<CHAPTER 5>

“What? Grandpa?”

Mom asked.

“Ah, nothing.”

“Nothing? Taewoong, did you go to the army or something? Why are you suddenly ending your sentences like that?”

“The seniors in my club are really strict about discipline.”

I quickly changed the subject.

In our family, the word grandfather was forbidden.

To the world, he was Chairman Ha—the kindly-looking old man who resembled a traditional Korean Hahoe mask.

But I remembered his true face.

When I was young.

Before I had even entered elementary school.

When we learned that Grandma was critically ill, my parents and I went to Grandpa’s house.

Back then, I was thrilled.

I had only ever heard about grandfathers and grandmothers from my friends.

Until then, they had been nothing more than stories about other people.

The fact that I actually had a grandfather and grandmother of my own felt incredible.

And that wasn’t all.

I had so many uncles and even aunts—relatives other kids didn’t have!

I only understood the truth when I grew up.

My father, who traveled all over the country every day as a sales employee for a small or medium-sized company…

He had been a senior to me at university, many years ahead of me.

He was a graduate of Yeonguk University’s School of Business Administration, back when getting a job at a major corporation was relatively easy.

On top of that, he was the youngest son of the sitting chairman of the massive Haryun Group.

And yet, my father worked for a small company.

All because he had married my mother despite his family’s opposition.

My father had been stripped of every privilege he could have enjoyed as a member of the chaebol family.

The woman he chose had lost both her parents at an early age and had lived alone, practically like an orphan.

The two of them had met by chance on the beach in Sokcho and fallen passionately in love.

Their first love—the most beautiful emotion humanity has ever been granted.

That was where the tragedy began.

My father had already had his marriage arranged while he was still in college.

It was practically an obligation that came with being born into a chaebol family.

The youngest of four sons and two daughters, my father had already been promised to the daughter of one of Korea’s three largest media families.

Even so, he chose love.

Because of that, the Ha family went as far as making absurd threats to kill him.

My father never backed down.

He chose my mother.

Naturally, Grandpa cast him out on the spot.

He needed stepping stones to build the empire he dreamed of.

Any child who refused to comply was ruthlessly discarded.

Even my father’s siblings welcomed Grandpa’s decision, knowing that their own shares would increase as a result.

My father never regretted his choice.

Through his love for my mother, he overcame a world filled with prejudice.

When I look back on my childhood, our family had been happy.

My parents were so deeply in love that just looking at each other seemed to make honey drip from their eyes.

And there was me, their only son.

I have so many memories.

Whenever Dad had a day off and the weather was nice, the three of us would go to the Han River.

We would rent bicycles, ride around together, and tear into fried chicken afterward.

When it rained, we’d stay home and eat Mom’s delicious Korean pancakes.

Pumpkin, chives, sweet potatoes, napa cabbage, and so on.

Just thinking about Mom’s pancakes, made with such ordinary ingredients, still makes my mouth water.

Cheap ingredients, with the toppings changing according to the season.

They didn’t need expensive wine.

A single glass of makgeolli was enough to make the two of them happy.

Under the shelter of their love, I grew up without a care in the world.

If only that day—the nightmare I would never be able to forget—hadn’t happened, things might have stayed that way forever…

Pitter-patter.

It was a rainy day.

The three of us had driven to the neighborhood in the tiny company car Dad used for work.

It was Seongbuk-dong, one of Seoul’s wealthy neighborhoods.

Grand mansions stretched endlessly along the streets.

My heart raced.

I couldn’t believe I had a grandfather who was this rich.

My parents got out of the car in front of the mansion.

Even now, I can clearly picture how restless and nervous they were.

Mom was tense.

I could feel everything she was feeling through her tiny hand.

I held it tightly.

A faint tremor traveled through her warm palm.

At the time, I really didn’t understand.

Mom was genuinely afraid.

Dad pressed the doorbell.

There was no response from inside.

He rang it several more times.

After quite a while, two heavily built men opened the gate and came out.

They told us that, on the chairman’s orders, we were to leave.

Dad begged them.

“Please. Just let me see my mother once.”

That was the first time I ever saw my father cry.

The two men were bodyguards.

They firmly blocked our way and refused to let us pass.

An argument broke out between the three of them.

Dad tried to push past them and enter the gate.

The bodyguards grabbed him and held him back with brute force.

