Deep Night (2)
“Hah!”
Seogeo-geogeok!
One sweep of her sword, and the monsters lunging to ambush her fell together, carved clean through.
Baek Seo-ha took a short breath to steady herself, then swung her arm even faster.
“Keeehek!”
A goblin's neck parted, and its body crumbled into particles and vanished.
Training session ended.
“Haah.”
Only when the end-of-session message floated up did the tension finally drain from Baek Seo-ha's shoulders.
This was Cheonseong's training hall. The virtual reality training available only here delivered far better results than she'd expected. She could custom-build whatever scenario she wanted, and when the mood struck, generate human-shaped opponents instead of monsters.
“My sword feels... light.”
Baek Seo-ha gazed down at the blade in silence. Lately she could feel her skill climbing at a steeper and steeper angle.
Is it because I accepted the Mind Demon?
Ever since she'd taken in the Mind Demon and gained the SS-rank skill Darkening, every swing of the sword seemed to deepen her understanding of it. It was as if she'd finally stretched her hand toward a place she'd never been able to reach before.
It's like the first time I ever held a sword.
Her senses were growing by the day. The more time she put in, the more honestly she grew stronger. As a hunter, was there anything in the world more joyful than this?
“...”
But the moment she finished thinking about training, the memory she wanted to forget came crawling back up again.
'Ha! You shameless bitch...?'
'Tae-hyun. Don't get tangled up with other women in front of me.'
'I don't know why, but seeing that made my blood boil.'
“Ugh-uuuugh!”
A strange noise burst out of her mouth.
“Wh-why did I do that?”
No matter how many times she replayed it, she couldn't understand. It was her own doing, but from the reason behind the act to the words that came with it, it was pure madness she couldn't rationalize at all.
“What does it even matter to me if Lee Tae-hyun gets tangled up with someone else...?”
If it were possible, she wanted to travel back and interrogate her past self.
“Could it be... ha... because of Darkening?”
The SS-rank skill she'd obtained in exchange for choosing to accept the Mind Demon.
Darkening
When activated, the user's true nature is unleashed without restraint.
In terms of raw performance, it earned nothing but admiration — but it came with one fatal flaw. When she was in her Darkened state, her personality shifted somewhat. To be precise, it was closer to Baek Seo-ha's true nature detonating outright. The genuine personality she'd sealed deep inside her body all these years became violently, extremely activated. That was Darkening's greatest weakness.
“...”
She knew it too. That this Darkened state was, in fact, closer to who she really was. Because the 'White Dragon' Baek Seo-ha was nothing more than a mask she'd forged with her own hands. Seen one way, she had spent her entire life performing a role.
But if this makes Tae-hyun hate me...
She wasn't sure she could bear that. The things she'd done in her Darkened state were, on reflection, the kind that made you want to smother yourself in your blankets at night. And yet she had no intention of giving up the sincerity she'd only just reclaimed.
“...Right. I'll just adapt.”
In the end, she had no choice but to embrace it — and she'd resolved to. So she simply had to learn to control this power as much as possible. Fortunately, there was no chance of her making a mistake in front of Lee Tae-hyun right now.
He was in Japan at the moment. With physical distance between them, even if she Darkened, she couldn't possibly do anything in front of Lee Tae-hyun that would make her face burn.
Darkening
Sararak!
A black aura washed over her, dyeing her hair. A monstrous power coiled through her entire body as her emotional state began shifting from one moment to the next.
“Ngh...”
She grit her teeth. It wasn't pain, exactly. Just—
Why did Lee Tae-hyun suddenly go to Japan?
Doesn't he have a secret lover hidden away over there?
Did he find someone he likes?
Seong Yong-ho threw me away after a trip to Japan too, didn't he.
Is Lee Tae-hyun going to be the same?
Tae-hyun's going to throw me away?
I'm going to be abandoned again?
Gloomy thoughts kept crawling up from some dark corner of her mind.
Suppress it...!
Empty the mind. Convert this obsession into obsession with the sword.
Tsuzuzuz...
Gradually, the rampaging emotions settled.
