I Became a Black Market Tycoon with an Inventory - Chapter 14

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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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014-Enlistment
14. Yang Jung-won
After much deliberation,
the military proved to be a remarkably rational choice.
I was genuinely impressed with myself for selecting such a path.
I had decided not to enlist as an ordinary soldier, but as a non-commissioned officer.
Specifically, a Special Forces non-commissioned officer.
That place we call the special operations unit.
There were several reasons behind choosing a Special Forces non-commissioned officer among so many options.
First, they provide food, clothing, and shelter.
Where else could you find such a thing?
This alone was reason enough to enlist.
It was such an extraordinary benefit that I could imagine living in the military for life.
Outside, money drains away with every breath you take.
Electricity, water, gas—though I wouldn’t know personally.
But that’s how ordinary people live.
You need to eat, and you need to buy clothes.
Everything costs money.
But the military handles it all.
They provide meals and uniforms.
In fact, since there’s only one uniform, you don’t even need to worry about what to wear.
Such thoughtfulness.
Second, you gain a profession.
In other words, you receive a salary.
They provide food, clothing, and shelter,
and they pay you too?
Plus, you build a career.
Why wouldn’t you go?
Enlisted soldiers receive salaries too, but the scale differs from non-commissioned officers.
I heard various allowances are included with the salary.
This was one reason I chose to enlist as a non-commissioned officer rather than a soldier.
Third.
You can learn new skills.
When enlisting as a non-commissioned officer, there are occasionally opportunities to learn new techniques.
Or depending on your specialty as a non-commissioned officer, you can learn skills.
Working construction, following around older men just gets you cursed at and they won’t teach you anything,
but the military, being state-run, offers free training with numerous benefits.
Fourth.
This seems to be the most important one.
You fulfill your military service obligation.
For the record, I’m not an orphan.
Of course, I have the obligation to fulfill my military service,
and since I have to go to the military anyway, I decided to enlist as a non-commissioned officer.
The military is inevitable.
Why not earn money and learn skills while I’m there?
The military is amazing.
.
.
.
Damn it.
You have to take an exam to join the military?
This is ridiculous.
I never thought about this.
I thought all you needed was arms and legs and the ability to speak,
but there was a written exam.
Military enlistment hit me with a massive barrier called an exam.
So the Special Forces non-commissioned officer program really is
a special place only for the chosen, exceptional few?
I became acutely aware of just how significant what I was undertaking truly was.
Right.
They offer such incredible benefits,
so the reason people don’t enlist is because it’s that difficult and demanding.
But I will overcome that barrier.
Because I’m a Special Forces non-commissioned officer.
I purchased an online course.
For the first time in twelve years of formal education, I sought help from private tutoring.
I should have passed through sheer ability and fair competition, but I lacked confidence.
I felt a twinge of guilt about bending the rules slightly, but I convinced myself it was unavoidable.
I submitted my enlistment application
and underwent a physical examination.
187cm / 80kg.
My body showed no issues, including my vision.
And then came the decisive written assessment.
Though I worried greatly, with the help of private tutoring, I passed with ease.
So that’s why people talk about private tutoring so much.
I finally understood the mindset of wealthy mothers in Gangnam.
Online sources claimed the written exam wasn’t particularly difficult,
that it focused more on intellectual ability tests and situational judgment rather than knowledge, but that was a lie.
It was far harder than I expected.
If I hadn’t prepared in advance,
If I’d relied purely on skill, I would have failed immediately.
There were too many problems, and time ran short.
And some questions contradicted my common sense.
Disaster response procedures—apparently my approach was incorrect.
Disaster response procedures?
You run away.
What kind of response are they talking about?
If I hadn’t memorized problems centered on past exam questions, I would have chosen a completely wrong answer.
Among the problems I’d practiced, there were similar ones, so I barely avoided disaster.
Next came the background investigation.
Passed.
Apparently there were no major traitors in my family.
Though truthfully, I didn’t really have a family to begin with.
Then came the physical fitness assessment.
Running, sit-ups, push-ups, pull-ups—I breezed through all of it.
Grade 1, they said.
I was almost there.
One final hurdle remained: the interview.
I’d realized something during the written exam.
Most of what I thought was correct turned out to be wrong.
This tendency was especially strong in the values judgment section.
My honesty was the wrong answer.
I burned this deep into my mind.
I would unconditionally dedicate this one life to the nation.
Since childhood, my dream had been to become a special forces officer.
The special forces were my only hope sustaining me through a harsh life.
I would never give up until I completed my mission.
I memorized it all mechanically.
