The S-Classes That I Raised

Chapter 571: Failure

It was a heap of corpses.

Forgotten and cut away, piled up in layers like sediment at the bottom of a deep lake. Seong Hyunjae looked at them.

Originally, all of them were one person. But after losing his own world and being cut off from his own body, there was no way any life could still remain in them. Lives that had each gone on in their own worlds in their own way, now tossed aside any which way.

“Spatial movement was mixed in too, huh.”

After going through Chatterbox’s skill several times in a short span of time – something different from a dungeon gate or a portal – at some point a familiar sensation stirred. Maybe it was because it was not simple teleportation, but a force strong enough to move dozens of people at once.

An old ability he had possessed long ago. It had been giving faint reactions to the power Chatterbox wielded. Seong Hyunjae stared at the heap of corpses, a little bored.

It was neither an actual pile of corpses nor a real space. It was just that what was stacked up was being expressed that way. Countless heaps, he could not tell how many bodies. Limbs flung here and there. In someone else’s eyes they might look like masses of power that shone brighter than any priceless jewel. But to Seong Hyunjae they were nothing more than unwelcome, uninteresting corpses.

He was rummaging through them only because he had to. Seong Hyunjae let out a short sigh.

“I feel like I’ve turned into a grave robber.”

No, it was worse than that. He was after the corpses themselves, not even the grave goods. With a reluctant expression, Seong Hyunjae stepped forward. Before he knew it, he was sitting astride the pile of corpses. The eyes of the two identical men met.

“At this point, taking it all on is close to impossible.”

A version of him from some time ago said to Seong Hyunjae. It was similar to what Young Chaos had warned.

The Seong Hyunjae sitting on the corpses lightly moved the hand that had been propping up his chin. The familiar mannerism was unpleasant. Seong Hyunjae suddenly thought of Han Yujin. If Han Yujin had been here, he would definitely have made that, ‘it’s filthy how elegant it is, so it just pisses me off,’ face.

“Crescent Moon erasing and cutting away memories as she piled them up probably had that purpose too. It’s the difference between placing wooden blocks one by one from the bottom of a bowl, and dumping them in all at once in a jumble.”

If the links had continued without being severed, maybe he could have digested all these versions of himself. But taking in, all at once, a mess that had been stacked without any sense of order was many times harder.

“Either scoop out enough to be manageable, or accept Young Chaos’s offer.”

Choosing one of the two would give him a higher chance of surviving as Seong Hyunjae.

“The ones who can take some of the load off aren’t just one person. Even if Song Taewon can’t handle it all, there’s still Han Yujin. There’s still plenty of empty space left in that body.”

From the nape of his neck down to his toes. Seong Hyunjae let the words pass him by. Of course, it was nothing he didn’t already know. And then—

“That’s not something I should be saying.”

Strands of silver thread descended onto the pile of corpses. One strand per body. Contracts that had piled up over a long time. Threads wrapped around the arm of the man on the corpses as well.

Seong Hyunjae’s hand reached out toward Seong Hyunjae. The moment his fingertips touched, they could not endure and melted. His hand, his wrist, his entire arm. Still, this time it stopped at just one arm. It would affect his real body too, but right now he was in the middle of a party schedule. In other words, he was under Chatterbox’s protection.

So, without hesitation, just as he was about to stretch out his remaining arm as well—

Splaaash–!

Cold liquid poured over his face.

“Whoa, a wasteland.”

Spinning as she looked around, Park Yerim spoke. She couldn’t see a sea, a lake, a river, or even a little stream. Instead—

“Huh?”

A familiar face was lying on the ground. Just as she was about to turn the stream on, Park Yerim faltered and looked at the fallen man.

“…Guild Leader Sesung? We haven’t even started yet, you know?”

What the heck. A message window popped up and told her the conditions for victory. It said winning also counted if the opponent became unable to fight, but maybe because he’d been unconscious from before the match started, it didn’t apply.

“You’re not cheating or something, right? Hey, Mister Sesung! Hey, Seong Hyunjae!”

Right after she shouted, Park Yerim felt a bit guilty. Whatever else, he was basically a parent figure, or at least at her uncle’s age. Her conscience pricked at her for dropping all politeness and just yelling his name.

