A Beast in the Making
A curse slipped out of Yoo Kang-soo before he even knew it was coming.
It wasn't a situation that called for swearing, and it wasn't anything that mattered — and yet here he was, hung up over banana milk, so stunned at his own behavior he barely recognized it. Without quite realizing it, he was turning into one of them: the kind of inmate who obsessed over the smallest things. He could feel himself changing.
"Well... I mean... Hyung-nim, you're a martial artist, so I figured you only drank plain milk..."
Dong-sik scratched his head as he said it.
The very next day, they were on their way back from the labor yard.
"Hey... Number 8869. A word."
Kang-soo turned around.
For a moment, the knife fighter he'd killed with a Salsu flashed through his mind. The man in front of him was of average build, but he had that kind of body — the type born with the reflexes of a puma. You could tell at a glance he wasn't someone who'd learned to fight. He was the kind who did it on raw athletic instinct.
"What?"
Kang-soo answered, already figuring this was one of the Haeyang Shindaeryuk people Dong-sik had mentioned.
"Our boss would like a word with you. If you could spare a moment."
The man didn't use rough language. It was a complete contrast to how most inmates talked — especially the violent offenders, who lived with informal speech and coarse language hanging off every sentence.
"If I get pinched by a guard because of you people and end up in solitary, you gonna take responsibility for that?"
Kang-soo's voice was low. He'd had more than enough of these bastards.
"We'll take responsibility. Just come with me for a moment."
Kang-soo never let the tension out of his shoulders. He knew all too well that even when bad men played at being gentlemen, they were perfectly capable of putting a knife in your back.
It was an open stretch of space along the way to the showers — fairly large, since groups of inmates passed through it on their way to bathe. More than five men with a menacing air about them were gathered there, and one of them was sitting in a chair. You could tell at a glance that he was the boss of Haeyang Shindaeryuk. His hair was streaked with gray; he was well past fifty, no young man.
"Mr. Yoo Kang-soo. This prison has its own rules. And right now, you're breaking every last one of them. I don't know how strong you are, but how about this — we settle it fair, no weapons, bare fists. The loser serves the winner. What do you say?"
The middle-aged man who'd called him over spoke in a polite, measured voice. Kang-soo figured he was around his own age at most — maybe even younger.
"Fuck off, you son of a bitch. Why the hell should I waste my energy fighting gangster trash like you? Shut your damn mouth and get lost before I start yelling for a guard."
Kang-soo used informal speech from start to finish, his language rough and coarse. He'd never talked like this on the outside. His speech had always been calm and polite. Even as a military police investigator, he'd only used harsh language with suspects — with his fellow soldiers, he'd been nothing but warm. Maybe it was because he'd grown up seeing so much ugliness from the bottom of the ladder, but humility had been baked into him. After transferring to this prison, though, he never showed that humility. In here, humility was as good as an invitation to be walked all over.
"The guards won't be coming," the man said, looking at him.
"Hah... fuck."
One of the men was standing watch by the door.
"Keep this up and you're gonna die. From now on, any asshole who mouths off to me, I'm crippling them. No exceptions. You still wanna fight?"
Kang-soo said it looking straight at him.
"Yes. Order inside this prison is extremely important. If you'll just fight — win or lose — we'll give you two cartons of cigarettes."
"I don't smoke. What the hell are cigarettes even doing in a prison?"
"If you're not going to fight, then keep your trap shut from now on and stay quiet. Don't cause any more trouble. Sit there like a dead mouse for two years and then get out."
Kang-soo almost laughed. The man had started off playing polite, and now the gangster in him was finally showing.
"Hey, gangster. Did you just talk down to me? You son of a bitch — how old are you? You look younger than me. Come on, then. I'll kill you today. Dong-sik begged me not to touch your tendons. Begged me. Too bad. No mercy. I'm crippling you today."
Kang-soo stepped forward as he cursed.
The man lunged at him in a flash. He came in with a flying kick, fists and feet whipping out like lightning. The way he fought was on a completely different level. He really was like a puma.
Kang-soo didn't put any power into it at first — he just kept dodging. Honestly, he was afraid. He kept thinking of his old master, who'd died a miserable, lonely death in a seaside village. That was the life of a martial artist.
What frightened him now was that he could see every one of the man's attacks. From the moment he opened his eyes in the morning to the moment he closed them at night, all he did was train. When had he ever had a stretch of his life like this? As a student, he'd trained around his studies. In the military, he'd trained around his work as an investigator. But now all he did was train, and in the leftover hours he read. The labor detail wasn't even real work, honestly. Compared to what he'd done in the army, prison labor was child's play. In forty-seven years of living, had he ever devoted this much time to martial arts?
The fact that he could see every attack meant that if he wanted to, he could kill this man in a single blow. And that terrified him.
He kept dodging until the man closed in fast on his face and threw a punch — and in that split second, Kang-soo caught one of the man's hands, twisted it, and simultaneously drove a kick hard into the rear of his ankle. It was a Hapkido initiative technique: break the arm, collapse the stance, and throw.
He didn't hold back. They were criminal bastards anyway. The arm wouldn't snap, but he didn't care if it got hurt. He twisted hard, kicked the heel hard, and threw him.
The destructive force generated by Kang-soo's body weight — well over two hundred pounds, now pushing two-twenty — was tremendous. With a heavy thud the man hit the floor. Kang-soo drove a hard kick into his thigh, then grabbed one ankle and yanked it high.
He was about to twist it — then he let out a sigh. The man had already been slammed hard into the floor, his center of gravity completely gone, helpless. A slight twist of the ankle here and the tendon would stretch right out; that much was obvious. Kang-soo let the tension out of his arm. Then he just flung the ankle forward and let go.
"You... you piece of trash. You ought to thank Dong-sik. He was worried every time he served the food that you'd end up with a stretched tendon, limping around, suffering."
The men who'd just watched Kang-soo's absurd Hapkido defense and offense stood there in a daze, unable to say a word.
"You. The one blocking the door. Maybe you should get your ankle tendon stretched instead. Dong-sik didn't say anything about you."
The man watching the door hurriedly stepped aside. There were five of them, including the one who looked like the boss — and not a single one could bring himself to come at Kang-soo.
"Hey... Number 8869. No — Yoo Kang-soo. Let's talk for a minute."
The white-haired man stood up from his chair as he spoke.
"Yeah... fuck it. Beating the shit out of gangster underlings a hundred times over is a waste. You're the boss, right? Today I'm gonna make you shit blood, and we're ending this bullshit as of today. You die or I die — let's do this. Come on in, you son of a bitch."
Kang-soo cursed at the white-haired man and got ready to fight. He could feel himself getting stronger by the day, and even he was starting to worry about it. At this rate, I might actually turn into a mad beast. The thought frightened him.
"Everyone out. Don't let anyone near."
The white-haired man they called the boss spoke to his men in a deeply solemn voice.
The truth was, every man who'd come at Kang-soo so far had been beaten to within an inch of his life. But today's middle-aged man had barely been hit at all — he'd just gotten a light taste of a few blows.