The Abduction of Bukgung Seol
Bukgung Seol had been kidnapped.
The clash of Unicorn against Bicorn, and the intervention of Cheon Se-ah and an unidentified pervert — and yet, for all the Bicorns now sprawled across the ground over there, moaning in agony, not all that much time had actually passed. It had been over in the space of a breath…
"H-How…."
Bonjwa knew exactly how strong Bukgung Seol was. The Bicorn was, admittedly, among the most powerful monsters Bonjwa had ever laid eyes on. But this was Bukgung Seol — the woman who had weathered the ten-star output of the Forged Blood Art and still come back swinging, unfolding swordplay like a raging torrent. Weapon or no weapon, she should have been more than capable of holding her ground for this long.
"We tried to stop them, but… it barely did anything. They just shrugged off every hit and went straight for Seol, like nothing else even existed. There was nothing we could do…"
Namgung Yurin sat slumped on the ground, clutching her dyed hair, murmuring the words like a confession. This, from the girl who back at school had always wedged herself between Bukgung Seol and Bonjwa with that sly, greasy grin — supposedly a cold-blooded assassin of the wretched Namgung Clan, no less. Bonjwa had never once seen her this hollowed out.
"Seol was only trying to protect us… and I, I couldn't do anything…"
Namgung Yurin ground her teeth against her lip, swallowing a helplessness with no way out.
"Yurin… it wasn't your fault. Nobody could have known the Bicorn would suddenly turn like that…"
"………?"
At the homeroom teacher's words — a comforting hand resting on Namgung Yurin's shoulder — Bonjwa asked what exactly had happened to the Bicorn, how things had unfolded at the time, and the answer that came back was beyond anything imagined. The Bicorn had approached Bukgung Seol.
"W-well… from what a kid who can use mana-sight saw, once the mana latched onto it…"
Its muscles had swelled in an instant, its demonic energy had surged, and it had powered up at a terrifying rate. An amplification of demonic energy — and corruption. Only after hearing this much did Bonjwa finally grasp what the berserk Bicorns' strange behavior had meant.
By all accounts, the fall of a Unicorn usually hinged less on outside influence than on the Unicorn's own mind. This time, however, the beast had been dragged down by external forces — a demonic art, and the demonic energy it carried. Worse, it was steeped in the energy of the Explosion Demon Art, a crude, third-rate scrap of a technique.
Bukgung Seol was an awakener of the demonic arts. And no ordinary practitioner of them, either. Just which art she wielded, nothing on the surface gave away — even Bonjwa didn't know yet. But that immaculately refined demonic energy made one thing certain: hers was a qi art of transcendent height, leaving ordinary demonic arts far, far behind.
Watching the Bicorns charge, Bonjwa had assumed they were running as if their eyes had rolled back in their skulls. Not as if — their eyes genuinely had rolled back. At Bukgung Seol, the single most serene concentration of demonic energy to be found!
So that's… why they went for a single point of breakthrough.
Even in their frenzy, they had seemed to run with something like a purpose — just as the Unicorns had rolled their eyes back at the sight of the serene inner energy of Bonjwa's Forged Blood Art. Beyond that wall of Unicorns, the Bicorns' true target had been Bukgung Seol all along.
And so, Bonjwa gently laid a small hand atop Namgung Yurin's head.
"Namgung Yurin."
"Jjin…?"
"It's all right. Just wait for me. We're… definitely having lunch together."
Just as Bonjwa once did for little Se-ah, long ago. A soft stroke, then another, gently smoothing the crown of Namgung Yurin's head, where the black roots still showed through the bleach.
"………!"
The hand had shrunk, yes — shrunken so far that only with Yurin crouched down low like this could it barely reach to stroke. The body, too, had become impossibly small. But still — the way an older brother comforts a younger sister. Slowly, and gently.
"………Ah."
A faint tear welling in one eye, Namgung Yurin stared blankly up at her. Bonjwa gave her a light wave, turned, and started walking away.
A few steps in—
"…Shlurp."
Ah, dammit.
One stray thought about lunch boxes, and this cursed body had reacted all on its own…!!! Having executed the most magnificent turn of either lifetime, Bonjwa could only pray, please, that the sound of that swallow had not reached Namgung Yurin's ears…
Just then, Se-ah — who had been off to one side bickering with the pervert about something — came hurrying over.
"Oppa! What are you doing… why are you over here? Weren't we supposed to regroup and evacuate?"
"Shouldn't you not be calling me Oppa with all these people around…? They'll hear."
