Goblin Library - Chapter 201

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Chapter 201.

Lim Sung-un, who had been listening to Lee Gang-hyuk’s words, spoke.
『If you found it, you should report it. Then the prosecutors and police would arrest them and handle it according to the law.』
『Report it… but would reporting it recover the hundred billion? They’ve already hidden it everywhere and laundered it, so the odds of finding it are slim.』
At Lee Gang-hyuk’s words, Lim Sung-un bit his lip. If it were Jang Ma-ru, he would dig around everywhere and somehow trace the flow of funds.
Even if they’d converted it to cash or gold, it would just take time to find it. But… if it’s a nation, that’s different.
If they’d hidden it well, there was a high probability they wouldn’t recover the hundred billion.
『Ah! And even if you did recover it, with lawsuits and trials and all that nonsense, wouldn’t it take three years? Five years? So in the meantime, the people who lost their deposit money would be sucking their thumbs on the street? And those who put in their own money for deposits aren’t in the worst situation, but what about those who took out loans? They’re already getting squeezed because they can’t pay back their loans, aren’t they?』
When Lim Sung-un had no answer, Lee Gang-hyuk continued.
『And you’re saying you’d siphon off slush funds and return them to the victims? What’s the difference between you and me? And… you won’t return everything to the victims either, will you?』
At Lee Gang-hyuk’s words, Lim Sung-un silently drank a glass of soju. He had nothing to say to that either.
While Jang Ma-ru had an exceptional talent for making money, they weren’t a group that received funds from elsewhere.
That’s why they needed to secure operational funds separately.
Watching Lim Sung-un like this, Lee Gang-hyuk chuckled and then said “Ah!” as he picked up his phone and pulled up something to show him.
『I think you’ll like this case.』
『What is it?』
『It’s a conglomerate group matter. You like this kind of thing, don’t you? Punishing the crimes of powerful people.』
At Lee Gang-hyuk’s words, Lim Sung-un reached out and looked at the phone.
『W Group.』
『It’s a case of unpaid wages in the hundred-billion range.』
『I thought the wages went unpaid due to deteriorating company management?』
『That’s what they always say. But why does the company struggle while the executives receive their full salaries, and relatives—cousins, distant cousins—don’t even show up to work yet receive tens of billions in annual compensation? Oh, and by the way, the chairman alone received sixty billion just from the company last year through various means.』
At Lee Gang-hyuk’s words, Lim Sung-un tilted his head.
『It’s supposed to be one of the top conglomerate groups, yet they do this kind of thing?』
『They did. And this is something unusual among their wage payment records.』
Lim Sung-un opened a file and showed it to him. Inside were records of the chairman and his relatives’ wage payments.
『Of course, it’s true that wages went unpaid due to poor company management. So shouldn’t the chairman and those people share the burden too? Why should only the diligent employees bear that burden?』
At Lee Gang-hyuk’s words, Lim Sung-un looked at the file for a moment before speaking.
『It’s not illegal. It’s a loophole.』
『So it’s not your jurisdiction?』
『….』
When Lim Sung-un put down the phone, Lee Gang-hyuk chuckled and spoke.
『Then… we’ll do it.』
『You will?』
『They must have stashed slush funds somewhere. We’ll shake that loose and….』
Lee Gang-hyuk looked at Lim Sung-un.
『Return it to the office workers who haven’t received their wages for months.』
“Are you seriously telling a prosecutor that you’re going to steal?”
“The theft is what that chairman does—embezzling his employees’ wages to line his own pockets. And you’ve committed theft too.”
Lee Gang-hyuk pointed at Lim Sung-un.
“The prosecutor might not know this, but in ordinary households, even one month of delayed wages causes an uproar. Yet there, wages have been delayed for three months… good grief.”
Lee Gang-hyuk chuckled and continued.
“But since I’ve said this in front of the prosecutor… I suppose I’ll have to delete this. Can’t risk getting caught.”
Lee Gang-hyuk displayed a delete button on his phone screen and placed it before Lim Sung-un.
