Descent of the Demon Master

“You stinking pieces of traaaaaash!” Ju Yeong-Gi's voice, tinged with sorrow and lamentation—and a healthy dollop of rage—rang out within the pizzeria.

And the two targets of his yell couldn't dare express their dissatisfaction as they knew the insults and scolding were fully justified this time.

“I'm sorry,” said Kang Jin-Ho.

“Yeah, me too...” Park Yu-Min lowered his head.

Ju Yeong-Gi's face reddened even more as he began pointing fingers at his friends. “You think your apologies can fix this?! You bastards! People might think I'm the boss and you two are my lackeys or something! Even part-timers wouldn't act like you two nowadays! You think everything will be fine just because something happened, and you couldn't be bothered to pitch up to work! Ah?!”

“...I'm sorry.”

“Blooming hell! Kids these days just don't have any sense of duty! So bloody irresponsible, I tell ya! My generation would never dare do this kinda nonsense!”

Although they were of the same age, Ju Yeong-Gi had entered the job market (?) earlier than his friends, giving him the necessary experience and clout to lecture his friends like a boomer nearing his retirement date!

“You shouldn't behave like that when you're working for someone else, don't you know that! You must, at the very least, finish the work assigned to you first before going off on your merry ways! Am I wrong?! Isn't your intention the most important thing regardless of whatever you're trying to do?! In that case, how dare you not get your asses to work when it hasn't been that long since we opened our doors?! Ah?!”

Kang Jin-Ho and Park Yu-Min progressively shrunk back more and more.

'This is uncomfortable...'

'Wow, I'm scared...'

One of the most dreadful situations in this world was getting lectured, nay, nagged, with fact bombs. Obviously, no one would want to sit through a round of nagging. However, every word spoken was factually correct, and the targets of nagging this time were definitely in the wrong, so they couldn't even try to justify or create excuses for themselves.

That was the situation these two men found themselves in.

“...Yeong-Gi, please listen to us. Jin-Ho didn't do this deliberately, you know?” Park Yu-Min tried to defend his friend.

“Say what now?” Ju Yeong-Gi scowled scarily at Park Yu-Min.

“Well, uh... The situation with the kids was...”

“Kiiiiiids?” Ju Yeon-Gi's eyes gleamed dangerously just then.

Park Yu-Min flinched nastily. Why did it feel like he had unwisely stirred a hornet's nest just now?

“If you were worried about those kids, you should've shown them how hard-working you are! Tell me, are they gold spoons? Gold spoons like this punk?!” Ju Yeong-Gi pointed at Kang Jin-Ho while yelling.

Technically speaking, Kang Jin-Ho was a mud spoon who used an alchemy-like method to transmute the material of his spoon into gold, but he had a hunch that keeping his mouth closed was a wiser move in this situation.

“Those kids will have to work their butts off to survive after leaving the orphanage! In that case, why are you so-called adults showing them it's okay to skip work for all sorts of random reasons?! How do you expect the kids to learn something useful with that kind of example?! Wake the hell up, you idiots! Life is a constant battle!”

“...”

“Are you gonna look after those kids for the rest of your lives? Are you their parents or something! Do it in moderation, you damn idiots! Sure, treating those kids well is great and all. But don't you know they'll become too dependent on you if you keep this up?”

“...My apologies.”

“Yeah, I'm really sorry.”

Kang Jin-Ho and Park Yu-Min bowed deeply. Ju Yeong-Gi's daily lecture on life was just as impactful as before.

“You insane bastards. If that was your plan, at least you could've sent replacements to the pizzeria! What was I supposed to do when all the kids working part-time suddenly failed to show up? Do you have any idea how freaked out I was while trying to find enough workers at the last minute?!”

“...My bad.”

Kang Jin-Ho couldn't say anything to excuse himself. It felt like he was discovering new mistakes he had made in the past every time Ju Yeong-Gi said something. He couldn't help but get swept up in the self-doubt of “Have I been this terrible with my life?”

Park Yu-Min blinked his eyes and looked around the pizzeria. “I have to say, though... Things look pretty good, don't they?”

“...You think so, too?” Ju Yeong-Gi scratched his head. The dining hall was packed to the brim with customers even now. “Well, the business has been pretty good. I won't deny that.”

“...”

“And all we did was add a few new items to our menu, too.”

Park Yu-Min gravely nodded away. “I told you, Yeong-Gi. You're born for this kind of work.”

Kang Jin-Ho chimed in unnecessarily. “Except for interior decorations.”

“Want some of this?!” Ju Yeong-Gi raised his hand high up as if he wanted to smack the daylight out of his friend. However, he suddenly groaned loudly before lowering his hand. “Since that's been brought up, there's something I gotta talk to you about, Jin-Ho.”

“Okay?”

“...Any thoughts of opening another branch?”

“Eh?” Kang Jin-Ho's jaw dropped slightly in stupefaction.

***

“Okay, so... Someone came to you about opening a branch store?”

Ju Yeong-Gi nodded at Kang Jin-Ho's question. “Yeah.”

“A branch store... Hmm.” Kang Jin-Ho rubbed his chin, then offered his honest opinion. “How reckless.”

