Still Two Hits Left
Hwang Ye-rim had left, and preparations for the matches began.
Today, only the Round of 16 would be held.
Eight matches per year group, twenty-four matches in total, running back-to-back without pause.
Might as well watch for a bit.
Truth be told, Kang Hyun had been looking forward to this main stage all along.
For the past two months I’ve been buried in dawn training, teaching Baek Yu-yeon, and cranking out manuals. No time left to hunt for other talent.
No need to go looking, either.
This Murim Tournament was right here.
Every genuine powerhouse from each year—the ones who could truly fly—would be gathered in this one place today.
Rustle, rustle.
As he sipped whiskey and studied the bracket, Lee Se-ah was rummaging around in her coat.
“What’s that?”
“Snacks.”
“Snacks?”
Lee Se-ah shook a bag of dried shredded squid and jerky at him.
Kang Hyun answered as if he couldn’t believe what he was seeing.
“Anyone watching would think we came here to picnic.”
“Just have some snacks while you watch.”
“Forget it. Put it away.”
“Aw, don’t be like that.”
She casually pressed a wad of jerky into Kang Hyun’s empty hand.
“If you keep slamming straight whiskey with nothing to go with it, your liver’s going to give out.”
“Now that we’re partners in business, you’re suddenly worried about my health?”
“Obviously! My retirement fund is riding on you. Please live a long, healthy life and keep stacking that pension for me.”
“Heh.”
Kang Hyun let out a dry laugh and popped the jerky into his mouth.
It paired better than expected.
Coming up next—the long-awaited Round of 16! Order of play: 21st batch first, then 20th, then 19th!
The matches would proceed in reverse year order.
Once today’s Round of 16 finished, tomorrow would bring the quarterfinals, and the day after that the semifinals and final.
First match: Cadet Han Tae-ho versus Cadet Kim Dong-sik! Please take the stage!
“Ohhh, Kang Hyun-nim! It’s Tae-ho right from the first match!”
Lee Se-ah’s voice was tight with nerves.
“Still, we’re lucky.”
“How so?”
“His first opponent is Cadet Kim Dong-sik. Look at the prelim rankings—he barely scraped into sixteenth.”
Kang Hyun chewed the jerky thoughtfully.
It was better than he’d expected. He might start buying this stuff regularly.
Whistle!
At the signal, the spar began.
Taat!
Kim Dong-sik struck first.
Closing the distance with flashy footwork, he unleashed a flurry of blows at Han Tae-ho.
Kang! Kkaang! Kang!
Han Tae-ho was driven back.
Three Talents Sword Style—Earth.
He met every strike with pure endurance, nothing more.
How hard was it to block a variety of attacks with a single stance?
“Look at that.”
Whispers spread through the stands.
“Doesn’t work once you hit the main bracket.”
“Sure, he might have some talent. But beating main-bracket kids with the Three Talents Sword Style? Come on.”
The regular professors watched with hawk eyes.
The instant Han Tae-ho used anything other than the Three Talents Sword Style, Kang Hyun would be dismissed on the spot.
“K-Kang Hyun-nim!”
Lee Se-ah was burning up inside.
“Tae-ho’s getting pushed way too hard! He’s going to get knocked out of the ring at this rate!”
Kang Hyun merely took another unhurried sip of whiskey.
Back on the stage, Kim Dong-sik’s mouth twisted.
“This is it!”
He spun his body hard and raised the wooden sword high—
Whoosh.
For a single heartbeat his lower-body center lifted.
Han Tae-ho’s eyes, which had only been defending, flashed.
Taaang!
His rear foot exploded off the ground.
The sword that had been holding the line transformed into a thrust in an instant.
Three Talents Sword Style—Man.
Puhk!
“Guhk!”
Kim Dong-sik crumpled, clutching his solar plexus, face contorted in pain.
Combat incapacity!
“Winner! 21st batch, Han Tae-ho!”
“Aja jaja ja!”
Han Tae-ho pumped his fist and let out a clean, ringing shout of triumph.
He even dropped to one knee and shook both hands over his head.
“Huuu…”
Only then did Lee Se-ah, who had been holding her breath, exhale in relief.
