I Became the World's Strongest Father (3)
As soon as I broke free from the navigation screen glowing hellishly red and parked the car in the lot, I turned on my smartphone. What I checked wasn’t some obsessive habit of a forum-bound ghost with too much free time. I was confirming public opinion about my daughter.
“Damn it.”
And just as expected, the communities—no, the entire Korean internet—was on the verge of exploding. Pages showing real-time trends and best posts across multiple sites were completely flooded with screenshots from Lee Hana’s press conference that had just ended.
“...The reactions are favorable, as expected.”
The fact that the reporter’s personal information spread this quickly showed just how much interest Korea had in Lee Hana. To be blunt, the entire country was walking on eggshells around her. Reporters getting flamed was the same in both Korea and America, but when it came to a superhuman’s private life, the same people who eagerly bought paparazzi photos were now worrying about Hana’s scandals.
There was only one reason. Lee Hana wasn’t just any S-class superhuman. She was the Final MVP who had led her team to victory in America in just one year.
The sharp reactions from both her supporters and attackers all stemmed from the same desire: they wanted her to join their team.
And here was another post.
A fierce recruitment battle between two lower-tier teams. Most posts on internet communities came from regular people, but some were clearly planted by the teams’ online PR staff.
“They look desperate.”
Daejeon and Busan. Even though the superhuman league ran on capitalist logic, team names were based on the superhuman’s hometown rather than the company sponsor. This was closely tied to the “regional defense” system from the days when superhumans were still called Hunters.
Back when monsters could appear anywhere at any time, Hunters couldn’t all stay in Seoul. Every province wanted to recruit outstanding Hunters to serve as the core of their local defense. A kind of “turret” strategy. Even now, in an era where monsters were gone and Hunters had become superhumans, the image of heroes who settled in a region and protected it still remained.
Hunters had become superhumans, and instead of protecting regions, they now fought under their region’s team to spread that region’s name across the world.
So if you asked whether any team from Busan, Daejeon, or even Korea had made it to the World Championship last year… the answer was no. Which was exactly why they were paying even more attention to Lee Hana.
They wanted her in Busan. No, they wanted her in Gangwon. Officials from every province and every team—or the citizens living there—were desperately throwing every possible strategy from their desks and basement rooms onto the internet battlefield.
And if there was one element they were universally focusing on right now…
“It ends up like this after all.”
I may have once been the official B-class Hunter Lee Dokyung, but now Korea recognized me as “Hana’s Dad Lee Dokyung.” Was that a good thing? It might be. There were people who didn’t want the name Lee Dokyung to become known, but with Lee Hana rising to the very peak of the public eye, it would be strange for Lee Dokyung to remain hidden in the shadows.
‘They’ve probably established guidelines by now.’
The more they dug into Lee Dokyung, the more trouble it caused the Korean government. Of course, from the current government’s perspective it was already the “damn previous administration” from over a decade ago, but if all of my secrets were revealed, it wouldn’t be surprising if a “Lee Dokyung Gate” scandal erupted.
And that… was something I didn’t want either.
‘I hope the story doesn’t spread.’
I had deliberately avoided external activities and SNS as much as possible. Surely no one would stir up chaos by dumping their ego in the comments.
“...Time to open the comment section with a racing heart.”
“...Anyway, it’s the internet.”
Maybe it was because more than ten years had passed. Or maybe it was because monsters had disappeared and we now lived in an age where superhumans were worshipped like heroes instead of Hunters running wild. To some people, stories about me could be a trauma switch that brought back painful scars from the past, yet the internet was a space where such stories popped up without hesitation.
Still, the one fortunate thing was… there were almost no insults toward my daughter.
‘It would be strange if there were.’
Even if she joined a specific team, other teams might say “What a shame,” but no one could ever insult or slander Lee Hana. Even in female-dominated communities, anyone trying to post weird comments would get hit with “Read the room, you crazy bitch.” So of course that would be the case.
Of course, all this favorable reaction was built on the assumption that she would “become a Korean superhuman,” but—
“Hm, she’s coming.”
I slipped my smartphone back into my pocket and took a short, steadying breath.
BOOOOOOOOM!
Even inside the car, the sound was loud enough to rupture eardrums. I wondered if there had been a traffic accident, but I already knew what it was. I calmly turned my head toward the passenger seat where a gust of wind had just arrived.
“You’re here?”
“Yes, Dad.”
Lee Hana. My proud daughter. The world champion who had been holding a press conference in the airport briefing room had used her space leap at maximum speed, essentially teleporting straight to my car in the parking lot.
“What about the press conference?”
“I wanted to see you, Dad, so I came as fast as I could. To be honest, I wanted to just jump out of the plane.”
“...You can’t do that. Think about how much it would trouble the flight attendants. This isn’t America.”
“But I really missed you. It’s been almost a whole year since I saw you in person.”
Lee Hana spread her arms. The seatbelt made it a little awkward, but I leaned over and reached out to pat her back.
“There, there. Our daughter missed her dad—”
She threw herself into my arms. She must have missed me terribly; she practically climbed over the seat and into the driver’s side to hug me tight.
“Dad....”
“There, there. You worked hard.”
I gently patted her back. To everyone else, Lee Hana was the world’s greatest champion, a proven existence as the strongest among all superhumans. To the public—both before and after boarding the plane—she was an untouchable goddess. But to me, she was simply my daughter who had returned from a long time abroad and was acting spoiled.
“Dad....”
She took a deep breath. Maybe she had hugged me a bit too hard. She suddenly lifted her head.
“Did you change your cologne?”
Our faces were so close our breaths mingled. My daughter stared straight at me.
“This isn’t the one I sent you.”
Her eyes seemed to cloud over for a moment, but—
“As if.”
“Ow!”
I lightly flicked her forehead and sat her back in her seat.
“How could I waste the gift my daughter worked hard to earn and send me? I’ve kept it safe.”
“...I sent it for you to use.”
“It’s fine, it’s fine.”
I settled her properly in the passenger seat and reached over to buckle her seatbelt myself.
“Let’s go home.”
“Dad.”
The moment I grabbed the steering wheel, Hana pulled my right hand over and placed it on her thigh.
“Can you keep holding my hand the whole way?”
“.......”
She held my right hand tightly with both of hers. A memory of her childhood flashed through my mind. I adjusted the controls to switch to autonomous driving and held the wheel with only my left hand.
“As much as you want.”
Living abroad for a year hadn’t been easy even for a champion, it seemed.