Chapter 35
Chapter 35 – What is Important
“Yes? Car?”
Jonggu’s voice was slightly broken .
Jaegun sat in front of the computer and searched up cars .
“With the money you are giving up front, I want to buy a car that’s below 30 thousand dollars . I never bought a car before so I wanted your help . ”
“Haha, that’s what you meant . Haha”
“Is that not possible?”
“No . Of course it is . What car do you want, writer?”
“Hm, I don’t know about the car brand . Just something compact car . A fuel efficient car and something that doesn’t cost too much to maintain . ”
Jaegun said while looking through the pictures of cars .
He thought of maybe getting a small car but he chose the compact car because of giving family and friends a ride .
He didn’t need a car that was uselessly big and expensive . It just needed to have the minimum capacities of a car .
“A compact, I think a Hyundai is pretty good . There’s a 14 thousand to 24 thousand car in the new models . What do you think?”
“Pick one and give me one . You can make the options as you wish . ”
“Yes, writer . Hm Hyundai…”
Jonggu muttered as he was memoing .
“I’ll do the options, what about the color?”
“I’ll do black . ”
“Black… I get it . ”
“It’s not important so I can wait . I’ll write really well if you help me with this car . ”
“Hahaha, yes, writer . I get it . I’ll call you when I’m done . ”
Jaegun sighed with relief after the call and looked at Rika .
Rika wasn’t moving from the top of the cat tower . She wanted to be away from Jaegun’s touch .
“I got a car . Now let’s go out sometime . Go to a park and meet my friends and stuff . ”
There was no meow that came usually .
He opened the drawer on the desk . It had Se Gunwoo’s mug in it . After he knew it was an important item, he was hiding it in his desk than the sink .
“Phew, this is magic . ”
After a cup of coffee with that mug, all the stress went magically away .
Jaegun waved to Rika and left home happily .
“Hold him?”
StarBooks representative office .
Tewon was dumbfounded .
Representative Park Jeguk was nodding on the other side .
“Yeah, hold him . Make him an exclusive writer . With today’s sequel talks, just get him to sign . ”
“…!”
Tewon couldn’t answer and lowered his glance . His glasses were slipping and were hanging dangerously on his nose .
He came into report his sequel talk schedule .
But Jeguk was now just ordering him to get an exclusive contract with him .
“I don’t like holding either mostly . It’s hard to control writers sometimes . But we need Ha Jaegun . One of Jaegun’s projects is doing the work of 3 other projects, no 5 other projects . We need the money so that the company can grow?”
Tewon couldn’t respond to that .
First, he couldn’t feel that Jaegun would take that contract
It was a problem even if Jaegun took the contract because of his friendship with Tewon .
If he became a StarBooks exclusive writer, then he couldn’t contract with other companies . It wasn’t a project contract but a writer contract .
Tewon knew Jaegun was a truly writing loving writer .
He wasn’t a writer that would be only fulfilled in the genre novel section . With his award in the Digital Literary Contest, his power with emotions were already confirmed .
He was a writer with potential that could grow .
It was a hard thing to do for Tewon to ask Jaegun to be an exclusive writer . It was a person to person problem more than a company profit problem .
It wasn’t one day that he knew Jaegun; it was a long time . He didn’t want to interfere with Jaegun’s writing life .
“Why do you have no answer?”
Jeguk asked .
Tewon came out of his thoughts and looked at Jeguk .
“I have some thoughts . ”
“What thoughts?”
“Writer Ha is not going to take that contract . ”
Jeguk clucked his tongue .
“Isn’t it your job to take a contract anyway that you can? Your style of work has been weird lately . Why have you changed so much?”
Isn’t it representative that changed instead of me, almost came out of his mouth but he pushed it down .
It was getting clearer . Now, the aging representative’s brain had the thought of writer=money . A few years before, it wasn’t like this .
“Say it right, ah?”
Jeguk patted Tewon’s shoulder and said softly .
“If I don’t have you, who can I trust to run this big company? I’ve worked with you for how many years? It’s almost 10 years, 10 years . Go clean this up and have a vacation with your family for about a week . I’ll give you the vacation money . ”
Jeguk’s offer didn’t cling with Tewon at all .
Well there was nothing else to do in this spot other than nodding his head .
“I’ll try . ”
“Yes, just call no matter what time . ”
Tewon went back to his office after he left .
He could see Somii’s back . She was focused on her work, typing hard in her computer .
A bitter smile came over Tewon .