Dad screamed at the top of his lungs.

“Mother! Mother!”

His face was covered in tears and mucus as he desperately tried to get inside.

The iron gate was unusually tall and sturdy.

With the bodyguards standing in front of it, there was no way it would open.

Mom tried to stop the bodyguards when they began treating Dad roughly.

As the struggle dragged on, the umbrella we had been holding was thrown aside.

Pitter-patter.

Dad, Mom, and I were soaked through, looking like drowned rats.

And then, as if by some miracle, the gate opened.

An old man with a pleasant-looking face appeared.

“Father…”

Dad called out to Grandpa in a trembling voice.

He looked like a grandfather straight out of a children’s storybook, with a comical traditional mask for a face.

What caught my eye were the gold buttons.

Bright yellow gold buttons dangled all over his hanbok jacket.

“……”

The commotion died down.

A heavy silence descended.

It lasted only a moment, but to me, it seemed unbearably long.

The oppressive aura spreading in every direction terrified me.

I was scared.

I couldn’t breathe.

Hiding behind Mom, I stole a glance at Grandpa.

His lips were tightly pressed together.

He looked stubborn and mean.

His eyes were like those of a tiger, devoid of even the slightest warmth.

That was my first clear impression of my grandfather.

Even now, it remains etched vividly in my mind.

His gaze was nothing like the way Mom and Dad looked at me.

It wasn’t the gaze of a parent toward their child.

His eyes were cold and hostile, as though he were staring at an enemy.

For a brief moment, our eyes met.

There was absolutely nothing in his eyes.

Not even a trace of warmth toward his own blood.

He didn’t even look at Mom when she bowed and greeted him.

Behind Grandpa, my father’s siblings stood one after another.

They were lined up like a folding screen.

Their eyes were no different.

They looked down arrogantly at Mom, Dad, and me in our miserable, rain-soaked state.

I still vividly remember the faces of several of them, especially the ones who sneered at me because I was just a child.

And then I heard those words.

“Get out! You lowborn thing! How dare you come here!”

Someone among the women standing behind Grandpa shouted at Mom.

“How dare that bastard who was struck from the family register crawl back here!”

One of the men spat the words at Dad.

Dad begged again.

“Please. Just let me see my mother once.”

He dropped to his knees in front of the gate despite the pouring rain.

Grandpa remained silent even as he watched.

Instead, his children—the ones lined up behind him like a folding screen—shouted even louder.

“There is no bastard like you in the Ha family!”

The threats continued.

“If you ever come back here again, don’t expect to keep even your pathetic little life and job!”

After throwing those words at us, they all turned and disappeared behind the gate.

Grandpa turned his back on us and walked away without saying a single word.

He was a man without blood or tears.

Even as a child, I understood that much.

Dad cried out for Grandma.

Still on his knees, he slammed his fists against the rain-soaked ground again and again.

He sobbed so hard that his entire body seemed ready to collapse backward.

He continued trembling and crying like that for a long time.

Mom wrapped her arms around his shoulders.

That was when I learned that Dad could cry just as loudly as I could.

After that incident, Dad became much quieter.

He lost weight rapidly, too.

Not long afterward, the face of that frightening Hahoe-mask grandfather appeared on television.

It was a funeral hall.

The chairman was being interviewed after losing his wife of many years.

Throughout the interview, Grandpa shed tears and spoke sorrowfully of his grief.

Seeing him wearing that disgusting mask of sorrow made my stomach churn.

I remember running to the bathroom and throwing up everything I’d eaten that day.

Even when Dad died, not a single person from Grandpa’s side came to see us.

I spent several days comforting Mom as she grieved.

Looking back, I think that was when I erased every relative on my father’s side from my memory.

What remained in that empty space was nothing but rage.

Whenever I thought about them, I wanted revenge.

But reality was cold.

After entering university, I finally understood.

The Haryun Group wasn’t someone I could fight.

It was a colossal monster I couldn’t possibly touch, even if I died and came back to life.

A monster I couldn’t challenge even if I became a prosecutor or judge.

It was one of the great conglomerates holding up the entire South Korean economy!

A petty revenge was all I could manage.

Boycotting Haryun Group products.

I wouldn’t even set foot in the Seongbuk-dong area.

The advertisement on the screen changed.

