First Game, First KO

Saturday evening, seven o'clock.

Ha Ije's stream went live.

Her face filled the screen. She'd put more care into her makeup than usual — black hair spilling over her ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠shoulders, a sheer pink lip gloss catching the studio lights with a wet shimmer. The eyeliner, drawn a shade heavier than she typically wore it, made those already striking eyes cut even sharper.

"Hello, everyone~ It's Ije!"

The live chat started rolling up the screen at a blistering clip.

Concurrent viewers had already blown past ten thousand at the open. That was more than double her usual numbers, and the viewer graph was still climbing at a near-vertical angle, ticking up by the minute.

"I mentioned we had a special guest today, didn't I? I know you've all been waiting......"

Ha Ije tossed a playful wink at the camera and glanced to her side. Excitement and nerves sat together in the corners of her eyes.

"Alright, let me introduce him. The current East Asian Middleweight Champion — Geum Hyuk!"

The camera panned smoothly to the right.

Gold hair. Tanned skin. A casual short-sleeve T-shirt stretched across a densely muscled upper body, tracing every contour of those broad shoulders and solid forearms. Under the studio lights, the gold in his hair caught and rolled with a soft, liquid sheen.

Geum Hyuk lifted a hand in greeting. That signature unhurried smile hooked at the corner of his mouth.

"Hey. I'm Geum Hyuk."

The chat detonated.

Ha Ije's face went faintly pink as she read the chat. She tucked her hair behind her ear, as if that might hide the flush climbing all the way to the tips.

"Okay, okay — let me explain today's content!"

She rushed the subject change, pointing at the screen with both hands.

"Today, Geum Hyuk and I are going to play Iron Fist!"

It was one of the top titles in this world's VR fighting-game market. It couldn't touch something like Fighter of Legend — the legendary masterpiece of Lee Woojin's original world — in either recognition or history, but among VR-native fighting games, its polish was considered first-rate.

This was an era of virtual-reality technology. Slip on a VR rig and you didn't mash buttons or waggle a controller — you moved your actual body to pilot the character. You threw real punches. You threw real kicks. Among the players who walked away dripping sweat, the game had even picked up a nickname: exercise that happens to be a game.

Think of it as roughly the VR version of Fighter of Legend and you wouldn't be far off. The character pool was similar. The move systems tracked close. The difference was in the demand. Where Fighter of Legend was a traditional fighting game built for PC and console, requiring frame-perfect precision, Iron Fist — by the nature of VR — asked for real athletic instinct, real reaction speed, and real stamina.

"Hyuk, have you ever played Iron Fist?"

"No. First time."

The answer was even, almost bored. Inside, Lee Woojin's calculations had already finished running. For someone who had poured more than thirty thousand hours into Fighter of Legend, a game with a similar system wasn't a first time so much as a first time that didn't count.

"It's fine — I'll teach you!"

Ha Ije beamed. Behind the smile sat a quiet resolve of her own: even if he couldn't play, she would carry him through it.

"Want to try the VR gear first?"

Geum Hyuk pulled the rig on.

The helmet settled over his entire head with a soft, even pressure. Interior padding sealed against his temples, and a faint vibration hummed through the contact. ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠Haptic gloves slid over his hands; motion trackers locked onto his feet. He could feel the glove sensors reading the movement of every individual finger.

......Oh.

Virtual reality unfolded in front of his eyes.

A fighting arena blazed with neon. Red and blue laser lights crossed in the air, painting elaborate patterns overhead, while tens of thousands of virtual spectators roared from the stands in a ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠single, feverish wall of sound. An octagonal ring sat at the center, its LED floor pulsing in living waves of light.

Seventy-two character portraits bloomed across the display like translucent holograms.

......?!

Lee Woojin's eyes went wide.

It was almost identical to Fighter of Legend. The character designs diverged in the details, but the core concepts and move systems were startlingly close — like looking at a spiritual successor, or a VR remake.

And one fighter in particular snagged his attention.

A heavily muscled boxer. An out-boxer in the mold of Muhammad Ali — float like a butterfly, sting like a bee. The character description listed dazzling footwork and a razor jab as his specialties.

It was a similar role to Geum Hyuk's in Fighter of Legend. The difference was in the lean. Geum Hyuk had been a strong in-fighter; Muhammad Jr. was built more around out-boxing. The character tips noted an advantage in range control and harassment, paid for with relatively weaker infighting power.

This one.

Geum Hyuk selected Muhammad Jr. He reached out a finger, and the portrait flared as the choice locked in.

"Hyuk, want to jump straight into a match?"

Ha Ije's voice came through the VR speakers, clean and close.

"Yeah."

The chat lost its mind.

Ha Ije looked just as rattled. A small gasp leaked through the mic.

"Uh...... Hyuk, that's a Challenger. You okay? Want me to rematch?"

"It's fine."

Geum Hyuk's answer was level. Not a tremor in it.

"This should be fun."

On the virtual ring.

Geum Hyuk's Muhammad Jr. and his opponent's Raiden squared off at center. Two fighters rendered with a fidelity that made it hard to believe this was virtual at all, measuring distance, watching each other with the wariness of men who knew what a single opening cost.

Raiden. A Muay Thai-based striker. An all-rounder who threw elbows, knees, and kicks as freely as breathing. Traditional Thai patterns were tattooed across the character's skin, and a strip of red cloth reminiscent of a mongkhon was wrapped around one wrist.

