Life, Once Again!

ted until October.

“Why don’t you give up now? If you can’t find out after all that effort, it’s heaven’s decree telling you not to dig further into it.
Or maybe, it never happened in the first place.
You were chasing nothing.”

“How can you say it’s nothing after seeing all that evidence?”

“Let’s be straight here.
It’s not ‘all that evidence’, it’s very little.
You should be ashamed.”

Dongwook tried to stand up with his laptop in hand.

“I see a tail now.”

“Miyeon.”

“I mean it.”

“Choi Miyeon.
That tail is in the end, a lizard’s tail.
If you grab it, it’ll fall off.
You should start looking into articles that suit your magazine.
It’s been a year, no wait, it’s been two years already, hasn’t it? You did enough.
Unless you want the Journalist Award or something, you should stop here.
You need to make a living, don’t you? Aren’t you past 30? You should think about marriage.”

He wondered how he should convince this stubborn junior.
Miyeon’s persistence was incredible.
Ever since she became a blind believer of Capaism, this junior kept digging into Lee Miyoon without resting like she was something like a perpetual motion machine.
What started it off was an actress’ unjust framing.
Miyeon felt sympathy for that person and kept chasing down the culprits in secret in order to find out the truth.
She spent the past 2 years like that.
Dongwook did not know whether what moved her was a sense of justice, the public good, or journalism.
How she was able to give up her reality for the sake of her dogma was beyond his comprehension.

“I did it for 2 years, so I might as well do another.
Middle school lasts 3 years and high school also lasts 3 years, don’t they?”

“What kind of nonsensical logic is that?”

“We’re not in a field where logic plays a role, you know?”

Dongwook clutched his hair.

“So what? What did Lee Hyuk do? Before that, we are talking about the actor Lee Hyuk, right?”

“Yes, the actor Lee Hyuk.”

“Weren’t you digging Lee Miyoon?”

“She leaks absolutely nothing.
There are only rumors about her and nothing concrete.
I think she’s been cautious ever since The Five became an issue.
I tailed her for about a week three months ago, but I got nothing from her.”

“You tailed her? Why don’t you switch your job to a private detective instead? You know, those people who take photos of husbands who are cheating on their wives.”

“I actually looked into that, but there’s the possibility of backlash there, so I stopped.”

“You, girl, stop at nothing, don’t you? Did you not contact me for a while because you were doing those things?”

“If I want to catch people who mock the law, I should avoid the law too.
I didn’t break any laws though, I promise.”

“Good for you.
I should have stopped you back then in that pojang-macha.
My deepest regret in life is agreeing to help you.
Gosh, I was crazy back then.”

“You can’t take back what you already started.
Anyway, back to Lee Hyuk.”

“Fine, let’s hear it.
What about him?”

“I was digging into Lee Miyoon, and I found out something interesting.”

“What is it?”

“Rich young masters partying with ladies.”

“That’s really something for the social department to handle.
Since you quit the TV station and entered a magazine company, you should learn how to take care.”

“Have you ever seen public TV attacking chaebols? It’s the ones that decide to attack them that leave.”

“That for political journalists, while you’re a women’s magazine journalist.”

“Still, I’m a journalist.”

He couldn’t get through to this junior of his.
Dongwook took out a cigarette from his pocket and put it in his mouth before frowning when he was reminded of the fact that they were inside a café.
He snapped the cigarette in half and wrapped it in some napkins.

“So what? Rich young masters are partying.
How’s that a problem? Did they do drugs or something?”

“Who knows? They might have.”

“That sounds like the most useless thing I’ve heard.
So, what did you actually find out? Did Lee Hyuk play with the ladies along with those rich young masters? And that’s somehow related to Lee Miyoon?”

“No, there was nothing like that.
From what I’ve looked into until now, Lee Miyoon and Lee Hyuk don’t have any relations.
There might be a connection, though, and it might be that I just don’t know anything about it.”

“Then what? Where does Lee Hyuk appear in all this?”

“Where does Lee Hyuk belong to now?”

“Soul, of course.”

“Do you remember that Soul’s president, Hong Janghae, had a behind-the-curtains deal with Lee Miyoon when he brought The Five?”

“That’s just an assumption though.
Do you have any evidence? You don’t, do you? Then that’s just gossip.”

“But it’s true, circumstantially.”

“You should know that circumstantial evidence means nothing.”

“Alright.
Then I’ll only talk about the facts now.
Lee Hyuk entered Soul, who might or might not have done a shady deal.
Although he was kinda part of nowhere since his contract with JA didn’t go through, he wasn’t someone who would enter a new company, especially not under Hong Janghae, who never worked in the entertainment industry before.”

“Maybe the contract terms were good.”

“You know who Soul’s parent company is, right?”

“Who doesn’t? It’s YM, isn’t it?”

“Do you know who the grandson of the leader of YM is?”

“Why would I? I don’t see the need to know since I’m not related to such a person.”

“Kang Giwoo.”

“Kang Giwoo?”

“You know that there’s a big disaster movie that’s starting soon, right?”

Dongwook probed his memories.

“Ah, right.
Kang Giwoo.
I finally remember him.
You’re talking about the kid who plays the lead male in New Semester, right?”

“Yes.”

“He’s the grandson of YM’s chairman?”

“That’s right.
Also, that boy’s relationship with Lee Hyuk is kinda interesting.”

“What is it?”

“Master-slave relationship.”

“What?”

“What I discovered is not the relationship between Lee Miyoon and Lee Hyuk; I discovered the relationship between Lee Hyuk and Kang Giwoo.
Furthermore, one of the women partying with Kang Giwoo is related to Lee Miyoon.”

“So you’re basing things on gossip again.”

“I can be sure of my source.”

“Your source is a rotten one.”

“If I dig into Kang Giwoo and Lee Hyuk and get in touch with that woman, who’s the source of the money, I might be able to grab Lee Miyoon’s tail.
That would explain the reason why she can sweep something as big as sexual service under the rug.”

“So YM is behind all this? The chairman’s grandson and perhaps Lee Miyoon herself is mixed in this?”

“Hong Janghae might be the core.
You’ve seen what he’s like.
He’s like a snake.”

Dongwook smiled and put his laptop inside his bag.
He then took out a 10,000 won note from his wallet and handed it to Miyeon.

“Seonbae?”

“Okay, that’s enough.
I’ll pretend I never heard it.
I’m already not sure about digging into Lee Miyoon the individual, but now you’re also bringing YM into this? I have enough money to buy a house now.
Life is long.
I don’t want to suck on my thumb for my entire life.”

“But you should bring justice!”

“Give it to a dog for all I care.”

“Where’s your journalism?”

“Outside Earth’s atmosphere.”

“What about the things you said in the pojang-macha that day?”

“I’ve long since sold my soul.”

“Senior!”

“Stop calling me.
I’m really not going to do it this time.
Absolutely not.”

Dongwook shook his head and left.