“Though it is a modest amount, I am simply grateful to be able to contribute, even in the smallest way, to a difficult world.”

The beautiful words continued.

Ugh!

My stomach twisted, and I had to force down the vomit rising in my throat.

At least now, I had developed enough strength to endure this much.

“Mom.”

“Yeah, son.”

I had confidence now, too.

The independent war chest Grandma had left behind!

A chuckle escaped me.

I couldn’t help laughing at the absurd sense of victory.

“Mom, can your son become a chaebol?”

“A chaebol? All of a sudden?”

It had been a grudge I carried throughout my life.

And after living as an adult, I had realized it even more clearly.

This damn world!

It was a paradise for people with money!

Especially chaebols!

And especially that old man!

Before my regression, right at this exact point in time…

That old man was supposed to go to prison for embezzlement and breach of fiduciary duty.

He had thrown money around to bury the scandal.

The media figures connected to him through marriage and personal networks had rushed to protect him.

He was deeply entangled with the political world as well, so even serious crimes were smothered before they could explode.

Of course, the 300 billion won he publicly announced as a social donation never actually went to society as promised.

It flowed into a foundation managed by the group.

Naturally, the foundation belonged to Grandpa too.

The public knew perfectly well that he was merely pretending to be generous with his words.

And yet, his approval ratings remained sky-high.

I wanted to tear away every layer of that smile and expose what was hiding underneath!

That disgusting old man, less human than a beast, and all his blood relatives.

The Haryun Group was praised throughout South Korea as the model textbook example of a virtuous chaebol.

I wanted to crush those people who worshipped money with money itself!

“Okay, son! Become a chaebol. Do everything you want!”

Mom seemed to think I was joking.

“Just make sure you’re a human chaebol. Be that kind.”

I could feel the resentment of a woman who had experienced the cruelty of chaebols firsthand.

A chance to rise from the ashes.

Heaven had given me a chance.

No.

Grandma had come bearing that chance in her hands!

“Becoming a chaebol… I’ll make sure Mom’s son takes this one all the way!”

—

“Ten billion won…”

Thump, thump.

My heart pounded violently.

Ten billion won was an enormous sum of money—more than most ordinary people could ever hope to hold in their hands.

It was enough to buy a small apartment in Seoul.

Even I had never possessed this much money before.

“But…”

This was only ten billion won when facing a chaebol.

It wasn’t remotely enough to go up against them.

I needed to turn it into at least several trillion won in cold, hard cash.

“Real estate is already out of the question… If I invest in U.S. stocks now… I could multiply it several times over…”

I steadied my breathing and began retracing everything I had experienced in the past.

Then I organized my memories by time period.

Countless memories began lining up one after another.

“……”

Thump! Thump!

They were things I had personally experienced, yet at this point in time, they were still events of the future.

My heart began pounding like crazy.

Ten billion won.

It wasn’t much compared to what I needed, but it was by no means an insignificant amount.

“Right now…”

I pieced together the fragments of my memories.

May 2022.

The great catastrophe that struck the crypto market!

Whoosh.

The best investment strategy automatically played itself back in my mind.

“Grr…”

A groan slipped through my lips from sheer excitement.

The curves of those assets surged through my mind like waves.

“Crypto!!”

The crypto Grandma had said young people were into.

There was only one answer.

Crypto!

“They’re all going down!”

Once I had chosen my target, I realized just how incredible Grandma’s gift was.

If the future didn’t change…

Then I…

Tap, tap.

I picked up my smartphone.

I opened Upbit, the number-one cryptocurrency exchange in South Korea.

I’d signed up out of curiosity when I came of age.

Back then, I’d played at being an investor with 100,000 won of allowance money.

Looking at it again after returning, I was overwhelmed by conflicting emotions.

“Things are different now.”

The inexperienced Ha Taewoong who had holed himself up in a university club, dreaming of turning his life around, was gone.

Back then, I’d jumped into the crypto market without any background knowledge and lost even the money I didn’t have.

And it wasn’t just me.

Most of my classmates, seniors, and juniors had become obsessed with crypto too.

I still remembered the balance in my account at the very last moment before I finally quit crypto.

1,880 KRW.

A pitiful balance so low I couldn’t even transfer it.

It was a miserable state of affairs.

I’d been liquidated several times before graduation.

