You Have Been Defended [EN]: Chapter 496

“Were there any rooms in this house we haven’t seen before?”

As he said this, Choi Jong-hyun got up from the floor and scanned the hallway where the rooms were located.

“Why the sudden interest in rooms?”

“Min-jae, besides the guest room, have you seen any other rooms?”

“Other rooms? I used to, but not since I’ve lived here.”

“Hey, he might have set up a shrine. Let’s look for it. There’ll be a room with a Buddhist painting or something. From watching Cha for years, I’ve realized that he does a lot of things that don’t make sense unless he’s some kind of prophet, like Nostradamus.”

They seemed ready to search my house for a shrine.

Then, Jo Bong-joon chuckled in disbelief.

“There’s no way someone like Cha would believe in something not scientifically proven. Well, I don’t know if such a spiritual world really exists, but Cha seems to have a thought process closer to an agnostic than an atheist.”

That’s right.

Even when I went back to the past and lived a second life 10 years ago, I wasn’t sure about the existence of an absolute being.

Moreover, considering I even gained the ability to discern whether someone is telling the truth or a lie, it seems like there might be a world beyond science. But perhaps at a certain point that modern science hasn’t yet reached, it could be considered scientific.

That’s because my ability is only activated when I visually confirm the other person.

There are research results that facial muscles move differently when telling the truth versus lying. So, I’ve wondered if a certain part of my brain is highly developed for some unknown reason, catching those changes and outputting truth and lies.

But that can’t explain the hologram-like letters I see, so I gave up on drawing a conclusion.

So, the most plausible thing I thought of was the parallel universe I told Kang Min-jae about.

Of course, even thinking that way, the question of how I moved to a parallel universe remains, so I’ve considered that there might be an absolute being…

If I had heard any voice in the moment between my previous life and this life, maybe things would be different, but as Jo Bong-joon said, I’m an agnostic.

“Well, you’re closer to a highly developed science type of person, Attorney Cha,” Kang Min-jae added.

It seemed like the alien theory, which had faded due to being busy with life, was about to resurface.

“No matter how scientifically advanced the world is, how could you have guessed all that unless you were divinely inspired?”

Fortunately, Choi Jong-hyun didn’t seem to catch Kang Min-jae’s hint.

“Wouldn’t there have been logical reasoning?”

“Then, give me the basis for predicting that YouTube would be the ultimate winner among many video platforms. Then I’ll give up looking for a shrine in Attorney Cha’s house.”

Choi Jong-hyun sat back down as if bestowing great generosity.

Of course, I didn’t want Choi Jong-hyun rummaging around my house, so I decided to talk about the ‘reason for YouTube’s ultimate victory,’ which I had never thought about deeply.

“At that time, the UCC [User-Created Content] craze had been going on for a while, and Google had acquired YouTube a few years before and started the Korean service. And around that time, although it was a bit late in Korea, smartphones were becoming widespread overseas.”

“So, you’re saying that since Google developed Android and also owns YouTube, it was a natural flow to lean towards that side. But in the early days of smartphones, Google couldn’t even compete in the OS market?”

Jo Bong-joon sharply dug in.

Perhaps because he had been dealing with stocks for a long time, his knowledge in this area was very quick.

I was going to make excuses as Jo Bong-joon had preempted, so I decided to shift the logical development in a slightly different direction.

“Globally, the smartphone OS market share at that time was highest for Symbian, but Google’s Android OS, which was close to last place, quickly and frighteningly caught up and even followed BlackBerry OS. So, I thought that YouTube, which is operated by the same company, would also rise together. Naturally.”

“…What’s natural about that? How did you predict all this? First of all, connecting OS market share and a video platform is amazing, and even if Android was on the rise, it was really at the bottom then. Isn’t it common to assume that the rise would be cut off at a reasonable level?”

“It was such a rapid rise, and the preference for Android OS increased rapidly in a short period, so I thought there must be a reason for that. That’s how it is with software. Besides, Android OS is often evaluated as imitating BlackBerry OS, but the fact that Android OS eventually surpassed the imitation target means it’s that convenient. So, I thought the rise would continue.”

“Well, I’ve heard that they could highly evaluate the expandability because it’s an open-source platform, but it’s still amazing that Attorney Cha, who only dug into law books and went around catching bad guys, knows this much in detail.”

In fact, in this life, I was so frustrated that the introduction of smartphones in Korea was delayed, so I kept a close eye on how widespread overseas smartphones were and when the iPhone would be released in Korea.

I gained that knowledge thanks to that, but I never thought it would be used at a time like this.

“Even professional investors couldn’t have predicted that much, unless they were experts in IT. Back then, everyone was paying attention to Apple and BlackBerry; not many people paid attention to Android. And Google’s stock price hasn’t exactly jumped a lot compared to 2010? Of course, it jumped, but even when Android’s market share surpassed iOS and became number one, there wasn’t a crazy reaction.”

“Is that so?”

