The Return Man
It always happened.
Every team that faced Jaehyuk swore up and down that they had prepared for him—game-planned, scouted, drilled. Yet when the moment actually came, someone would inevitably mutter that familiar, comfortable thought: Well, he can't be that good...
And by the time they'd tasted the heat, it was already too late.
"TOUCHDOWN!!"
"WAAAAAH!!"
The momentum had long since slipped through their fingers.
"ROOOOLL! REDLINE!!!"
"KYAAAAA!! Jaehyuuuuk! Nice touchdown!"
"That absolute monster! Thank god he's on our team!"
"Let's rebuild the Redline dynasty!!"
A touchdown on the very first drive of the game.
The price of committing their second line of defense to guarding the pass had been brutal.
And the Volunteers' bench, who had watched the whole thing unfold with their own eyes, stood speechless, simply drifting in the rolling tide of cheers.
Their gazes were fixed on Jaehyuk, who walked back toward the sideline without so much as a celebration—quiet, matter-of-fact, as if scoring were merely his job.
"What... what was that, exactly?"
Honestly speaking?
It was perfect.
The speed, the spin, the cutback, the juke.
From the mechanics of every step to the angles, the height, everything.
Especially his field of vision—it was as if it stretched a full 360 degrees, taking in everything at once and responding with precisely the right movement each time. That wasn't just football anymore. That had crossed into another realm entirely.
That was a kind of art.
He had elevated the running back position into something beautiful.
And we were so sure we'd scouted him properly...
To be fair, there had been plenty of material on Jaehyuk.
His football career was short, but the highlights he'd packed into that short window were numerous enough that the analysis had felt thorough.
But the Redline they'd studied on film and the Redline standing in front of them in the flesh existed in entirely different dimensions.
"Coach. It looks like they're setting up for a two-point conversion."
The defensive coordinator's urgent voice cut through the daze. Josh blinked, and there they were—the opposing quarterback and running back lined up in formation.
The same running back who had cruised through eighty yards like it was a jog.
A two-point conversion from just three yards out would be child's play for him.
"We stop it."
Josh answered hollowly, and in the end it was the defensive coordinator who stepped in, barking instructions at the defensive unit on his behalf.
Soon the two-point conversion began.
Thud! Thud! Thud!
Amid the violent clash of bodies—
Tap!
The ball slipped cleanly out and into a pass.
With every eye in the stadium locked on Jaehyuk, Ty sold the play without effort.
The one who caught it was Marcus Thornton.
Alabama's momentum surged even higher.
This is a disaster.
He had to pull himself together.
The Third Saturday in October—a rivalry over a century old.
They'd won it at home last year. He refused to lose it on the road in such a hollow fashion.
And to lose because of a single player?
That was something he could never, ever accept.
"Listen up—!!"
Josh finally spoke, and the dazed players turned their attention to him.
"We gave up points the second the game started. That stings. But football is a team sport!"
"......"
The players listened in silence.
Then Josh, still staring out at the field, turned back and roared.
"They scored on us? Then we score right back! Whatever they took from us, we pay back tenfold!!"
"YEAH!!"
The offensive unit spurred themselves to their feet, and soon the teams traded sides, the defense jogging back onto the field.
"Good work out there. But don't beat yourselves up—some of that was on me. I called the wrong defense."
"No, Coach. There's no excuse."
The returning Volunteers linebacker shook his head, his face tight with frustration.
"I shouldn't have let it happen, but honestly? I got complacent. I caught myself thinking, what does some Asian kid think he's doing out here... That was my mindset. And it cost us."
"Then let's lock in from here and stop them properly."
"...Yes, sir!"
Josh was mid-sentence when—
It struck him, sudden and unbidden.
Maybe the player we're facing right now... isn't something we can measure. Maybe he's not someone we can just 'match up against.'
Maybe he's the kind of player who'll make legends of himself in the NFL—who comes along once in the entire history of football and never comes again.
Pfft.
No. That's too far.
Evidently, surrendering that one score had shaken him far more deeply than he'd realized.
Josh resolved to collect himself and got to work drawing up plays with his offensive coordinator.
Derby High School, Kansas.
With football season in full swing, the regular season was charging along here as well—and Derby High, fresh off yet another game, had brushed their opponents aside with ease and settled into a well-earned rest.
"Great work out there today, everyone."
Coach Steve of Derby praised his players in the locker room and was about to dismiss them when he noticed one player still in his gear, phone in hand, not even bothering to change.
