How a Loan Shark Survives as an Actor Chapter 58

Chapter 058

 

‘Just now… did he get angry at me?’

Director Shin blinked, completely bewildered.

As the CEO’s younger relative, he had never once been shouted at by the CEO before.

If anything, it was often the CEO who watched his mood.

That was because Director Shin handled an enormous amount of the company’s work, and the employees under him were fiercely loyal.

Which was why he couldn’t understand why he was currently being cursed out so viciously by the CEO.

‘Hah.’

Unlike Director Shin, who stood there dumbfounded in disbelief, Hyun Jingae quickly picked up the documents the CEO had thrown.

“Director, here…”

After receiving the papers from Hyun Jingae, Director Shin hurriedly checked their contents.

The thick stack of documents had been sent by the legal team of ‘Wooyeon Entertainment’.

The documents pointed out that numerous unfair clauses had been found in Yoo Seulho’s exclusive contract with Star Actors, and that many of them deviated significantly from the standard exclusive contract guidelines established by the Korea Fair Trade Commission.

From an extremely unfavorable profit-sharing ratio for Yoo Seulho to outright toxic clauses.

“W-What is this?”

Naturally, nobody present… including Director Shin… was unaware that the contract heavily favored the agency over the artist.

They simply had never bothered to change it because it had never become a problem before.

Most entertainers signed to Star Actors were people who considered even a contract like this a blessing and desperately tried to keep working.

No one had ever rebelled.

And whenever an artist occasionally complained that the company was taking too much of their earnings, Director Shin would immediately step in.

After a little gaslighting, mixing lines like ‘When are you going to succeed if you’re obsessed over a little money?’ with ‘But you’ve still got us backing you up, don’t you?’, the issue would always disappear.

So this was the first time the unfair clauses had become an official problem.

“This is all your fault!”

The CEO, face twisted with rage, shifted all the blame onto Director Shin.

“What did I tell you last year? I said that for Yoo Seulho, we should just use the standard contract like every other agency! This is exactly what I was worried about! But you said you’d take responsibility!”

“You agreed too hyung! I told you he was mentally weak trash and that we could handle him carefully, and you liked the idea and told me to raise the commission rate!”

“Who the hell are you calling ‘hyung’ right now?! I’m the CEO, you bastard! Get a grip!!”

“You get a grip first!!”

The two brothers completely abandoned any semblance of professionalism and started screaming at each other.

Meanwhile, only Hyun Jingae quietly reviewed the documents.

This was a settlement proposal from Wooyeon Entertainment, delivered in an extremely polite manner.

They had found weaknesses in Star Actors’ contract and were signaling that the agency should quietly let Yoo Seulho go before they turned it into a formal issue.

‘Honestly, it wasn’t even a contract. It was exploitation.’

Hyun Jingae hadn’t been unaware of that fact either.

Still, the news was so sudden that he couldn’t help feeling somewhat disappointed.

‘At least he could’ve told me.’

He felt something akin to betrayal toward Yoo Seulho.

Then he realized the feeling seemed strangely familiar.

It was exactly what Yoo Seulho had told him a few days ago.

‘I’m unbelievable…’

His shamelessness knew no bounds.

“So what are we going to do? Just let Wooyeon steal him?”

“What are you talking about? Even if it’s an unfair contract, it’s not that serious. Tch.“

The CEO clicked his tongue.

“Let’s say it actually goes to court. It’d take years before a conclusion is reached. Do you really think Wooyeon will stay by Yoo Seulho’s side that whole time? They’re just looking down on us. They think we’ll back off if they scare us like this.”

Director Shin nodded in agreement.

“That’s true. The fact that they think they can take away our only star this easily means they don’t take us seriously. Let’s see them try.”

“Good! Let’s do it!”

The brothers immediately became united once again.

Watching anxiously from the side, Hyun Jingae cautiously spoke up.

“But can we really afford the legal costs? Considering the opponent is Wooyeon…”

“What do you mean, because it’s Wooyeon?! Are you looking down on us too?”

“N-No! That’s not it. I’m just worried.”

Hyun Jingae stammered while sweating profusely.

The CEO glared at him and snapped.

“Wooyeon Entertainment has no intention of actually filing a lawsuit either. You think we’d be the only ones losing if this turns into a legal battle? More importantly, Yoo Seulho would be tied up in litigation too. He’d just be digging his own grave. Tch.”

Hyun Jingae quietly nodded.

The CEO and Director Shin were beasts, but what they had just said wasn’t wrong.

No matter how unfair the contract was, the public would never look kindly upon an actor trying to jump to a better agency right after becoming successful.

‘Seulho should know that too.’

The Yoo Seulho he had watched over the past several months didn’t seem foolish enough to do something like this.

He still couldn’t understand it.

But Hyun Jingae remained the company’s dog.

He moved according to the orders of his superiors.

“Lawyer, please take a look at this.”

Star Actors, which had never even bothered to establish a proper legal department to save money, hurriedly hired an attorney.

After having him repeatedly check for any clauses that might be used against them, they sent a reply to Wooyeon Entertainment rejecting the proposal.

