Surviving Restructuring

Choi Seung thought back to the question the Management Bureau director had asked his superior, “What is that child’s weakness?”

His superior’s answer, which sounded truthful at a glance, was nothing more than a carefully woven lie. ℴℴ𝘮

“Subordinates with honey on their lips and daggers in their bellies. Power built like a castle on sand. That’s the boy’s weakness.”

Perhaps the outcome had already been decided from the moment those words left her mouth.

“It hasn’t even been a month since they got out of restructuring, right?” Harona had said.

“That’s true, but—”

“The memory of competing viciously against one another must still be fresh. They may look friendly on the surface, but they’re probably filled with poison inside.”

Harona had always said something different. Lee Eun-Ho’s greatest weakness and strength was his warmth, a kindness that came before profit or loss. Though it cost him unnecessary losses, he always turned them into something far greater in the long run.

Yet she not only lied and had Seung pass along hints, she even moved personally this time.

“Will you regret this?” Seung asked carefully.

“I won’t,” Harona answered calmly.

This wasn’t a battle as it was a war and a political struggle. In a battlefield riddled with betrayal and schemes, the most important thing was choosing who to trust and support.

“I’ve chosen my side.” Her heart felt heavy from the suddenness, as though sand poured from someone else’s sky had piled inside her lung. “I’ll brag about this like crazy later. Just watch.”

Still, once she made the decision, she felt strangely relieved.

“Are you sure you picked the right side?” Seung asked bitterly.

Harona shrugged. “Who knows? We’ll have to wait and see.”

Only time would tell whether it was an escalator to heaven or a rotten rope ready to snap.

“Understood,” Seung said quietly.

There was no use crying over spilt milk. His superior had made a move without the slightest intention of turning back.

“I’ll keep this matter strictly confidential.”

It would remain a secret between the two of them, buried deep underground. If by some miracle, Lee Eun-Ho truly became the right line to stand behind, they would dig it up again. Such was the vow they had made.

[You have a new message.]

Harona had an odd look. “Huh?”

Seeing her expression sent an ominous chill crawling up Seung’s spine. “What is it?”

Fwoosh—

With a casual wave of her small hand, Harona pulled up a photo. “Look at this.”

“This person is—” Seung murmured.

“Skinny like a dried stick. It’s definitely that guy, right?”

The photo showed a familiar face.

“Ju Gwang.”

Memories surfaced immediately.

“Why did you pick someone from the mid-tier candidates? That was stupid.”

“Well, I guess it wasn’t easy choosing from a district with only fifty million people. I understand.”

Ju Gwang had been in charge of China in Sector Thirteen. Every time restructuring happened, he would seize the most populous regions and consistently produce the annual rookie representative. He had been her colleague.

“Stop being stubborn and come work under me. If I move up, I’ll need someone practical.”

He had always spoken in that irritating tone, but when Eun-Ho had been chosen as the representative, Ju Gwang had thrown a complete tantrum.

“What the hell has this bastard been up to?”

The photo showed Ju Gwang secretly handing something shiny to a staff member from the chairman’s secretary office. Clearly, it was a bribe.

“L-Lady H-Harona! What is this? What happened here?!” Seung exclaimed.

“It’s a bribe. Can’t you tell?” Harona replied casually.

“No, that’s not what I mean—”

Harona zoomed in and out of the photo, studying their obnoxious colleague with mild curiosity. “Looks expensive too.”

Seung, however, wasn’t staring at the picture. His wide eyes were fixed on the message that had come with it. The sender’s name alone was enough to make his eyes nearly pop out.

Lee Eun-Ho: Not sure if this will help.

“The sender is Lee Eun-Ho!” Seung shouted.

“Do you want to die?” Harona snapped. “I can hear you just fine without the yelling.”

“Lady Harona!”

Seung’s question wasn’t how but it was why. Why had Eun-Ho sent this photo to them and why now?

Then, another series of messages appeared.

Lee Eun-Ho: Consider it a token of my gratitude.

Lee Eun-Ho: Dear Ferry Man.

“F-Ferry—” Seung’s eyes nearly bulged out of their sockets. “L-Lady Harona! That guy already knows who we are!”

However, unlike Seung’s panic, his superior showed no sign of alarm.

“Wow, this is ridiculous,” Harona muttered.

“You’re not worried we’ve been exposed?”

Her twin pigtails bounced cheerfully. They trembled neither with fear nor stiffened with anger. “If he does this, I don’t even get the chance to brag about it later.”

“That’s not the issue here!” Seung protested.

“Wow. This guy’s really something, isn’t he?”

Seung pointed at the message with a pale face. “Is this really okay?!”

However, Harona simply waved it off. “Leave it.”