Ah, I can’t just say I knew the future, so I added an explanation because I thought I had to give a plausible reason, but this was a problem in its own way.

I only knew that it had a huge impact in 2018, so I just made it up.

Jo Bong-joon dug into the gap again and began to press me fiercely.

“Then, did Attorney Cha buy Google stock?”

“I did.”

“When? Around the time we started our broadcast? Then you would have made some profit, but not much. And there’s still a lot of talk about the stock split this year. Rather, Apple has risen much more compared to then?”

“I bought it in 2008.”

“Before Lehman Brothers collapsed?”

“Are you talking about the Lehman Brothers crisis? Based on that time, I bought it after it collapsed.”

“That’s fortunate, but you still wouldn’t have made much profit.”

“I really don’t know about stocks; I just bought it because the stock price had fallen a lot at that time. I kept buying more, too.”

“You really don’t know. You should have bought Apple then. Apple has risen a lot compared to then. It’s too bad. If you had caught Apple instead of Google, how much would it be now…? You would have earned about four times as much?”

“I bought Apple too.”

“…You bought Apple?”

“Yes.”

As soon as I answered, a different light appeared in Jo Bong-joon’s eyes.

That light was close to madness, to the point where I regretted saying it.

“How much did you earn?”

“I don’t know.”

“Ah, tell me without holding back. Do you think I’m going to ask Attorney Cha for money?”

“You are asking.”

“Hyung [older brother/male friend], be quiet. Ah, please. Please tell me. How much did you earn?”

“It seems to have risen about 6 to 7 times.”

In fact, I don’t know stocks well.

I wasn’t interested in investing in my previous life, so I don’t know when or why there were ups and downs.

I just remembered a few companies that had risen frighteningly in 2018 compared to 2008, so the news reached even an amateur like me.

“Wow, how did you think of buying Apple back then…? It would have been burdensome to enter Apple at that time. Crazy. 7 times, ha. Can I ask how much you put in back then?”

“I don’t know well. I kept buying more, so it’s ambiguous to say exactly how much I put in.”

“Ha, you can just look at the average price… Okay, I understand you don’t want to tell me. Then, did you buy anything else? I’ll follow you and buy some too.”

Jo Bong-joon began to ask as if he would cling to me.

I hesitated for a moment.

It’s not that I hesitated whether to tell him or not.

Jo Bong-joon is also a grateful person to me, so if I know information that could be helpful, I want to tell him.

But from the perspective of someone who really doesn’t know stocks well, it was difficult to judge what to tell him to buy.

I pondered for a long time and carefully answered.

“I bought Amazon.”

“Amazon? You bought Amazon? When did you buy that?”

“I first bought it in 2008, but I kept buying it steadily.”

“If you bought it in 2008… it would have risen about 4 times? How do you keep buying such things? No, does that make sense? Did you really receive divine inspiration?”

I thought that explaining the reason why YouTube came to mind would free me from the question of whether I received divine inspiration.

I didn’t know it would strengthen the theory of divine inspiration…

“Did you fail too? Of course, there would be? Didn’t anything plummet?”

I don’t, but I feel like I should say so.

“There is.”

“Haha, right? That’s normal for a person. Haha. But Amazon has risen a lot even now; will it rise more?”

In 2018 of my previous life, I remembered hearing that if I had bought it 10 years ago, it would have risen 30 times.

Thinking about that, 4 times is nothing, but it would still be a great figure from the perspective of someone who doesn’t know the future.

“I don’t know either. But I’m going to try to hold it for a long time.”

“Then I should buy some more Amazon.”

As Jo Bong-joon wrote on his phone, Choi Jong-hyun, who had been listening to the conversation quietly, looked at him with a pathetic expression.

“Hey, how can you, a stock expert, follow Attorney Cha, who doesn’t know well, and buy it? Return your stock expert title.”

“I don’t know, I’m going to follow Attorney Cha’s portfolio and buy everything. Don’t stop me. Is there anything else you bought?”

“Um… Ah, I bought Nvidia too.”

“Ah, Nvidia. You’re talking about the company that makes graphics cards? I’m not really drawn to that. The graphics are good enough now; how much more detail are you going to see? You can see all the pores of celebrities even now. Is there anything else?”

“I bought Tesla too.”

“Ah, that electric car? But it’s already risen a lot. It seems a bit late to get in now… Well, there are many saying that electric cars will be in the spotlight in the future, so it’s not bad to get in now. We’ll have to see. But Attorney Cha buys mainly Nasdaq stocks?”

In the case of Tesla, I heard that if I had bought it when it was first listed, it would have risen between 10 and 20 times, so I bought it.

Of course, there seemed to be a lot of talk about whether to sell it now or not, but isn’t that something to think about when the time comes?

2018 hasn’t come yet.

And even if 2018 passes, I’m going to keep holding the things I bought for now.

Since I already have enough money, it doesn’t matter even if those stocks become scraps of paper in the future after 2018 that I don’t know.

And who knows?

Maybe they’ll rise more in the future.