Novelist Running Through Time-Chapter 175

TL: KSD

A long, long time ago.

That is to say, back when tigers smoked pipes and novelists dined at the same table as members of the National Assembly.

The power of Baekhak Group pierced the sky.

Side EP – Mother Said She Hates Grasshoppers

Baekhak Group is a media corporation.

This simple sentence carries the implication that Baekhak Group was far more influential in the past.

This is because the era when the media wielded its greatest power was back when television monopolized public interest.

These days, the MZ Generation dismisses media power entirely, calling journalists “trash” and whatnot (and even mocks the term “MZ Generation” as an outdated media construct), but there was once a time when the ruling party’s floor leader would rush out, bowing and saying, “Welcome, sir!” the moment a newspaper editor-in-chief made an appearance.

And among those media conglomerates, there was one family so powerful that even the most influential figures trembled before them like frightened puppies, its glorious name: Baekhak.

“Cut the bullshit!”

Crash—!

Once again, chaos erupted in the prestigious Baekhak household. The eldest son was hurling curses, while the second son overturned the dining table.

There was only one reason why a noble family of such long-standing history would descend into such disgraceful disarray.

Inheritance distribution.

And with the inheritance being vast, the conflicts between the brothers escalated to the extreme.

Ever since the founder who had built this massive Baekhak empire from a single bookstore had collapsed, the Baek family had not known a day of peace.

The eldest son, wielding the power of legitimacy.

The second son, aligning himself with the tides of the emerging civilian government.

The third son, relying on foreign powers.

Who would inherit this massive empire?

Of course, in the end, it would go to the eldest son, the one who would later fail at his “Presidential gacha” and run the family into the ground, but at the time, no one knew who would ascend the throne of Baekhak Group.

Because Baekhak’s power was unimaginably vast, there were too many variables seeking to interfere in the succession dispute and take a share for themselves.

The ruling party, which had barely extended its reign through President Roh Tae-woo’s re-election, wanted to either keep Baekhak as a steadfast ally or force it into submission.

The fiercely ambitious “Three Kims” secretly supported the second son, hoping to eliminate Roh Tae-woo and other rivals to secure the presidency for themselves.

The third son, who had successfully married into another chaebol conglomerate, was willing to sell even his soul to foreign powers for a shot at the throne.

As they repeatedly formed and broke alliances, the long war dragged on while the founder lay bedridden…

And when civil wars drag on, outsiders inevitably start eyeing the spoils.

Among them was the owner of a flour factory.

The man who would later become Baek Seol’s maternal grandfather.

* * *

The key players in the Baekhak Group’s internal war were primarily the eldest son, second son, and third son.

However, there was one wild card, a hidden piece in the game.

The illegitimate son.

Like many tycoons of that era, Baekhak Group’s founder had more than one wife. As a result, he also had a youngest son who was an illegitimate child.

This illegitimate son, whose name was never even recorded in the family registry, grew up enduring severe mistreatment from the legal wife and her children.

Had the founder been a cold-hearted man, this would have simply remained a tragic tale.

But because the founder was a soft-hearted man, it led to an even greater tragedy.

It is only natural to feel guilty toward a child who was never given nice clothes or good food.

As the founder grew old and approached his final days, he could not take that guilt to his grave. In the end, he sought to atone with money.

Thus, the illegitimate fourth son was given a considerable inheritance while his father was still alive, including shares in the company.

Not enough to claim succession rights, but not so little that the other brothers could dismiss him outright.

Of course, while the founder was still of sound mind, he left behind a stern warning:

“Never… absolutely never pick a fight with your older brothers. That’s not why I gave you this. I gave it to you so you wouldn’t be mistreated… Just hold onto it quietly…”

The fourth son (the illegitimate child) accepted with tears in his eyes.

“Yes, Father, thank you… I will live as if I am dead.”

But soon after, the founder fell ill. Now, he could do nothing but wait for the day of his death.

All the brothers had disregarded their father’s will and thrown themselves into the civil war, so there was no way the fourth son wouldn’t feel restless.

To make matters worse, his sharp-witted eldest son, the ambitious Baek Do-hyun, fanned the flames in his father’s heart.

“If we fail, it’s treason! But if we succeed, it’s a revolution!”

“W-what…!”

“The same bastards who treated our family worse than stray dogs our entire lives are now begging us for help just this once. If not now, when will we ever have the chance to intervene in the main family’s affairs?! Father!”

In the end, under Baek Do-hyun’s leadership, the illegitimate family threw itself into the Baekhak Group’s civil war.