Park Yu-Min nodded. “I gotta agree with Jin-Ho on this one. Does that person want to throw away money that badly?”

“What the hell, you punks...!” Ju Yeong-Gi's anger flared up again, but...

But Kang Jin-Ho remained resolute. The thing about running a pizzeria was that anyone could do it. Anyone with enough skills to bake pizzas could open one, but the store could fail just as easily, too. That was because differentiating one's product from a rival store's was not as easy as it sounded.

Even Kang Jin-Ho's store would've failed a long time ago if it hadn't been for several favorable factors happening one after the other. Unless it was a well-known franchise boasting a deep pocket, a store would usually lose out to a more established rival in terms of public awareness and marketing. The new store's owner would steadily eat away at their starting funds until they ran out of money.

Park Yu-Min curiously asked, “What was on that person's mind while asking you about opening a branch store?”

Ju Yeong-Gi shrugged his shoulders. “I guess he thought our pizzeria was doing exceptionally well.”

“Okay? So, what did you do?”

“I showed him how much we spend on the ingredients, among other things... And he said he'll be back later.”

“Oh. He's not coming back, then.”

“Yup.”

If that person still wanted to have a go even after taking a gander at the ledgers, he deserved to go bankrupt. Kang Jin-Ho's pizzeria was only in the black because of the flood of customers. The branch store might do okay if it got half as many customers, but that 'half' would be like gangbuster business for other pizzerias!

In other words, opening a franchise store was realistically impossible.

“So, I had another idea…” Ju Yeong-Gi cautiously piped up.

“Mm?” Kang Jin-Ho tilted his head.

“A franchise-style branch store won't cut it, so...”

“Okay?”

“How about opening a directly-managed branch store instead?”

“...Mm?”

Ju Yeong-Gi shrugged his shoulders. “I realized something while you guys weren't here. As long as we can recreate Jin-Ho-specific recipes, running this store isn't as hard as it looks. I mean, we can already get pretty close in taste to Jin-Ho's pizzas after he told us about the methods, right?”

Park Yu-Min nodded slowly. Initially, Kang Jin-Ho had to bake all the pizzas since no one could replicate his baking style. That shouldn't be surprising since no one else could use the Blazing Sun Energy technique.

Kang Jin-Ho realized this was unsustainable and began modifying the stove to increase the firepower. He didn't stop there and even came up with various other methods until his friends could bake similar pizzas to his.

Although they still couldn't match up to the original's taste, the customers seemed satisfied enough with the product.

“Yeah, that's true.”

“So, I was thinking that instead of opening a franchise... We just go ahead and open another store. As long as we get a good chef, I don't think it's gonna be too hard to manage the new place.”

“And you'll be in charge of the management for both stores?”

Ju Yeong-Gi briefly nodded. “Yeah.”

Kang Jin-Ho furrowed his brow slightly.

'A sister store, huh...'

The idea didn't sound bad. Not just Park Yu-Min, but even Kang Jin-Ho had begun thinking that Ju Yeong-Gi was surprisingly good at running a business. No, Ju Yeong-Gi wasn't the type of manager who crunched numbers and pored over the ledgers everyday in his office, but a man who rolled up his sleeves and directly jumped into the thick of it. That kind of a manager.

No one could deny that Ju Yeong-Gi and his hard work were largely responsible for turning this mess of a pizzeria into a growing and sustainable business venture.

'Right. And the store found its footing only after Yu-Min and I became more of absentee fathers...'

Kang Jin-Ho and Park Yu-Min suddenly became depressed after realizing that... They were actually obstacles to the store's success!

Park Yu-Min frowned slightly. “That's not gonna be as easy as it sounds, though. Finding people to work in the store is the hardest part, right?”

Ju Yeong-Gi shrugged his shoulders again. “Nah. It's not that hard when hiring full-time, actually. I mean, we are in the age of youth unemployment hitting ten percent, so how hard would it be to find willing workers?”

“Even if that's the case, finding trustworthy kitchen staff will still be hard, right?”

“Well, sure. For now, at least. First of all, we'll start with them,” Ju Yeong-Gi pointed at the part-timers waiting tables in the dining hall.

“Mm?” Kang Jin-Ho and Park Yu-Min tilted their heads.

“They aren't some university students working part-time to pay for their tuition. I only hired the potential full-time workers, you see. The hard workers among them will be upgraded to kitchen staff, then I'm gonna teach them how to bake our pizzas.”

“Hmm...” Kang Jin-Ho rubbed his chin.

“And when we open a sister branch, I'll have to go there for a few months until things stabilize...”

“...And you'll repeat what you did here in the branch, too?”

“Basically, yeah.”

“Mm…” Park Yu-Min and Kang Jin-Ho both seriously pondered this option.

Find the original at bit.ly/3iBfjkV.

Park Yu-Min thought this matter was not something he could carelessly offer his opinion. Increasing the number of stores could lead to higher revenues, but it'd require a larger budget, too.

All the investment for the pizzeria came straight out of Kang Jin-Ho's pocket. Which meant he had the final say in this matter.

Park Yu-Min glanced at Kang Jin-Ho. “Opening a new store will cost quite a lot of money, though...?”

