Beyond Level 23
The next morning, I woke to the sound of my alarm. I'd tossed and turned all night, but strangely enough, my body felt light as a feather.
Let's go. Another day of hard work.
The moment I arrived at the construction site, I threw myself into the job with more energy than usual. Hauling cement sacks, moving bricks — my steps felt overflowing with strength for some reason.
"Hey! Kim Hanbin! What're you doing, boy?! You're way overdoing it — you'll hurt yourself! Take it easy, will ya!"
Foreman Choi spotted me and shouted, his voice thick with worry.
I set down my A-frame and grinned back at him. "I'm fine, Foreman! I'm in great shape today, for some reason!"
"You crazy kid... No matter how good you feel, don't overdo it. Gotta look after your own body, y'know."
Foreman Choi clicked his tongue, but there was a warm, contented smile tugging at the corner of his mouth.
When the morning's work wrapped up and lunchtime came around, I gathered with the crew at the Korean buffet. Amid the noisy clatter of chopsticks and chatter, Foreman Choi's voice boomed over everyone.
"Our Hanbin here! Yesterday he was practically flyin' out there, I tell ya! Four goals? Five? All by himself — and man, watching him was better than a cold beer on a hot day!"
Foreman Choi thumped my shoulder again and again as he bragged to the crew members seated around us.
"And get this — a Seoul Citizen scout showed up yesterday too! Took one look at our Hanbin, said 'This kid's the real deal!' and handed him his business card! Hoo-wee! Told ya I've got an eye for people!"
Every worker around us turned to look at me at once.
"Oh~ for real?" "You're gonna be a pro footballer?" "That's amazing!" Exclamations of awe burst out from every direction, and I ducked my head, embarrassed.
"Aw, come on. It's nothing."
"Nothing, my foot! Anyway, when you make it big, Hanbin, you're buying us all dinner! Got it?"
"Yes, Foreman. I'll buy the whole crew a feast."
I meant every word of it.
Time passed, and the promised day arrived.
A few days earlier, I'd arranged the meeting with Manager Park Cheolmin over the phone. Now I was headed to the Seoul Citizen training ground in Guri.
The moment I reached the main gate, my heart began pounding like crazy.
I showed my ID to the guard at the gatehouse and gave Manager Park a call. A short while later, he came out to greet me personally.
"Welcome, Hanbin. Glad you could make it."
"Hello, sir. Thank you for having me."
"No need to be nervous. Just follow me and relax."
With a warm smile, Manager Park guided me through the main gate.
The scale of the training ground that spread out before me was on an entirely different level from anything I'd seen on TV or YouTube. Four full-size natural grass pitches stretched side by side along the entrance road — a genuinely breathtaking sight. Beside them stood a sleek, modern clubhouse building, its facade dominated by an enormous gleaming Seoul Citizen crest.
Wow... so this is what a professional club looks like.
I'd thought the pitch where I'd been trapped had excellent facilities, but a pro club was simply in another dimension.
The inside of the clubhouse was even more spacious and spotless than I'd imagined. Along one wall, the club's history was on display — trophies and jerseys from years past. Along the other, I could see a weight training room and massage suites fitted with the latest conditioning equipment. Everything spoke of the refinement of a professional sports organization.
Past the clubhouse, we arrived at one of the four grass pitches.
"Under normal circumstances, we'd hold an open trial with a whole group of other prospective players," Manager Park said, pausing to choose his words as he looked at me. "But honestly? A player with zero competitive experience like yourself receiving a private, one-on-one trial at a club like ours is exceptionally rare. Just understand that I personally vouched for your talent and made a special request to the club. Which also means expectations are high."
The weight of those words settled onto my shoulders.
"So don't let the pressure get to you. Just show me what you normally do. For today, we mainly want to assess your basic physical abilities and technique."
'Don't let the pressure get to you' — how am I supposed to manage that when you say it like that?
I thought to myself. But it didn't matter. Today, I would let the results do the talking.
The first tests focused on basic fitness. There was the Yo-Yo Intermittent Recovery Test — a 20-meter shuttle run measuring cardio endurance — along with short sprints for acceleration and top speed, and side-step drills. Pure physical assessments, one after another.
Fitness tests... now those, I'm confident about.
These were the very drills I had repeated until I was sick of them, back inside that pitch.
I took one deep breath and got to work. On the shuttle run, I kept going until the manager told me to stop, and I felt pretty good about my sprint and agility numbers too.