“Want me to tell you a secret my Mister’s been hiding? If you get up right now, I’ll give you a voucher for a stay at Dodam Breeding Facility. I won it off Mister in a bet. I was saving it so I could ditch Han Yuhyun and go hang out.”

The truth was, she hadn’t been able to use it even when she had the chance. Leaving Han Yuhyun out made even Park Yerim herself feel just a tiny, very tiny bit regretful. Stretching her neck out, she peered at Seong Hyunjae, who lay collapsed a bit away.

“You’re really not getting up… I was lying about giving you the pass, but if you get up now, I’ll still sell it to you at a ridiculous price.”

There was still no reaction. Uuugh. After wavering, Park Yerim tiptoed closer to Seong Hyunjae. His eyes were shut tight, but she could faintly hear his breathing. He was alive, at least.

“If it were Mister, I’d have just grabbed his nose and twisted it.”

She couldn’t go that far here. Tapping Seong Hyunjae with the tip of her spear, Park Yerim took out a potion.

If he was this quiet, maybe he was hurt somewhere. He was an S–rank Hunter, so surely not… but the Seong Hyunjae she’d seen so far was a bit softer than the rumors said.

Especially from how Han Yujin treated him, he was basically just a normal neighbor Mister. Han Yujin would casually say things like, “It’s cold and you came out without even a coat, you’ll catch a cold.”

Of course, Guild Leader Sesung was still Guild Leader Sesung, so Park Yerim stayed a step away and only stretched her arm out to pour the potion. The potion flowed out and spilled over Seong Hyunjae’s face. Immediately after—

Clatter!

“Ah!”

Golden chains shot up. Park Yerim immediately teleported to avoid the chains lunging at her, but—

Bzzzt–!

Right at the spot she teleported to, electricity crackled up as if it had been waiting. It was already too late to dodge! Gritting her teeth, Park Yerim spread Magos’s shawl wide in front of her body. At the same time she soaked the shawl with water and froze it solid. Crack! The frozen shawl and the current collided, sending shards of ice flying. The stinging mana bled through even beyond the bucking shawl, but it was tolerable.

As the electricity died down and the shawl not only completely thawed but even had parts of it scorched, she could see Seong Hyunjae standing up beyond it. Park Yerim backed up further and glared at him.

“That’s so cheap!”

“How unfair. I really was unconscious.”

Rubbing one of his arms lightly, Seong Hyunjae spoke.

“Hunter Park Yerim, you’d better not approach abnormal S–rank Hunters. There are cases where they attack without even being able to distinguish friend from foe.”

“…I do know that, you know?”

It was a warning she’d heard many times. Even if they were critically injured, do not rush in; ask a healer who can heal from range for help and protect the healer. If there is no healer, use potions from as far away as possible.

That was why she had, in her own way, kept some distance when she splashed the potion. Park Yerim stiffly lifted her chin.

“I only went over because I was sure I could handle it. Look, I’m fine right now. My hair got juuust a little singed, though.”

A few strands of hair, their ends slightly curled, swayed as she moved her head.

“You should have been able to use the potion at range.”

“…I did let my guard down a liiittle. It’s someone I know. It feels too cold to treat them like a stranger.”

Park Yerim answered awkwardly. It was only because it was Guild Leader Sesung that she’d kept any distance at all; if it had been Han Yujin, of course, or even Han Yuhyun, she would have rushed over without thinking and checked on them. Pouting, she said she’d be more careful from now on.

“Anyway! I really didn’t think Mister Sesung himself would show up. I did write Mister Sesung down, but I kinda wanted to fight our Guild Leader, or Mister too. You had the most votes on the survey, anyway. You can just not use your skills and hold back like you’re unawakened.”

“It is certainly unexpected.”

Seong Hyunjae also tilted his head slightly. He had written Park Yerim’s name, but most of his overall picks had been Han Yujin and Song Taewon. And more than anything—

“There’s no way Chatterbox took the survey answers at face value. There can’t have been many who answered honestly.”

It was clear some other conditions had been added in. At Seong Hyunjae’s words, Park Yerim pulled a put–out face.

