Chapter 81: Total: $1.3 million in orders. (Edited) - Damn, I Don't Want to Build a Business Empire - NovelsTime

Damn, I Don't Want to Build a Business Empire

Chapter 81: Total: $1.3 million in orders. (Edited)

Author: tiko_tiko
updatedAt: 2025-10-08

CHAPTER 81: TOTAL: $1.3 MILLION IN ORDERS. (EDITED)

The crowd sniffed, eyes brightening. One man shrugged. "Fine, give me one. Outside food’s the same greasy junk every day."

Lee Wonho quickly added with a flourish, "Six dishes total, all randomized—could be pork belly, meatballs, tenderloin, or even shredded pork with Beijing sauce. It’s like a blind box, but edible."

That did it. Curiosity and hunger did the rest.

Within twenty minutes, the entire stack of thirty-two lunchboxes was gone. Thirty-one sold, one in the guard’s belly, plus six extra rice boxes offloaded for a buck each.

Lee Wonho counted the crumpled bills, heart swelling. $471. One meal. Do it twice a day, nearly $900. A month of this? Over twenty grand.

He pushed the empty cart back to the cafeteria with his head held high and chest puffed like a general returning from war.

"Mr. Kim Suho put me in logistics. Everyone thought I was useless. Ha! Who’s useless now? Twenty grand in savings! This is only the beginning."

Half a Month Later

In his office at the Steel Cup T-Shirt Factory, Kim Suho massaged his temple and stared at the performance report like it was a horror novel.

Another order. Two hundred thousand dollars.

"Unbelievable..." he muttered.

For the past two weeks, his three rookie salesmen had been signing orders left and right. Small ones, sure—one hundred thousand here, three hundred thousand there—but together it stacked up. Wu Yu alone had racked up over $700,000. The other two combined? $600,000.

Total: $1.3 million in orders. From rookies who didn’t know a sales pitch from a sandwich two weeks ago.

Suho leaned back, cold sweat prickling his neck. "This... this isn’t normal. This smells like... him."

His mind immediately conjured the shadow of Lee Wonho—the eternal old fox who turned everything into a scheme.

"Cho Rin," Suho called, his voice sharp.

His assistant peeked in. "Yes, boss?"

"Go check the sales department. See if Wu Yu and the other two are in. If yes, bring them here."

Cho Rin nodded briskly and disappeared.

Moments later, Wu Yu walked in with the other two rookies, nervous smiles plastered on their faces like schoolboys summoned by the principal.

"Boss Kim," Wu Yu said carefully, "you were looking for us?"

Suho forced a smile, gesturing to the chairs. "Relax, relax. Sit down."

The three perched on the edge of their seats like birds ready to flee.

Suho tapped the performance sheet on his desk. "You’ve been signing orders faster than lottery tickets. Tell me honestly... did you stumble onto some kind of secret method?"

His tone was calm. But in his heart?

If Lee Wonho’s scheming hands are behind this, I swear to heaven, I’ll... I’ll... sigh, I’ll probably just promote him again.

"Boss Kim, this is all thanks to my master."

Wu Yu, the rookie salesman, sat forward in his chair, his expression deadly serious—like a student who wanted extra credit on his exam.

"My master gave me and the others all his customer contacts. Without him, we never could’ve signed so many orders."

Kim Suho’s eyebrow twitched. "Your... master?"

"Yes, sir. Director Jin from Horny Princess Interactive. I went to him for advice, and he generously shared everything. We’re just following up on his clients."

Suho almost coughed blood. Director Jin Wu. Of course. That stubborn old fox. He had transferred Jin to Horny Princess Interactive so the man wouldn’t meddle in Steel Cup T-Shirt Factory. And what did Jin do? He just tossed decades of customers back into the rookie salesmen’s laps like party favors.

"I... see," Suho said through clenched teeth, smiling like a man in the middle of a stroke.

"Boss, we don’t dare take all the credit," Wu Yu added earnestly. "It’s thanks to Master’s generosity. And of course, the quality of the shirts from Steel Cup T-Shirt Factory. Customers can’t resist."

Suho waved a limp hand. "Mm. I understand. You can go back now."

The three rookies bowed like schoolboys, relieved to leave the principal’s office alive.