But he won't say a word, so I have no idea how I'm doing...
Manager Park gave nothing away — no instruction beyond "Start" and "Stop," just a stopwatch and a clipboard. The silence was maddening. With his face an absolute blank, I couldn't tell whether I was exceeding his expectations or falling short of them. He simply kept his poker face fixed, counting the seconds and jotting down figures.
Next came dribbling and trapping. In the cone drill, weaving zigzag between the markers, I glided through smoothly and fast — the fruit of countless hours of dribbling practice.
In the trapping test, where balls flew at me from all heights and speeds, I settled each one with instep, inside of the foot, chest — bringing every ball down neatly at my feet.
Good. That wasn't bad at all.
Even I was satisfied with my movement, and I could tell from Manager Park's eyes that his earlier reserve had given way to something closer to approval.
Around that time, murmuring began to rise from a corner of the pitch. I stole a glance — several men who looked like Seoul Citizen coaching staff had gathered and were watching me.
"Is that the kid? The one Manager Park's specially testing today?"
"His physique is no joke, I'll give him that."
"What is he, an American football player? What's with that body? Can a guy built like that even sprint?"
I felt their stares, but did my best to ignore them.
The passing test produced somewhat mixed results. My accuracy in hitting the target zones was solid, but on passes to moving players and under simulated pressure — with the coaches involved — I fell a little short of satisfying.
Real-match instincts really are a different animal. There are things solo practice just can't cover.
The gap hit me all over again. But there was no time for disappointment. The test wasn't over yet — the final event was none other than... shooting.
Manager Park set a pile of balls down in front of the goal. Other coaches had somehow drifted over to stand beside him.
"Shooting is what you're most confident in, right, Hanbin? Take them from all sorts of angles — freestyle."
Finally. The event I was most confident in.
Manager Park watched Kim Hanbin as he announced the first fitness events.
Confidence fairly radiated from the young man's face as he listened to the list.
Eyes fixed on Kim Hanbin's movements, stopwatch in one hand and evaluation sheet in the other, Park ran the numbers in his head. Considering he quit football back in middle school — and considering that muscle mass — even a merely average K League shuttle score would be extraordinary for him.
Players built with that much height and bulk almost always posted worse endurance numbers than leaner athletes; the weight alone dragged them down.
A beep sounded from the speaker, and the Yo-Yo test shuttle run began.
The early levels of the Yo-Yo test were little more than a warm-up. Kim Hanbin lightly trotted between the lines, shaking his body loose. Even during the ten-second recoveries, instead of catching his breath he simply stood waiting for the next beep.
Hm. Comfortable so far.
But with each level, the required pace climbed, and soon those ten-second breaks would start to feel woefully short.
Level 18 cleared. The average mark for K League midfielders. This was usually where players began to hit their wall.
And Kim Hanbin? Sweat had only just begun to bead on his forehead. His breathing remained perfectly steady.
...What? That stamina? Steady breathing at level 18?
It was a sight Park struggled to believe even while watching it.
Level 20 cleared. At this point, he was matching the famous workhorses of the K League — the players renowned for their motor. Most athletes who reached this level bent double, hands braced on their knees, gasping for air. Or collapsed flat onto the grass.
Kim Hanbin stood ramrod straight, breathing in slow, controlled rhythm, his posture utterly unshaken. When the beep sounded after the ten-second rest, he surged forward without a moment's hesitation.
Beep. Beep. Beep.
The intervals came faster and faster. Level 21... 22...
...This doesn't make sense!
Only a tiny handful of players in the world ever cleared Yo-Yo level 23. That was territory belonging to World Class athletes playing in Europe's top leagues. And here was a man who'd quit football in middle school — with that frame, putting up that number? He wasn't even showing the first hint of giving up.
If I let him keep going, he really will run until he drops...
He looked fine for now, but it was the height of July — peak summer. Dragging the test out any longer in this heat could genuinely endanger the player's safety. The point of an evaluation wasn't to drive an athlete to collapse.
"That's enough!"
In the end, Manager Park called the halt himself.
Kim Hanbin finally stopped, breathing a little hard, but his expression remained perfectly calm. As if to say, I was just getting into it — why'd you stop me?
...He's unbelievable, isn't he?
On the evaluation sheet, Park wrote: Yo-Yo Test: Level 23+. Cardio endurance and recovery had already blown past the highest possible rating.
