Not for the First Time (Completed Main Story) - Chapter 7
“I’ve checked the scenario you sent. I’ll contact you as soon as the internal review is finished. Yes, go ahead and come in.”
After finishing the call with the planning director of a new film production company, Young In put down the phone and leaned her head against the chair’s headrest.
She was about to give her dry, tired eyes a short break when she heard a knock on the partition. Lifting her half-closed eyelids, she saw a chubby man’s face peeking over the top of the partition in front of her.
It was Kang Yu Gun, CEO of Hye Seong Entertainment.
“Team Leader Chae, did you not sleep last night?”
“I slept.”
Probably about three hours.
Young In swallowed the words that it wasn’t just yesterday—she hadn’t been sleeping well lately—and straightened her back.
“Is there something you want to talk about?”
“Come see me for a moment.”
Young In stood up and followed CEO Kang into the CEO’s office.
Sitting face-to-face with Young In on the sofa, CEO Kang got straight to the point.
“We’re selling Hye Seong to SL Entertainment. With comprehensive succession terms.”
After his mother, who had suffered from a long illness, passed away last year, he had fallen into severe burnout and decided to wind down Hye Seong Entertainment. Being betrayed by a trusted affiliated actor had also greatly influenced that decision. His plan was to close the company, rest for a while, and think about a different business.
“…SL Entertainment?”
“Why? Is something wrong?”
“No, it’s not that… You never even considered SL Entertainment before.”
“They made an offer with conditions that give absolutely no reason to refuse.”
“Ah, I see…”
Young In felt uneasy inside. Since SL Entertainment was one of the SL Group’s affiliates, it was only natural she couldn’t brush it off lightly.
“Young In, even if Hye Seong goes to SL, you are not quitting, right?”
CEO Kang was the older brother of Young In’s friend. That was why the two of them were much closer than a typical CEO-employee relationship.
“It sounds like you are saying I am not allowed to quit.”
“That’s right. Exactly.”
CEO Kang beamed and continued.
“At SL, they may not care about others, but they absolutely want to take you.”
“Me?”
CEO Kang looked at the puzzled Young In with an even more puzzled expression.
“Isn’t that obvious? You are Hye Seong’s ace.”
“Ace, my foot…”
“You are not quitting, right?”
Young In thought for a moment and nodded.
“Actually, I’ve always wanted to experience how a big company runs.”
Although entertainment wasn’t the core business of SL Group, SL Entertainment was large enough to rank among the top five domestic entertainment companies.
The reason Young In decided not to quit was because of something that happened a few days ago. If she hadn’t heard that Sung Hyuk was moving to SL Group’s management planning division, she would have firmly said she was quitting without any hesitation.
“Of course, of course. All of that is assets. It’ll be a huge help when you start your own company later.”
“Yes.”
SL Group has so many affiliates—why would they even care about the entertainment sector?
Young In brushed away the last bit of unease like that.
[This is the timeline separator]That night.
Young In, who had been forcing herself to sleep, eventually opened her eyes again.
Counting hundreds of sheep hadn’t worked, so she figured it was better to just work. She felt regret surging over wasting time when there was a mountain of scenarios waiting to be read.
She reached to the bedside table, turned on the lamp, and the orange light spread throughout the room.
Sitting up and leaning against the headboard, Young In grabbed the tablet PC beside the lamp and turned on the screen.
10:52 p.m.
She had lain down around 9:30, so she had been tossing and turning for almost an hour and a half.
Young In lightly stretched her stiff neck and shoulders and opened the scenario she had been reading.
There was endless work as the management team leader—supporting affiliated artists’ activities, meetings with industry figures, monitoring projects, tracking trends, writing press releases—but the task Young In valued most was script review.
Every script that came into Hye Seong Entertainment passed through Young In. It was fairly well-known both inside the company and in the industry that Young In had an excellent eye for works.
She pressed her dry eyes with her palms for a moment, about to focus on the text, when a faint vibration came from somewhere inside the blanket.
