Chapter 5
Chapter 5
It’s Not a Reawakening…
“What’s the point of coming from a prestigious family or sect? This martial world is a place where strength speaks for everything. No one should ever dare stand proudly before Great Hero Kang. No one.”
Whenever someone even slightly disrespected him, Yeonhwa would become angry before Jihun himself ever could.
To her, he had probably been more than just a beloved husband—he was someone she admired.
Perhaps because he had always stayed by her side, Jihun himself had slowly begun to change too.
At some point, it truly felt as though he stood above everyone else, looking down upon the world.
“You… you fucking psycho…”
“You think you’ll get away with this? Do you even know who Younghwan’s father is?”
Jihun genuinely couldn’t understand.
The people looking down on him.
The people who started trouble for no reason, yet became sincerely furious just because they got hit a few times.
Why had the Jihun of modern society been treated this way?
Ten years had blurred many of his memories.
No—
Perhaps the desperate memories of fighting and killing to survive, the memories of reigning as a powerful figure, had simply overwritten the pathetic memories of his previous life.
Jihun stepped forward once.
Flinch.
The three students standing in fighting stances recoiled instinctively.
He took another step while making eye contact with each of them one by one.
“Must I know who that child’s father is?”
At times like this, traces of his martial world speech and mannerisms unconsciously slipped out.
“Younghwan’s father is an executive in hunter management at the Ares Guild. You’re completely fucked now.”
“Do you even know how many connections Younghwan’s dad has with high-ranking hunters?”
“You’re seriously dead, you crazy bastard!”
They looked like puppies barking desperately at a tiger, unable to actually bite.
“Ahh… I see. So he simply has a father with powerful connections?”
Jihun found the situation utterly ridiculous.
This wasn’t the first time he had seen people like this.
There had been many in the martial world too.
People asking if he knew who their father was.
People asking if he knew which sect they belonged to.
People asking if he knew who their master was.
And what happened to all those people who talked like that before him?
Jihun lightly pushed off the ground and appeared in front of the student standing farthest to the right.
Smash.
There was no need to clench a fist.
No need to infuse internal energy.
The physical techniques he had refined over many years alone were already enough that these people could never follow his movements.
Jihun’s right palm slammed directly into the student’s face.
“Ugh… urgh…”
Just like Do Younghwan moments earlier, blood poured from the student’s mouth and nose as teeth spilled out before he collapsed unconscious.
Maybe Jihun failed to control his strength slightly.
Because it looked less like the guy simply passed out and more like his jaw had been completely shattered.
“Does his dad have powerful connections too?”
Jihun asked the remaining two while meeting their eyes, his tone now carrying a trace of amusement.
This wasn’t some deadly duel between martial artists risking life and death.
To him, the situation had started to feel more like children’s play.
“Y-You psycho…”
Smash.
The exact same scene repeated again.
The student beside him suffered the exact same fate.
“Urgh… ugh…”
Now all three of them lay on the ground bleeding from their mouths and noses.
Only one remained.
“W-Wait! Hold on! What the hell are you…? I just… Younghwan told me…”
Jihun watched him with visible interest, pretending to listen attentively.
“You what? Aren’t you friends with them? If you’ve got something to say, hurry up and say it.”
When the trembling student lowered his gaze slightly from Jihun’s smiling face, he saw blood dripping steadily from Jihun’s right hand.
At that moment—
Han Sooyoung spread both her arms and stepped in front of Jihun.
“Hey!! N-No! The rules! Right, this violates academy rules! You’re seriously going to get in huge trouble!”
Her worried eyes and trembling voice reached him.
“I seriously don’t remember who she is at all… Then why did she take my side?”
In the moment when every Class 11 student either ignored or mocked him, Han Sooyoung alone had defended him.
Jihun desperately searched through his memories.
“Ten years ago… were we close? No… I don’t think I ever had a friend like her…”
“Um… I’m really sorry, but were we friends? My memory’s been a mess lately, so if I forgot, I seriously apologize!”
To the one person who defended him—the only person here who actually seemed righteous—Jihun showed a completely different kindness than he had toward the others.
“Ah… no… we weren’t really friends or anything… B-But still, it’s really not good for you to keep causing more trouble like this.”
“Haha, thanks for worrying about me.”
Jihun patted Sooyoung’s shoulder while thanking her.
The sudden touch made Sooyoung lower her head shyly for some reason.
Then—
Whoosh.
Smash.
The final member of Younghwan’s group, who had just begun relaxing slightly, collapsed to the ground with his jaw shattered.