"Peter. What are you doing?"
"Oh, Coach! I'm watching a college game."
"Which one?"
When Steve showed interest, the player called Peter turned his screen around.
"Alabama versus Tennessee. I've been pulling for Alabama lately. Redline!"
"......"
Redline.
The old resonance he'd almost forgotten washed over Steve once more.
"Coach! Just last year Redline was in OUR league! Can you believe it?!"
"Man, I wasn't even a starter back then—I was watching from the bench, and he was already unreal."
"Who would've thought Redline would still be flying around in college? Never saw it coming."
"He was Kansas's undisputed MVP, of course he's flying around! Redline is Kansas's pride!"
The locker room erupted into chatter.
Watching his players carry on like kids, Steve let out an easy laugh.
"That kid's going to have his name written into the history books."
His second game against Redline.
Even now, he couldn't forget the chill that had run down his spine that day.
No—he probably never would, for the rest of his life.
Their starting quarterback had gone down with an injury. Then Derby's scheme targeting the backup had worked, and for the first time all game, victory had felt within reach—
Flinch!
The beast Jaehyuk had become in that moment was still vivid in his memory.
When he'd stretched his red afterimage long across the field and run down Hopkins—Derby's ace, their crown jewel—it could only be described one way.
Overwhelming.
Come to think of it, if things go well, we might run into him again through Hopkins.
Hopkins had gone to the Georgia Bulldogs.
A D1 program in the same SEC as Jaehyuk's Alabama.
And by raw value alone, Georgia held far higher standing than even last year's Alabama squad.
Measured against Alabama's glittering century of history, of course, Georgia paled—but look at just the last five years, and no team in the country had surpassed them.
Back-to-back national championships in 2022 and 2023—the very definition of college football's strongest.
"WAAAAH!! TOUCHDOWN!! Redline scored another one! Is this guy even real?!"
"INSANE!"
"REDLINE! REDLINE!"
His players were screaming their heads off.
At the sight of them, Steve couldn't help a wry smile.
"Why do you all look more hyped than when we win our own games?"
But honestly—was this even the time to worry about that?
Wichita North High School was blowing the league apart this season too.
Fortunately, they hadn't been placed in Derby's district, and even without Jaehyuk, they were marching through the schedule undefeated just like last year.
At the head of it all, naturally, rode the 'Supernova' himself—Mateo Rodriguez.
Behind him, Quinton Gibson holding the line.
And as an unexpected dark horse, Joseph Baker had stepped into Jaehyuk's old spot.
Joseph in particular had been swinging freely between tight end and running back, demolishing defenses at every turn.
All thanks to the advice Jaehyuk had once given him, apparently.
That kid really never stops making his presence known, even in college.
A presence caught somewhere between love and hate.
But still.
Coach Steve found himself leaning over to peek at Peter's phone screen too.
"What, is the drive over?"
"You're late, Coach! They even just ran a two-point conversion—clean pass, right in. Perfect execution."
Why, though?
Steve, of all people—the one who wanted nothing more than to see Jaehyuk succeed—
The game unfolded as a brutal, grinding battle.
Alabama had knocked the wind out of Tennessee early, but a rivalry game lived up to its name—the Volunteers refused to back down an inch.
They really do breed some fierce dogs down there, huh?
The score had crept to 25:15, Tennessee on offense.
Had Alabama not crushed their early momentum, things might genuinely have gotten dangerous—Tennessee's talent was that real.
Otherwise the Crimson Tide would have already blown the game wide open, but these Volunteers clung and clawed like starving dogs.
Tenacious to the last.
"Next drive, Green comes out and Isaiah Horton goes in. Keep feeding them passes."
"Yep!!"
"And Jaehyuk—get ready for a short pass. Run it like a tight end. Avoid blocking as much as you can; Ty will handle any scramble on his own."
"Got it."
Even on the bench, the offense was scheming in real time, building strategy drive by drive.
The defense would take care of itself—the players back there knew their jobs.
All we had to do was trust them and put points on the board.
"Oh! Punt kick!"
"A punt?"
Punts happened now and then—maybe five or so a game?
Normally they'd line up for a field goal, so the fact that Tennessee was sending out the punter meant our defense was playing out of its mind.
"Jaehyuk!"
Then it came.
DeBoer called my name.
In an instant, a flood of eyes swung toward me.
Every one of them blazing with expectation.
"No way—"
"FINALLY!"
The returner. The role I'd played exactly once, in a scrimmage, and never since.
