Chapter 12
Tear Open a Festering Wound
“What are you doing here?”
As Kwak Dojin strode forward with a fierce expression, his body suddenly twisted.
Damn it.
It was the aftereffect of the horse stance.
The muscles in his lower body felt as if they had been ripped apart. Even walking was painful.
“Senior!”
Baek Yuyeon cried out in surprise.
“How did you know I was here?”
Before she could say anything else, Hwang Minwoo stepped in front of her with a mocking grin.
“Hey, hey. Easy there, Mad Dog. Calm down.”
“You son of a bitch…”
“What? Going to hit me again? Want another disciplinary action? You do realize the only reason you got away with repeating a year instead of being expelled was because of me, right?”
“You… You…!”
Watching from the rooftop, Kang Hyun observed the situation with interest.
So Kwak Dojin used to be a decent guy until his second year?
Looks like there’s quite a story between these three.
“Disciplinary action? Fine, you bastard. Go ahead. Keep piling them on.”
Kwak Dojin charged like an enraged bull.
For the first time, Hwang Minwoo instinctively took a step back under the pressure.
“Has this lunatic seriously lost it?”
“Senior! Please stop!”
The one who blocked Kwak Dojin was Baek Yuyeon.
“Why do you always do this?”
“…What?”
“Whatever I’m doing here has nothing to do with you. I’ll handle my own problems, so please stop interfering.”
Her sharp words brought Kwak Dojin to an abrupt halt.
No one knew better than he did that both of her fists were trembling ever so slightly.
“You hear that, Mad Dog? Learn your place—”
“You be quiet too, Hwang Minwoo.”
Baek Yuyeon’s icy gaze turned toward him.
“Watch how you speak to my senior. If you keep acting like this, I won’t feel like signing that contract.”
“Ah… Alright. Fine. I get it.”
He gave a half-hearted bow.
“My apologies, Senior Kwak.”
Then he subtly gestured toward Baek Yuyeon.
Let’s leave.
After hesitating for a moment, she abruptly turned away and disappeared with him.
Grinding his teeth, Kwak Dojin watched them leave.
He wanted to say something…
But in the end, he couldn’t.
“AAAAAAAH!”
BANG! BANG!
Like a wounded beast, he slammed his bare fists into the wall.
Cadets passing by frowned and instinctively avoided him.
It wasn’t anything unusual.
Just the academy’s infamous Mad Dog acting crazy again.
Then—
Thud.
Someone landed lightly behind him.
“…!”
Startled, Kwak Dojin turned around.
A familiar face casually held out a bottle of whiskey.
“Want a drink?”
The two of them sat in a quiet alleyway, each holding a bottle.
Kang Hyun drank while discreetly expelling the alcohol with his qi.
Kwak Dojin, on the other hand, got drunk almost immediately.
“Fuck… Fuck!”
He kept taking huge gulps.
I wonder if he knows this bottle costs five hundred thousand won.
Normally, Kang Hyun would’ve simply walked away.
He believed that children’s problems were best solved among themselves rather than by adults stepping in.
But…
When Baek Yuyeon was involved, things were different.
Especially if she was about to sign some suspicious contract.
“So…”
Kang Hyun spoke lazily.
“You like that girl?”
“…It’s not like that.”
“Then what is it?”
“That’s none of your business, Professor.”
Kwak Dojin replied curtly before taking another long drink.
Gulp.
Gulp.
“You’re right. None of my business.”
“Who you fight over or whether you tuck your tail between your legs in front of some pretty-boy parasite—that’s your problem.”
“…I didn’t tuck my tail!”
He exploded.
“Oh? Then what exactly did I see earlier?”
“You couldn’t even throw one proper punch. You were just standing there trembling.”
“That’s because…!”
Kang Hyun deliberately provoked him.
He wanted to scratch open the wound buried deep inside.
Get drunk.
And throw it all up.
Wounds don’t heal because you hide them.
They fester.