Young In reached into the blanket and pulled out her phone. An unsaved number was on the screen.
It wasn’t saved in her contacts, but she knew the number.
She wondered why, even though it wouldn’t be strange to have forgotten it long ago, Cha Sung Hyuk’s number still hadn’t disappeared from her memory after three whole years. She was even more curious why he was calling.
Her head knew she should ignore it if she didn’t want to get tangled up again, but her finger moved toward the answer button.
Perhaps it wasn’t about what he wanted to say—she might just want to hear his voice.
Even if she would regret this moment tomorrow after the sentimental night passed.
“Hello.”
-It’s me.
A voice heard in the same room felt different from a voice heard through the phone. It was a little lower, a little heavier.
-You picked up knowing it’s me.
“…”
-It’s one of the two. Either you lied about deleting my number, or you still remember it.
“I’ve never lied.”
-Then it’s the latter.
“…”
Silence answered instead of denial.
-I called because there’s something to tell you.
“What is it?”
Young In wrapped her folded legs with one arm and listened closely to his unusually sweet voice tonight.
-Oh Chang Geun became a dad. Some woman he had a one-night stand with showed up saying she’s pregnant.
The content was anything but sweet.
“Really?”
Young In’s expression remained calm.
-Just in case you think we’re birds of a feather, I’m telling you—I’m not close with Oh Chang Geun at all. I’m not like that guy.
“…”
Young In stayed silent, feeling that even saying “I know” would be insulting to him.
If it were Chae Beom Joon and Oh Chang Geun, maybe—but how could anyone lump Cha Sung Hyuk and Oh Chang Geun together as the same kind?
-It means there’s no woman who would show up saying she’s pregnant. I haven’t made a baby with anyone else since we broke up.
“…”
Embarrassment flickered across Young In’s face.
The fact that a pregnant woman went to Oh Chang Geun was far less shocking—thousands of times less—than the fact that Cha Sung Hyuk hadn’t slept with another woman in the past three years.
She had assumed he would quickly find someone else after their breakup. She had thought women would never leave him alone.
Not only had she known about his popularity since the days he was just her friend’s older brother, but having seen countless celebrities because of her job, she had never met a man more attractive than him—so it wasn’t unreasonable for her to think that way.
-They call this staying chaste, right?
Young In’s already embarrassed eyes widened.
“We broke up cleanly. Why would you stay chaste?”
-I didn’t plan it—it’s just that my body doesn’t react to other women.
Young In decided to say the words she couldn’t say a few days ago when Sung Hyuk came to her place.
“Sunbae, why are you doing this to me? What do you want?”
-You.
“…”
At that short single word, her heart dropped with a thud. There was no hesitation, no wavering in his answer.
-I want to go back to how things were.
Young In bit her lip so hard it could bleed and firmly cut him off.
“I have no intention of going back to how things were with you, sunbae.”
-If you didn’t like how things were, marriage is fine too.
Young In was old enough to know that marriage isn’t something that can work just because the two people want it.
That would be true for ordinary people, but for Cha Sung Hyuk, a member of the royal family representing South Korea, it was even more impossible. That was why she had let him go—before she liked him more, before she became a stain on his life.
“Sunbae, I’m seeing someone.”
-Don’t lie.
The drastic measure to silence nonsense was seen through pathetically fast. But she couldn’t accept it right away.
“Why are you so sure it’s a lie?”
-If you were seeing someone, no matter how much your family pressured you, you wouldn’t have gone on that blind date. I know Chae Young In well.
“…”
A bitter smile appeared on Young In’s lips.
He doesn’t even know why I said let’s break up. He doesn’t know that your mother came to see me.
-Chae Young In.
“…”
-Young In-ah.
Young In bit her lip hard. His low voice felt like it was digging into her heart.
She wanted to beg him not to call her like that. We’re already over, so please stop shaking me—she felt like pleading.
-Didn’t you miss me all this time?
“…”
Young In had to clench her teeth to stop the words “I missed you” from jumping out.