Next: explosive power and speed. Standing long jump and the 50-meter sprint.
A player with that absurd endurance — can he really be fast too?
Endurance and explosiveness usually existed in inverse proportion. But Manager Park's expectations were spectacularly wrong yet again.
The 50-meter sprint time was...
...Is the stopwatch broken? Or are my eyes?
Park very nearly laughed out loud at the number. He lost count of how many times he double-checked the watch. It was a time that didn't just match the fastest wingers in the country — it beat them.
That massive body, moving at that speed?
Impossible results, one after another. This wasn't merely a lot of muscle. This was a body forged to absolute perfection — explosive power, blistering speed, and inexhaustible stamina, all in one package.
Manager Park swallowed hard.
The side-step test told the same story. In defiance of that heavy build, the kid displayed startling agility.
Physically, he passes. No — "passes" doesn't even begin to cover it.
Forcing down his excitement, Park prepared the next round of tests. The basic fitness evaluation alone had already completely won him over. Now all that remained was technique. Did the boy's skill measure up to that body?
"All right, now we'll look at the technical side. We'll start with dribbling."
He lined up the training cones, keeping one eye on Kim Hanbin.
At Park's word — "Start" — Hanbin placed the ball at his feet and burst forward on the signal.
The standard dribbling test: a zigzag weave between the cones.
Let's see...
Park had braced himself for sloppy touches and plodding pace, hampered by all that bulk.
Kim Hanbin blew past those expectations too.
...That's silky.
It was as if the ball were magnetized to his foot. His upper body barely swayed, holding a stable posture while his ankles and knees alone did the work — flowing between the cones like water finding its way downstream. And the speed was considerable. The technique wasn't just good; he was fusing his raw sprinting pace directly into his dribbling.
That physique AND that dribbling? That's just cheating.
Park barely managed to suppress a disbelieving laugh. Dribbling of that caliber could go through plenty of K League defenders without breaking stride.
Next was the trapping test — how securely he could control balls arriving at every height and speed.
Thump. Thump. Manager Park struck the balls himself, and Kim Hanbin received each one with quiet composure. Low, fast ground passes he cushioned softly with the inside of his foot, flowing straight into his next touch. Lofter balls he killed dead with his chest or thigh, dropping them precisely at his feet. Even the final delivery — a fiercely driven pass from distance — he controlled with effortless ease.
Trapping: pass. His fundamentals are rock solid. Honestly, it's hard to believe he trained alone.
On the sheet he added: Dribbling: Advanced. Trapping: Reliable.
By now, the coaches who'd been watching from a distance were drifting one by one toward Manager Park's side. Surprise and curiosity were written across every face.
"Manager Park, is this the kid you mentioned before?" the attacking coach asked in a low voice.
"Yes, Coach. He's testing today."
"Wow. Honestly, seeing that frame from far off, I didn't think... But he's got something, doesn't he? His dribbling looks really clean."
"No kidding. It's almost eerie, seeing that kind of flexibility out of that body."
Amid the coaches' murmuring, Park gave the next instruction.
"Passing now. Send the ball accurately to those target zones over there."
The test alternated long passes and short passes at a line of cones set at fixed positions. Kim Hanbin handled it comfortably. The weight of his passes and his accuracy were both solid.
But in the drills that followed — passing to a moving coach, or distributing under heavy pressure — a few cracks showed.
Hm... so this is the weak point after all.
Pass timing ran slightly late here and there, and when pressure closed in, his vision narrowed and errant passes crept in. It exposed the absence of match-ready instincts — the kind of sense that's nearly impossible to develop through solitary training.
"Just as I thought — the lack of real-match experience really shows."
The attacking coach scratched his head.
"Yes, that's the biggest shortcoming. But his fundamental kicking ability is there, so with tactical training and experience, he should develop into—"
Before Manager Park could finish, another coach cut in.
"Still, with a physique like that, isn't he worth developing? Forwards built like him are rare as hen's teeth these days."
Opinions among the coaching staff were clearly divided. But at the end of every remark hung the same unmistakable undercurrent — expectation.
Manager Park nodded and readied the final test.
"All right, last one. Shooting."
As Manager Park stacked a pile of balls in front of the goal, something changed in Kim Hanbin's eyes.
The coaches all held their breath, waiting for his very first shot.
"You said shooting is what you're most confident in, right, Hanbin? Go ahead — take them freely, from any angle you like."
Kim Hanbin moved toward the first ball.