Chapter 27: Always Hiding…

After eating and drinking his fill, Qi Huai returned to the film set and ran into a staff member who was on her way out to run an errand.

She was one of Choo Min-young’s assistants and had been present when Qi Huai and Min-young discussed the photoshoot collaboration earlier that day. She had become a new fan of Qi Huai’s and was very friendly towards him.

“Oh, right!” she greeted him with a smile, then asked, “Did you see Manager Choi later, Actor Qi?”

“Manager Choi?”

Saying he was going to call Choi Min-jun had just been an excuse for Park Seok-jin. He hadn’t actually planned to discuss the matter with him right away, nor had he mentioned it to Choo Min-young. He didn’t understand why she was asking.

“Oh? You didn’t meet? Manager Choi said he was going to look for you. Did he have to leave for something?”

Qi Huai shook his head. “We didn’t meet, and he didn’t call me…”

“Is that so…” The staff member was also a bit confused. “It’s about Min-young wanting to work with you for the clothing photoshoot, haha. The goddess Choo just couldn’t wait. As soon as Manager Choi arrived on set this afternoon, she grabbed him and said she wanted to sign the contract. It gave him quite a shock. He said he needed to discuss the schedule adjustment with you and then went to find you.”

Is that so?

But he hadn’t received any calls or texts from Choi Min-jun. Qi Huai found it strange. “Thank you. I’ll find him myself.”

The staff member bowed slightly. “Okay, then. See you tomorrow, Actor Qi.”

Qi Huai smiled. “Okay. Thank you for your hard work.”

After the staff member left, Qi Huai dialed Choi Min-jun’s number. The voice on the other end was cheerful, clearly in a good mood, and sounded like he was driving.

“I heard you were looking for me?” Qi Huai asked.

Choi Min-jun paused for a moment, then chuckled. “Oh, right. It’s about Actress Choo wanting to collaborate with you on a photoshoot. That’s great, Qi Huai. You’re getting along well with the company’s ace actor and landing commercial deals on your own.”

Qi Huai offered a few modest words and asked if they needed to meet in person, saying he could go to the company that evening.

To his surprise, Choi Min-jun was completely unhurried, a stark contrast to his usual self, who would immediately confirm a meeting time whenever a collaboration came up. “No rush. We can talk about it tomorrow. I have something more important to do right now. I can’t be distracted.”

More important?

His relaxed tone didn’t sound like it.

Qi Huai scanned the set and caught sight of the protagonist shou chatting with a staff member. His furrowed brow slowly relaxed. “Alright, then I won’t disturb you.”

---

After hanging up, Choi Min-jun parked his car in the underground garage of his apartment building and hummed a happy tune as he walked home.

That useless bastard Yoon Nam-woo, who was good for nothing but throwing tantrums—what difference would another hour make? That couple, who only knew how to buy Hermès and complain about life, would be busy enough just trying to scrape together the money in these two hours.

Soon, two billion won would be in his account. That money, combined with his past savings, would be enough for him to start a new life abroad.

Choi Min-jun knew that if he asked for too much at once, even a cornered rabbit would bite back. So he set the blackmail price at a figure that would be painful for them but still manageable if they gritted their teeth.

Soon, his life would undergo a fundamental change.

The poverty, the filth, his past—his father, a gang member beaten to death; his mother, a prostitute who had supposedly abandoned him at birth; and his own past of being tricked into signing with a talent agency only to be sent to a nightclub to entertain clients.

All of it would vanish into thin air the moment he left this country.

Choi Min-jun hummed contentedly. “As expected, a man has to rely on himself—Ah! Are you blind?!”

At the entrance to the elevator, a group of young men reeking of alcohol crashed into him. One of them fell directly onto him, clutching him like a drowning person clinging to a piece of driftwood, dry-heaving and apologizing at the same time.

Choi Min-jun, disgusted and annoyed, pried the man’s octopus-like arms off him, cursed “Aish,” picked up his briefcase from the floor, and quickly got into the elevator.

Although they were annoying, he didn’t want to mess with these drunkards. Damn brats, a bunch of no-good drunks, ruining my mood.

In the elevator, Choi Min-jun sniffed his alcohol-stained clothes and cursed several more times, hating that the smell wouldn’t come off no matter how much he patted it. “Did they spill soju all over themselves, those stinking brats!”

The elevator came to a stop.

Choi Min-jun, still patting his clothes, stepped out of the elevator with an annoyed expression. But when he reached his front door, he felt something was wrong.

His phone?

His phone had been in his jacket pocket. How could it be gone? Choi Min-jun searched his briefcase and all his pockets, but it was nowhere to be found. He cursed loudly, “Shibal! It must have been knocked out by those damn drunks!”

His phone still had that video on it! That was his two billion won! It would be disastrous if he lost it!