Because the founder had showered them with some measure of affection, they held a fair amount of power.

Of course, it was just a handful compared to the other brothers, but now was a time when that handful could be used as a decisive dagger.

And one particular flour factory owner took notice of this.

“The fourth son… could he actually take over Baekhak?!”

History has always been written by youngest sons. Even web novels prove it, whether it’s a chaebol family or a swordsmanship clan, the youngest son is always the strongest. Even King Sejong was a youngest son.

This flour factory owner was by no means a chaebol.

But he was a quasi-chaebol, running not just a massive flour factory but also several food production plants. Having built his fortune from nothing, he trusted his own judgment more than common wisdom.

And in his eyes, if he backed the fourth son and made him the Chairman of Baekhak Group, an unimaginable fortune would come rolling his way.

In other words, he had jumped on the “Youngest Son of a Chaebol Family” hype train.

This phenomenon is often called the “Kingmaker Syndrome”, a dangerous delusion that has afflicted many ordinary men in history who fancied themselves the next Zhuge Liang.

And, of course, it was an incurable disease.

Regardless, the flour factory owner took a gamble, hoping to break into the financial elite. He offered his daughter (along with an enormous amount of military funds) to the fourth son’s family.

The fourth son’s faction, which had been unable to wage war due to a lack of funds, saw this as a divine sign from the heavens and eagerly accepted the marriage proposal. The wedding proceeded in the blink of an eye.

Taking on the role of de facto family head, Baek Do-hyun arranged for his younger brother to marry the flour factory owner’s eldest daughter.

“Alright, let’s take the photo. Everyone say kim—chi!”

The eldest daughter, who found herself suddenly in an arranged marriage, wore an unfamiliar wedding dress and forced an awkward smile.

Her name was Song So-eun.

She would become Baek Seol’s mother.

* * *

The (illegitimate) youngest son of the chaebol family had now armed himself to the teeth with flour money and charged into the ferocious Baekhak Group succession war.

His goal wasn’t necessarily to become chairman himself. Rather, by influencing the next chairman’s selection, he aimed to gain enough authority to properly join the main family.

To be more precise, there wasn’t even a clear strategic objective.

For someone who had spent his entire life being scorned as a nameless, unregistered child, this was simply the first time his brothers had ever acknowledged him and asked for his help.

And that high, the thrill of finally being included, blinded him.

“Hmph! You were born from a lowly mother, but… if you help us just this once, maybe, just maybe, I’ll acknowledge you as a ‘brother’…?”

“Truth is, I’ve always considered you guys ‘family’. Isn’t that right, brother? So just close your eyes and sign this proxy document real quick.”

The moment he fell for this sweet talk, tragedy was inevitable.

The fourth son of the founder had never received the training to be an heir, he was an ordinary man.

And his son, Baek Do-hyun, was still young, swept up in the heat of the moment.

As everyone knows, when the succession battle reached its climax, the Baekhak Group’s illegitimate family was crushed to dust and exiled by the main family.

The only silver lining was that, through this turmoil, the bond between Baek Do-hyun and his younger brother solidified.

Having witnessed firsthand the terrifying underbelly of the business world, filled with gangsters and backroom dealings, Baek Do-hyun’s younger brother abandoned his inheritance claim and dedicated himself entirely to supporting his older brother.

Thus, despite suffering a crushing defeat, Baek Do-hyun managed to rally the remnants of his faction, fueling a long-standing resistance.

And in the process, he gained an unwavering younger brother and an adorable niece, Baek Seol.

At least he had avoided the absolute worst.

But there was one person who had not been so lucky.

A woman who had married into a powerful family through an arranged marriage, only for that family to collapse overnight, left with nothing but the crying baby Baek Seol in her arms…

Song So-eun.

The grand, imposing in-laws had collapsed, her own family treated her as an outsider since she was married off, and to top it all off, her husband had declared that he would not inherit any wealth and would instead live off the allowance given to him by his older brother.

How could she not resent the father who had pushed her into this marriage?

-So-eun, I know you’re not too thrilled about this, but if you go through with this marriage, you’ll truly become the wife of a chaebol household.

-Don’t lie to me! I heard this family doesn’t even have a proper family registry!

-What does a registry matter? From what I’ve heard, the chairman of Baekhak Group left him an enormous share of the company. If things go well this time…

Things did not go well, and Song So-eun had ruined her life.

She wanted nothing more than to slap the face of the greedy father who had pushed her into this.

But even that father did not escape unscathed.

