A Worthy Rival Appears
Choi Moon-seong might not quite qualify as a veteran commentator, but he prided himself on possessing more respect for hunters and love for the league than anyone else.
These days he was busy writing legends, but back then he had personally volunteered to cast for League 4’s Mir Guild—a slot everyone else avoided. That alone proved how genuine his passion was.
……Which was exactly why this match made him so furious he could barely stand it.
“They have to go in! If not now, they have no chance! Show us one last—ah…….”
“……Armed Guild is pulling back again. They’re giving up the buff and returning to lane.”
“What on earth! What are they doing, Armed Guild?! Do they want to play or not?!”
It was Round 31 of the rivalry matches.
A blockbuster showdown between second and third place.
And on top of that, another chapter in the drama known as the Ido Derby!
Not to mention Dynasty Guild’s super-shining trade!!
Thanks to the recruitment war that had broken out around Mir Guild, League 2 was enjoying the greatest season in its history. Given the atmosphere, this match was undeniably a marquee event.
The Bureau had poured on the advertising, hyping it up, and deliberately slotted it into prime time on Saturday evening.
But!
But!!
Bang—!
Once again, Armed Guild was tucking its tail and running. Choi Moon-seong slammed his desk without realizing it.
“They have to fight! They have to fight!! This isn’t a concept where things magically work out if they drag it to the late game!!”
“Um, Mr. Choi Moon-seong……”
“I know! I know that Rank 20 Ssaurabi is strong and Rank 16 Hwarang is terrifying. Everyone in Korea knows that. However—”
Ssaurabi had dropped nine kills in twenty minutes and swept the first set.
Hwarang had dominated the second set with godlike side-lane macro.
Even so.
“—the match isn’t over yet, is it?”
Just as Choi Moon-seong said, everyone—officials, experts, and even the viewers watching the game—knew the truth.
Although it was a match between second and third place, the gap in their actual combat power was far beyond imagination.
From the first skirmish of set one all the way to the present moment in set three, Dynasty had won every single fight, small or large, without exception.
They had crushed Armed Guild so thoroughly that calling it a victory felt almost cruel—like an adult twisting a child’s wrist.
It was so one-sided that even the notoriously vicious Ma-gul chatroom was leaning more toward pity than mockery.
No one was even curious about the outcome anymore. The only reason the match was dragging on was because the shrunken Armed Guild kept retreating. Everyone already knew the result would be Dynasty Guild’s victory.
“……Armed Guild is reorganizing. There’s nowhere left to run. They’re preparing for one final team fight.”
“Armed Guild! For the sake of your fans who are still cheering for you, show us your final fighting spirit!!”
“Here it comes! The Fist King goes straight for the enemy carry with a lightning-fast initiate!!”
“There it is! That’s what I’m talking about!!”
Unable to endure any longer, Armed Guild finally threw the dice.
The timing was perfect!
Because Ssaurabi had stepped slightly forward, Dynasty’s current formation made it difficult to protect him.
Choi Moon-seong cheered.
This could flip the team fight!
At that exact moment.
“……Ah!”
“Ah……!”
The casters and the chatroom all let out sighs as if they had rehearsed it.
The heart-pounding ultimate strike had been blocked by Hwarang’s shield toss.
Just moments ago he had been pushing top lane—when on earth had he gotten here?!
“Hwarang blocks the enemy initiate with a shield toss and immediately counters! He sidesteps the defender, flows past the next attacker with a parry, then dodges arrows, magic—everything! Divine weight shifting! In the blink of an eye Hwarang pierces straight into the center of the enemy formation… leaps!! He snatches the floating tower shield out of the air and slams it down… whoa… Shatter!!”
A five-man stun.
The match was over.
※ Round 31
Dynasty Guild (3) : Armed Guild (0)
* Dynasty Guild Victory (+3 points)
* MVP: Hwarang Kim Yu-shin (Rating: 9.9)
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At the same time, inside Mir Guild’s strategy analysis room.
A heavy silence had settled over the group that had gathered to monitor Dynasty Guild’s strength.
“……”
“……”
“……”
Everyone kept their mouths shut, but their bodies were honest. Their complicated emotions showed in every movement.
For example, Guild Leader Jeong Sun-dong.
Why are there rankers in League 2?! And two of them on the same team!!
His fingers wouldn’t stay still; they kept tapping the table like he was playing piano while he screamed internally.
