I Became the Youngest Daughter of a Chaebol Family-Chapter 39: Myrian (2)

I can't believe I managed to kidnap that Ellen Marshall so easily.

Truly... what a touching moment.

He just stared at me with a dumb look on his face. Guess he still hadn’t figured out what the hell was going on.

Dude, you’ve been kidnapped.

“...So, uh, what... what is this?”

That’s all he managed to say, totally lost. Ellen still had no clue.

But since I’m such a merciful person, I didn’t shove a gun in his face or anything. Instead, I decided to indulge his little fantasy.

“I came here because I wanna be your friend!”

“...?”

I smiled sweetly and nodded.

“Oh, right. Let me introduce myself first. My name’s Yoo Ha-yeon, but I already know who you are, so no need for intros. You’re Ellen Marshall, right?”

A chaebol heiress, genius-level IQ, drop-dead gorgeous girl like me, setting up her own boy-meets-girl plot? No teenage boy could resist that.

Especially not one deep in puberty.

“How...?”

Guess he still had a shred of rational thought left, since he asked while keeping his guard up. Even so, he kept sneaking glances at me, which was kinda cute.

‘Damn, I’ve picked up a bad habit.’

Why is messing with people so fun?

“I saw the code you posted in that magazine. Pretty interesting stuff.”

“...You found me because of the game code I posted?”

I nodded brightly.

“Yup!”

Ellen didn’t even ask how I tracked him down just from that. I mean, there aren’t exactly a lot of girls in Korea driving around in a Benz with a hot secretary.

Especially not ones with the last name Yoo.

“Why though?”

“You seemed smart. I don’t have anyone decent to talk to. Don’t you think most people are kinda stupid?”

“....”

Okay, I don’t actually think that. Intelligence and wisdom are totally different things, and I’ve done my fair share of dumb shit too.

Take Chairman Yoo Seong-pil or Kim Hae-ik, for example—both way more brilliant than I ever was in my past life. And even now, they’re probably on par with me. I like to think of myself as a humble genius.

But... Ellen? He’s different. Sure, his dad was smart, but not even close to Ellen Marshall’s level.

“So, you’re telling me some rich girl like you came all the way here just because of that? What was that stuff earlier about ‘get in the car’?”

“That? Just something I’ve always wanted to say. It was on my bucket list after watching some old spy movie.”

“....”

Thankfully, Ellen was just as much of a weirdo as me, so he got it.

Or maybe he just gave up trying.

“And because I am a rich girl, I could come here to meet you. Right?”

“I guess... when you put it like that.”

Honestly, back in the day, people used to do all kinds of crazy stuff just from reading a short article or note in a magazine. This was before the internet, after all.

Hiring someone just from a code snippet in a magazine? Nothing. There were guys recruiting for suicide missions to the South Pole, and tons of people actually signed up. Some women even moved halfway across the world to marry strangers based on a single photo.

That’s the kind of wild romance the 20th century had.

Give it a few decades and even this absurd little episode will be spun into “a fateful meeting between two geniuses.”

“Alright, let’s head to the office now! Si-hyun, let’s go!”

“...Yes, ma’am.”

-Vroom!

With a smooth hum, the black sedan sped down the street. Ellen still hadn’t come back to his senses—he kept pinching his cheek or staring blankly out the window.

Then, as if something just clicked, he turned to me.

“...Wait, hold on. Office? What office?”

“Didn’t I say? I own a little company. Why do you think I came looking for you?”

“You said you wanted a friend...”

“You didn’t even put your name in that magazine code. At first, I didn’t know you were thirteen.”

I did know, but I had plenty of excuses ready.

Pigmalion Soft was about to dive headfirst into software development, after all.

“Originally, I was gonna scout a programmer for my company. But then I found out—surprise! There’s someone in this country who’s kinda like me.”

I gave him a sweet smile and poked him in the chest with my index finger.

His face turned bright red.

***

Pigmalion Soft is a game company—and a software company. But we don’t make game software.

Why? Because there’s no money in it.

Right now, my company does two things: importing badass foreign games like Tetris and distributing them, and developing software for internal use within Daehwa Group.

Obviously, I’m one of the best developers in Daehwa Group—no, in the whole damn country. With a reincarnated brain turbocharged by future knowledge, there’s no way I couldn’t be a programming genius.

Getting software contracts? Piece of cake. All the programmers in Korea are studying our code right now.

“P-Pigmalion Soft? You’re telling me you run that company?”

So... Ellen knew about my company too.

He stood there, mouth hanging open, staring at the company sign like he was mesmerized. Honestly, he looked more excited than when he was staring at my perfect face.

“Technically, I’m not the CEO. I own it.”

“That’s basically the same thing! So you are the Daehwa Group heiress?”

I felt both proud and weirdly amused. Seeing Ellen Marshall react like this to my company? Kinda satisfying.

“Don’t be too shocked just yet, heh. Come on, let’s go inside.”

I giggled and led Ellen into the office. With full confidence, I waved at the CEO.

“Hey, I brought a friend! Mind showing him around a bit? Cool?”

“Oh, sure.”

The CEO glanced at Ellen and turned back to what he was doing. Ellen’s burning eyes just got even more intense.

Updat𝓮d from freewēbnoveℓ.com.

Yeah, this is it.

To think that the Ellen Marshall—one of the most powerful people in the world in my past life—is reacting this passionately!

