New Employees With an Annual Salary of 1 Trillion Won - Chapter 122

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Chapter 122. Internal Crackdown (1)

After Lee Jung-hoo left his seat.

A strange atmosphere lingered in the small device factory meeting room.

When the tiger disappears, the wolf naturally becomes king. Factory Manager Myeong Jin-seop, who had ruled as the absolute power in the factory since long ago, naturally leaned back in the head seat.

“That young punk sure talks a lot for his age. Don’t you think?”

“That’s exactly right.”

“Department Manager Park and Department Manager Kang, you can leave now. Don’t you have factory management to take care of?”

“Congratulations on your appointment as president. We’ll take our leave now.”

President Myeong Jin-seop sent the Quality Team Manager and Technology Team Manager outside.

With only the Production Team and Materials Team managers remaining in the meeting room, the executives finally began to pour out what was really on their minds.

“Some guy who only played around with money is trying to teach us!”

“Exactly. How would a young punk know anything about the field? Increase dust-proof facilities? Build trust with clients? That’s our job to handle, where does he get off spouting such nonsense? Tsk tsk.”

The executives who had bowed their heads and acted so respectfully in front of Lee Jung-hoo.

However, what they showed now was their true nature.

They firmly believed they controlled the small device factory and thought of it as their own kingdom.

“But what do we do if the fund requests accounting data and financial materials?”

“What would they know from looking at it? How would anything change just because people who don’t know the field are looking? How could they find what even Daehyeon Electronics couldn’t discover?”

“Then do we hand over the materials as is?”

“We’ll need to touch them up a bit. The Materials Team can handle that kind of thing, right?”

The Materials Team that handled purchasing and materials.

Since there was no separate accounting team, the Materials Team also handled accounting duties.

“Of course it’s possible. We just need to talk with the service providers to adjust unit prices and create completely separate account books.”

“That’s why you’re Department Manager Jang.”

“And gifts came in from parts suppliers this time.”

The Materials Team manager distributed envelopes to all the executives.

The executives accepted the envelopes all too naturally, and the president even took out the contents to check them.

“Gift cards?”

“Two million won for the president. And one million won gift cards as gifts for the other executives.”

“That’s a reasonable amount.”

“And we’re scheduled to receive gifts from the pallet supplier within this week as well.”

“Department Manager Jang really handles things cleanly.”

When Department Manager Jang received praise, Production Team Manager Kim also stepped forward.

He presented a thick cash bundle to President Myeong Jin-seop.

“Money came in from the scrap metal company.”

Did scrap prices go up? The amount seems higher than usual.”

“Scrap metal prices did rise, and it seems they added a bit more as a gesture of goodwill for future business.”

“As you all well know, I’m not someone who eats alone. I share everything like this.”

President Myeong Jin-seop cut the cash bundle in half and pushed it forward.

The two managers bowed and scraped as they fairly divided the half portion of money.

“Thank you so much. We’ll trust only the factory manager, no wait, only the president, and devote our loyalty going forward!”

“Actually, the factory becoming independent might be better for us. We can expand without having to worry about Daehyeon Electronics.”

“The fund says they’ll review materials, but what would people who don’t know the field understand? Daehyeon Electronics knew the field inside and out so it was hard to deceive them, but dealing with the fund should be much easier.”

“That’s exactly what I’m saying! Let’s expand the scale going forward.”

The executives had been worried at first.

But they were reassured by the overly young appearance of the person who was supposedly the Korea branch manager of the fund.

***

As soon as I returned to the fund office.

I called for Accountant Kim, who had been promoted to manager.

“Take a detailed look at Nexcon’s accounting data. There’s definitely something there.”

“Are you referring to corruption or embezzlement?”

“After examining the factory directly, I saw absolutely no reason for it to be running such a deficit.”

The facilities, equipment, and even the employees.

I had toured the factory and confirmed everything with my own eyes.

There was absolutely no reason for the deficit shown in the public accounting data.

All that remained were parasites.

It couldn’t be explained unless there were several parasites feeding off the factory and sucking money from it.

And during the executive meeting, I could constantly hear discord, so I was certain of the parasites’ existence.

“If executives systematically pocket money under the table, honestly it’s not easy to discover. If they manipulate data in advance at the working level, it’s difficult to catch evidence with simple account books alone.”

“Then we’ll need to hire field experts.”

Suspicion alone was useless.

Without solid evidence, punishment was impossible.

If we moved carelessly, we’d only give them a chance to escape.

Therefore, we absolutely needed someone or an organization with the ability to dig in meticulously and catch evidence.

“There is someone decent available.”

“What kind of person?”

“Two years ago, when the NIS was reorganized from the former intelligence agency, there was a large-scale personnel shake-up. We could hire people who had skills but left the organization due to political reasons or factional conflicts.”

The mention of the former intelligence agency brought negative thoughts first.

That’s why the government had transformed it into the NIS.

“I’d prefer information analysis or security experts rather than political operation personnel.”

“I understand there are quite a few such people. Many who were kicked out of the agency at a young age found employment at security companies.”

“Are there cases where they started their own security companies?”

“I’ve heard stories of them opening everything from security companies to errand service centers.”

NIS-affiliated security companies.

