If I'd Only Been Faster

"Hey, Kang Ayeon!"

The instant she opened the door, a milk carton came down on her head with a vicious smack. White milk streamed through her hair and dripped from the ends.

Laughter spread through the room like paint in water.

"Ah. I was going to tell you to watch out. Too bad. I'm late."

"Pfft. You could've said it a little faster."

"Whoa. It reeks like spoiled milk."

Ayeon stared blankly at the milk soaking her whole face and falling from the point of her chin. There was nothing else she could do.

She shook her head with a show of indifference and went back to her seat. The moment she tried to set herself down in the chair—

It slid out from under her, as if it had been waiting. The classmate in the seat behind had done it.

"Oh, were you about to sit? Sorry. My lip tint fell under there. Mind picking it up?"

Ayeon hesitated, then bent at the waist. And in that instant—

"Not there."

A shoe came down hard on the back of her hand.

"Here."

Ayeon was fourteen then. She had only just become a first-year in middle school.

She had lost her parents in a gate accident and grown up in an orphanage. For reasons she never learned, that fact had spread through the entire school from the day she enrolled.

Ayeon thought the vicious bullying was probably because of it. Looking back now, though, she wondered if bullying had ever needed a reason at all.

Lunchtime.

"Hey, eat this too."

Soup poured over her tray in a rush. Ayeon sat frozen with her spoon in her hand, and a classmate shoved her face in close.

"You're on basic livelihood support, right? All you get at home is instant ramen, so you'd better load up on school lunch while you can."

"She's not some parasite on the dole. Just an orphan."

"Hey, eat mine too."

There. The seasoning from someone's half-eaten soy-braised beef spilled across the ruined tray.

"What are you doing? Not eating?"

Ayeon's hand shook as she lifted the spoon. The moment she brought the revolting garbage to her mouth, a dry heave climbed her throat.

Eyes wet, she swept the classroom in a hurry. She met the gazes of a few classmates, and they looked away at once.

Giggles.

An ordinary scene. In the middle of it, no one reached out a hand to her.

"Kids your age fight a little and then grow close, you know. Try being brave and going to your friends first, Ayeon. I'll be cheering for you."

Her homeroom teacher was no different.

For Ayeon, school was hell. The orphanage had been far better. At least there she had been among friends in the same situation as herself.

She wanted to go back.

After school, in an empty classroom, she stared at the vicious graffiti covering her desk and thought it.

Ayeon shut her eyes tight.

Even when something terrible happened at the new orphanage, even while she ran from it and drifted from one youth shelter to another, even while the school ground her down with its bullying, she kept believing. She kept waiting. Someday she would be able to return to her teacher's arms.

But not anymore. Ayeon had given up on waiting. All she did now was pray that these awful days would end as soon as possible.

And yet.

The hell that had seemed as if it would never end collapsed with ridiculous ease, ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠on the far side of one particular day.

Korea's fourth S-rank: Kang Ayeon.

Setting aside Maestro Baek Yijun, the very first, she was the first S-rank hunter to appear since White Night Shin Gwihun, Dr. Plant Geum Rose, and the Great Sage Equal to Heaven, Yu Hwan.

The number of S-rank hunters was national power itself.

Korea's existing three stood in the upper reaches of the world rankings—S-ranks among S-ranks. All of them were acknowledged across the world. White Night for overwhelming combat strength, Dr. Plant for exceptional healing, the Great Sage for a monstrous power that was hard to believe.

Even so, no one could deny that Korea had fewer S-ranks than the countries around it. And so, when the fourth they had waited and waited for finally appeared, the nation roared its welcome.

The girl's identity spread across the country in less than a day. The middle school Ayeon attended was no exception.

Whispers.

"Ah, Ayeon."

The moment she set her bag down after arriving, Ayeon glanced back. A classmate. A kid whose name she couldn't even remember.

"Want to go to the snack shop?"

At first she was simply dazed.

Overnight, her classmates had become different people.

The ones who had tormented her all this time crawled of their own accord, reading the room, and kids she had never once spoken to started fighting one another for the seat beside her.

It wasn't only her classmates who changed.

"Ayeon, how's school these days? If anything's hard, you can tell me anytime."

"There's nothing like that."

"R-really? Then that's a relief. I was worried for no reason."

Ayeon lifted her head and looked at her homeroom teacher. That was all. The teacher's shoulders flinched, and she forced the corners of her mouth up.

"Oh, and class isn't too hard to keep up with? You're leaving early a lot, going back and forth to the Association. If it ever gets to be too much, just say so. I'll help."

"...Thank you."

Ayeon stepped out of the teachers' office and stared, blank, toward the hallway window.

Her own face in the glass.

Irises dyed the pink of azaleas by her awakening. The black bob had faded a little, gone brown.

An unfamiliar look. A familiar face. Ayeon drew a finger across the surface of the glass.

The self reflected there was smiling.

Men hauling heavy camera rigs came to the villa where she lived, day after day.

They packed the school's front gate and the back alike, and the moment they saw Ayeon in her uniform they hammered their flashes without pause.