"Oh, that's fine — I've got a soundproof barrier up. More importantly, Oppa, I can pretty much guess what you're thinking… The rescue is completely doable with me, that pervert, and backup requested from the guild over there. So…"
Se-ah pressed a hand to her forehead and spoke like a sigh of despair.
"You're not even a hunter yet, Oppa. You're a civilian. Please, just evacuate already. I'll… I'll handle all of it. Okay?"
She was right. The Bicorn ambush had left no choice but an improvised response, but with the situation now contained, a dangerous rescue properly belonged to licensed hunters.
And yet.
"A Bicorn at full gallop… you can't catch that. The sooner the rescue happens, the better — and waiting on the guild's armored vehicles will be too late."
"That's… true, but…"
Bonjwa shrugged and tipped a thumb toward the far side of the field.
"If you want to chase down Bicorns, you want mounts that can run just as fast, no?"
Over there, most of the herd had been corrupted into Bicorns, and only a handful remained —
"Prrt, prrt."
"Prrrt…!!!"
— white manes still streaming, hooves grinding at the earth. And the moment their eyes met Bonjwa's, their gazes shimmered with pure, eager mana, as if begging for orders. And in answer, the horn jutting from Bonjwa's own forehead began to scatter motes of radiant light.
"………."
…Honestly, Bonjwa had no idea by what principle this damn horn even operated. Nor could Bonjwa fathom the minds of the Unicorns, who at some point had started treating Bonjwa as herd leader as a matter of course…
Well, whatever. It was useful right now, and useful meant good. There was no other way to see it.
"…Ugh, damn it."
Clicking her tongue in a low voice, Se-ah raked her fingers through her hair, glancing between the Unicorn herd and Bonjwa.
"If I combine my barriers with Unicorn speed, I think we could actually keep up. But even so, I can't make you take that risk, Oppa…"
"Hey, Cheon Se-ah! I can't wait any longer! Support, my ass — I'll just go on ahead first!"
"Haah, that's exactly what the pervert and I were arguing about. How's he planning to chase anything on foot, with no armored vehicle…"
The pervert, for all his perversion, seemed to be a Martial Arts Awakener of considerable attainment. But unless he had reached a realm on par with the supreme peak in both internal energy and lightfoot technique, no movement art in the world would let him match the speed and stamina of a galloping horse. Hence the shouting from that utter pervert, who had been standing there with his arms crossed, kicking at the dirt, patience long since spent. Whatever his story was, the agitation had bled through — a faint edge of murderous intent laced into that mana-charged voice.
Se-ah let out a long, deep sigh. And Bonjwa met her eyes and smiled — a little heh.
"Se-ah, then you just have to protect me. Right?"
Me… protect Oppa? she breathed, barely audible. Her eyes, rippling like disturbed water, slowly settled —
"…Right."
— and a confident smile bloomed.
"Right."
Thump. Their fists knocked together. Se-ah sprang up, energy renewed, and hollered across the field at the pervert still prowling in the distance.
"Hey, Pervert! We're leaving right now, exactly like you wanted — get over here."
"Ugh, c'mon! I told you to stop calling me Pervert!"
Grousing, the pervert trudged over, looked at Bonjwa, and straightened his sunglasses with a bewildered air.
"Cheon Se-ah, what… what exactly are you planning?"
"You're the most frantically impatient bastard here, so quit nitpicking and get on a Unicorn. We're building a 'road' starting now."
"Goddamn… fine. I don't understand a word of this, but as long as we can move fast, I don't care."
That seemed to settle it, so Bonjwa channeled the Forged Blood Art's power into the horn and gestured to the Unicorns. Don't ask why it worked — but whenever that energy filled the horn and it glowed, the brighter it shone, the more docile the Unicorns became. At Bonjwa's gesture, they bowed low and offered their backs, and the pervert walked up and swung himself aboard—
THWACK—!!!
"Guhk—!"
…Correction. He did not board the Unicorn. He was mercilessly planted by its hind legs — a pristine, flawless clean hit, the kind Bonjwa had witnessed only a handful of times across two entire lifetimes.
"…Ah. Ugh."
"You piece of trash…"
Bonjwa was left speechless. Se-ah stared at him with flat contempt.
"No, wait…! I mean—damn it! Unicorns hate men, that's just how they are! It's not what it looks like, I swear…! Cheon Se-ah, you have to believe me!"
"…Right. I believe you."
"Khh… Cheon Se-ah…!"
"I believe the police…."
"CHEON SE-AHHHH…!!!"
It was, in every sense, a pitiful defense. Bonjwa took a single discreet step — putting a little more distance between Bonjwa and the pervert…
"C-could you… just give me a ride…?"