And when they fester, they rot from the inside until they destroy a person completely.
So tear them open.
Rip them apart.
Drain the pus.
Let the blood flow if it has to.
Empty out everything rotten first.
Only then can something else fill the space.
“If you’re too scared, then don’t bark.”
“But if you bark and still can’t bite…”
“What kind of mad dog does that make you?”
“You’re just a mutt.”
“You think I don’t bite because I can’t?”
“I figured you couldn’t.”
“I don’t bite because Yuyeon would get hurt!”
His emotions had become so overwhelming that he barely knew what he was saying anymore.
Yet the moment he shouted those words…
It felt as though something clogging his chest had finally loosened.
Once the dam cracked, everything came pouring out.
“Hwang Minwoo…”
“He’s the eldest son of the Taewang Guild Master.”
“Taewang Guild?”
“You’ve never heard of it?”
“No.”
“…”
Kwak Dojin stared at him in disbelief.
What kind of professor doesn’t know Taewang Guild?
It wasn’t one of the Three Great Guilds, but every hunter knew its name.
“It happened about a year ago.”
“We were doing dungeon field training.”
A monster suddenly turned its aggression toward Baek Yuyeon.
Without hesitation, Kwak Dojin threw himself in front of her and saved her.
“But afterward…”
“I found out it was intentional.”
“It was Hwang Minwoo.”
He had been secretly in love with Baek Yuyeon.
After publicly confessing to her and being rejected…
Out of spite…
He deliberately arranged for the monster to target her.
“What a bastard.”
“He is.”
Creak.
Kwak Dojin ground his teeth.
“So I beat the hell out of him without thinking twice.”
“Good.”
“Good? What’s so good about it?!”
He bitterly poured more whiskey down his throat.
“I almost got expelled because of that!”
That was where everything began.
From that day on, he was punished for assaulting a fellow student.
His case was even sent to the expulsion committee.
Naturally, he protested.
But the Taewang Guild had already bribed several professors.
“That’s when I learned what kind of world this is.”
“It isn’t decent people who get ahead.”
“It’s rich punks with money and connections.”
“A rotten world.”
That was probably the turning point.
The day Kwak Dojin started going astray.
Kang Hyun silently drank.
So that’s why.
Every time he looked at Kwak Dojin…
Something had always felt off.
He wasn’t really a thug.
He was simply pretending to be a third-rate delinquent.
Kang Hyun had wandered the martial world long enough to meet countless pieces of trash.
The kind who laughed after cutting people’s heads off.
Do you know what they all had in common?
They never bared their fangs at someone stronger.
When they sensed death…
They wet themselves…
Begged for mercy…
And ran away.
That was the true nature of real scum.
But…
Kwak Dojin was different.
Even when murderous intent threatened to take his head…
He still crawled forward and crossed the line.
Real trash could never do that.
He was just a wounded kid…
Crying out for someone to notice him.
Unfortunately…
There had never been an adult around to set him straight.
“Haah…”
“The liquor’s bitter.”
His voice trembled as he nearly emptied the bottle.
“I know why I wasn’t expelled.”
“It was because of Yuyeon.”
“That idiot…”
He clenched his fist.
“She begged that piece of trash Hwang Minwoo not to expel me.”
“She said I’d ruined my life trying to save her.”
“She actually knelt in front of him.”
“…”
“That bastard…”
“The girl who never even looked at him suddenly got on her knees.”
“He must’ve been thrilled.”
“And he used that as leverage to control her for an entire year.”
To be honest…
Kwak Dojin had been relieved.
Relieved that he hadn’t been expelled.
“I don’t have parents.”
“I was raised by my grandmother.”
Kang Hyun quietly sympathized.
He had no parents either.
He, too, had grown up under the care of elderly people.
“My grandmother spent her whole life selling wild vegetables in the marketplace just to raise me.”
“When I got accepted into this academy…”
“She held a celebration for the whole neighborhood.”