If she tossed a few words into microphones that looked heavy just to hold, that alone was enough to make them cheer.

Conglomerates whose names the whole country knew did not stint on investment in the dazzling supernova who had lately risen into the S-ranks. Even the simple work of updating a vlog that was nothing but her commute made the money pile up like snow.

"No way. Those shoes—aren't those the Chanel collab with Big Bam ZD? How'd you even get them?"

"That's insane. I can't believe I'm seeing them in real life. Can I try them on, just once?"

"Go ahead. I've got another pair at home anyway."

"For real? You've got another pair at home?"

"Yeah. Still in the box. Signed limited edition."

"Holy— that's disgusting. What even is this level of flex."

Her friends invited her to every birthday party, and there was no school event, no class-president vote, no occasion at all that Ayeon was left out of.

The classmate who had led the campaign to ostracize her was the one being ostracized now.

"Hey, you got Ayeon's bag dirty. You gonna apologize?"

"I-I'm sorry..."

"If you're sorry, plant your face on the floor!"

Thud.

The classmate folded right in front of her. Passing through the hall, Ayeon stopped and glanced back.

"Do you have any idea what that bag costs? You couldn't buy it if you added up a whole year of your mom's salary."

"Hhh... hhk..."

She could have told them to stop. The bag could simply have been replaced.

One word—stop—and her friends would have quit without a murmur.

But.

Ayeon looked for a moment at the classmate with their head pressed to the floor, and then she took her eyes away.

Why bother?

A life turned a hundred and eighty degrees. There was nothing in it to regret.

And so Ayeon became a second-year.

Summer break arrived, and she headed for a university hospital in Bucheon with shopping bags filling both hands.

The director of the orphanage where she had grown up was there.

She must know.

She would certainly know that Ayeon had become an S-rank. What would she say when she saw how Ayeon had changed?

She went with her heart full to bursting. But she never got to meet the teacher she had missed so badly.

"She passed away last winter."

She was already far too late.

"Did the surgery go wrong?"

"No. They never even got to operate."

"Why..."

The man seemed to hesitate. Then, faltering, he opened his mouth.

"...They couldn't raise the surgical fees. The long hospitalization had already left a considerable debt."

"Th-that can't..."

The shopping bags hit the floor. A shoulder bag stamped with the logo of a famous overseas brand rolled wretchedly across the tile.

"You're saying the director died because of money?"

He didn't answer.

"She could have... lived...?"

Still he didn't answer. Ayeon folded onto the floor.

The first thought that came was this.

If I'd come a little sooner.

No. If she had awakened a little sooner. If she had made the money a little sooner.

Then maybe she could have cured the director's illness.

The seed of regret, once it sprouted, grew enormous in the blink of an eye. Faster than she could control.

Yes. If it had only been a little sooner, maybe she wouldn't have been bullied at all. Maybe she wouldn't ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠have had to leave the orphanage.

If only she had awakened.

If only there had been money.

None of the misery would have existed in the first place...

After that, Ayeon dropped out of school.

It was a simple whim.

If she absolutely had to give a reason, it was only that the whole thing had come to feel meaningless. Going to school, that is.

She decided it was worth more to work as a hunter than to sit at a desk in a school uniform, staring into space. The more she did it, the more the money grew, and the stronger she became.

And so, still a child, Ayeon began to make a name for herself as a professional hunter.

But less than a year after she started hunting in earnest, the incident broke.

It was absurd.

As Ayeon saw it, she hadn't done anything seriously wrong. Everything the girl claiming to be a victim of school violence said she had suffered, Ayeon herself had suffered in the past.

Ayeon had endured. She had changed. She had succeeded.

What that girl claimed was nothing but a loser's jealousy and resentment.

I didn't do anything wrong.

The ones in the wrong weren't her. They were the ones who hadn't endured, hadn't changed, hadn't succeeded.

Ayeon held her head ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠high.

But the public turned its back on her as easily as flipping a palm. Where were all those fervent cheers and all that worship now? Everyone in the world pointed at her, laughed at her, tore ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠her down.

Closing the S-rank gate at Hapjeong Station, donating a fortune to the W Hospital foundation—by this point, all of it seemed to have vanished beyond the reach of memory.

In the end, protest groups even formed to refuse her work as a hunter.

Because of that, Ayeon had no choice but to suspend her activities for the time being.

People guessed without a shred of evidence. The Ayeon who had vanished from sight had bolted overseas. She was in long-term care for severe panic disorder. Hounded by malicious comments, she had tried to end her own life.

Those who knew the truth kept their mouths shut, and only those who didn't know it rushed to talk.

All of them were wrong.

An S-rank hunter was national power. There was no way the state would quietly consent to Ayeon's retirement.

As proof...

"All right, all right, eyes over here! Hero-grade items, today only, a mere twenty chips! Line up, line up!"

Her alias was Phantom Thief.

An unaffiliated free hunter.

At present, she was doing a roaring trade at the Hunter Auction in Sejong City.