Thumbs Up, Level Up

Chapter 51

“A completely new type of an arcane golem has appeared?”

It was Jung Su-Gi from the Jungha Group. For a while, he just stood there, doubting his own ears.

“How the hell did that bastard come back alive?”

Frost began to form around Su-Gi. As his name suggested, his ability to handle water and ice was in sync with his feelings.

“Oh…That’s…”

The secretaries did not have a good answer for him. All the secretaries were Awakened, and they were wearing thicker coats than usual, but it was not easy to overcome Su-Gi’s frost ability.

‘He got stronger!’

‘Is he a monster?’

His father was Jung Han-Taek, the eldest son of Jung Man-Deuk, who was the CEO of the Jungha Group. Among the sons of Jung Man-Deuk, Su-Gi's father was said to have inherited the greatest power. Additionally, Jung Han-Taek had married a strong Awakened. In other words, Su-Gi was the child of two very powerful people.

“That’s just great, isn’t it? I still can’t believe a mere level 20 Hunter came back alive from that,” Su-Gi said.

Su-Gi’s actual personality was very different from what the media showed. His ability to clean and handle water freely had given him a nickname, “Man of Purity”, which added a humble tone to his public image. But in reality, he was another person altogether.

‘He is the type of person who always plays by his own rules,’ one of the secretaries thought.

He had never been underprivileged in his entire life. He never understood the life of people weaker than him. This didn’t mean that he enjoyed bullying the weak—it just meant that he didn’t care about them.

“Mr. Jung Su-Gi…Please control your ability,” one of the secretaries said.

“Oh, right. I guess it’s hard for you guys to handle this. Come to think of it, I’ve gotten a lot stronger since last time,” Su-Gi said.

The frost melted away as Su-Gi brought his power under control. The feeling of pressure, akin to sinking into the depths of the Arctic Sea, melted away with it. All the secretaries sighed with relief, and Su-Gi quickly read through the data they had brought in.

“Hahaha, I guess the other guys already started their bullshit. 120 million? It’s quite cheap for trying to kill a level 20. So you are saying he is not an average level 20 Hunter right now, right?” Su-Gi asked.

“In my opinion, that is indeed the case. Considering the cost of rigging the public opinion, I think it cost them twice as much,” one of the secretaries said.

“Still cheap.”

Su-Gi rubbed his chin. His personality was different from Jung Ji-Han's, but he was still handsome.

“Joining Ji-Han is like casting pearls before swine. He seems like a smart guy, but I don’t know why he joined Ji-Han’s faction,” Su-Gi said.

“The terms on his contract were supposedly really good.”

“Well, yeah. We wanted to offer better terms, but couldn’t because of the rules that my grandfather made.”

Jung Man-Deuk hated the idea of his family fighting each other over fresh talents. That was why he had put a rule in place: they were not to intervene if anyone else had already made a shot at recruiting a Hunter.

“But he didn’t say anything about poaching Hunters,” Su-Gi said.

“Does that mean…”

“He is an interesting kid, isn’t he? See if he can be recruited. Whether it’s money, power, or influence, there’s got to be something that he wants.”

The secretaries’ eyes widened at Su-Gi’s comment.

“Do you really think that he has that much potential?”

Su-Gi was considered one of the most promising successors. The fact that he was reaching out to Ji-Cheok meant something special.

“Yes, I got a good feeling. He has the flair, and I like that he always has something up his sleeve.”

As Su-Gi said enthusiastically, he threw the documents back to the secretaries.

“Well, this might make Ji-Han resent me, but what the hell? He is the one who stabbed my father’s right-hand man. This would be his way of paying the debt.”

“But that’s…”

“Yeah I know I was also part of it. Hahaha. What could I do? He was trying to betray me. It worked out fine, didn’t it? Even Um Ji-Cheok got a house from that,” Su-Gi said.

As Su-Gi gossiped about the past, he stretched slowly, and his well-trained muscles twisted with his movement.

“You can leave now. I have to go back to training anyways.”

