Descent of The Demon Master [EN]: Chapter 1801

Carrying the Burden (3)

Having something to do.

Having something you want to do.

That alone is enough to change a person.

“I’m off.”

“Huh? Where are you going so early in the morning?”

“I have to go to work.”

Baek Hyun-jung looked at Kang Jin-ho with a slightly surprised expression.

Kang Jin-ho, who used to dawdle until lunchtime before dragging himself out, or even worse, just lazing around on the sofa until evening, was now neatly dressed and full of energy as he was about to leave the house early in the morning.

“What wind blew you all of a sudden… No, no. It must have been the wind that made him act weird.”

“……Weird, you say.”

“It was weird, it was.” Kang Jin-ho chuckled.

“Anyway, I’m off. I might be a bit late, so have dinner first.”

“Okay, got it.”

Kang Jin-ho patted Dong-dong’s butt a couple of times as the dog was nibbling at his pant leg, then stepped out of the front door. As he walked outside and leisurely lit a cigarette, he noticed a sedan parked in front of his house.

The sedan door opened, and Cho Kyu-min greeted him politely.

“You’re here?”

“Weren’t we supposed to meet in the middle?”

“I should be the one to pick you up.”

Kang Jin-ho chuckled at Cho Kyu-min’s words.

He was so used to treating the Assembly Head like a neighborhood friend that he felt overwhelmed by such treatment.

“Please, get in.”

“Let me finish my cigarette first.”

“There’s an ashtray in the car. What’s the big deal?”

Kang Jin-ho, torn between ‘should I be polite even if I don’t want to’ and ‘should I choose efficiency,’ got into the car. The car was surprisingly clean for a smoker’s car.

“You came out early.”

“A salaryman should be diligent.”

“……I don’t think most salarymen are like that.”

Kang Jin-ho chuckled and stubbed out his cigarette in the ashtray.

“Let’s get going.”

Cho Kyu-min stepped on the accelerator smoothly.

“Did everything at the company go well?”

“Kang Jin-ho-ssi… No, I should call you Chairman now. Chairman, you’ve never worked as an employee at a company, so you might not know, but resigning isn’t that simple. You have to hand over your work… It’ll take at least another month.”

Kang Jin-ho tilted his head.

‘Handing over work… Uh…

There must be a lot.

Oh, right. Matching Hwang Jung-hoo’s temper isn’t easy. The new secretary will probably be dying.’

“He won’t hit them with his cane, will he?”

“He never did that. What do you think of the Chairman? He’s such a progressive person.”

“But he’s a geezer, right?”

“He’s a progressive geezer.”

It was a strange combination of words that seemed impossible, but somehow it made sense. Anyone who knew Hwang Jung-hoo would have to nod in agreement.

“But he gives a lot of words of encouragement.” Cho Kyu-min chuckled.

“As a finance guy who started in finance from my first job, I feel a bit sentimental. I knew I wouldn’t be in finance forever, but now that the day has come, I feel nervous and excited.”

“……You’re talking like you started as an office worker. You were a bodyguard.”

Cho Kyu-min, feeling stung, made a subtle grimace.

“But finance is still finance!”

“I didn’t say anything.”

Cho Kyu-min sighed and changed the subject.

“But you’ve changed a lot. In the past, you would have left things like checking out buildings and sites to me and just received reports.”

Cho Kyu-min gave a wry smile.

“It feels a bit inefficient, though.”

“It’s the first step.”

Kang Jin-ho said calmly.

“I won’t be able to take care of everything myself in the future, but at least I plan to do what I can with my own hands.”

Cho Kyu-min’s eyes lit up at those words. He realized once again that Kang Jin-ho was serious.

“You’ve made a good decision. If a leader doesn’t know the ins and outs of how a business operates, it will inevitably become lax. That’s why the person leading a business needs to be more knowledgeable than the people working under them.”

Kang Jin-ho nodded.

The Assembly was the same.

Kang Jin-ho’s management skills were no match for Lee Jung-geol or Bang Jin-hoon. However, the reason he could lead the Assembly without any problems was that he was more outstanding than anyone else in the aspect of martial arts, which was the foundation and basis of the Assembly.

That’s why he could achieve greater efficiency even with some problems.

Remembering that fact, Kang Jin-ho mumbled with a slightly vacant look.

“……Do I have to study?”

“Pardon?”

“No… You said I need to be knowledgeable.”

Cho Kyu-min grinned as if he had caught something.

“It would be good if you did.”

“Originally, the person establishing a welfare foundation needs to have a social worker certificate. We managed to get by by appointing someone as the director and using some tricks, but originally, the chairman should have studied and obtained the certificate.”

“……R-really?”

“Yes. The reason why the country has such a law is simple. If the person running a welfare foundation doesn’t know about welfare, problems will arise.”

That was too obvious.

How could a foundation run properly if the chairman of a welfare foundation didn’t know about welfare? It was only because Kang Jin-ho was the kind of person who could get by by making his subordinates do the work.

Cho Kyu-min had been feeling a sense of problem with that part. So, he wasn’t going to miss this opportunity.

“I’ll prepare.”

“Yes?”

“I’ll prepare the textbooks. It would be easiest to go to university, but since you’re so busy, Chairman, you can’t waste time like that.”

“Originally, you only need to get a level 2 certificate… But with the Chairman’s reputation, would level 2 be enough? Aim for level 1.”

