A Stronger Awakened Is on My Side
What happens when an Awakened fights an ordinary person?
You lose. Miserably. The gap is about the size of the one between a grown adult and a child.
Which is why the Awakened are the ones out there carving through zombies and monsters.
Being Awakened isn't flashy, either. Fire bursting from your palms, sword-light streaming off a blade — that's a story out of fantasy. All it really means is a stronger body, sharper senses, and a better fight. But anyone who has stood in front of a zombie and lived through the real thing knows how enormous that difference is.
"Haha! For all that bravado when you accepted, this is pretty underwhelming!"
Thock! Thock! Crack! Crack!
I barely managed to block Shin Wijun's wooden sword. Every clash sent a sick whine up through my wrists. However far short he'd fallen, he was still Awakened. The weight class was different from the start.
"Keep blocking like that and you're going down!"
"Ngh—!"
He swung harder. The impact shoved me back a step.
"Wijun! Just smash him already~"
"Show us something cool, and I'll make tonight even filthier~"
The two women sat at their ease and watched, faces bright with easy smiles. I was a thorn in their side. Watching me take the hits was entertainment enough.
"Man, what am I supposed to do? Now I can't go easy. As you can see, I've got a lot riding on my shoulders."
No one thought Shin Wijun would lose. Not him, not the women — not even me. The gap in strength, stamina, and speed was that wide.
"Come on. I didn't ask a friend to spar just so we could play kids' games."
The wooden sword kept coming down, and the sound of the impacts grew louder. A properly swung wooden sword doesn't make a noise like that. He was getting sloppier by the moment. In front of the women, he'd want to look as overwhelmingly dominant as he could.
"Beating on you like this is killing the fun. Just get on your knees and beg, and I might let it slide."
"I'd have to have done something wrong to beg."
"In this world, being weak is the crime. You know that as well as I do."
I held the wooden sword still. One chance. One was enough.
"You always called yourself a realist and talked like the world was ending. Look at you now. Pretty funny, isn't it?"
"You used to be a halfway decent bastard, back in the day."
"The hell did you just say?"
"No? You used to say you wanted to be someone your mom and your sister could be proud of, and you asked me to help. These days you don't even go see them."
"You little—"
"What, ashamed? Or are you scared that if your little sister saw you like this, all she'd have for you is contempt?"
"Shut that mouth, you bastard!"
A story only I knew — one the other women never would. Hit dead center, his face flushed red. He raised the wooden sword and charged, the motion far rougher and wider than before. Exactly the stance I'd wanted.
I've watched the way he fights more times than I can count.
Which meant I knew just how many bad habits he carried, and exactly where the openings were. I drove straight into that gap in a single line.
"Huh...?"
Thud!
The tip of the wooden sword struck his throat dead on. For an instant his expression went slack with shock.
If the fight simply went on from here, what would happen? Fear and instinct dragged the truth out of him on their own.
"You bastard...!"
WHAM!
He kicked me in the gut — the raw strength of an Awakened body. I flew and rolled across the ground for a long while. I ended up a wreck, my lip split and bleeding, but my mouth was smiling.
"You said you wouldn't use your abilities. Isn't this a forfeit?"
A flash of oh, shit crossed his face, then settled into a cold little smile.
"I didn't use an ability. That was my strength."
"Pfft. Bullshit."
"Yeah? And what are you gonna do about it? Got any way to prove it?"
Whether an Awakened used an ability or not, there is no way to prove it. There never needed to be. In this world, power had been the truth for a long time already.
"What's certain here is that you're the loser on the ground."
Loser. Well. Whose pride took the deeper crack today? It didn't feel like mine.
"Know some shame, you bastard."
"Shut up. This is why you look like that. A Non-Awakened who doesn't know his place, running his mouth!"
Even his snarl pulled a short laugh out of me. I wasn't fuming about getting hit. I'd never expected him to keep his abilities out of it. This spar was never about winning.
The smile only made him angrier.
"Anyway, cooperate properly on the next operation. If you don't, it won't end at this."
The more he thought about it, the hotter he seemed to burn. He stomped off, feet hammering the ground, and the women who trailed him glanced around for a moment before they withdrew as well.
"Hoo."
I didn't get up. I just looked at the sky. One hit. That was all. Even so, it meant something to me.
And it went the way I wanted.
