The Mountain King Returns
Could the 100,000 people gathered in this stadium—no, the hundreds of millions watching this match around the world—possibly all feel the exact same emotion?
The twenty-year veteran Yongbung youth, the American high school girl watching across the ocean, and the grandfather sitting in the VVIP seat number one.
Could they truly share the same feeling, transcending nationality, era, and status?
The answer, surprisingly, was yes.
At least while watching this match.
“……Uh, um, this is astonishing. Honestly, I’m at a loss for words. Hwarang isn’t playing top, they put him in support, and a complete rookie is in the top lane instead……”
“And they’re throwing in a player they registered just this morning? This is completely different from when they debuted Yu Ri-ra. Totally different. That was League 3. This is straight-up insane behavior.”
“Analyst, we’re live on air.”
“Ah, oops. My apologies.”
This was League 1. The Major League!
And not just any Major League—Korea’s, famous for its brutally high level of play.
This was the opening match of the Korean Major League. The very game meant to showcase the dignity of the entire nation.
And they were sending out a complete rookie? One they had registered this very morning, no less?
One thing was certain. This was not normal.
And Chae Dong-ha completely agreed with that assessment.
The guy sitting in front of him right now was definitely not normal.
“I control my emotions.”
How could anyone call a man normal when he was jamming his fingers into both sides of his head and going “beep beep~”?
Even Chae Dong-ha secretly wanted to punch the guy. His fist trembled as he spoke to Lee Shin.
“……Are you satisfied?”
“Oh yeah, completely satisfied. The attention is off the charts.”
“I’m so glad. Congratulations. Right now, at this very moment, you are probably the most cursed person on the entire planet, Representative.”
“Krrgh~ I’m getting drunk off this. I’m dying!”
People thought Lee Shin moved however he pleased like a madman, but surprisingly, he was a meticulous representative who discussed every decision with his subordinates.
The decision to change Hwarang’s support position had already been discussed with the strategic analysis team from the recruitment stage. At first, even the analysts had opposed it, asking why they would move a world-class top laner to support, but they had eventually been convinced by Lee Shin’s logical breakdown.
But Baek Yeon-woo was different.
Lee Shin had allowed zero objections regarding Baek Yeon-woo.
“……You know the guild is buzzing about this Baek Yeon-woo situation, right?”
“Heh heh, I’m curious what they’re saying.”
“You call it ‘buzzing’? You put a nineteen-year-old complete rookie in the starting lineup for the opening match! A kid who awakened only recently!!”
“Come on~ What about Ri-ra……”
“Don’t try to use Miss Yu Ri-ra as an escape! That situation was completely different!”
“Tsk, this is exactly why I hate sharp vice-leaders.”
Yu Ri-ra had made her debut after only ten days since awakening, but this was entirely different.
League 1 or not, back then Yu Ri-ra had the Mountain King—the greatest mentor possible—right by her side. What was right was right, and what was wrong was wrong. He could perfectly cover for a rookie’s shortcomings.
But Baek Yeon-woo? He had nothing.
The kid was completely alone out there!
“Have I ever gotten this worked up before? And this isn’t just any match—it’s the opening game! Do you know how much we poured into winning this? We invested enough to buy an entire third-division guild outright.”
“Whoa, it was that bad?”
“Is that all? Who created this opening match? It was your beloved fans, Representative. Not only is the stadium sold out, do you know how many people are gathered outside? And yet you’re throwing that boy into the Rift without a single piece of justification?”
“I know, I know.”
“Then why would someone who knows do something like this!! To that poor kid who was already suffering!”
“Ah~ So that’s why our Dong-ha hyung is so worked up. You’re worried about Yeonu. Of course. Our hyung is always so concerned about public opinion……”
“This isn’t a joke. At least tell me. That way I can come up with some excuse. What’s your basis for sending him out?”
Seeing Chae Dong-ha’s serious expression, Lee Shin decided to drop the teasing.
To those who didn’t know the situation, Lee Shin’s actions must have looked like pure madness. And he had pushed it quite far.
“If you want a basis, it’s these eyes.”
“So it’s your insight again. Is Baek Yeon-woo that amazing? As good as Su-bin or Ri-ra?”
“That’s so obvious it doesn’t even need saying. The insight I’m talking about here is something else.”
Lee Shin held up two fingers, then folded one.
“One. Faith in Park Jeong-seok.”
“Park Jeong-seok……”
“You worked on him too, so you know, right? That guy never should’ve been in League 1 in the first place.”
It wasn’t just the items. For three years, Lee Shin had massaged the media and fed them soul-crushing lies.
At this moment, his faith in Park Jeong-seok was actually greater than his faith in Baek Yeon-woo. Because no matter how well that guy played, he was still only worth one person’s share.