A close cousin of Rampakam from Fighter of Legend. Even the move animations looked nearly identical.

A familiar face.

Lee Woojin's eyes lit. The corner of his mouth ticked up before he could stop it.

Rampakam, he knew cold. He could read a Muay Thai character's patterns with his eyes shut — the startup on the low kick, the arc of the middle kick, the tell before a clinch attempt. All of it sat in his head like a database.

The match began.

IronFistEmperor's Raiden moved first.

Low kick.

The classic Muay Thai opener — targeting the lead thigh to clip the other man's mobility. The shin came down in a chopping arc, splitting the air as it flew.

Data replayed behind Lee Woojin's eyes. Thirty thousand hours of accumulated experience offered the optimal answer in a fraction of a second.

Geum Hyuk's body answered.

Step-in.

An ordinary boxer would have given ground, or picked up the leg to check it. Geum Hyuk did the opposite. He stepped straight into the kick. The blow caught not on the meat of the shin but near the ankle, and more than half its force bled off against his thigh.

Jab, in the same breath.

Geum Hyuk's left hand snapped out like lightning.

Thwack!

The punch landed flush on Raiden's face. A burst of hit spark exploded across the display.

The opponent froze. It wasn't the character's animation locking up. The player on the other end had seized in place from sheer disbelief.

What?

IronFistEmperor was stunned.

He'd thrown first. The plan had been simple: probe with the low kick, then chain into a middle kick or an elbow the instant the other man flinched.

This guy had walked through the kick. Minimized the damage and used it as a ticket inside the pocket — textbook, the way a real boxer was supposed to handle a kickboxer.

Wariness spiked. A thin current of tension ran down his spine.

Jab. Jab. Backstep.

Geum Hyuk started out-boxing.

Muhammad Jr.'s specialty — holding range, stacking points on the jab. Inside the virtual space, Geum Hyuk's footwork slid across the ring as light as a butterfly.

But the Muhammad Jr. Lee Woojin was running didn't follow the textbook.

Out-boxing the whole time would be boring.

He stepped inside on the exact timing of Raiden's middle kick, slipping outside the arc and firing a counter in the same motion.

Body hook.

His left hand, loaded with the full rotational torque of his hips, hammered Raiden's ribs dead-center.

Whump!

A heavy impact rolled through the VR speakers.

"Kh—!"

The opposing character staggered. The health bar dropped by a visible chunk.

The chat began to stir. Numbers scrolled past in a frenzy.

Ha Ije was staring at the monitor with her mouth slightly open.

"Hyuk...... is this really your first time?"

"Yeah."

Geum Hyuk's answer was still even, as if he were doing the most natural thing in the world.

His hands never stopped.

Jab. Straight. Duck. Body hook. Uppercut.

The combo linked as smoothly as running water. Muscle memory, translated straight through a virtual body.

IronFistEmperor tried to cover up, but he was already late. Raise the guard and a feint was waiting to punish the gap. Take a backstep and a step-in was already there to meet it.

This guy...... he's reading me!

Shock rolled in.

Every attack was being picked apart.

Throw a low kick, and he stepped in through it.

Throw a middle kick, and he ducked under and countered.

Throw a high kick, and he backstepped out and chained jabs.

It felt like the other man was reading him one move ahead — no, two, three. Like fighting a prophet.

This is insane!

The pride of Challenger #17 was coming apart.

He'd put more than twelve thousand hours into this game. He'd beaten countless strong players on his Muay Thai character. He'd cracked the top ten once.

And now he was losing to a guy playing for the first time?

End of round one.

The gap had been overwhelming. Raiden hadn't landed a single clean, meaningful shot.

The chat went feral. Concurrent viewers were spiking in real time.

Round two.

IronFistEmperor changed his pattern.

Muay Thai's signature clinch game — close the distance and drown the other man in elbows and knees. He'd felt it in his bones: he could not win at range.

Going to the clinch.

Lee Woojin read it.

It was a pattern he'd seen thousands of times against Rampakam in Fighter of Legend. The last resort of Muay Thai players who were losing the out-boxing battle.

The clinch came. Raiden spread both arms and drove in to close the gap.

Geum Hyuk took a backstep.

A precisely calculated distance. The instant his opponent hugged empty air — step-in.

Counter straight.

Power started in the ball of his foot, climbed through calf, thigh, hip, and waist, and gathered at the end of his right fist.

WHAM!!

Raiden's head snapped back. Virtual or not, the impact felt viscerally real.

A yellow warning light blinked over Raiden's health bar.

He wasn't going to miss this.

Hip rotation. Force born at the foot drove through his entire body.

Uppercut.

A rising arc from below — Geum Hyuk's finisher.

WHAAAM!!!

Raiden's character launched into the air. Just like when he'd knocked out Seo Minjae in the real world.

A fanfare blared to close the match.

"Wooooaaaah!!!"

Ha Ije screamed. Both hands flew to her mouth and still couldn't contain it.

The chat was already a war zone.

Geum Hyuk pulled the VR gear off for a moment.

Beads of sweat stood out among the gold of his hair. His cheeks, faintly flushed, looked healthy under the studio lights. Even a VR fighting game counted as a real workout if you moved at full power.

"How was it??"

Ha Ije asked, eyes shining.

Geum Hyuk huffed a quiet laugh. Through sweat-damp gold hair, those sharp eyes gleamed the way a predator's do when the hunt is good.