Meanwhile, Vice-Leader Chae Dong-ha was gnawing on the knuckle of his index finger.
How the hell did that trade even go through? Even if it was a Legendary item, trading two rankers mid-season? Is that even allowed??
And Kim Jong-pil simply closed his eyes gently.
The years really are merciless.
He felt proud of his juniors’ brilliant performances, then smiled bitterly when he compared them to himself.
And finally, the man who would normally burst in at this exact moment with a joke—Lee Shin himself.
“……”
Surprisingly, he remained silent.
With both hands clasped together, he thought, So Lee Myeong-hwan really is a named player after all.
Lee Shin had assumed that handing over the Wooden Elf would be an easy win, but the man had delivered a sharp counter-blow. It was a splendid counter indeed, exactly what one would expect from Lee Myeong-hwan, the representative of the ‘Lee Shin’ that existed in his memories.
Even he had never imagined the man would manage to recruit two active League 1 rankers at this stage.
“Hup!”
Enough useless worrying!
Lee Shin clapped his hands loudly, flashing his usual bright smile.
“All right, meditation time is over. Let’s raise the tension. Worrying won’t give us any answers, will it? Vice-Leader, please set up what you prepared earlier.”
“Yes, sir.”
The lights came on, and soon the table was filled with warm coffee and tanghulu—fruit coated in crystallized sugar.
The two men turned visibly pale at the overwhelming visual that promised a blood-sugar shock from a single bite.
“They say you should eat something sweet when your brain isn’t working. I bought these because they’re popular with the Young and MZ crowd lately. Everyone take a bite and let’s come up with a plan.”
Lee Shin went first.
Ahh—!
It was sweet!!!!!
Immediately afterward, Lee Shin’s whole body trembled.
To get to the point, the tanghulu Lee Shin had prepared was a huge success.
Even before they ate any, Jeong Sun-dong and Kim Jong-pil’s faces had already gone deathly white. At the very least, it had definitely raised the tension, right?
With the mood successfully lightened by a single snack, the meeting began in earnest.
They replayed the match footage for a proper power analysis.
“Shall we start with Ssaurabi Kang Han-bi?”
The moment he spoke, the frozen image of Kang Han-bi on screen began to move.
“Rank 20, Ssaurabi Kang Han-bi. Age thirty, male. Position: carry.”
“He’s fast and agile. Excellent vision, calm demeanor. But what I rate highest is his decision-making. This hunter’s instantaneous judgment is monstrous. Watch this.”
The fast-forwarded footage suddenly stopped.
It was a scene from a skirmish in the first set.
The instant a 3-on-3 broke out in mid lane, Kang Han-bi charged forward without hesitation. Then, inside the concentrated barrage of magic, his evasion show began.
“Short attack range, resulting in an uncomfortable standoff. But there are three enemies? Looks like he could dodge them easily, right? Timing!”
“This is the kind of judgment he makes the moment he faces the enemy.”
And this S-grade decision-making, combined with Kang Han-bi’s unique combat style, had created the Rank 20 hunter known as Ssaurabi.
“This time he’s surrounded by three enemies in the middle of a chaotic fight.”
There was no escape route in sight, not even enough space to make use of his agility.
The moment the three surrounding hunters tried to close in on him—
Kang Han-bi scattered his daggers into the air.
And in that instant, he moved like a ghost.
He shot upward like a bullet, changed direction mid-air and flew to the opposite side, then kicked off at an impossible angle without losing any momentum and flew again.
Kang Han-bi’s ability: teleport to the location of a thrown dagger.
Trait: Target Moving.
“As you can see, Kang Han-bi uses his ability to move to wherever his daggers are planted, shooting around like living bullets.”
It was far faster than Fly magic and cost far less mana than the short-range teleport ‘Blink,’ yet completely defied the laws of physics.
After stirring up the battlefield and landing in the enemy’s blind spot, Kang Han-bi’s hand would inevitably be gripping a longsword.
“Draw.”
The sword that left its sheath stretched out elegantly, then returned. By the time the kill sign appeared, the opponent had already scattered into the air.
“Ta-da! He was there, and now he’s gone.”
Lee Shin shrugged playfully.
It was shocking no matter how many times you saw it.
Jeong Sun-dong and Chae Dong-ha felt as if their souls might leave their bodies. Still, even in that state, Chae Dong-ha managed to show that he was the future SS-grade genius leader…….
