novelraw Chapter 69
Chapter 69
Chapter 69
While I spent a heated stretch of time with Jung Oh-hoon, Han Sang-ah kept up her own training and pushed ahead with preparations. And this afternoon, at a venue arranged under Han Sang-ah’s lead, I sparred with Sohwi.
“Are you okay? It must’ve been pretty hard to set all this up.”
Han Sang-ah answered with a look that said it was nothing.
“Until I was fifteen I trained as the Geumyang Group’s heir. Putting together a simple event like this isn’t even work.”
I felt a pang of envy. Did she even hire tutors to drill her on this stuff?
“What does people’s reaction look like?”
“Sohwi’s a fairly big-name influencer. Plus his opponent is you, the one who’s riding a wave and soaking up all the attention.”
Han Sang-ah set down the tablet in her hand and spoke.
“Plenty of companies want to slap ads on this, and public interest is huge. Oh, Geumyang Group reached out too.”
“If you’re fine with it, I am too.”
Who’d say no to someone duplicating my money for me.
“For reference, I quoted them at a slightly stingier rate than the other companies.”
So we were angling for a sort of bloodline advantage. I could oblige. I hadn’t planned to make money like this anyway.
As long as it stirred up enough buzz, I didn’t mind taking a little less.
“But even if we offered them a cheaper rate than others and they still bought the ad, people could take issue with that.
“You’re regularly getting elixirs from Geumyang Group. They’re cheap stuff, but you get them in bulk, so if we factor that in, I don’t think anyone will complain.”
“Really?”
Han Sang-ah answered me.
“More precisely, they wouldn’t be able to lodge a formal objection.”
Either way, her handling was excellent. We wrapped everything cleanly with every kind of sponsorship and didn’t spend a single coin.
Even the car taking me to the sparring site was provided through a partnership, and the drinks in the car were sponsored too.
“You’re a money fiend. When you said you wanted to be a Hunter, Chairman Han Sang-Cheol must’ve felt that was a waste.”
“Grandpa doesn’t cling to anything that has no return.”
Chatting like that, Han Sang-ah, Jung Oh-hoon, and I drove to the venue.
“Wow, nice car.”
Jung Oh-hoon let out a small exclamation, then looked at me.
“But seriously, is it okay for me to take today off, Chan-seok?”
“Yeah.”
His body had hit its limit. He needed at least a day off at this point. I wasn’t tormenting him for no reason. I was training him.
If training made his condition worse, then it wasn’t training.
“Today, just eat the food and drink they provide and do nothing. Rest.”
I finished speaking, then looked him in the eye and added with a serious face.
“I mean it. Don’t wake up later and sneak in extra training. You’ll only wreck your body.”
“Yeah I got it. Do I look like a training-obsessed freak like you or Han Sang-ah?”
I answered.
“I told you to sleep last night. But this morning I noticed ten trays of eggs were gone.”
“I was hungry so I boiled them, you jerk.”
He said that, stared out the window for a moment, then muttered, “Damn it.”
“Fine. I won’t, you bastard. How can your nagging be worse than my mom's?”
“Yoo Chan-seok is a guy, so shouldn’t you call him Dad?”
At Han Sang-ah’s line, Jung Oh-hoon scrunched his face at her and let out a weary sigh.
* * *
A stage stood on a broad open lot, and crowds packed in around it. The moment the livestream kicked on, a massive swarm of viewers poured in like a hive of bees.
— When does it start?
— Wasn’t Sohwi a big deal back then too?
— He’s just a show-off.
— Come to my channel and I’ll give out New Year’s cash vouchers worth 30,000 won to everyone, no subscription needed!”
It’s not a scam, try it first and see. Lots of people already got theirs.
— He couldn’t even touch a grade 1 Erosion Core.
— Uhm Jun-sik is still aliv….
Filtering out the nonstop nonsense in chat, about sixty percent predicted Yoo Chan-seok would win, while the other forty percent hoped for Sohwi.
Honestly, a lot of those cheering for Sohwi seemed to just want Yoo Chan-seok to slip this once.
“...”
Watching the mood on his phone, Sohwi clenched his molars. Even his own supporters didn’t seem to truly believe he would win.
They were just rooting for the other side like contrarians because most people thought Yoo Chan-seok would win. Classic underdog effect.
“Why me.”
Even so, he didn’t like that after years as a Hunter he was being cast as the underdog. He pulled a vial from his pocket, stared at it, then took a deep breath.
The sparring would run five rounds. Not best of five, just five bouts.
“Just once.”
If he won even once, that would be enough. He didn’t like the underdog label, but because of it, people would be lenient with him and strict with Yoo Chan-seok;s performance.
If Yoo Chan-seok lost even once, the arrows of blame would rain down right away. And with that, Sohwi could make up for all the damage he had taken from his last video and everything still to come.
“Hunter Sohwi, are you ready?”
The waiting room door opened and a staff member called him. It was time. He slipped the vial back into his pocket and stood.
“Wow, this is our first time seeing each other face to face, right”
When he stepped onto the stage, the man opposite tossed him something between a greeting and a comment. It was Yoo Chan-seok.
Wearing black protective gear like a racing suit, a spear resting on his shoulder, he looked at Sohwi as if he had already won.
“I’m Sohwi.”
“I’m Yoo Chan-seok.”
Yoo Chan-seok’s eyes skimmed him up and down. Sohwi did the same. He didn’t feel overwhelming power. If anything, the power seeping off Yoo Chan-seok didn’t feel that large.
‘About one fifth.’
