A knife-edged wind was tearing between the towers of Yeouido, but Kim Taeseong’s insides had gone colder still.
[130.0 kg]
A week now.
Just as the weight loss had seemed to pick up decent speed, it had stopped as if by a lie once December arrived.
“Is this thing broken?”
Taeseong stamped his feet on the scale, stepped off and back on again, but the number on the digital display stayed put, as if laughing at him.
Only 2.5kg remained to his target weight of 127.5kg.
Ordinarily that was two days’ worth, but this was different.
His body had activated its survival instinct.
‘The owner has gone mad. He is cutting the food supply and increasing movement. Emergency! Defend the fat!’
Taeseong’s fat cells were putting up a last stand.
The plateau he had been through before had come back stronger.
“Haa......”
A sigh came out on its own.
It was Wopora’s mission deadline, for one thing.
And with DS Danseok listing on December 22, he had to have the information and a trading strategy in place by the 21st no matter what.
“I have to lose another 2.5kg in a week.”
The sight of a trader who had grown a fund to 7 billion won fretting over a mere 2.5kg.
But beyond it hung a golden fruit worth a quadruple.
***
After work, at the Dye-Gym.
Taeseong was walking the treadmill like a zombie.
Just then, a cool presence made itself felt behind him.
“Sir.”
The gatekeeper of hell, Trainer Kang Pilgeun.
Arms folded, he glanced at Taeseong’s display and shook his head.
“At that pace it will never happen. Your body has already adapted to cardio. It means you have become a fuel-efficient hybrid. A body that lasts a long time on very little.”
“Then what do I do? Cut my food further?”
“No. Then you lose muscle. Now we change the engine. We increase your displacement and make you a muscle car that guzzles fuel even at a standstill.”
Kang Pilgeun’s eyes flashed.
“Get down. From today I’ll be escorting you into the hell of the big three lifts.”
Taeseong was dragged, dazed, into the weight zone.
The place was full of the heavy smell of iron and the rough grunting of men.
Kang Pilgeun brought him to the squat rack.
“Squat, deadlift, bench press. The foundation and the flower of weight training. We’ll use the large muscle groups explosively and inflate your basal metabolic rate.”
“Er, Trainer. My knees are......”
“Don’t worry. I will protect your joints. Now, we start with the empty bar!”
But the empty bar was only the beginning.
Kang Pilgeun slid on another plate with each passing set.
Before long a heavy weight was bearing down on Taeseong’s shoulders.
“Nnngh! Khhh!”
Taeseong’s legs shook like aspen leaves.
His thighs felt ready to tear and stars burst in front of his eyes.
“Sir! Can you not stand? Are you losing to this much weight?”
Kang Pilgeun bellowed right into Taeseong’s ear.
“That weight is not iron! Think of it as the weight of the fat you carried on your back for thirty years! Are you going to lose to a lump of flesh again? Push it off!”
The weight of the fat.
At those words a spark leapt in Taeseong’s mind.
The years of being dismissed, the memory of climbing stairs gasping, the looks of people whispering that he smelled of sweat.
All of it was loaded onto the barbell on his shoulders.
“Gwaaaaargh!”
With a beastlike roar, Taeseong drove the barbell upward.
Clang!
Racking the bar, Taeseong dropped straight onto the floor.
“Huff, huff...... Trainer, I honestly think I’m going to soil myself.”
“Hahaha! Excellent! Proof that you exerted force right down to the sphincter. Very good! Now, one minute of rest and we go to deadlifts.”
“...... Have mercy.”
But there was no such thing as mercy with Kang Pilgeun.
That night, Taeseong crawled out of the gym on all fours.
***
The next day, the Woojin Securities office.
Taeseong sat down at his desk, his walk half-crouched from muscle pain.
The office had been noisy since morning.
There was only one topic: ‘DS Danseok’, the last big fish of the 2023 IPO market.
“Hey, they say DS Danseok’s offering price is fixed at 100,000 won. Did you see the ratio? Institutional subscription was 341 to 1.”
Manager Jeong made a fuss over his monitor.
“But isn’t this too expensive? It wasn’t just fixed at the top of the indicative band, it came in above it. The float at 15% is on the small side, sure...... but the market cap is over 500 billion.”
Assistant Manager Seong tilted his head.
The report from the in-house research center was conservative too.
[DS Danseok: growth potential in biodiesel and battery recycling is intact, but valuation burden exists. Note short-term volatility.]
In a word, it meant ‘there may not be much to eat here’.
Department Head Park Geonil appeared with his hands behind his back and offered his wisdom.
“Come on, this one’s the tail end. EcoFree only went because madness happened to carry it. Look at the market mood right now. It’s year-end, everyone’s closing their books and taking it easy — who’s going to spend money? Don’t go in and get stuck, just stay out and watch.”
Department Head Park still seemed to carry the EcoFree nightmare as trauma.
But Taeseong’s thinking was different.
He quietly went over Wopora’s last message again.
[Success reward: the sell timing on DS Danseok’s listing day at a 300% profit]
300%.
A 300% rise (four times) on an offering price of 100,000 won put the share price at 400,000 won.
A profit of 300,000 won per share.
The so-called ‘quadruple’.
Since the price limits were widened in June 2023, only two names had recorded a quadruple: ‘JNS’ and ‘SL Materials’.
And DS Danseok was going to add its name to that legendary record.
‘You go on watching from the sidelines forever, sir. I’ll be eating four times my money.’
