The Conditions of Victory
Once, Jeong-gu had asked the Old Man a question.
"Is there an ability that can tell whether someone carries a core ability?"
"Not that I know of. Then again, who can say? It may only be that no one has found it yet."
We took that answer to mean no such ability existed. If a thing was rare enough that even the Old Man had never seen it, we might as well treat it as nonexistent.
And yet.
"...The rumored kid really is more than the rumors. How does a brat like this already have an Ability Core? Getting his hands on one is something else."
That ability user was standing right in front of me.
Someone who could tell whether a person held a core ability would be useful beyond measure. The government would treat a talent like that as precious. So why wasn't he a hunter? Why was he in a place like this?
The Gang Leader caught me by the scruff of the neck and quietly shifted a few steps back. From then on, his voice dropped.
"Merchandise or not, unwritten rules are still rules. I won't ask what your ability is. Propriety ought to be kept."
Gentlemanly of him. What was he scheming?
"So a core ability was how a mere kid made a name for himself?"
That stung. I hadn't gotten a single thing out of the core.
How do I play this? Ignore him?
I had gained a core ability, yes, but I still didn't know how to use it. I didn't even know what I'd gained. Suppose I could wield it freely. If I went out of my way to hide it, would there be anything in it for me?
No.
More precisely, the only tactic worth anything was hiding it briefly, for later. If you had an ability, you had to spend it without stinting if you meant to stay alive. Sooner or later it would show. There was no reason to keep it buried to the end. Hide it forever, and you might as well not have it.
If I went on without using it, the Gang Leader would only think I was holding it back, biding my time for an opening. His guard would climb. I had nothing—not a damn thing—and somehow I'd still end up with a spooked man dumping a rifle into me on full auto. The whole thing had twisted itself into a knot.
Might as well gamble.
Worst case, I broke even.
"I did get a core ability. It's the same as not having one."
Honest, then.
"Hm?"
"I mean it literally."
I wanted to use it and couldn't. Better to loosen their guard than sit on a bluff.
"Boss, you think he'll own up if you push? Own up and he's a dead man—"
"Yeah. It was me."
I'd already confessed once. Might as well lock in the part of the honest kid while I was at it.
"You gained an ability, but it's the same as not having one... You still don't know how to use it properly? Have you even figured out what it is?"
What was this? Maybe the conversation would actually go somewhere.
"Something like that."
"I see. That can happen."
He accepted it with surprising ease.
...Was he an idiot?
"You believe me?"
"When did you use the core?"
"Not even two months ago."
"I see."
"...You believe that too?"
This easily?
A soft tap. The Gang Leader set a hand on my shoulder again. This time I didn't flinch.
"If I'm to answer honesty with honesty, my own ability is riddled with defects."
"Defects?"
What did that mean? One thing, at least, was certain. He had an ability.
"So you've never once used your core ability?"
"No."
"Not that you used it without knowing, unconsciously?"
"No chance."
"Hm."
"I'm sure."
"I'll take your word for it."
The meal ended. The trip to wherever we were going didn't take long, and it was a good thing I'd eaten lightly. A full stomach would have meant fighting before the food had time to settle.
We arrived in the basement of some ruined building. From outside it looked abandoned, but down below the place was neatly kept. There wasn't a single thing worth calling a possession. Nobody lived here. An empty room, and here and there a light left standing on its own.
"An eye for an eye! A tooth for a tooth!"
A man with some bizarre paint on his face stepped out and worked the room up, and the rest of them howled it back like madmen.
"An eye for an eye! A tooth for a tooth!"
"That is our creed! And thanks to it, the three of you have been gloriously granted the chance to live as our slaves! That's the long and short of it!"
The Gang Leader only watched from a corner, arms folded. He was nothing like the men burning hot around him. He barely felt like someone sharing the same room.
"Here stand three challengers who rushed us without a scrap of fear!"
The ropes binding me all came loose.
"Lose, and you die! Win, and you earn the right to live on as a slave!"
"Ohhh!"
The worst, or the next worst. So this was an underground arena. A court, maybe. Or a place built for revenge. No wonder the air stank of blood.
"Hurry up!"
Morning had come, and the monster colony still had no intention of clearing the road. Clock-out Man had started nagging the moment I woke, and picking the story back up had carried us all the way to lunch.
"Hurry up, man! Get to the part where the fighter walks in!"
"What are you so excited about? I nearly died."
"You didn't die. You're right here, perfectly alive. Ah, hurry!"
One of these days I was going to have to finish that duel the two of us never settled.
An underground arena. They were never going to give me a fair fight. I needed my head clear.
"Rumored Kid! You're the star of the day, so you go last!"
Of course I did.
"You there, first! You're number one!"
"Boo!"
One piece of merchandise was dragged out ahead of the rest.
"Dongdaemun's little scrap. Two weeks ago, in the dead of night, you—"
"Make it short."