“...There we go!”
Her head finally felt a little clearer. The voice whispering its dreary murmurings faded away—
Let's go see Tae-hyun, yeah?
—No, it hadn't fully vanished. But it had shrunk enough that it wouldn't interfere with her actions.
“Yeah. All good.”
The moment she rose to her feet to test a swing in this state—
“Haaaah...”
the side door slid open and Shin Min-woo walked in, his face thoroughly deflated. Spotting Baek Seo-ha, his eyes went round.
“Huh? Your look, noona... ah, it's that thing you mentioned before—”
“Don't say the skill's name.”
“Ahaha. Yes, ma'am.”
Shin Min-woo nodded quickly.
“...By the way, what's with your face?”
“Sorry? My face?”
“Yeah. You were sighing like the world was ending when you walked in.”
“Ah, that.”
Shin Min-woo held up his phone.
“It's because of this.”
It was an internet article.
Japan's greatest hunter, Ayase Karin. Baek Seo-ha had heard of her, of course. The woman had even been mentioned alongside her once, under the banner of 'the women hunters who will lead the next generation'.
“But why this? Are you a fan of hers?”
“Khh... honestly... yes...”
Apparently he was even registered in her fan club.
...
Hold on a moment.
“When did this article go up?”
“Huh? Ah, um...”
Shin Min-woo scrolled up to check the article's date.
“Today, looks like?”
“...Today?”
“Oh, now that I think about it, hyung went to Japan today too. They said Ayase cleared a gate that popped up at Haneda Airport today — if you're lucky, maybe he saw her. Jealous...”
“...”
“Noona?”
Kugugugugu!
A black aura began surging violently from Baek Seo-ha's body. The light in her eyes died to something ice-cold.
“Is there a problem here?”
A man in a hound mask, apparently one of the security staff, approached — I had my foot propped up on the bear mask, after all.
“Hey. Just how the hell do you people manage this place?”
“What do you mean...”
He took in the state of the bear mask and shut his mouth tight.
“...Would you care to explain?”
“Explain? Ex-pla-aaain?”
I clicked my tongue as if the whole thing were beneath me.
“Hey. Am I in any position to be standing here explaining myself to you people, point by point?”
“Depending on the circumstances, expulsion may be considered.”
“Ha... look at these fucking bastards.”
I swept my hair back and let out a long breath. My hands trembled too, just enough to look like I was barely holding down boiling rage.
“I'm the victim here, right now. You people should already be on your knees groveling an apology to me, and you have the nerve to threaten me? You understand?”
“Victim of what, exactly?”
“This punk insulted me and assaulted me.”
I'd embellished it a little, sure, but it wasn't a lie.
“I held back — didn't kill him, just gave him this much — and now you're treating me like some common criminal?”
“Un-until the facts are verified...”
“So you're saying I'm the one lying here?”
Why does nobody believe me. I'm genuinely aggrieved here. So aggrieved I want to run advertisements about it for every single person present.
“What's going on?”
“That wolf mask just went berserk out of nowhere.”
“That wolf guy was clearly getting his head bashed in by the bear mask a minute ago.”
“Puhaha! So he started the fight, got flattened for it, and now he's crying about it?”
“Knew that bear mask bastard would pull something like this someday.”
People gathered around, and the mood gradually curdled in my favor.
Going by the chatter, the bear mask's reputation is rock bottom.
And I was the one who'd decked that bastard, clean and satisfying. Even if nobody defended me, no one would step up to stop me either.
“Let's take this inside and discuss it.”
“Discuss what inside? Say it right here.”
“There are many eyes watching.”
“That's your problem, not mine.”
Anyone who heard that line and followed him through those doors would find themselves in the shop proper. I wasn't worried about being handled by goons like these, but I could be permanently expelled from this place. Which meant I had to win here — until these bastards judged they had no choice but to call the owner of this establishment.
“If you keep this up, sir, I'll have to handle you a bit roughly.”
The man laced his voice with a threatening edge.
He's stronger than he looks.
In hunter terms, maybe upper-mid B-rank. Any guild would take him without a second thought. No wonder he had that much confidence in his own strength.