She rested her chin on her hand, lazily swinging her feet that didn’t quite reach the floor.

“I figured he’d notice eventually. Though he realized it faster than I expected,” she added under her breath.

“This doesn’t sound like you, Lady Harona,” Seung said quietly.

“Oh? Really?”

Seung had also been watching Lee Eun-Ho for a long time. Whenever Eun-Ho performed brilliantly, Seung had admired him. Whenever Eun-Ho fell into danger, Seung had secretly rooted for him.

However, above all else, Seung was Harona’s loyal subordinate. He couldn’t simply stand by and watch his boss step onto the edge of a cliff, especially when his own life was dangling right beside hers.

As if understanding his thoughts, Harona turned around in her chair, her twin pigtails bouncing a moment later. “I’m an employee too.”

“Pardon?”

She lightly patted Seung’s shoulder. “I’m curious, you know?”

Harona flashed a bright, cheerful smile.

“Let’s build a company where employees can truly be happy.”

That was the other reason she had made such an uncharacteristic choice. She truly wanted to see whether Eun-Ho could truly make that kind of company a reality.

***

“Hyung! Did you get it?”

“Yeah.”

A chuckle slipped out of Eun-Ho before he realized it.

“Uh, how much was it?” Ji-Woong asked, looking like a baby sparrow waiting for food.

“One million points—”

“Holy! Seriously?!” Ji-Woong blurted.

“... as compensation.”

“What?!”

The real reason Eun-Ho couldn’t hide his smile was not because he found Ji-Woong’s expression cute, but the reward box that had opened before him. The contents were far better than he had expected.

[Griffon’s Golden Eye]

- A circlet crafted from the eye of a Griffon that once flew toward the sun and burned to death.

- Wearing it increases your Defense by thirty and your electrical skill damage by ten to fifteen percent. It also reduces enemy electrical resistance by fifteen to twenty percent.

- Though, users must possess electrical-type skills.

That’s insane.

Eun-Ho’s strongest attacks were Electric Surge and Bolt from the Blue, which were both electrical-based skills. In other words, it was practically a custom-made item for him.

“Wow! That’s amazing!” Ji-Woong exclaimed.

“But, Mister! Why does the Audit Bureau even have something like this?”

“They confiscate a lot of items during audits,” Eun-Ho explained.

“Oh, so it’s secretly a treasure vault?”

Even so, it was unexpected.

I thought they’d just give me something to fill the quota.

Apparently, the member with the lowest seniority of the Audit Bureau, Guk Ryang, had been assigned to handle the lawsuit compensation. Judging from the item, he had clearly taken the task seriously.

A message popped up.

Guk Ryang: I sent 500,000 Welfare Points and sent the rest as a physical item.

He had claimed it was because of a lack of operational funds, but honestly, it felt more like an excuse to send something nice.

Lee Eun-Ho: Thank you, Mentor.

Guk Ryang: No one else wanted the job. I only took it because someone had to.

Guk Ryang said it as if to avoid any misunderstanding, but Eun-Ho knew better. The man was the very definition of by-the-book, yet observant enough to notice Eun-Ho’s worn-out shoes and send him a gift.

“Ji-Woong.” Thanks to him, Eun-Ho had learned something. “You did well back there. Pretending to be a defendant isn’t exactly in your job description.”

“Oh, it was nothing,” Ji-Woong replied. “I mostly just sat there.”

Eun-Ho had realized something important: to reward, win the loyalty of, or motivate a subordinate, material compensation works best.

“What do you want?” he asked.

“Huh?”

“Go to the shop and pick something. Anything you want.”

“Seriously?” Ji-Woong’s eyes widened as he glanced around, as if he couldn’t believe what he had heard. “Really? Anything?”

“Yeah. Anything.”

“Hyung!” Ji-Woong suddenly grabbed Eun-Ho’s hand and blurted something completely unnecessary, “If you ever come to my house, I’ll treat you really well! I swear! I promise!”

“What? Why would I go to your house?”

Ji-Woong stood there for a long moment, looking utterly baffled. “Huh?”

Eun-Ho couldn’t figure out what exactly had shocked him so much.

“This idiot still—”

“Are you talking about me?” Eun-Ho asked.

“N-no! Not you, Hyung! It’s my...”

“Your?”

Ji-Woong scratched the back of his head awkwardly for a moment before hurrying off. “Nevermind! I’ll go pick my gift!”

What’s wrong with him?

Still, Eun-Ho figured this was more than enough to acknowledge Ji-Woong’s hard work. Truthfully, the trial earlier had left his mind so tangled that he hadn’t had the energy to think about it much.

Though we won by a landslide, something still bothers me.