Bonjwa lit up the horn and murmured to a Unicorn, and the single-horned white steed let out a whinny of protest — "Prrt, prrt." — yet docilely crouched and presented its back. Only then could the pervert finally mount up. Se-ah, still glaring at him with contempt, was scanning for a Unicorn of her own when—
"Hihihing…!"
"Prrt, prrrrrt!"
"Prrrrrrrt…!!!"
Something about that reaction was… a lot.
"Wh-what…?"
They were being very enthusiastic…! The Unicorns came surging over without a shred of shame, shoving their horns at her as if begging to be chosen. The polar opposite of how grudgingly they'd carried the pervert — they were welcoming little sister Se-ah with excessive, ardent, extremely enthusiastic body language.
"………."
Bonjwa. The Blood Demon, Cheon Yujin. There was a time when, should any man so much as cast an eye on one of the little sisters — decent fellow or not — Bonjwa had resolved to feed him a double fist to the face before anything else. A devoted older brother, sworn to answer any punk who dared lay a hand on his sisters with merciless retribution, whoever he was. That vow had held before the fall into Murim, and after the fall and the return; the one conviction that never wavered.
That was what Bonjwa had believed… right up until, absently, Bonjwa counted off on ten fingers how old Se-ah was now, ten years on.
"S-Se-ah…"
"No… it's not like that…"
"You… all the way to that age, and…"
"NOOOOO…!!!"
It was indeed the one conviction that never changed. But it had never, ever meant Bonjwa wanted it proven quite like this…
"I-I'm… not… a pervert…"
"It's not that I couldn't… I just… chose not to…"
Ah yes — with the power of the Unicorn, the world was made complete. A world that offered everyone nothing but wounds.
"I hate… Unicorns sooooo much…!!!"
With a scream of raw anguish, Se-ah twisted the palm she held out in front of her.
VMMMMMMM—!
A colorless crack split the air, and a colossal passage yawned open, just as before. Only this one was different. It sealed out wind resistance entirely, disregarded every obstacle of terrain, and ran the optimal line — a great bridge flung across the open sky! And the bridge caught the light and blazed, glittering for all the world like a seven-colored rainbow.
"…Doesn't this look a little like a rainbow bridge?"
"—LET'S GO!!!"
Ignoring Bonjwa's uneasy question entirely, that idiot middle-school-dropout Cheon Se-ah spurred her Unicorn on and was off at a dead run. The pervert broke into a run too, and so — doom-doom-doom-doom — Bonjwa had no choice but to swallow the dread and go hurtling down a barrier passage that looked… suspiciously like a rainbow bridge.
There was no wind resistance at all. Se-ah even fine-tuned the barrier with the delicacy of an escalator, feeding them extra acceleration on the fly, and they cut straight through the sky regardless of terrain, chasing at Unicorn speed. Before long… the herd of Bicorns bounding across the ground up ahead came into view!
The instant the chase succeeded, Se-ah twisted her palm and shouted.
"Releasing it! Everyone, brace for landing!"
VMMT!
The physical barrier dissolved, and they dropped straight down into the path of the stampede, as if to wall it off head-on.
"Prrrrrrrt…!!!"
The Bicorns kicked up clouds of dust, dragging their hooves through the earth in a frantic bid to stop. And then—
The pervert, first to leap down in his urgency, shouted:
"Hey, Bukgung Seol…! We came to save… you…?"
His voice trailed off all on its own.
"…Huh?"
The demonic energy had only ever been the medium that dragged Unicorn down into Bicorn. What had stripped away their reason and sent them raging was the Explosion Demon Art. Everyone had been so absorbed in the beasts' new, empowered state that a single fact had slipped past: if the demonic energy had been replaced, then the Explosion Demon Art had been wiped away with it. And without the Explosion Demon Art — fallen though they were — the Bicorns had their wits back. A Bicorn with its sanity restored can wield magic, just like a Unicorn. And the Bicorn's signature magic: illusion, for luring in its prey of choice, humankind… and hypnotism.
"B-Bukgung Seol…?"
There stood the girl, Bukgung Seol. Somehow, the thick twin horns rising from her head gleamed like a crown of glory, and an aura of dark-blue demonic energy traced the lines of her body and streamed across her surface, flapping like a cape.
To anyone watching, this was no kidnapped victim. A white-haired, blue-eyed girl sat astride the black steed, spine straight as a blade, utterly regal. Radiating a cold, crushing majesty, the girl opened her mouth.
It was a grandiose, wildly unnecessary roar of laughter. And as Bukgung Seol cackled, her lake-blue eyes… were spinning round and round…