO said.” After he finished the remark, he left the place.

For the next three years, I would do my best in the sun and in the dark to prevent the end of the world…