The Pursuit of Growth
After his regression, the thing Jung Hyuk focused on most was growth.
What growth meant differed from player to player. For some, it was mental training. For others, it was sharpening their dribbling. For Jung Hyuk, growth meant raising his stats.
That was why his top priority was reclaiming the attributes of his prime as quickly as possible. Intense training was essential. Even with S-class talent, effort was still required—that went without saying. Of course, talent of that caliber meant he could coast through soccer half-heartedly and still make it overseas as a solid player. Jung Hyuk, however, had zero interest in living as a merely solid player.
If I was going to live like that, I never would have chosen regression.
He was a man who had already stood among the final three candidates for the FIFA Ballon d'Or, the award given to the world's greatest player. In this life, he intended to become the absolute best. And so, right now, Jung Hyuk was ready to move for even faster growth. He knocked on the door of his father's room.
“Father, are you in there?”
His father's voice answered at once—warm, easy, without a shred of weight to it. It was also the voice Jung Hyuk loved most.
“Oh! Son? Come in!”
“Father.”
“Yeah, Hyuk-ah, how's soccer going?”
Looking at the friends around him, Jung Hyuk knew plenty of them had strained relationships with their fathers—not outright bad, but stiff and distant. He was different. He and his father got along like friends, all because the man always treated him with easy warmth. On top of that, his father had always supported whatever Jung Hyuk wanted to pursue. No pressure, only trust. That was why the Jung Hyuk of the past had carried a quiet guilt toward him.
I really felt sorry. An eighteen-year-old with zero visible potential as a player kept insisting he wanted to keep playing soccer.
Whenever he was asked if soccer was going well, he had always answered without confidence.
What a pathetic son I was.
Of course, things were different now. Jung Hyuk looked at his father with a confident smile.
“Yes. Of course it's going well.”
“Ohhh! Really? My son almost never says things like that. Did you score a goal recently or something?”
“They're practice matches, but I've been scoring often.”
“Really? Position? Still bouncing around all over the place?”
“Lately I've been playing as a defensive midfielder and central midfielder.”
“Even central midfielder? That's a really tough position. To survive in the middle you need to be decent in physical battles, right?”
At his father's words, Jung Hyuk's eyes lit up. This was the moment to bring up the real point.
“Yes. So I have a request.”
“What is it? Tell me.”
“I want to go to the gym after training.”
One of the world's finest leagues: the English Premier League. Often shortened to the EPL, it stood as a true titan among global competitions. Famous for its blistering tempo and rough physical play, it had also earned a reputation as a graveyard for players weak in the tackle. In fact, stars who thrived in another elite league—Spain's Primera División—often struggled after transferring to the EPL. The Spanish game valued technique over raw physicality; even players rated as the best there frequently failed to succeed. That was the EPL.
“To become the best in England, I need to build my physique ahead of time.”
Jung Hyuk knew that truth better than anyone. That was why, after school soccer sessions and personal training at home, he intended to keep building his body at the gym. Having received his father's ready permission, he wasted not a second.
Beep!
After tapping his bus card and stepping off, Jung Hyuk surveyed the area. Thirty minutes from home stood the gym he planned to join. There were gyms closer to the house, but he had a reason for coming here.
“Sigh. No wonder a gym stuck in a place like this wouldn't do well.”
Jung Hyuk smiled faintly as he climbed the stairs of the rundown building. On the third floor another battered door greeted him.
Creak!
The moment he opened it, the gym interior came into view—a handful of people working out, and a scatter of unimpressive equipment.
“Welcome!”
A thick voice boomed. Jung Hyuk turned and saw a man.
That fierce look hasn't changed a bit.
A heavily bearded giant with a massive frame and muscles that looked ready to burst stood smiling at him. The visual alone was enough to inspire fear. That man was Kang Chul-gon, the owner of this gym.
Before the regression, every time Jung Hyuk returned to Korea he had sought out Kang Chul-gon's gym. Back then Jung Hyuk was already thriving in England, and Kang Chul-gon himself had become a household name in Korea. Naturally the man of that future ran a facility with world-class equipment—nothing like the place before him now. The man who would one day become Korea's top fitness trainer was standing right in front of Jung Hyuk's eyes.
“Hello.”
“Yes, haha! Here to work out?”
“That's right.”
“Student?”
“Yes.”
“Okay, great! Shall we start with a consultation?”
The consultation ran long. Accurately grasping the purpose of anyone who wanted to train under him was simply Kang Chul-gon's style.
“So you're dreaming of becoming a professional soccer player?”
