The King of Beatings
“How! Why! Have you still! Not found her!”
Every time Gluttony roared, the entire building shuddered.
And through it all, his most trusted subordinate, Chen, spoke with perfect composure.
“I apologize, Lord Gluttony.”
“Chen! Explain yourself! Why have you still not found her!”
Any other subordinate would have been devoured on the spot, but Chen had no such worry. She had stood at Gluttony's side since long before he became a demon — and her alone, he had never laid a hand on.
“She crossed over Mount Baekdu. More precisely, we cannot go past what lies beyond it.”
“Chen, even you can't manage it?”
“I apologize, my lord.”
She hadn't said it was impossible — but Gluttony understood at once that her reaction was an indirect admission that it was.
“Chen, if you can't do it, then the others certainly can't.”
“...I apologize.”
“No matter.”
Gluttony did not unleash his fury. Instead, he pulled food from his inventory and devoured it indiscriminately, one item after another.
We are bound together by our vow!
He believed, without a shadow of doubt, that she was waiting for him. And then he drew a single faded photograph from his pocket.
“Baek-hwa...”
With a tender expression, Gluttony caressed the photograph.
And so he failed to see it — failed to see the look on Chen's face as she watched him.
The look of a woman who had just been heartbroken.
“Someone's badmouthing me, aren't they?”
“Hmm?”
My ear had suddenly started itching, so I rubbed it. In cases like this, it was a sure sign that someone, somewhere, was cursing my name.
Which little bastard is it this time.
I vowed to hunt them down later and pulled my composure back together. Then, putting on my most dignified(?) voice, I issued a command to Song Baek-hwa.
“I hereby assign you your first mission.”
“I await your command.”
Barely a moment after granting her the position, I gave her my first directive.
“You will entrust the territory to Elder Cheong, and I hereby appoint Song Baek-hwa as a civil official serving directly under Chancellor Baek Hyuk.”
“I humbly accept your command.”
BANG!
That very instant, the door flew open with tremendous force and Baek Hyuk stormed in.
He was, by any measure, extremely worked up.
“Baek Hyuk? What brings you here so suddenly?”
“As I've said before, Your Majesty — 'Hyuk' is quite enough.”
“Very well, Hyuk. What brings you here?”
At my question, Hyuk looked up at me with shining eyes and began to bubble over with excitement.
“I just saw the message that you've appointed a new civil official. If it's all right with you, please, please make her my deputy! I have mountains upon mountains of work for her — financial management, welfare planning, meal administration...”
Watching Hyuk spiral off, rattling off tasks to assign her, I could only offer a wry smile. It was a telling glimpse of just how hard I had worked the poor man into the ground.
“As it happens, I just assigned her directly under you.”
“You did?”
At my answer, Hyuk immediately turned to Baek-hwa standing beside him.
Then he seized her hand and dragged her toward the door.
“Right! Let's go get to work!”
“W-wait, just a moment...!”
Caught completely off guard, Song Baek-hwa was hauled away before she could so much as react.
I caught a glimpse of her eyes begging me to save her somewhere along the way, but I made a valiant effort not to notice.
I suppose I'll have to deliver the news to Elder Cheong myself, then.
And so I left my seat, made my way to the walls where Elder Cheong was, and explained the situation. The elder simply laughed heartily, thanked me for the consideration, and departed for the DMZ at once.
“Come at me.”
At that single word, the air around us grew heavy.
There were none of the mindless chargers from last time, nor anyone who gave up before it even began. All six of them circled like seasoned hunting dogs, probing for the slightest gap in my guard.
Oh? They've grown even more than I expected.
For the past week, I had done nothing but drill their footwork, while Won-ae and Yujin had taken turns sparring the six during every other hour. A week of training against a genius and a monster — and this was the result.
“If you won't come to me, I'll come to you.”
Saying so, I deliberately left an opening.
And the six did not miss it.
Basic Footwork.
Speed.
The first to come in was Hanbyeol, same as before — but this time, he was moving with actual footwork behind his steps.
“Your movement's improved.”
“Hyaah!”
Whoosh!
Hanbyeol's sword sliced through empty air. The instant his attack failed, he immediately broke the distance.
“You think I'll let you go?”
I didn't bother with footwork and simply chased him down. And the moment I raised my hand to strike, two figures burst out from either flank.
Sara... and Baram, is it.
Sara was an archer, but she knew her way around a dagger, and Baram was the kid who'd fought with daggers from our very first bout.
“Hyaah!”
“Hup!”
A seamless combination. Two ambushes while my attention was pinned on Hanbyeol.
A good play.
“But it won't work on me.”
Muttering so, I moved my hands faster still. The plan was to knock Hanbyeol out cold in a flash, then deal with the other two.
But the training did not unfold the way I intended.
CLANG!
“Oh ho?”
Because the shield-wielding kid, Jaehyeon, had wedged himself between my hand and Hanbyeol. The crew-cut, heavily muscled brute had somehow managed to stop my blow dead.
Granted, I was holding my strength back — but still, he blocked my attack.
Honestly, I was impressed. I hadn't expected them to coordinate at this level.
