WeTried Translations
Translator/Editor: Arsène
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◈ The Conglomerate Heir Just Wants to Fail ◈
Chapter 26
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Lee Jinju, Chief of Staff, arrived at Vice Chairman Kang Daeun’s penthouse at the same time every day.
In her hands were printed documents containing the day’s major reports and schedule, as well as a tablet holding the same information.
The indoor temperature was, as always, perfectly maintained, while morning sunlight poured through the windows and shone over the spotless marble floor.
Kang Daeun had grown accustomed to this routine and usually finished preparing for work before Lee Jinju arrived.
Today, however, he was still sitting blankly on the sofa in his pajamas.
Lee Jinju paused for a moment, then approached Kang Daeun with her usual steady stride.
Perhaps he had stayed up late thinking about Daeseung’s future strategy, she thought.
“Good morning, Vice Chairman. I’ll begin briefing you on today’s major schedule.”
Standing straight beside the sofa, Lee Jinju handed him the prepared documents and explained while looking at her tablet.
“At two this afternoon, you are scheduled for an interview with Goryeo Ilbo. As you instructed, photography has been completely excluded. It will be an in-depth interview with only one reporter and one editorialist present. We have secured their promise to run it as a special feature in the business section. The anticipated questions and response guidelines are...”
The influence of traditional print newspapers had declined, but Goryeo Ilbo, South Korea’s largest daily newspaper, still mattered.
Lee Jinju continued her briefing smoothly, but received no response.
Normally, he would have at least given a brief reply.
Lee Jinju paused and looked up at Kang Daeun.
Kang Daeun had not moved at all. His unfocused eyes were staring at a point in empty space.
Was he so deeply absorbed in thought that he could not hear her voice?
After hesitating briefly, Lee Jinju stepped closer to the sofa.
“Vice Chairman?”
Only when she drew near did Lee Jinju realize something was wrong.
His cheeks were flushed red.
His hair was plastered to his forehead with cold sweat.
His cloudy eyes wandered aimlessly through the air.
“Oh my, you’re burning up. Vice Chairman, how long have you been like this?”
Lee Jinju placed a hand on Kang Daeun’s forehead, startled by how hot it was.
Without delay, Lee Jinju called Daeseung Medical Center’s VVIP medical team.
.
“It’s a bout of exhaustion caused by overwork and severe stress. There is no serious illness, so there is no need for excessive concern, but he must get absolute rest for the next few days.”
The doctor routinely prepared an IV drip, and the nurse skillfully inserted the needle into Kang Daeun’s arm.
After the medical staff left, Lee Jinju immediately began canceling all of the day’s appointments.
“I will cancel this afternoon’s Goryeo Ilbo interview. Publicly, we can say you had to leave on an urgent overseas business trip...”
“No. Keep the interview... as scheduled.”
Kang Daeun, lying weakly in bed, interrupted Lee Jinju in a hoarse voice.
“Vice Chairman, you must not overexert yourself. The doctor said you need absolute rest. We can postpone the interview...”
“It’s fine. I can do it. If we cancel now... it will put them in a difficult position too.”
“It is not more important than your health. With the Chairman away, your well-being is what matters most to Daeseung.”
Seeing Kang Daeun, who still retained traces of boyishness, showing such a heavy sense of responsibility even while ill, Lee Jinju felt her chest tighten.
After all his wandering, he had returned. Now, more than anyone else, he was trying to carry Daeseung and the lives of its countless people on his own shoulders.
.
For a moment, I was almost touched by Chief Lee Jinju saying that nothing was more important than my health.
Then her following words made my heart turn cold again.
Right. I was only filling in for Grandfather, after all.
And I wasn’t insisting on doing the interview for Daeseung’s sake either, so we were even.
Part of it was spite.
I was sure I had clearly told Lee Jinju that I didn’t want to do interviews because I had nothing to say and no confidence in myself. Yet apparently, as long as there were no photos, it was fine?
What kind of punishment was this?
Since things had come to this, I could make a complete mess of it on purpose. That would ruin Daeseung’s image and the strange misunderstandings people had about me.
Then the Executive Office wouldn’t make me do interviews like this again.
“All right. However, I will coordinate things in advance so that the interview can be concluded within thirty minutes. And if your condition worsens even slightly, I will stop it immediately. Is that acceptable?”
I nodded with difficulty.
Lee Jinju bowed her head, changed the interview location to the penthouse living room, and hurried off again to ask Goryeo Ilbo for its understanding.
Behind her, I gave a bitter smile and thought hazily through the medicine clouding my head.
Fine. This time, I was really going to fail.
.
At exactly two in the afternoon, the penthouse doorbell rang.
Two men in neat suits stood on the monitor by the entrance.
One was Editorialist Park, Goryeo Ilbo’s leading editorialist, an older man with sharp eyes behind his glasses.
The other was Reporter Kim from the business desk, a young reporter in his early thirties who stood beside Editorialist Park without managing to hide his tension.
“A same-day change of location. How unreasonable.”
“Ha ha, well. We’ll find out when we get inside.”
Before the door opened, Reporter Kim muttered his complaint, while Editorialist Park stroked his mustache as though intrigued.
Chief Lee Jinju received them without the slightest sign of disorder.
As she led the two men into the living room, she reminded them once more of their prior agreement.