“But if there’s something I believe in even more than my faith in Park Jeong-seok, would you believe me?”
“……What kind of nonsense are you spouting now?”
Lee Shin shrugged, then flashed his signature sly grin.
“Two. This is why I didn’t say anything. I honestly thought you’d all figure it out. But how is it that not a single one of you knows? I’m actually a little hurt. Guess it really has been a long time.”
“What is it? Why are you dragging this out?”
“Come here.”
Lee Shin wrapped an arm around Chae Dong-ha’s shoulders and pointed at the monitor with the finger he had just held up.
“That’s the Mountain King.”
At that exact moment.
As if he had predicted Lee Shin would point, a hand wrapped in wooden vines grabbed the opponent’s head on screen and slammed it straight into the wall.
⊳ ‘Kim Jong-pil’ has slain ‘Park Ho-su’.
“!!”
Chae Dong-ha’s eyes widened like saucers.
Lee Shin smiled at him and said,
“That’s the Mountain King.”
What had they been worried about? What had Baek Yeon-woo said?
There was no need for such concerns.
Because today’s protagonist was that man.
The living legend who, alongside the Two Kings, had pulled the stagnant Korean Awakened scene back up from the depths.
And that man, now even greater than he had been back then.
“……Who could possibly worry about anything else?”
The Mountain King, freed from the shackles of time, was finally rising to his feet.
* * *
He was running.
Right now, he was running.
Freely, on his own two feet!
“Hahahaha! I’m really back!”
His body had deteriorated to the point where flying had become natural, but now the Mountain King was exploding with physical power.
It felt good. It felt joyful.
He realized it. His body had changed.
All that remained was to restore his old, worn-out mind.
With a refreshing laugh, the Mountain King shook off his doubts.
Alongside the shining golden laurel wreath, his eyes sparkled as well.
“Let’s run, Vita.”
The miniature Vita on his shoulder flapped her horns cutely.
The fluttering scholar’s robe clung tightly to his body like battle attire, controlled by the vines.
Spirit power reinforcement.
The moment his foot touched the ground, his body shot forward like a bullet.
Kim Jong-pil, the Mountain King, sprinted through the jungle at terrifying speed.
As if testing how far he could move, he kept accelerating. Faster and faster.
Back to his prime.
“F-f-fast!!”
“The Mountain King is invading the enemy jungle again. Wolves, raptors, golems—every neutral monster is disappearing at lightning speed!”
“It’s only been three minutes since the game started, and he already solo-killed Park Ho-su! He’s completely cleaning out the enemy jungle!”
“This is serious! Hunter Park Ho-su has nothing left to eat!!”
“At this rate…… huh? Wait?? N-no way!!”
Having swept the enemy jungle clean, the Mountain King parted the bushes. Though it looked like he was running randomly, every movement had been simulated thousands of times.
Behind his sprinting figure, wind hawks spread their wings and scattered in all directions.
Vision secured at key points.
The moment dozens of vision points lit up in the Mountain King’s sight—
This Rift now belonged to him.
“Park Su-bin!!”
— “Yes!!”
He vaulted over the wall and sprinted across the river toward mid lane.
There was a massive wall ahead. Normally, it would be nearly impossible to cross with ordinary ability, but the Mountain King only sped up.
The instant he was about to collide with the wall—
The miniature ‘Vita’ emitted light.
It was the moment the Mountain King exploded upward, running across a surging stump.
Whoosh!!
Using the soaring stump as a rail, the Mountain King raced across the sky.
Faster than actual flight.
There was no way the enemy mid laner could react.
By the time Hae-mu’s Aki widened her eyes in shock, the Mountain King had already claimed the space directly behind her.
Aki’s trembling gaze turned.
There stood the Mountain King, smiling with a vicious grin.
“!!”
“You’re too late, child.”
Boom—!!
Wooden cliffs erupted from all directions.
Not only between her and the tower, but walls rose on her right and left as well.
The moment her escape routes were sealed, Aki’s fate was decided.
Water rats had already filled the ground beneath her feet.
“W-when did you……”
The water rats swirled violently, trapping Aki inside a sphere of water.
And above the trapped girl’s head, Park Su-bin’s milky-white giant brought its arm crashing down.
Kwaaaaang—!!
⊳ ‘Park Su-bin’ has slain ‘Aki’.
As the enemy mid laner scattered into mana, the Mountain King had already stepped on another launching stump and vanished leisurely into the enemy jungle.
“C-crazy. What was that just now? What did I just watch?”
“He used the stump to jump over the massive wall, secured the rear, cut off escape routes, and simultaneously neutralized the opponent with water spirits. Then he vanished like the wind. The entire sequence took three seconds.”
“……Three seconds?”
“Ah, correction. It was 2.9 seconds. The Mountain King destroyed the mid lane in 2.9 seconds!”