“Mm, that's right,” said Ju Yeong-Gi. “That's why I came up with a new plan!”

“Eh?”

Ju Yeong-Gi turned his attention to Kang Jin-Ho. “Dude. It's time to let go of this place.”

“...Mm?” Kang Jin-Ho tilted his head at this sudden recommendation. “What are you talking about?”

“You're gonna return to your studies pretty soon, right?”

“Well, yeah.”

“You won't be able to mind this place while studying, right? Besides, your goal isn't to become a boss of a pizzeria, am I wrong?”

“...No, I don't think it is.” Kang Jin-Ho slowly shook his head.

Ju Yeong-Gi's expression grew more serious. “Besides, you're basically no longer involved in the pizzeria's business nowadays, anyway.”

“That's not true,” said Kang Jin-Ho.

“Nah, dude. If it's not your number one priority, then you should just forget about it.”

“...”

“You mustn't underestimate this thing called running a business, okay? You're busy with this, busy with that... If a business is something you could run during the break time in-between your other, more urgent work, anyone would've become super successful.”

Kang Jin-Ho silently nodded away. He couldn't deny that Ju Yeong-Gi's observation pretty much hit the bull's eye on his attitude toward his own pizzeria.

“I'm not trying to bite your head off, Jin-Ho. It's just that that's the reality here. To you, this pizzeria will serve as a nice memory as long as it can sustain itself. But it's still not a priority in your mind, right? It's not a place where you'll bet everything of yours to keep it going. Am I wrong?”

“Mm...”

“That means, you believe it won't be a problem even if the pizzeria goes under. Because... You have money. However, I guarantee you this. You run this place with that mindset? It's gonna go bankrupt in no time at all.”

“...You're right, Yeong-Gi.” Kang Jin-Ho readily agreed with Ju-Yeong-Gi's assessment.

'I've been a little too arrogant about this, haven't I?'

Since things had been working out pretty well lately, Kang Jin-Ho started thinking that even the pizzeria would sustain itself without too much input from him. Even though he knew that every organization would start to crumble from such a mindset...

Kang Jin-Ho was freshly reminded of the fact that putting one's words into action was one of the hardest things in the entire world.

Kang Jin-Ho slowly nodded. “I see. So, the conclusion is to close up the pizzeria, then?”

“Huh? What are you on about?” Ju Yeong-Gi's brows shot up. “I never said that, dude!”

“Mm? But didn't you tell me to let this place go?”

“Yeah. YOU let this place go. I'll be staying.”

“Huh?”

Ju Yeong-Gi smirked deeply. “Hand the ownership over to me. You can stay as an investor. Until I finish paying off the investment, I'll give you all the revenue earned minus my wage. That being said, the final ownership percentage will be fifty-fifty between you and me, pal. And the revenue will also be shared half-half.”

Park Yu-Min tilted his head at that offer. “What does that mean?”

“It means I'll be in full charge of running the store. Yu-Min, you gotta get back to preparing for the new season, right? And Jin-Ho will be going back to school soon, too. Of course, since I'll be in charge, the profit from the store will be shared between me and Jin-Ho here. That's my idea.”

“Oh...” Park Yu-Min slowly nodded.

This suggestion didn't sound bad at all. For one, both Kang Jin-Ho and Park Yu-Min had things to do, so focusing on the pizzeria was out of the question. In that case, leaving it to Ju Yeong-Gi seemed to be the best option.

From Ju Yeong-Gi's perspective, this was no different from finally finding that one thing he was good at. Besides, he was also passionate about this work, so everything seemed like a perfect fit.

“The store will be managed by Miss Jeong Su-Yeon and me. We'll take good care of it, so don't worry. Besides, managing a few pizzerias here and there isn't my end goal, anyway. Nope. I'm actually aiming to gradually increase the number of sister stores until we become big enough to rival other major franchises!”

“Mm...” Kang Jin-Ho contemplatively nodded. “I agree. It sounds like a good idea.”

“Right?” Ju Yeong-Gi smiled brightly.

“However, if we all agree to do this, and a new store needs to open, the new issue will be about who foots the bill. So…”

“Don't worry, man. I told you, I've already thought of a solution for that!” Ju Yeong-Gi triumphantly declared.

“Oh, really? Let's hear it, then.”

“I know of a suitable investor. He's got plenty of money but no places to spend it.”

“...Mm?” Kang Jin-Ho cocked an eyebrow.

Ju Yeong-Gi grinned like a smooth operator while bending forward ninety degrees at Kang Jin-Ho. “It's my pleasure to make your acquaintance, dear potential investor, sir!”

“...”

“I'd like you to invest in this venture, good sir! An opportunity like this doesn't come around often, you see? I promise you, you shall receive a several-fold return on your investment!”

“...Get lost.”

“Kyah~! Look how decisive you are, sir! At this rate, we'll be opening our tenth store pretty soon! Uwhahahahaha~!”

Kang Jin-Ho groaned under his breath as Ju Yeong-Gi burst into a heroic guffaw.

'Gee whiz. Everyone around me is abnormal...'

This life could be so headache-inducing sometimes!