Vacation Beach Trip # 3
Vacation Beach Trip # 3
This bastard's trying to hustle an Awakened?
"Come on, no way I'm paying fifty thousand. Just take five thousand, okay?"
I was pissed, but a hero cadet who's supposed to set an example can't start beefing with civilians over money. I pulled out my wallet to make a quick, cool five-thousand-won deal, but the parasol goon scowled and said,
"What, you're haggling down ninety percent? It's peak vacation season, demand's exploding—how do you expect me to do it for five thousand?"
"Then take ten thousand. Hold on—we brought our own parasol, so where do you get off asking for fifty thousand?"
"We own this whole stretch... renting a parasol is a hundred thousand."
"Sick. That's insanely expensive. But I don't give a shit, anyway—let's call it five thousand and be done."
I was just about to hand over roughly five thousand won and end it nicely when—
"Hey, fuck this. Hold up. Stop hustling him."
From behind me, Yu-ri strode right up.
"Whoa, hold on—Yu-ri? If you assault a civilian..."
"Ah, that's not what this is, shut it. Let's see. The name of this beach."
"Says here, Dotakbu Beach."
"Yeah."
Yu-ri pulled out her phone and started tapping away—
"Oh what the fuck? Get a load of these piece-of-shit bastards. They're operating without a license!"
What?!
"What did you say?! You're unlicensed and you've been gouging a hundred thousand won! You fucking scumbag, you wanna die?!"
My eyes practically bugged out of my skull. I whipped around toward the parasol goon, and the guy flinched and stammered,
"Un-unlicensed? We've got permits from the local government..."
"Don't give me that bullshit, you bastard. Where the hell do you bastards get off running an illegal operation and charging fifty thousand a head? Hey. Those parasols next to ours. You see 'em? We're using 'em."
"Now, hold on—"
"And you—go grab us chairs and a table. Ransack your office and bring us drinks, too. And snacks—bring anything you've got. Unless you want to get fucked up."
Yu-ri's voice was vicious as she yanked out the neighboring parasols and set them up around our spot.
Add chairs and a table to the mix, and this was literally a luxury setup. Completely unintentional jackpot.
"What are you waiting for? Hurry up and bring it over."
"Ah, fuck this."
When Yu-ri raised her fist, the parasol goon spun around and bolted.
—Pitter-patter.
The madman actually ran.
"Wow. These bastards are illegal, and they've been raking it in?"
"Kim Geun-cheol, you dumbass. Why were you trying to pay them? Just smack 'em around and be done with it."
"No—now that I hear what's going on, I really want to beat the crap out of them too. But, come on. A hero cadet comes to the beach and starts wailing on civilians—how's that gonna look? I was just gonna slip him five thousand so he could go buy an ice cream and call it done."
Fifty thousand won, over my dead body—but five thousand, I could spare that. Yeah, I used to scrap a lot back in the day, but now that I'm a hero cadet, I can't go using unnecessary violence against civilians.
"You and your goddamn... look. If a civilian tries to scam an Awakened, you can beat the hell out of them and get away with it. It's a legally protected right, you know."
Anyway, while I was hashing that out with Yu-ri—
"Those bastards?"
The parasol goon had returned with reinforcements—big guys covered in tattoos.
"You there! What's the meaning of this—wreaking havoc in a vacation spot?! Why are you pulling up perfectly good parasols?! Come over here and talk!"
But the thing is, the tattooed goon was the one bellowing. That bastard... should I actually just beat his ass?
Yu-ri let out a sigh.
"What the hell is this? These gangster bastards? Christ. Civilian scumbags running their own little mob and ripping off vacationers. The country's in great shape. I ought to deck every last one of these assholes."
The parasol goons came striding over.
I yelled at them.
"Hey! What you're doing here—it's illegal, assholes! Who the hell charges a hundred thousand won?! Just get lost, you bastards!"
"Well, look at this—Illegal, what crap... We've got full permission from the local government. If you're not gonna pay, you're the ones who can get lost! We're calling the cops!"
"Thugs are calling the cops now?! Hey! Kim Geun-cheol! Leona! Lee Si-hoo! These bastards are hopeless! Let's just smash every single parasol they've got!"
Hell yes!
"Sounds good to me! I can't take this anymore!"
"Pulling this kind of stunt at the beach! Unforgivable!"
—Whoosh!
Leona and Si-hoo, who'd been standing in the back with their arms crossed, were coming over!
And then—
—Crash!
We immediately commenced Operation: Destroy Every Commercial Parasol in Their Little Fiefdom.
"Huh?"
"H-hey! Boss! These bastards!"
"The hell! Call the cops!"
I made sure to leave the spots where other customers had their stuff alone; I only targeted the empty parasols—ripping them up, breaking them, and hurling them away.
—Crash!
—Thud!
"Heu-hah-hah-hah!"
Shattering that whole row of parasols one after another—it felt damn refreshing! Should've done this from the start! I snapped the poles with my fists and sent the debris flying with kicks.
"Kim Geun-cheol! Look!"
"Ooh! The Goddess of the Sword! It's the Goddess of the Sword!"
