The Red Emperor Takes Notice
Mexico. Cancun.
On the terrace of a Mediterranean-style villa, a man sat watching a video.
Leon Cardenas.
Thirty-two years old — standing at the very heart of his prime. His black hair was cropped short, his eyes sharp as a hawk's, and the tattoos running from his neck down both arms gleamed against sun-darkened brown skin.
On the tablet screen, a boxing match from Korea was playing. A blond boxer uncoiled an uppercut. His opponent went airborne, collapsing as if he'd been launched toward the sky.
And then the post-fight interview.
"Leon Cardenas. You watching?"
"Keep that belt nice and safe. I'll be coming to take it soon."
"Don't you run."
The corner of Leon's mouth lifted, just barely.
"Just ignore that asshole, Boss."
The man standing beside him was Marco — Leon's right hand, and his promotions manager.
"He knocks over one Asian Champion and starts running his mouth at the number one in the world. Pure clout-chasing. He's fishing for viral clips on purpose."
"......"
Leon didn't answer.
He rewound the footage.
Late in the third round: the boxer named Geum Hyuk was getting beaten from pillar to post. Early in the fourth: that same boxer started slipping the jabs.
Leon played it in slow motion.
"......"
His eyes narrowed.
Through three rounds, Geum Hyuk had been a punching bag. He'd taken Ha Minjae's jabs and straights with nothing to show for it, completely outclassed in the fight for distance. Then the fourth round started, and everything changed.
Same timing. Same trajectory. The jab came in exactly as it had before — and Geum Hyuk's upper body was already moving.
He had reacted before the punch arrived.
He read the footwork.
Leon saw it. The instant Ha Minjae's right foot advanced a half-step, the jab came. Geum Hyuk had mapped the pattern, and the moment that foot so much as twitched, his evasion was already underway.
He'd spent three rounds getting hit, collecting data — and applied all of it in the fourth.
A fighter who adapts and grows that much inside a single match......
A face surfaced from Leon's memory.
Himself, years ago. The night of his professional debut at eighteen. His opponent had been an undefeated veteran, and everyone had expected Leon to lose. The first round, he'd been overwhelmed. The second, the same. From the third round on, he started reading every pattern the man had. Fourth-round knockout.
That was the night he first became certain of his own talent.
Same type as me, then.
The type that grew in live combat. The type that learned by taking punches. A warrior who got stronger the more he fought.
"Marco."
"Yes, Boss."
"Gather everything you can on that kid."
Marco's eyes went wide.
"Boss — you're not seriously......"
"Geum Hyuk. Gym, record, sparring footage, amateur history if he's got any. All of it."
Leon set the tablet down.
"And keep an eye on him for now."
"......Keep an eye on him?"
"Whether he's the real thing or not. Time will tell."
Leon rose from his chair.
He leaned against the terrace railing and looked out at the Caribbean horizon, where the sun was bleeding red across the water.
"Korea's boxing scene has never produced a real challenger."
Leon's gaze sharpened.
The next morning, notifications flooded Geum Hyuk's phone.
......So Leon actually responded.
Lee Woojin scrolled through the screen, still lying in bed. Honestly, half of it had been bluster — the product of Geum Hyuk's instincts running wild during the post-fight interview. He'd never imagined the number one fighter in the world would take it seriously.
And yet the man had actually answered.
A single word — interesting — and that alone had set the global boxing community on fire. The reaction at home was just as explosive.
Leon Cardenas mentioned Geum Hyuk???
After he'd had his fill of the internet, Geum Hyuk pushed himself up off the bed.
Hwang Jinsu's gym.
Bulgom Boxing Gym
It was a boxing gym tucked into the basement of a worn-down building. The paint on the sign had peeled away, and the old lights flickered and buzzed as you went down the stairs.
But this gym had history. The photographs on the walls proved it.
19xx Asian Games Bronze Medal — Hwang Jinsu
20xx National Sports Festival Gold Medal — Kim Taehoon
20xx Rookie of the Year MVP — Geum Hyuk
This was the space Hwang Jinsu had held onto for more than twenty years since hanging up his own gloves.
The moment Geum Hyuk stepped inside, the atmosphere flipped.
"Hyung!!"
"Geum Hyuk hyung!!"
The younger fighters came swarming.
"I watched the fight yesterday!! You were insane, for real!!"
"I rewound that uppercut like ten times!!"
"Hyung, your Outstar followers passed a hundred thousand?!"
Respect and raw admiration shone in their eyes. Lee Woojin tossed them a few halfhearted replies, then turned away.
"Alright, alright. Let's just train."
Geum Hyuk waved them off and headed for the locker room.
He changed into his workout gear and came back out to find Hwang Jinsu waiting.
"You made it."
"Yeah."
"How's the body?"
"Fine."
He meant it. Fine didn't cover it — his condition was at its peak.
This body is a genuine cheat.