Behind me, Hansol was already charging in with his saber raised, and behind him, Hanbyeol was readying his sword once more.
So the strategy is: one closes in with Speed to draw my eye, while the others veil themselves in Stealth and strike from ambush...
Having analyzed the tactic in my head, I delivered my evaluation out loud.
“Fifty points.”
Saying exactly that much, I stepped forward.
Basic Footwork.
Break.
The ground all around us shattered, and shards of stone and earth flew at all six of them. Even against so sudden an assault, the six reacted as best they could — but it was nowhere near enough.
“Kuhak!”
All six of them doubled over coughing and collapsed to the ground.
Their combinations and combat methods had taken respectable shape. Their footwork, however, was not producing satisfactory results.
Is the footwork weaker because it runs on magic power instead of mana?
Techniques originally built atop a higher power would naturally be downgraded in force and performance once rebuilt on a lesser foundation.
Well then... won't their power go up if they just take hit after hit?
Maybe that was a stupid thought. But the old saying goes — people grow by being beaten.
The old sayings are never wrong. Hmm, indeed, indeed.
Having thoroughly convinced myself, I picked up a wooden sword.
“Y-Your Majesty?”
“Wh-why are you making that face all of a sudden...?”
“P-please, have mercy on us?”
I had no idea what kind of expression I was wearing, but the kids had started trembling like leaves.
Hoping to ease their terror, I smiled warmly and spoke.
“Don't worry! People grow by being beaten!”
“““...What?”””
Every last one of them wore the same what on earth is he talking about? expression.
I raised the wooden sword toward them.
“It's fine. You'll understand once you've been hit a few times.”
And with that, I swung.
“KYAAAAAAAH!”
From that morning until nightfall, the sound of pigs being slaughtered echoed throughout the castle.
“Huh? A hidden achievement?”
It was the first time I'd ever seen one, and I tilted my head for a moment. The character attached after the name was different from the usual "hegemon-king" I knew.
What character is that supposed to be, now?
I set the question aside and checked the system message that followed.
As the effect of the hidden achievement, you may now adjust the degree of pain inflicted when striking people.
“Whoa!”
Reading the message, I let out a genuine gasp of admiration.
Until now, I'd assumed achievements existed purely as fodder for legends of transcendence — or else as a means of tuning the difficulty of that Gate.
Don't tell me hidden titles actually come with their own effects built in?
Truthfully, there weren't all that many places I could use this one. But as the saying goes, the more, the merrier.
Things like this are always better to have than not.
Deciding to dig into the conditions for hidden titles sometime later, I looked down at the kids still rolling around on the ground.
“Up! On your feet!”
“Uuuggghhh...”
Not a single one of them moved despite my bark. To be precise — they couldn't move.
“Did I go too hard on them?”
Only now did the day's misdeeds come flooding back. They collapsed during training — I beat them. They got back up — I beat them. They tried to run away — I caught them and beat them.
The result: the kids' skills had improved at a staggering pace, but at the same time, their bodies and spirits were worn down to threads.
And I, caring not one bit about any of that, had just kept swinging the wooden sword.
“...Yeah, that was pretty harsh of me.”
Feeling awkward, I scratched my cheek and turned my gaze away. Dawn was already beginning to break.
“All right, dismissed for today!”
No one answered me. They had all passed out from sheer exhaustion.
Leaving the broken children where they lay, I returned to my room and went to sleep.
A softness like floating on clouds wrapped itself around my whole body.
Where... is this?
My mind was awake, but no words would come out. My body wouldn't move as I willed it, either.
Is this the famous lucid dream I've only heard about?
I had never once experienced a lucid dream, either before or after my regression, so in my excitement I tried to force my eyes open.
Uuuggh...
But my eyes refused to obey — if anything, they felt like they were pressing shut even tighter.
That was when a voice drifted into my ear.
“Sa......ve......me.”
“Save... me.”
What? Who's there?
Startled by the sudden voice, I tried again to open my eyes and look around, but they wouldn't budge an inch.
Save me?
A plea for help. Normally, I'd have brushed it off as nothing more than a dream — but the thought struck me that this was no ordinary dream.
Eyes — MOVE!
I screamed it inside myself with every scrap of willpower I had, straining with everything in me. And my eyes cracked open, if only a sliver.
Yes!
And at that very moment, my body was seized by the sudden, stomach-lurching sensation of falling.
“Hahk!”
I shot upright in a cold sweat.
What had just happened was a dream — and yet it wasn't a dream. Some form of mental interference had allowed that person to enter my dream.
How did they pull it off?
I possessed complete immunity to mental attacks. And yet someone had reached me through a dream.
Did the System judge it not an attack?
Certainly, judging by the content alone, it had been a plea for help, directed at me. If the System had ruled that it wasn't a mental attack, then everything made sense.
And that silhouette I glimpsed at the very end...
The silhouette had been so achingly familiar that an uneasy feeling settled in my chest.
For now, I climbed out of bed.
“Huh?”
And I felt it — the difference between yesterday and right now. My line of sight, and the position of my legs, were not where they had been yesterday.
“I got... taller?”