"Hyaaahp!"
Leona straight-up plucked whole parasols out of the sand, wrapped them in sword aura, and started smashing the others; Yu-ri was just having the time of her life turning parasols into javelins.
—Splash!
"What are you, an ancient Greek javelin thrower?!"
And Si-hoo gathered up the parasol wreckage flying everywhere, piled it into one spot, and ground it into smithereens. I gotta say—my friends are goddamn hardcore.
"Crazy! They're Awakened!"
"You said they were just some brats!"
"W-We didn't know!"
By then, the parasol goons were trembling in fear, shifting their weight from foot to foot. And just after we'd annihilated every last empty parasol—
—Wee-oo! Wee-oo! Wee-oo!
The cops showed up.
"Over there! Freeze! What do you think you're doing?! I'm placing you under arrest, caught in the act!"
"Arrest? Who the hell's getting arrested?!"
"E-excuse me! These people—they're Awakened..."
"Whaaat?!"
The officer who'd been rushing over stopped dead in his tracks.
Right as he was about to say something, Yu-ri stepped forward first and let him have it.
"Hey, you fuckin' bastard. Are the cops running protection for gangsters now? Huh?"
And she said it with absolutely terrifying menace! Is it okay to talk to a cop like that?
"Excuse me? Wh-wha? G—gangsters?"
"They've been shaking people down for a hundred thousand won a spot, not even letting 'em put up their own parasols—what the hell are you doing instead of cracking down on this? You bastard, you think a little police badge makes you untouchable?"
"No, that's... they've got local government permission, so cracking down on it..."
"You think you know the law better than me? Or do I know it better? You honestly believe that? All of you bastards—call your superior if you don't want to get completely fucked. You, start by putting your head on the ground. A cop taking cash for this—real classy."
"R-rangers? Please, calm down for a moment and..."
"You not gonna do it? You want me to call the Hero Association?"
"Whaaat?!"
"What do you think, minimum response—a suppression unit gets deployed? Once they see a criminal organization and the cops are in bed together?"
"No! Just a moment! I-I'll call him! Hello?!"
Right then, the cop pressed his forehead against the sand and whipped out his phone to call his superior.
"..."
The parasol goons were standing at stiff attention, sweat streaming down their faces. Still... wait, was this whole thing actually locally permitted?
"Yu-ri. If these bastards really did have a permit, aren't we totally screwed?"
"There's no such permit, you moron. Do you seriously think anyone on Korean soil could get away with bleeding vacationers for a hundred thousand a pop?"
"No, not exactly."
"Just leave it to me, dumbass. Did our little Geun-cheol get scared? Awww, is widdle Geun-cheol a scaredy-cat?"
Yu-ri immediately started cooing and tickling me under the chin. Fine—if Yu-ri says so, that's probably how it is.
"I absolutely cannot fucking stand this kind of shakedown. Scumbags trying to fleece Awakened people and regular families who came here just to have a good time..."
"Rangers!!!"
—Thud!
Soon enough, the superior officer came sprinting over and threw his forehead onto the sand.
* * *
In the end, Yu-ri even carpet-bombed the fiftysomething police superior and kept lividly grilling him until he confessed that this entire operation was an illegal dark industry run under tacit approval.
The whole thing was illegal.
There was technically something about local government permission, but it wasn't the right to sell those parasol spots at exorbitant prices—it was just a simple permit to set up a stall at the beach entrance and exclusively rent out just the parasols themselves.
These bastards had expanded that on their own and started charging a "spot fee."
"Alright, then. What should we do with these bastards? For starters, confiscate the illegal profits and donate it to the local government, or...?"
"Good idea! Let's donate it all to an orphanage! We can even storm their houses and seize everything—once vacation's over, of course!"
The moment the word "donate" came up, Leona excitedly yelled.
"Heroes! Please! We were wrong! So just...!"
"So just what?"
And right as we were deciding their sentence—
"Ah, aah! Boss! The boss is here!"
"Boss! Please, save us!"
From over there.
"Huh? Geun-cheol? It's that hero."
"Say what?"
A heavyset hero in his forties, an older guy, walked over. The moment he appeared, every face in the crowd—the cops, the parasol goons, all of them—lit up.
Wait, there's no reason these bastards should be happy a hero showed up.
"Boss!"
"Ah, shit—I told you not to call me boss."
Boss?
Could he be a gangster hero?
I felt a deep pang of suspicion. A hero mixed up in a civilian criminal organization? From what I'd learned, things like that fell under Treason. Practically a straight shot to being designated a villain.
Anyway, as I was watching this hero who'd showed up—
"Oh, my."
He put on a friendly smile and held out his hand.
"You’re academy graduates too, aren’t you? Nice to meet you. I’m Han Mi-hyeok, an alumnus."
"My god. You’re an academy alumnus?"
"I sure am. It’s a real pleasure running into younger graduates out here."
A quick glance told me everything: Yu-ri had an annoyed look on her face, and both Leona and Si-hoo had simply shut their mouths.
Which meant I was the one who had to deal with him.
"Here, let’s all have a drink. You guys! Grab us something cold!"
