Yamasaki Hideo’s house stood in a completely rural area, quite far even from Tokyo’s central 23 wards. The residence was estimated to have been built in the iji era.
After knocking on the small wooden gate, Masayoshi Son called out.
“Elder. It’s Masayoshi.”
A mont later, the door opened and a large-built man stepped out.
“Hisaki. It’s been a while.”
“Yes, Chairman.”
The man called Hisaki bowed his head to Son in greeting.
At the sa ti, he examined as if observing closely. His gaze, which had been studying , eventually stopped on Chief Ma standing behind us.
With sharp eyes, he swept Ma over from head to toe.
It seed he was asuring Chief Ma’s skill.
“Hisaki.”
Sensing the strange tension, Masayoshi Son called to him.
Only then did Hisaki pull his eyes away from Chief Ma and step aside.
“Please co in. The elder has been waiting.”
Son, Chief Ma, and I stepped into the courtyard.
In the small yard, there was a beautifully maintained garden.
Even I, who had already seen countless Japanese gardens while visiting many estates in Japan, found it hard to tear my eyes away.
Though smaller than the others I had seen, in terms of beauty it was incomparable.
At the center of the carefully tended garden, a man wearing a straw hat was crouched down, tending to the flowers.
“Elder. It’s Masayoshi.”
Yamasaki Hideo stopped moving his hands.
Then he turned his head and looked at Son and .
“Wait just a mont, Masayoshi.”
“Yes, Elder.”
Son answered respectfully, and then Yamasaki asked as well.
“Would you mind waiting?”
“Of course. Please take your ti. Would it be alright if I looked around the garden for a mont? It’s beautiful.”
Yamasaki nodded, then returned to finishing what he had been doing.
I took a few steps and stopped in front of a small pond. Inside, several koi swam leisurely through the water.
“Would you like to feed them once?”
The man called Hisaki had followed after and asked.
“Ah, thank you. Sure, why not?”
Hisaki moved toward a sack of koi feed placed beside the pond.
“Chief, don’t be too on guard.”
The mont Hisaki turned his body, I spoke to Chief Ma in a low voice.
“......He’s no ordinary man.”
At those words, I looked at Chief Ma in surprise.
There were only a handful of n who ever made Chief Ma react like this.
“He’s that good?”
“Yes. Judging by the scar on his neck, his gait, and the calluses on his hands, he seems to be the sa kind as .”
I nodded at Chief Ma’s words.
If a man like Hisaki was no ordinary figure, then it naturally ant Hideo himself was not ordinary either.
“Here.”
As Hisaki approached, we ended the conversation.
I accepted the brownish koi feed he handed .
Crouching by the pond, I extended my hand over the clear water, and several koi imdiately swam over after noticing the food.
I carefully dipped half my hand into the water.
Only then did the koi begin eating from my palm.
A pleased smile spread across my face as I watched them.
It felt calming.
When I have more room to breathe again, raising fish might not be such a bad idea.
“Do you like koi?”
Yamasaki Hideo, apparently done with his work, approached and asked.
“I neither like nor dislike them.”
“Is that so?”
“It’s just that my grandfather really loved them. In Korea, it’s rare, but he even raised koi in the garden. Because of that, they don’t feel unfamiliar to .”
“I see. Shall we head inside?”
I rose from my crouched position and nodded.
“Yes. Let’s.”
He led Son and toward the house.
The place we arrived at was a typical Japanese room.
The mont the sliding door opened, it was obvious the room had been built in the iji era. Japanese and Western styles blended together with elegant harmony.
“You will wait here with .”
Hisaki said as he blocked Chief Ma.
I gave a small nod, and Chief Ma slightly bowed his head toward .
Soon the door closed.
In the center of the tatami room were floor cushions and a small table.
“Sit.”
Yamasaki Hideo sat first and gestured for us to sit.
I sat comfortably cross-legged while facing him, but Masayoshi Son knelt formally.
“I heard you wanted to et ?”
“Yes. I was curious what kind of person could possibly be holding that much cash.”
“Hahaha.”
He laughed leisurely, then fixed with sharp eyes.
“And why are you so curious about that? Whether there are few or many scraps of paper, it has no effect on you. If anything, aren’t you the one with more money than I have?”
“You know about ?”
“If I do, I do. If I don’t, I don’t.”
I frowned at the riddle-like answer.
“Elder. I don’t like people speaking in circles.”
“Hahaha. What an impatient temperant. First, I’d like to finish Masayoshi’s matter.”
He was slippery like an old serpent.
Still, that was the reason we had co here in the first place, so I had no choice but to nod.
“How are the negotiations with Vodafone going?”
Masayoshi Son carefully explained the discussion we had before coming here.
Yamasaki nodded here and there as he listened, then finally spoke.
“Two trillion yen... Expensive.”
“But it’s a company we absolutely need. The money itself isn’t what matters. It can beco a reliable cash-generating source that will protect SoftBank for decades to co.”
“You trust that thing called the iPhone that much?”
“Yes. It’s an object that will change the era.”
Yamasaki Hideo closed his eyes for a mont in thought.
After a while, he opened them and turned to .
“Do you agree with Masayoshi?”
“I believe in it even more than Chairman Son does. Otherwise, why would I be investing half?”
“Hahahaha! You sound certain.”
His hearty laughter filled the room.