“So you weren’t serious about wanting to fight me either? I got excited for nothing!”

“It’s not that I don’t want to trade blows with you, young lady, but you’re a bit too young, aren’t you.”

“In the last game, I–!”

“And Han Yujin is scary, too.”

“Oh,” Park Yerim faltered.

“…Yeah, if Mister found out, he’d probably curse you out.”

“Exactly. ‘What are you doing picking a fight with a kid,’ and so on.”

“You’ve lived more than twice as long and you can’t give way to a kid even once. But he’d get mad if you didn’t fight me seriously, too.”

Seong Hyunjae pulled a troubled face, as if saying it couldn’t be helped.

“So I have no choice but to take it easy, don’t I.”

“Our Mister is pretty picky about that stuff… Seriously, I still wonder how you got through it when Han Yuhyun awakened. He was still a minor back then, even if he was older than me.”

“It’s an immense relief I didn’t treat the young master roughly. There wasn’t anything Han Yujin had a right to get angry about.”

In truth, you could say there wasn’t anything at all that would really bother him, but Han Yujin still disliked even the small ways he had helped his younger brother. At that, Park Yerim tilted her head.

“When I look at you, Mister Sesung, you’re unexpectedly good with kids. Soyeong unni said she liked being able to just live however she wanted with you.”

“Protecting children is a duty adults naturally ought to fulfill.”

“This isn’t an interview, you knoow~”

Park Yerim bounced in the air, going even higher. She could see golden chains circling around Seong Hyunjae. Without thinking, Park Yerim swallowed dryly.

‘This is hard.’

She had no idea how she was supposed to go up against him. Park Yerim’s eyebrows knit slightly. As she fought among various S–rank Hunters, the thing she’d felt most strongly lately was this—

‘I don’t have a decisive hit.’

Park Yerim didn’t have a move that could deal a truly fatal attack. She was better than anyone at dealing with a number of moderately strong opponents, but her stats were disadvantageous when facing a single person stronger than herself. Whether it was Han Yuhyun, Seong Hyunjae, Song Taewon, or Moon Hyunah, she was confident she could tie their feet down. But she could not win.

Droplets of water formed around Park Yerim. There wasn’t much moisture here to begin with. Even underground, she couldn’t feel very much.

“Electricity hurts even if you just spread it around. But water and ice aren’t that dangerous on their own.”

You didn’t get hurt just by touching water. It was the same with ice. Extreme cold would be dangerous, but Park Yerim still couldn’t produce a chill that would injure someone from a brief touch.

“Focusing it doesn’t make it that much stronger either. I can shoot it out using water pressure, but that’s not easy, you know. Even in the plaza, it was hard to do more than keep people in check.”

An ice lance packed with mana was threatening, sure. But it couldn’t compare to swinging an SS–rank weapon directly. In other words, it wasn’t an attack that was hard to block.

“Everyone has their own specialties.”

“Even so! For me right now to catch Mister Sesung, the only way would be to hold his ankles in a place with a ton of water for days and days until he got tired. It’d be the same with Hyunah unni, Han Yuhyun, and Chief Song. I’m confident I wouldn’t lose to Liette unni either.”

But that was it. Park Yerim fidgeted with the bead of the necklace hanging from her neck.

“Against most people.”

Seong Hyunjae lifted a fingertip and lightly pointed at himself.

“You wouldn’t even be able to hold me down.”

“…That’s… yeah, true. But still.”

“I enjoyed Miss Park Yerim’s stream very much. I was almost sad it was a rerun. Chief Song Taewon really went through the wringer.”

With a smile on his lips, Seong Hyunjae spoke. Park Yerim looked a little embarrassed.

“Mm, I might have gone a bit overboard. But I did get the popularity award!”

“I’m not saying it was bad. It’s actually a good thing. Children are allowed to set down their sense of responsibility a bit.”

“I’m not that young. I’m in middle school. And I’m super responsible, okay?”

“I’m sure you were. You had to be. Park Yerim had to take responsibility for Park Yerim.”