Footsteps. Someone walked slowly toward me as I lay staring blankly across the training yard.
"I really didn't think you'd land a blow on an Awakened."
"That's because that guy's an idiot."
"Even so, it's impressive."
A beautiful woman with a sword at her hip looked down at me and smiled, bright and easy.
"That was an impressive fight."
"So did I pass the interview?"
"So you did have it in mind. Smart. I like you even more for it."
She reached down and pulled me to my feet. Her name was Yoo Hina — an Awakened, like Shin Wijun, and a Raid Team leader. A cut above him.
"If you don't mind," she said, "let's step outside and talk."
With that, Yoo Hina led me on.
Leaving the city is suicide, as a rule. Zombies swarm everywhere beyond the walls. With an Awakened beside you, it's the exception.
"Graaaaaah!"
"May you find heaven in your next life."
Shhk!
Her sword split a zombie's head in two. The gentle eyes she had turned on me went cold the moment they found the dead.
"Graaaah!"
I didn't stand idle either. A slow corpse came shambling in. I brought the axe down on its skull.
Crunch!
Bone gave way, and the zombie collapsed. I shook the blood off the axe.
"Not bad. You handle zombies well."
"I've taken down monsters, too. This is the basics."
Ordinary or not, I was Raid Team myself. There was plenty of fighting wherever we went. Officially my work was support and rear assistance, but that never holds once you're actually fighting zombies. When it came down to it, I had to throw women with nothing left in them over my shoulder and run.
And just thinking about it, I was pissed off all over again.
"I'm about to stake my life on you. I ought to make a good impression."
"Why? You could go somewhere other than me."
"Could I, really?"
Shin Wijun was a fairly well-known Awakened. There weren't many teams that would welcome a man who'd taken a beating and walked out on him. No sense picking a fight with the guy for nothing.
In a word: why bother.
The only person who would reach past all of that and offer me a hand was Yoo Hina.
"Honestly, I don't understand. You work well. You fight well. Why did Shin Wijun go that far with someone like you?"
"I've been wondering the same thing."
I could guess, more or less. I'd been a nuisance. He wanted to commit crimes now, to play around with women on his arm, and I — always nagging — was a thorn in his eye. He couldn't just throw me out without it looking bad. More than anything, I knew far too much.
"I want to join your team, no matter what. That's how I survive."
"Has he been threatening your life as well?"
"He doesn't seem able to bring himself to kill me. Even so, I've been put through just about everything."
He had no idea what I might set off — a will, or something else — or whether I had ties to someone like Yoo Hina. And that was true. He was probably sick with worry on the inside, which was why he kept picking fights and making threats. Knowing his character, I doubted he'd failed to consider even that.
"So you're what's left of my chances."
"Hm. Then may I ask you one thing?"
Yoo Hina sat on a rock as she spoke.
"By your account, Shin Wijun committed misconduct and took money under the table."
"That's right. I caught him, I called him on it, and he turned his anger on me."
"Then wouldn't it have been better for you to simply accept it and live with it? If you'd shut your eyes and let it go, you could have lived comfortably."
Is this a test of hers, too?
She was choosing a teammate she would stake her life beside. I had to speak with an open heart. So I decided to be honest.
"Because it pissed me off."
"Pissed you off?"
For the record, I am not a particularly good person. I've done trash things. Sometimes I've made cowardly calls. Even so, I never played games with people's lives. Everyone has a line. Of all people, the friend I had trusted most was the one who crossed it.
"The truth is, I went around badmouthing Shin Wijun a lot. Why does he live like that — it's maddening. But if I acted the same way, I'd become that kind of bastard myself."
Yoo Hina let out a short laugh.
"That's how people are. They talk big, as if they're better than everyone, and the moment it gets hard they step back."
"You're not like that, though."
"I'm no different. That's why I came to bring you with me."
Humble, and still lifting me up. A good person, as expected. Which was why she could lead a Raid Team and still live so modestly — nothing like the Shin Wijun of now, women hanging off him, liquor poured down his throat.
Why does someone like her think well of me?
She wasn't the type to take people on out of simple sentiment. Which meant she considered me capable.
"Good. I like you."
Yoo Hina rose with a smile.
"Once the next mission is over, I'll take you onto our team."
I was a little surprised. I hadn't expected her to decide so quickly. And there was still more to be surprised by.