He looked like a kindly old man, yet those sharp eyes remained completely undisguised.
“Completely. No, I’m two hundred percent certain. If SoftBank acquires the mobile carrier and then launches the iPhone, within five years it will easily rise to second place among Japanese telecoms. As for first place... that depends on the chairman’s ability.”
“Do you know the market share gap between KDDI and Vodafone Japan? You’re saying that gap can be closed in five years?”
Vodafone Japan was called third place, but it only held a re 15% market share.
Worse, it was still declining.
The reason was its network quality.
Among the three carriers, its service quality was the worst, so even though it offered relatively cheap rates, custors kept leaving.
“Well. Shouldn’t you ask Chairman Son sitting next to instead of ? He’s the one who’ll be running it.”
“Hahaha. Right. I chose the wrong person to question.”
Son quickly responded.
“It’s possible. Next year, mobile number portability will be introduced. Then custors can switch to our carrier while keeping the sa number. To use the iPhone, they’ll have no choice but to co to us.”
Son’s voice was overflowing not rely with confidence, but with conviction.
At that, satisfaction appeared on Yamasaki Hideo’s face.
“This is it! This is exactly why I invested in you, Masayoshi. That confidence in your eyes. That certainty. This is what makes you Masayoshi.”
Yamasaki even clapped his hands in delight.
“Good. Then how will you prepare the acquisition funds?”
“Half of the acquisition amount will be invested by President Kim here. And together with the additional investnt you promised, plus contributions from SoftBank’s subsidiaries...”
After hearing the full explanation, Yamasaki nodded.
“I’ll increase my investnt and put ◆ Nоvеlіgһt ◆ (Only on Nоvеlіgһt) in five hundred billion yen.”
“E-Elder.”
“Why? Is it too little? Do you need more?”
“No. It’s more than enough!”
Son bowed deeply in gratitude.
His lips trembled. He seed genuinely moved.
“Masayoshi. You must succeed.”
“Thank you for believing in .”
“This high-speed internet or whatever it is, I don’t understand such things. I’m investing in only one thing: Son Masayoshi. I believe in you. Don’t disappoint .”
“I will absolutely repay your expectations.”
Son prostrated himself flat once again.
Hideo quietly looked down at him.
“You may leave now. Today, I need to speak with this young man.”
“Understood.”
As Son stood, he staggered slightly.
Still seated, I caught his arm.
“Thank you. Haha.”
“Take care of your health, Chairman. If it weren’t for you, I wouldn’t have bothered investing.”
“All I have is this body of mine. Don’t worry. Haha.”
Joking lightly, Son offered one last greeting to Yamasaki Hideo before leaving the room.
“Now, let’s speak.”
A grave voice. Sharp eyes.
At so point, Yamasaki Hideo’s face had beco stern.
“Did you ask whether I know you?”
“Yes.”
“I do. I knew Chairman Cheon. There’s no way I wouldn’t know his successor.”
“...You knew my grandfather?”
“Whether I should say I knew him, or call him a rival... First, let tell you my story.”
Soon, he began speaking of the life he had lived.
“Half the blood flowing through my body is Joseon blood. Very few people know that.”
“You an Korean?”
“I said Joseon.”
I didn’t understand the distinction, but he emphasized the word Joseon.
“However, I have never once considered my holand to be Korea. I am Japanese.”
As if his throat had gone dry, he lifted the glass of water before him and drank.
“My father died early. I was told he died before I was even born. Do you know how hard it is for a woman to raise a child alone?”
The image of my grandmother raising ca to mind, and I nodded.
“I was raised by my grandmother as well.”
“My mother did anything that made money. Even if that ant...”
He paused for a mont.
Perhaps because old mories had surfaced, his eyes drifted sowhere far away, as if tracing the past.
“In the sa way, I too did anything that could make money from a young age.”
I simply listened in silence as his long story continued.
His life cut straight through the modern history of Japan.
The more I listened, the more I felt myself being pulled into his life.
“Then my mother died. I was eighteen then. ...Do you know why she died?”
“I don’t.”
“Money. Because of that damned thing called money. She died because there was no money for treatnt. I went out into the streets and begged people. Please save my mother, I pleaded. But not a single person helped us. And so she died without treatnt.”
He paused briefly, gathering his emotions before continuing.
“That was when it began. I swore I would earn money and nothing else. I survived death many tis. In the end, I even earned the nickna money ghost. Still, I clawed and scraped my way to wealth. If it made money, I did it. No matter what it was.”
After finishing his story, he gazed steadily at .
“Do you know why I’m telling this story to a stranger like you?”
“I don’t.”
“It is to tell you not to live like I did. So you won’t regret it later. The mont I first saw you, I saw myself.”
I wanted to argue.
But I couldn’t.
The entire ti I listened to him, the version of myself from my previous life kept surfacing in my mind.
As if he understood exactly what I was thinking, he nodded and continued.
“In the beginning, I was just like you. I built fences and divided people into those inside them and those outside.”
At words that felt as though he had peered straight inside , I was startled inwardly.
“As ti passes, emotions fade. Even the thick fences grow old and weaken. And eventually...”
It wasn’t hard to understand the emotion in his voice.
Regret.
He regretted the path he had walked.
“In the end, no one will remain around you. No friend who truly worries for you, no family, no one at all.”
The words no one will remain kept echoing in my mind.
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