IMCT 04

Chapter 4

When he went outside, he saw a man who looked like some street thug or delinquent. The man was holding a metal pipe, apparently something he had picked up somewhere, and was smashing it against the wall of the house.

“Hey, you bastard! This isn’t even my house! There’s a landlord! If you break that, how am I supposed to pay for the repairs, you idiot?”

“Old woman, listen. I’m trying to get my life together and start a proper business this time. You know how it is. You need some initial capital to start a business.”

“You worthless piece of shit! I gave birth to you thinking you were my son, so why do you do nothing but ask for money every day? You took money from me last time for the same damn reason, and it hasn’t even been a year! Where did all that money go? We don’t even have enough to feed our Jin-su, so I have to make him ramen every day! You think I have money to fill your greedy belly?”

“Ha… Is this old hag screaming like she swallowed a train whistle?”

The man looked past the grandmother at Kim Si-min, who had followed her outside.

“Who the hell are you?”

“You bastard, this young man brought my handcart all the way here for me! Don’t you dare try anything with him. Just get the hell out!”

“Old woman! If you bring a child into this world, you have to take responsibility for him. You have no sense of responsibility. It’s not like I chose to be born! You brought me into this world, so you should take responsibility!”

Crash!

He swung the metal pipe right in front of the grandmother. Startled, she fell backward, while the pipe smashed a flowerpot sitting in the narrow alley behind the house.

“Oh, God… Buddha… What sin have I committed to deserve this? Oh…”

The grandmother collapsed onto the ground and began to sob uncontrollably.

Seeing her like that seemed to make the man even angrier. He raised the metal pipe and charged forward.

Whoosh.

Kim Si-min dodged the incoming pipe, stepped inside the man’s reach, hooked his arm under the man’s armpit, and threw him hard onto the ground.

Thud!

The man landed flat on the asphalt after a perfect shoulder throw and could only gasp for breath.

“What is this?! Jung-sik! Mom! What happened?! And who the hell is that bastard?! Why is our Jung-sik lying on the ground like that?!”

Just then, a woman around the same age as the delinquent son came rushing out from somewhere and started screaming.

“You bitch! You crazy bitch! You and that bastard, get the hell out of here! You old hag is going to die soon! She’s going to die! She doesn’t have a single penny to give you, so get the hell out!”

Judging by the way she was acting, she seemed to be the grandmother’s daughter.

She did not seem any better than her brother.

“We’re going to report you to the police! I got a good look at your face! We’re definitely pressing charges!”

After the crazy woman helped the man on the ground to his feet and disappeared with him, the grandmother collapsed where she stood.

“I’m the one at fault. I’m the one who raised my children like this.”

The grandmother beat her chest with her fists as tears streamed down her face.

“Grandma, let’s go inside first.”

Kim Si-min helped the grandmother, who was lying on the ground, back into the house.

“As soon as I had the three of them, that bastard of a husband who beat me every day ran away. I had to keep food in their mouths, so I barely slept two or three hours a day. I glued doll eyes, worked at factories, worked at restaurants, worked as a maid in other people’s homes… Did I ever have time to stay at home? That’s why I ended up raising my children like this.”

She shed tears.

Kim Si-min remained silent as he watched her cry.

After sobbing on the floor for a long while, the grandmother suddenly jumped to her feet.

Then she went somewhere and came back with a bankbook.

“Young man, please take this.”

“What is this, Grandma?”

“The money for my Jin-su’s education.”

“Why are you showing this to me?”

“Young man, I’m going to die soon. The doctor said I have cancer. He said I don’t have much time left. So please give this to my Jin-su when I’m gone.”

So that was it.

Now Si-min could understand, at least a little, why the grandmother had been so worried.

The grandmother, who knew nothing and simply handed over her bankbook, was clearly from an older generation.

She seemed to think that handing someone the bankbook meant she was entrusting the money to them.

“You’re giving this to someone you just met today. How can you trust me? And the money in your bank account will be passed on to your heirs according to the order of inheritance after you die.”

The grandmother’s face hardened.

“Not a single penny can go to those damn bastards!”

She shouted angrily.

There was no way the grandmother’s money should end up in the hands of people like those good-for-nothings he had just seen.

But the world—and the law—didn’t work that way.

Once a minor has a legal representative, that legal representative gains the authority to act on the minor’s behalf.

In the end, after the grandmother died, even if there were money in Jin-su’s name, it would not be easy for him to actually gain control of it.

“What happens to my Jin-su’s education if those bastards get their hands on this money…?”

The grandmother cried as she pleaded with him, but it was not a simple problem.

“For now, let me look into it, Grandma. Please keep the bankbook with you.”

“Please hold onto it for me, just for now. If that bastard comes back, he’ll make a huge fuss trying to get his hands on the bankbook first.”

Unable to turn away from the grandmother’s desperate expression, Kim Si-min accepted the bankbook from her.

Then he saved his number in the grandmother’s old cell phone.

“If you press and hold number one, it’ll call me.”

The grandmother nodded for a long time. Si-min gently held her hand before leaving her house.

After leaving the grandmother’s house and returning home, Si-min spent the entire day thinking about one thing.

What if he took out an insurance policy with Jin-su as the policyholder?

After the grandmother died, the legal representatives would change to those people, and they might be able to cancel Jin-su’s insurance.

But it would be difficult to identify the money when filing the inheritance report.

Since it would no longer be an asset under the grandmother’s name, there would be no way for them to find out about it.

