The Famous Millionaire

Ohsung Co. was the best and biggest company in Korea. There was a prevalent perception among the people that products made by Ohsung were the best, so Ohsung had a very good name.

Though Singyong Co. was quickly catching up with Ohsung’s growth, the former lagged far behind the latter.

Munsik Choi, CEO of Singyong, was unhappy about it all the time. He felt that Singyong could overtake Oshung by trying a bit harder, but the gaps between them didn’t narrow as Ohsung also grew as much as Singyoung.

So, Munsik burned with a competitive spirit whenever he heard the name Ohsung. That’s why he felt so nervous when he heard Ohsung was entering into the oil business.

He helped OneStar to keep Ohsung in check, but the former was not standing in the way of Singyong’s growth.

If that was the case, he felt it was necessary to reverse the foe and friend relationship between Ohsung and Singyoung. It was time Singyoung joined hands with Ohsung to keep OneStar at bay.

Munsik, standing before the headquarters of Ohsung, let out a sigh.

He entered the building.

As he arranged an appointment with the CEO of Ohsung in advance, Munsik headed straight to the CEO’s office.

Konho Ahn, the CEO of Ohsung, welcomed him. Though he was over 70 years old, Konho seemed as fit as a fiddle.

“Come on in,” said Konho.

“How are you, sir,” said Munsik.

Munsik bowed slightly to him, given that Konho was the elder in life as well as business.

“Have a seat. I’ve very nice puer tea ready.”

They exchanged pleasantries over tea for a while.

Konho didn’t feel good these days because his son Taesu was sentenced to jail recently in connection with the sex video scandal.

Besides, Assemblyman Chulmo Kim, the strong backer of Ohsung Group, lost power as he was involved in the scandal. He was once mentioned as a presidential candidate, but he was not on good ground in his own party these days.

Ohsung Group quickly moved to cultivate new connections with politicians to replace Mr. Kim.

“Don’t worry too much. I think your son will be pardoned soon.”

“Yea, he should. I want to see the President by the end of this year and ask a favor of him.”

Munsik felt it was the right moment to bring up the main topic.

“By the way, did you find out who was behind the disclosure of the sex video involving Mr. Kim? How dare anybody make such a video…?”

Konho frowned at that.

He ordered his men to find out who was behind it and confirm how the video was released.

Unfortunately, it was the mistake of the private security company, a subsidiary of Ohsung Group.

The villa, where the sex video was taped, was the property of Taesu Ahn, and only Taesu could control the unmanned securiy system. But somebody made a copy of Taesu’s security card and succeeded in unlocking the unmanned security system. And the man who got into the villa installed a secret camera to videotape the affair of Mr. Kim and Yonji Choi.

When Konho remained silent, Munsik talked about the suspect who was behind the incident.

“Don’t you think OneStar was behind it?”

Konho nodded silently.

“But I am not so sure,” he said.

“Well, I’m sure they were behind it. As far as money is concerned, they will try to risk anything.”

Konho saved his breath. Though he had a strong suspicion of OneStar, he had no specific evidence.

Munsik opened his mouth to stir up Konho’s hostility toward OneStar.

“In fact, I’ve got a big headache over OneStar. Why don’t we join hands to fight against OneStar on this occasion? We two can play the game.”

“How can we put pressure on OneStar?”

“Don’t you think it’s the biggest pressure on them for us to cut dealings with those companies that OneStar invested in?”

Konho nodded at that.

In fact, Konho was working out a plan in that direction. And several days ago he found one company he could use against OneStar. It was Nanotech, the producer of carbon nanotubes.

Ohsung Group was buying carbon nanotubes from three companies, the majority of which came from CNB. It was a company of which OneStar was a large shareholder.

Konho was going to switch the orders from CNB to Nanotech first. And as soon as he could confirm the quality of carbon nanotubes of other companies, he would receive orders from them instead of the existing three companies.

This time Konho asked, “What kind of plan do you have to put pressure on OneStar?”

“As you know, OneStar took over Bando Oil. So, I’m going to meet the ranking officials of the relevant ministries of the government. Sooner or later the government will clamp down on those gas stations owned by OneStar.”

Konho nodded his head, feeling such a government measure would be enough to make OneStar feel the pain.

But their dialogue was not over. Munsik had one more thing to double-check with Konho.

