“SKREE—!”
The gnoll staggered to its feet. The pain must have been considerable, because the arm holding its spiked club trembled uncontrollably.
Only then did Corporal Byeon Ji-tak react.
He charged forward in a single burst and swept his sword horizontally.
THUD.
The gnoll flailed its arms, then toppled over as its torso split apart.
Blood streamed out between the torn flesh and hide.
After gasping for breath, the creature soon died.
The one that had been hiding in the brush had long since gone down the road to the underworld. I strode over and pulled out the object lodged in its heart.
It was the sword I'd thrown.
With the battle ending in an instant, Corporal Jeong Ye-som bounced up and down.
“Wow, again! This time you even killed one yourself! What on earth is going on with you?”
“I was lucky.”
“Lucky? You aimed properly and killed it! You did great, seriously!”
Looking at the gnoll with a hole through its heart, Corporal Jeong Ye-som was as happy and excited as if she'd done it herself.
She had every reason to be this excited.
I'd accurately predicted where they were and subdued them in one go.
Of course, from my perspective, it left a lot to be desired.
Before I regressed, the one I'd kicked in the side would've died from that alone.
‘Can't be helped. I'll have to blame the physical ability I had twenty-five years ago.’
I let out a sigh and looked ahead. Corporal Byeon Ji-tak had started moving again.
A quick glance showed he looked like he'd bitten into shit.
He'd dismissed my earlier detection of the gnoll from that faint sound as pure luck, but even he knew what had just happened wasn't simple luck.
“Did you come here for a party or something? Hurry up and keep moving.”
“Yeah, yeah. We're coming.”
Corporal Jeong Ye-som answered obediently, then snickered.
“Look at Byeon Ji-tak's face. You keep showing off like this, Yun-ho, and his guts must be twisting with envy.”
“Haha.”
“But honestly, even I think it's strange. How did you suddenly get this good? Is all that training you do every day finally paying off?”
That payoff comes much later.
The only reason I could suddenly do this was because I'd regressed.
My physical ability had been reset, but my instincts were still intact.
My body remembered how I needed to judge a situation and move.
Of course, instincts alone couldn't solve everything.
“Knew this would happen. He's panting like a fucking dog caught in the rain.”
Another two or three hours passed. They were only gnolls, and there were barely fifteen of them in total, but I'd already exhausted myself.
Even holding up my sword was becoming difficult.
“That bastard was just insanely lucky today. That's all.”
As if he'd been waiting for it, Corporal Byeon Ji-tak once again dismissed my performance in today's battles as luck.
“Luck? Aren't you embarrassed to say that now? You couldn't say a word earlier.”
“That was because we were in the middle of combat.”
“You never shut up no matter the time or place, and now you're pretending you were being cautious? Yun-ho's role is support in the first place. Taking down a few monsters while he's on support is already impressive.”
“Did you sleep with him or something? You're covering for him like fucking crazy.”
“What? I've had enough of you!”
If I left them alone, Corporal Jeong Ye-som would only end up getting dragged into trouble for no reason. I smiled and casually spoke up.
“Corporal Byeon Ji-tak, by the way, did you really not sense anything earlier?”
“What the hell are you talking about? What didn't I sense?”
“No, I mean the gnolls that were hiding. I was wondering if you really didn't sense them at all.”
“Fuck, are you out of your mind? Why wouldn't I have sensed them?”
“Ah~ Of course. I knew you would have. So you sensed them, but stayed back with the heart of a mother bird dropping her chick from a cliff? Like you wanted me to try fighting on my own?”
“Y-you bastard.”
Corporal Byeon Ji-tak poured out obscenities, but he couldn't flatly deny it either.
Because the moment he did, he'd have no comeback left.
It wouldn't make any sense for him to have noticed the hidden enemies and done nothing about them, would it?
Not when he was supposed to be the team leader.
“Pfft.”
Apparently catching on to what I was doing, Corporal Jeong Ye-som burst into snickers.
“Y-you... just you wait.”
His broad face flushed bright red. Corporal Byeon Ji-tak whipped around and walked off in the opposite direction.
Now that the fighting was over, it was time to return to the assembly point.
Corporal Jeong Ye-som draped an arm over my shoulders almost as though she were hugging me and pinched my cheek.
“Since when was our Yun-ho this good with words?”
I hadn't been originally. Just like sucking up, I'd gotten better at it over time.
That's just how things are in this line of work.
If you want to get promoted, combat skills matter, but skill with your tongue matters too. That's how you survive. When you strip it all down, it's all politics.
Though the relationship between Corporal Byeon Ji-tak and me was a little different.
“Let's head back, Yun-ho. Everyone's going to lose their minds when they hear about you.”
“Private Second Class Gu Yun-ho. Yes.”
On the way back to the assembly point, I was still irritated by the emptiness and frustration that came with regressing, yet at the same time, I felt strangely different.
Because before I regressed, nothing like this had ever happened.
Praise for doing well.
Making a contribution.
I'd truly never heard anything like that before.
At least, not the me from this period.
