The Ties That Bind
Soft breaths sounded at regular intervals in the training room.
Kim Jae-sik stood there with a long spear gripped in both hands, breathing evenly as he composed himself.
He wore only short pants, leaving every muscle in his body exposed. Because of that, the abs that rose and fell with each breath stood out sharply.
His shoulders never moved.
He wasn’t breathing through his chest, but from his belly.
How long had he stood like that?
...!
In an instant, the repeated breathing stopped.
His hands tightened around the spear.
At the same time, Superhuman, the B-rank skill he had possessed since birth, activated on its own.
The muscles in both his arms and legs swelled.
Jae-sik thrust the spear toward the scarecrow in front of him.
The spear, which had been shooting straight ahead in a dead line, suddenly rotated counterclockwise.
Fwoosh!
The spearhead lunged without mercy and punched a hole through the scarecrow’s torso.
Seeing the hole, he immediately drew the spear back.
“Success...?”
He crouched in front of the scarecrow and stared at the hole.
In Jae-sik’s eyes, the opening looked perfectly clean.
There wasn’t even a hairline crack around it.
It was pure force, condensed into a single point.
Seeing that, a smile spread across his lips.
He clenched both fists and thrashed in silent celebration.
He wanted to cheer with all his heart, but he held himself back.
He had a nagging feeling that if he got happy over something this small, he’d never make it to the next stage.
And that was because...
[This is the basic “thrust” of my spear arts.]
Jae-sik tapped the screen of the smartphone he had set down beside him.
The paused video started playing again.
The owner of the voice was Woo Yeon-hoo, the Master of Ildae Guild and an A-class hunter.
In the video, Yeon-hoo was talking with an interviewer from the Hunter Association.
[That’s incredible power! But is it really okay to show a technique like that so easily?]
[Haha, yes. It’s fine. Like I said, this is basic. Most spear users among hunters can do it. No, let me correct that.]
[Pardon?]
[If you can’t even do this, then it would be right to stop calling yourself a spear-wielding hunter.]
As he said that, Yeon-hoo in the video looked straight into the camera.
Under that gaze, Jae-sik squeezed his eyes shut.
“Feels like he’s talking to me...”
That was right.
By Yeon-hoo’s standards, Jae-sik had only just managed to succeed at the “basic” spear technique used by A-class hunters.
It was basic in the sense that if you couldn’t even do it, you should put down the spear.
It was also a technique so fundamental it didn’t even have a proper name, just a simple explanation: a thrust.
So Jae-sik couldn’t relax and celebrate just because he had succeeded once.
“...Right. This isn’t the time.”
He nodded and stopped the video.
Then he set the smartphone down and took up the spear with both hands again.
He wanted to try that successful thrust one more time.
After several days of effort, he had finally succeeded once.
If he wanted to fully learn the feeling of success, he’d have to try it dozens more times at the very least.
...
He used abdominal breathing just as he had before.
Breathing from his belly, he fixed the scarecrow with a stare.
The round hole in its torso was already gone.
The training scarecrow, made from a golem body processed by magic, had the ability to naturally repair most damage.
Of course, it couldn’t withstand truly serious attacks, which was why it was used only for basic training.
In other words, it was exactly what its name said: a training scarecrow.
...!
His hands tightened around the spear once more.
Superhuman activated automatically as well.
The muscles in his arms and legs swelled again.
Just as Jae-sik was about to drive the spear forward with that body—
“Jae-sik! Time’s up!”
His mother’s voice rang out from far away, calling to her son.
The training room was a little separated from the house, but her voice still came through clearly.
How was that even possible?
Before he could think any further, Jae-sik reacted just like any son who heard his mother calling him.
He wasn’t even doing anything wrong, either.
“J-just a second! I’m almost done!”
“What do you mean, just a second? You said you wanted to watch this!”
“Watch...?”
Jae-sik tilted his head.
Come to think of it, his mother had only said it was time.
She wasn’t calling him to dinner like usual.
At that moment, a noisy sound rang beneath his feet.
The smartphone he had set down was blaring an alarm.
[6:30 PM.]
“Ah! It’s already this late...!”
Only after seeing the time on the screen did he realize what day it was.
Today was the day the four S-class hunters in the world were gathering in one place. Right in the middle of Seoul, no less.
He had originally planned to go there in person and watch—
“Jae-sik! It’s about to start! You said you really wanted to see this!”
“Y-yes! I’m coming!”
At his mother’s call, which came again, Jae-sik set the spear down.
He picked up the smartphone, which was still ringing with the alarm, and hurried out of the training room.
He passed through the garden where blue trees had grown, then went back into the house. His mother was seated on the sofa in the living room.
“Did it start?”
“Yeah. Just now. You got here right on time.”
As soon as he asked, she nodded.
Then she handed him a dry towel and a short-sleeved T-shirt she had set on the sofa.
Jae-sik wiped the sweat off his body with the towel and looked at the TV.
The news was playing.
There were two anchors: an older woman and a man who looked younger.
He put on the short-sleeved shirt and sat on the floor, leaning his back against the sofa.
While he was doing that, his mother brought him a glass of ice water.
Glug.
Thanks to the ice water, Jae-sik immediately found out where his internal organs were.
After setting the cup down, his mother asked, “Didn’t you say you might go out to watch it today?”
“Ah, I was going to, but...”
“But?”
“I couldn’t get in touch with Do-woon hyung, so I decided not to go.”
“Do-woon hyung...? You mean the hunter who saved you in the Muju Ant Cave?”
“Yes. Him.”
“Bring him by sometime when you can.”
“Bring him by?”