They rarely used it because the injury risk to the ball carrier was so high—but apparently, for this game, Coach had decided to go all in.
As I stepped forward, DeBoer clapped a hand on my shoulder.
"Return team."
That one word was enough.
I settled my visored helmet onto my head and nodded.
"I'll bring back points."
"I know you will. I'm counting on you."
A short exchange—but the coaches and players who'd overheard it from either side absolutely erupted.
"RAAAAAAGH!!"
"Redline's going in as the returner!!"
"Show them in a real game!!"
"Blow Tennessee to pieces!!"
And the moment I jogged onto the field, my image bloomed across the jumbotron, huge and unmistakable.
The crowd realized what was happening all at once.
"AAAAAAAHHH!!!"
"REDLINE IS THE RETURNER!!"
"HOO! HOO! HOO!"
"ROLL TIDE! ROLL REDLIIIIINE!!"
The crowd's roar shook the stadium in every direction.
At the same time, the Tennessee defense stared at me with taut, wary faces.
They hadn't expected me to come out. Not for a second.
The Volunteers' bench burst into frantic motion.
Scrambling substitutions before the snap—doing everything they could to build a wall around me.
But.
It wouldn't matter. Not all of it, not together.
I'm the strongest one out here.
Soon the long snapper fired the ball back to the punter, who hauled it in with steady hands.
BOOOM—!!
The punt sailed high and deep.
I tracked its flight and took off running.
The punter had deliberately kicked it away from my side of the field—but it was well within my reach.
Thump.
A dark crimson line unfolded before my eyes.
Not a straight path—my Gift was sketching a winding, complicated route.
Presumably because the coverage men were already charging at me, it was showing me how to slip them before they ever arrived.
Thump. Thump. Thump.
The ball arced down from the sky.
The closer it fell, the more violently the Gift's path trembled and flickered.
Thump! Thump! Thump!
I was looking up now.
The line had vanished from view.
And yet I could feel it—the Gift's pulse beating hot against my heart.
Thump!!
Tap!
The instant I caught the ball—
A tackle came hurtling in.
SLAM!!
"NO!!"
"REDLINE!"
Screams and cries burst from the stands on every side. But—
Tap!
I'd already seen it coming. The moment the ball touched my hands, I took a back step, bleeding off the impact to almost nothing.
It was only possible because the Gift had already drawn the path—move backward—before the hit ever landed.
The shock wasn't zero.
But the defender, so certain he'd made the stop, found himself violently peeled off me as I hammered back step after back step.
Stagger.
He crumpled forward all on his own, unable to do a thing about it.
But it wasn't over.
The punt had hung in the air a long time, and the coverage unit came charging in full tilt.
Thump! Thump!
And I ran—trusting the Gift completely.
Backward.
"......!"
"!!?"
They chased me.
But no one here could catch my speed.
My legs had already converted the very impact of that tackle into acceleration—and they were faster than anyone on this field.
"Jaehyuk! Over here!"
The bench was shouting from the sideline—and the Gift's path bent exactly where they were pointing. The two lined up perfectly.
RATATAT!
Running briefly in reverse, sweeping a huge half-circle, I hooked onto the sideline and flew.
With my teammates materializing at my side, guarding me like a fortress.
"RUUUUUN!!"
"RUN! RUN! RUN!"
"RUN, REDLINE!!"
Players sprinted along the sideline with me—then Coach DeBoer and the whole coaching staff were running too.
80, 70, 60, 50......
Defenders kept flinging themselves into my path, and one by one my teammates threw their bodies in front of them, cutting them down.
Thirty yards to go.
Every teammate had fallen away. Only I remained.
The last man standing between me and the end zone—a safety, planted in my path.
"All alone?"
Even at full sprint, I flashed him a grin—and the man froze solid.
Thanks to that, his tackle was laughably easy to read.
Can't tense up. Not with me right in front of him.
Whoosh!
I spun out of his reach.
To his credit, the safety had some craft to him—he wrenched his body around, arm stretching desperately toward me.
But here's the thing.
That was a fake.
Hup!
Spin, followed by a back-step juke.
Convinced I'd cut forward, the safety lunged at empty air, his balance collapsing beneath him.
"Can't stop me alone. Greedy, aren't you?"
I left him those final words and surged for the end zone.
There were no more defenders left. Not one.
Glancing back, I could see Tennessee's defense had already given up the chase entirely.
"Touchdown."
Stomp!
And stepping into the end zone, I made absolutely sure—once more—of exactly who I was.