A series of notifications resurfaced in his mind.

[Signal has been detected]

[Monster rampage observed in Sector Thirteen.]

[There is a risk of escalation to disaster-level phenomenon.]

The phenomenon that had almost occurred in Sector Thirteen could’ve turned into a huge problem.

Eun-Ho had known the number of monsters would increase while the contract workers were away. Harona and Choi Seung had practically shouted it at him.

He had planned to head there himself once he finished his business at headquarters. However, everything had piled up all at once including the sudden group trial, the chairman’s assassination squad, and the trial. Things had been so chaotic that he never managed to send them back.

To be honest, I needed them with me, too.

For the labor union’s early positioning, it was better if they showed their faces. After all, the contract workers symbolized the company’s inequality and irrational structure.

“They say if this incident disrupts the balance, the purification process in Sector Thirteen may fail.”

If interpreted more broadly, the failure of the final stage would render the entire restructuring meaningless.

I was too complacent.

The issue had been bigger than he had anticipated. If Harona hadn’t stepped in and handled it, things could have gone very wrong.

There’s still too much I don’t know.

Knowledge wouldn’t always be power, but ignorance could definitely be poison. He had to know more about the company’s systems, its core businesses, and the reason employees kept working without complaint in such a terrible environment.

He had dared to talk about revolution without access to the company’s most important information. The thought refused to leave his mind.

I’ll figure it out just like I did thus far.

***

“Hyung! I picked something!”

“What did you choose?” Eun-Ho asked.

“The Wailing Ghostshell Armor! It’s light, the defense isn’t bad. More importantly, the evasion option looks pretty good.”

Eun-Ho nodded in approval. “Nice.”

It seemed like a reasonable choice for archers, who usually fought from long range.

Yet Ji-Woong suddenly hesitated. “But the price is a little—”

“Expensive?”

Ji-Woong nodded, watching his reaction.

No way, I know the prices in the Universal Emporium.

Eun-Ho had visited the Universal Emporium more than once. He had a rough idea of the market rates. Even if this was a newly stocked item, there probably wasn’t anything there he couldn’t afford right now.

“I’ve got plenty of points,” Eun-Ho said casually.

“Wow!”

At this point, Eun-Ho could practically buy out the entire store if he wanted.

“I’ll go get it myself,” Eun-Ho said. “Might as well say hi to Soeju while I’m there.”

“That’s so cool! Eun-Ho Hyung, you’re the best!”

Eun-Ho headed to the shop.

[You have been transferred to Soeju’s Universal Emporium.]

However, Soeju wasn’t there. Eun-Ho had actually wanted to ask him for a favor, just in case something happened.

Well, that can wait.

Clink—

He picked up the armor Ji-Woong had mentioned. Made from several layers of thin, slick fabric, it was lighter than he expected.

[Wailing Ghostshell Armor]

- Armor imbued with ghostly energy.

- Woven from silk threads spun using mulberry leaves fed to silkworms that had listened to a thousand years of ghostly wails.

- Wearing it increases your Defense by ten, and there is a ten percent chance to evade ranged attacks.

Not bad.

The defense value wasn’t very high, but considering the weight, it was decent enough. The effect was fine.

Eun-Ho’s outstretched hand froze midair. “And the price is fifty-eight thousand... no wait. Fifty-eight million points?!”

He hadn’t frozen during the sudden trial. He hadn’t frozen when the Audit Bureau’s men had stormed in. He hadn’t frozen even with the noose of execution hanging over his neck.

“But the price is a little—”

Ji-Woong, that’s not a little.

Ji-Woong apparently had a much bigger taste for expensive things than Eun-Ho had expected.

Wait, did this shop always have items this expensive?

Feeling slightly suspicious, Eun-Ho began checking the other items.

Clink—

He picked up a thin necklace.

[Dragonian Necklace]

- Price: 120,000,000 Points

O-one hundred and twenty million?!

He immediately put it back down.

[Barintos Meteoric Iron Sword]

Ah, I remember this one.

It was a sword he had considered buying early on. Out of curiosity, he picked it up.

- Price: 50,000,000 Points

“Nope, that’s not right.”

Startled, he quickly returned it to the display, before grabbing a simple potion.

[Heat Resistance Potion]

At least this one should be fine.

- Price: 1,000,000 Points

He quietly put it back. “Is this a bug?”

Something was clearly wrong. Just as Eun-Ho was about to send a message to Soeju, a message shot into his inbox like a bullet.

Choi Jae-Hyuk: Hyungnim! I think you need to come out here!

Another message followed immediately.

Choi Jae-Hyuk: Something serious has happened!

Choi Jae-Hyuk: The union members are demanding to withdraw en masse!