Golden Goddess

Money, Power, Women

Son Woojin POV

In this country, you gotta make the money first. Then when you get the money, you get the power. Then when you get the power, then you get the women --- Scarface.

They all have their own ways to survive. Those three are men's weaknesses. Any man. To conquer my goals, I always look for those three.

I was forced to run GoldenSon right after a tragic accident that took my parents away. I was just graduated from college, and being underestimated by everyone, including my own employees. Not easy at all, but what's not to learn? I thought I was good at it, but people called me a cunning tycoon. I never take it as an offending call but praise. I thrived, I calculated my strategies carefully, I survived the crisis, and I never lose.

Kochang was a buried treasure that intertwined with me and my sister's deepest wound, the death of our parents. They died in their way to visit the project. Ever since I got a piece of information from this guy months ago, I invested my mind to win the Kochang game.

I looked up through his file to learn about his weak spots among those three that I mentioned above. Was it money? Yes, he had high school debts to pay. He was a smart ass architect. A president scholarship awardee who went to Columbia. But everyone knows, the scholarship wasn't enough, the architectural study was an expensive course.

He came from a middle-class family which coincidentally, suffered from the same accident with my parents. Even worse, he was there and witnessed from inside the crashed car, who later be blamed for the whole tragedy. His parents were being blamed.

He came to me with information, that he knew who actually made the first hit. Geochang County Mayor, Jeong Chaesan.

Both of us knew well how to use that information. That person would not bring the dead victims back to life, but to bury such big guilt and secret like that must be burdensome. He would be easy being used to somehow channel his guilt.

Chaesan knew both me Son Woojin and this guy Hyun Bin, were among the children of the victims. Collateral damages. Not only drawing my attention with the information about who made the first hit, but Hyun Bin came with a grand design on how to extort Jeong Chaesan.

Jeong Chaesan would not be able to bring the dead back to life, but he was able to bring out Kochang's buried treasure.

I have known that there were buried gold there that my parents were studying on it when they went to visit Kochang but never made it back home. With Hyun Bin's idea, I studied back their file from ten years ago and planned to execute it together with Bin using the very basic strategy of negotiations, to control it before it even begins.

Goldmine permit was one of the hardest and crucial things to earn, it was always sensitive for the images of any authorized leader who grant it, as it always causes environmental problems. But no government can deny the potential big fat tax that can be received by granting it.

An election is a form of power war, and it was going to happen in Geochang that he suggested me to take my chance on it. Bin fed me with pieces of information from both parties, all their weakness, and the power they were possessed.

Incumbent Mayor Jeong Chaesan loved his wife dearly, and she loved to throw glamorous parties. Mrs. Jeong spent a lot from his husband's savings that he would not have sufficient funds to campaign. That's where I enter the game, to fund it in return for the permit. Wouldn't be easy as he must be worried about his images if he grants the gold mine permit, but he loved his power too much.

That's where I needed the push from Hyun Bin. He would side with his Yoo Jitae, a challenger candidate mayor for Jeong Chesan. Yoo Jitae was not a lack of money, but he was the thirst for power. He was a man from the Blue House and has earned a good reputation from there. But he was just an employee of the President there. Working in Blue House has lured him to have his own Blue House, so he went back to his childhood town, Geochang County, and planned to hold power there through the mayoral election. He was the new face who brought new hopes in every election.