The Chaebol Who Flies From Space - Chapter 69



Only Noblemtl

69. New house

At home? I thought there would be a very interesting reaction if they heard the news.

When I told Jeongyeon that I was dating Jamie, she reacted explosively. I was sweating profusely trying to stop my mother from sending a private plane to come here right away.

My grandfather called me to scold me and express his concern about the paparazzi, but the most unexpected reaction was from my father.

It was a simple call, just to ask how my parents were doing since they returned from LA.

Phone conversations between rich people are inherently dry and boring.

I didn’t know it before, but when I was on the phone with my father, strangely, I couldn’t think of anything to say.

Mr. Park, the CEO of Holdings, came to LA and reported on the work that had piled up.

What makes me feel safe and secure about my Korean business while I am here is that the holding company is doing its job well.

“It’s a good thing the chairman is here. If he were in Korea, he would have been in trouble.”

“Is that it?”

“Don’t even say a word. All sorts of guys come and force me to give them money. They are so bold as if they are demanding that I give them the money they entrusted to me.”

It was election season here and there. The Korean political world went straight into the presidential election system after the local elections. Many people came to see me because the presidential election was half a year away.

In times like this, it’s better not to step forward.

The reason my extended stay in LA was kept quiet at home was because of the election.

My grandfather and father were also harassed by politicians.

“I will continue to stay in LA.”

“In LA? What about the businesses in New York?”

The scale of business was larger in New York than in LA.

There’s also the fashion company Emma Brown and the large amount of money invested in the New York Stock Exchange.

“If you leave it like that, it will take care of itself.”

“Is there any special reason why you stay here?”

“Mr. Park, you must have guessed it. I’ve decided to date Jamie. We’re looking for a place to live together.”

Finding a place to live together before getting married would be out of the question in Korea, but this is America.

Mr. Park, the CEO of Holdings, is my subordinate, but he is like an adult in the family. He gave me several requests regarding my young nephew living with a woman.

I didn’t think it was nothing more than meddling, but listened to the advice silently.

After listening to President Park for a while, I received a full business report.

“Are you checking the list of people I gave you?”

“I feel a bit awkward about checking on members of the National Assembly during the presidential election period. I am also worried because the list of candidates you provided is mostly young people.”

It was not that I did not understand President Park’s concerns. Judging from past practices, the direction of the wind blowing through the company changed depending on who took the presidency.

If you make a mistake in the election, you will face a backlash and have to walk a thorny path, but if you do well, you will have a tailwind and it will be easy to run a business for five years.

“The political climate of Korea will change in the future. From now on, no matter who becomes president, the era of the imperial presidency is over.”

There is no change in the fact that President Park, who was shot and killed by his subordinates, or the former president who became president after being pushed in by a tank, are dictators.

Most of those who followed him also ran the government with a similar attitude.

Even the current president, who dedicated his life to the democracy movement, was the same.

But with him the era of imperial presidencies comes to an end.

It has become a time when no matter who becomes the next president, he or she will not be able to exercise imperial authority.

“How could that be?”

President Park tilted his head at my words. It was natural for someone who had lived his entire life in an authoritarian era to feel that the president was like a king.

“Whoever becomes president in this election will not be able to wield as much power as in the past. Times have changed a lot. The political base is different. The president does not have a group of followers like the current president. The members of the National Assembly will follow the president’s words as they do now. In the future, a significant portion of state power will be transferred to the National Assembly.”

In my view, the president is now in office for two years. This means that after two years in office, the president loses his power. If the power base is weak, he won’t be able to last even two years.

So what we have prepared is to nurture future political hopefuls. There are some people on the list who are over 60 years old, so it may be hard to call them hopefuls, but most of them are young adults who are ready to step up right away.

It takes a lot of money to do politics.

Stories of people who ran for National Assembly elections and lost one after another and ended up in ruins are a common drinking party topic.

If you select the seedlings in advance and apply, the political burden on the company will be reduced.

“Our company doesn’t care who becomes president. Neither Judge Jeong, who is now acting like he’s the president, nor Representative Joo, who is causing a stir and becoming the ruling party candidate, will be able to touch us. We have to complain to the bank so that the political world can pressure us. Did we borrow money from the bank? We were going to pay off all the debts the toad had from the bank, but we begged and left them alone.”

In the past, they would arrest businessmen who did not listen to the president, torture them, and take over their companies. If they did that now, the president would be ousted.

“But it is a problem that they are not providing financial support for the presidential election. Most of the time, it is said that large corporations are providing the money behind the scenes.”

“Chairmen are people who have a lot to be sorry about from the government. They need financial support when running a business and they have to solve succession issues. They are people with many weaknesses, so they know how to take action whenever there is an election.”

“……Still, supporting political funds is necessary in current Korean politics.”

He had a point. Political funds cannot be withheld.

I have not experienced one or two elections. If I had created five federal presidents with my own hands, would there have been no failures among them?

After thinking about it for a while, it seemed right to follow President Park’s suggestion to provide financial support.

“The candidates don’t manage their own funds?”

“Each camp has its own financial officer.”

“Big companies will probably want to give political funds in cash. They have little experience managing slush funds. Do we need to do that? This is a method that will come up later. Let’s give this to them. Give it to them when the timing is right and they won’t ask for it again. It’s a bank account in the Bahamas. Each account has $100 million, so this should be enough.”

“···.”

President Park was speechless at the unexpectedly large financial support. It is foolish to provide funds to a bunch of people. If you want to spread the word, you have to spread it all at once to avoid any complaints.

How much would it cost for large corporations to provide presidential election funds? It would be a struggle to provide more than 30 billion won.

All I have is money.

When it comes to spreading it, it has to be done fairly and enthusiastically. Just because one side becomes president, people on the other side don’t leave politics.

