Money Keeps Piling Up No Matter How Much I Spend

Chapter 196

Translator: Dreamscribe"CEO. They're saying a military clash has broken out at the Port of Shanghai as well."

"What? Even Shanghai?"

The Port of Shanghai was the world's number one container port.

Because of that, I had assumed the Chinese government would keep tight control over it no matter what, ensuring nothing went wrong there of all places, but a military clash had broken out there too.

"It wasn't an external attack. Apparently, the Central Army units stationed there started fighting each other. On top of that, reports of coups d'état breaking out across multiple regions keep pouring in."

When I first heard that the Port of Guangzhou had been seized, I had expected the Chinese government to resolve things somehow.

China was a country that had poured astronomical sums into building a rock-solid internal system and perfecting an airtight surveillance apparatus, all to ensure the regime never fell.

The idea that such a regime could collapse had been hard to believe.

But it was becoming reality.

"I figured that since it's China, they'd manage to suppress it one way or another. But it looks like the central government has thrown in the towel. According to the rumors circulating now, some say President Li Jinping was betrayed and already killed, others say he's been detained, and still others claim he's already fled to Russia. Nothing but rumors."

With the situation this dire, Li Jinping, the head of the current Chinese regime, should have appeared publicly and issued an official statement.

He could have calmed the people and the military by assuring them that things looked chaotic for now but would be brought under control soon enough.

But given the total silence, something had clearly happened to him.

"Then the emergency food supplies we sent..."

"It appears the military factions will seize all of it. Also, Kwangwoon Shipping apparently halted deliveries on its own to areas where fighting had already broken out before the shipments could arrive."

"That was the right call."

Still, more than half had already crossed over to the Chinese side, and the military factions were fighting over it right now.

"......"

I felt conflicted.

Who could have possibly imagined that China, so obsessed with control, so meticulous in managing its systems, would crumble this pathetically?

Droughts and floods caused by global warming had led to a severe food crisis, and in the end, even the perfect control they had been so proud of had reached its limit.

"You did everything you could, CEO. You gave up food supplies for the sake of the vulnerable, the people no one else cared about. It's just that greedy warlords intercepted it."

That was the nature of war.

Young people were sacrificed for the ambitions of those above them, and countless lives were surrendered for no reason at all.

If those warlords had set aside their greed and joined forces for the suffering people, things would have looked very different.

"The problem is the global economy. The collapse of the central government is a foregone conclusion now, so China will be in civil war for years at minimum, and that will shake companies around the world."

One of the reasons I had tried to minimize the chaos in China was exactly that.

If China fell, the global economy would take a devastating hit.

Even Korea alone relied on China for 25 percent of its total exports.

In other words, 25 percent of Korea's revenue was about to vanish entirely.

And that wasn't all.

Over 20 percent of Korea's imports came from China.

This wasn't just Korea's problem.

The entire world, the United States included, and especially companies that had outsourced their manufacturing to Chinese factories, would suffer irreversible damage.

"Wall Street, with its fast access to information, has apparently been dumping all its holdings since two days ago. Same everywhere else. Instead, money is flooding into Safe Assets. And the companies that outsource manufacturing to China are scrambling too."

The whole world was trembling.

Because what was unfolding before their eyes was an event on an entirely different scale from the usual bubble bursts.

The collapse of the Chinese regime.

That enormous tsunami was about to spread in every direction.

* * *

"Report. How are things going?"

"Chairman. It appears the Chinese government is finished. There's been a split within the central government itself, and President Li Jinping's status, whether he's alive or dead, can't even be confirmed."

"Son of a..."

Chairman Kang Sung-ho cursed before he could stop himself.

"What about the damage on our end?"

"We moved our production facilities to Korea and Africa a long time ago, didn't we? To minimize technology leaks. Of course, some facilities are still in China, but it's not enough to affect our overall production. However..."

"However?"

"Our exports to China, displays, various components, and so on, have been completely blocked."

The Chinese market was enormous.

Its sheer population was overwhelming.

There was a reason companies clung to it.

So this situation was bound to deal a significant blow to Kangseong as well.

"The silver lining is that we're not heavily dependent on the Chinese market. China relies entirely on its domestic market for everything from phones to computers to semiconductors. They strictly censor anything coming in from overseas."

"The hit is still nothing to dismiss."

"True. But it's not fatal. Right now, Kangseong dominates the semiconductor market, and we're steadily pushing Apple out of the phone market too, aren't we?"

That was exactly why he couldn't blame Kwangwoon.

Kangseong had grown this much precisely because of Kwangwoon.

"But... is it really confirmed that Kwangwoon caused China's fracture?"

"Yes. The decisive factor behind China's fracture is food. We don't know the details, but Kwangwoon's Sentinel would have been in contact with Chinese warlords. Above all, wasn't the seizure of the Port of Guangzhou triggered by the food Kwangwoon sent?"

On top of that, by sending food to multiple ports, they had induced coups d'état to break out nationwide.

"There was a reason Kwangwoon engineered food crises through financial crashes, bubble bursts, and wars. And a reason they aggressively stockpiled food in advance. It was all buildup for this exact scenario."

"And the endgame of that buildup is the collapse of the Chinese regime?"

"Based on how things have played out so far, yes. As proof, aren't all financial assets flooding into Safe Assets right now?"

Jung Jin-ho was an aggressive investor.

He had always relished risk.

But at some point, he had suddenly parked all his money in nothing but Safe Assets.

That was when it had started to seem off.