I committed to memory a personal statement bordering on fiction, then fleshed it out.
I wove in my national consciousness and security philosophy within that statement.
Thanks to that, I earned my acceptance.
I submitted my application right after graduation,
in the depths of winter,
and received my acceptance letter in summer, when the cicadas sang.
I was now a special forces warrant officer.
.
.
.
Ten days remained until enrollment.
Normally, people meet up with friends at times like this, hold farewell parties and such.
I had no friends, so there was nothing like that for me to do.
I knew no one, and there was no one to gift me a Dolphin watch as a send-off to the military.
Still, I needed to put my affairs in order.
Though calling it “putting affairs in order” made it sound grander than it was.
I would be away from home for a very long time, so I needed to prepare accordingly.
I had no idea when I would return to this house.
I wasn’t enlisting as a regular soldier—I was becoming a Special Forces non-commissioned officer.
My military service could be eighteen months, or it could stretch to eighteen years.
Perhaps this was my last time here.
I might die in the military, after all.
Dying in the military is acceptable.
It’s not a bad death.
But I hate the thought of my death compensation going to the man called my father.
He’d just gamble with it or drink it away.
I don’t need my death to hasten his.
Where can I donate it instead?
I’ll ask about that later.
So I gave the house a thorough cleaning.
Later, some delinquent youth might move into my house,
but clean is better than dirty.
Fortunately, the house had almost no furnishings, so organizing didn’t take long.
Next came inventory management.
The tent and camping gear that had served as my home for so long—
things I wouldn’t need anymore—I sold on Carrot.
I even tried sharing items for the first time.
Miscellaneous objects.
Things I’d hastily shoved in when I was in a rush.
Items I’d used while traveling.
Garbage bags I’d carried around while selling ice cream.
Things like delivery vests I’d used were all crammed in my inventory.
I pulled out everything useless and either discarded it or organized it.
And then…
That bag of love and hate.
The bag I’d stolen when I was kidnapped.
When I first opened that bag, I was shocked.
It was full of cash.
When I counted it, it came to one hundred million won.
It was completely filled with fifty-thousand-won notes.
At first, I wanted to deposit it directly into the bank,
but apparently these days, if you deposit cash like that directly, they investigate its source?
Where did this money come from?
If I can’t prove the source of the funds, I’ll be hit with taxes immediately.
So I just kept it.
Yang Jung-won’s gold necklace in that bag.
Insurance money from scrapping the motorcycle.
Money from part-time work, money from selling ice cream.
I put it all in.
Whether this money came from part-time work
or from selling ice cream, I couldn’t distinguish,
but in any case, I gathered all the money I had and stuffed it into that bag.
It was a bag containing my entire net worth.
It held 118 million and 200,000 won.
I stored the bag in my inventory.
Since I never knew when I’d need money.
My personal affairs were settled lightly.
.
.
.
The day of enrollment.
To enroll, I just had to go to the Special Forces School in Gwangju, Gyeonggi Province.
I transferred subways three times, got off, and took a taxi to the Special Forces School.
“Are you enrolling?”
I rode in a taxi driven by an elderly taxi driver with white hair.
“Yes. I’m enrolling today.”
“Ah, I see. I’m an alumnus of that unit myself.”
“I see.”
“I’m a senior from that unit, you know.”
“Yes.”
What’s with that look in his eyes?
What does he expect from me?
Does he perhaps expect a salute or something?
No, that can’t be it.
When have we ever met before?
And I haven’t even enrolled yet.
And what would I even do with a salute he receives?
Why would he expect such a thing?
Something utterly useless?
“These days the intensity of training has weakened considerably. Too many people got injured during training. So now the priority has shifted to preventing injuries.”
“Ah, is that so?”
“Still, training needs to be somewhat grueling to feel like you’ve actually been trained. Nowadays training is too soft and wishy-washy, you know.”
“Ah, it seems you’ve been through training recently?”
I asked out of genuine curiosity, but he seemed quite flustered.
Why was that?
“Huh? Uh? No, that’s not it. You know, if you watch YouTube and stuff these days, it’s all over there. We experts can tell right away from watching that.”
For an expert, he had quite a bit of a belly showing.
His forearms were too soft, and his legs were thin.
“So anyway, did you bring all the equipment you need for enrollment?”
“Pardon? Equipment?”
“Don’t tell me you didn’t bring anything?”
“They said I could just come as is?”
“Officially they say they provide everything, but once you get there, you realize you need so much. A watch, for instance.”
“This one?”
I held up my left wrist to show him.
“Lotion, shampoo, razors and such.”
“These?”