After she lost her parents, there was no one left to take responsibility for Park Yerim. People took care of the basics – food, clothing, shelter – but everything else, she had to handle herself. Even after she met Han Yujin and gained a new family, she couldn’t easily shrug off that familiar sense of responsibility.

“…What’s so wrong about taking responsibility?”

“The more you carry, the fewer things you can do. Challenges become impossible, and you’re forced to follow the stable path.”

Under a reliable guardian, a child can try many things. It’s all right even if they fail. The guardian, not the child, shares the burden and bears it for them. Not having to take responsibility means being able to experience many failures comfortably.

“Even if you commit any kind of mistake, Han Yujin will accept you, young lady.”

“…”

While hesitating, Park Yerim still nodded.

“Um, I do feel like I’ve gotten kind of lax, though.”

A reliable guardian who would take her side no matter what. Not just Han Yujin, but Han Yuhyun, Moon Hyunah, and even Seong Hyunjae were people she could trust. They’d get angry when she did something wrong. They’d scold her and tell her not to do it again, but at the same time they would protect her.

“Oh, but that Mister has to stay healthy for that! There are a lot of people gunning for him!”

“That’s true. Guild Leader Breaker is already carrying far too much to take his place.”

“…I hope Mister is the last one.”

Park Yerim tightened her grip on her spear. The parched ground cracked with a tearing sound and began to darken as it absorbed moisture.

“Here I go!”

Boom! Thoom! The water underground blasted upward. The spot where Seong Hyunjae had been standing split wide open as well. As if he’d been waiting for it, Seong Hyunjae dodged the geyser of water, but he couldn’t block what was pouring down from the sky. His head and body grew wet, as if he were standing in heavy rain.

Without leaving a gap, cold spread out in all directions. The edges of Seong Hyunjae’s clothes stiffened with a brittle crack. But it wasn’t enough to stop his movements. And on top of that—

Bzzzzzt!

The moment a current lightly swept over Seong Hyunjae’s entire body, all the chunks of ice shattered apart. He brushed back his hair, which had frozen and melted again.

“I’m sorry, but it’s hard for me to give you a long time today.”

“Don’t underestimate me!”

With the corners of his mouth lifting slightly, Seong Hyunjae started to move. Ice arrows flew toward him as he quickly approached where Park Yerim was hovering.

Clang, clank! A few shattered against the chains, and the rest didn’t even graze his collar. Park Yerim’s brows drew together.

“Combat Precognition is seriously cheap!”

“I have a pitiful body without even a flight skill, you know.”

Seong Hyunjae reached the spot directly beneath Park Yerim. The chains shot up like arrows, and Park Yerim’s figure vanished. And at the same time, a metal arrow shot from Seong Hyunjae’s hand. Thrown with no bow, the arrow tore through the air.

Rumble!

Lightning crashed down, targeting the metal arrow. In that moment—

“Ow!”

Park Yerim appeared at that exact spot. Magos’s shawl wrapped around her body, and the surrounding cold disrupted the current as much as possible, but it couldn’t fully absorb the impact. Park Yerim’s vision went black for a moment. Her flight skill faltered, and as she fell, Seong Hyunjae caught her lightly with one arm.

“…Can’t you fight with Combat Precognition turned off? I don’t stand a chance like this!”

“When you’re fighting me, it’s better not to use teleportation.”

“Let’s do it again, again! Then I’ll forfeit and put in a good word for you with Mister!”

“That’s a hard offer to refuse.”

Park Yerim shot back up into the air. The second round did not last long either. Out of ingrained habit, she unintentionally used teleportation again, and the result was similar. But Park Yerim did not forfeit. In the third round she did not use teleportation. However, as soon as it turned into close combat, Seong Hyunjae subdued her with only one hand.

And in the fourth, Park Yerim drew out all the water she could and bound Seong Hyunjae. But with the lack of moisture and mana around them, she couldn’t hold him for long. In the fifth, she lasted the longest. For a moment, Seong Hyunjae’s hand missed.

[Park Yerim – Defeat]

It was quiet. But Han Yujin kept listening. In the end, he shouted.

“Now, after all this!”

…

…

“…Now, after all this.”

…

…

Han Yujin’s figure disappeared.

[Han Yujin – Forfeit]