-Vrrrm.
A black sedan sped through the streets of Seoul.
I quietly sipped my coffee in the car.
Thunk.
“Pfft!”
“Gah! Ugh, gross...”
Lee Si-hyun grumbled as her long ponytail got soaked in coffee.
“Hey, this is totally your fault for not driving properly!”
Ugh, I really wasn’t planning on saying anything, but here we are.
All that gloom from visiting the grave just vanished in an instant. Physically, too.
Tap.
I rested my foot on Si-hyun’s shoulder and snapped.
“Your driving’s really gone downhill. Must be age catching up to you? At this rate, you’re disqualified from being Chief Secretary.”
“That title already went to that Seo Ji-yeon girl, didn’t it?”
“Well, yeah, but still. Just drive properly, will you.”
“Heh, this is considered safe driving by Russian standards. Besides, who the hell drinks coffee like that in a moving car? Of course it’s gonna spill...”
“My chauffeur used to drive so smoothly I could eat an entire meal without spilling a drop, let alone coffee.”
“Yeah, well, you’re comparing me to someone whose only job was to drive and feed you.”
Si-hyun, now older and slicker than ever, shrugged her shoulders.
The leg I had resting on her shoulder bounced up with the motion.
“...”
Squish.
I pressed my leg into her shoulder again, and Si-hyun glanced at the mirror and muttered,
“You’re gonna flash your panties if you keep that up, young miss.”
“Hmph, not my problem.”
Of course, I said that, but I still awkwardly lowered my leg—just a little embarrassed.
“...By the way, are we just heading home?”
Si-hyun pointed to her coffee-soaked hair as if asking me to do something about it.
“Just go. You can wash up at home, can’t you? Our bathroom’s big enough to fit dozens of people.”
“Jeez... Got it.”
.
.
.
“Oh, and when I asked earlier, I didn’t mean anything weird by it. I just thought you might want to stop by the chairman’s house.”
“...Forget it. If I go now, I’ll just end up making Grandpa worry again.”
“Huh? Why would he...? Ah, never mind. I get it. Man, seeing you cry is such a rare thing...”
***
Shhhh—
Even from outside the door, I could hear the heavy, rain-like pressure of the shower.
“Yawn... She sure is taking her time.”
Apparently, in Russia, you always have to shower with # Nоvеlight # scorching hot water, so adjusting the temperature isn’t easy. I used to think they only showered in cold water over there, but turns out it’s the opposite.
Anyway, because of that, Si-hyun was taking her sweet time. Funny, considering she said she didn’t want to use the bath and chose the quick shower room instead.
[Oil prices fall... From $20 per barrel down to $15 in just a few months]
[‘Shale Revolution’ pours oil on the fire of the low-price crisis... Mixed fates for oil companies]
Rustle.
I flipped through the newspaper, scanning the international situation. I’d been playing some fun games with oil recently, and since that was tied up with the U.S., I had to be careful.
It was literally like playing with fire beside a barrel of gasoline.
Who knew when the OPEC production cut agreement would go through—but I had to wrap things up before then. In this venture, oil was a crucial variable.
Creaaak.
“Phew, your house really is the best, young miss. Mm... but my underwear...”
Si-hyun stepped out of the shower, lazily wrapped in a towel.
Her toned abs contrasted with the soft swell of her breasts. She covered the important parts with her arms, which honestly made it even more appealing.
“Ooh, still lookin’ good. That’s my Si-hyun.”
“...‘Still’?”
She scowled, clearly offended. Water dripped from the curves of her body and pooled at her feet.
“Let’s be honest, you’re not that young anymore. Not early thirties, more like mid-thirties...”
“Grr...!”
She ground her teeth and smacked me upside the head.
“Ugh!”
“Sigh. Why do you always start something? This isn’t the first time, but seriously, don’t bring up a woman’s age like that. You’re almost twenty yourself now—you should know better.”
“I’m still young, thank you.”
“Some people say you're done the moment you graduate high school. And the fact that you’re already using phrases like ‘I’m still young’ means you’re not.”
Who the hell says stuff like that?
Also, I don’t age. So it doesn’t matter.
“It’s fine! Ha-yeon will forever be seventeen!”
“....”
What?
Why are you looking at me like that...?
***
Hmph.
Maybe that’s why it took some time to soothe Si-hyun’s bruised pride.
“I mean it! Rejuvenation tech is totally possible in our lifetime.”
“Yeah, yeah, whatever you say, brilliant Lady Yoo Ha-yeon.”
