Chapter 9

The Bear Republic is Now My Territory Chapter 9

009 The Creator of Yandex, Who Beat the World's Number One / 45 Days Later

The place where Sasha arrived was near a dilapidated container.

Ordinary Russians store large quantities of used containers in open spaces and keep their cars inside.

Due to the rampant theft, they resorted to this unconventional method, which turned out to be very cost-effective.

While old apartments from the Soviet era were not so, if you bought a brand new apartment worth 300 million won, you had to separately purchase a parking space worth 70 million won, which was just two lines painted on the ground.

‘They’re crazy.’

This was the situation in Russia during the war.

It was truly incomprehensible why such bizarre things happened in that vast land.

But here.

A rusted container, which should have been used as a parking space, was being used as a home.

“Is this the place?”

“Yeah, it’s definitely here.”

“This is a parking lot. Are you living here in the middle of winter?”

“From what I saw when we met before, it seemed like he had some unspeakable story.”

“Everyone has a story. Even the many graves in the cemetery have their own stories.”

“Got it. Don’t get so worked up over nothing.”

At that moment,

A car drove into the parking lot, and four burly, thug-like men got out.

The men, dressed in thick black leather coats, scanned the surroundings and approached the rusted container.

Then, bang! bang!

“Hey! Open the door! Not opening?”

Bang! bang!

“I’ll break this thing if you don’t open it!”

Idiots. No matter how rusted the container is, it’s not that easy to break.

“Hey, bring that thing over.”

One of the men, who looked the most disgusting, instructed another to retrieve something from the trunk.

A large cutter?

Ah… that would do it.

“Cut this.”

“Sure.”

The man with the cutter started cutting the I-shaped steel bar inside the round hole.

Seeing that there was no lock, it seemed there was someone inside the container.

Nikolai, watching from the corner of the opposite container, his Adam’s apple moved up and down.

‘What should I do?’

It’s too dangerous to pretend not to notice someone else’s business.

But I can’t just jump in without a reason.

They had come to get information about Sergey, the creator of Google, and now they were at a loss.

Meanwhile,

With just a few strokes of the cutter, the steel bar was cut like a piece of straw.

The men quickly opened the door.

Squeak. Thud.

“Damn it. You were here but didn’t open the door. You made me use force. Drag him out.”

The face of the man dragged out became visible.

He looked to be in his early 30s, but his body was far from the typical Russian male build.

“Do you think you can hide? You have nowhere else to go. Look up, bastard. Not looking up?”

The man, who had been kneeling on the ground with his head bowed, slowly raised his head at the leader’s curses.

“I told you I’d chase you to the ends of the earth. You can’t escape from us.”

“...”

“Do you have the money? Oh, I asked a pointless question. If you had it, you wouldn’t have locked the door from the inside. What are you going to do now?”

The man bit his lip and, as if spitting out something he had been holding back, shouted.

“I’ve already paid back the principal and interest! Why do you keep tormenting me? Why!”

“Huh?”

“You’ve already taken my home. What more do you want from me? Are you here to take this rotten container too? Sob, sob, sob...”

In the hot tears flowing in the freezing weather, there were many emotions that contained the story of his life.

Resignation, despair, giving up, and...

A very small glimmer of hope.

A tiny flame of hope that could be extinguished with a single breath.

This flame of hope was the reason he hadn’t given up on life despite all the hardships.

He was determined to protect this hope even at the cost of his life.

“You’re smart, but you can’t do simple math. I wasn’t good at math in school, but I was great at arithmetic. Listen up. The money you paid was only half the interest and principal. So, you still owe the other half. Got it?”

“I’ve paid twice the principal! How can the interest be twice the principal in just six months?”

“Feeling wronged? Feeling wronged? Even if you feel wronged, there’s nothing you can do. That’s how we do our calculations.”

Nikolai’s hands clenched tightly as he watched the situation.

‘Should I turn their bodies into wilted lettuce that’s been sitting for three days?’

As the country fell into chaos, so did the law and order.

Local mafia ran rampant, but the police, who had been bribed, did nothing to protect the powerless.

If the police had done their job and the law had been enforced, this man wouldn’t be in this situation.

In reality, fists come before the law.

‘I must start the war on crime after making my grandfather and uncle close to Yeltsin.’

I plan to arrest everyone involved in crime and send them to Siberia as lumberjacks.

I will make Russia as clear and clean as Lake Baikal.

“Looks like you have no more money to pay. Where’s your son hiding?”

“Y-You bastards!”

“Now you’re really losing it, losing it.”

“You’re worse than animals… Cough! Cough!”

The leader’s fist hit the man’s face and then deeply into his stomach.