"You had the nerve to lay hands on our goods?"
"The hell are you talking about? You lick it and call it yours?"
"It came up on our land, so it's ours."
"Bullshit. Who owns land that died like a dog?"
"The man who pays the tax owns the land!"
"Shut up and start."
"Boo!"
"Oho. You're prepared, I trust?"
"I die, I die. Fuck it."
The man who stepped out against him was a full head taller, a big blade in his hand. Dongdaemun had nothing.
"If Dongdaemun dies, he loses!"
You call that a rule.
"You have one way to live! Subdue one of our own without killing him! Take his surrender, and you survive as a slave!"
So killing was off the table.
"Take the life of one of our family, and you die too!"
An unfair fight, sure enough. Just as expected.
"You done with this shit? Start, you morons."
"Boo!"
"Begin!"
It was one-sided. I hadn't expected otherwise. I'd already known Dongdaemun's bravado didn't come from any confidence that he could win. He was only ready to die.
"Kill him!"
"Kill him for what? Take your time!"
"Play with him!"
Rather than watch a dull bout, I looked over at the Gang Leader, shoved into his corner. He seemed to be thinking along the same lines. The fight didn't interest him. He was staring off, lost in something else.
"The match is decided! Gwanghwamun wins!"
"Ohhh!"
"That ended way too fast!"
The next bout followed. From the opening to the result, it was identical.
"Now only the Rumored Kid remains!"
I turned the two dreary fights back over in my head. A different opponent had come up each time, and both had used the same weapon. One side armed, the other bare: an unfairness they didn't even bother to hide. They must have picked whatever they considered the finest close-quarters weapon they had. If so, mine would be carrying the same thing.
"Time! Rumored Kid! Come on up!"
"Boo!"
The weapon was a machete, and a large one. The floor itself was fairly wide. The problem was the crowd packing every side of it. Nothing held them back—no rail, no barrier. The longer a bout ran, the closer the spectators crept, and the space only shrank. Tight ground meant no room to give. With nothing to stop the blade, dodging wouldn't be much of an option either.
"Kid! Are you prepared?"
"Boo!"
But he had a weakness too. A big blade was a weapon that demanded the whole body, every single swing. You had to coil the waist and turn the shoulder; that went without saying. You had to move your feet, shift your weight, and only then bring it around. Swing it wrong once, and hauling it back took an age.
"The kid's so scared he's lost his tongue! Nothing for it! Fighter, enter!"
As expected. A machete.
"Kill him!"
"Don't go easy just because he's a kid!"
"...Don't worry. I have no intention of going easy."
He was a different sort from the two who'd come up before.
"Weren't you trying to get revenge on me?"
"That won't be me. Someone else will."
He clearly had business with me.
"Kid."
The one calling me that didn't look so much older. Five years, maybe. Barely a man.
"I know why you were dragged here. You had no way to live unless you did that to our brother. But—"
For an instant Jeong-gu's face rose up, and was gone.
"Boo!"
"Don't go easy on him!"
"You—"
"I understand."
"...?"
I could understand it a hundred times over.
"If I were you, we wouldn't even be talking. The Rumored Kid's head would already be off his neck. So hurry up and start."
"...I was uneasy, fighting a child. This puts me at ease."
Just what I'd wanted.
"The last bout of the day! Gwanghwamun versus the Rumored Kid, Sheki!"
"Ohhh!"
Just behind my opponent, off his diagonal and set among the spectators, I could see the Gang Leader. Hadn't he been stuck in that corner the whole time? When had he gotten this close? He'd even changed into something lighter, and come out to watch in the open.
"Begin!"
"Tear him apart!"
"Revenge! Revenge!"
The man settled into a stance. He wasn't rushing. The posture was good—not a standard one, and better for it. A stance built for cramped ground. He didn't throw his arms or his legs too wide, and he still kept a sure distance between us. Not an ordinary fighter.
"I'd just as soon end this quickly, but my comrades don't want that. So tremble a little longer."
The one who let the talk go unanswered always won. Fine. Time to sort the situation.
He knew my skill was nothing ordinary. He'd be reading my next move.
I'll get in close.
A man swinging a long blade in a narrow space. The answer was obvious: fight glued to him. Slip inside the reach where the edge could actually land. He'd have seen that coming, and he'd be ready for it. Getting in with no shield was no simple thing, of course. Worst case, I'd have to spend a hit on something that wouldn't kill me, and go in anyway.
What matters is simpler than that. I have to take his surrender.
A miserable condition for victory. I could steal the weapon and beat him half to death, and if he refused to quit, none of it would mean a thing.
Turn it around. Say I was the one taking revenge for Jeong-gu. Say, on top of that, that my opponent wasn't allowed to kill me. Would I ever surrender?
Not a chance.
He'd be thinking the same.
"Frozen stiff? Don't tell me you're looking for a way to win."
If that was what this was, then it was worth doing. A road nobody had ever walked.