Novelist Running Through Time

“Baekhak Publishing rejected the publication?!”

Baek Seol was shocked.

Her mouth fell open, clearly not having anticipated this.

“A fly will fly into your mouth if you keep it open like that.”

Baek Seol closed her mouth.

It wasn’t that she heeded Lim Yang-wook’s advice to prevent a fly from entering her mouth, but rather she was angered by the team leader making a boring joke in such a situation.

“Then where on earth are we going to publish? What about marketing and distribution! And the cover design and printing?”

Baek Seol trembled with worry about what to do next.

To Lim Yang-wook, her concerns seemed laughably trivial.

Why aren’t new employees treated like people? It’s because they can’t contribute the work of one full person. That was Baek Seol’s current state. She was like a chirping chick.

After all, even the ambitious 26-year-old new employee Lim Yang-wook took a long time to realize that he was an idiot. As a life senior, what else could he do but embrace her with a broad mind?

“Ugh…”

He didn’t even bother to mention that if Baekhak Publishing had published the book, success would have been credited to Yang Sung-jun, the chief of the publishing planning department, and failure would have fallen on them.

Nor did he explain that he had visited the publishing planning department in advance, swallowing his pride to prevent this, and how this might be a strategic move for the future.

Explaining office politics to a chick who doesn’t even know how to publish a book? That’s absurd.

So, Lim Yang-wook said this.

“You ignorant thing.”

“……!!”

Baek Seol, despite being the eldest granddaughter of the second son of a chaebol chairman, prided herself on having an open mind.

However, as a graduate of the English Literature department at Oxford’s Lincoln College, it was a slightly complicated feeling to be called ignorant by Lim Yang-wook, who graduated from a less prestigious local university with a confusing name.

Lim Yang-wook spoke with a somewhat enlightened expression.

“I will teach you how to publish a book.”

Baek Seol didn’t say it out loud, but she thought that with his bald head and enlightened expression, he somewhat resembled a monk offering to teach her something.

“How are you going to do it, without even involving Baekhak Publishing?”

“If you throw enough money at it, every problem can be solved.”

EP 1 – Cause of Death

Publishing one’s own book is as difficult as picking stars from the sky.

No matter how good your writing is, if it doesn’t catch an editor’s eye, it will be buried without a trace, and if you participate in a contest, you’ll have to fiercely compete with other strong contenders.

But that’s only the case from the perspective of a ‘subordinate’.

If you approach a publisher with a manuscript in hand, you might be turned away, but if you go with bundles of money, you become the ‘boss’.

If I’m willing to spend my own money to rent a printing press and publish a book, what concern is it of others?

This is known as “self-publishing.”

It’s the opposite concept of “planned publishing,” where the publishing house manages everything from start to finish according to their guidelines.

Self-publishing may sound easy at first, but it’s not a simple task.

Starting from selecting the paper quality to cover design, printing, distribution, storage, and so on, it involves various complicated processes that you must navigate without the help of a professional.

But Lim Yang-wook was a professional.

“Make it a black background with neat white letters saying Cause of Death. Not the flashy kind of black, but a gloomy kind. Yes, that’s it. That feeling. You don’t have to specifically include the Chinese characters, umm, uh…”

“Yes, yes. I’ve already sent you the paper quality and book size. We’ll handle the distribution.”

“I’m looking to rent a warehouse. A warehouse to store books. How much did you say? Ah, that can’t be right. Last time it was…”

Apple doesn’t manufacture iPhones themselves. They oversee subcontractors around the world, with top administrators at the center directing and coordinating the production of phones.

Baek Seol thought Lim Yang-wook’s way of handling his work was similar to Apple’s approach.

Lim Yang-wook accomplished everything from within his office.

He received a quick cover and book interior design from a book designer he was acquainted with. He contacted a printer untouched by Baekhak Publishing for publication. He even secured a suitable warehouse to store the books.

Outsourcing.

Lim Yang-wook outsourced all the work. Sometimes appealing to personal connections, sometimes being forceful or pleading, he accomplished everything by clinging to a phone.

Though he was a shabby team leader with only one new member on his team, as he began to demonstrate his true capabilities, numerous people started moving according to his orders.

In reality, what Baek Seol did was nothing more than watching Lim Yang-wook work.

Baek Seol already knew what this type of business method was called.

It was a “One-Person Publishing Company.”

But this was the first time she truly experienced the meaning of that term.

Lim Yang-wook was truly a person who could replace the role of a publishing house all by himself. He was a walking publishing house.

As a result.

After a month had passed.

Baek Seol faced a pile of books stacked high in the warehouse.

* * *

“My goodness…”

They were freshly printed, warm books.