“Your mom wants to treat him.”
Jae-sik gave a bitter smile.
There was no way Do-woon hyung would come to our house...
That thought came to him immediately.
“He’s probably too busy to come...”
“Is that so?”
“Do-woon hyung is a B-rank hunter. He only got back recently... I mean, not even a month ago, right? You know that from B-rank on, hunters are nationwide, don’t you?”
In truth, Do-woon had already been promoted to A-rank, but Jae-sik still didn’t know that.
Knowing his personality, Do-woon wasn’t the type to go around bragging about his rank to other people.
Which meant the only people who knew he had become A-rank were the ones who had seen his face over the past few days.
Or maybe the workers related to the Hunter Association who checked the publicly posted hunter rankings every day.
Seeing Jae-sik like that, his mother let out a snort of laughter.
She reached out with her right hand and ruffled his hair.
“A son is amazing to his mother, too.”
“...Huh? Out of nowhere?”
“You’ve gone from E-rank to C-rank since that day, too. B-rank is only one step above that, isn’t it?”
It was easy for an F-rank hunter to become E-rank.
Anyone could do it after clearing a gate successfully a few times.
Going from E-rank to D-rank, or D-rank to C-rank, wasn’t all that difficult either.
With strong physical ability and enough experience, you could climb that far.
But C-rank to B-rank was different.
From B-rank upward, there was something absolutely necessary.
That was attack power that could inflict damage on a monster’s body.
The gap in defense between C-rank and B-rank monsters was on a completely different level, due to the difference in mana density forming their bodies.
Even if you had excellent physical abilities and could dodge a monster’s attacks, it was pointless if you couldn’t actually deal damage.
That was why hunters who used cold weapons worked so hard to train Sword Qi.
That was also the reason Jae-sik had been training his thrust by watching Woo Yeon-hoo’s video just now.
Of course, Jae-sik’s mother, an ordinary person, didn’t know any of that.
And because she didn’t know, she could praise her son purely and sincerely.
E-rank to C-rank.
D-rank to B-rank.
Both of them had gone up two steps, hadn’t they?
“That’s—”
Ah. Jae-sik was about to say, You’re saying that because you don’t know. But then he clamped his mouth shut and looked at the TV screen.
The word he had been dying to hear came out of the news anchors’ mouths.
On screen, two S-class hunters were stepping off a plane.
A very tall woman and a lean, almost skinny man.
They were the American S-class hunters, Alading Miller and Edidat Gwicin.
Jae-sik was overwhelmed.
“Whoa! There they are, there they are! It’s really Miller and Gwicin!”
“Of course they’re really those people. It’s not like anyone lied about it.”
“Still!”
“They’re both Black, huh?”
“Ah, Miller is French-American. Gwicin is Indian.”
“Ahhh, I see.”
“Wow, wow! So Jin-hwan went out to greet them!”
Jae-sik’s mother marveled.
Even though she wasn’t especially interested in hunters, she knew who Han Jin-hwan was.
As the anchor had said, he was the only A+ rank hunter in the world.
As a Korean, there was no way she couldn’t know about him, Korea’s pride.
“Yes. The ministers and the hunters representing Korea all went out to receive them. The S-class hunters wanted to meet specific hunters, too. That’s why Hunter Baek Do-hee went out as well. Miller said she wanted to meet her in an interview. And...”
“And?”
“She’s Do-woon hyung’s younger sister.”
“Huh? Oh, right. Same surname. Both siblings are amazing!”
“I know...”
Why hadn’t he noticed?
Jae-sik remembered asking at their first meeting, “By any chance, are we acquainted?” and his face turned red with embarrassment.
As Gwicin shook hands with Han Jin-hwan, Miller, standing nearby, smiled brightly and hugged Baek Do-hee.
Do-hee showed a brief flash of surprise, then lifted her arms and hugged Miller back.
“Huh? Jae-sik.”
“Yes?”
“Weren’t there supposed to be four hunters coming to Korea this time?”
“That’s right.”
“Then why are there only two?”
“Ah, because they entered the country through different gates at the same time. The broadcasters decided to air them separately.”
As he explained, Jae-sik picked up the remote.
“Then the channel we’re watching is KBC, so...”
“Yes. The other news stations are probably showing Smirnov and Li Lianzhe.”
“Ah. I see.”
Jae-sik changed the channel.
Two clicks down, and SBC News came on.
The face of Russia’s S-class hunter, Smirnov, appeared.
“My, that one’s handsome.”
“His abilities are nothing like his looks, though.”
“What kind of ability does he have?”
“A monster of an ability. After he uses it, his body gets unbelievably—”
“Lee Tae-cheon...”
“Do you know him?”
“He’s the Master of the guild where I told you Baek Do-hee belongs.”
“Oh? Then—”
“Yes. He’s not exactly a brother to Do-woon hyung, but... no, wait. They’re childhood friends.”
“Goodness, is that true? Then Do-woon is surrounded by capable people.”
At that, Jae-sik nodded.
While the anchors on TV laughed, Jae-sik swallowed.
He suddenly felt an inexplicable dryness in his throat.
So he hurriedly drank the ice water he had set on the floor.
“Jae-sik, switch to MBS. I’m curious about the other hunters too.”
Glug, glug.
At his mother’s request, Jae-sik changed the channel while still drinking.
On the TV screen appeared Li Lianzhe, an old man with white hair.
Behind him followed a young man with very short hair.
The screen showed the caption: “Li Lianzhe arrives with his prized disciple...”
And then...
Pu-huuuu!
Kim Jae-sik spat out the water he’d been drinking.
Why was my hyung there...?