Room 'Apollo,' on the sixty-third floor of the H Automotive Group headquarters in Yangjae-dong.
Enclosed on all sides by massive floor-to-ceiling glass, this space looking down on the city of Seoul felt like the seat of gods surveying the world.
The noon sun was bleaching the Gangnam skyscraper forest white outside, but the interior remained sterile, cold, and unnervingly dry under the central climate control.
Kang Si-hyun stared blankly at the espresso on the marble table, which had already turned ice-cold.
Years of litigation had left her with an old habit.
Reading the bizarre silence that stretched before someone began to speak.
Watching the microscopic hand gestures that surfaced long before a question was asked.
And logging the trajectory of a gaze that wavered a fraction of a second before a reply was uttered.
To her, the law was not a collection of clauses. It was the art of exploiting human flaws and lies.
Beneath her loosely rolled sleeves, her silver Cartier Tank watch sharply reflected the fluorescent lights.
With every flash of the silver frame, her rational silence grew more formidable.
Stripping away even her calculated business smile, she waited for the two tycoons who had summoned her to this glass-walled height above Seoul.
Before long, the heavy double doors swung open, revealing Chairman Jeong Ui-hyun and Vice Chairman Jeong Hyun-jin.
Ordinarily, these men exuded an overwhelming presence and authority that drove the nation's economy.
But today, through Si-hyun’s eyes, their posture looked strange and deeply unbalanced.
Jeong Ui-hyun’s face was as pale as bloodless paper, while Jeong Hyun-jin’s cheek muscles twitched minutely, his eyes overly bloodshot.
What on earth was shaking these giants so precariously?
"Apologies for calling a busy person like you out so abruptly, Attorney Kang. The process through the secretary's office must have been less than smooth."
Jeong Ui-hyun sank deep into his chair, roughly loosening his tie.
Uncharacteristic of a man dubbed the dictator of the business world, his fingertips trembled minutely—a detail immediately logged by Si-hyun’s sharp gaze.
"How was your meeting with Dr. Lee Seo-han yesterday? I believed you were the only woman capable of matching his stubborn intellectual arrogance on equal footing. Did the conversation flow as expected?"
Sitting beside him, Jeong Hyun-jin chimed in, feigning composure while carefully reading Si-hyun’s face.
Si-hyun slowly set down her teacup, tilting her head slightly.
"Rather than meeting a human, it felt as though I was facing a living mass of raw data," Si-hyun said.
"Instead of human charm, it felt like interacting with a highly sophisticated system built to process and control variables. Most of the conversation revolved around biological mechanisms and the value of his technology."
Si-hyun’s gaze sharpened.
She pierced through the seams of their massive authority, cutting straight to the core.
"But I am curious. Why me?"
Her question landed on the marble table with a cold, deliberate weight.
"Given your extensive network, Vice Chairman, there are more than enough women capable of extravagantly catering to a man's ego."
"Yet, you deliberately placed me—a global M&A specialist and corporate valuation architect—in front of that scientist."
"To explain this away as a simple 'blind date' feels far too contrived, doesn't it?"
A blind date.
Si-hyun chewed on the word internally, letting out a low, cynical scoff.
What a convenient mask. In the corporate world, contracts always began with such trivial names.
Securing friendly shares, strategic investments, and even hostile takeovers—initially, they were always packaged under the guise of 'introducing a good person.'
The darkest deals always wore the mask of goodwill first.
And the contract itself only reared its head once trust had been safely established.
Jeong Ui-hyun swallowed a bitter smile as he listened to Kang Si-hyun’s razor-sharp questioning.
A blind date.
She was right. At first, they truly believed it was nothing more than that.
A brilliant scientist they could easily bring under their massive capital and power.
A technology they believed could secure H Group’s future.
And a manageable personal tie they could use at will.
They thought that was all.
But somewhere along the way, the board had turned against them.
The predators who used to design the game and 'introduce' people were suddenly reduced to a helpless state, kneeling before the entity called Dr. Lee.
Jeong Ui-hyun was realizing, with agonizing clarity, that the scales of power had completely flipped.
Jeong Hyun-jin cleared his throat awkwardly, shifting his gaze out the window.
Instead of answering, Jeong Ui-hyun reached for his water glass first.
The sound of him swallowing hard, as if his throat were completely parched, shattered the heavy silence.
Watching this unfold, Si-hyun’s gaze dropped into a freezing void.
No. If this were a simple money matter or a slush fund embezzlement issue, a seasoned predator of his caliber would not seek water before a reply.
Then was it a management succession dispute or a breach of trust?
She looked at Vice Chairman Jeong Hyun-jin’s fingers. He was repeatedly opening and clenching his fist, as if trying to grasp something in the empty air.
It was a classic neurological tic of someone who had been backed into a corner.
This wasn't a festering wound caused by internal power struggles or technology leaks within H Group.
