I Woke Up as the Villain

Choi Woo-Jae's power in the family was absolute. For this reason, when most of the family members stood in front of him, they had to walk on eggshells. The sharp words he spoke would only cause the family member’s heads to fall low and go numb.

In fact, Choi Mi-Na was the only one who deviated from that behavior. That naturally earned her the jealousy and envy of many siblings. Sometimes, they became angry at her due to their inferiority complex.

Thanks to this, and her arrogant personality which clearly resembled Choi Woo-Jae, Choi Mi-Na had become a loner in the whole family.

‘If you are jealous, why don’t you just work hard and do better? They can do nothing but choose to backstab… Just go out to the dungeon, hunt, and train.’

Choi Mi-Na didn't filter her thoughts, and she also spoke arrogantly. In fact, she had surprised Choi Woo-Jae more than once because of that.

‘She's my daughter, but I agree that she's persistent.’ 

From a young age, even before she became a player, Choi Mi-Na was the only child who talked back to Woo-Jae and sometimes refused to listen. The biggest incident that had happened was when Choi Woo-Jae had tried to send Choi Mi-Na to the U.S. to study. She had refused to leave Korea just because she didn't want to go abroad. She had even asked why she had to leave when she was good at studying anyway.

Choi Woo-Jae had scolded her at that time, but Mi-Na’s reaction had been very different from his other children. If it were like his other children, she would have dropped her head from the slight scolding. However, she had insisted until the very end and cried that she would not go abroad even if she had to die.

Back then, Choi Woo-Jae had been so angry that he took away all of her authority, money, and cards, and had kicked her out of the house. Mi-Na had only been left with clothes, shoes, and the bag that she had at the time. She had also been completely broke.

The interesting thing here was that Choi Mi-Na had simply spat at the front door while crying, shouting that she would not live in this disrespectful house. She had then turned her back and left the neighborhood.

Choi Mi-Na had gone on to sell the limited-edition sneakers that she usually wore to raise funds to buy new sneakers, which turned out to be another limited-edition pair that she had to stay in line for 12 hours during a cold winter morning.

However, the most surprising thing was that she had hired about ten foreigners who had low labor costs with the money she had gotten from selling her original pair of limited-edition sneakers. Then, she had them stand in line with her and had eventually gotten her hands on three pairs of limited-edition sneakers, which she easily resold afterward.

‘She left without a penny but deposited 800 won in her bank account in three days.’ 

With that money in her bank account, Mi-Na had gone on to start an illegal street business. She had set up the stall right next to those who had been lining up in the cold to buy the limited-edition shoes.

The daughter of a conglomerate group had become the owner of an illegal street stall! So what did she, the princess who never did harsh work in her life, sell? She had sold the fish cake soup that she had learned to make from a Newtube video. Also, despite being a minor back then, she had even secretly bought and sold alcohol.

On any ordinary day, a glass of soju with some hot fish cake soup wasn’t anything special. However, due to it being in the middle of winter, the business had turned out to be quite successful. It also did help that Choi Mi-Na was rather beautiful.

If her story had finished here, Choi Woo-Jae would have just clicked his tongue and thought that Mi-Na would one day regret upon suffering a big loss.

However, with the money she had earned, Mi-Na had gone on to design a few clothes that she had interest in, set up an Internet pop-up shopping mall, and advertised them through one of her acquaintances, a male entertainer.

'Was she 17 years old then? She earned about 160 million won, after five months of leaving the house.’ 

It was really incredible and hard to believe. In the end, Choi Woo-Jae had called Choi Mi-Na back home. He had learned to respect her opinion and had said he would never talk about studying abroad again. That had been on the condition that she had to end both the street stall illegal business and the clothing brand business.

‘She’s my daughter, but a crazy one.’ 

Choi Mi-Na still was like that. The other children would bow their heads as soon as they entered Woo-Jae’s office, but Mi-Na just nodded slightly and casually went around the office with a big step. After saying, “I’m here”, she would simply sprawl out on the wide sofa.

"Whew, I'm so tired. I'll take a five minute break, father," Mi-Na said as she closed her eyes.

Even when Choi Ji-Ho was in a privileged situation, he didn’t act like Choi Mi-Na.

‘When it comes to individual talent, she’s definitely the best in the family.’

This part included Choi Woo-Jae himself. At the age of 19, Mi-Na had Awakened on her own and became a hunter, quickly achieving an S-rank which was rare in the family. She was also exceptionally strong even within the same S-rank.

'Honestly, I think it would be hard for me to fight her directly now.’ 

Mi-Na was a daughter who was good at every single thing. Nevertheless, there was only one reason why Woo-Jae did not choose Mi-Na as the heir.

“Yes, yes, I like a lot of things about you but this one aspect… You didn't get any of them this time?” asked Woo-Jae.