With that thought, he rushed back to the elevator and down to the parking garage. But when he burst out of the elevator and into the garage, he found that the group of drunks was long gone.

The garage was completely silent.

The whole incident had taken only a few minutes. A group of stumbling, heavily drunk men should have made some noise in the garage, right? Had they already left? But even with a sober friend helping, it wouldn’t be easy to get a group of drunks to sit quietly in a car.

Goosebumps instantly erupted on Choi Min-jun’s skin.

A cold sweat broke out.

Those men weren’t drunk at all. The alcohol smell on them had been sprayed on, which was why it had rubbed off on him!

Their target was his phone.

He had been exposed.

---

Yoon Nam-hyuk had a meeting in the afternoon and then stayed busy at the company for a long time before deciding to go home. It was less that he was busy and more that he was in a daze.

I don’t just dislike seaweed, he thought. I also dislike wakame and nori. I don’t like any organ meats. I don’t like anything with cream or butter. I don’t like overly salty side dishes…

Although he still didn’t like the taste of the seaweed soup, the rice he had hastily swallowed down with the beef today seemed to have a hint of sweetness, perhaps because he had company.

Yoon Nam-hyuk had rejected Qi Huai’s offer to eat his seaweed soup set meal, but the other’s matter-of-fact attitude had puzzled him. Couldn’t he just order another one?

They weren’t a couple or in any kind of intimate relationship. Why would he offer to eat his food?

And then there was the matter of Baek Soo-kyung.

He had said he wasn’t jealous or fighting over anyone, that he only saw Baek Soo-kyung as a child. Then why didn’t he accept his offer? Did he really not like him, or had he just not realized how much he liked him?

He clearly liked Baek Soo-kyung, right?

He wasn’t swayed by the temptation of 600 million won and top-tier resources, and he was determined to see him. He said he didn’t like him, but he was willing to help him pay off his debts, doing things that a lover would do.

And…

If he liked Baek Soo-kyung, then why did he treat me like that? Because he’s gay, likes men, and the situation was too ambiguous to resist? Or because of my status as the president? Was he trying to curry favor with me?

Qi Huai’s actions confused Yoon Nam-hyuk, but the man himself was addictive. He returned home with a heart full of turmoil and immediately sensed that the atmosphere was unusual.

His stubborn, old-fashioned, and grim-faced father; his stupid, illegitimate older brother with a provocative smile; and his sister-in-law, who pretended to be virtuous all day—they were all sitting on the living room sofa, staring at him in unison.

“Is there a problem?” Yoon Nam-hyuk frowned slightly.

Yoon Nam-woo’s upturned lips were almost impossible to suppress. It wasn’t until his wife pinched him that he managed to say in a feigned, caring tone, “Oh, Nam-hyuk, don’t hide it anymore. We all know.”

His sister-in-law, Goo Ah-ra, dabbed at her non-existent tears with a tissue. “Oh my… little brother-in-law, it must have been so hard hiding it all these years. You should tell your family about these things. Otherwise, how sad would Father be, always worrying about you?”

She let out a soft sob, her exquisite eye makeup perfectly intact. “No wonder you were never willing to date all these years, whenever Father brought it up. You even made excuses, saying you couldn’t… Oh, it must be because Mother passed away early, and you never experienced a mother’s love. It’s not necessarily something you’re born with. It can be treated. You should get it checked out.”

Yoon Nam-woo exclaimed, “Ah! Right, right, you should go to church, right? They have that… conversion therapy. I heard you can get better after a year or two of treatment. You can even be virile in front of women…”

Bang!

“Shut up!”

Yoon Tae-min slammed his water glass down on the table. Yoon Nam-woo and Goo Ah-ra instantly fell silent as mice, both staring at their feet.

The porcelain cup shattered, followed by a dead silence in the room.

Yoon Tae-min stared at Yoon Nam-hyuk for a long moment. “Don’t you know what you’ve done? It’s already all over the media!”

He pressed a hand to his heart and took a few deep breaths before continuing in a stern voice, “Yoon Nam-hyuk! You are the president of Wushan Entertainment and one of the directors of the entire Wushan Group! Don’t you have even a shred of sensitivity to public opinion? If you can’t handle it, then maybe you shouldn’t be doing it!”

At these words, Yoon Nam-woo’s neck flushed with excitement.

Yoon Nam-hyuk frowned and opened his phone. It was only then that he saw that Assistant Yoo had sent him messages and called him over ten minutes ago. But he had been spacing out in the car, and his phone had been on silent, so he hadn’t noticed.

The long string of messages contained several news links. The one with the most interaction was an entertainment news post on X.

【WOOSAN President Yoon Nam-hyuk Suspected to be Gay! Spotted Hugging, Kissing, and Flirting with a Man on the Set of a New Drama!】