“Press it. Those employees can endure a few more months.”
At Lee Gang-hyuk’s words, Lim Sung-un drank his soju and pressed the delete button with his hand.
Seeing this, Lee Gang-hyuk smiled bitterly.
“I see. So you’re saying you’ll stay within the boundaries… and only go as far as your own principles allow.”
Lee Gang-hyuk interpreted Lim Sung-un’s deletion of the file as a breakdown in negotiations.
As Lee Gang-hyuk retrieved his phone, Lim Sung-un spoke up.
“I’ll take this case.”
At the unexpected words, Lee Gang-hyuk looked at him.
“Didn’t you say this wasn’t your jurisdiction?”
“When a prosecutor becomes aware of a crime, it’s their duty to investigate. And… this situation qualifies as a crime.”
“You said it was a loophole.”
“If you get involved, it becomes a crime. So it falls under my jurisdiction.”
Lee Gang-hyuk stared at Lim Sung-un in silence for a moment, then glanced at the ramen. While they’d been talking, the noodles had shriveled considerably.
Lee Gang-hyuk told him to wait a moment, then gripped the pot with his sleeve and headed into the convenience store.
After discarding the overcooked ramen, he picked up fresh ramen and bottled water and approached the register.
Lee Gang-hyuk seemed to exchange a few words with the part-time worker, nodded, and emerged empty-handed.
Once Lee Gang-hyuk sat back down, Lim Sung-un asked.
“Empty-handed?”
“They’re cooking it for me.”
“They’re cooking it?”
“Money’s nice and all. Oh! I didn’t ask for it. They offered to do it, so I didn’t refuse.”
Lee Gang-hyuk poured soju into Lim Sung-un’s empty glass as he spoke.
“So, what are you going to do?”
Instead of answering immediately, Lee Gang-hyuk drank his soju and picked up the bottle. When Lim Sung-un raised his glass, Lee Gang-hyuk poured and spoke.
“Before that… how did you end up starting this business?”
“My business?”
“Yeah.”
“How did you end up like this? Ah, never mind. I don’t even need to ask.”
Seeing Lim Sung-un, Lee Gang-hyuk chuckled and spoke.
“Looking at the cases you handled, I’m getting a sense of it. A righteous prosecutor… but when you took on major cases, those above you started pressuring you. Cases involving powerful figures and conglomerates—external pressure came down like a storm. ‘Let it go, grant prosecutorial discretion, what kind of case is this, why waste paper on such things’… After experiencing that a few times, you must have thought this isn’t right. And the result was…”
Lee Gang-hyuk spread his fingers.
“Boom! You decided to let things play out and handed down prison sentences, right? Doing that, you came to realize that the wealthy don’t follow the law’s standards, and that they too must face legal punishment. And the conclusion is… the dark hero you are now?”
When Lim Sung-un said nothing, Lee Gang-hyuk laughed.
“Honestly, a prosecutor like Lim Sung-un is common enough.”
“Common?”
“Well, people talk a lot these days about prosecutors being money-hungry or power-obsessed… but the truth is, most of them start out righteous.”
Lee Gang-hyuk continued with a smile.
“Even I, someone full of distrust toward the law, have to admit that. If you put a rookie prosecutor in the position of Prosecutor General, this country would be great. But… as time passes, a prosecutor’s conscience grows dull, gets smeared with grease, splattered with filth, and eventually they become a political prosecutor, a conglomerate prosecutor.”
Lee Gang-hyuk shook his head.
“You could say the lower waters are clean but the upper waters are dirty. When you think about it, prosecutors have it particularly bad.”
Lim Sung-un didn’t answer and drank his soju. He knew it too—that prosecutors start out righteous but gradually wear down over time.
“But… there’s no prosecutor trying to change things through dark hero methods.”
Then Lee Gang-hyuk looked at Lim Sung-un.
“That’s why I like you, Prosecutor. There needs to be at least one prosecutor like you so that rich people fear the law too. That’s why I….”
Lee Gang-hyuk trailed off with a quiet chuckle.
Lim Sung-un looked at him for a moment. He could guess what came next.