Choi Mi-Na, who was closing her eyes, opened her eyes and looked at Choi Woo-Jae. She said, “What am I to do? I just don’t like working with people.”

"What's so hard about sitting back and telling them what to do? And didn't you do it well when you ran away from home when you were 17?" Choi Woo-Jae clicked his tongue.

Mi-Na’s talent as a hunter was equal to Choi Ji-Ho, but her sense of battle was overwhelming. Her business skills were also undeniable. She had left home alone at the mere age of 17 and had started a successful business.

Woo-Jae heard that Mi-Na was still running a store in Itaewon very well. The problem was, as he said, she just hated people so much. She didn’t know how to keep people near her.

'What a cock of the walk.’ 

It was his daughter, but Woo-Jae couldn't understand Choi Mi-Na.

"I only did it then because I thought I was going to die if I didn’t.”

"What about now? You are running a bar in Itaewon.”

Choi Mi-Na messed up her hair as if she was annoyed. "I have that place in case you kick me out of the house again."

"Don't you have something else in mind?"

"No, I don't. What are you thinking? Even if I did, I can't fool you with my abilities.” Choi Mi-Na scowled and then closed her eyes again as if she was annoyed.

It was a trivial action, but Woo-Jae could infer something different.

‘There must be something…’

Choi Woo-Jae was somewhat instinctively aware of the fact, but he did not bother to ask.

‘It must be about her mother, tsk.' 

Even Woo-Jae thought her mother’s death, who had been his second wife, was really a pity. Where could Choi Mi-Na's sharp business sense come from?

‘I would feel very reassured if she took charge of one of my affiliate companies by now… She was a very reliable woman.’

It was a pity in many ways, but it was already in the past.

"Forget what you have to forget. If you don't let it go, it'll hold you back forever," said Woo-Jae.

“...”

Choi Woo-Jae lightly clicked his tongue and continued to talk. "The guild registration card is out, and the office is ready. There's a lot of guys to handle the office, and I just need a central member. Since you said you don’t want anyone from the family, I selected some good candidates. But things haven't been going on here for days.”

"That's why I met two of them today. But what should I do if I don't like any of them?"

"Are you picking your husband or something? I'm not asking you to find a guy that suits you."

"What do you mean ‘husband’? Do I look like I'm going to get married? Please give up and tell Choi In-Young to go to a gooood~ place that suits her," said Mi-Na.

"Again, you're going off on a tangent. Aahh..." said Woo-Jae. Once again, he clicked his tongue and hardened his expression. "No more hesitation would be accepted. The Cheon-Ji Group and the Dae-Hyun Group also don't like us starting our guild business. If you drag it long, they will use whatever means possible to interfere."

"Well, that’s because they have their own guild. The reason why our company has not become the No. 1 business in Korea so far was because we didn’t have a guild business."

The current position of the Comet group was third in the domestic business world.

In fact, it was the result of not being able to carry out the guild business even though they had the upper hand in all other businesses. What was interesting was that everyone thought that Choi Woo-Jae could not carry out his guild business. They weren’t completely wrong.

"In the meantime, it was inevitable because the man in the presidency received money from the Cheon-Ji and Daeh-Yeon group,” said Woo-Jae.

"But you could have done it if you wanted to, right? It's not like the president didn't take your money."

Choi Woo-Jae smiled and stroked his short beard. "You have to be sure when you put the dagger in. It happened when I was young. Maybe it was because I was still at an age where I had the spirit, so I handled things rather poorly. It could have not gone that far, but a family completely collapsed. One person died, and I also became worried about it."

"No way, are you feeling sorry for them?"

When Choi Mi-Na asked him, Choi Woo-Jae smiled strangely instead of giving a clear answer. "At that time, I was still short of strength. There was a lot of trouble when a cornered rat came at me to bite. Besides, the opponents this time are the Dae-Hyun and the Cheon-Ji group,” said Woo-Jae.

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"If you're going to strike the neck, strike it with certainty," replied Mi-Na.

Woo-Jae smiled satisfactorily at Mi-Na's response and stood up from his seat. "So now is the chance. This year marks the fourth year of his presidency. It's about time that even the political aristocrats started to make a fuss that they cannot give too much attention here as they had to prepare for the next presidential election. Besides, a whimsical person like you decided to work with me. Is it because of Yu-Seong?”

Choi Mi-Na's eyebrows momentarily trembled from Choi Woo-Jae's sudden sharp words. It was a small change, but Woo-Jae did not miss that reaction. He said, "No need to get surprised. Recently, Yu-Seong has been doing a lot of noticeable things. Normally, the other children would not stay still. But all of them are turning blind, focused on the guild business. Yu-Seong is just coming up, besides, you're already too big. At least five of them must form an alliance to stop you."

"If you know all that, I'd appreciate it if you wouldn't bother me,” Mi-Na said.

"I can't do that now. If I fail the guild business this time, I will have another chance someday, but raising children is not like that."