I followed the Association staff member’s guidance out of the dome. The towering buildings of downtown Yeouido lay quietly asleep in the dark.
It was five in the morning.
Since the Assessment had started at noon yesterday, that meant I’d spent nearly twenty full hours inside the Stage.
Maybe because it was still so early, the streets were empty. I stretched hard, then started walking toward the subway station.
That was when I sensed someone near the front gate.
“Kim Daram!”
That clear, refreshing voice was starting to feel strangely familiar.
I turned toward the sound. Lee Hasol was running over.
“What? You didn’t go home?”
“Nope. I was waiting for you to come out.”
“Why?”
“To see you before I left.”
“…For how long?”
“About five hours?”
“Here?”
“Yep.”
“No, you could’ve gone inside somewhere. Are you saying you stayed here all night?”
“But we might’ve missed each other.”
“That’s what phones are for…”
Only after I said it did I realize the problem.
Cool nineteen-year-old guys did not exchange numbers the first time they met. I quickly changed the subject.
“Did it never occur to you that I might come out before you?”
“Nope. You’re stronger than me.”
Lee Hasol answered without the slightest hesitation.
Strangely enough, that made me feel better than when the Chairman of the Association had praised me.
“…Anyway, let’s go.”
The two of us walked in silence for a while. Then I suddenly asked.
“By the way, where are you going?”
“Me? Hmm… I guess I should start looking for a place to stay.”
“A place to stay? You’re not going home?”
According to the Association staff, the next gathering was scheduled for next week. The exact date and time would be sent individually based on each participant’s results.
“There’s no one there even if I go back. My parents are gone, and the grandfather I lived with passed away last year.”
Lee Hasol’s expression was calm.
I didn’t know the details, but he seemed to have already found some kind of peace with the pain of losing his family.
“Oh, yeah? Then do you want to stay at my place for now?”
The words slipped out before I realized it.
This guy had a strange way of moving people’s hearts. He made you want to look after him.
“Really? You have a room at your house?”
My mom was Joo Miyeon, one of Korea’s top stars. We had plenty of spare rooms.
“Yeah. We have spare rooms.”
“Hehe… then I’d love to! Honestly, I had no idea where I was supposed to find lodging.”
Lee Hasol accepted my offer without the slightest hesitation. He must have been pretty anxious about the whole lodging problem.
I hadn’t asked Mom for permission yet, but she probably wouldn’t object. If anything, she might be even happier that I’d brought a friend home.
“Anyway, how far did you Clear?”
I asked Lee Hasol.
I already knew because the Chairman had told me, but I still wanted to hear it directly from him.
“I Cleared Level 15. You?”
“I Cleared Level 20.”
“Whoa, Kim Daram, you’re insane. Then you’re first place?”
“Yeah. I heard you’re second.”
“Kekekeke. Amazing. We’re the best, huh?”
Short little Lee Hasol hopped up and slung an arm around my shoulders.
Yeah, we’re the best, you punk.
I felt like I’d been dragged back to my immature nineteen-year-old days with him.
It wasn’t bad.
We kept walking down the empty streets of Yeouido, chatting about pointless things, when Lee Hasol suddenly tugged on my sleeve.
“Kim Daram, Kim Daram! Over there! That person!”
“Huh?”
The moment I turned in the direction Lee Hasol was pointing, I nearly screamed without meaning to.
Mo—Mom?
A white van, the kind only celebrities seemed to ride around in, was stopped by the roadside.
In front of it, a woman with her face hidden behind a scarf and sunglasses was pacing around while scanning her surroundings. Next to her, a man who looked like a manager was anxiously shuffling his feet.
“Kim Daram, isn’t that Joo Miyeon?”
At Lee Hasol’s words, I nearly screamed again.
I recognized her immediately because I was her son, but Mom had wrapped herself up so thoroughly that most people wouldn’t have been able to tell.
“H-How did you know?”
At my question, Lee Hasol gave me an incredulous look, like he had no idea what I was talking about.
