章節 18: Dragons. (1)
After the press caught wind of Yong Myeong's accident, it became the biggest topic of gossip. It ended up on the front pages of papers like Business Insider, and entertainment tabloids. The story even made it to the news segments of international broadcasters like the BBC. Everyone was wondering what this all meant for the Kang family.
Would Kang Joon-ki remarry now that his wife was brain dead? Would the illegitimate child, Kang Ho, become the next heir to the Nam faction since Kang Cheon-Sa was paralysed? What did this mean for the future leadership of the Nam faction, the Kang family and ultimately the KangMung group?
If these questions were buzzing about in the headlines and amongst the public, within the Kang Estate these questions were being shouted about. The atmosphere had become heavy within the household.
Of course, I wasn't really affected by any of this, at least not immediately. I was still a baby and as a result I wasn't expected to attend any of the many family meetings. The only reason I knew about any of the gossip, was because of Min Ho.
Min Ho faithfully kept me up to date on current affairs and the latest headlines. I had requested for him to do this for me, telling him innocently that "I like the news".
So it became a ritual of ours; each morning, while we went out on our tour around the Kang Estate, Min Ho would read me the news and tell me about the latest developments in the family. Of course, he never told me this seriously; he'd always put on a storytelling voice like one of those annoying children presenters, and make it seem overly dramatic.
"And then the Stocks crashed and went BOOM!!!" he said loudly waving his hands about.
Since Yong Myeong's accident, most Kang family businesses, that involved my father, had fallen in stock price. It wasn't surprising. Ever since the accident was revealed, the press had begun demonising him.
A nasty rumour spread, the media outlets branded Kang Joon-ki as 'The Cursed Husband' stating that any woman who lay with him was likely to die during childbirth or suffer the consequences.
There was also another rumour saying that he plotted Yong Myeong's death, since he was still in love with his high school sweetheart, my mother, and he had hated the arranged marriage.
As rumours tend to do, they spun out of control until people were saying Kang Joon-Ki was a maniac, a murderer who liked to kill his wives, and the Kang family was covering it all up.
Madame Kang was obviously outraged by all the slander, and she did everything to try and control the media outlets, even bribery, but that didn't quell the rumours. She even wanted Joon-ki to remarry so that she could prove the rumours wrong, but she couldn't. Technically Yong Myeong was still alive, brain dead was not dead, and divorce went against the Kang family tradition. Even if a man was widowed, in the Kang Household, they must respect their deceased partner and never move on from them. That was the sole reason she had been against my mother's union with Joon-ki, she was well aware of this tradition.
And my Father, well, Kang Joon-ki didn't help matters. Apparently, Kang Seung didn't tell him about Yong Myeong's accident until after they had come back from their overseas business trip. When Joon-ki found out, apparently he had an awful mental breakdown. Screaming, crying, kicking, and in the end, he passed out from the shock. At least that's what Min Ho had told me, ah, I wish I could have seen it.
I guess he really had liked Yong Myeong to have been in such a state, and I guess in this case, he had no one to blame. When Bin Soo-Ah died, he blamed me, since she died in childbirth. But with Yong Myeong's accident, it was an accident. She tripped and fell down the stairs. His mental breakdown probably wasn't because he loved her, but more because he couldn't process the guilt, which made him freak out. He seemed to be that type of fragile man.
His breakdown showed everyone how weak he really was.
He had been in such a state that Kang Seung sent him abroad to recover away from the media, and he never returned, even after a month.
So of course the stock prices dropped.
"So the stock price went BOOM!" I said while mimicking Min Ho's hand movements.
"Exactly", Min Ho danced about with joy, "Young Master is so intelligent, aww you really are the smartest." He rubbed me on the head and gave me a loving hug.
Of course, I found the way that Min Ho babied me to be annoying, but I put up with it. It was better that he thought of me as a child. He would underestimate me, and he wouldn't question my thoughts too much, and he would listen to the suggestions I whispered into his ears, and eventually, he would believe that my words were his thoughts. I was already wrapping him around my little finger.
As I walked around with Min-Ho many of the servants greeted me fondly like they normally would, but there was an extra hint of respect in the way that they treated me. The bows were a bit lower, and instead of referring to me as 'Ho' or 'Kang Ho', many called me 'Young Master'. This was because, even though nothing had been confirmed, I had become the golden child in the Kang Household. It wasn't stated but everyone knew that I had unofficially become the heir to the Nam faction. Nobody really respected my father and Kang Seung had many years of leadership still ahead of him, but I was a diamond.
A child prodigy; polite, cute, and special.
With Kang Cheon-Sa disabled I was likely going to be the next in line after Kang Seung, it was only natural.
Of course, this idea distressed many people within the Nam faction. I heard the gossip from the servants who repeated what their masters said like parrots, "People are saying that Kang Seung will be the last Nam faction leader to be head of the whole family. The Young Master may be brilliant but he's still an illegitimate child, a Bastard can't become head of the household even if he does one day become head of the Nam faction. This will be the end of the Nam faction's reign of power, to think they only got one shot at leadership."
Perhaps because I was from a more western background, I couldn't understand their fixation on legitimacy and illegitimacy. Just because my mother hadn't been married to Joon-Ki I was suddenly not fit for leadership. Why did such a thing even matter? But to the people within the household and to the outside world, the issue of marriage seemed very prominent. They seemed to hinge on the fact, to the point that people whispered about Kang Cheon-Sa being heir, despite his paralysis.
Just hearing people whisper about that, irked me. How was being a bastard child worse than paralysis?
I was still thinking this when I was introduced to Kang Cheon-Sa for the first time. Workers brought him to the house carrying him, and there I saw a small child wrapped in cloth, smiling with an innocent face and cooing at me while waving his short little arms about.
I instantly hated him.
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