“Thank goodness. He almost lost.”
“Lost my ass.”
“Huh?”
“You think he barely scraped by?”
“He was getting completely pushed around!”
“All calculated.”
Still chewing jerky, Kang Hyun’s mouth curved upward.
“You think Han Tae-ho’s goal is just making it through the Round of 16? He has to reach the quarters, the semis no matter what. So what’s the play?”
“…Don’t tell me. Lulling them into complacency?”
“Exactly. That whole ‘I’m so happy I won’ act is pure theater.”
Make it look to everyone like he’d won by the skin of his teeth and pure luck.
Kang Hyun liked that part.
He’s gotten shrewd.
Kids who got flashy and tried to dominate for show never lasted. The ones who quietly took the practical win, no matter how it looked, were the ones who survived long-term.
In the Murim, every fool who’d chased vanity had died before his time.
The matches continued.
Kang Hyun watched the stage in silence, scanning for usable material.
One kid did catch his eye.
Do Jeong-hyeok?
He had a slightly bookish air about him.
Textbook model student, at a glance.
But the raw power he carried was enormous.
Oddly, he used a spear—its length and force kept the other cadets from closing easily.
That one looks better suited to fists than a spear…
He’d keep an eye on him for now.
Lunch ended and the afternoon schedule began.
The heat in the stands was far hotter than the morning’s.
The 20th batch Round of 16!
As the academy’s mid-year core, people expected far more spectacle than the freshmen had offered.
Next match! Cadet Yoon Hyun-jong! Cadet Choi Min-su! Please take the stage!
“Ugh.”
Lee Se-ah checked the bracket and frowned.
“Choi Min-su won’t be easy. He placed fourth last year. They call him the textbook of orthodox academy swordsmanship.”
“Orthodox my ass, in a place full of dogshit.”
Kang Hyun snorted.
“A year is long enough for a dog to turn into a tiger. Look at those kids. See how much they changed in just two months.”
Whistle!
The match began with the referee’s signal.
Just as Lee Se-ah had feared, Choi Min-su’s sword was sharp and precise.
Yoon Hyun-jong, barely holding on with the Three Talents Sword Style, finally won only after sacrificing one arm.
Winner! Cadet Yoon Hyun-jong! However, he appears to need medical attention!
The moment he won he headed straight for the infirmary, then reappeared in front of Kang Hyun with his arm bandaged.
“Professor! It hurts! It really, really hurts!”
“You traded flesh for bone. Of course it hurts.”
“It’s not just ‘hurts’—they said it’s a fracture.”
“You’re whining over a simple fracture?”
“What?”
Yoon Hyun-jong looked utterly baffled.
His bone was broken and the man called it whining!
Lee Se-ah shot to her feet, face pale.
“W-what do we do? I never even thought about injuries. Does he have to forfeit tomorrow’s quarterfinal?”
“Forfeit my ass.”
Clink.
Kang Hyun lazily swirled the whiskey bottle.
“If you can’t fight just because one arm’s broken, you might as well bite your tongue and die.”
“…Excuse me? Th-that’s cold!”
Having spent most of his life in the Murim, Kang Hyun genuinely could not understand the fuss.
Especially since, when he trained under the old monsters, a day without fractures had been the exception.
“Stop yapping and go recover. Next match starts soon.”
Meanwhile the regular professors’ faces had hardened considerably.
“Does this even make sense?”
Professor Park Gwang-woo scrubbed his face dry and continued.
“Han Tae-ho beating Kim Dong-sik, fine, we can swallow that. But Yoon Hyun-jong beating Choi Min-su is a different problem entirely.”
“Calm yourself, Professor Park.”
Professor Jin Myeong-hoon, seated beside him, tried to sound composed.
He was just as unsettled.
“In any case, Yoon Hyun-jong just broke his arm in that spar. There’s no way he can fight a proper quarterfinal tomorrow. And Han Tae-ho barely scraped through as well.”
“But if all five of those kids make the quarterfinals…!”
“They won’t all make it.”
Jin Myeong-hoon cut him off firmly and jerked his chin toward the arena scoreboard.