Just hearing about it sounded quite promising, but I needed to see the actual data to make a choice.

“Could we get data on such companies?”

“That’s definitely possible. I’ll mobilize all my connections to create a company list.”

Manager Kim’s network wasn’t bad.

Having lived as an elite in the United States, he had active exchanges with Korean elites too.

Especially since he had considerable connections with Korea’s major law firms and accounting firms, this kind of information could be easily verified.

Just 3 hours.

Manager Kim secured a list and data for over 10 companies.

“This is a list of companies mainly founded by retired NIS employees.”

“There are more places than I expected.”

“It seems to be because such a large-scale personnel shake-up was conducted.”

I carefully examined the company data one by one.

The first place I looked at was the largest security company.

But every time I reviewed the data, discordant sounds poured out that tormented my eardrums, so I quickly closed it.

“This place seems problematic.”

“It’s the largest in scale, but there are dirty rumors since it was created by agents who did political operations. They’ve disguised themselves as a political consulting company, but I’ve heard they also handle things like money laundering and illegal political fund creation.”

I couldn’t trust a place like this.

I needed experts with skills but little connection to politics.

For that, I thought smaller scale would actually be better, so I looked at the company data at the very end of the list.

“This place doesn’t even have 10 employees.”

“It’s also the place with the youngest CEO. He was kicked out of the NIS in his late twenties and started a security company.”

“Their specialty is information analysis and security.”

“They have considerable field experience and their reputation isn’t bad. But it’s confirmed they left the NIS because they chose the wrong faction.”

Small-scale security company ‘Red Line’.

The more I looked at the data, the more I liked it.

They didn’t discriminate in means and methods, but they didn’t cross the line either, should I say?

Decisively, it felt right.

Every time I examined the materials, I heard good harmonies, and the shape of the gear teeth looked decent too.

It was an organization with just the right form to become a component of the structure I was building.

“Could I meet with the representative of RedLine Security Company?”

“I’ll contact them right away.”

The Deputy Branch Manager personally called RedLine’s representative.

In less than a minute, he returned with a positive response.

“He says he’ll come to the fund office right now.”

“He must not have much work on his hands.”

“It’s a startup company and quite small in scale, so it seems they can’t find proper work.”

“If he’s from the National Intelligence Service, couldn’t he get work from that side?”

“His career at the National Intelligence Service wasn’t very long, and all his upper connections were purged, so that seems to be why.”

Until RedLine’s representative arrived at the fund office.

We investigated the company through various channels and confirmed it was on the verge of bankruptcy.

Just as we finished reviewing all the materials.

RedLine’s representative, drenched in sweat, rushed frantically into the fund office.

“Nice to meet you. I’m Park Dae-hyeok, representative of RedLine!”

“Hello. I’m Lee Jung-hoo, Branch Manager of Tiger Fund Korea Branch. Please come inside.”

I first guided him to my private office.

A sturdy build and intelligent eyes, but an impression full of stubbornness.

Just looking at his face, I could understand why he couldn’t properly climb the ladder at the National Intelligence Service and got kicked out.

“I heard you’re from the National Intelligence Service.”

“That’s right. I went straight to work at the National Intelligence Service after completing my bachelor’s degree officer program!”

“You don’t need to shout. I need someone I can trust to handle work – would that be alright with you?”

“Keeping promises with clients is absolutely my motto.”

He seemed capable but lacking in flexibility.

Being stubborn had its pros and cons, but it seemed unlikely that information would leak out.

“If you handle this job well, I’ll make sure RedLine never lacks work in the future.”

“What do you mean by that?”

“We could assign you security work, or other jobs too. And of course, I’ll promise a success bonus for this job. I’ll give you 2,000 as a down payment, and 2,000 as a success bonus.”

He must be short on money.

Representative Park Dae-hyeok’s lips twitched.

In a situation where he couldn’t even pay rent properly, even just the 2,000 down payment was an enormous amount.

“What do I need to do?”

“Depending on RedLine’s capabilities, it could be short-term or long-term work. It’s finding evidence of executives’ corruption.”

“So I just need to find corruption evidence, not classified materials?”

“And it’s not a competing company, but finding corruption materials from a company that Tiger Fund acquired. There won’t be any major legal issues.”

There wouldn’t be any major legal issues.

Since the fund would be conducting an internal audit of its own company.

Of course, aspects like wiretapping or illegal filming in the process might be problematic, but once we found evidence, we could easily cover up such issues.

“That’s definitely possible. My staff and I specialize in information gathering and analysis.”

“Please collect corruption evidence from Nexcon, which we recently acquired. There will be a Nexcon security recruitment notice tomorrow. If you apply there, you’ll be able to enter Nexcon naturally.”

Tiger Fund held complete personnel authority over Nexcon.

Since we had been using the security personnel hired by Daehyun Electronics until now, recruiting new security wouldn’t be strange at all.

“If you go that far to help, we can collect evidence comfortably.”

“If you need any equipment, tools, or personnel, just let me know anytime.”

“No support is necessary. RedLine’s capabilities alone are sufficient.”

Representative Park Dae-hyeok was overflowing with confidence.

If it was confidence with substance rather than bluster.

Starting with this job, I planned to entrust him with many tasks, and RedLine would grow dozens of times larger than now.

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