-I missed you. So much.
After a short silence, his resonant voice wrapped around her ear.
-Save my number on your phone too, not just in your head.
Young In stared at the ended call for a while, then saved Sung Hyuk’s number.
For the first time in three years, his name was back in her contacts.
[This is the timeline separator]Four days later, Young In and CEO Kang visited the SL Entertainment building together.
The building, with three basement levels and eight above-ground floors, was unique and sensual, making the most of curved aesthetics.
“Wow, this place is insane.”
Exclamations kept bursting from CEO Kang’s mouth.
“You are making me embarrassed.”
“…”
Only after Young In’s jab did he close his wide-open mouth.
The two had come to sign the finalized sale contract. Young In had reluctantly tagged along because CEO Kang had strongly insisted on her company.
When they reached the 8th floor, the head of the legal team was waiting in front of the elevator.
“Welcome. The CEO is waiting.”
They were immediately guided to the CEO’s office.
“Please go in.”
The moment Young In and CEO Kang stepped inside and saw the face of SL Entertainment’s CEO, both froze at the same time.
For different reasons.
CEO Kang, flustered at seeing an unfamiliar face, whispered quietly to the legal team head standing beside him.
“It’s… not CEO Hwang Seon Joo…?”
“It’s the newly appointed CEO Cha Sung Hyuk.”
Young In’s conviction that Sung Hyuk would never get involved in the entertainment business was beautifully shattered.
My Arch-enemy Sealed My Memory and Said That He is My Husband
This is an incredibly captivating story that you absolutely shouldn’t miss! I’ll give a brief introduction here, and below you’ll find a detailed synopsis of the plot.
The female lead is a fierce and powerful demon king. The male lead is a once-in-a-millennium celestial lord, admired by the entire cultivation world.
They are equally matched, legendary rivals who have battled for centuries.
In the final duel, the female lead is gravely injured. The male lead saves her, seals her memories, and hides her true identity. He tells her that he is her fiancé. His entire life has been flawless—except for the one thing he never expected, never controlled, and never wanted to control: falling for his greatest enemy. She is his inner demon, his obsession.
When the female lead regains her memories, she is furious at his deception.
She makes his life a living hell.
And somehow, the male lead—possibly a total masochist—doesn’t mind at all. In fact, he’s happy she’s paying attention to him.
Yep, we’re back to my favorite trope: male lead suffering. If you love this kind of story, jump into the pit with me now!!!
Intro
Dong Xia lost her memory.
Her handsome and extremely powerful fiancé Li Qing comforted her: “It’s okay if you can’t remember. I’ll always be with you.”
Everyone thought Dong Xia’s ancestors must have burned incense to get such a perfect fiancé. He was the number one person in the immortal realm, yet he remained chaste and only loved her.
…
The day before marrying her fiancé, Dong Xia finally remembered everything.
She wasn’t suffering from memory loss at all.
Her arch-enemy had made her fake her death, destroyed her cultivation, replaced her memories, and pretended to be her deeply in love fiancé.
No wonder he said, “It’s okay if you can’t remember”!
Dong Xia laughed coldly as she pulled out her long knife: Li Qing, prepare to die 🙂
*
Li Qing, as the supreme being of the immortal realm, was the people’s shining beacon.
The only unknown stain in his life was his affection for Dong Xia, the ruler of the demon realm.
In the final battle of the war between immortals and demons, the sky collapsed and the earth shattered. The ruler of the demon realm was finally slain under the sword of the supreme being of the immortal realm, and everyone in the immortal realm applauded.
The cultivation world lost a ruler of the demon realm.
And in the back mountain of Li Qing’s cave dwelling, he secretly hid away a fiancée.
Notes:
1. The female lead is white on the outside, black on the inside, and the queen of flattery; the male lead repeatedly tests the edge of darkness, a VIP guest at the crematorium.
2. Fantasy cultivation world setting.
[Touch the gear icon in the bottom right corner of the screen to move to the next chapter if you want.]
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