But judging from how aggressive those good-for-nothings had been earlier, they were the kind of people who would do anything if they found out.

He needed some kind of safety measure first.

If they canceled the grandmother’s bank account in advance, it would also be harder to trace the transaction history.

After staying up all night thinking about it, Kim Si-min went to see the grandmother early the next morning and explained his plan.

“Young man, you worked at a bank?! Oh my! Such a kind person working at a bank, too. That’s amazing. I wish my Jin-su could grow up to be like you. I’ll do as you say, young man. That’s what I should do.”

Trusting Si-min’s advice, the grandmother obtained the necessary documents from various places and then went to the branch where Si-min worked.

“Oh, Manager, weren’t you on vacation today?”

“That’s why I’m here.”

“You’re on vacation, so what brought you to the branch?”

Kim Si-min slowly explained the grandmother’s situation. The VIP Team Leader nodded.

The grandmother looked awkward in the bank’s VIP room, glancing around nervously.

“Grandma, please sit here. Our team leader will make sure the money you gave can be used for Jin-su.”

And so, the long-term insurance policy for Jin-su was completed.

As the grandmother left the VIP room, her eyes were filled with tears.

“Thank you, young man. Thank you so much.”

“First, please focus on getting treatment, Grandma. You need to live long enough to see your grandson get a job and get married. You’ve been worrying about him so much.”

“Yes… Yes, I should. Thank you, young man. I’ll make sure to take my medicine, too.”

For some reason, Si-min’s eyes became moist as well.

He escorted the grandmother outside the branch and turned back.

A few days passed after the insurance was taken out in Jin-su’s name.

Then an unfamiliar number appeared on Kim Si-min’s phone.

“Hello. Is this Mr. Kim Si-min? This is Investigator Na Jae-ho from the Criminal Affairs Division of the Northern Seoul Police Station—”

Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep.

Annoyed by what he assumed was a voice-phishing call first thing in the morning, Kim Si-min quickly pressed the power-off button.

Not long after he ended the call, his Galaxy rang again.

“Mr. Kim Si-min. This is the Northern Seoul Police—”

“I know this is voice phishing, you bastard.”

Voice-phishing scammers had become pretty persistent lately.

Usually, they did not call back after you hung up.

Ring-ring-ring-ring.

The phone rang again.

“Mr. Kim Si-min… This isn’t voice phishing… This really is the Northern Seoul Police Station. A report has been filed regarding an assault involving you.”

The call he had hung up on because he thought it was a scam seemed to really be from the police station.

“Let me explain again. I’m contacting you because a report has been filed regarding an assault.”

“Who reported me?”

“Um… Do you know a woman named Kim Sun-bok?”

“Yes, I do.”

“Two of her children, Cha Jin-san and Cha Ji-suk, filed the report. We’d like you to come in. They claim that you seriously injured Cha Jin-san by throwing him to the ground. They also claim that you entered the grandmother’s house without permission.”

“Hah… Is that what those people told you?”

“Yes.”

Kim Si-min was dumbfounded by the nerve of those people.

At the same time, the absurdity of being accused of something for the first time in his life left his mind blank for a moment before it finally started working again.

“All right. I understand. When should I come in?”

“Within about three days should be fine. Please come to the police station sometime during that period.”

“Yes. I’ll do that.”

After hanging up, Si-min suddenly felt anger boiling inside him.

He was already furious about the way those people treated the grandmother, and now these worthless bastards had gone this far.

What was he supposed to do?

As far as he remembered, the neighborhood was so run-down that he had never seen any CCTV cameras.

And the only witnesses were the grandmother and that woman, who was clearly on Cha Jin-san’s side.

After thinking for a long while, the face of the man he had met in the elevator at Lighthouse’s office recently came to mind.

[Lighthouse Co., Ltd. — Legal Advisor Hwang Su-ho]

After hesitating for quite some time, he called the number on the business card.

Ring… Ring… Ring…

“Lighthouse Legal Advisor Hwang Su-ho speaking.”

The voice on the other end sounded rough.

“Hello. I’m the new employee you met in the elevator a while ago.”

“Ah. The new guy recruited by that old man Park Won-jung?”

“Yes. I was so caught up in everything at the time that I didn’t even introduce myself. My name is Kim Si-min.”

“Oh, right. It’s good to hear from you, but what’s going on?”

“Well…”

Kim Si-min briefly explained everything that had happened.

“You got tangled up with a bunch of punks, huh? All right. As your senior, there’s no way I can just leave you hanging. Where did you say you live?”

Kim Si-min gave Hwang Su-ho his home address.

About three hours later, the doorbell rang.

“Oh, new guy. You live in a nice place.”

What was so nice about a two-room officetel rented on a deposit-only lease?

As a lawyer, Hwang Su-ho probably made much more money than Si-min and lived somewhere much nicer.

Of course, Hwang Su-ho didn’t exactly look like a lawyer.

“Anyway, new guy, let’s hear that story in a little more detail.”

With his short beard, messy hair, and tired eyes, Hwang Su-ho did not look particularly trustworthy.

But Si-min had nowhere else to turn, so despite his doubts, he began explaining everything that had happened in detail.

“Good grief. Those guys look like they jumped straight out of a gangster movie. Don’t worry. I may look like this, but your senior here is a professional.”

He ran a hand through his messy hair with a grin and pulled out a cigarette from his suit pocket.

“This isn’t my house, so no smoking indoors.”

“Oh, uh, right.”