Episode 58 – Workplace Manager Authority

After Hye-ri urgently disappeared from the hotel, leaving her phone behind, the two met again at the company the next day.

“Is your father… okay?”

With a stiff expression, Choi Hyun-min barely suppresses his emotions as he asks Hye-ri.

“Yes! It was just simple overwork. Phew… I’m so relieved. Hehe.”

Following Hyun-woo’s instructions, Hye-ri went with Hyun-min to the hotel and deliberately left her smartphone behind, then nonchalantly rattles off a lie. Of course, both of her parents are doing well and healthy without any problems.

“Oh, and… Hye-ri, you left your phone behind. Here you go.”

“That’s right!! I don’t know how frustrating it was without my phone. Thank you for taking care of it, Chief Choi-nim.”

Perhaps she was frustrated for a while, Hye-ri unlocks her phone as soon as she receives it and checks the new messages.

“But… Chief Choi-nim, you didn’t happen to look at my phone, did you?”

– Thump

Hyun-min is startled by Hye-ri’s sharp question, like someone caught stealing something. But he tries hard to maintain a calm expression.

“Huh… what are you talking about? It’s locked.”

“I definitely left it in the call log state after making a call… or did I? Hmm…”

“You… you must be mistaken about something.”

“Is that so? Then, since it’s work hours, I’ll go in first.”

Hye-ri returns to the office without taking her eyes off her phone.

“Haa…”

Choi Hyun-min, left alone, has a face full of worries.

* * *

“How does it look?”

“He saw it. Definitely! His expression wasn’t good either. And I locked the phone in the call log state, but when I turned it on again, it was on the home screen. I’m sure… Hiiing…”

Thinking that Hyun-min saw her nude photos and the video of her masturbating with an anonymous man, Hye-ri’s face suddenly flushes with shame. But at the same time, an unknown tingling sensation sweeps through her body.

‘Haa… This is weird… Why is my body…’

“Good job. Shall we see how Chief Choi-nim reacts now?”

“He’ll definitely say let’s break up, right? If he saw all that… you know…”

“Yeah. Probably? Hmm, let’s talk about the details later for now.”

Hyun-woo, who had been whispering with Hye-ri after she returned to the office after breaking up with Hyun-min, didn’t want to show the team members that he was too close to her, so he soon returned to his seat.

‘He didn’t say let’s break up right away?’

Hyun-woo was sure that if Choi Hyun-min met Hye-ri again, he would immediately notify her of their breakup. This was because he had returned the [Affection] and [Guilt] for Hye-ri, which had been amplified by the work system, to their original state.

[User: Choi Hyun-min]

[Age: 28] [Height: 185cm] [Weight: 73kg]

[Stamina: 7/10] [Charm: 8/10] [Lust: 10(+3)/10] [Mental: 1(-7)/10]

[Psychological Message]

[Annoyance] about the person in charge of system management

[Guilt] about Kim Hye-ri

[Obsession] with Kim Hye-ri

[Love-Hate] for Kim Hye-ri – new!

“Ah…”

However, Hyun-woo, after checking Choi Hyun-min’s status in the work system, could only stare blankly at Hyun-min’s status window, which was completely different from what he had expected.

The [Mental] stat was completely wrecked, and the [Lust] stat soared to the end, perhaps because he hadn’t done it with Hye-ri.

In addition, [Affection] for Hye-ri had disappeared and [Love-Hate] had been newly created. Love-hate. Isn’t that a truly paradoxical emotion in which love and hate are mixed at the same time?

‘Did I break him too much?’

Hyun-woo feels a slight sense of guilt after seeing Choi Hyun-min’s status window.

Manipulating Hye-ri’s first experience at the Busan hotel, then dating again but Hye-ri refusing skinship. To top it off, a random chat masturbation video with an unknown man.

When he thinks about what he has done, it may be a very natural result that Hyun-min’s mental state is not left intact.

‘Hmm…’

However, Hyun-woo soon began to think about how to use Hyun-min, who could not give up on Hye-ri until the end and even developed [Love-Hate] and [Obsession], rather than feeling guilty.