“By the way, are you going to enter the oil business? As you know, there are too many oil refineries in our country when its land is so small. Besides, recently OneStar has entered the oil refinery market…”

Konho giggled at that and said, “I gave it a brief thought when Bando Oil came up for sale, but I don’t want to enter the market now. I can assure you that.”

“Oh, I see. Haha, I was a bit worried about it,” said Munsik with a big laugh.

It was one hour later that Munsik came out of the Ohsung building.

There was a satisfied expression on his face.

“Done! Let me take revenge on you OneStar. How dare you insult me? Let me get you in trouble.”

Munsik came back to his office.

At that moment, the manager of the intelligence team came into the office for a special briefing.

“Sir, we have finally succeeded!”

Munsik’s eyes sparkled momentarily. As soon as he saw the manager, he thought of green oil.

“Success? Are you talking about…?”

“Yes, we have succeeded in stealing the secret on Super Green. Super Green is the name of the green oil that Duyoung has newly developed.”

Munsik sprang to his feet before he knew.

“Analyze it right away and apply for a new patient on it. We should be ahead of Duyoung. Remember it should not be too late unless it’s absolutely necessary.”

“Got it.”

The manager hurriedly went out of the office.

Munsik could not hide his excitement.

“Done. You bastards at OneStar. Let me make you suffer losses whenever you make an investment.”

***

Hyunwoo headed for Tapgokri village in Sosan City, where the construction of Haenim School was underway.

The school was designed to house 500 students, but its new building was much larger than the existing one in Hwasung.

Though it had only 50 students, Hyunwoo hoped the new school would be crowded with students in two or three years.

But this was just the beginning. Hyunwoo planned to expand it tenfold in five years.

After stopping by Tapgokri, he moved to the construction site of the STM factory located in Daesan Port.

Super Green was the new green oil developed by Duyoung. Hyunwoo was convinced that the moment the construction of the STM factory was completed, Super Green could shake the gasoline industry of Korea.

Back to Ansan he headed for the Ani & Funny office again.

The Ani & Funny office now had eight branches across the country, with a total of 150 staff and 450 students as part-timers.

The Ani & Funny office in Ansan was its headquarters. Though it was late evening, it was more crowded with the staff than during the daytime.

When Hyunwoo came into the office, everybody was so absorbed in their work that they didn’t even look at him. He could feel their strong enthusiasm at the moment.

Recently Ani & Funny was in the thick of producing animated movies. So far, it made a total of four movies including one intended for the audience of movie theaters, and all of them made box office hits.

The revenues of the movie for the theater were huge. Though Ani & Funny spent 12 billion won in producing the movie, the revenues it generated around the world were more than 100 billion won. Its DVDs and downloads on the internet for resale also brought in more than 50 billion won in revenues.

Other movies made for TV also raked in 50 billion won, and other short animation works also hit gold whenever they were on the market.

Everyone working at Ani & Funny deserved the credit for this tremendous success.

In particular, Yenam Noh was the biggest contributor.

As long as Hyunwoo had him on his staff, he felt the success of Ani & Funny could go on for the time being.

Anyway, the students and staff of Ani & Funny got in high spirits these days.

This time he went to Haenim School because of his father Duyoung.

As he developed Super Green, his father needed to take some rest, but he didn’t.

He was more enthusiastic about his research than ever.

As he launched the STM start-up, he cut down on his research time. To make up for this, however, he continued to spend more time on research by reducing sleep.

It seemed his father might fall sick if Hyunwoo would not step in.

It was around 9 pm when Hyunwoo arrived at the school.

Let me ask him go to sleep at 10 pm.

Hyunwoo headed for the research room to kill time until then.

At that moment, he saw somebody crouching down there, who looked like a student.

Who is he? What’s he doing there?

Hyunwoo slowly approached him, walking on tiptoe.

When he was getting near the student, he heard some weeping sound. A student was crying crouched over in agony there, covering his mouth with one hand.

When Hyunwoo stood before him, the student raised his head, sensing someone’s presence.

He was Mingyu Kang.

“Why are you crying, Mingyu? What’s wrong?”

Mingyu shook his head. When he saw Hyunwoo, he shed more tears as if he was all the more sad.

Stroking his back, Hyunwoo said, “Tell me what’s wrong. We’re a family.”

But Mingyu didn’t say anything.

Hyunwoo knew why he was crying, though.

Stroking his back again, Hyunwoo asked, “Are you crying because that man didn’t give you the money he promised?”