Chapter 274
Talent outflow...
It was a phenomenon where high-quality domestic personnel migrated overseas. The weaker the country, the worse it suffered from this. It was natural, after all, for people to seek better lives for themselves—and that was something developed countries could provide.
To stem this issue, nations around the world had revived the peerage system. They lavished extraordinary rights and perks upon their best players, incentivizing their loyalty. And it worked... for the most part.
In reality, the top countries were economic titans. Talents born in America stayed in America. And whatever they wanted, they bought. Be it money, land, or status—there was a price for everything. Even foreign talents.
There was even a joke that every foreign genius must have considered a US citizenship at least once in their career.
Of course, Korea wasn’t laughing. Trapped and stifled between China and Japan’s power struggles, Korea had little to offer its talents but much to demand by way of service and sacrifice. It could never compete with the US on benefits. All Korea could do was appeal to Korean players’ honor and patriotism.
Yet, for Kang Jae-Hyeok... no, for anyone of the Kang family, would such appeals work? For eight years, eight long years, Korea’s government had turned a blind eye to the Kang family’s decline, which was itself the product of schemes both international and domestic. Citizens everywhere had cursed Duke Kang as incompetent and his children as traitors.
Only recently had this changed. But that was thanks to Kang Jae-Hyeok’s own freakish talent and power. He’d torn through the web of lies binding the Kang family with brute force. Yet, had he been any weaker, any less talented, what would’ve happened? Would he, the president, have stepped in? Would he have crossed politicians, military generals, and the Association’s executives all for a single boy?
He wouldn’t.
As president, his interests lay with the nation. Corrupt or not, the people who’d suppressed the Kang family had been integral to the power structure of Korea. With no one to replace them, harming them was harming the country. And so, he’d left Kang Jae-Hyeok, the final remnant of the Kang family, to fend for himself. He would not wage domestic war for the sake of a boy—and that was all the more so because the core of his power, the people’s will, had been disfavorable to Jae-Hyeok back then.
Ultimately, only Jae-Hyeok had stood up for Jae-Hyeok. He and his Kang family owed Korea nothing. The president knew this, and so did the Korean people.
It was no wonder, then, that the country was in a state of mass angst. News had spread of Gate Hunter Blake’s presence in Korea, and everyone believed he was here to poach Jae-Hyeok.