“I’m serious...”
“Then I’ll start teasing you once you turn thirty. That fair?”
“Tch...”
Back in the day, I would’ve just scoffed and moved on. But now that I’m getting older too, it’s... unsettling.
Ugh.
Now that I think about it, I do feel a little guilty. If nothing else, I shouldn’t have said that to someone who hasn’t even had a chance to marry because she’s been devoting herself to me all this time.
“Oh, you just realized that now? Wow.”
I hesitated a bit before saying, carefully,
“If... if you want, you can retire and marry someone decent. I wouldn’t mind.”
“Oh, so I get a full retirement package now? Korea’s been in the middle of an IMF wave, so I guess early retirement’s trendy. Didn’t think I’d be part of the movement.”
“That’s not what I meant...”
Si-hyun shook her head.
“Young miss. Would you throw away all your accomplishments just to raise kids if someone told you to?”
“...That’s...”
I couldn’t say that plenty of Alpha Fund directors retired early to spend time with their families.
They were regular people, after all.
Unlike me, who decided to burn her entire life for money and power just because I felt like it.
Sure, raising kids might be nice someday... but giving up the thrill of making money?
That’s a tough ask.
Well, I knew the kind of person she was when I made her my right hand.
“Then it’s fine, right? What I hate is being mocked for my age like a coward. I don’t mind being overworked without rest.”
“Hmmm...”
That so?
Then I guess I can pile on more work without guilt.
“Si-hyun.”
“Yes?”
“Can we increase oil production in Russia?”
“...You want to ramp up output? In this climate? It’s doable, but tough.”
“So it is possible. Then do it.”
“Right now?”
“Yep. Right now.”
I blinked at Si-hyun’s stunned expression.
What? You said it was fine.
***
A few hours later, with someone screaming hysterically in the background, I quietly flipped through a list of companies to invest in.
Rustle.
“Not this one... not that one...”
I’d meant what I said about anti-aging.
Immortality research isn’t just a pipe dream anymore. Rich people obsess over living longer, and that alone makes it a reasonable sector to target.
Even Ray Kurzweil, the guy famous for his singularity quotes, was known for being obsessed with eternal life. Plus, with an aging global population, the healthcare industry was booming.
It’s an inevitable field.
If I acquired the right company and gave them just the broad direction using future knowledge, we could shave off ten years of trial and error. Trial and error is the biggest time sink in high-tech R&D anyway.
And the key to taking that first step...
Pharma. Duh. If you work on Wall Street and don’t use future info to bet on biotech, that’s a crime. A crime!
Clack.
“Ah, found it.”
A very familiar company name greeted me.
Pfizer.
In Korea, they got famous during COVID-19. But originally, they made an insane amount of money off Viagra, the legendary male enhancement drug.
Actually, they’re still pretty well known. Their new statin drug recently hit it big, and they’re a fairly high-profile company now.
Viagra got FDA approval in 1998, but the side effects were discovered during earlier cardiovascular research in the early ’90s. So the people in the know already had their eyes on it.
Unlike semiconductors, which develop exponentially faster over time, pharma has slower and slower drug pipelines. But for some reason, this one got from lab to approval unusually fast.
“Ji-yeon, acquire this company.”
“...Wait, not invest. Acquire?”
Seo Ji-yeon, who had naturally migrated to my house after finishing student council duties, was beside me now.
“Yup. We’ve got more than enough cash, right?”
“True. We’ve been careful with big spending to grow our reserves, but it seems you’ve decided things are stable now.”
Exactly.
Korea still has a long way to go to recover from the foreign exchange crisis, but the money I’ve got left can cover that.
“Even Warren Buffett is reducing his cash reserves now. Same logic for me. As long as the Fed keeps rates low, sitting on cash is just a loss.”
“Mmm, but a pharmaceutical company, all of a sudden? Never even heard of this one... is it famous?”
“In the industry, very. The drug they’re working on is about to get FDA approval, and if it does, they’ll shoot to the top.”
“Wow, that big? I guess I haven’t studied enough. What kind of drug is it? A cancer treatment?”
“Erectile dysfunction.”
“....”
What?
Pfizer made $25 billion over 15 years from that one drug. Nearly $2 billion a year—about 2 trillion won annually.
Isn’t that insane? Meanwhile, Lehman Brothers was on its knees for not being able to cough up $500 million.
But Seo Ji-yeon, apparently still unaccustomed to the taste of money, just turned her head sharply with a flushed face.