The punch caused his mouth to burst, and bright red blood flowed down.

“This is what happens when you don’t shut up. Hey, give him a little beating to bring him to his senses.”

These scumbags.

I can’t stand this any longer.

No matter how uninvolved we are, I can’t just watch after seeing this.

Nikolai took a deep breath, clenched his teeth, and tightened his fists.

Then,

He pushed Sasha forward.

“Wh-What?”

You solve this.

The eyes of the exposed Sasha and the gang met in the middle.

A moment of silence.

Sasha looked back in disbelief, and Nikolai slowly revealed himself.

“What are you guys?”

The men, who were about to beat the man, turned their bodies completely towards them.

Nikolai, looking at them, said calmly.

“A passerby… No, I came here to park but ended up seeing something I shouldn’t have.”

“If you’re done parking, just leave.”

“But how can you beat someone like that?”

They say you should stop a fight and start a negotiation. First, we need to stop the violence.

Nikolai signaled to Sasha that he would handle it and spoke to the leader again.

“I heard that this man has already paid back the money, but you’re still treating him like he hasn’t. Can’t you just talk it out?”

“That’s not grammatically correct.”

“...”

“Look, just go away. We’ll handle it. Just leave.”

“I can’t do that. Let him go, or I’ll call the police.”

“The police? Oh, here’s another hero.”

Sasha, who is over 190 cm tall, has a presence and a face that command respect, and I’m over 180 cm.

Even though we’re outnumbered, our appearance is quite intimidating, so the thugs didn’t dare start a fight...

“Hey, get rid of them.”

No, they didn’t.

Three of them stepped towards us.

Even if Sasha takes on two, I have to deal with one... Honestly, it’s too much.

So, Nikolai chose another approach.

“Wait!”

The three men, without realizing it, stopped in their tracks.

“What?”

“Do you know Anton?”

“...?”

“Know him, or not?”

“No.”

The leader answered.

“No?”

“Yeah, no.”

“Do you know Andrey?”

“No.”

“Gregory?”

“No!

“Really don’t know Gregory?”

“No! No! What’s wrong with you? Hey! What are you doing? Hurry up and deal with it.”

I need to know them. This is getting complicated.

The leader’s order made the three men start moving again.

Sasha prepared for the impending confrontation.

But the questions weren’t over yet.

“Wait a moment! Listen to the Russian to the end.”

Still, the three men kept approaching.

“Wait a moment! Why are you in such a hurry? That’s not very mafia-like. You have plenty of time, don’t you?”

“No!”

Nikolai quickly thought and asked.

“What about Maxim?”

Instantly, the leader’s eyes widened with interest.

“Maxim? What’s your connection with Maxim?”

Thank goodness. I got one.

I listed common names, and luckily, I got one at the end.

“I’m very close to Maxim. We’re like blood brothers.”

“Blood brothers?”

“Yeah. Last month, we went to the sauna together, drank vodka, and grilled shashlik (kebabs)!”

“Really?”

“Yeah, man.”

‘Maxim’ is a name often used by the top bosses in the Russian mafia.

It’s such a famous name that many local bosses use it to boost their status.

Young Korean men would probably love the name ‘Maxim’ too.

Not coffee, but something else.

The leader’s face contorted, and he seemed to swallow hard, indicating he was hooked.

The three subordinates, seeing his expression, took a step back.

Alright.

The dangerous situation is over for now.

We’ll take him to the hospital first and then ask what happened.

The leader cleared his throat and spoke heavily to Nikolai.

“Maxim was shot and died in August last year, right?”

“Uh, yeah?”

“You said you went to the sauna and drank vodka with him last month?”

Damn.

“Come here for a moment. What was your name again?”

I didn’t say my name, man.

Damn, I’m caught.

Now, I have no choice but to leave everything to Sasha.

“Sasha, you handle it.”

“Ah, here we go again.”

Muttering, Sasha took off his jacket, retied his shoelaces, and, with a stern expression, said to the men.

“Scram!”

“What? Scram, what? What?”

“Scram!”

Nikolai, I can’t beat four of them alone. Even if I could, I don’t want to fight these scumbags. Let’s get out of here and come back later.

We bolted, our eyebrows flying.

Fortunately, a whistle sounded from somewhere.

Beep! Beep! Beep!

The men chasing us stopped in their tracks.

Then, they rushed to their car, got in, and fled in the opposite direction of the sound.

They’re still scared of the police, or they just find it too much trouble to deal with.

Even as they fled, they didn’t forget to leave a final threat.

“You have until tomorrow. If you don’t have the money by noon, you’ll really die. Or hand over your son!”