That was about how much power Sohwi sensed from him. Less than a year as a Hunter, so even that was an impressive achievement. But to think he and Han Sang-ah had ransacked Bratsk’s Refrigerator with just that.
‘Impossible.’
He could handle this. He might even win decisively. The thought filled him with a prickling anticipation.
“Dual blades, huh.”
Crossing his drawn swords into an X, Sohwi fixed his gaze on Yoo Chan-seok.
“I hope you’ve got at least half the skill the rumors say.”
Sohwi spoke with confidence. Yoo Chan-seok spun his spear once and didn’t bother to answer.
And the first spar began. The instant the starting signal ended, Sohwi lunged in viciously.
The spear in Yoo Chan-seok’s hand snapped shorter, shrinking to the length of a short sword.
‘Hah, just a weapon with a gimmick.’
Thinking that for a heartbeat, Sohwi swung his dual blades like a gust. He put everything into each moment. Flooded with power, his body roared beyond conscious control, rampaging under will and instinct.
‘Not bad!’
This was the feeling. He had taken two years off, yet his years as a Hunter clawed his combat sense back up. Like an engine shaking off rust and kicking to life, he burned hot.
He had watched the videos too, the ones of Yoo Chan-seok sparring with Hunters over several days after his press conference declaring he would focus on clearing grade 1 Erosion Cores. For some reason, Yoo Chan-seok’s power never ran down.
‘In that case, I need to force a decision at the point when I still have more mana.’
His accumulated experience and the years he had overcome guided his body from the realm of the unconscious.
Watching this, Han Sang-ah spoke.
“Sohwi already lost.”
“Yeah.”
Eyes gleaming, Jung Oh-hoon sat munching popcorn. Han Sang-ah casually reached into his bucket.
“Hey, that’s mine.”
“I got it through sponsorship.”
Jung Oh-hoon fell silent at that and looked back at the clash. At a glance, Yoo Chan-seok seemed to be getting pushed back. He wasn’t. After getting pummeled all night for days, Jung Oh-hoon had finally stepped into the state Yoo Chan-seok wanted.
He had dragged the experience and years sleeping in his unconscious up into consciousness.
‘Yoo Chan-seok’s method is right.’
His view was completely different now. Before sparring with Yoo Chan-seok, he might’ve watched this and picked Sohwi to win.
Movements born in the unconscious couldn’t keep up with movements governed strictly by conscious control.
As Yoo Chan-seok swept his spear, blue trails traced its path. Fourfold spear thing, was it? The blue arcs hanging in the air kept following their tracks, repeating their attacks.
“That’s ridiculously crafty.”
“I still can’t break through that.”
At Jung Oh-hoon’s words, Han Sang-ah answered simply. Not a single trail hung there without a reason. Like a typhoon, Sohwi’s onslaught was being steadily smothered by those tracks.
It was like an anaconda’s hunt. Before you realized it, you were wrapped, your movement crushed, swallowed whole, and digested over a long time.
“He has the right idea though. To beat Chan-seok, you have to finish him when your power reserve is ahead.”
“If that worked, Yoo Chan-seok would’ve lost to me a long time ago.”
A cool line from Han Sang-ah. That did look like the only way to beat him. Even if his power didn’t drop, there was still a limit to the amount he held in his body.
You had to finish or seize momentum when you could draw out more power than he could, but Yoo Chan-seok never let a fight end there and never surrendered momentum.
“Even Hunter Lee Se-eun also took a long time to grab momentum from him.”
Sohwi wasn’t on that level, and his reserves weren’t gigantic like Lee Se-eun’s. If Sohwi’s power was a candle flame, Lee Se-eun’s was the summer sun that sizzled asphalt.
— Hunter Sohwi is pressing fiercely. Hunter Yoo Chan-seok is barely managing with defense and dodges. Is something actually going to happen here?!”
Nope, nothing would happen. That was just how Yoo Chan-seok fought. The thought flashed through both Han Sang-ah and Jung Oh-hoon at once.
After about thirty minutes, Sohwi’s gale-force assault began to slow down. More precisely, it was being forced down.
“Aigoo.”
Jung Oh-hoon sighed in pity. This was the end. Yoo Chan-seok had completely seized Sohwi’s movement. The instant the pressure ebbed, Yoo Chan-seok truly moved.
His spear flicked three or four times, and at the same moment, the blue trails orbiting him launched their attacks. In seconds, Sohwi took nearly ten hits and dropped to his knees.
“He won’t even know how he got caught.”
At Han Sang-ah’s words, Jung Oh-hoon could only nod. His hand had stopped going to the popcorn a while ago.
There was no way he could know. He had fixated on his own movement, and the result was that heated blood and writhing muscles dragged him wherever they pleased.
The moment he came to his senses, he would’ve been on his knees. Han Sang-ah and Jung Oh-hoon could easily guess what was going through his head now.
‘I was winning, wasn’t I?’
On his knees, Sohwi coughed a harsh sound, drooled, and clenched his fist. He hadn’t let up for a second, and Yoo Chan-seok’s blocking and dodging had looked razor thin.
Then he suddenly lost. He was kneeling on the ground, and Yoo Chan-seok was standing.
‘What is this? What’s going on?’
Sohwi stared at the floor in disbelief. Naturally, the Yoo Chan-seok looking down at him had no intention of offering advice. Why would he?
“Whew, that was close.”
Yoo Chan-seok, on the contrary, muttered such words while instilling in Sohwi the resolve to win the next time. It was a wicked act, like that of a card shark stripping a fool bare at the gambling table.