“Let me repeat that today’s interview is limited to thirty minutes. Photography is absolutely prohibited, and as the Vice Chairman is not in good health today, please refrain from asking overly demanding questions.”
The two men nodded as they entered the living room, then fell silent at the sight before them.
A young man sat on the sofa wrapped in a blanket, with an IV drip in his arm.
‘This man is...!’
He was Kang Daeun, Vice Chairman of Daeseung Group, the eye of the storm sweeping through South Korea’s business world.
His pale complexion proved that he was genuinely ill.
Yet his eyes burned like blazing flames, and Editorialist Park felt intimidated for a moment.
.
Sunk deep into the sofa, I glared at the two men sitting before me.
My head throbbed from the fever, and my vision swam.
I wanted to say anything at all and end this painful ordeal quickly.
“Hello, Vice Chairman Kang Daeun. First, thank you very much for making time for us despite your difficult condition.”
Editorialist Park spoke first, and I saw Chief Lee Jinju set a timer.
“As time is limited, I will get straight to the point. Daeseung Group’s recent moves have been nothing short of remarkable. Many experts have been discussing ‘Kang Daeun’s leadership.’”
Kang Daeun’s leadership...?
“Since taking office, what has been the secret behind your continuous string of successes? What would you say is your core management philosophy?”
Management philosophy?
It was not as if I had anything like that.
I should have at least looked over the list of anticipated questions the Chief of Staff had prepared earlier.
“...Luck.”
My hoarse voice came out.
“Everything in this world comes down to luck in the end.”
Both journalists’ expressions stiffened at my words.
They probably wondered whether we had called busy people here just to hear that.
The Chief of Staff looked even more shocked, as though her face had gone pale.
Feeling better, I began saying whatever came to mind through my foggy head.
“But no matter how lucky someone is, their luck cannot stay good forever. And no matter how unlucky someone is, their luck cannot stay bad forever.”
It was the only lesson I had learned from playing Code Ball.
Probability was cold.
As the number of pulls rose, it would eventually converge on the average.
“Then there are only two options. Increase the number of attempts... or wait for the moment when the odds of success are high.”
I could not always pull what I wanted.
But if there was something I absolutely wanted, I had no choice but to keep pulling until I got it, or pray that it would appear in a special banner where the game company had raised its pull rate.
.
‘Was he merely a lucky young master...?’
The moment Editorialist Park heard the word luck, he tried to hide his disappointment.
But the words that followed immediately drew him in.
‘Luck... Everything in this world is luck.’
Luck meant the uncertainty of the market.
Unpredictable variables. Black swans.
Most executives regarded this “luck” as an uncontrollable risk and sought to avoid it.
There were often rumors that major conglomerate heads consulted fortune-tellers or believed in superstition before important decisions.
People mocked them or were disappointed by them, but Editorialist Park knew it was not something to dismiss so simply.
Having already done everything in their power, they were clinging to that final, uncontrollable element of luck.
But this young business leader was both similar and slightly different.
He was treating luck as the starting point of management, as its most basic premise.
From the beginning, he acknowledged that this world was fundamentally full of chaos and that human reason could neither predict nor control everything.
“Then there are only two options. Increase the number of attempts... or wait for the moment when the odds of success are high.”
Lightning flashed through Editorialist Park’s mind.
That single statement threaded together everything Vice Chairman Kang Daeun had done so far.
‘Increase the number of attempts.’
Those words perfectly explained the significance of Daeseung’s enormous cash reserves.
Each attempt might fail.
Because whether something succeeded was determined by luck.
But if only a few attempts succeeded after countless tries, their profit would be great enough to cover every other failure and more.
But when would that success arrive?
Could one continue making a second and third attempt toward success that might never come, unconcerned by devastating failures?
Cash was what made that possible.
This was not blind gambling. It was the coldest possible game of probability, based on the law of large numbers.
If the stake was unlimited, a casino became a very simple contest of probability.
Chairman Kang Sinsu had spent his entire life accumulating cash despite being called a miser. Perhaps even he had not known the essential meaning behind it, but this young heir had grasped it perfectly.
‘And waiting for the moment when the odds of success are high...’
It did not merely mean passively waiting for the market to improve.
It meant active action. It meant creating the odds.
Though their meeting had been brief, Editorialist Park shuddered at the realization that every move Vice Chairman Kang Daeun had made could be perfectly explained by that one sentence.
Think of the cutthroat competition in the retail industry.
Daeseung declared war at the perfect time, when Hanseong could not counterattack because of Hwasu Heavy Industries, and the odds of victory were at their highest.
During the Project Finance (PF) crisis in the construction industry, Daeseung moved only when the chance of acquiring distressed assets at bargain prices had reached its peak.
‘Accumulate cash to increase the number of attempts, then pull the trigger only when the odds of success are at their highest.’
Acknowledging that worldly affairs depended on luck did not mean leaving every future to luck.
This young business leader was showing the coldest and most terrifying rationality, turning luck itself into mathematical probability and seeking to rule that probability.
“Th-this is management on an entirely new level...!”
What drove the final nail into Editorialist Park’s thoughts was Vice Chairman Kang’s next statement.
“And the only way to eliminate all those variables of probability... is simple. You see it through to the end.”
Editorialist Park could not have guessed that Vice Chairman Kang was thinking of the pity system from a special banner where he had failed to pull what he wanted because he had been short by a single pull.
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