‘First, I’ll keep amplifying [Guilt]. Hye-ri must always have a sorry heart to hold the reins of the relationship.’

‘And love-hate… This is the problem… Can I amplify this? I’m so nervous, I’d rather…’

[User: Choi Hyun-min]

[Psychological Message]

[Annoyance] about the person in charge of system management

[Guilt] about Kim Hye-ri – Amplification Activated

[Obsession] with Kim Hye-ri – Reduction Activated (new!)

[Love-Hate] for Kim Hye-ri

‘It’s better to do it this way.’

Ultimately, Hyun-woo decides to amplify Hyun-min’s [Guilt] emotion and reduce [Obsession]. It was too risky to leave [Obsession] alone when there was even [Love-Hate]. It wouldn’t do if Hyun-min became a Misery.

The problematic emotion [Love-Hate] will be observed for now.

‘Choi Hyun-min, I clearly gave you a choice. You made the decision.’

The result of Choi Hyun-min’s decision in a state where all the emotional manipulation of the work system was released for a short time was ‘I can’t give up on Kim Hye-ri’, contrary to expectations.

Of course, it’s hard to say what meaning Hyun-min’s choice has now, after all the manipulation he’s done so far, but anyway, Hyun-min seems to have decided to continue dating even after seeing Hye-ri’s perverted masturbation video.

‘I’m sure this bastard was a playboy.’

Looking at it now, there is no such thing as pure love.

Hyun-woo has no way of knowing Hyun-min’s original feelings now, whether it’s [Obsession] with Hye-ri, whom he couldn’t get laid with, or whether he was destined to love her even before manipulating her with the work system. He doesn’t particularly want to know either.

‘Anyway, Hye-ri, you’ll have to suffer for a while longer. Heuk heuk heuk’

Hye-ri even did various shameful things that Hyun-woo ordered in order to break up with Choi Hyun-min, but in the end, she couldn’t get rid of Hyun-min. Perhaps her fate is to continue playing with Choi Hyun-min?

Hyun-woo, who played with Hye-ri and Hyun-min’s emotions at will with the work system, comes up with a nonsensical theory of fate in his head.

* * *

“Hiiing…”

Hye-ri was frustrated because Hyun-min, contrary to expectations, did not say let’s break up, even though he must have seen all of her dirty and lewd videos and photos.

‘I want to officially date Assistant Manager Lee-nim soon…’

“Tsk…”

Hye-ri was also treating Choi Hyun-min quite coldly in order to break up. But whether she did or not, Hyun-min’s attitude is the same. He still eats dinner with her after work and takes her home.

He was still trying to go to the hotel slyly like before, or trying to subtly make skinship with Hye-ri. Likewise, Hye-ri coldly rejected such attempts, using the previous Busan incident as an excuse.

In that way, the relationship between Choi Hyun-min and Hye-ri is maintained without breaking. Thanks to that, Hye-ri is about to go crazy with frustration.

“Assistant Manager Lee-nim… How come? He doesn’t say let’s break up…”

“Even though I did all those weird things…”

Choi Hyun-min took Hye-ri to her house as usual after work. But Hye-ri doesn’t go straight home and meets Hyun-woo at a bar near her house to share a drink.

This is because Hye-ri, feeling frustrated, asked Hyun-woo for a drink.

“Why are you pretending to be drunk after drinking two shots of soju?”

Hyun-woo understands Hye-ri’s upset feelings, but he is just dumbfounded by Hye-ri’s behavior of whining and pretending to be drunk without even drinking alcohol.

“Hmph! Do you know how frustrated I am, Assistant Manager Lee? You don’t even know my heart…”

In fact, from Hyun-woo’s point of view, it was a better thing. If it spread around the company that he was dating Hye-ri after breaking up with Choi Hyun-min, he would be gossiped about and chewed on by people for a while.

If there is one thing he has learned in his short career, it is not to be gossiped about by people. The best way to survive in a public institution is to do the assigned work moderately, like a person who exists but doesn’t exist.