“Hyung, let’s prepare an article right away!”

“For what?”

“About how Yoo Seulho forgot his place and tried to run to another agency! We should leak it to the reporters!”

At Director Shin’s suggestion, the CEO hesitated.

His expression practically said, ‘Uh… maybe not.’

“Hyung?”

“Hey, think about it. Without Yoo Seulho, we’re screwed this year. How are we going to cover the investments we just received? The company’s thriving because of him right now.”

“So we’re supposed to take back someone who betrayed us?”

“Who said he has to stay forever? Let’s calm him down and squeeze more work out of him first. If we brand him as a traitor and destroy his public image, we won’t be able to use him anymore. We should milk him dry before kicking him out.”

Even though he was furious, the CEO’s argument about acting rationally wasn’t wrong.

Director Shin knew he was right.

Though still fuming, he did his best to keep reporters from catching wind of the situation.

However, Wooyeon Entertainment didn’t back down.

Once again, they proposed a quiet settlement and even offered to pay whatever penalty fee Yoo Seulho owed.

The CEO and Director Shin immediately scoffed.

“These bastards think money can solve everything! Maybe if they offered several times the penalty fee! Otherwise, absolutely not!”

Filled with anger, they searched for various ways to resolve the situation.

If Yoo Seulho stubbornly refused to return, they were even prepared to destroy him completely.

Their lawyer told them:

“If negotiations completely fail, the only option left for them is a frontal assault. They’ll file an injunction to suspend the effectiveness of the exclusive contract.”

“That’s the thing where the court temporarily halts the contract’s validity, right?”

“Yes. There are precedents of entertainers fighting their agencies through this method. It takes several months for a decision, and during that period they can’t work. It’s entirely disadvantageous for the entertainer.”

The CEO nodded with satisfaction.

Now they were prepared no matter what approach Wooyeon Entertainment chose.

‘Just come at us.’

While they waited, a package arrived by courier.

Unlike the thick documents that had been exchanged until now, this envelope was so light it seemed like it might blow away.

Inside was…

“A USB?”

It was a USB drive designed to look like a cute little teddy bear.

Suppressing a growing sense of unease, the CEO checked the files stored inside.

The contents were so shocking that everyone’s jaws dropped.

“…Holy shit.”

The drive contained videos of the agency’s CEO and employees mistreating Yoo Seulho and even physically assaulting him.

Everyone’s faces instantly turned pale.

“W-What is this? This is CCTV footage, right? How the hell did they get our company’s CCTV recordings?”

“There are even screenshots of KakaoTalk conversations between our employees. It’s the group chat we made just to badmouth Yoo Seulho… How did they find out about this?”

“And what’s this audio file?”

After listening to the recordings Yoo Seulho had personally made, the CEO exploded.

“This bastard secretly recorded me cursing him out! Lawyer! He recorded me without permission! Can I sue him for this?!”

As the CEO raged, the lawyer sighed.

The moment he reviewed the footage, he had removed his glasses and practically given up.

“It’s not illegal for someone to record a conversation they personally participated in. The victim collected these recordings as evidence. There’s nothing we can do about that…”

“Victim my ass! How much did we even hit him?!”

Director Shin shouted furiously.

But there was undeniable evidence showing Yoo Seulho being bullied by company staff… getting smacked on the back of the head, having people intentionally trip him, and other forms of harassment.

Apparently, he had meticulously gathered evidence over the past year, because the collection alone occupied a considerable amount of storage space.

The lawyer explained that this constituted a violation of labor laws and was sufficient grounds for terminating the contract.

“You could’ve been criminally charged from the beginning. Now that the other side possesses all this evidence, you’re no longer in the position of power.”

The room fell silent.

A completely unexpected attack had blindsided them.

“When the hell did he prepare all of this?”

Director Shin laughed hollowly, unable to believe reality.

No matter how much Wooyeon Entertainment was involved, there was no way they had gathered all this evidence for him.

There simply hadn’t been enough time.

Which meant…

Yoo Seulho had orchestrated all of this himself.

‘How can one person prepare this much?’

He couldn’t understand it at all.

Naturally.

Because Yoo Seulho hadn’t prepared it alone.

The day he discovered that Director Shin was the one behind the egg-throwing incident, Yoo Seulho immediately contacted the private investigators.

He requested that they gather evidence of the harassment he had suffered from agency employees.

Whether they hacked the company’s CCTV system or hacked employees’ phones, he told them not to worry about the methods.

And so the organization did exactly that.

‘A promise is a promise.’

The private investigators had still never officially agreed to become Yoo Seulho’s allies.

But they had promised to help him become an independent individual.

To become independent, Yoo Seulho needed to free himself from both his parents and his agency.

“…We’re so screwed.”

The people who had never imagined someone was backing Yoo Seulho could only mutter blankly.

At this point, there was nothing Star Actors could do.

“Let’s just settle.”

The CEO’s exhausted voice echoed through the room.

Director Shin trembled with rage.

“Absolutely not.”

The only person absent from the video evidence spoke boldly.

“I’m taking this all the way to the end!”