The plane touched down in New York City in the early hours of the morning. The city was already awake, a sea of bright lights and endless movement. Jae-Min watched through the window as the skyline grew closer, his chest tight with anticipation and unease. He was miles away from everything he had known—his father's empire, his penthouse, and most of all, the suffocating life he had once lived.
His phone buzzed incessantly with notifications—missed calls, unread messages, and emails from his father's assistant. He ignored them all. He'd made his decision, and there was no turning back.
At the airport, he exchanged his designer watch for cash, an impulsive act fueled by an overwhelming sense of disgust. The very thought of using his black card—his lifeline to an easy, comfortable life—filled him with shame. He wouldn't touch it. Not anymore. His father had raised him to believe he was entitled to all of it. But that life, those privileges, had been the chains that kept him complacent. No more.
He grabbed his suitcase and stepped out into the cold morning air, the weight of his resolve heavier than the bag he carried. He didn't know where he was going or what he would do, but he knew one thing: he wasn't going to live as the man he had been.
Jae-Min spent the next few days in a small, grimy apartment he had found in a rundown neighborhood of Brooklyn. It was far from luxurious, a far cry from the opulence he was used to, but it was real. For the first time in his life, he felt like he was truly on his own. The constant noise outside, the smallness of the room, and the dull, flickering lights were all reminders of how far he had fallen. But more than that, they were the environment he had chosen. He wanted this. He needed this.
He spent the first night staring at the peeling wallpaper, his mind racing. How had it all come to this? The night Soo-Ah had broken things off felt like it had happened years ago, and yet the sting was still fresh. The words she had said—lazy, disgusting, insufferable—echoed in his mind like a cruel refrain. He wanted to forget, to block them out, but they kept coming back, resurfacing in the silence of the room.
The next day, he started searching for jobs. Not the kind of jobs he had been born into, the ones that came with a fancy title and an office on the top floor. No. He needed to prove to himself that he could survive without his inherited wealth. Without his father's name. Without the crutch of his social status.
He found a part-time job at a local café, scrubbing dishes and wiping tables. The work was hard, the hours long, but it was a start. The pay was meager, just enough to cover rent and a few basic needs. He made do, refusing to dip into his savings. He was disgusted by the thought. Every time he looked at the bank account balance, the numbers staring back at him felt like an insult. Those were the funds he had squandered in his old life—on meaningless luxury, expensive dinners, and nights he couldn't remember.
He could hear his father's voice in his head, reminding him how easy it was to get whatever he wanted. But now, with each dollar he earned, Jae-Min felt like he was clawing his way out of the hole he had dug for himself.
The days blurred into one another. He would wake up, work, come back to the apartment, and crash on the bed. He barely slept, often lying awake at night thinking about his failures, his choices, and the man he had been. The guilt ate at him, gnawing away at his insides like an infection he couldn't shake.
But the hunger for change was stronger. It was becoming the only thing that kept him going.
He didn't allow himself the comfort of luxuries—no new clothes, no meals at fancy restaurants. He refused to let himself fall into old habits. His phone stayed off for days at a time, and he ignored every message from his old life, including those from Soo-Ah. Her name on the screen made his hands shake, so he turned it off and shoved it in a drawer. He didn't deserve to hear from her. He didn't deserve anything.
After work, he buried himself in books—business strategies, behavioral psychology, history, anything that could help him understand how to move forward. It felt like a punishment, but also like a lifeline. Each chapter, each lesson, was a step further from the man he had been. He had no right to skip through the pages like he used to. No right to rush through the material, as he had done during his time at Harvard. Back then, he had barely scraped by, barely passed. He had gotten into Harvard on the strength of his father's donations, and he had graduated with just enough effort to satisfy the minimum requirements.
The thought made him sick.
Now, as he poured over books in his small apartment, he consumed every word. The Prince, The Art of War, Influence by Robert Cialdini—he studied them all with the same fervor he once reserved for empty nights of partying. It wasn't just about gaining power or control anymore. It was about redemption. It was about proving to himself that he wasn't a failure. That he wasn't the worthless, lazy son of a chaebol that everyone had written him off as.
But every time he opened his wallet, he was reminded of what he had once been. The black card, the one that could pay for anything he desired, sat heavy in his jacket pocket, mocking him. It felt like a weight he could never get rid of.
He refused to use it.
The first time he bought a meal with his own money—a simple sandwich and coffee—it felt like a victory. Not because it was a great achievement, but because it meant he hadn't relied on the wealth that had once made everything easy.
But the guilt still lingered. The old life still called to him, a reminder of the privileges he had abused. He didn't deserve to step back into that world, not until he had earned his place, not until he had become someone else entirely.
Jae-Min had learned to hate the man he had been. But with each passing day, he was starting to understand that change was not something that could be rushed. It wasn't about escaping his past; it was about learning to live with it and forging something new from the ashes. And if that meant enduring the suffocating weight of self-loathing until he could stand on his own, so be it.
He wasn't the man he used to be. Not yet. But one day, he would be.