The moment they closed the door, Suho slumped in his chair, clutching his chest. "If I keep this up, my headstone’s going to say: Here lies Kim Suho—killed by his own employees’ enthusiasm."

Back in the sales office, Wu Yu let out a long sigh of relief. His colleagues Luo Yuan and Cai Jing crowded him.

"Boss Kim looked kind of... mad, didn’t he?" Luo Yuan asked.

"Yeah," Cai Jing agreed. "I thought he was going to fire us."

Wu Yu stroked his chin like a philosopher. "No, no. You’re both thinking too shallowly. Boss Kim isn’t angry that we got orders—he’s angry that we aren’t working hard enough."

"Huh? But we’ve signed over a million in orders already!"

Wu Yu shook his head solemnly. "That’s nothing compared to Master Jin. Remember, he pulled a million-dollar order on his own in the past. And what did we do with his entire contact list? Just a bunch of little $100,000 scraps. To Boss Kim, that’s underachieving."

The other two gasped. It almost made sense.

"So... Boss Kim was disappointed in us?" Cai Jing whispered.

"Exactly. He probably thinks we’re too complacent. We need to push harder. If he sees us hustling, he’ll be proud."

The three nodded in unison, their eyes blazing with renewed determination. And within minutes, the sales department emptied as they charged out into the streets like door-to-door evangelists of cotton T-shirts.

Meanwhile, Kim Suho leaned back in his chair, staring at the ceiling.

"These brats. Because of Jin Wu, I now have more orders, which means more revenue, which means... I have to spend more money to keep up. Fantastic."

He sighed like a tragic hero. His whole system relied on losing money. Yet every time he turned around, his people were working overtime to make him richer.

"Why, God? Why can’t my employees be lazier?" he muttered, rubbing his temple.

He flipped open the next file on his desk: the cafeteria’s weekly purchasing expenses.

His brows furrowed. "What’s this? Canteen... retail lunch boxes?"

He skimmed the attached schedule. His face darkened by the second.

"Oh, for crying out loud. Lee Wonho, you little gremlin!"

Apparently, Lee Wonho had started selling the cafeteria’s leftover food as $15 "boxed dinners" to workers from neighboring factories. In two weeks, the cafeteria had already pulled in over $10,000.

"No wonder the canteen’s expenses dropped," Suho groaned. "One guy’s sneaking me extra revenue, the other’s cutting my costs. This is a nightmare. My employees are going to bankrupt my plan to go bankrupt!"

He slapped the file shut. "Shen Rou!"

His assistant poked her head in. "Yes, boss?"

"You don’t need to fetch my lunch today. I’m going to the cafeteria myself. I need to see this circus with my own eyes."

By 12:20, most of the employees had eaten and left. Suho and Cho Rin walked into the now-quiet cafeteria.

Through the glass, he spotted Lee Wonho bent over the counter by the kitchen window, scribbling furiously on a sheet of white paper. Suho crept closer.

Today’s dishes: Braised Spare Ribs, Sauced Chicken Wings, Kung Pao Chicken, Twice-Cooked Pork...

Suho’s eye twitched. Was the man writing a restaurant menu?

Before he could blow up, Head Chef Wu Yi shuffled over carrying a large cardboard box. He froze when he saw Suho. "Mr. Kim, you’re here! The reserved lunches are almost ready. I’ll bring them right over."

"No rush," Suho said coldly, watching Lee Wonho like a hawk.

Startled by Wang’s words, Lee Wonho turned. His eyes widened when he spotted Suho looming behind him. "Boss Kim! I was just—uh—making a notice. For the lunch buyers. You see, some workers from other factories have been coming in..."

Suho raised an eyebrow. "Lunch buyers?"

Lee Wonho panicked. "Y-yes, sir. After we tested selling boxes at the industrial park gate, demand went crazy. So I moved the sales point here to the cafeteria window. Only twenty to forty portions a day, first come first served. They sell out instantly! I even submitted a formal plan to the finance department: ’Cafeteria Retail Lunchboxes.’"

Suho’s face went pale.

From outside the window came the sound of footsteps. A crowd of workers from other factories were sprinting toward the cafeteria like bargain hunters on Black Friday. Their eyes locked on Lee Wonho’s little handwritten menu taped to the glass.

Suho pinched the bridge of his nose.

"Fantastic. My factory cafeteria has officially turned into a side hustle."

Novel