"There was a reason for all of it. Since the collapse of China was one of his plans, he liquidated all his positions and moved everything into Safe Assets before executing it. And he placed bets on the collapse of the Chinese market with a portion of those funds."

Thanks to that, Kwangwoon was currently the only entity making money in the financial markets.

"It's a truly ruthless company. Sending food under the pretense of solving the food crisis, then using it as a trigger for war. This civil war will cost tens of millions of Chinese lives, no, hundreds of millions."

"And the global economy collapses along with it?"

"Yes. That's precisely why the Chinese regime couldn't be allowed to fall. Isn't that exactly why the U.S. stopped its regime destabilization operations? Because the fallout from a regime collapse would spread across the entire world."

Among people who handled money, how many actually wanted the Chinese regime to fall?

Probably no one but Kwangwoon.

"What the hell is Kwangwoon trying to accomplish? If China falls, the global economy falls. Isn't that a loss for Kwangwoon too?"

"Chairman. It seems that Kwangwoon is... trying to restructure the world order."

"What?"

Restructuring the world order.

It was such a grandiose statement that even Chairman Kang Sung-ho was taken aback.

"China's internal conflict will persist for years. No one knows who will emerge as the last man standing, or who is on whose side. It's essentially a Contest of Warlords. So who will have to take over the manufacturing and hub role that China filled?"

"Korea?"

"Yes. Korea and Japan will become the main players. But before striking China, the first place Kwangwoon dealt with was Japan. Korean-Japanese citizens already control the political establishment there."

"And beyond that, Kwangwoon has been pouring astronomical sums into expanding infrastructure across Africa. Labor is cheap there, and the infrastructure is developed enough that large-scale factories can move in."

At those words, Chairman Kang Sung-ho's eyes went wide.

"So that means..."

"Securing Africa and Japan's political establishment was preparation for the collapse of the Chinese regime. It was all to absorb every role China had been playing."

"!?"

Only then did Kang Sung-ho understand why Kwangwoon had invested so heavily in Africa and Japan's political circles.

Absorbing China's role wholesale.

Korea seizing the position of Asia's central hub.

"Kwangwoon must have concluded that even if they entered the Chinese market, dominating it would be impossible. The Chinese government would keep blocking them at every turn."

"So they chose a different approach?"

"Yes. If you can't have it, destroy it."

If you can't have it, destroy it.

If the Chinese market can't be dominated, annihilate it.

What a terrifying idea.

"The problem is that even with Kwangwoon's preparations, the future is impossible to predict."

"So we can't tell whether this will be an unprecedented golden age for Korea, or its darkest hour?"

"Exactly. China being right next door is one issue, but North Korea sits directly above us. That's the biggest wildcard of all."

Everyone swallowed hard.

An era of brilliant prosperity for Korea, or one of utter darkness.

The difference between the two was razor-thin.

* * *

"So... all the supplies coming to us are completely cut off?"

"Yes. Military clashes have broken out across all regions of China, and every supply route has been severed, Supreme Leader."

Kim Jong-woon, the North Korean leader, could not stop his hands from trembling.

For North Korea, China was the last lifeline.

With exports and imports effectively blocked by UN economic sanctions, China was the only country North Korea could rely on.

Because of that, North Korea depended on China for 98 percent of its trade: food, energy, daily necessities, everything.

It imported everything from China.

Several times, the regime had boldly launched reforms, vowing to develop domestic markets and achieve self-sufficiency, but a country already rotted to its core and crumbling from within was never going to change easily.

On top of that, this round of droughts and floods had dealt North Korea a fatal blow, with over one million people starving to death.

It was nearly catching up with the statistics of the 1990s, the period known as the Arduous March, which had claimed an estimated two million lives.

"And now, on top of everything, supplies from China are cut off?"

It was no different from 98 percent of North Korea's supply lines being severed.

In other words, the people who had been surviving on barely enough to stay alive would now have nothing to eat at all.

It wasn't just the common people, either. The upper class was in the same boat.

The cutoff of supplies from China meant that the elites, too, would soon face the same starvation, if not immediately.

"What about Russia and Iran?"

"Neither is in a position to support us right now. Russia can't manage supplies because of the war with Ukraine, and Iran's war with Israel makes assistance impossible."

His mind went blank.

Cold sweat streamed down his forehead.

The collapse of the Chinese regime had been something beyond imagination.

"If food supplies don't come through, the public discontent that's already boiling over will only intensify, and the units that are barely receiving any supplies will start voicing their frustrations too."

The supply line from China, the country responsible for all of North Korea's food and energy, had been severed.

This meant a grave existential crisis for the North Korean regime.

When the Soviet Union collapsed in the past, hadn't North Korea lost its support and endured the infamous Arduous March?

But the collapse of China was on a far greater scale.

Because this time, even the Kim family that controlled North Korea would be cut off.

"F-first, we need to find some kind of solution..."

"Supreme Leader!"

"What now?"

"Tens of thousands of refugees are streaming down from the Yalu and Tumen rivers. Some of them are armed, and clashes are breaking out everywhere."

"Wh-what!?"

The Yalu and Tumen rivers were routes frequently used by North Korean defectors fleeing to China.

Now the flow had reversed, and Chinese refugees were pouring across into North Korea.

But North Korea had no capacity to take them in.

There was nothing to eat here as it was. How could they possibly accommodate refugees on top of that?

"Stop them from crossing! Even if we have to shell them, shoot every last one of them!"

The mountain called China had collapsed, and the avalanche it set off was about to bury North Korea.