Chapter 77: A-Bio Cancer Laboratory (1)

Young-Joon came back to his office after the show ended. He took out some orange juice and had a glass.

—Can I get rid of the remaining virus now that it’s over?

Rosaline sent him a message.

“How long will it take to get rid of it with a regular immune response?”

—It will be less than 74 hours for the virus to be completely eliminated.

“Not bad.”

—But your body will be pretty heavy and tired during it. I’ll just get rid of it now.

“Okay.”

[Controlling immune response.]

[Inducing target location of macrophages.]

[Destroying reverse transcriptase and virus.]

Rosaline controlled the immune response and destroyed the virus by using a little bit of fitness.

—There won’t be any people that will get in the way of making the vaccine now, right?

“There’s no way it will be solved that easily.”

Young-Joon stretched out his legs as he leaned back on his couch.

“The opposition against the vaccine will still be there.”

—Even though you explained everything about how the vaccine worked and why it is needed?

“Even if they were convinced logically, people who were against it once will always be against it because they don’t want to admit that they were wrong.”

—Really?

Rosaline asked again with a hint of surprise in her voice.

—Why do they do that? They don’t admit it even after understanding that they were wrong?

“People are like that. They call it cognitive dissonance.”

—It is the most puzzling thing I have heard and seen since I was born. In this case, doesn’t understanding mean the same thing as admitting? The fact that they do not admit it when they have understood is like hot iced tea.

Rosaline said.

“People are like that.”

—Unbelievable. Then was the show and the lecture all for nothing?

“No.”

Young-Joon grinned.

“A lot of the anti-vaxxers will leave, and the people who didn’t know about the vaccine will not go that way now, so there are definite benefits.”

—I see.

“The people who were strongly against it will continue to be stubborn, but that organization will lose power soon. Like a virus that was discovered by an antibody.”

—I understand.

“Anyway, I’m done with the urgent things now. The International Vaccine Institute will do the clinical trial for the vaccine, Karamchand will produce the treatment, and now that the bone marrow is out of my hands now, I should rest for a while,” Young-Joon said. “More than that, it’s suspicious that Roche is keeping quiet.”

—Roche?

“It’s a company that originally made a lot of money from AIDS drugs. It won’t hurt them a lot if it disappears, but they’re probably annoyed that the replica drug companies in India participated in the HIV eradication companies, and it’s weird of them to have just left me alone,” Young-Joon said. “I’m sure they’re up to something…”

Thud thud!

Someone banged on his door. It was Park Joo-Hyuk. He looked a little angry.

“Are you insane? Why would you inject a virus into your own arm?”

“To a scientist, research is like their child. What are you going to do if you don’t believe in it?” Young-Joon replied calmly.

“Oh, my blood pressure…”

Park Joo Hyuk looked up to the ceiling while grabbing the back of his neck. Young-Joon laughed.

“You’re laughing?”

Park Joo-Hyuk frowned.

“You’re actually out of your mind, aren’t you?! Argh! What should I do with a lunatic like you?”

Park Joo-Hyuk put Young-Joon in a headlock, which was partly serious and partly a joke.

“Ah okay. Sorry, I’m sorry. I’ll be careful from now on,” Young-Joon said as he escaped from the headlock.

“You will, right?”

“Okay. I’ll probably be nagged a lot by my family, so please stop here.”

Park Joo-Hyuk glared at Young-Joon like he was annoyed.

“Yeah, I guess you hear an earful from your parents. Enough about that. There was an entertaining incident in the industry recently. Do you know about it?”

“An interesting incident?”

“Conson & Colson absorbed Schumatix.”

“Really?”

Young-Joon was surprised.

“It was revealed this morning. Schumatix almost went into a coma after being punched by you, right? It was basically impossible to recover from, right?”

“Well, their business was in the medical field, so it was pretty fatal that they induced a tumor in a patient on purpose.”

“Right. But Conson & Colson already had a lot of stakes in Schuamtix. It seems like they just took this opportunity to take over the company.”

“Wow…”

“That’s not it. There’s another multinational pharmaceutical company that is based in Switzerland other than Schumatix.”

“Roche?”

Young-Joon’s eyes widened.

