The Wolf Gig
"Hey, you! Number 32! What the hell is that footstep? You dragging slippers to the bathroom? You some neighborhood grandpa out for a stroll? One wrong step and your collar snaps—got it? If you can't react to that split-second vibration, you're just meat!"
Jinhyuk's sharp Korean sliced through the training ground like lightning.
Naturally, not a single soul in this camp understood his words perfectly.
But the 1,300 Heavenly Wolf Squad members snapped their heels up and held their breath the instant the word "footstep" hit the air.
They weren't grasping the language.
Through endless repetitions of his gestures, footwork, and the searing pain of that staff when they ignored him, they'd wired Korean words to specific actions like some kind of code.
Jinhyuk was channeling his old days bossing around foreign laborers on construction sites and loading docks—hacking through mountains of work with brute efficiency—forcing these bottom-rung slaves into ironclad conditioned responses.
If words failed, make their bodies remember.
That was the surest lesson from his gutter-hopping life.
The Great Wall camp's 10,000 slaves split into two shifts of 5,000, rotating between the walls and the wilds every 100 days.
Of the current 5,000 inside the walls, 4,000 were veterans who'd sniffed blood at the Outpost and survived three months to limp back.
They'd done their training and combat tours, so now they patched walls and did odd jobs, taking it easy.
Jinhyuk's Heavenly Wolf Squad followed the same weird setup.
1,000 black道 veterans from the old 4,000, plus 300 black道 newbies from the fresh 1,000, made 1,300 total.
Before Jinhyuk stood 1,000 jaded old waters with dead eyes from every hell imaginable, mixed with 300 greenhorns who looked ready to piss themselves.
The vets lounged in the corner, dusting off dirt and snickering at the rookies rolling in the muck.
The newbies couldn't even breathe under the vets' pressure.
"You 1,000 in the back! Think you've been out once so you can stand there arms crossed like loading dock foremen? You die, these 300 die. They fuck up, your collars snap too! We're in this together—got it?"
Jinhyuk slammed his staff into the ground.
The black道 vets scoffed at first, but his eerie pressure made their brows twitch.
He handled them like stubborn vets on the docks—poking raw survival instincts.
No martial arts, but he knew people from the bottom.
He strode up to the biggest, meanest-looking vet and jammed the staff under his chin.
"You feel hard done by? Then live and get out. Go chop the heads of whoever fucked you over. Die like a dog here, you're just rotten meat. Crawl for me or be scavenger chow?"
The vet swallowed hard under Jinhyuk's killing glare.
No qi, just a laborer—but this guy had killed or was a lunatic who didn't fear death. Gut certainty.
The Survival Demons watching from the shadows chimed in.
They used fake names, erasing pasts while waiting for death—their rule.
"Tsk tsk, look at that pup. No real combat arts, trying to wrangle 1,000 black道 thugs who've shed their green. Against orthodox etiquette, total insubordination."
The old man calling himself Cheonun clucked his tongue.
Pure elder from a famed sect—peak boomer vibe.
He fanned himself nonstop, hating Jinhyuk's crude barbarian tongue and sloppy drills.
A Sapa-born Dogui cackled back.
"Hey, Cheonun. Martial arts pay the bills? I like him. See those eyes? Gambler's stare—last finger on the line after losing everything. That ragtag bunch? He'll shake the table with 'em. Look, the tough ones are already tucking tail."
Gwian, the cranky Demonic Cult geezer, flashed vicious eyes.
"Survive and return? Xiongnu ain't the half—beasts swarming too. That grit? Nine in ten come back as chunks. Dying natural's rarer than fingers on one hand. That pup ain't training—he's just thrashing like a beast."
Night deepened; Jinhyuk dragged his aching back to the craftiest Survival Demon, Hwang-yeonggam.
He only gave the surname Hwang.
Jinhyuk scratched letters in the dirt with a stick, grunting.
[穴 (Meridian)] [針 (Needle)] [足 (Foot)] [學 (Study)]
Hwang-yeonggam snorted at the crude scrawl, then crushed Jinhyuk's acupoints with brute fingers.