“She cried…”
“Saying…”
“‘Our Dojin is finally going to become a Hunter.'”
“‘Now he’ll be able to live comfortably.'”
Drip.
Tears finally rolled down Kwak Dojin’s face.
“How could I tell someone like her…”
“That I got expelled for beating up a classmate?”
“How could I tell her…”
“That I was kicked out because I didn’t have powerful connections?”
In the end…
The chains binding Kwak Dojin were the people who loved him.
Baek Yuyeon’s sacrifice.
His grandmother’s hopes.
“Do you know Professor Hwang Yerim?”
“She’s the greatest martial medicine expert in the country.”
“Yuyeon is talented enough to become her direct disciple.”
“But…”
“To save me…”
“She’s about to sign a ten-year slave contract under Hwang Minwoo’s guild.”
“I heard about it today.”
“That’s why I came looking for her.”
“AAAAAH!”
“What a fucking rotten world!”
“That’s how the world has always been.”
The martial world had been no different.
People like Hwang Minwoo were everywhere.
Hypocrites hiding behind the prestigious banner of righteous sects while manipulating others through money and power.
Likewise…
There were countless fools like Kwak Dojin.
People who shouted about justice…
Only to be crushed because they lacked strength.
Justice?
A disgusting word.
The world wasn’t rotten.
It simply operated according to strength.
Justice without power…
Would always be devoured by hypocrisy with power.
“If you resent it…”
“Then become stronger.”
“Why roll around in the mud with them?”
“And proudly bark that you’re filthy too?”
“You idiot.”
Kang Hyun slowly stood.
He dusted off his pants.
Then casually snatched the empty whiskey bottle from Kwak Dojin’s hand.
“H-Huh?”
Still half-drunk, Kwak Dojin blankly followed the movement.
“Looks like you finished it.”
Klang!
Kang Hyun lightly clinked his own bottle against the empty one.
The crisp sound echoed through the night.
“I’ve heard enough whining.”
“…I wasn’t whining.”
“I was just frustrated.”
“So?”
“Were you hoping someone would step in…”
“And cut off that pretty-boy parasite’s head for you?”
Kwak Dojin shut his mouth.
No.
He had never hoped for that.
He had already learned…
No one would ever save him.
“Listen carefully.”
“You mutt.”
The lazy look in Kang Hyun’s eyes suddenly turned cold.
His alcohol-laced voice struck Kwak Dojin’s ears like a hammer.
“If someone took something from you because you were weak…”
“Then take it back with your own strength.”
“If you’re going to bark while rolling around in the mud because life is unfair…”
“Tonight will be the last time.”
“…”
“And you’re the exception.”
“…What?”
“What do you mean?”
“You don’t get to skip class anymore.”
“If you’re not there at six tomorrow morning…”
“It won’t be that pretty-boy who kills you.”
“It’ll be me.”
“…W-What? All of a sudden?”
“That’s the price for drinking my expensive whiskey.”
With those final words…
Kang Hyun’s figure quietly melted into the darkness.
As though he’d never been there at all.
“…Hah.”
A faint smile finally appeared on Kwak Dojin’s lips.
His heart still hurt…
But somehow…
It felt much lighter than before.
That Night
The hallway of the professors’ residence.
Knock. Knock.
The door swung open.
“Mr. Kang Hyun?”
Lee Se-ah, her hair wrapped in a towel after what looked like a shower, greeted him with wide eyes.
Without saying a word…
Kang Hyun shoved two empty whiskey bottles into her arms.
She immediately understood.
He wants me to buy the exact same ones.
“Oh…”
“Those were expensive.”
“You finished both already?”
“I need something investigated.”
“Huh?”
“Oh, you mean Cadet Baek Yuyeon?”
“No.”
“Something else.”
“Then what?”
“The Taewang Guild.”
“…Taewang?”
“Yeah.”
“And while you’re at it…”
“Find me every academy professor who’s connected to that guild.”
“Whether it’s through money…”
“Or through favors.”