Most of the executives at Schumatix were from Roche. As the two companies cooperated, competed, and developed together in that tiny Switzerland, they had a very close relationship. They also had stakes in each other’s company, but they were already close, starting from their network of people.

“No…”

“Conson & Colson guaranteed the status of the Schuamtix’s executives. And it seems like Conson & Colson must have successfully negotiated a large stake through them with Roche.”

“Then did Conson & Colson and Roche become related companies?”

“Yeah. It’s hard to estimate it accurately because the stock prices are fluctuating, but experts predict that the combined market value of the three companies will exceed one hundred trillion won,” Park Joo-Hyuk said. “It’s five times A-Gen. Three times Pfizer.”

“So there’s a new pharmaceutical dinosaur.”

“Anyway, it seems like Conson & Colson are negotiating with Pfizer, too. If they sign some contract together, it will really be the largest company in the world. It will be an unprecedented company that is monstrously big.”

“I see.”

“Why are you so calm? Isn’t it obvious that they’re trying to keep you in check? Those people are probably thinking that you will ultimately become A-Gen’s CEO. They think that it will be hard to fight you if A-Bio’s research ability and A-Gen’s infrastructure come together,” Young-Joon said. “And they really started feeling the danger as they saw Schuamtix getting destroyed. Seeing even the White House be on your side, they know that it will really be dangerous if they just leave you alone. That’s why the multinational pharma companies are bunching up together. To keep A-Bio in check.”

“I know,” Young-Joon said.

“Then why are you so calm?”

“It’s better if those companies come together and make a better drug.”

“Fuckkk… Seriously, you…”

Young-Joon burst into laughter as he saw Park Joo-Hyuk frown.

“I’m kidding.”

Young-Joon got up.

“Love for humanity is important, but so is our company.”

“Shouldn’t we do something?”

“We are already doing a lot of things. Everyone is working hard, and we’re getting good results, right? This is enough.”

“I looked up some things about Conson & Colson’s CEO, and he’s really dangerous.”

“He’s famous. He’s like the Steve Jobs of the pharmaceutical industry, right?”

“You already know. Apparently, he’s pretty good. I mean, look at them now. They absorbed Schuamtix, and they also rode that wave to get Roche, too. What if they bring in Pfizer?”

“What do you mean?”

Young-Joon shrugged.

“It’s just another company that we have to compete with.”

* * *

For a while, everyone who Young-Joon met nagged him to not be reckless, and that it was too much to inject a virus into himself no matter how confident he was in the vaccine.

‘Well, I was also confident in the vaccine, but honestly, I mostly believed in Rosaline when I injected the virus into myself…’

But since Young-Joon couldn’t explain Rosaline, he just said he would be careful and moved on.

In the meantime, a video of Young-Joon’s self-clinical trial of the HIV vaccine was uploaded on A-Bio’s homepage and fan club.

“I get the fan club, but why on the homepage…?”

To Young-Joon, who was puzzled, Yoo Song-Mi explained, “Public opinion is really good right now. The management team distributed a press release with the live broadcast video of you.”

“A press release?”

“Yes. You have a really good image right now. They were saying that they need to improve the company’s image with this energy.”

Before Young-Joon started the live broadcast, the international community was focused on the press conference that Ardip appealed to with tears. Ardip, who cried and begged on his stomach while revealing the situation in developing countries to the people against the development of the vaccine, showed up everywhere in the media.

When the whole world was dripped with tears, Young-Joon suddenly appeared and injected the virus into his own body on live television to see the effects of the vaccine. To people, it looked like he was reacting to Ardip’s tears.

‘This person isn’t just a genius scientist; he’s a pioneer of medicine who sacrifices his own body.’

The image he imprinted on the whole world was different than before. Young-Joon’s ingenuity had already drawn attention as he put the stem cell treatments into clinical trials, but his personality hadn’t been highlighted as much. Things like how he went against his lab director because of Cellicure and how he fought with the hospital director because the clinical trial patient changed weren’t stories that were revealed to the public. Destroying Schuamtix’s scheme with a counterattack made him out to be smart and competent, not a matter of personality.

But it was different this time. The way people understood the flow of events was as follows:

1. Young-Joon, who visited India for the production of Karampia, an AIDS treatment, felt the unsanitary conditions and the prevalence of infectious diseases in developing countries.