"Yes, boss!"
The parasol goons immediately fetched cola and pressed bottles into our hands.
"Anyway, the thing is—that permit is a little, how do I put it, ambiguous. But you could call this a public-service gig I’ve been running. After I retired, I started managing this little beach and living my life here."
The retired hero Han Mi-hyeok prattled on, face set in that good-natured expression.
"Then again, I’ve got a lot of other things going on. I’m seriously busy. These bastards here work under me. I handed the job off to them this time, but when they saw you were students, they apparently tried to go behind my back and shake you down for pocket money. In other words, I trusted them to manage the beach, didn’t supervise them properly, and they stabbed me in the back."
"Ah... I see."
No matter how I looked at it, the only one doing any back-stabbing seemed to be this old guy. If I were one of those goons and heard that after doing exactly what I'd been told from above, I'd lose my goddamn mind.
"Originally, these bastards were local gangsters, punks, you know? And as a retired hero? Figured I'd try to rehabilitate 'em a little. Tried to make decent human beings out of 'em by giving 'em some work, and they pull this crap. My bad. I thought turning punks around was a public service, too... Hoo. In the end, no matter how sincerely you treat 'em, they just don't listen. That's actually part of why I retired... Hoo."
But the way this bastard talked was seriously pissing me off.
"So what do you say? Could you let it slide just this once, for my reputation’s sake? I’ll make sure these guys get thoroughly schooled. And since those cops are completely useless, I’ll clean house there too. Do me a favor and let it go, all right?"
It was a demand disguised as a request.
When I thought about it, this was definitely that retired hero's turf. If we pushed things further here, we'd be the only ones who lost out.
And besides, hero society runs on mutual protection. Picking a fight with a fellow hero never ends well. Even if that hero is retired.
As if she knew that, Yu-ri stepped up and spoke.
"Ah, yes. That’s probably for the best. If we’d known from the start that you were in charge here, we would’ve checked with you first. Sorry about wrecking the parasols."
"Forget it. These idiots caused it trying to run a scam, after all. I'll just make 'em take out loans and cover the costs—don't worry about it."
—Flinch!
The cops and parasol goons all flinched.
"Well then, enjoy your time. Take any of the parasols that are still intact and use 'em. If there's a place in town you wanna eat at, just drop my name and get a free meal. Alright, later. Oh, and you lot—come along. We've got some things to discuss, me and you. Our boys in blue, you come along too, yeah?"
"Y-yes! Boss..."
"Understood..."
I watched them go, and drank the cold cola the parasol goon had handed me.
What the hell was that bastard?
Do scumbag heroes like him just lord it over the provinces?
I felt that question linger.
* * *
"Argh, for real—I almost died laughing, it was so ridiculous. That punk-ass thug bastard."
Irritated, Yu-ri kicked at the ground.
"What can we do. It's obvious he's local establishment. And since the other party is a hero, our hands are tied. Don't dwell on it, just ignore it, Woo Yu-ri."
"Yeah, I have to. If he were a regular citizen I'd wreck him, tch."
"A bit of a shame we couldn't make the donation, though."
Leona rubbed Yu-ri's shoulder. The look on Yu-ri's face—the situation must've seriously pissed her off.
I was pissed too.
"Anyway. Was that whole shitshow with the beach parasols all the work of our dear alumnus?"
"Don’t show a bastard like that any respect, for fuck’s sake. We let it go because this isn’t our turf, but if this were our neighborhood? Hah. We would’ve wiped them out."
"By unleashing the people from your swordsmanship dojo?"
"That, among other things."
Yeah, if the dojo crew came storming in, those guys wouldn't stand a chance.
"In any case, Geun-cheol. Even if it's aggravating, you have to let it go. Nothing good comes from starting a fight with a hero from another region. Retired or not, a hero's still a hero."
I nodded at Si-hoo's words.
"Hah. That's exactly why it's so damn annoying. That crazy son of a bitch. A former hero, out here shaking down beachgoers for cash."
Yu-ri said that as she stood up from her spot.
"Once an Awakened gets involved, the police have no real recourse. Well, let's just forget it and have fun. If you let this bother you, you lose."
"Yeah, we have to."
We came here to enjoy ourselves.
"Hm."
As I was thinking that, Leona called out to me.
"Kim Geun-cheol? What is it?"
"No, hold on a second."
"Yes?"
"But why is someone who's supposedly a retired hero out here living as a parasol goon? Or, wait—why'd he retire in the first place?"
"Who knows? Maybe he got tired of fighting. I'm aware there are a number of heroes like that."
Tired of fighting, huh.
And Han Mi-hyeok here did look pretty strong... Anyway, I came out today just to have fun and not think about anything, but it feels like I ended up glimpsing an ugly side of the world of heroes and superhumans.
"Hey! What are you standing around blank-faced for! This bastard's scared out of his mind!"
"No! I'm not scared!"
"Then get in there, dumbass!"
"Huh?!"
In an instant, Yu-ri grabbed me, hoisted me up—and hurled me straight toward the ocean!
"Aaaaaaaaahhh!"