In Tewon’s eyes, Somii was really enjoying her work as a editor . It felt like she was overlapping his past self when he came in .
‘It’s been a long time . ’
Tewon muttered to himself and stopped his steps .
If there is a high, there is a low, looking at Somii, he could feel the path that he had to go .
“Somii . ”
“Ah, yes, editor .
Somii was startled and looked up from her screen . Tewon asked as he looked on her screen .
“Do you have a lot of work today?”
“No, I finished everything done today . This is something that I wanted to finish early . ”
“Then, get ready to leave . Let’s go out together . ”
“Ah go out? Ah, with Writer Ha?”
Tewon smiled instead of answering .
Somii immediately saved and turned off her keyboard . She was smiling as she was taking her stuff .
‘I haven’t seen him since the writer’s meeting?’
She couldn’t help but get excited at meeting Jaegun . He was a person that just gave strength, with a comfortable smile and polite speech . His ferocious eyes when he was working came up .
“I’m ready, editor . ”
“Yes, then let’s go . ”
The two people went down to the parking lot .
Somii asked as he was getting in .
“Is it Guro today as well?’
“Yes, Writer Ha likes that place and it’s comfortable . ”
The car went out of the parking lot .
Tewon had no words while he was driving for a while .
Somii was looking outside, not asking first .
As the car stopped at a light, Tewon said first, lowering the volume of the radio .
“I’ll say it before we get there . ”
“Yes, editor . Say it . ”
“The representative wants to get an exclusive contract with Writer Ha . ”
“An exclusive contract?”
Somii widened her eyes .
“If then, Writer Ha can’t write anything else?”
“Yeah, he doesn’t want to miss any of Writer’s Ha’s writing . ”
Somii could see his bitter smile . She couldn’t think of anything that a new editor could say .
“I’m going to resign soon . ”
“Re…sign? The company?”
That was completely surprising .
With Somii who was flabbergasted, Tewon said stolidly .
“I was there a long time . With the atmosphere and that, it’s time to find a different path . It’s better than getting pushed out . ”
“But editor…! I know this may be rude to say this, but you’re really good at working . You have the representative’s trust…”
“It’s because I can’t respond to that trust of his . ”
Tewon cute Somii’s words . As the light turned green, he pressed the acceleration and continued .
“Just you know it . I thought I should tell it to you so I said it . ”
“Yes…”
Somii said weakly with his head down .
Tewon raised the radio volume again . A K-pop song whose lyrics couldn’t be understood was turning up loudly .
…
“It’s a series, so I would like the contract to be like before . With 10%, from 3000 books up 1 %, and the 6 for the electronic books . ”
“Thank you, Writer Ha, here take a drink . ”
Jaegun got Tewon’s offering .
There was a lot of sashimi and seafood on the table .
“Here, a toast . ”
“Toast . ”
Teon and Somii, and Jaegun put their cups together .
After he drank, Jaegun picked up a piece of sashimi happily
“It’s been awhile since I ate one of these . It looks good . ”
“Go eat a lot . You like sashimi . ”
“Ah, there’s only the editor for me . Somii, you have some too . ”
“Ah, yes, Writer . ”
Starled, Somii who was blankly staring picked up her chopsticks
Jaegun thought to himself .
‘What happened . ’
Jaegun’s observation skills as a writer came up to him right now .
There was a heavy air between Tewon and Somii . It was different from their previous meetings . Jaegun felt before .
But Jaegun didn’t ask at first .
If it was important, Tewon would have said it before .
He was an amazing editor that did everything for his writer . So Jaegun felt it, but he wasn’t nervous .
“I guess I can’t expect anything too good? Because it has the previous two characters . ”
With Jaegun’s word, Tewon said carefully .
“I think so . It won’t be too bad, but I don’t think it would be too amazing either . ”
Tewon wasn’t a person who said something that was false . Jaegun liked Tewon for that reason .
Jaegun let out a question as he was pouring a drink to Tewon .
“I was thinking of a title but nothing is coming out . Maybe I should it name it the Realm Rankings because they fight in the other realms? Or maybe the Double Rankings? It feel weird with Rankings and double . It’s all weird? Do you have anything that you have in mind?”
“…Writer Ha . ”
“Yes?”
Jaegun stopped and looked at Tewon . Tewon had a different look than before .
“Yes editor . ”
Tewon was conflicted .
He was still a StarBooks editor . He needed to do everything he needed to do and think of the other things . Thinking that to himself Tewon asked
“Would you sign a contract to be an exclusive writer for StarBooks?” .