“Hey, what Korean doesn’t know Joo Miyeon? That’s obviously Joo Miyeon! My grandfather was a huge fan. That’s why I’ve been a fan for a long time too.”
I could not agree with the claim that it was “obviously Joo Miyeon.”
I decided to believe that fans just had some kind of uniquely sharp eye.
I looked back at Mom.
She should have dressed more warmly…
The March dawn wind was still biting.
Lady Joo Miyeon had clearly come all the way here at this hour because she was worried about her son, who hadn’t come home for an entire day.
A moment later, Mom spotted me too.
Since the only people walking along the silent sidewalk before sunrise were the two of us, it wasn’t hard.
“Daram!”
Mom called my name and ran over. Her flustered manager hurried after her.
…Good grief, Mother.
“Daram? Daram? Holy shit, Kim Daram, what is this…”
Beside me, Lee Hasol muttered blankly under his breath.
*****
“Amazing! This is seriously insane! This makes no sense! Kim Daram, you’re Joo Miyeon’s son? Kim Daram! Let’s be best friends! Okay? We’re doing it, right? No betrayal allowed!”
In the car on the way home, Lee Hasol kept bursting with admiration.
“Yeah, yeah… let’s do that.”
“Wow! Amazing! My best friend’s mom is Joo Miyeon!”
“Stop shouting. My head’s ringing.”
“Now that I look at you, you really do resemble Joo Miyeon.”
Resemble her, my ass. We’re not even related by a single drop of blood.
“Oh my, really? This is the first time anyone’s ever said my son resembles me.”
But Mom seemed to really like what Lee Hasol said. She poked her head back from the front seat and smiled brightly.
“Ah! You’re blinding me, Mother! You’re so beautiful I think I’m going to lose my sight!”
Lee Hasol flattered her with no setup whatsoever.
Well, it wasn’t exactly wrong.
Mom’s face really was beautiful when she smiled that brightly.
“You said your name was Hasol, right? What a friendly, adorable friend you are. This is the first time our Daram has ever brought a friend home. Please rest comfortably and think of it as your own home. You can stay as long as you like!”
“Yes, Mother!”
A little while later, as we stepped through the front door, Lee Hasol burst out in admiration again.
“Damn. Kim Daram’s house is freaking nice.”
*****
When I woke up, the clock had just struck twelve.
I left my room and found Lee Hasol sitting in front of a feast, eating like he’d lost his mind.
Just then, Mom came bustling out of the kitchen with a large plate of braised short ribs. I quickly went over, took the plate from her, and asked.
“What is all this?”
“Mom decided to show off her cooking for once.”
“Gim Daram, yer mom’s cooking ish sheriously insane.”
Hasol.
You’re spraying rice everywhere.
Shut your mouth when you eat.
“Son, you’re eating too, right?”
Mom asked me with a smile.
“Of course. Three bowls of rice for me, please.”
*****
“They said the reassembly would be next week at the earliest. Kim Daram, what are you going to do until then?”
Lee Hasol asked while rubbing his swollen belly.
We had moved to the living room, and in front of us was a generous tea table with fruit and snacks.
I speared a neatly cut piece of melon with my fork and said,
“What else? Train.”
“Train?”
“Yeah. Train.”
A Hunter was fundamentally a job that required using your body.
And unlike most other jobs, how well you used that body could decide whether you lived or died. It was an incredibly dangerous profession.
The fact that the Hunter profession had never once lost its number one spot for highest mortality rate among all jobs since its emergence proved that well enough.
Awakened basically continued their careers as Hunters using the power of the Trait they gained when they Awakened.
Traits granted Awakened absolute authorities that ordinary people could not even imagine.
That was why most Awakened focused more on studying their own Traits and completely internalizing them than on the simple physical enhancement gained through leveling up.
That wasn’t wrong.
A person’s time was limited, so it was natural to say that training the ability with the highest return on investment was the correct choice.
But there were many cases where it was difficult to fully unleash a Trait’s power outside a Stage.
