Chapter 20

20. Let’s Be Honest (1)

Wednesday.

Jiseul arrived at the office before dawn.

She was preparing for the New Technology Team’s Regular Demonstration Meeting on Thursday.

She took the first subway and arrived at the office at 6:15 a.m.

At this hour, she’d have the quiet office all to herself for several hours and be able to focus without distractions.

Jiseul turned on her computer, started some music at a low volume, and got to work.

Her long fingers flew frantically across the keyboard as she began coding.

Taking Kangbin’s and Yuna’s suggestions into account, Jiseul had chosen “Improving WinCare’s Blood Glucose Monitoring Algorithm” as her research topic.

Since the existing algorithm needed a complete overhaul, she’d spent all of yesterday analyzing the data and organizing possible improvements.

Jiseul buried herself in coding all morning.

She stayed at her desk the entire time, eating nothing more than a simple sandwich for lunch.

If she wanted to finish such a major overhaul in only a day, she’d have to work relentlessly.

Around two in the afternoon, while she was completely absorbed in her work, someone suddenly placed a paper cup of coffee on her desk.

When she looked up, it was Kangbin.

“Here. Drink this while you work.”

Grateful for the unexpected kindness, Jiseul smiled brightly.

“Thank you, Team Leader. I was actually getting really sleepy, so I needed some strong coffee.”

“Perfect timing then. How’s the work coming along?”

Kangbin asked with a smile.

His eyes were filled with anticipation as he looked at her work.

After thinking for a moment, Jiseul gave a safe answer.

“…It’s going okay.”

“I don’t think it’s just ‘okay.’ Huh? Didn’t you completely rewrite this part? It definitely didn’t look like this before.”

Kangbin stared at the monitor in surprise.

Then he freely scrolled through the code, examining her progress.

“Whoa! This is incredible! You didn’t just improve it, you rewrote the whole thing from scratch. Did you really finish all of this in just a few hours?”

Kangbin looked completely stunned.

Embarrassed, Jiseul scratched her head.

“Yeah. I was going to improve the existing code little by little, but small problems kept popping up everywhere. It turned out it’d be much faster to rewrite everything from the beginning.”

“Wow! Just as expected from you, Senior Jiseul. You’re unbelievably fast. This is the amount of work that normally takes people more than a week, and you finished it in half a day.”

“My hands are just a little fast.”

Jiseul brushed it off.

The truth was, she’d always worked alone.

She had no idea how fast other people usually worked.

The only person she’d ever been able to compare herself to was her former partner, Crow.

And at least compared to Crow, she worked faster.

Kangbin’s expression became complicated.

Half amazement.

Half sympathy.

One thing was certain.

He genuinely cared about her.

“I guess I should’ve explained it better. For this week’s demonstration meeting, you only needed to present the improvement plan. The actual coding wasn’t supposed to start until next week. Even then, that would’ve been considered incredibly fast progress.”

“Oh… I didn’t realize I could take it that slowly. But since I’ve already started, I’ll go ahead and finish the coding too.”

“The demonstration’s tomorrow. You really don’t have to push yourself that hard. Honestly, finishing all the coding by today is physically impossible. No human can work that fast.”

Kangbin shook his head repeatedly as though the very idea was absurd.

Jiseul simply smiled awkwardly.

“It’s not impossible. I just need to work a little faster. I’ll see how much I can finish.”

“Wow! Senior Jiseul, you’re actually a monster. A coding monster. No… a coding genius? At this level, you’re on par with the CEO or the CTO! Actually… I don’t even think the CEO could keep up with your speed.”

Jiseul let out a small laugh at the exaggerated praise.

“Haha. You’re giving me way too much credit. I’m not that…”

“What exactly can’t I keep up with?”

A deep voice suddenly interrupted her.

When they turned around, Woohyun was standing there.

“Mr. Shin.”

Jiseul’s eyes widened in surprise.

Kangbin flashed his usual easygoing grin and explained.

“We were talking about coding speed. Senior Jiseul’s practically a monster. She’s almost beyond human.”

“Is that so?”

“Absolutely. Team Leader Jung and I only suggested the research topic two days ago, and she’s already finished analyzing everything, completed the improvement plan, and started the actual coding today. On top of that, she finished what normally takes people a week in just half a day.”