Before long, we arrived at the assembly point. Each team leader gave a situation report.
All gnolls inside had been eliminated.
Zero injured.
Just as it seemed that would be the end of it, Corporal Jeong Ye-som excitedly spoke up.
“Squad Leader! Team 3 encountered a dangerous situation!”
“A dangerous situation? What is this, Byeon Ji-tak? You said nothing like that happened.”
“Ah, well, that is....”
“Enough.”
When Corporal Byeon Ji-tak fumbled for an answer, Staff Sergeant Kwon Min-chan turned his gaze back to Corporal Jeong Ye-som, as if telling her to continue.
“Yes. It happened while we were passing through the entrance area.”
Corporal Jeong Ye-som explained everything in detail, one thing after another, from how I'd been the only one to hear the sound and pinpoint the gnolls' location to how I'd launched the first attack on the ones that were hiding.
After hearing the whole story, puzzlement spread across Staff Sergeant Kwon Min-chan's eyes.
“Gu Yun-ho did all of that?”
“Yes!”
“Well, I'll be damned.”
He let out an incredulous laugh and looked at Corporal Byeon Ji-tak.
“Byeon Ji-tak, is that true? Gu Yun-ho really did all that?”
“Well, he did, but....”
“Maybe the sun will rise in the west tomorrow. What's gotten into you, Gu Yun-ho?”
Rather than praise me, Staff Sergeant Kwon Min-chan only went on about how absurd it was.
“Byeon Ji-tak. If something like that happened, you should've reported it. That's how we prepare and train so we don't get caught by the same thing next time.”
“Corporal Byeon Ji-tak. I'm sorry.”
In the end, he merely reprimanded Corporal Byeon Ji-tak.
I didn't particularly care.
What was the point of getting praise from Corporal Byeon Ji-tak or people like them anyway?
It'd only make me feel even dirtier.
“We're returning to base.”
“Yes!”
After finishing the mission, we exited the dungeon.
Downtown Seoul.
Other than looking dated, it wasn't all that different from twenty-five years ago.
If anything, hairstyles were more stylish now.
Twenty-five years from now, that old shaggy cut would come back into fashion.
We traveled by vehicle. The squad members sat in rows along both sides of a two-and-a-half-ton military truck.
The civilians showed no particular reaction even when they saw us.
May 2030.
It had already been decades since monsters and Hunters appeared in the world.
This was simply everyday life to them now.
The base was located near the city center. After chatting about this and that with Corporal Jeong Ye-som, we reached our destination before I knew it.
A unit patch depicting a white tiger.
It was the Flying Tiger Battalion, the unit I'd belonged to twenty-five years ago.
Once again, it truly sank in.
The fact that I'd regressed.
“Corporal Jeong Ye-som.”
“Yeah?”
“Would you believe me if I said I came from the year 2055?”
“Our Yun-ho must be really tired today. Want your big sis to let you use her arm as a pillow once we get back to the barracks?”
“...Never mind.”
I'd confessed it to Corporal Jeong Ye-som almost like I was grumbling, and she immediately dismissed it as nonsense.
Yeah. It's not like this is some regression web novel. Who'd believe that I came from the future to the past?
Even I, the person it happened to, can't believe it.
…Fuck.
“Good work today, everyone. Head up to the barracks, get changed, and have dinner.”
“Yes! Loyalty!”
“Loyalty.”
After we were dismissed, I went up to the barracks. The Hunter Corps operated almost identically to the regular military, so even the barracks weren't much different.
Bunks and lockers lined both sides.
The squad leader's desk.
A weapons locker.
Even a TV stand at the front.
It was military life itself.
“Damn it, is it really okay to keep Hunters who protect the country shackled like this?”
“Exactly. It's all because of that damned Hunter Mandatory Service Bill or whatever it's called.”
“I just want to get discharged already and join a guild.”
“Do you have anywhere in mind?”
“A few places, more or less.”
“Oh, congratulations on getting in.”
“Getting in, my ass. I've still got a long way to go.”
“Come on, you only have a few months left.”
“Damn, a few months feels like a few years.”
I changed clothes while listening to the senior soldiers talk.
An olive-drab PT uniform.
It had been an incredibly long time since I'd worn one, yet it felt as comfortable as if I'd been wearing it every day.
Whoever made these did a great job.
A long privacy curtain had been drawn over the bunks across from us. Before long, the female soldiers, including Corporal Jeong Ye-som, emerged after changing into their PT uniforms.
That's right.
Men and women lived together in the Hunter Corps.
It hadn't been that way from the beginning.
There hadn't even been plans for it.
But because of sex-specific traits, coed living was eventually discussed, and this arrangement was adopted in 2010.
Men tended toward physical abilities.
Women tended toward sensory abilities.
Because there was such a large difference in the abilities they unlocked, an extraordinary measure had been taken to create a more efficient force composition.
In practice, the results were so effective that no one objected anymore.
“Hey, hey, breaking news! Sergeant Kim Yong-hun and Corporal Park Ji-young got caught doing it in the supply warehouse!”
Though it wasn't entirely without problems.