‘How much stronger is he trying to become?’ Secretaries thought.

As soon as Su-Gi finished talking, he sent all the secretaries out of the room. He was left alone.

“Unprecedented skills and unprecedented attributes… It would be a fun fight. He is still weak right now, of course,” Su-Gi whispered to himself.

With that thought in mind, he started training once more.

* * *

After watching Ji-Cheok’s live performance, Ji-Han was deep in thought.

“To kill a level 80 monster when he is merely level 20…”

Ji-Han watched the video several times, but the doubts grew bigger and bigger. Ji-Cheok’s power level seemed unusual. Ji-Cheok wasn’t even with a party like the previous time—he did everything by himself.

When Ji-Cheok asked Ji-Han for permission to go alone, Ji-Han had a lot to think about. He wanted to talk Ji-Cheok out of it, for Ji-Cheok’s safety, but he knew that his employee wouldn’t be persuaded just like that.

‘I’m sure he will find a way without me knowing, which would make it even more dangerous.’

Ji-Han had given up on the idea of controlling Ji-Cheok in the first place. He was just going to support Ji-Cheok as much as possible within his reach. Ji-Han took off his glasses and rubbed his eyes.

"It's better than him being a firefighter and dying while saving a child, dying while saving a friend from a flood of monsters, dying while trying to save me, dying while trying to save his brother, dying while trying to slow down natural disasters….”

Ji-Han smirked as he thought of the ways Ji-Cheok could die one by one.

‘‘How could I be this used to someone’s death?’’

Ji-Han felt as if the whole world was on his shoulders.

“Was I supposed to just help him in moderation and let him be?”

He was already exhausted, but he knew what he had to do. Then, the phone rang.

[Jung Bi-Ga]

Ji-Han immediately picked up the phone.

“Hello?”

—Are you going to let your company go public?

“Huh…?”

Ji-Han tried to hang up the phone, as he was tired of this nonsense. He knew there was little time left for mankind, and he couldn’t waste time on things like this.

—Don’t hang up and answer me.

“I’m not planning to as of this moment, but maybe later.”

—Right. Thank you! If you do it, please tell me first. Okay?

A true mechanic fanatic like Bi-Ga, who had no interest in anything other than machines and multi-dimensional research, just said something like this. It inevitably piqued Ji-Han’s interest.

“I didn’t expect you to be interested in personal finance,” Ji-Han said.

—Personal finance? I think I get more money from my patents than from buying stocks.

Bi-Ga’s financial accounting team was one of the top three teams in the United States, with a number of legendary investors. The yearly profit they earned from rolling Bi-Ga’s assets was already enough to live comfortably for generations. However, even that was nothing compared to the money she earned from her patents. There were patents like artificial intelligence drones, dungeon exploration devices, and measurement devices for Hunters’ abilities. True to the title of Master Mechanic, she had various major and minor patents related to artificial intelligence, drones, and dimensional observation. She even had some of the patents released to the public so that anyone could use them freely. That was why she didn’t care much about the management rights of the Jungha Group. It was also the reason why the chairman, Jung Man-Deuk, gave such special treatment to an out-of-wedlock granddaughter. Even at this moment, she was about to issue another patent. She was going to use the data she had obtained from the Dungeon Expansion incident during Ji-Cheok’s Hunter test, since she had all the data at her disposal.

“Then why are you asking me this?” Ji-Han asked.

—We gotta film the mukbang, remember? That was the promise.

“Do you want the management rights?”

—Yes~ I give you one of my technologies, and you give me a share of the company.

It felt like Ji-Han was listening to a broken record when he talked with his sister. Bi-Ga’s demands were simple.

.

‘Why is she so interested in Ji-Cheok?’

She had already used Ji-Cheok’s younger brother, Mu-Cheok, as a guinea pig. Ji-Han didn’t know if she was also aiming for Ji-Cheok.

‘That can’t be true.’

Bi-Ga had never hidden her curiosity from others. She was very straightforward. She had the money, power, and technology, so she’d just give you what you wanted, then request to experiment on you.

