The man stuttered his answer. It was hard to understand because he seemed to have bitten his tongue during the beating, but Lee Young-jin and Yoon Hwa-kyeong clearly caught the most important words.
Early this morning.
Teacher personally took out the fake item.
He intended to deceive Seo Seung-hyun with the fake item.
Thump. Yoon Hwa-kyeong’s hand let go of the man. He collapsed flat on the ground, gasping.
“Hmm. What should we do now?”
Yoon Hwa-kyeong asked.
Lee Young-jin looked up at him for a moment before speaking.
“We have to inform CEO. The item has a time limit. Maybe Teacher is trying to buy time with the fake item. Since he knows there is a code… When time runs out, so does the code. Then the item will, probably, be discarded or….”
Lee Young-jin quickly muttered to himself.
“No. If I were a developer, I wouldn’t do that. If I were to set a time limit on an item involving huge amounts of money, I would… if it were me….”
He would build a perfectly secure cloud server linked with the system and battery, program it to self-destruct when the time limit expires, and ensure the internal data could be recovered.
To find another buyer.
Willing to pay a much higher price.
“Hm. I don’t know what you’re talking about, but anyway, contact them quickly.”
Yoon Hwa-kyeong casually interrupted his thoughts.
Lee Young-jin suddenly looked up at him. Yoon Hwa-kyeong shrugged as if to say why.
“There’s a time limit, right? So, isn’t there no time?”
“Ri, right….”
A dreamlike gloss shimmered in Lee Young-jin’s eyes. His gaze fell. In front of him was a laptop. His weapon, capable of anything.
Lee Young-jin opened the laptop lid on the spot.
The screen lit up instantly.
It was inconvenient without a mouse, the trackpad was not touch-sensitive but clickable, there was only one monitor, and anyway, it was too small. The environment was harsh, but now was not the time to be picky.
Yoon Hwa-kyeong, leaning slightly on one leg beside him, hummed and looked around.
“Don’t take too long.”
“Ten minutes should do it.”
Lee Young-jin calmly replied.
And it happened just as he said.
Ten minutes later, Lee Young-jin had found the satellite phone line connecting to a 150,000-ton cruise ship cruising through the Ryukyu Islands. Several windows popped up and disappeared quickly on the laptop screen. Numbers appeared, prompt commands rose swiftly upward, and the scroll bar moved quickly down. Yoon Hwa-kyeong glanced at them briefly before yawning. As his yawn ended, on the other side of Lee Young-jin’s smartphone, beyond the satellite line, the person picked up the call.
A few phrases like communication codes were exchanged.
Yoon Hwa-kyeong yawned again, and on the other side of the satellite phone, the receiver was changed several times.
And then the last exchange.
[Yeah.]
A low voice tinged with laughter came through amidst the unstable communication noise.
[You’ve called me all this way. Let’s see if you have any information worth finding me for.]
The voice was as cold as the laughter, making Lee Young-jin feel a chill at the tip of his tongue. But now was not the time to freeze up. He barely managed to speak.
“CEO… it’s me.”
What Seo Seung-hyun might have thought at that moment, what reaction he showed, or what dreadful imagination he had, Lee Young-jin did not know.
A brief silence followed.
[You, where are you? Who are you with?]
Simultaneously, several urgent footsteps sounded in the background. Someone was making a call, and someone else was quietly shouting commands.
[Not at home, right. Who is it? What do they want? Any injuries?]
“No, no.”
Not understanding the questions, Lee Young-jin decided to quickly get to the point instead.
“CEO. About today’s deal… the item.”
It was not easy to organize all the information in his head and verbalize it.
Lee Young-jin tried to speak as calmly and clearly as possible. And even if Seo Seung-hyun got abruptly annoyed or cut him off, he resolved several times to steadfastly finish his words. But Seo Seung-hyun waited for him until the end.
“It’s fake. Teacher made a fake item. Five of them… and I have one.”
[You have?]
“Yes. I… Teacher… sold several fakes. He said he’d sell a fake to you too. You haven’t bought the item yet, right? Have you met Teacher?”
[Not yet.]
Then, Seo Seung-hyun whispered something in a very low voice toward the outside of the receiver for a few seconds.
‘To Young-hee… …tell him, yes. Right now.’
Lee Young-jin did not catch that brief command, but then Seo Seung-hyun spoke to Lee Young-jin again.
[Where are you now? Are you alone? Are you safe?]