“……Isn’t that something you need to graduate from social welfare?”

“Hahahaha, don’t worry. There’s a great system called the credit bank system [a system in South Korea that allows people to earn college credits through various means, including online courses]. If you complete the credits through online lectures, you’ll be eligible to apply, so if you start diligently today, you’ll be fine.”

Kang Jin-ho looked at Cho Kyu-min with trembling eyes.

“If you whine….”

“Ah, no, it’s not that…”

“Yes?”

Cho Kyu-min tilted his head and looked at Kang Jin-ho.

“I’m a college student on leave, can I take online courses with the credit bank system?”

Cho Kyu-min’s head tilted slightly to the side.

“……I hadn’t thought of that, but I’ll look into it.”

“……Yes.”

Kang Jin-ho chuckled.

When he first returned to this world, the thing that baffled him the most was the fact that he had to study. Even though he thought there was no real use for it, he had devoted himself to studying in order not to disappoint his parents and to try to live a normal working life.

But now, he was finding things to study on his own.

‘You never know what will happen in life.’

Even so, he found it interesting that he didn’t feel particularly bothered by it.

“Well then, let’s go.”

“Yes.”

Kang Jin-ho smiled faintly.

“……What’s that supposed to mean?”

Lee Hyun-soo looked dumbfounded.

[No, suddenly he’s become so naggy. Today, when we were looking at the site, someone who used to say ‘Hmm, this place is nice’ is now talking about the lighting, the water supply, the accessibility!]

[I thought I was a real estate agent. The Chairman used to be known for his boldness, but now he’s constantly complaining.]

“Uh…”

Lee Hyun-soo nodded without realizing it.

“Being meticulous is a good thing, I guess.”

[Well, yeah, but….]

“So, did you decide on the site?”

[He doesn’t like the building or the site. He told me to look into it more, so I have to go out and do some more legwork.]

“You idiot, if you had looked for a good place from the start, this wouldn’t have happened.”

[Wow… You’re coming at me like that?] Lee Hyun-soo chuckled. Kang Jin-ho wasn’t the type to pay attention to such things. But that didn’t mean that Kang Jin-ho wasn’t meticulous. When it came to martial arts or family, things he considered important, Kang Jin-ho was more meticulous than anyone else.

It was just that the scope of those areas was expanding.

“So, don’t try to gloss over things, and do your best. I know you’ve been slacking off because your affiliation was vague.”

[What kind of slander is that? I’ve been working so hard. Because my affiliation was vague, I had to do this and that!]

“Bullshit.”

Lee Hyun-soo chuckled.

“Anyway, once the Assembly Head makes a decision on this, I’ll go and check it out, so don’t you dare do a sloppy job. You, you little punk. I’m your direct superior now.”

[Don’t talk nonsense. We have different affiliations.]

“What, you punk?”

[Ah, I’m busy. I’m hanging up.]

Lee Hyun-soo chuckled as he looked at the disconnected call.

“This punk thinks I’m joking.”

He’ll realize the reality once he grabs his shin and rolls around a few times.

“Welfare…”

Lee Hyun-soo scratched his chin.

‘He’s fixated on something weird.’

Of course, he knew that Kang Jin-ho was interested in that area, but he didn’t expect him to take it so seriously. It was a bit of a shame that he wasn’t focusing on the Assembly’s work….

“Maybe it’s a good thing.”

Hanging on to something where he could no longer pour his passion wasn’t good for Kang Jin-ho either. The Assembly could now be managed by the people of the Assembly doing their best.

Lee Hyun-soo, feeling like a subordinate who had lost his superior’s attention, scratched the back of his head.

“He’s getting sentimental as he gets older….”

Thump!

At that moment, Lee Hyun-soo’s door was opened roughly.

“Huh?”

Kang Jin-ho walked in quickly, waved his hand lightly, and sat on the sofa.

“Come here.”

“Yes?”

“Come and sit down quickly.”

Lee Hyun-soo got up from his seat as if he was possessed and sat across from Kang Jin-ho.

“No, suddenly….”

“The thing we discussed last time.”

“Yes?”

“It’s been about that much time, so it should be roughly sorted out. Report on how it went.”

“……The future food source?”

“Yeah.”

“Uh, that’s….”

Lee Hyun-soo hesitated to speak. After rolling his eyes for a while, Lee Hyun-soo opened his mouth with a friendly smile.

“No, that’s not something that comes out just by thinking about it for a few days….”

“Are you smiling?”

Lee Hyun-soo shut his mouth when he saw Kang Jin-ho’s eyebrows twitching.

“So, nothing’s prepared?”

“Ah, no, Assembly Head.”

“Are you having a good time these days?”

“……Yes?”

“It’s been a few days since the meeting, and you still haven’t come up with anything? What have you been doing?”

Only then did Lee Hyun-soo realize.

‘Ah, it’s not that he’s changed where he’s pouring his passion, it’s just that the scope has widened.’

‘I’m screwed.’

Kang Jin-ho smiled faintly as he looked at Lee Hyun-soo, who was smiling awkwardly.

“Lee Hyun-soo.”

“Yes, Assembly Head!”

“Go and bring all the directors.”

“……D-directors?”

“Yeah. Everyone above you and below me.”

“Hurry.”

Lee Hyun-soo’s last protest, that this wasn’t the army and that it was unfair, couldn’t even come out as words.