The scraps of money I’d earned from part-time jobs, the tiny sums I’d poured my soul into earning, had all been devoured by various fees.

All that remained were fragments.

“The ultimate form of speculation.”

In fact, after crypto became widespread, many gambling establishments went under.

May 18, 2010.

Ten thousand Bitcoin were traded for a single pizza.

Then, in 2013, Bitcoin started at $13 per coin and reached $1,163.

A few years later, it surpassed $15,000!

Those who had experienced that new world began to lose their minds.

I had been right there in the middle of that madness.

“This time…”

“I’m taking my share, too!”

No matter how much I thought about it, none of this felt real.

I still couldn’t believe I’d regressed.

The life I’d lived so fiercely throughout my youth had vanished like a dream overnight.

Yet I hadn’t even died, and the future was unfolding clearly before my eyes.

They say life is like a dream that disappears in a single night.

Maybe it really was.

My regression itself was unbelievable, but the graphs from my ruined life were still vividly etched into my memories.

Bitcoin.

Ethereum.

Ripple…

And so on.

The crucial highs and lows, the exact moments when they occurred, came back to me with astonishing clarity.

Screens filled my mind, flowing along the waves of those graphs.

And beyond them came a panoramic view of the world’s major economic trends.

Raw materials.

Bonds.

Foreign exchange.

Everything.

It was incredible.

Apparently, all those years of keeping track of global economic trends as a business major had finally paid off in a way I could never have imagined.

“Talk about a fucking cheat buff…”

I didn’t need all those scraps of useless knowledge I’d picked up here and there in the past.

The information I’d shared with the seniors, juniors, and classmates in the investment club.

The violent waves of the crypto market that could soar and crash repeatedly within a single night, crushing all expectations.

We’d acted like we possessed extraordinary investment instincts.

Staying up all night staring at charts while tearing into fried chicken and sucking down coffee had become our daily routine.

We cobbled together various indicators used in the stock market and applied them to crypto.

We designed our strategies for profit with Elliott Wave Theory at the center.

Fibonacci retracement, volume profiles, trend lines, MACD, RSI, Stochastic, and countless other technical indicators.

We challenged the market with burning hearts and cold reason as our weapons.

Looking back, we had been far too young.

Far too inexperienced.

We had nothing but youthful bravado.

Whenever one of us happened to make a fortune, FOMO would hit, and we’d start making impulsive trades.

Our blood would boil collectively, paralyzing our rational judgment.

Everyone who spent time together in that club room slowly became a wreck.

When we rode an upward wave, our nerves would betray us, and we couldn’t hold on.

But when the market fell, we somehow became fearless and jumped in to buy.

Money melted away by the second.

So did our sanity.

In the end, all that remained was the miserable reality of a group of losers and the pathetic balances sitting at the bottom of our accounts.

“How can you beat the whales? The whole thing is a rigged gambling table.”

And yet I was diving back in.

I was still nothing more than a tiny fry just getting started.

But…

“The guy who eats wins. The guy who wins is king!”

This time, I knew exactly what I was getting into.

Even major stocks like Ilseong Electronics were manipulated and toyed with by the big players.

Wall Street controlled the global stock markets.

There was no way a tiny fry could defeat people who had been running games designed to last for decades.

Especially retail investors.

Their role was simply to fill and fatten the big players’ pockets.

Then I remembered the perfect target.

The ideal investment at this exact point in time.

“The Moon’s downfall…”

Just thinking about it made my skin crawl.

My heart was pounding like mad.

For now, it was still stable, before the crash.

In a few days, the jackpot would hit.

A scam shitcoin that would crash by 99.9999 percent!

“Grandma…”

“Thank you. Really.”

Bitcoin was still hovering around the mid-to-high 30-million-won range.

A few years later, it would shoot vertically to nearly 150 million won.

Simply holding it would make me a billionaire in won.

If I had no dreams, that alone might have been enough.

But the dream I’d lost…

I wanted to find it again.

Conquer the chaebols with crypto!

“Not enough.”

“Not nearly enough!”

The chaebols had spent decades building their towers into impregnable fortresses.

Their political, economic, and legal cartels were their greatest assets.

“I need enough capital that even those cartels won’t dare come near me…”

My excitement instantly cooled.

“Keep your heart hot.”

“Keep your head cold.”

Those were words Dad had repeated to me time and time again.

The mos