A shiver of pure thrill ran down my spine, and feeling pumped, I started showing Ellen around the place.

“This here’s the office computer. I picked it up last year from Yongsan Electronics Market when they opened.”

–Thunk.

He practically flew over to the computer, grabbed onto it, practically drooling.

“Holy shit, this is a Macintosh II? Wow! And an Amiga 2000! How the hell did you even get one of these...?”

Of course, the fact that he’s drooling over the Mac and Amiga before even looking at the IBM tells me he’s still got that hipster streak.

“What do you think? Pretty nice, right? It’s got 80MB of storage and 8MB of RAM.”

To me, someone who remembers my past life, this is painfully primitive, but by current standards? This thing is cutting-edge.

The only machine I own that’s better than this is the Cray supercomputer I stashed in the US under the Alpha Fund’s name.

Originally, I wanted to bring it to the basement of Daehwa Securities, but... Korea’s first supercomputer, the Cray-2S, is officially coming here under government control in November this year. Bringing mine in first would’ve drawn too much attention, so I gave up on that plan.

Not to mention the thing cost over 10 million dollars. That stings.

“...Wow.”

But Ellen had only ever used standard home computers, so this was more than enough to blow his mind.

Like he was hypnotized, he let out a short gasp and powered it on.

“These colors are insane. Can I... can I try it out?”

I generously gave him permission. Praise from someone smart? Never gets old.

“Sure, go ahead. Your computer’s what, 16 colors? Take your time, I’m not going anywhere. Heh, just don’t break it.”

Finally, some reason returned to Ellen’s eyes, and he flinched.

“Ah, uh, yeah. Right.”

Yeah, yeah. The way he totally loses it around high-end computers says it all.

He powered up the Amiga 2000 and started fiddling with it, then spoke up with a trembling voice.

“...How many colors is this? It’s way more than 256, right?”

“4096.”

This is the best quality personal computer I could get my hands on. It’s not as powerful as the Macintosh, but in terms of color? Top tier.

“...!”

Oh-ho, yes. That’s the reaction I was waiting for.

Praise me more, come on.

Being worshipped by my past life’s nemesis (even if it was one-sided)? Kinda feels like I’m finding peace. Enlightenment, even...

Anyway, hedge funds scamming people out of their money is just what they do, and this guy bitched about it like it was something special. Even thinking about it now pisses me off.

He didn’t even try to help out a fellow Korean-American—just posted mockery online. That’s not happening in this life.

“Whew, that was fun. Thanks. You’re Yoo Ha-yeon... right?”

After spending the whole afternoon playing around with the computers, Ellen thanked me as we left the office, the sun already setting.

I smiled brightly and nodded.

“Yup. Ellen, today was fun. Let’s hang out again sometime?”

Guess he wasn’t used to girls, because he blushed and looked away.

“Uh, but... you said you wanted to hire me?”

“Hmm, I still kinda do. But you’re a minor, so it’s tricky. Let’s just meet up now and then and chat.”

“....”

For a second, his eyes flashed with disappointment, but then he looked determined. Like he’d just made up his mind about something.

“Meeting often... that’s good, right?”

“Well, sure. But I’m busy, so we can’t meet too often. If you wait about three years, I’ll transfer to whatever middle school you’re going to, so we can hang out for about a year then.”

Ellen stroked his chin, looking thoughtful.

‘Hah, doesn’t even realize how lucky he is.’

A beautiful girl like me actually saying all this to him? He should be thanking me.

“I’ve got an idea.”

“What is it?”

“Not sure if it’ll work, so it’s a secret. But don’t worry too much. I’m really good at making things happen.”

Yeah, I know. He is Ellen Marshall, after all.

He gave me a cheerful wave and headed home.

For some reason, I felt... uneasy.

“....”

Why do I feel so nervous?

I had this exact same feeling when that bastard called my fund a “massive scam” in my past life....

***

Two weeks later, Monday morning.

I was at school, pinching my cheek in disbelief.

‘What the hell? Am I seeing things?’

A teenage boy, smiling awkwardly, was waving at me.

It was Ellen.

“...Hey.”

Ah, right.

As soon as he found out about conscription, he strong-armed his dad into getting him US citizenship, ditched his Korean nationality the moment he turned eighteen, and ran off to America. That insane drive of his? Still here, clearly.

Yup, this little shit would totally do something like this.

But why the hell is he here? This is the 4th grade classroom.

Just then, the homeroom teacher stepped up and gave a friendly explanation.

“Alright, everyone? We have a new student joining us. This is Ellen Marshall, so be nice and make him feel welcome, okay? ...Go sit over there. Got it?”

What.

Why are you coming here?

I stood up and whispered to him.

“...Why are you still in 4th grade? You’re two years older than me. Weren’t you supposed to be in 6th?”

“I flunked. Wanted to spend more time with computers.”

What a crazy bastard.

“...For two years? Are you insane?”

“Yeah. I was only planning on one year, but... ~Nоvеl𝕚ght~ my dad beat me, and I ended up in the hospital, so I had to stay back another year. Actually worked out better this way.”

Shit, I didn’t know that.

I felt a little bad, but I decided to play it cool. Not to brag, but I’ve got plenty of my own problems.

“Too bad. My dad died early, so he can’t beat me anymore.”

“....”