“The political funders who receive the money will step aside. The question is whether the main candidate will seek the money. They have declared that they will not receive political funds.”

“So, are you saying that you will run the election with your bare hands? Candidate Joo has always been a dreamer, and this time he is no exception. Do you think the camp will just sit back and do nothing just because the candidate says something like that? If you really follow those words, it is obvious that you will lose the election. If you wait, they will contact you. No matter what the candidate says, the people working under him will think differently. Do you think that President Hyun’s aides, who took control of the ruling party’s core just because he was elected as the presidential candidate, are under Candidate Joo?”

“I heard that the ruling party’s powerful figures are strangely not actively participating in the election.”

“Why would those people actively come forward? No matter who becomes president, they just need to run for the National Assembly elections and become members of the National Assembly.”

Looking at the current political landscape, it was an overwhelmingly disadvantageous fight for the ruling party’s leading candidate.

Candidate Jeong, who served as a Supreme Court Justice and Chairman of the Board of Audit and Inspection, narrowly lost to the current president in the last presidential election.

The support base he gained at that time remained intact, and he completely took control of the opposition party and moved in unison during the election campaign.

In contrast, the main candidate had nothing.

Even if you look at opinion polls, the results have already shown that the opposition candidate, Jeong, will win the election by an overwhelming margin.

But still, I felt strangely nervous.

Elections are like magic, so you shouldn’t make any rash judgments until the results are out.

President Park continued his report after carefully collecting the bank account documents I had handed him.

“And the audit results came out. As expected, there were a lot of rats inside the company. Those who embezzled a large amount of company funds from Toad F&B were found.”

“I thought that would happen. When the company was having a hard time, the chairman would step forward and embezzle company funds, so he wouldn’t have just stood by and watched.”

Rats instinctively feel that the ship they are on is sinking.

I wouldn’t have stopped doing what I was doing before because I took over the company. I would have taken a quick look at the change in ownership, but I would have continued doing what I was doing as if nothing had happened.

“We will fire the 35 people who were caught in the audit, and file a criminal complaint against the three who committed serious crimes. There are no major issues with WD Investment, so we will just point out a few and end it.”

“Is this a thank you note? Please do as it is.”

I signed my name in the approval column of the document reporting the audit results.

Now it was time to find a new house. If I had bought a bigger house from the beginning, I wouldn’t have had this problem, but I hated my sister who had refused to buy a bigger house for no reason. I had to call an expert in this field to find a house.

“I’m sorry to ask this of you, a busy gentleman who is building a company and working in Texas.”

President Lee Jun-ho, who came running at my call, said he was delighted to hear my request to find a new house in Bel Air.

“The house we live in now is a bit small for many people to live in. There’s a good property that just came up for sale.”

“Let’s go see it right now. No, we should go together. Just wait a moment.”

I don’t live alone in this house. I picked up the phone and called Jamie right away.

President Lee Jun-ho, who was wondering who to call, was startled when Jamie showed up.

President Lee Jun-ho, who noticed why I was looking for a bigger new house, treated Jamie very well.

Among the many candidates that the chairman had researched, the one Jamie chose was a French-style house with a large garden.

The house is currently empty, so I can see it anytime by appointment, so I called the owner and made an appointment to visit the house.

Jamie was excited to see the house in person.

“It’s quieter than it looks in the pictures and I can do everything at home. I really like this place.”

The location was exquisitely isolated, so it was hidden from outside views, and the house was decorated in the French style, so it didn’t look like a typical American house.

The garden also closely resembles the geometric gardens of the Palace of Versailles.

Because the house was so large, it took a full half day just to look around it in detail.

I would have liked to see other houses, but since Jamie liked this one so much, it was pretty much a done deal.

If another good house comes up, you can just buy it.

What I like is that there is a separate building that can be used as an office, so it is good for decorating an office.

I have to stay in LA for a while, so I have to work, right?

While Jamie was waiting at home for the agent to give her a detailed explanation of the house, she discussed the sale with the chairman.

“How much does it cost here?”

“We asked for $120 million last year, but when there were no buyers, we lowered the price to $100 million.”

“For that price, it’s not expensive.”

It was the same here, with house builders charging outrageous prices for houses they built.

“When the IT bubble burst, many houses came up for sale. This is one of them. The previous owner put a lot of effort into building it. It seems he is quite sad to sell the house, but what can he do when his funds are dry?”

“Yes, it looks like it. I feel attached to this house even when I look at it. Let’s buy it.”

“I will step forward and negotiate the price with the owner as best I can.”

I left the purchasing issue to the CEO and discussed with Jamie what needed to be fixed.

Jamie, who was almost jumping for joy when he heard that I had decided to buy a home, started telling me about the things he didn’t like about the house.

“The house looks old in every part, so we have to fix it up when we buy it.”

“It’s a building that was built 10 years ago, so of course there are things that are old.”

“I really like that the house is built in the French style.”

“Isn’t it more comfortable to live in an American-style house?”

Jamie blushed at my words.

“No, I’m saying that a house should have class. I hate houses that are built haphazardly in the American style. They only do fancy interiors and charge high prices. I’ve always wanted to live in a house like this.”

That’s right.

It was the right thing to do if the person who was to become the hostess wanted it.

“here.”

I handed over the card I had prepared.

“what’s this?”

“If you buy a house, you’ll have to remodel it and buy furniture. Jamie, choose the one you like.”

“Yongwon!”

If Jamie, a world-famous star, doesn’t have money to decorate his house, he will get a response when he expresses his feelings like this.

An excited Jamie immediately hugged me and blew me a kiss.

Looking at it so brightly, even if there were no eyes around to see it, it would have been like going straight to the bedroom.