“These?”
“These?”
Just to be safe, I showed the taxi driver everything I’d packed in my inventory.
“Underwear, athletic shoes…”
“These?”
“These?”
“Phone charger, gloves, tumbler, notebook, insoles, protective gear.”
“These?”
The taxi driver watched me with fascination as I pulled out item after item.
“You’ve prepared remarkably well and thoroughly. You won’t be lacking anything.”
“Thank you so much.”
It was the first time.
Someone had taken care to help me prepare for my enlistment.
He was kind enough to check each item one by one to make sure I hadn’t forgotten anything.
And on top of that, he even praised me for preparing so thoroughly.
Sir.
Or rather, senior.
I will train hard and be reborn as a dependable Special Forces soldier for this nation.
In return, I won’t take the change from the taxi fare.
Thank you.
.
.
Min Young-bae, a taxi driver working near Gwangju, Gyeonggi Province.
He was exempt from military service,
but whenever he drove his taxi, he lied and said he was a graduate of the Special Forces School.
The moment I mention being a senior, they snap to attention with a salute.
Then they tell me to relax, saying things like “take it easy” or “you’re getting old now,” while asking about this and that with concern.
Did you prepare this? Did you prepare that?
Usually, people haven’t prepared anything.
Because it’s unnecessary.
The unit tells them not to prepare anything.
But when a senior says something is necessary,
and claims that while it’s not on the official list, it’s actually useful once you bring it in, most people buy it.
Especially when parents come along—the mothers buy everything.
Then I sell those worthless items at inflated prices.
To sell these garbage products at even higher prices, my wife runs a general store.
Our store doesn’t have price tags.
The price varies depending on the customer.
We aim for personalized service.
Should I call it custom marketing?
Product quality doesn’t matter.
Those items will never actually be used anyway.
The unit doesn’t even give them a chance to be used.
They’re all prohibited items.
Everything gets confiscated upon enrollment.
This naive-looking kid I picked up in the taxi today.
He looked perfect for overcharging—so gullible and easy to fool.
I thought I could boost sales a bit.
I mentioned I was from that unit, but he didn’t even salute.
Kids these days have no manners.
I kept rattling off items I supposedly needed, but he already had everything prepared.
He doesn’t even seem to have a bag, yet items keep appearing.
Since things weren’t going my way, I got irritated for no good reason.
So when he paid in cash, I didn’t give him his change and just left.
The fare came to 9,700 won, and he gave me 10,000, so I just took it and went.
Is that about even?
.
.
.
After getting out of the taxi and walking a bit, I saw an enormous gate,
and in front of it stood a man in military uniform, perfectly still like a statue, guarding the entrance.
He looked impressive.
I awkwardly asked if this was the right place and whether I could enter,
and despite his earlier commanding appearance, he guided me with a kind and gentle voice.
“Welcome. If you head straight up the path visible from here, you’ll find the Drill Instructors who will help with your enrollment. Unity.”
“Yes, thank you.”
I passed through the Guard Post and climbed into the compound for enrollment.
Two to three-story buildings, not particularly tall, stood in neat rows like school structures, with a spacious parade ground stretching before them.
Was it a parade ground, or something else?
On one side stood a tall tower, and perched atop it sat a single eagle.
Beneath it was inscribed the phrase: “If it cannot be done, make it so.”
Rather than feeling empowered by those words, I found them somewhat unsettling.
As I walked, absorbing the sight of the compound, I arrived quickly.
“Are you enrolling today?”
“Yes.”
“Please proceed this way.”
“Yes.”
Who said the Special Forces School had such strict discipline?
They’re being so courteous.
And then I entered the Grand Hall through the door.
The moment I stepped inside, the door closed behind me.
“What are you staring at, you bastard? Lower your head! Bow your head, bow it! Find an empty spot over there and squat down in three seconds. One, two, damn it, move! Are you crawling? I said, are you crawling?!”
Simultaneous with the closing door came thunderous shouting and profanity.
I immediately surveyed what lay ahead.
People in the same predicament as me,
those enrolling today, were squatting,
their hands interlaced and pressed against the back of their heads.
Their heads bowed low.
Anyone watching might have mistaken us for hostages captured by terrorists.
Shouts and curses erupted from all directions.
I naturally wedged myself among them.
I squatted just as they did, interlaced my hands, and pressed them against the back of my head.
I lowered my head.
Curses echoed, shouts rang out,
and as I crouched there like a frog,
memories of my shuttle days suddenly surfaced.
My heart grew calm.
Everything felt oddly familiar.
This place felt like home.
This is where I belong.

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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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