“Look who’s up next.”
The next matchup flared across the board in red letters.
Seo Hae-in VS Song Gi-cheol
“Seo Hae-in? We can’t keep treating her as the eternal bottom-ranker anymore. She made the main bracket.”
“Not Seo Hae-in.”
Jin Myeong-hoon smiled with easy confidence.
“Look at Song Gi-cheol.”
“Ah.”
Song Gi-cheol.
Currently ranked second in the 20th batch, and a finalist in last year’s Murim Tournament.
A prospect half the guilds were already eyeing.
“Ahem. Right. If it’s Cadet Song Gi-cheol…”
Even the professors had begun to concede a certain amount.
Professor Kang Hyun was a genuine eccentric.
He clearly possessed some special ability.
But still—
“Even so, turning an eternal last-place student into someone who can stand against a championship contender in just two months? That’s simply impossible.”
Match 5 will begin shortly! Both cadets, please take the stage!
With the announcement, two figures walked out of the waiting room.
“Wooooaaah!”
“Song Gi-cheol! Song Gi-cheol!”
“Don’t go easy just because she’s a girl!”
One-sided cheers for Song Gi-cheol poured from the stands.
Toward Seo Hae-in came only the occasional snicker.
It’s always been like this.
Because she had no talent and was introverted, she had been quietly ostracized.
She had even decided to drop out once.
She truly believed she had no gift, that this path simply wasn’t for her.
But now it was different.
Seo Hae-in slowly drew in a breath.
In the past those sneers would have shriveled her heart; now they meant nothing.
Talk all you want.
Suddenly her professor’s voice rose in her mind.
She raised her wooden sword and looked not at Song Gi-cheol but at the stands.
There was Kang Hyun, tipping back his bottle.
The only professor who had given her trust, elixirs, and martial arts.
I’ll show you. The stronger me.
As Seo Hae-in set her sword, Song Gi-cheol smiled.
“I’ll give you credit for making it through the prelims.”
“…”
“But you’d better drop any idea of playing around with the Three Talents Sword Style in front of me.”
She had no intention of playing around.
Seo Hae-in knew full well how strong her opponent was.
Heaven, Earth, Man… just those three things.
The Clear Wind Sword Style she had learned before had long since been erased from her mind.
Senior Yu-sik said it.
That was her plan.
Whistle!
The whistle sounded. Song Gi-cheol gripped his wooden sword and opened the distance.
He had talked down to her, but there was no real carelessness in his stance.
They watched each other, the gap slowly closing—
“Haaat!”
Exactly as planned, Seo Hae-in charged first.
The first of the Three Talents—Heaven.
I bring it down.
Seeing that, Song Gi-cheol’s lips curled.
What was the greatest weakness of the Three Talents Sword Style?
That the next move was completely obvious.
A girl’s downward wooden sword? Please.
He laid his own sword horizontal.
Lightly deflect hers, then spin his waist and smash the unprotected side—that was the calculation.
Swaaaeek!
The two wooden swords met with a sound that tore the air—
KWAAAAAANG!
Huh?
Song Gi-cheol’s eyes nearly popped from his skull.
His entire arm felt as if it were being crushed to powder.
Not a wooden sword—more like a boulder had fallen on him.
What the hell is…
Crrrack!
The solid wooden sword snapped like a dry reed, and the tip of Seo Hae-in’s blade—still carrying all its force—continued straight toward the crown of his head.
…Oh shit.
This was going to hurt.
A lot.
But it was already too late to dodge—
BAAAAAANG!
Ugh.
Crazy…
Shit!
A rupture that should never have come from a wooden sword thundered across the entire stage.
“G-guhheok…!”
Song Gi-cheol’s mouth fell open; his eyes rolled white.
His expression still hadn’t processed what had just happened.
Then, like a puppet with its strings cut, he toppled backward and slammed into the floor.
Silence blanketed the arena.
The assistant referee holding the flag had frozen solid; every professor in the VIP seats sat with mouths hanging open.
Huh?
Seo Hae-in herself blinked blankly.
She had only used the very first movement, after all.
There are still… two hits left…