“You can’t afford to spare even one of these people. Trash like this shouldn’t even dare meet my eyes.”
Watching Jihun casually say such chilling words, Sooyoung could only stare at him speechlessly.
Professor Goo Eunyoung, who managed Class 10 at Hunter Academy, couldn’t understand the current situation at all.
The students from her class now lying in the treatment room receiving healing from a B-rank healer-type hunter were among the strongest cadets in Class 10.
“…Who exactly did this to them?”
At her question, the staff members who carried the injured students in answered,
“We heard they got into a fight with a cadet named Kang Jihun from Class 11.”
“Kang Jihun… Kang Jihun… I’ve heard that name before. Isn’t that the failure student’s name?”
Jihun had become infamous even among professors outside his own class as the weakest cadet in the entire academy.
“Yes, that should be him.”
“How… how is that possible?”
At Professor Goo’s bewildered expression, the staff members merely shrugged helplessly.
The reputation she knew Kang Jihun had was the absolute worst possible.
She’d heard he possessed a somewhat useful combat skill, but it was only C-rank—not especially impressive.
And wasn’t he also a cadet whose base hunter abilities were drastically lower than everyone else’s?
“Ah… then where is that student now? What exactly did he do to leave four people like this…”
The four patients before her had all lost their teeth, and the bleeding still hadn’t fully stopped.
The healer-type hunter’s recovery skill was gradually stabilizing them, but fear remained deeply engraved across their faces.
“We heard he was summoned to Professor Jin’s office.”
“Professor Jin… meaning Professor Jin Seokhyun?”
“Yes, that’s correct.”
Professor Goo decided she could ask Jin Seokhyun about it later and instead examined her injured students once more.
“He shattered… all the jaws of Do Younghwan and those other Class 10 students?”
Professor Jin Seokhyun couldn’t understand the situation any more than Professor Goo Eunyoung could.
Kang Jihun.
His Class 11 failure student who had somehow seemed different lately.
Only four days ago, Jin Seokhyun had witnessed him instantly decapitate the King Goblin with a sword strike too fast for even his own eyes to follow.
And now, somehow, that same guy had already caused another massive incident and ended up summoned to his office.
“Yes. They deliberately came looking for trouble, so I disciplined them enough that they won’t try again.”
Why the hell was a student who got called in for causing trouble acting this confident?
And ever since before, that incomprehensible arrogance of his kept irritating Professor Jin more and more.
“Ahem… Personal fights between cadets outside official sparring matches are punishable under academy regulations.”
“So I’m getting penalty points again? Come on, let it slide this time. Kids fight sometimes, don’t they?”
“You are an adult and an awakened individual now, aren’t you?”
“The guys who got beaten were awakened too. If they started trouble first, they should’ve been prepared to get hurt.”
Crack.
Not backing down even a single word.
Remaining stiff, proud, and confident the entire time.
Jin Seokhyun found Jihun strangely irritating.
“Ahem… We’re currently taking witness statements from the other students, so we’ll determine fault later. More importantly…”
Professor Jin carefully continued, as though choosing his words cautiously.
“…Have you perhaps reawakened?”
Reawakening.
A phenomenon where an already awakened hunter experiences a unique turning point and awakens again, gaining completely different abilities from before.
Considering the changes Jihun had shown over the past few days, it was a reasonable suspicion.
So Professor Jin carefully asked him.
“What’s reawakening?”
“…?”
Professor Jin completely lost his words at Jihun’s confident question.
“Ah, my mind’s been messy lately and my memory’s a bit blurry. I’m basically relearning everything.”
After saying that, Jihun fell into thought with a serious expression before speaking again.
“Ahh, reawakening. I vaguely remember now. No, I haven’t reawakened.”
Professor Jin’s eyes narrowed suspiciously.
“You didn’t reawaken, yet you one-shot the King Goblin and defeated four awakened students from Class 10?”
“Yes.”
The short answer with absolutely no further explanation left Professor Jin increasingly frustrated.
“Do I specifically need to reawaken and receive a high rank in order to move to Class 1?”
“Hm? You mean moving to a higher class? Not necessarily. Cadets can move up through excellent monthly or quarterly evaluation results, or if their abilities are recognized as exceptional. That’s common knowledge for academy students, isn’t it?”
Jihun scratched his head while thinking deeply about something.
“I haven’t reawakened, but I suppose I really should move to Class 1.”
The nonsense Jihun kept casually throwing out one after another was slowly grinding away at Professor Jin’s sanity without him even realizing it.