By Zephyria “He?”
Yohan, who often watched documentaries, vlogs, and videos related to the Sunrise Team, tilted his head. Yoon Seung-ryong had seemed like a diligent, cheerful, and active person, even if he had a bit of a delinquent vibe. Yohan wasn’t sure about his appetite, but he didn’t seem lazy. Lee Hyun-muk reminded Yohan of one fact.
“Yohan-ah, you know that personality traits become negatively reinforced when one is corrupted, right?”
“Ah, yes. I heard that.”
‘Negative Reinforcement’ meant that one of one’s inherent tendencies would be extremely amplified as one of the Contamination Symptoms.
For example, someone who was already prone to anger might reach a level of rage disorder due to Corruption. Or conversely, the self-control of someone naturally calm might disappear, leading them to lose all their assets through gambling or entertainment. Of course, most people simply dismissed it as ‘getting mental illness when corrupted.’
“The last time I met Seung-ryong, he bit off my thigh.”
“…What?”
Yohan doubted his own ears again. What did Yoon Seung-ryong eat, and whose, just now?
“So, this time, you’ll have to prepare yourself thoroughly, both body and mind.”
This wasn’t just about appetite… Can we just cancel bringing our colleague? The words belatedly surged up to Yohan’s throat, but he managed to swallow them down.
Lee Hyun-muk’s plan was as follows:
Train Yohan.
Find Yoon Seung-ryong’s location.
Subdue him by beating him up, then purify him.
The word ‘training’ made Yohan extremely nervous. The images of team members in Sunrise Team documentaries collapsing from exhaustion and vomiting after grueling training flashed through his mind. Lee Hyun-muk told Yohan, who had changed into comfortable clothes and come out into the yard,
“From now on, you need to learn how to detect danger and how to avoid it well.”
“Yes, I’ll learn well!”
Yohan declared stoutly, steeling his resolve. In such a harsh and terrible world, Yohan was prepared for training so strict and brutal that it would make him cry. To such a Yohan, Lee Hyun-muk raised his left hand and said,
“Let’s start with the easy stage. For today, just try to run away well, avoiding contact with my left hand.”
“Yes! I’ll try to avoid it well!”
Expecting a fierce punch, Yohan clenched both fists tightly and glared. However, contrary to his expectations, what approached was the tip of a hand, slowly reaching out with fingers spread. Wondering if this was a real attack, Yohan hesitated, then stepped back to evade. Even though it was an attack a kindergartener could avoid, Lee Hyun-muk praised him.
“Well done.”
“Th-thank you?”
“Let’s try evading like this for an hour.”
Yohan nodded again. The slow fingertips approached again, this time jabbing from below towards his side. Yohan stepped back to evade. The incredibly slow attacks continued. And then they gradually sped up.
‘But his movements are really strange….’
As Yohan dodged Lee Hyun-muk’s increasingly fast hand, he suddenly realized something. Staring only at Lee Hyun-muk’s hand, it felt like a separate, living creature. It was strangely like the movements of monsters played back at several times the speed. It seemed the movements were intentionally designed to appear that way.
Lee Hyun-muk continued the training, alternating between an hour of attacks and breaks. When Yohan seemed to have fully adjusted to the speed, his hand would become slightly faster. Repeating the same training like this, after three or four days, the speed had become quite fierce. Panting, Yohan dodged Lee Hyun-muk’s movements. When the hour ended, he wiped his sweat.
“Is it okay for training to be this easy?”
“You’re a High-level Awakener. Just building this foundation is enough to survive somehow. While your muscle strength and stamina are weaker compared to Dealers or Tankers, your reaction speed is similar.”
Then, Lee Hyun-muk picked up a stone. He threw it with a light application of force, and it flew with a swish, embedding itself with a thud into one of the barn’s pillars. Pointing at the stone, Lee Hyun-muk said,
“This is the speed of the attacks you’ve been dodging today. At this speed, you can avoid the attacks of most monsters. For an intermediate awakened to reach this level, it would take years of training.”
Witnessing the speed of the stone, Yohan asked, dumbfounded,
“Was Lee Hyun-muk’s hand this fast?”
“It also means that your dodging the tree’s attack twice in the forest last time wasn’t just luck.”
Only then did Yohan realize the level of the training and was greatly surprised. Because the speed had increased gradually, like clothes getting wet in a drizzle, he hadn’t noticed at all. He keenly felt the fact that he was a High-level Awakener.
Lee Hyun-muk then began using both hands. This time, the speed remained the same, but the attacks doubled, and Yohan started to get confused.
“Ah!”
“Gotcha.”