Taeseong checked the available cash in the corporate account.
7.7 billion won, swollen by the EcoFree Materials exit.
He could not throw all of it into the subscription. With an IPO, the number of shares allotted is determined by the subscription ratio.
Even going in at full size for a proportional allotment, the ratio was so high that the volume he received would be limited.
‘It’s the opening price on listing day.’
The characteristic of a name that goes quadruple is that buying pressure explodes the instant the market opens and it runs straight to the price ceiling.
Taeseong’s strategy was to sweep up shares on listing day faster than anyone.
For that, he absolutely needed Wopora’s information — or more precisely, its certainty.
Because without certainty that it would truly run, you cannot burn billions on an opening price.
“Assistant Manager Kim, what do you think? Are you going in on this one too?”
Department Head Park asked, watching Taeseong’s face.
The scheme was to follow Taeseong as he had last time and get a taste himself.
Taeseong grinned and answered.
“Who knows. I’m still thinking it over. My body’s so heavy my head isn’t turning well either.”
“Tsk, playing hard to get.”
Department Head Park smacked his lips and walked away.
***
December 19.
The hour of destiny was approaching.
Taeseong’s weight was [128.5 kg].
Thanks to the hellish weight training another 1.5kg had come off, but he was still 1kg short of his 127.5kg target.
Three days remained.
‘Ordinary methods won’t do it.’
Taeseong decided to play his last card.
The drastic prescription bodybuilders use right before a competition.
Namely ‘water manipulation’ and depletion.
“From today I cut carbohydrates and sodium completely.”
At lunch hour, Taeseong refused even chicken breast and had only boiled egg whites and water.
The strategy was to cut salt to flush the water out of his body, and cut carbs to deplete his glycogen.
“Assistant Manager...... your face has gone half the size. Are you all right?”
Associate Kang Hyeona asked with worry in her eyes.
Taeseong’s face was gaunt and the skin under his eyes hollow.
But his gaze alone burned bright.
“I’m fine. I’m in the middle of burning off all the leftovers in my body.”
“What if you collapse?”
“I won’t collapse. If I want to laugh in three days, I have to cry now.”
“Is something happening in three days?”
“There is...... something like that.”
***
That evening, at the gym.
Taeseong held his head, dizzy from depleted carbohydrates, and sat down at the leg press machine.
He did not even have the strength to load the plates, so Trainer Kang loaded them for him.
The weight: 80kg.
“Sir, let’s not overdo it today. You don’t look well.”
Even Trainer Kang was moved to hold him back.
But Taeseong shook his head.
“No. I have to. If I push...... it breaks through.”
Taeseong pressed his back flat against the machine.
The heavy 80kg came through the soles of his feet.
That weight felt like the world’s prejudice bearing down on him.
And at the same time, it felt like the share price of DS Danseok, about to list.
Press it down and it springs up.
Like a coil.
‘DS Danseok...... you must be under pressure like this too.’
The pressure of countless doubts and worries, of the overvaluation controversy.
But the instant it overcomes that pressure, the price explodes.
“Hup!”
Taeseong held his breath and drove through his legs.
His thigh muscles screamed.
His blood vessels swelled as if they would burst.
“Gwaaaaargh!”
Wham!
The 80kg of iron surged upward.
Taeseong breathed hard and looked at the ceiling.
His vision swam, but a smile spread across his lips.
‘I can feel it.’
Sweat poured down like rain.
The water was leaving his body.
He was getting lighter.
His life, and his body.
***
The evening of December 21.
The day of reckoning.
The moment he left work, Taeseong headed for a sauna.
To wring out the last remaining drop of water.
After sweating through a half-body bath, he stood before the scale with a trembling heart.
Tomorrow morning DS Danseok would list.
Tonight he had to complete the mission and obtain the S-grade information to make his opening-price bet tomorrow.
He needed certainty to move 7 billion won.
Taeseong carefully stepped onto the scale.
His throat was so parched it was hard even to swallow.
The number moved quickly, then slowly came to a stop.
[127 kg]
“...... Ha.”
Target weight, 127.5kg.
Achieved.
And with a full 0.5kg beyond the target, at that.
The result of enduring three days of hell without salt or carbohydrates.
Ding!
The phone in his pocket rang as if cheering.
Taeseong roughly dried his wet hands and checked the screen.
[Mission complete!]
[Congratulations! Santa’s gift has arrived.]
[Reward: DS Danseok listing-day trading guide]
[Content: Probability of achieving a ‘quadruple (400%)’: 99.9%.]
[Strategy: Full market buy at the opening price. Hold once it settles at the limit (400,000 won).]
[Note: Profit-taking volume may appear late in the session, but the limit will not break.]
“...... That’s it.”
Taeseong punched the air.
99.9%.
Wopora had never given him certainty at this level.
This was as good as being told to pick it up off the ground.
Taeseong looked at himself in the mirror.
Cheeks hollowed out over the past few days, and eyes gone sharper still.
The hunger and thirst were gone.
In their place, an enormous fullness was getting ready to move in.
‘Nine a.m. tomorrow.’
The 7.7 billion won sitting in the Woojin Securities corporate account.
Where that number would climb once tomorrow was over, not even Taeseong could gauge.
Only one thing was certain.
Kim Taeseong’s life was now not merely light but ready to take off.
“Merry Christmas, you bastards.”
In the empty sauna locker room, Taeseong offered a victory greeting to no one in particular.