Not actually warm, but that’s the feeling.

But Baek Seol, as if the books were indeed warm, approached the pile and rubbed her cheek against it.

If a girl who loves bread is called a ‘bread-lover’, then Baek Seol was a ‘book-lover’. (In fact, she was also a bread-lover)

“Do you like it that much?”

“Yes!”

Lim Yang-wook smiled, as if watching a child on their first visit to an amusement park.

And Baek Seol looked around the warehouse with bright eyes, just like a child on their first visit to an amusement park.

“These are… all the books we made? All of them?”

“No. I made them. You just watched.”

Baek Seol deliberately ignored his comment.

“How many books are there? It’s really a lot…”

“About 50,000, I guess?”

“…50,000?”

Baek Seol had not merely watched idly by Lim Yang-wook’s side. She studied his work carefully and had developed a sense of understanding.

50,000 copies.

The first edition of a book before any reprints is 50,000 copies.

“Huh?”

Am I misunderstanding something?

In an era where authors who can’t even sell 2,000 copies are common, 50,000 is a number only best-selling authors could dream of.

And, the cost of printing 50,000 books would be…

“Yikes!”

It would easily exceed hundreds of millions of won.

Judging by the quality of the book, the cost per copy wouldn’t be cheap either.

But 50,000 copies?

Is that even a plausible number?

“Team Leader, 50,000 is a number only best-selling authors aim for, isn’t it? Either I am mistaken, or you must have meant 5,000…”

Even 5,000 would be a lot.

So, 50,000 is just unimaginable…

“It’s 50,000.”

Baek Seol fell silent.

She doubted if she had heard it wrong.

Then she opened her mouth.

Because she couldn’t believe this reality.

Finally, she screamed.

Not for any specific reason.

It was just an involuntary outcry.

“Team Leadeeerrr-!”

“Why.”

Her hands and feet were trembling, and her heart started racing. Baek Seol, despite being part of a chaebol family, lived quite modestly. Her sense of money was similar to that of an average person.

“How, how can there be 50,000 copies…! What were you thinking to print 50,000 copies! No! With what money did you print 50,000 copies!”

“With my entire savings.”

“Ah…?”

She couldn’t understand.

So, a mere salaried employee.

Poured all his savings.

To print 50,000 copies of a book to sell?

Does that even make sense?

According to company rules, that’s…

No, is it even legal to begin with?

Baek Seol’s mind went blank.

She couldn’t continue speaking.

Lim Yang-wook looked at her and smiled leisurely.

“What’s the problem with a venture company president investing his own money in the business?”

“What are you talking about all of a sudden?”

“The Publishing Management Task Force Team isn’t just a department; it’s registered as an in-house venture company of Baekhak Entertainment.”

That was the trend these days.

Registering employees who handle potentially problematic tasks as an in-house venture company.

Then, if something goes wrong, there’s no need to fire each person individually; just terminating the contract with that ‘venture company’ will suffice.

Of course, the employees of that ‘venture company’ still wear their original company badges and go to the same office as before.

But technically, it’s a venture company.

On paper, that is. And paper is everything.

“There must have been some fancy English name for it, right? I’m the president of that company, at least administratively.”

But this raises a question.

Why then wasn’t Lim Yang-wook fired?

As a new employee, Baek Seol couldn’t ask such a question.

It wouldn’t be polite, person to person.

So Baek Seol kept her mouth shut.

But Lim Yang-wook read the question in her expression.

“Baek Seol, are you curious why I wasn’t fired?”

“A little bit…”

“Well, the government subsidies and tax benefits for the in-house venture are much more than what they pay me.”

“Oh.”

“Plus, if the government later finds fault, the company can just claim I defrauded them and kick me out, right?”

New employee Baek Seol felt afraid of society once more today…

Lim Yang-wook comforted the grim-faced Baek Seol.

“But it’s all for the best. Thanks to being registered as a separate corporation, we could proceed with our work without informing the higher-ups.”

“The higher-ups don’t know about the current situation?”

“What do entertainment business people know about publishing? Unless I tell them directly, they have no clue. They probably thought I was just holed up in the office all month. Did anyone even visit our office during that time?”

In Baekhak Entertainment, Lim Yang-wook was almost a mythical figure, similar to a ghost in the underground parking lot in terms of presence.

He was often mentioned when a superior warned a subordinate to listen to them if they didn’t want to end up like him.

Ironically, thanks to this, Lim Yang-wook was able to progress his work to this point without anyone knowing.

However, Baekhak Publishing was a different story. They were the rulers of this industry. Being there, he knew. Especially since he had fallen out with the publishing planning department, if caught, he wouldn’t be seeing anything good.