“A week’s worth of work? That’s impressive.”

“See? You think so too, don’t you? Nobody works that fast. Oh, right. What brings you to our office, Mr. Shin…?”

“I have something I’d like to discuss with Senior Jiseul.”

Woohyun unexpectedly shifted his gaze to Jiseul.

“Huh? Me? What…”

Jiseul, who’d been quietly listening, looked at him in confusion.

Woohyun simply smiled as though it were nothing important.

“I have something I’d like to ask you personally. It won’t take long.”

“Oh… I see. Sure.”

“This isn’t the place. Let’s go to my office.”

“Ah… Okay.”

Jiseul quietly nodded and followed him.

Since he didn’t want to talk in a public place, she guessed it was something related to Phoenix.

Had they discovered something new?

The thought alone made her nervous.

* * *

The moment they sat across from each other on the sofa in his office, Woohyun slowly began speaking.

For some reason, his expression was unusually serious.

“The truth is, there’s something I have to ask you. There’s no point letting unnecessary misunderstandings continue between us. Let’s be honest with each other.”

What was he about to say?

Unable to read his intentions, uneasiness crept over her.

“Okay. Go ahead.”

Jiseul answered willingly, but she couldn’t hide her nervousness.

Without realizing it, she bit her lower lip.

“First, I’d like to know this. Why did you apply for our company’s recruitment test? Was the reason you gave me back then the real one?”

“What do you…”

“You said you wanted to experience working at a company. You also said you liked our company’s innovation and vision. But I’m wondering if there was another reason besides that.”

“Ah… That.”

Jiseul hesitated.

In a way, she could’ve brushed it off.

But Woohyun had deliberately asked about it.

That meant he already suspected something.

“The truth is… there was another reason. I needed a way to get close to you.”

In the end, Jiseul decided to tell him honestly.

It would’ve been better if she’d explained it sooner, but she thought it was still better to tell him now.

“I see. I gave you my business card, so you could’ve simply contacted me. Why did you go as far as joining the company?”

“I needed a way to stop Phoenix before it reached you. But I couldn’t tell you everything from the beginning. It was all classified national secrets, and I wasn’t allowed to reveal any of it.”

“National secrets?”

Woohyun’s expression instantly hardened.

As his sharp gaze settled on her, Jiseul grew even more nervous.

Her lips trembled slightly as she continued.

“Yes. Honestly… most of what I’ve already told you is classified information. I only revealed it because I believed you needed to know.”

“I see. It must’ve taken you a lot of courage to tell me the truth.”

“Yes. Of course.”

Woohyun’s expression softened slightly.

He slowly nodded, as though he finally understood everything.

Seeing that, Jiseul felt some of the weight on her heart ease.

She was finally able to explain in greater detail.

“The truth is, there’s something like a blacklist inside the National Intelligence Service. I don’t know the exact details, but I believe it’s a list of people under surveillance. Crow and I discovered that most of the people who died because of Phoenix were on that blacklist.”

“A blacklist… That’s disturbing. If people on it are ending up dead, it’s practically like a death note.”

“Yes. That’s one way to look at it. And on the day you first came to see me, I checked it just in case… and your name was on the blacklist.”

“What…? My name?”

Woohyun frowned in disbelief before narrowing his eyes.

He clearly couldn’t accept what he’d just heard.

After all, who would ever imagine finding their own name on a list like that?

“Yes. They already knew you were investigating Prosecutor Shin Junghyeon’s case. I think that’s why they added your name to the list. I had to stop them from getting to you somehow, and to do that, I needed a natural way to stay close to you.”

“So that’s why you suddenly applied for our company’s recruitment test?”

“Yes.”

Jiseul answered honestly.

Woohyun slowly nodded before asking another question.

“And one more thing. I saw you secretly enter our company’s server room. I also saw you access the L3 switch and work on something.”

“…What? You… saw me?”

The unexpected confession shocked Jiseul so badly that she couldn’t speak.

It felt as though everything had gone completely white before her eyes.

Her heart tightened painfully.

Completely unaffected by her shock, Woohyun continued calmly.

“I analyzed the logs on my computer and found that a new program had been installed at exactly that time. You even disguised the installer as a Windows Update file.”

“…”

“The program was called Guardian. Were you the one who created it?”