Due to the poor communication, Seo Seung-hyun’s voice sounded uncharacteristically anxious. Lee Young-jin thought that the uplink and downlink ultrashort wave satellite phone technology still hadn’t developed as much as landline or undersea fiber optic cable communications.
“I’m okay. CEO, just, I…”
That’s when Yoon Hwa-kyeong quietly raised his head and stared at one end of the dark junkyard. His keen hearing caught the sound of car tires friction on the asphalt road, the scraping of brake gears, and several sirens, several kilometers away. He lightly gestured with his chin toward Lee Young-jin.
“We don’t have much time. It seems like more of those guys are coming.”
Lee Young-jin, with his phone wedged between his jaw and shoulder, picked up the laptop. His knees wobbled. His feet, twitching among the groaning heaps of human bodies on the ground, seemed precarious. Yoon Hwa-kyeong leaped ahead.
[Lee Young-jin. Where are you now?]
Seo asked again.
“Incheon…”
Then Yoon Hwa-kyeong tapped his shoulder.
“We don’t have time.”
After that, without hesitation, Yoon Hwa-kyeong jumped forward and flung open the driver’s door of the black sedan that Lee Young-jin had arrived in. By now, Lee Young-jin could also hear the roaring sound of car engines approaching them. Probably, Seo Seung-hyun could hear it too, through the smartphone.
[Lee Young-jin, listen.]
Seo’s voice hastened.
[The payment for today’s item is drugs. Pure cocaine, a hundred percent purity. At three o’clock sharp in the morning, Teacher is to receive the cocaine, and at the same time, the prosecution will raid this cruise. Teacher will be arrested, and soon there will be a search and seizure throughout the entire IG Logistics. Of course, the prosecution is not after the drugs but the documents related to Gyeongup Trading.]
Lee Young-jin blinked several times.
“Then, CEO, you are…”
[I’m okay. It’s all been arranged in advance. Did you understand what I said? Don’t show your face there. I’m sending someone now, so go back home….]
“CEO.”
Lee Young-jin mustered all the courage he had in his life to interrupt him.
“CEO. The documents aren’t there. IG Logistics… There’s nothing in that warehouse but wheat and beans. Of course, there’s nothing in the office either.”
[Young-jin, you don’t mean…]
“I know. Probably the real item is there too. Maybe even the documents the prosecution is looking for…”
We don’t have time, Yoon Hwa-kyeong said again. Lee Young-jin nodded and climbed into the passenger seat. Simultaneously, Yoon Hwa-kyeong shifted the gear into reverse and slammed on the accelerator. The tires growled as they spun backwards, kicking up coarse sand, and then stopped with a thud just before hitting a container. A slick hand pushed the gear into drive.
Only short, clipped breaths could be heard over the handset.
Lee Young-jin thought that Seo Seung-hyun might be angry. Even though the returned voice was calm, it was difficult to accurately read the emotions embedded in it due to the communication condition, which made the voice seem slightly trembling.
[First… where is that place you know of? Is it in Korea?]
When Lee Young-jin answered “Magnolia Island,” Seo Seung-hyun called his name again, his voice cutting through, ah, the communication condition…
[I’ll send someone over there, so you stay put. I’m sending Young-hee right now, so stay with him.]
“No. I have the highest level of access to enter there. We don’t have time, CEO. So… the item’s time limit…”
[Time limit or whatever, just stay put… Young-jin. Are you listening to me?]
Lee Young-jin was indeed listening, so he said yes. Obviously, that answer did not satisfy Seo Seung-hyun.
[Since I’ve sent Young-hee, or I’ll come to pick you up myself… Damn! Where are you going right now?!]
Seo Seung-hyun couldn’t contain his frustration and swore violently, perhaps hearing the car engine noise and the tires rubbing against the uneven road. Lee Young-jin quietly listened to his rough breathing. The sighing breath mixed with the sound of waves and wind. It seemed like Lee Young-jin’s auditory hallucination and yet also real.
Magnolia Island.
His hometown.
At the same time, the real warehouse of Gyeongup Trading.
The underground panic room securely protected by a security system Lee Young-jin had built over ten years.
If Teacher had gone to Seo Seung-hyun for a fake deal, Magnolia Island would now be empty.
Retrieving the real item before Teacher returns was a task only Lee Young-jin, who held all access, could do.
“CEO, I will.”
Lee Young-jin spoke resolutely towards the phone.
“I will find it and return it to you, CEO.”
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