The victors of the bloody succession war would never let some upstart flour factory owner who had dared to insert himself into Baekhak Group’s affairs walk away unscathed.

Baekhak crushed the flour factory with a single newspaper article.

“Mold has been found in a certain flour factory—”

And just like that, her father’s empire crumbled.

Thus, Song So-eun’s marriage became the worst mistake in the history of her family.

And so did she.

She had committed no crime, yet just her existence alone reminded everyone of the humiliating mistake they had made.

But the ruthless world did not leave Song So-eun alone.

Her father, who had lost his hand in the Baekhak Group’s succession war, died.

And the business was inherited by his eldest son, who went on to turn the remaining food “factories” into a full-fledged food “corporation.”

The secret to success? Selling good food at fair prices. For decades.

While their father had tried to become a chaebol through underhanded means, supporting the youngest son’s coup in a chaebol family, his children took a righteous and honorable path to becoming a chaebol themselves.

But on that noble, upright path, there was no place for Song So-eun.

She had become nothing more than a mistake of the past.

* * *

“When your cousin buys land, your stomach hurts” It’s not just an old joke about petty people, it’s a timeless truth that pierces to the core of human suffering.

Every time Song So-eun heard news from her family, her insides twisted with rage.

The siblings she had grown up with had all become chaebols.

All of them, except her.

All of them, except her, were living well, eating well, thriving.

And yet, as they grew older, it seemed they had suddenly decided to feel sorry for her.

Sometimes, they would call her up, saying “So-eun unnie” or “So-eun noona” with affectionate familiarity. ƒrēenovelkiss.com

But Song So-eun never answered those calls.

They had tormented her for so long without reason, and now they wanted to call her?

But sometimes… she wasn’t even sure who was tormenting whom.

She couldn’t tell if her memories of her siblings looking down on her were based on truth or just paranoia.

Hatred like this had no clear direction.

She had no idea where it had come from or where it was going.

And in the face of such emotional turmoil, the only way for a person to protect themselves, was to shut themselves away.

Song So-eun had all but cut off contact with her family.

But even if she avoided them, she couldn’t escape their presence.

Even a simple trip to the supermarket was enough to haunt her.

No, she wasn’t losing her mind.

It was just that the supermarket shelves were lined with products marked with a familiar logo.

This was why Song So-eun avoided certain food brands.

And Baek Seol knew exactly why her mother hated going to the supermarket.

Because it wasn’t just a random discomfort, it was her mother’s deepest wound.

So, on a certain day-

When Baek Seol saw “it” on the breakfast table,

She froze in shock.

“……!!!”

Big round bug eyes.

Sleek hind legs.

Cute compound eyes, smooth hind legs, a cute caricature reborn as a green insect…

‘Grasshopper.’

It was the uncomfortable “certain food brand” that Baek Seol’s mother had been running from all her life.

Baek Seol, who had been busy wrapping white rice with tuna in seaweed, stopped her moving hands.

“Mom, this…”

She couldn’t bring herself to finish the sentence.

She had almost blurted out, “Isn’t this ‘Grasshopper Tuna’?”

But she couldn’t.

She could never say the name of that horrific insect in front of her mother.

But Song So-eun…

She was no longer the young maiden who had just married into a powerful family.

She was now a wrinkled mother who smacked her husband’s back whenever he skipped home-cooked meals to go eat omakase instead.

And she just smiled casually.

“Why? What do I have to be ashamed of anymore?”

“Ah…”

“Did they raise their children better than I did?”

Baek Seol watched as her mother finally let go of the dark, heavy complexes she had carried in her heart for decades.

Her mother’s turmoil had not been a fleeting wave of emotions, it had been deep-rooted han, a sorrow etched into her very being.

But now, in the smile of the woman who had cast off that pain, there was a peace that even her own daughter had never seen before.

Baek Seol gazed at that beautiful smile for a long moment, then, unable to meet her mother’s eyes any longer, she lowered her head.

Her chest tightened.

Baek Seol had never once felt pride in her own success.

Because none of it had been hers, it was the success of her lineage.

Even the Hugo Award that had shaken the world was no different.

The news might call it “Baek Seol’s genius translation”, but in reality, it had been Lim Yang-wook’s sharp strategy that had secured the victory.

But…

Just for today.

And only in front of her parents.

Would it be so wrong to boast just a little?

With that thought, Baek Seol let out a soft laugh.

“Of course – I’m such a capable CEO. I’m great at translating, great at business, great at investing… I make good coffee, and I even replace water purifier tanks like a pro…”

“But when are you getting married?”

“Oh, come on…!”

*****

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