“Yeah. Didn’t I tell you? Most of our founding capital came from Alpha Fund.”

That was why Berlin Bank’s security was so airtight. The people came from Daehwa Group, but the money came from Alpha Fund.

Any normal person would’ve sensed something fishy. But everyone here... was far from normal.

“Ah, I see. And the one billion dollars that came in last time... how should we handle that?”

The staffer casually suggested how to hide the funding trail, as if it were just another day at work.

“The funding source... hmm.”

No need to go overboard hiding it. As long as it didn’t look like everything came from Alpha Fund, it’d be fine.

Besides, a billion dollars isn’t exactly something you can just hide.

“Let’s label half of it as coming from Alpha Fund... and split the remaining 500 million into small pieces. Reassign the sources—see those? Daehwa Investment Bank, the Swiss pension fund, Microsoft, the Polish Energy Hub... we’ll rotate it through the organizations listed on that document.”

Some were real entities, some were paper companies. Filtering the investment through a few hedge funds might shave off a bit in the process, but the money would come out clean.

Not that it mattered much. Berlin Bank had decades of operational history and a solid reputation.

Sure, the bank had been renamed after being acquired by a shady-sounding company a few years ago, and nearly the entire staff had changed around the same time—but that wasn’t such a big deal.

Germany’s reunification was a major event. A bit of personnel shuffling amid the chaos? Perfectly “reasonable.”

The Bank of England, rattled senseless by repeated punches, wouldn’t even think to investigate what kind of bank Berlin Bank actually was.

***

January 1992 – City of London

Robert Leigh-Pemberton, Governor of the Bank of England, was beginning to resent the new year. He’d served nine years as governor, and now, with just one year left in his term, this happened.

Clearly, the gods hated Britain (not that he could blame them, honestly).

“...Barings Bank was hiding a 400 million pound loss.”

His secretary whispered beside him.

“Sir, it’s 500 million now.”

“...Right. Five hundred. It’s grown by 100 million already.”

Leigh-Pemberton glared coldly at the man in front of him: the president of Barings Bank, the one ultimately responsible for the Nick Leeson disaster.

“I-I’m terribly sorry.”

The bank president trembled and sweated. Even if Barings had long since lost its former glory, in the UK it was still a bank that bowed to no one.

The way the president groveled now made him look like a criminal.

Which, frankly, he was.

“A bailout? At a time like this?”

“Please... if you could just provide 300 million pounds in emergency funding—”

“Three hundred! Ha! We’re already stretched to the limit trying to defend the pound, and you want 300 million pounds?”

The sixty-year-old man’s forehead creased with deep wrinkles.

He hadn’t thrown the man out immediately because... well, he couldn’t not provide a bailout.

Defending the pound wasn’t just a matter of the Bank of England’s credibility—it was a matter of national pride.

But Barings Bank was also part of Britain’s pride. He couldn’t just casually abandon one or the other.

“Governor...”

“...Sigh. For now, leave. We’ll ask other banks about emergency funding. Unless someone else steps in to acquire Barings first...”

“Th-Thank you!”

The bank president bowed, wringing his hands, and stepped out.

—Thud.

As the door closed, Leigh-Pemberton turned to his secretary.

“Prepare a bailout for Barings. We can’t just let it dissolve completely... but I doubt anyone’s going to want to acquire it outright.”

If the bailout didn’t arrive in time...

Well, then there was no helping it.

Bankruptcy means failing to repay debt, and if the emergency funds didn’t arrive soon, Barings would either go bankrupt or be taken over.

In truth, a bank with hundreds of millions in debt shouldn’t be eligible for a bailout—unless it had once been one of the most prestigious institutions in the world.

“There is... one bank interested in acquiring it.”

The secretary hesitated, then handed him a file.

“The Dutch ING? I’ve heard of them. They’re still considering it, right?”

“No, not them... It’s Berlin Bank. From Germany.”

Leigh-Pemberton stroked his chin.

“Berlin Bank...? Isn’t that one of those new banks?”

“Yes. They’ve submitted a takeover bid for Barings.”

“That’s odd. I didn’t think they were that large. Sounds like hubris.”

The secretary nodded.

“Other analysts thought the same. But... they’ve successfully restructured several larger East German financial firms a few years ago.”

“Hmm... if that’s the case, then maybe. Wouldn’t be a bad outcome. The UK’s debt burden would pass to Germany. Barings might be a loss... but we could always reacquire it later once things stabilize.”

He didn’t believe Berlin Bank could handle Barings. And how could they?

The debt was 500 million pounds.

“But what if Berlin Bank does have the funds? There’s been talk—some American hedge funds may have funneled investment through them...”

“So you think it might not actually be a German bank, but an American front. Still... we don’t have the time to vet that.”

Leigh-Pemberton was a rational man. So he didn’t suspect Berlin Bank.

If it wasn’t a real bank, but some scheme orchestrated by an unseen hand... that would pose a national security risk. But surely that wasn’t the case.

To pull that off...

They would’ve needed to set up a legal entity in West Germany before reunification, buy a state-run East German bank during privatization, and immediately start preparing to take over Barings Bank.

Clearly, nonsense.

Anyone capable of that wouldn’t waste time on Barings. They’d be running a major hedge fund in the U.S. and founding their own investment bank.

***

“Si-hyun, what did Soros say?”

I lay in bed at home for the first time in ages, my bloodshot eyes finally closed.

It wasn’t exactly time to sleep, but... I was exhausted. The plan was finally rolling, and it was time to let my body rest.

This might be my only chance.

“...He accepted the proposal. He said they’ll short the pound after the Bank of England announces the bailout.”

“Good. What’s the size?”

“1.2 billion dollars. He pulled all the money out of Spain and added extra leverage. Somehow he also managed to dodge losses in Sweden.”

“Aha-ha, that man really doesn’t hold back.”

My tired voice echoed faintly. Si-hyun gently placed a cool cloth on my forehead.

“Please rest, Miss.”

Her small figure shifted on the bed. The crushing exhaustion I’d put off for so long hit me like a tidal wave.

“Ugh... I really shouldn’t sleep yet. What about Berlin Bank? We still haven’t finished laundering the funding sources...”

“Sir Seon-jun is there. He’ll handle it.”

“You say that because you don’t know ING. They’ll probably submit a bid too... We’ll need to boost our credit rating before we can accept it. I’ve already planted a time bomb in the Netherlands, so ING’s gonna be a little busy—”

“...When did you even have time to do that?”

“Ehehe, used Alpha Fund.”

In the full-length mirror beside the bed, my flushed reflection smiled back. It was the bright spark of a child about to pull off a really fun prank.

Ah... I still have more work to do.

I need to prepare for the MGM acquisition. And get someone ready in case the Thai baht collapses. There’s work piling up at the Microsoft Korea branch too...

So many interesting things happening in the world.

“But what if Barings doesn’t accept the acquisition?”

“Ahaha, they will. It’s not even a right—it’s basically an obligation.”

The ten-billion-dollar debt Barings had racked up... was the kind of debt that couldn’t be paid even if the entire bank was sold off. Without government help, this proposal was one they literally couldn’t refuse.

“An acquisition offer to a bankrupt company means, ‘We’ll take on your debt for you.’ If someone’s offering more than the company’s worth, why wouldn’t they take it?”

I glanced at the towering stack of documents on my desk.

The acquisition proposal Berlin Bank had sent to Barings.

To summarize the dozens of pages into one sentence:

—“We will acquire Barings Bank for 1 pound.”

That... was the value of one pound.