“Bullseye! 10 points for Young Miss.”

The staff working at the shooting range announced as Sojung slowly lowered her gun. Her father got ready for his shot next to her.

“8 points for Mr Oh!”

“Damn, daughter, you’re getting good,” Mr Oh chuckled. “A formidable opponent.” 

This was a monthly thing between the father and daughter pair. Initially, her father thought it was important for his daughter to learn how to shoot a gun. He brought her to the air-pistol range and there, she found a new hobby.

She learned quickly and was good at it, that she joined several competitions and eventually won awards.

When she was 20, her father brought her to the live firing range, and there, she found her true love. Firing live rounds was exciting, exhilarating. She made it a point to practice her skills every week until she got too busy with Samsung.

“Practice makes perfect, father.” She smiled, putting her gun down. “I win.”

He clapped at her achievement, “It’s been so long since someone won me in a shooting game. Sehun’s too busy with both branches here and in Singapore.”

“We’re all working now, it’s inevitable.”

Mr Oh reached to remove the ear musks around his neck, “That’s true. You both are turning 26 in two months, time has passed so fast.”

The pair walked back into the building and staff guided them to the restaurant. They settled down at the table near the window, the staff knew what they would always order and the food was already ready to be served when they sat down.

“I want to talk to you about something,” he started and waved their guards and the staff away. Sojung stopped eating and gave her father the attention he needed.

“Remember the family that I used to tell you when you were younger?”

“Yeah?”

“I reconnected with the family again, and we talked about the promise our fathers had made when they were alive.”

Sojung nodded, “And?”

“What do you think about marriage, dear daughter?”

“I…”

She thought about marriage once, but that didn’t go through the way she did. Life as head of Samsung, upcoming leader of the Clan, she didn’t have the time to meet men, let alone date one. No other man would ever want to marry a woman who’s part of the underworld.

“I feel work is more important now, with everything on my hands, marriage is not on my list.”

“But daughter,” he put his cutlery down. “You’re 26. It’s time you consider marriage and honour the promise your grandfather made.”

“Father, I’m not someone who you can use to honour promises or to marry off when I come to age.”

“It’s final. You’ll be marrying Seo's son.”

Sojung sighed, there was no point fighting her father. He was stubborn, a trait she had inherited. She couldn’t see herself marrying anyone else in the future anyway.

But at the expense of the other party stepping into the life of the Clan?

It was conflicting.

“Do they know what we do?”

“About the Clan? His father knows. After all, it was his father who saved your grandfather when there was a fight near 60 years ago. Without him, our family wouldn’t be able to survive up until now. I'm not sure if he told his son.”

Ah, a classic repay-his-help type of cliche.

“Fine.”

***

Johnny woke up past noon the next day, groggy from too much sleep and the hangover was not good. It didn’t help that it was a Monday. He had to go to work. His father gave him the role at one of Kia’s subsidiary companies, to handle the sub until he was fit enough to take over the whole of Kia.

He left his room and heard the TV going on downstairs, his parents were chatting with each other. He usually wouldn’t pay much attention to what they were saying, but something interesting caught his attention.

“I met Hyun-Oh the other day.”

“Oh Hyun-Oh? It’s been so long since we last saw them. How are they?”

“He’s doing alright, but, his wife--”

Johnny’s footsteps alerted his parents and they stopped talking. Mrs Seo got up and went to her son, ushering him to join them at the table.

“You’re finally awake,” Mr Seo said nonchalantly as he dug into his lunch. “It’s noon, which is an achievement by the way, from yesterday’s 3PM.”

“Dear,” Mrs Seo whispered.

Johnny took a deep breath, “Good afternoon, dad.”

He dragged his feet towards the kitchen to grab himself a glass of cold water when he overheard his parents resuming their conversation.

“We’ve decided to honour the promises our fathers made.”

“What? The marriage?”

“Yes. Hyun-Oh has a daughter and Johnny’s our only son.”

“That would be a nice change, but would Johnny even agree to it?”

“Absolutely not!”

Johnny stormed out of the kitchen, slamming the glass of water onto the table. He stomped over to the dining table and stood in front of his parents.

“I am not marrying someone I don’t know.”

“You need to get married to settle down.” His mother pointed out. “Marriage will straighten you out.”

“Ma, what marriage? I’m still young.”

“Young?” His father scoffed. “But reckless. One day, your philandering ways will get you in trouble.”

“I won’t if I’m careful.”

Mrs Seo shook her head, “The problem is you aren’t.”

Johnny sighed.

“Ma, I’m 26, I know what I’m doing. How many more years do I have left to play before I have to settle down and slog the rest of my life in the corporate world?”

Mr Seo got up from the table, “This is why other people call you Kia's good-for-nothing.”

“Yongjin,” Mrs Seo gave her husband a look. “Stop it.”

“I’m just telling him the truth. Youngho needs to understand he’s not young anymore. Who am I supposed to hand my business over to, if my son isn’t competent enough?”

Johnny wanted to lash out in frustration, instead, he took a really huge deep breath and exhaled slowly.

“Pa, you handed a subsidiary to me, shouldn’t you trust me enough now?”

Mr Seo chuckled. “But have you gotten anything done for the company?” He asked. “Any collabs? Partnerships? Projects?”

Johnny bit on his inner cheek, he knew he didn’t get any of those. His father gave him a pointedly look, “You’re just enjoying the reputation of being a chaebol son to Kia.”

Mr Seo was going to head up to the room to change when the tabloid news cam