With shades of Park Chan-wook’s No Other Choice and Choi Jin-young’s Hunger, Employee No. 9 runs a psychological gauntlet of money, power, duty, and the daily struggle for survival.

No. 9 is in trouble. His son’s college tuition is coming due, his wife needs surgery after taking double shifts at a grocery store, the apartment building they bought as a nest egg is falling apart, and the company he helped build is trying to force him into early retirement. When he refuses, the mid-level IT man is demoted to sales and given increasingly impossible tasks. As his salary dwindles and the humiliations mount, No. 9 must decide where his loyalties lie. If he fights back, how far will the company go to stop him?

With her urgent and timely novel, award-winning Korean author Kim Hye-jin questions how long we can endure a corrupt system. In a rigged game, is there an alternative to playing out your hand?