2. Young-Joon was very heartbroken as he watched Ardip crying and begging for people to not oppose the development of the HIV vaccine on TV.

3. Young-Joon was determined to eradicate HIV as fast as he could. To accelerate the vaccine development, he had to spread the word about its safety and efficacy, and he conducted an experiment on his own body to do this.

4. Hurry up and give him the Nobel Prize.

“That’s the atmosphere right now?” Young-Joon asked, baffled.

“To people right now, you’re like a great saint who sacrificed his own body to medicine,” Yoo Song-Mi said.

“That image is too much… It’s a little burdening, to be honest.”

“But it’s true. The public is raving about you right now because stories of you fighting over research ethics are coming up all of a sudden. Search it up.”

“...”

What Yoo Song-Mi said was true. Public opinion, which was continuously popping up on Twitter, was no joke.

—He’s a genius, but look at his personality. He’s perfect.

—He’s like someone that would be in something like a Marvel Comic. Everything about him is so outstanding that it almost seems unreal.

—I scraped together other people’s reactions to the live broadcast LOL the amount of national pride I have right now is lethal

—I live in Minnesota, and the anti-vaccine movement also went down in America. Before this, people who were against vaccine development were marching and stuff like that, but they all just disappeared.

—They might not admit it, but they will have to be conscious of the current social climate.

—Wasn’t the number one mad scientist Werner Forssman, who invented conduit technology by cutting a vein in his arm with a knife and putting in a rubber tube? Now, he has to hand over the crown.

—But I was so scared. I’m worried that Doctor Ryu will get sick. Please be careful. You have to work for a long time.

—A resident who used to work at Sunyoo Hospital here. Spilling tea about why Doctor Ryu moved the Alzheimer’s clinical trial from Sunyoo Hospital to another place. This story is true because I heard it from the nurses who work on clinical trials. I’m deleting this in five minutes. Featured by Politician S.

“They’re talking about all sorts of things… There were only a few people who knew the reason why we moved the Alzheimer’s clinical trial.

“Speaking of clinical trials…” Yoo Song-Mi said. “The Clinical Trial Management Center called when you stepped out briefly.”

“About what?”

“They said they are done setting up the stroke clinical trial and starting Phase One, and the second is that Amuc, the type 2 diabetes cure was successful in the first phase.

Young-Joon shot up from his seat.

“Phase One of the Amuc trial was a success?”

“Yes. Try calling them.”

As Young-Joon picked up the phone, Yoo Song-Mi said, “And I have two more things to tell you. Hold on.”

“What is it?”

As Yoo Song-Mi checked her phone and her notes, she said, “You had a meeting with KCDC[1] about the diagnostic kit development, right? They asked us to submit a program plan because they put forward a national project competition. And Director Kim Young-Hoon at A-Gen wanted me to schedule a meeting because he wants to see you.”

Kim Young-Hoon was the person SG Groups added to A-Gen.

“Oh, and one more. The Office of Science and Technology from the White House called. They were asking when you’re coming to America. And they also want to schedule a meeting there… Seriously, the amount of work you have is murderous.”

“I think it’s about building the cancer lab.”

Young-Joon was lost in thought for a moment.

“First of all, please set a business trip to America. Right now, I’m going to check the clinical trial report on the diabetes cure. Please set up a meeting for this either today or tomorrow, and schedule a meeting with Celligener and the Probiotics team during next week.”

“Wait, go slower,” Yoo Song-Mi said as she quickly jotted it down. “But sir, what is the meeting agenda that I should tell to Celligener?”

“We’re going to talk about developing a cure for pancreatic cancer.”

* * *

“I heard that they are past stem cells and are touching the anticancer drug markets,” Mason said to the board of directors at Conson & Colson.

“The Office of Science and Technology in America is supporting that. And they said they are building a lab right beside the National Cancer Institute,” Richard explained further.

All the faces of the directors were dark. They had enlarged themselves by buying Schumatix and holding hands with Roche; the negotiation with Pfizer was going well too, but even so, Young-Joon’s advancement into America was still trouble for them.

“I will go meet Director James,” said David, the CEO of Colson & Conson.

1. Korea Centers for Disease Control and Prevention ?