Even if you become successful and famous here, there is no such thing as a salary increase or a quick promotion. This is because public institutions have a structure in which promotions and salaries increase as you accumulate more experience, that is, the more jjam you have.

“Well, what can you do in the current situation? Choi Hyun-min keeps saying he wants to date. Just be patient a little longer.”

“Hiiing…”

Hye-ri wants to have a sweet and romantic relationship with Hyun-woo as soon as possible, but she is just upset by Hyun-woo’s words that he doesn’t know her heart and keeps telling her to date Choi Hyun-min.

“Okay! We have to go to work tomorrow, so let’s wrap it up now.”

Hyun-woo quickly ends the drinking session because he doesn’t want to keep listening to her whining, even though Hye-ri asked him to come out. Hye-ri, who was about to complain more, pouted her lips and expressed her dissatisfaction with her whole body, but Hyun-woo was already

“I’m calling a driver. Go home quickly.”

He turned his back and headed to his car.

“Hmph… Tsk… I hate you. Assistant Manager Lee-nim.”

Hye-ri, who couldn’t drink as much as she wanted because the session ended quickly, kept looking back with regret, but Hyun-woo had already disappeared.

Even after returning home, Hye-ri, who still has some regrets and resentment, touches her phone here and there and recalls the memory of masturbating with a man whose name and face she doesn’t know.

It was a meeting that she had at Hyun-woo’s semi-coercive instruction, but perhaps because she covered her face with a mask? She showed her masturbating self to a man she didn’t even know, as if she had been unsealed, and reached climax several times.

‘Should I try it one more time… just once?’

Recalling the thrilling sensation at that time, Hye-ri carefully runs the random chat app Rain.

There were a lot of conversation requests from numerous men on her account.

“Aish… Why are there so many?”

Hye-ri, grumbling, continues to scroll down the screen and finds the chat room of the man she had video-called and masturbated with last time. And after thinking for a while, she enters a message in the chat room.

* * *

“Oh ho?”

Hyun-woo, who was sitting in the passenger seat of his car and was about to call a driver, immediately runs the random chat app Rain at the unexpected notification that popped up on his phone.

– What are you doing?

Hye-ri boldly sends a message first.

Hyun-woo’s instructions were clearly ‘Connect to a random chat just once, act according to the man’s instructions, and leave a record of it.’

He had never given any other instructions to the random chat Rain after that, and Hyun-woo thought that Hye-ri would definitely not connect again unless he gave her instructions. However,

Hye-ri is sending a message to an anonymous man in a random chat again for some reason.

“Hahaha…”

She’s talking to another man again without even reporting to Hyun-woo. Of course, that anonymous man was himself, but Hye-ri, who had no way of knowing that fact, was clearly having an affair. That is, cheating.

‘But well… we’re not dating either.’

Can her actions be called cheating? Hyun-woo is also forcibly attaching Hye-ri to Choi Hyun-min and enjoying the situation.

– Why?

Hyun-woo was surprised by Hye-ri’s actions, but he quickly sends a reply, thinking that she might contact another man if he doesn’t reply.

– Aren’t you… doing it anymore?

– Doing what anymore?

– You ordered me to do this and that last time?

– You want me to order you again?

– Yes…

“Ha… I knew she wasn’t normal, but…”

Was he expecting Hye-ri to be normal when he fed Hyun-min medicine and had his first experience next to him at the hotel, called her out and fucked her throughout the date, and even made her masturbate with nude photos in a random chat?

Hyun-woo puts aside his absurd expectations and decides to just go along with Hye-ri’s tune.

– Okay, accept the video call.

Hyun-woo rummages through the bag in the car, takes out a mask, and immediately requests a video call to Hye-ri.

– Can you… hear me well?

Hye-ri’s face, wearing a mask like Hyun-woo, is visible on the screen. They were just drinking together at the bar, but it feels strange to see each other wearing masks like this again.

“Yeah. Then you must be ready, right?”

– Yes…

What is she expecting? A slight tremor and anticipation can be felt in Hye-ri’s answer.

And Hyun-woo decides to fully meet her expectations.