I was one of them.
Where in the middle of Seoul was I supposed to find an enemy and drive a Puppet Needle into them?
Besides, Puppet Needle had no effect whatsoever on lifeforms unrelated to the System.
As for the Tentacles Trait?
No matter how many unusual Awakened had spread through the world, humanity’s standards of beauty did not change easily.
I didn’t even want to think about that.
Anyway, Traits were important, but an Awakened should never neglect physical training either.
Too many Awakened took the physical abilities they gained from leveling up for granted and only tried to enjoy them.
Plenty of Awakened risked their lives to level up their Traits, yet neglected physical training.
But that was the wrong way to think.
An Awakened’s fundamentals changed completely depending on how they controlled, refined, and polished their increased strength and speed.
Instead of simply being happy about improved physical abilities, they had to properly absorb them, internalize them, and make them entirely their own.
If you trained your Trait through real combat inside Stages, then in daily life, you had to spend time training your body.
A Hunter’s survival rate changed drastically depending on how they used their free time.
“I’m looking for a training center we can go to now, so once we digest a little, let’s head out.”
I said while scrolling through my phone.
“Okay.”
Lee Hasol nodded without complaint.
“Daram. Should I ask President Jung to look into a training center? If you’re going anyway, it’d be better to go somewhere proper.”
Mom, who had been peeling fruit beside us, suddenly spoke up.
President Jung was the president of JJ Entertainment, Mom’s agency.
Back when Mom married Dad, he had also worked as her road manager. Now, he was fully focused on running the agency.
Ask President Jung?
I found that odd and asked,
“Mom, doesn’t your agency not handle Awakened management?”
“Mm. But I was thinking we might start expanding into that side too. President Jung must have been interested already, because he became very proactive the moment I brought it up.”
For reference, our mother was JJ Entertainment’s majority shareholder.
To be honest, it would not be an exaggeration to say that JJ Entertainment’s current headquarters had been built on the name Joo Miyeon.
But this is different from my previous life.
During my previous life, when I left home at nineteen and spent twenty years as a Hunter, JJ Entertainment, the agency my mom belonged to, never once touched the Awakened management business.
But at this point in time, what Mom was saying was a little different, wasn’t it?
This was probably all because of the dramatic reconciliation Mom and I had two days ago.
In both lives, I had Awakened and become a Hunter.
But in one life, I turned my back on my family and left.
This time, I returned to my family’s arms.
That was the decisive difference.
A little while later, Mom handed me an address.
“Son, try going here. President Jung said this is the training center used by the Awakened he has marked as his top recruitment target.”
“Thanks, Mom.”
*****
The training center was in Goyang, Gyeonggi Province.
It was a bit far from home, so we borrowed Mom’s car and set off.
“Kim Daram, you can drive too? That’s awesome. Kim Daram! You’re totally an adult.”
So many things impressed him.
Hasol.
“You should definitely get a license too when you have time.”
“Okay.”
Who could have imagined that this innocent country boy, who burst into admiration at every little thing, would be active at the peak of Korea’s Hunter world twenty years later?
As I drove, I suddenly asked Lee Hasol,
“Hasol, why are you trying to become a Hunter?”
He paused for a moment, uncharacteristically.
Then Lee Hasol opened his mouth.
“When I was little, both my parents lost their lives to monsters. So I decided I’d become a Hunter so I could at least protect my grandfather… but my grandfather passed away last year too. Haha… Still, I made a promise with him, so I’m going to see it through to the end.”
Lee Hasol spoke with a calm look in his eyes.
But faintly, inside them, there was longing for the family he could never meet again.
“I see. That must have been really hard, Lee Hasol. But you endured it well. I’m proud of you.”
“What’s with you suddenly acting like an old man? You’re the same age as me, you know?”
Sorry.
I really am an old man.
When I gave a small laugh without answering, Hasol asked me in return.
“What about you, Kim Daram? Why are you trying to become a Hunter?”