After the men disappeared, a child, about seven years old, peeked out from the corner of the container.

With a whistle in his small mouth.

‘Is this his son?’

Yes.

The child was the hope he was determined to protect, even at the cost of his life.

The reason he hadn’t given up on life.

The child, with tears in his eyes, approached his bleeding and fallen father.

The child tried to lift his father with his tiny hands, but it was too much.

The child’s gaze turned to us.

Please help.

Nikolai approached the man and gently helped him up.

“Stay with us.”

“Gulp.”

“Is there any water inside?”

“I’ll get it.”

The child ran into the container and brought out a water jug.

Pouring a little water into the man’s mouth, he slowly opened his eyes.

Then, he seemed to come to his senses and hugged his son tightly.

“Sob. Sob, sob.”

It was a mix of all kinds of emotions, almost a wail.

The child also cried with his father.

After crying for a while, the father and son slowly got up from the ground.

“Thank you for helping us.”

“No, it’s nothing. The child blew the whistle in time, and the men ran away. We should go inside and talk.”

It’s too cold outside.

Even if it’s not because of the cold, the injured father and child need to get out of the cold.

Inside, the man immediately closed the metal door and turned on the light. The warm orange light embraced the interior.

Outside, it was freezing, and this was just a rusted container, but for the father and son, it was a home filled with love.

“You’re the one who came two days ago.”

Sasha slowly nodded at the man’s words and handed over the paper tucked between the books.

“Phone number, address, email, and most of the information related to that person.”

“Thank you.”

Sasha handed the paper to Nikolai.

When he tried to give some money from his pocket, the man shook his head.

“I won’t take the money.”

“This money is something I should give you, so please take it and use it as you wish.”

“...”

“By the way, if it’s not too much trouble, could you tell us what happened?”

Nikolai somehow wanted to hear this man’s story.

“As you heard earlier. I borrowed money from those guys, and because of the ridiculous interest, I lost my home, and we ended up living here.”

“How long have you been living here?”

“About three months.”

He came here during the coldest time in Moscow.

Living here with a young child for three months.

Nikolai looked at the child.

I’m really sorry for the father, but the child seems to have inherited a different DNA.

How could this boy be so delicate and beautiful? He’ll be a heartthrob when he grows up.

“You must have had a hard time. What do you do for a living?”

“I worked in the international information processing department under the KGB. It’s gone now, though.”

So, this man is also connected to the KGB.

That’s why he could easily obtain such secret information.

“By the way, if it’s not too much trouble, how much do you owe?”

“There’s no secret now that you’ve seen it. 30,000 rubles.”

For an average family, 3,000 rubles is a typical monthly budget, so 30,000 rubles is about ten months’ worth of living expenses.

If you have a job, it’s not a huge amount, but in the current difficult times, it’s a significant sum.

Probably, the interest piled up because he couldn’t pay it, making it 30,000 rubles.

“So, after leaving your job, you were working in the computer field to make a living?”

“I was working on a program.”

“A program?”

“Yes. I had been preparing for it in my spare time while working for the government, and I started working on it seriously after leaving. That’s why I borrowed some money...”

Ah, I remember hearing that there were many high-level professionals in the computer field during the Soviet era. I think I read it somewhere on the internet.

When the Soviet Union collapsed, most of these professionals left for overseas.

“Can I see the program you’re working on?”

The man took another sip of water and opened a folder on the computer, which looked like his most prized possession, to show what he had been working on.

‘Huh? Yandex?’

The Russian search engine service that launched a year before Google.

Most of the countries that gained independence from the Soviet Union use Yandex.

Google has conquered the search market in almost every country, but one of the four countries it hasn’t conquered is Russia, where Yandex holds the market.

The others are China with Baidu, Japan with Yahoo! Japan, and South Korea with Naver.

Nikolai immediately understood what the content on the screen meant.

‘This is almost identical to Google’s homepage, just with a different name.

The search method is also the same.

Nikolai knew about Yandex.

He often used it to find materials in Russian.

The corners of his mouth curled up slightly.

Sasha, who had been engrossed in the man’s story, noticed the change in Nikolai’s expression.

What’s he up to now?

But Nikolai, being an art school graduate, was too absorbed in envisioning the future to care.

Securing Slave 2.

‘Hmm. The term “slave” doesn’t sound right. I’ll promote him to “Lifetime Regular Employee Number 2” after Sasha.’

Without their knowledge, Sasha and the man were hired as “Lifetime Regular Employees.”

Nikolai, with a mouth full of saliva, calmed his excited heart and spoke slowly.

“It’s hard to stay here. Those guys will come back tomorrow.”

“...”

“So, how about staying at my place for a while