It still wasn’t enough. He had to regain his memories.
He was definitely faster before. More ferocious. More intense.
The Mountain King’s eyes grew increasingly savage. Like a wild beast.
Find the prey. Where are you? The few wind spirits he had scattered earlier vanished.
“Vita.”
The miniature Vita shook her horns, and the laurel wreath once again emitted a golden swarm.
He sprinted across stumps that bent at sharp right angles in midair. At the same time, his brain moved at high speed.
Three spirits had disappeared. After analyzing the time, escape routes, and even Park Ho-su’s patterns and personality……
‘He’s hiding.’
In that jungle over there!
The Mountain King, who had been sprinting across the aerial stump rails, leaped down and slammed his arm into the ground.
The Vita branch wrapped around his buried arm pulsed.
A green wave of mana spread out in concentric circles across the jungle.
At that moment.
The enemy jungler burst out from the bushes.
“Ugh!”
He had been struck by a tree root and sent flying. Watching his junior roll pathetically across the ground, the Mountain King clicked his tongue.
“Your studies are lacking if you think you can hide in the bushes against me.”
“Damn it.”
Provoked by the Mountain King, the enemy jungler Park Ho-su calmly drew his spear and tried to face him, but he had made another mistake. He should have run without looking back.
Park Ho-su looked around as the area around him darkened, then cautiously glanced upward. Only then did he realize how insane it was to face the Mountain King in the middle of the jungle.
A tidal wave of vines was crashing down on him.
“……Fuck.”
“Try not to make the same mistake next time.”
Crunch—!!
⊳ ‘Kim Jong-pil’ has slain ‘Park Ho-su’.
“Park Ho-su is dead! That’s already two deaths! The Mountain King is blowing up the enemy jungle! No, it looks like he already has! Everywhere the Mountain King goes, he’s producing results!”
“It’s getting serious. Their formation is shrinking. This isn’t the Hae-mu Guild we know! They’re supposed to be an aggressive guild that pushes forward and assassinates! If the Hae-mu Guild starts cowering, they’re finished.”
“Did the analyst’s words get through? The Hae-mu Guild’s mid laner is finally moving.”
“That’s right. If one isn’t enough, they need to send two! They have to stop the Mountain King no matter what!”
“Park Ho-su has returned, and this time they’re surrounding the Mountain King with Aki!”
The Mountain King faced the two enemies closing in from both sides.
On one side was Park Ho-su in blue martial robes holding a spear. On the other was Aki wielding twin daggers.
“We have to kill him no matter what!”
“Got it!”
Park Ho-su’s spear turned into a snake, flicking its tongue.
Aki transformed into a black wolf beastkin and melted into the shadows.
The Snake That Devours Hearts, which converted every valid hit into a critical, and the Shadow Wolf, the highest-tier assassination beastkin that could hide in an opponent’s shadow, combined their powers and charged at the Mountain King.
At that critical moment.
In that hair-trigger situation, the Mountain King’s choice was……
Grin—
A breakthrough. He was smiling.
Partner, are you ready?
The miniature Vita scattered light according to the Mountain King’s will. In response, the laurel wreath shone brilliantly, and the forest became his domain.
“Park Ho-su’s spear is blocked by a tree and right before Aki’s dagger reaches his neck, it’s caught. The Mountain King uses the jungle trees to pressure Park Ho-su while simultaneously suppressing Aki! He’s fighting her in close quarters! Hand-to-hand combat! How many years has it been since we last saw this?! The Mountain King’s martial arts, reinforced by spirits!!”
“Now I understand for sure.”
“What do you mean?”
“The Mountain King. It’s not just his appearance. He really has returned. To his physical prime!”
“What are you saying?”
“Listen. How is the Mountain King known in history?”
The smartest hunter in history.
A field commander. An unparalleled tactician.
That was the image that came to mind when people spoke of the Mountain King.
In reality, he had changed the paradigm of strategy. He had reestablished the tactics of competitive play and even coined the term “brain play.”
But had he always been like that?
“In his early to mid-twenties, before Kirin Guild even existed and before the Three Kings had united—the Mountain King, no, Kim Jong-pil was different. Yes, back then he was……”
Normally, a jungler’s role was to roam the entire map, hunt neutral monsters, and help their lanes through ganks and pressure. But the young Mountain King had been different.
He dominated the map. Rather than helping his allies, he hunted down enemies and tore them apart.
That’s right.
In his prime, the term “Mountain” didn’t do him justice.
“He was a carnivorous jungler!”
Crunch!!
⊳ ‘Kim Jong-pil’ has slain ‘Park Ho-su’.
⊳ ‘Kim Jong-pil’ has slain ‘Fujimoto Aki’.
⊳ Rampage in progress.