Then…that really meant that Bi-Ga was interested in Ji-Cheok in a different way.

‘It can’t be that she really wants to see his mukbang…right?’

It was hard to read people like Bi-Ga.

“I’ll…I’ll think about it,” Ji-Han said.

* * *

“He sure is playing hard to get.”

Bi-Ga grunted and snapped her fingers. A drone poured her a cup of coffee.

“What, it didn’t go well?”

It was the next successor of the Shinsung Group, Shin Ju-Ran, who was sitting in front of Bi-Ga. After watching Ji-Cheok’s live stream, she had contacted Bi-Ga.

“Why don’t you just meet Jung Ji-Han in person? Bi-Ga asked.

“Jungha Group is already dysfunctional, I don’t want to provoke other members by contacting Ji-Han prematurely,” Ju-Ran replied.

“And you are?Ji-Cheok’s stan?”

“I know, but listen. A rookie Hunter runs down the mountain on a motorcycle, trying to kill himself. I guess that… when he crashed into the gnolls, he also crashed into my heart. What do you want me to do?”

Ju-Ran had decided to admit to her official stan diagnosis. People said that becoming someone’s stan always happened unexpectedly. Ju-Ran felt rather lighthearted when she acknowledged that this did not happen of her own will. The problem was that she wanted to watch more videos of Ji-Cheok, but she felt uneasy when she saw Ji-Han’s faction.

“You don't feel attracted to him... Do you?” Bi-Ga asked.

“How can I? You are the only one I have, Bi-Ga,” Ju-Ran replied.

“Right. There is no way you can think of whatever man over me.”

The two exchanged jokes and laughed quietly.

“We sure fought a lot before we graduated…”

When they were studying abroad in the United States, they were both in the same college, the same year, and they were both considered the queen of parties. They both had a tremendous amount of money coming in from Korea, and they both loved fancy things.

Shin Ju-Ran hosted parties mostly to improve her connections. She would make allies with people she found useful, and she would exclude the rest from her party. She was like a rigid gardener. There could only be good and useful things in her garden. Shinsung Group was a company whose core activity was distribution. It was not like other companies like Jungha Group or Daehun Group, where the main activity was manufacturing. Due to being channel intermediaries, networking was paramount for the Shinsung Group.

However, it was different for Jung Bi-Ga. There was always punk rock or rap music playing at her party. Everyone was invited, but they were prone to drugs, violence, and alcoholism. Bi-Ga would sleep with anybody regardless of their gender, and bad rumors always followed her. Nonetheless, her skills were genuine, so Ju-Ran always secretly coveted Bi-Ga.

It was around their graduation that the two had begun to share something akin to friendship. Ju-Ran had become impatient, as she really needed Bi-Ga as her ally. It was mostly about Bi-Ga’s drone technology: Ju-Ran knew that having that drone technology would benefit her company greatly. With a big decision in her mind, Ju-Ran headed to Bi-Ga’s house. As she opened the door, Ju-Ran met Bi-Ga for the first time.

More specifically, she found Bi-Ga naked and entangled with a man and?a woman.

“You are pretty cute, just my type. Do you want to join? The bed is big enough for one more,” Bi-Ga said as she drunkenly tried to seduce Ju-Ran with a hazy voice.

Ju-Ran kicked out both of Bi-Ga’s friends and started to clean up the house for Bi-Ga. She threw away all the drugs, called maintenance to clean the house, and handed Bi-Ga a glass of warm milk instead of alcohol. Ju-Ran thought it was a shame that Bi-Ga was wasting her brain cells like this. Witnessing such a genius brain being destroyed by drugs and alcohol was simply absurd for Ju-Ran.

‘If you are going to waste it, just give me that brain. Give it to me and I will treat it like a treasure. Give it to me!’

Ju-Ran’s jealousy turned into anger, and that was the beginning of their friendship.

1. The original Korean line was “hey toad, hey toad, I’ll give you an old house, you give me a new house,” which is a Korean children’s song.