Yohan, caught for the first time, flinched in surprise. However, there was no pain. Lee Hyun-muk simply lightly squeezed his defenseless side and withdrew. Then, moving his hands like a bird’s beak, he said,
“If this had been a monster’s claw or mouth, you would have been torn apart. You wouldn’t die immediately, so it would be incredibly painful.”
It was a jolt to his senses. Lee Hyun-muk then proceeded to grip Yohan’s vital points with his firm hands, vividly describing the estimated injuries. He spoke of torn tendons making him unable to walk, blood gushing like a fountain, intestines spilling out… The most terrifying part was the remark he always added at the end.
“Since you’re a High-level Awakener, you’ll recover reasonably well after just a few days of being bedridden, so don’t worry too much. If needed, there’s morphine too. It was really fortunate I got it from the hospital last time, wasn’t it?”
Yohan, gasping for breath, half-crying, focused on his training with even more fervor. Eventually, that day, he managed to evade attacks from Lee Hyun-muk’s two hands for 10 consecutive minutes. Lee Hyun-muk, satisfied, praised the exhausted and completely sprawled Yohan.
“Well done. At this level, you should be able to hold your own against most monsters. Even if it takes a long time, if you can hold on for about a minute, I can do something about it.”
“Wow…”
Yohan weakly rejoiced and crawled on the dusty floor, not even noticing how dirty it was. Where he crawled, the floor became clean, as if it had been mopped. Yohan, who had barely managed to crawl onto the sofa, collapsed. Feeling a bit embarrassed by how clean Lee Hyun-muk looked compared to his own grimy state, he purified himself until his body felt fresh and dry. Lee Hyun-muk sat on the edge of the sofa and gazed at the limp Yohan.
“How about eating and sleeping a bit?”
“So sleepy…”
Right now, he just wanted to sleep, food be damned. Yohan grumbled and buried his head in the corner of the sofa. Thanks to his purification ability gently flowing out, the dusty leather sofa was gradually becoming shiny. Lee Hyun-muk lightly patted Yohan’s body and said,
“Then, turn over. I’ll give you a massage. If you sleep like this, you’ll have severe muscle pain tomorrow.”
“M-massage…?”
Yohan’s senses snapped awake. The memory he had forgotten due to the urgent situation at the time resurfaced. It was the memory of the Earthworm Monster’s den, which he had mistaken for a subway tunnel. It was precisely at this moment that he remembered Lee Hyun-muk kneading his buttocks like dough.
Of course, thinking back now, Lee Hyun-muk hadn’t intended to tease him; he had just wanted to draw his attention away from the constant hallucinations of monsters. Later, when he apologized and explained, he said that usually, people in that tunnel would be entranced by hallucinations and walk into the monster’s mouth on their own.
‘I thought if I called it a subway station, I could limit the scope of the hallucinations you were seeing.’
Indeed, at the time, Yohan had been foolishly entranced by the clearly fake subway and the people inside. If Lee Hyun-muk hadn’t given him a shock, he might have done something he couldn’t undo. Understanding the situation, Yohan had accepted Lee Hyun-muk’s apology and told him it was okay and he didn’t need to apologize.
But for some reason, the sensation of Lee Hyun-muk fondling his buttocks resurfaced precisely now. Yohan pondered, then nodded, half out of fear of appearing guilty without reason, and half out of fear of muscle pain.
“Then, please take good care of me…”
He moved to the bed and lay face down, trying to ignore the strange dark thoughts that arose. He then recalled the Sunrise Team documentaries. Lee Hyun-muk was a leader who took good care of his team members, and he would personally give them massages after training. Each time, the team members would writhe as if being tortured. Yang Yosep, who had been watching with him then, had teasingly said that if he ever received a sports massage, he would definitely cry his eyes out and spill even secrets he didn’t know, a detail Yohan remembered precisely.
‘No matter how much it hurts, I must not cry.’
Yohan took a deep breath, steeling himself with such resolve. However, when Lee Hyun-muk sat down around his lower back and buttocks, his heart couldn’t help but pound. It was fortunate that his flushed face couldn’t be seen because he was lying face down.
“It’s okay to fall asleep during a massage.”
Saying that, Lee Hyun-muk placed his hands on Yohan’s nape. Could one really sleep while receiving a sports massage? Pondering this question, Yohan relaxed his body as much as possible. But for some reason, the massage wasn’t very painful.
‘Strange. This feels more like a massage that aligns with my dark thoughts.’
Lee Hyun-muk’s firm fingertips pressed just enough to be pleasant, loosening his tense muscles. The pain wasn’t entirely absent, but after the creak* of pressure subsided, a refreshing sensation took its place. A languid groan escaped his lips. Lee Hyun-muk turned Yohan over once more, working the muscles well. And then, when he turned him over again.