No inner power, but the pressure bored into flesh and meridians like drills; Jinhyuk shrieked.
"Agh! Aaagh! Elder, bones breaking! Uwaaaagh!"
"Shut it. Tough bones and you're whining. No dantian, so gotta carve paths like this—or you won't even run later. Your body's stiff at near thirty. No qi vessel, so twist meridians to wake senses."
Hwang-yeonggam's fingers wormed like awls between muscles.
Jinhyuk screamed but memorized each spot, each path of pressure.
Compared to Korea's soul-crushing job hunts where he wrecked his body, this pain was honest specs logging in the system.
He glared through agony, tracking changes inside.
> Irregular meridian stimulation data collection in progress
> Status: Meridian blockage 91.8% (minimal efficiency / pain maximized)
> Imprint acquired: Pain Tolerance (F+)
> Imprint updated: Stealth Aura Suppression (D-)
> Additional data: Footwork analysis in progress
Next morning, Black Snake Squad thugs from Sapa came to provoke the Heavenly Wolf Squad.
Bored during wall rest, they bullied rookies on "law of the jungle" bullshit.
They sneered at Jinhyuk's clumsy steps with warrior eyes.
"Eastern mutt. Greenhorn who don't know 'martial' from shit—playing with black道 trash has limits. Gotta rip your tongues to wake you. Heard you screaming for old Hwang last night from here."
Jinhyuk gave his blank dock-boss face, replying in Korean.
"Bro, opened already—no refunds. Busy. Go stack bricks over there."
While they blinked, he recalled Hwang-yeonggam's poke and jabbed the staff into the thug's instep acupoint.
No qi, but loading-dock precision and grip strength packed the blow.
Thwack!
"Guh!"
As the warrior staggered, Jinhyuk murmured low.
"Bark."
1,300 Heavenly Wolf Squad members pounded chests and roared on command.
Vets' heavy momentum mixed with rookies' desperate yells—ground shook.
No mere shout: resonance from death's door returnees and those marching to it.
Dogui slapped his knee, laughing.
"Hahaha! See that? Real deal! No arts, but tied 1,000 trash into one. This deployment's the best show in my decades at the Wall!"
Jinhyuk scratched more letters in the dirt.
[生 (Survival)] [五 (Fifty)] [十 (Days)]
100-day cycle: 90 training/prep, 10 march/swap.
From mess hall slaves and Wall soldier chats, he'd clocked 40 days since last batch left.
50 days left.
Then 10 hell-march days—beyond walls, Xiongnu, Khitan, Jurchen cavalry and logic-defying beasts ruled the snow.
His pieced intel triggered cold text only he saw.
> User data analysis complete
> Result: Current survival rate 8.4%
"8.4 percent... Total shitshow. Worse than minimum wage."
Jinhyuk barked a hollow laugh.
But he didn't quit—back home, he muscled through loads everyone ditched, night shifts all fled, for cash.
Here, profit was survival.
He turned to his squad.
1,000 battle-hardened, 300 fresh meat. To them, madman—but to death-doomed slaves, that madness was hope.
"Listen up! This is 'chow' now. Got it? Hungry? 100 more reps! 'Chow!' Go!"
1,300 Heavenly Wolf Squad moved sharp on his Korean cue.
Sound of the camp's 10,000's most alien, fiercest legion stirring.
Even famed house elites and Ironblood retirees felt chills passing the drill ground.
Jinhyuk eyed the dark beyond the walls, fist clenched.
North wind howled—already laced with blood and beast roars, it seemed.
No refunds. Survival's the payout here. 8.4 percent? My specialty's flipping that to 100.
> Current survival rate: 8.4% (no change)
"Sleep when it's 100 percent, you fucks! Run again! Silence those steps! Muffle breaths! Hate dying? Train like you're dying now!"
With Jinhyuk's brutal Korean roar, the Great Wall camp's day faded.
It was the 1,300 Heavenly Wolf Squad's death-march prep—the wolves' first howl ripping the outer dark.