Golden Print [EN]: Chapter 72

Café Fresco

NA Food One was a huge company in Korea. It was part of the NA Group, and they made lots of different restaurants based on their food business.

By 2010, NA Food One was making so much money – one trillion won! It was one of the biggest companies in the country. It even was listed on the Korean stock market, called the KOSDAQ, in the early 2000s.

The boss of NA Food One was Kang Do-kyung. He was the CEO, and he got the job from his father, who was the chairman of the whole NA Group. People called Kang Do-kyung a “second-generation chaebol,” which meant his family was rich and powerful and owned a big family business.

His second son, Kang Seok-jung, was considered a third-generation chaebol.

But, unlike his older brother and younger sister, Seok-jung wasn’t very ambitious.

We can see this because he had already decided not to take over NA Food One when he was in his late twenties.

“Seok-jung, are you sure you won’t regret this decision?”

“Yes, Father.”

“You’re not just saying this because you don’t like studying, are you?”

“Father, you may still see me as young, but I’m long past the age of having such immature thoughts.”

“Hmm…….”

But, Kang Seok-jung loved food the most and was very interested in the restaurant business.

His older brother, Kang Min-joon, liked managing the company more than food.

And his sister, who was thirty, was more interested in the entertainment industry.

The reason Seok-jung didn’t want to take over NA Food One was also because he loved food.

It was ironic.

“But, Father.”

“What is it?”

“Please transfer a few buildings that bring in steady income to me in advance.”

“What? Are you planning to be a loafer in your twenties?”

“That’s not it.”

“Then?”

“I just want to use the money from them to do the things I want to do on a small scale.”

Seok-jung didn’t want to fight with his siblings over money, and he didn’t want to manage the company.

He wanted to create his own food and open his own stores, not get reports on sales and manage a huge company.

“What is it that you want to do?”

“The restaurant business, Father.”

“You’re not trying to play games with me right now, are you?”

“Of course not.”

“Isn’t our Food One a restaurant business?”

“But you expect my brother and me to manage the company, don’t you?”

“……!”

“I want to research and develop food, and create my own brand. Managing a company… it’s just not for me.”

That day, CEO Kang Do-kyung gave Seok-jung everything he wanted.

It wasn’t much money for Kang Do-kyung.

He hoped his son would soon learn the cold, hard truths of business.

‘He’ll realize that the restaurant business and managing a company are not separate when he experiences it himself.’

So, Kang Seok-jung, after getting what he wanted from his father, had been creating his own brand.

But, he had failed many times for ten years, and he was trying to find out why.

‘Is my food not good enough?’

‘Was the menu confusing?’

Kang Seok-jung didn’t know it, but the food from his brands was always good.

But, he only thought about the food and didn’t pay attention to other things.

He didn’t work hard on branding and marketing.

But the real reason he had failed for ten years without knowing why was that he wasn’t serious enough.

‘Hoo. The sales are going down again. Should I just stop and try something else?’

He easily thought, ‘If this fails, I’ll just try something else.’

Also, he had no money problems, so there was no risk.

As time went on, he became lazy.

He enjoyed starting new brands like it was a hobby.

He had lost the determination he had when he talked to his father.

‘I was really immature.’

Maybe starting a business after getting buildings from his father was a mistake from the beginning.

That was normal for him, a third-generation chaebol.

Sitting in his office, thinking about the past, Kang Seok-jung let out a hollow laugh. It sounded empty, even to himself, like the echo in a deserted restaurant.

He had told his father that he wasn’t immature when he was in his twenties.

But now, more than ten years later, he realized he was still immature.

‘This time, I need to give it my all, like it’s the last time.’

He really liked coffee, even among all the restaurants.

So, he was determined when he planned the café business, but after the meeting, he had a clearer purpose.

Woo-jin, the bold young woman who wanted him to take charge of Café Fresco’s interior, had asked for a meeting.

After hearing her story, Seok-jung felt more motivated.

Woo-jin gave him a clear vision, when he had only vaguely thought he should work hard.

And one more thing.

Woo-jin’s appearance, passionately building her own business at a young age, was also a great inspiration for him.

‘Branding is tempering. I can’t forget those words.’

Seok-jung sat at his desk, tapping his pen for a while, then got up and picked up his briefcase.

He was going to the site where the first Café Fresco would be built.

In about ten minutes, he would meet with Woo-jin for the final meeting.

Woo-jin was visiting the Café Fresco site for the first time today.

She had been near it for the meeting last week.

But she was entering the construction site for the first time today. There was no need to come in last time.

She could easily imagine the space just by looking at the drawings.

The final design plans were ready for Kang Seok-jung. They showed every detail he needed to see. Even though the design was finished without problems, Woo-jin wished he had visited the site himself before. Now, something strange was happening right in front of him.

“This is… a Golden Print,” Woo-jin thought.

He remembered the design competition. He had decided to call the golden hologram that reappeared on the blueprints the ‘Golden Print.’