“Handle me roughly? You? Handle me?”
Kahaha!
I clutched my belly and laughed like I'd heard the funniest joke of my life.
“Weak-looking bastards like you, daring to?”
“...”
“Go ahead and try, if you can. But put on a diaper first. If you shit yourself, my clothes get dirty.”
Tendons stood out along the hound mask's arm.
“I'll take that as permission to handle you roughly.”
A hand wrapped in mana sprang at me in an instant. Big frame and fast.
Still, compared to the things I've fought up until now...
He was laughably slow.
Puk!
Right before his hand could seize me, I drove my knee up into his jaw.
“Ugh...!”
“Thought you'd handle me roughly?”
I raised my fist, exactly like he had.
“You said you wanted to shit your pants. A man should get his wish.”
I fed mana into my fist as well. Back before the regression, when I was spending my days with Baek Seo-ha — she'd forced me to learn hand-to-hand combat on her stubborn insistence.
'The Sword Sect teaches grappling too?'
'Of course. What use is a hunter who becomes helpless the moment his sword is taken away?'
Back then I genuinely thought, why bother learning something so useless. Now it felt like the best decision I'd ever made.
Kwa-aaak!
My clenched fist slammed into the hound's flank. With a sound like something bursting apart, his body rocked.
“Kehk! Kkuk!”
Three consecutive blows to the gut followed.
“Ugh! Kugh! Krugh!”
A different sound with every hit. This friend of ours had a real aptitude for instruments.
“Gggghhh...!”
“All that big talk, and this is it?”
Watching him sprawled on the floor, drooling some unidentifiable liquid — I let out the nastiest smile I could produce.
“Boring bastard.”
“Y-you son of a biiitch!”
The hound rose to his feet one more time.
“The dog here is you.”
“I'll pound that snout of yours into paste!”
With that declaration, the hound's body swelled several times over in an instant. His muscles writhed grotesquely, his hair shot out in a heartbeat, and his whole appearance warped into something like a wildman.
“Th-that thing — isn't that dangerous?!”
“Wait... don't tell me that skill is 'Beastification'?!”
“If he can use that skill, don't tell me—!”
From within the crowd of masks, someone who clearly recognized the sight shouted out.
“It's Manabe! The guy who used to be an A-rank hunter! Heard he was serving time for murder!”
Being in the underworld's back alleys, I suppose they recruit anyone with talent regardless of qualifications. School ties, hometown ties, blood ties — even criminal records.
What an absolute dumpster fire of an operation.
The hound mask, Manabe, bellowed like a beast and brought his fist down.
Kwaang!
The ground split in a single stroke, and the whole space shook.
“Uwaaagh!”
“Everybody run! They say he has no sanity while that skill is active!”
Call it luck, maybe — Manabe seemed to have no interest in anyone but me.
“DIE!!!!”
Strength and stamina multiplied several times over. That probably put him around mid-upper A-rank.
Kugugugung!
His fist tore through the air with a sonic crack, but I moved between his blows with room to spare.
“What the hell is that wolf mask?!”
“How is he toying with Manabe like that, in that state?!”
This was the kind of thing you couldn't get hit by even if you wanted to. Fists flailing on pure instinct — no technique, no artistry, no reason behind them at all.
“Getting hit by that would hurt my pride.”
“Aaaargh!”
My constant evasion must have gotten under his skin, because the man began winding up one enormous blow. A huge sweeping fist, arcing from right to left.
About time I wrapped this up, I think.
It had already snowballed into a big enough spectacle.
Kwa-aaak!
I clenched my fist tighter.
“Good thing I learned hand-to-hand combat. And why's that?”
Because otherwise—
“I know exactly how hard I can hit without killing.”
I might have ended up killing this bastard by accident, after all.
Wuum!
A deep, dense energy condensed into my fist. With the Hyunmu Ink Spear fully mine came the origin of the ink arts I'd absorbed alongside it.
Hwak!
That artistry drew a long, single line through the air.
Black Tortoise Ink Fist
First Stroke