It would have been something about not killing him.
For Lee Gang-hyuk, burying Lim Sung-un in the ground would have been an easier path than having this conversation with him. He certainly had the power to do it.
Lim Sung-un, who had been watching Lee Gang-hyuk, opened his mouth.
“Then tell me how you started.”
At Lim Sung-un’s request, Lee Gang-hyuk shrugged.
“Honestly, at first I had no intention of running this kind of business. Since I was serving a life sentence, money was useless to me anyway. And back then, just surviving was hard enough.”
…
As Lim Sung-un drank his soju in silence, Lee Gang-hyuk spoke with a smile.
“Then one day… a guy running a pyramid scheme came in.”
“A pyramid scheme?”
“A guy operating a three-hundred-billion-won pyramid company… didn’t you see it on the news? People who were victimized committed suicide. When that bastard got caught… man, he got beaten up real bad back then.”
“Beaten up?”
“For running a three-hundred-billion-won pyramid scheme, the government only recovered a small amount. That meant he’d hidden it all somewhere… so the gang members beat it out of him trying to make him talk. But he never cracked. Then somehow he managed to turn the gang members into his bodyguards.”
Lee Gang-hyuk took a sip of soju and tore into a piece of squid leg as he spoke.
“After about two years of that, I got paroled and was leaving, and that bastard said something to me….”
Lee Gang-hyuk stared into empty space for a moment before speaking.
“If we meet again, I’m counting on you.”
“If we meet again?”
“Ah! That was when I was the prison boss. For him to say something like that to me, serving a life sentence… it meant that when he comes back to prison someday, he’s counting on me.”
Lee Gang-hyuk let out a heavy sigh and continued.
“Hearing that, I realized something. That bastard will commit crimes again once he gets out. There will be more people shedding tears of blood on the outside. So that’s when I formed a team. Guys whose release dates were coming up, and capable people among those already released.”
Lee Gang-hyuk took another sip of soju and continued.
“I wanted to create an organization that delivers real punishment—not child’s play like prison sentences—and actually helps the victims.”
“So what happened to that guy?”
…
At Lim Sung-un’s question, Lee Gang-hyuk said nothing. And his silence was answer enough.
Watching the stern-faced Lim Sung-un, Lee Gang-hyuk let out a quiet laugh and spoke.
“276,245,700,000.”
Lee Gang-hyuk continued after stating the lengthy figure.
“That’s the amount we returned to the victims back then. That pig of a man squandered over 20 billion won in such a short period.”
“Didn’t you say labor costs were expensive?”
“Back then it was our first time, so labor costs weren’t really a consideration. And the people whose hearts aligned with mine at that time—they thought of the victims more than money.”
“Criminals?”
“Not all criminals are the same. There was someone who came in after accidentally hitting a drunk causing trouble for a mother selling at the market, and someone who got caught up in a fraud scheme they were victimized by. There were more people who came in wrongfully than you’d think.”
Lee Gang-hyuk spoke while looking at Lim Sung-un.
“I devised plans for those people, and in the end, we recovered the money.”
“Were there no problems?”
“There were. For ordinary people, that much money is enough to change who they are.”
He meant problems arose after they secured the money.
“And then?”
“When things go wrong from the start, they only get more tangled later.”
Lee Gang-hyuk shook his head and continued.
“Still, I’ve been taking care of that family. Even now.”
Just then the convenience store door opened and a part-time worker came with ramen. After setting down the ramen bowl and placing several paper cups beside it, the worker spoke.
“When eating here, paper cups have their own charm, so I brought them. If it’s inconvenient, I have disposable bowls—would you like those instead?”
“No, it’s charming just like you said.”
As he spoke, Lee Gang-hyuk pulled out a 50,000 won bill and handed it over.
“I’ll enjoy it.”
“Ah, thank you.”
Lee Gang-hyuk watched the part-time worker leave with a bright smile, accepting the money, then poured ramen into a paper cup. Lim Sung-un also poured ramen into his paper cup.
“That’s how I started the work back then.”

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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