The true nature of this Golden Print was a mystery. But Woo-jin thought the name ‘Golden Print,’ inspired by ‘Blueprint’—a term for design plans—was perfect for this strange thing.

Woo-jin had thought the Golden Print would only appear on his blueprints.

But he was wrong.

The golden hologram shimmered on the empty site, even before construction. Golden lines, thin as threads of light, shimmered in the air. They pulsed gently, like breathing, outlining shapes that weren’t really there.

He looked at Jin-tae and the other employees. But only Woo-jin could see it.

“Ha… this is going to be a headache,” he thought.

The Golden Print always made Woo-jin’s designs much better.

This time, the Golden Print would likely lead to changes in Woo-jin’s design.

If that happened, the construction schedule would be delayed.

Therefore, Woo-jin felt both pleased and perplexed by this Golden Print. The Golden Print was amazing, a gift for his design. But a problem too! *More changes? More delays?* he thought, a knot forming in his stomach.

Of course, even though he was perplexed, he would not ignore the signals from the Golden Print.

“I need to use everything I can. I still have a long way to go,” he told himself.

Woo-jin, who had paused briefly in front of the site, began to walk inside again. The employees of WJ Studio followed.

Jin-tae had been watching Woo-jin’s serious expression. He asked in a low voice, “You look like you’ve seen a ghost, Woo-jin. Is something wrong?”

Woo-jin shook his head slightly. “No, hyung. It’s just… as I was comparing the blueprints to the site, I noticed some things I hadn’t considered during the design phase.”

Woo-jin wasn’t lying.

The things he hadn’t considered were, after all, the Golden Print.

He just didn’t mention it.

This was something he couldn’t tell anyone.

“Sigh. This is the third time this has happened… and it’s still not easy to get used to,” he thought.

Woo-jin tried his best to understand the third Golden Print. Woo-jin frowned, his eyes darting around the golden lines. He chewed his lip, trying to make sense of the shapes. *Floor plan… user flow… what is this one?* his mind raced.

“I need to figure out what these golden lines mean… as quickly as possible,” he thought.

The first Golden Print had been a floor plan. The second had been a flow diagram showing user movement.

This third Golden Print had a three-dimensional structure. It was different from the others that had appeared on a flat plane.

It was as if it were drawing the space itself.

“This is definitely a shape related to the design I created……,” Woo-jin thought.

Woo-jin could see the completed image of this site in his mind.

He realized that this golden hologram, made of points, lines, and planes, matched the image of the space to be completed.

But, like the user flow diagram, this Golden Print kept changing its shape.

The shape of the Golden Print had changed each time the spatial structure of the blueprint was changed.

This time, the shape changed each time Woo-jin moved within the site.

Also, it wasn’t showing all parts of the space.

Only the spatial structure of specific locations within Woo-jin’s view could be seen through this Golden Print.

“Ha, what on earth does this mean?” he wondered.

So, Woo-jin kept wandering around inside the site to understand the changes in the Golden Print. They stood on the empty building site. Red dirt stretched out before them, marked with wooden stakes. The city noise was faint here, replaced by the sound of wind.

He had arrived thirty minutes early. This was lucky for Woo-jin.

“Woo-jin, why are you wandering around so restlessly? You can look at the space while sitting down,” Jin-tae said.

“No, just a moment. There’s something I need to compare while checking the dimensions,” Woo-jin replied.

“Hmm……?”

Woo-jin wanted to understand the information this Golden Print was showing before Kang Seok-jung arrived.

If Woo-jin couldn’t find any information, the construction schedule would be fixed by the end of the meeting.

After that, even if he understood the Golden Print, he couldn’t change the design.

“‘Something that looks different each time I walk… within the space. What could it be?'”

Woo-jin wished the Golden Print would be more helpful. But he shook his head.

He knew that even figuring out what the Golden Print meant helped with the design and planning.

Woo-jin thought hard and finally understood a little before the meeting.

“‘Wait! If I look at the main hall from this location on the blueprint right now……!'”

Woo-jin compared the floor plan with the space. He began to move his steps slightly.

Then, standing in the exact location he had marked, Woo-jin took out a perspective drawing and compared it to the Golden Print.

Woo-jin understood for sure.

The Golden Print showed the ‘field of view’ from where Woo-jin was standing.

The three-dimensional golden lines showed the field of view in the perspective drawing.

“‘That’s it. Something that changes with the flow of space each time I move,'” he realized.

Woo-jin walked around the space again. He saw more things he hadn’t seen before.

Now that he understood the Golden Print, Woo-jin needed to find out what kind of signal it was sending.

Woo-jin thought about it and then exclaimed.

He had found the signal.

“That’s it…!”

But he couldn’t think about his design any further.

“Are you finished now, Mr. CEO?” Kang Seok-jung asked with a gentle smile. He was standing in front of Woo-jin.

Woo-jin realized the meeting was already ten minutes late.