Geum Hyuk's recovery was unnatural. He'd eaten punches for three straight rounds, slept one night, and the pain had all but vanished. The swelling in his face had gone down by more than half. It was exactly as the game had written him. Geum Hyuk was a Wild Genius — a creature of raw, born physicality. Recovery, stamina, strength. Every stat sat above the ceiling of an ordinary human being.
"We'll keep it light today. Just loosen up. You don't push it the day after a fight."
"Got it."
Following Hwang Jinsu's instructions, he started his warm-up. Stretching. Jump rope. Shadowboxing. The basic routine.
And then—
......?
Geum Hyuk's hands stopped in the middle of a shadowboxing sequence.
Something was wrong. His hands remembered.
The combos he'd drilled across thirty thousand hours in the game — data that had lived only in his head — were pouring out through his fingertips. Jab. Jab. Straight. Left hook. Startup frames, recovery frames, combo-link timing. Patterns learned in a game, executed by a real body.
This actually works?
Lee Woojin was stunned. It wasn't perfect — a hundred percent transfer was impossible. The game and reality were different animals. Even with identical frame data, live muscle and joint range introduced variables the code had never accounted for. But the more he repeated it, the smaller the gap became. Each pass, a little cleaner. Twice. Three times. Ten times. The accuracy of the combinations climbed in plain sight.
......This.
Lee Woojin's eyes lit up.
Geum Hyuk's learning speed is insane.
The game's character profile surfaced in his mind. Geum Hyuk was a born prodigy — a fighter who got stronger the more he fought. A technique seen once was learned on the spot. A pattern that had landed on him never landed twice. And that setting was running in the real world.
Lee Woojin's thirty thousand hours of game knowledge, plus Geum Hyuk's monstrous learning speed. The combination was broken. Techniques he knew in his head, the body absorbed at terrifying speed.
"Hyuk."
Hwang Jinsu had come over.
"Yeah?"
"What was that just now?"
"......Shadowboxing?"
"No — that combination. The timing on the extension......"
Hwang Jinsu's eyes wavered.
"When did you get that precise? That's a sequence I never taught you."
"Ah......"
Geum Hyuk scratched his head.
How the hell do I explain this.
That he'd memorized two hundred and forty-seven combo routes in a game? That he'd spent thirty thousand hours breaking down frame data? Even if he said it, no one would understand.
"I just watched some videos and studied."
"Videos?"
"There's a ton of overseas fights on Nertube. I analyzed the combo patterns... and it just kind of worked?"
He fudged it. Hwang Jinsu stared at him, half believing, half not.
"......You can do that from watching videos?"
"Pretty much."
"Pretty much?"
Hwang Jinsu let out a breath.
"Kid, I knew you had talent, but......"
He cut himself off and shook his head.
"No. I didn't know. I had no idea it was this much."
"Coach."
"Yeah?"
"Now that I'm warmed up, I want to spar."
Hwang Jinsu's eyebrows shot up.
"Spar? Hey — you had a match yesterday. Today's a rest day."
"The body's fine. Seriously."
"......"
Hwang Jinsu stared through him. Those weren't a liar's eyes. He genuinely looked like he was in peak condition.
This monster of a kid.
Any ordinary fighter would be wrecked the day after a bout. And this one wanted to spar?
"......Ha."
Hwang Jinsu let out a short laugh and pulled out his phone.
"Fine. But I don't have a partner lined up......"
He thought for a second, then dialed.
"Hello? It's Jinsu. Jo Cheolgyu around? ...... Yeah, send him over to our gym for a bit. I need a sparring partner."
He hung up and looked at Geum Hyuk.
"You know Jo Cheolgyu? Heavyweight, trains out of Hanyang Gym."
Jo Cheolgyu. Lee Woojin knew the name. A fighter who'd once climbed as high as number two in Korea's heavyweight rankings, retired on injury, and — according to recent rumor — had finished rehab and was preparing a comeback.
A heavyweight spar the day after a match. Anyone else would have called the schedule insane. For Geum Hyuk, this was just another day.
Thirty minutes later, Jo Cheolgyu walked into the gym.
He was a bear of a man, a full head taller than Geum Hyuk, with shoulders that looked half again as wide. Early thirties, give or take, and a veteran's craft sat in the set of his eyes.
"Geum Hyuk, right? I watched the fight yesterday. That was something else."
Jo Cheolgyu put out his hand. Geum Hyuk shook it.
"There is a bit of a weight-class gap......"
Jo Cheolgyu glanced at Hwang Jinsu.
"Keep it light. He just fought yesterday."
"Got it."
A short while later, Geum Hyuk and Jo Cheolgyu stood across from each other in the ring. The younger fighters gathered around the ropes. A former Korean number-two heavyweight against the new Asian Champion. Worth watching.
"Don't hold back."
Geum Hyuk said it around his mouthpiece.
"......You serious?"
Geum Hyuk nodded, and something interested sparked in Jo Cheolgyu's eyes.
"Alright then."
The instant the words left his mouth, both their expressions changed. This wasn't a spar anymore. Beast-fire moved in their eyes, as if they were about to step into a real fight.
Hwang Jinsu rang the bell.
Ding!