Luckily, Lim Yang-wook knew more about Baekhak Publishing than anyone else.

If he were to recall all the efforts he made to avoid being detected by Baekhak Publishing, he would be proud of himself.

But he decided to be content with his own understanding, knowing Baek Seol wouldn’t comprehend even if he explained.

“Hehehe…”

To Baek Seol, it seemed like Lim Yang-wook was suddenly laughing creepily to himself.

It was always like this, so she no longer found it surprising enough to react every time.

“So… how are you planning to sell these 50,000 books?”

“Well.”

“Ah, Team Leader, please…”

Fortunately, before Baek Seol developed stress-induced gastritis, Lim Yang-wook explained the outline of his business plan.

He tapped on the stacks of books.

“Once the books reach this stage of being physical and piled up, they are usually entrusted to a place called a distribution center. Then, as orders come in from bookstores scattered across the country, the distribution center staff deliver the books.”

“Like a wholesaler?”

“Exactly. The author is like a farmer, the distribution center is the wholesaler, and the bookstores are the retailers.”

“And what about us?”

“We’re like the unscrupulous distributors who take the grains from the farmers at a dirt-cheap price and sell them for a profit. We can also push around the wholesalers and retailers, so most of the money ends up with us. Sometimes, just for fun, we pit the farmers against each other to see who can grow rice better.”

“I’ll pretend I didn’t hear that.”

Baek Seol chose to ignore several dangerous statements in order to maintain pride in her profession.

But Lim Yang-wook didn’t stop there.

“Baekhak Publishing doesn’t need to wait for bookstores to order books. They have Baekhak bookstores all over the country, right? So, they just distribute the books nationwide through their distribution network. And if they place them right at the entrance, where everyone can see them as they walk in, how can they not sell? When I was there, I didn’t realize it, but they really do business the easy way…”

“Please, stop… I’m starting to feel ashamed of being an editor…”

“You still don’t get it, do you? Baek Seol, are you an editor? You’re just an assistant. An assistant.”

“That’s too harsh, really…”

Baek Seol hung her head in dejection.

Then, suddenly, she perked up.

“But, Team Leader.”

“What?”

“We’re not Baekhak Publishing.”

“Right.”

“So, how are we going to sell these 50,000 copies?”

“We’ll just sit in the warehouse and send them to the distribution center when orders come in.”

“That’s not what I meant! How are we going to get bookstores to order our book?”

“Well.”

“Ah! Seriously!”

* * *

“Um… Chief.”

“What? What’s the matter?”

Baekhak Publishing’s planning department chief, Yang Sung-jun, was enjoying a pleasant morning. It’s commonly understood that feeling good about going to work in the morning might indicate a serious mental condition, but for Yang Sung-jun, life at the company couldn’t be more enjoyable.

His subordinates feared him, and his superiors trusted him. His promotion was guaranteed with time, and his performance had amassed a substantial incentive.

What arduous journey had he undergone to reach this position? Outsmarting capable ones, getting rid of incompetents, dealing with stubborn guys like Lim Yang-wook… He had crushed them all.

Last month, Lim Yang-wook, completely bald and in an old suit, had come to him and been humiliated.

The guy he once thought was the most threatening had ended up like this. While it was somewhat pitiable, it also proved how high Yang Sung-jun had risen.

No need for a complicated explanation.

He felt good.

He had gotten rid of the guy who was lucky enough to join the company from a local university and was getting cocky over some good performance. And now, that guy had fallen so low.

Destroying one’s rival completely is a very rare experience in modern society, where personal conflicts are forbidden. Therefore, the sensation Yang Sung-jun was feeling was a special and exhilarating pleasure.

But what?

“Lim Yang-wook published a book?”

He refrained from calling him ‘that bastard’ only due to the minimum decorum required in the company.

But his subordinate sensed the displeasure in his words and shrank back guiltily.

“Yes, it’s been distributed to bookstores nationwide.”

“Does that even make sense? The manuscript he brought last time, was that it? Cause? Poet? Was it Cause? How did it get distributed nationwide?”

“He apparently won several literary awards at the same time…”

“Does that even sound plausible? I know perfectly well what the winning work of this spring’s literary contest is! Are you going to keep spouting nonsense?”

“I’m sorry, but if you look here…”

The subordinate handed over a smartphone displaying an online news article.

As soon as he saw the content, Yang Sung-jun understood everything Lim Yang-wook had done and what he intended to do next.

“This, thiis…!”

It’s quite rare for someone without any particular ailment to tremble with shock to such an extent.

Yang Sung-jun was experiencing that very emotion. Shock, fear, and rage exploded from his throat.

“That crazy bastard Lim Yang-wook-!!!”