“Is it just me, or does Yu Ri-ra keep coming to mind while watching these clips?”
“Ooh~!”
“Ho……”
Lee Shin and Kim Jong-pil let out genuine gasps of admiration.
He was right.
Short attack range, lightning-fast mobility, and a persistent style that occupied blind spots.
The two were incredibly similar.
And when two fighters shared such similar styles, the gap in power was usually clear.
“……Does that mean Yu Ri-ra is at a disadvantage?”
“Tsk, no matter how much of a future world-class player Ri-ra is, she still has a long way to go.”
“Unfortunately, that’s true.”
The difference in experience was simply too great.
One side had only debuted a little over a year ago, while the other was a veteran in his prime. There was nothing to be done.
Though it pained him, Lee Shin had to deliver the verdict.
“Yu Ri-ra versus Kang Han-bi goes to Kang Han-bi.”
Still, compared to what he was about to say about Hwarang, this was nothing. This one was truly hopeless.
Lee Shin picked up the remote like a microphone and began the introduction.
“And now, the man we’ve all been waiting for! Age twenty-nine, height 177 centimeters. Weight— no comment. Perfect on offense, perfect on defense. Hwarang is handsome in both body and face! Even his name carries deep historical weight. It’s Hwarang—Kim Yu-shin!”
Click!
At his gesture the screen lit up.
It was footage from the second set, where Kim Yu-shin had single-handedly dominated the game through pure side-lane macro.
Wearing full-plate armor that covered his entire body and carrying a tower shield large enough to hide behind, Kim Yu-shin nevertheless moved with unbelievable lightness as he charged into the enemy formation.
He had sent the main force to mid lane across the vast canyon.
The tower has been destroyed.
Completely alone.
The tower has been destroyed.
He pushed with stubborn determination.
Yet the moment a team fight broke out, he rejoined the main force like a ghost.
An enemy has been slain.
He was always the first to start the fight and ruled the battlefield.
And after winning the fight, he would return to his hellish side-lane push.
The tower has been destroyed.
As Hwarang’s suffocating macro slowly tightened around their throats, Armed Guild tried sending people to stop him.
An enemy has been slain.
One must not forget—Hwarang’s offense was also outstanding.
When the personnel they sent were crushed to death by Hwarang’s shield charge, Armed Guild eventually assigned two people to the lane he occupied.
“And this is where the magic begins.”
As if to say everything until now had been a joke, Hwarang began to run like a madman.
He really did run like crazy, again and again.
Trait: Two Hearts.
“Insane stamina. He turns half the canyon into his own territory. And don’t forget—he’s wearing heavy armor. He’s incredibly stubborn and sincere.”
“And smart, too.”
Kim Jong-pil picked up the commentary.
“Unlike Kang Han-bi’s instantaneous judgment, Yu-shin understands this canyon. He knows when to go in, when to pull back, where to fight to win, and what he needs to do. The kid doesn’t hesitate. And he doesn’t make mistakes.”
But the most serious problem was that regardless of how badly Park Jeong-seok had been crushed by Hwarang, this style—intelligent, resilient, and above all powered by insane work rate—was a horrible matchup for Mir Guild, which operated around Bok-chi’s style.
“If Yu Ri-ra is blocked by Kang Han-bi’s sword and Mir Guild is halted by Hwarang’s work rate……”
They would lose. It wasn’t a joke; they would genuinely be defeated.
Yet even while imagining their Nexus being shattered, Lee Shin—
“Heh……”
—was smiling. His face was lit up with excitement, as if he had received a new toy so precious he could hardly contain himself.
“Congratulations, everyone. And congratulations to me as well.”
From League 4 all the way to the current League 2.
For the first time since Lee Shin had taken over, a gift that had never once appeared had arrived.
“A worthy rival has shown up.”
A new stimulus had come.
Yes. This was how it should be.
While stomping on weaklings had its own fun, sometimes you had to fight with your whole heart like this!
And besides, that noisy thing that had been ringing since earlier was still going.
Warning!!
Warning!!
Warning!!
The rival ‘Lee Myeong-hwan’ has stepped forward. Can ‘Lee Shin’ overcome the approaching crisis and achieve promotion?
🎁 Reward: Compensation will be given according to results.
“Good. Very good.”
If they were going to set the stage like this, the only natural response was to run wild on it.
“Let’s have a fair, honest fight with real swords.”
Fighting!
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What?