These men weren't trying to 'manage' a legal risk.
Si-hyun had faced hundreds of these specimens in the Seocho-dong courtrooms.
The hypocrites who threw tantrums claiming they were innocent, the swindlers who smirked maliciously while hunting for a prosecutor's error despite knowing they were guilty, and the death row inmates who merely stared at the judge's lips because every shred of evidence had been completely exposed.
Right now, Jeong Ui-hyun and Jeong Hyun-jin were breathing with the exact same rhythm as death row inmates who had never stepped foot inside a courtroom.
To see the predators commanding South Korea crumble so helplessly before a single forty-three-year-old scientist was as surreal as watching an empire on the brink of total collapse.
It was because Dr. Lee held a true power over life and death—one that even capital could never hope to buy.
"Let’s get to the point. You didn't summon an M&A specialist like me just to parse Dr. Lee's personality traits."
Si-hyun adjusted the collar of her beige shirt, her tone remaining completely detached.
"What is the real 'risk' I am supposed to analyze?"
She leaned her upper body forward.
"The law is merely a blueprint to manipulate giants. To draw that blueprint, I must verify exactly what is buried beneath the ground."
Si-hyun withdrew a fountain pen from her briefcase, setting it lightly onto the table.
Tap.
The metallic friction cut through the dense silence, echoing coldly.
Jeong Hyun-jin swallowed hard, checking Jeong Ui-hyun’s reaction before speaking in a voice that had dropped an octave.
"Let’s look at a hypothetical scenario. Suppose someone, in a state of absolute desperation, has been continuously taking an unapproved, novel substance that lacks Ministry of Food and Drug Safety clearance."
"It’s absolutely not a narcotic or a psychotropic drug. There's no addiction, and no hallucinations."
He swallowed again, his throat dry.
"It is merely a protein analogue that activates hormone metabolism, temporarily restoring physical function to the peak of one's twenties. In this specific scenario, what would the level of legal prosecution or external risk look like?"
An unapproved substance.
That single phrase froze her thinking far faster than the icy climate control of the conference room.
Then, the scattered fragments inside her mind began to lock into a single conclusion.
The Chairman's deathly pale face and his parched thirst, the Vice Chairman's twitching cheek and anxious eyes, the arrogant brilliance the scientist had projected.
The fragmented physical data she had logged inside her mind finally mapped out a massive trajectory, locking together with terrifying precision.
This was no mere risk management for a new drug development pipeline.
This was the most dangerous contract in the world—one signed with their own bodies as collateral.
Ah.
Si-hyun slowly turned the cap of her fountain pen, closing it.
Her gaze narrowed, cold and precise, pressing down on the two men like a predator finally locking onto its prey.
"The voluntariness of the administration and the toxicity of the substance are the core metrics," Si-hyun said, her voice dropping another tone.
"But even if it lacks psychotropic components, distributing or administering an unapproved drug outside proper clinical procedures would create serious legal exposure under the Pharmaceutical Affairs Act."
"Particularly when the individuals involved command massive social influence, the fallout will be impossible to contain. Not only the supplier, but those who knowingly took the substance will find it difficult to evade criminal liability. It will deliver a fatal blow to corporate credibility."
She leaned deep across the table, leaving them no room to breathe.
"Does this mean Dr. Lee Seo-han currently holds the exclusive rights to this 'unapproved substance,' and you are already trapped inside the biological control system he engineered?"
Jeong Hyun-jin waved his hand dismissively, letting out a hollow laugh.
The sharp scrape of his fingernails against the marble tabletop tore through the stillness.
"No, no. Attorney Kang, you are getting ahead of yourself. This is a hypothetical about someone else entirely. And it has absolutely nothing to do with Dr. Lee."
His eyes darted rapidly, desperately avoiding her gaze.
Jeong Hyun-jin fiddled with the knot of his tie, fixing his eyes out the window.
But to Si-hyun, even that frantic evasion was nothing more than a confession she had already stripped bare and dissected.
"I simply introduced you to Dr. Lee with pure intentions because he is such an unrivaled talent and you are the perfect fit. Do not misunderstand."
"Now, let’s focus strictly on the essence of the question. If someone were to take such an unapproved substance, what would the actual level of prosecution look like……"
He forced himself to look straight at Si-hyun, his voice turning low and coarse.
"Just map out that specific part clearly. Tell us exactly how exposed we are."
Once he finished speaking, only the sterile chill and low vibration of the central ventilation system drifted heavily through the room.
A suffocating silence.
No one could open their mouth first.
The two chairmen commanding South Korea sat frozen, crushed by the weight of the truth they had just let slip.
And Kang Si-hyun did not press for an answer.
It was already more than enough.
Seated across from her were no longer arrogant clients seeking legal counsel.
They were defendants waiting for their final verdict.