“Yes. I plan to go to England.”
Jung Hyuk answered without holding anything back. The man across from him was Kang Chul-gon, a trainer of exceptional ability. Stating his goal clearly and training accordingly was the smartest approach.
“Whoa, to go toe-to-toe with Westerners you're going to have to work insanely hard. Legs need to be rock-solid, flexibility to avoid injuries, upper body has to get way bigger than it is now…”
Kang Chul-gon never mocked him. Even when a high-school kid declared he would reach the English Premier League, the man's expression never wavered. He simply focused on how to forge a body capable of surviving physical battles against Western players.
As expected, Coach Kang Chul-gon was already incredible even at this stage.
Jung Hyuk smiled, pleased. It looked like he would be able to prepare his physique thoroughly before heading to England. Then Kang Chul-gon asked with a puzzled look.
“Something good happen?”
“Yes. I feel like I've just met an outstanding trainer.”
“Hahaha! Guess I'd better do right by you. But are you really a high-schooler? Talking to you feels like talking to someone my own age.”
“I get called an old soul sometimes.”
“Heh heh, okay! I like you. Starting today?”
“Of course.”
Kang Chul-gon grinned in satisfaction at the answer. Of course, that grin still looked terrifying.
“Uwaaaaah!”
“Heui-cha!”
“Kkeueueuk!”
Before long the gym filled with the rough groans of men. The members were wringing every ounce of strength from their bodies, training with ferocious intensity. Members of Kang Chul-gon's gym were famous for working that hard—because the owner himself could not stand the sight of anyone coasting.
They're going all out.
And now Jung Hyuk began training under Kang Chul-gon's gaze.
“Let's start with stretching. You've been exercising a long time, so you know the basics, right?”
“Yes. I'll go through the routine I usually do. Please point out anything wrong.”
Stretching existed to prevent injury and expand joint range of motion so that training could become more efficient. Jung Hyuk was a man who had never skipped a single day of it. He had also trained inside the English Premier League, surrounded by the world's finest facilities and coaches. Naturally, his stretching approached perfection.
Wh-what?
Kang Chul-gon's eyes widened as he watched.
Kang Chul-gon was a man obsessed with fitness. He loved sculpting his own body and loved sculpting his members' bodies just as much. He lived by a single philosophy.
Fitness is for health.
That belief meant he forbade drugs for himself and every member without exception. His training, focused on healthy, injury-free progress, grew famous with remarkable speed. Then a high-schooler walked through his door.
A kid who plays soccer?
The young man who claimed to play soccer was unusual from the start.
What kind of high-schooler has eyes like that?
His gaze burned more intensely than any teenager Kang Chul-gon had ever seen. He was certain: people with eyes like those always worked hard. They always achieved what they set out to achieve.
I like him. I'm going to teach him properly.
Kang Chul-gon intended to build the boy's physique the right way—safely, efficiently, and without stunting growth. So he started with the most fundamental step: stretching.
I'll have to correct his stretching first.
As an active athlete the kid would know the basics, but perfection was rare. Kang Chul-gon had watched countless players; none of them stretched perfectly. And yet—
Wh-what?
This high-schooler stretched well. Extremely well.
There was a movement like that? Ah—doing it that way lets the muscle lengthen more safely!
When it came to fitness, Kang Chul-gon possessed a genius-level understanding. He recognized at once just how extraordinary the sequence unfolding before his eyes truly was.
Insane…! Where did this kid learn this?
Shocked, Kang Chul-gon stared with round eyes. Then the high-schooler who had once been a thirty-eight-year-old man grinned and asked,
“Anything to fix?”
Kang Chul-gon answered without hesitation.
“Not a single thing.”
He was honest. In stretching, he was the one who needed to learn. He fully intended to. Muscle work, however, was Kang Chul-gon's domain. Weight training would be different.
Just looking at him, this kid has never done proper weights.
The Jung Hyuk he saw was tall yet built so slender it seemed his bones might snap. His lower body looked solid, as expected of a soccer player, but his upper body was painfully underdeveloped.
“Now we move on to weights.”
“Yes.”
Kang Chul-gon's prediction proved correct. Jung Hyuk struggled even with light loads. His physique was that weak. But there was something Kang Chul-gon did not know: the high-schooler standing before him possessed S-class talent—an overwhelming gift for physical development. And more than that, he was a man who had once trained under Kang Chul-gon himself, before the regression.
“What the hell is this now?!”
Right before Kang Chul-gon's eyes, something unbelievable began to unfold.