Chapter 106

Chapter 106
Chapter: 106

Chapter Title: Now It Begins

—

The starting point was here. The tournament brackets had been distributed to the competitors. Upon reviewing the matchups in the staging area, I couldn’t suppress a cynical grin.

“Wow, are they really being this blatant about the seeding?”

Jeong O-hoon gave a sharp nod in agreement with my observation.

“No kidding. It’s pretty obvious.”

The layout of the bracket had clearly been manipulated with specific intent. Myself, Han Sang-ah, and Jeong O-hoon were placed in separate sections so we wouldn’t have to eliminate one another in the opening rounds.

Under normal circumstances—assuming they didn’t have a secondary scheme in play—the most logical strategy for the organizers would have been to force us into early confrontations. Doing so would have guaranteed that at least one of us was removed from the competition immediately.

However, that wasn’t the path they took. Instead, each of us—me, Han Sang-ah, and Jeong O-hoon—would need to defeat at least one other participant before there was any possibility of us crossing paths.

In simple terms, they had positioned the elite operatives from Taebaek—or whatever high-level unit they were boasting about—directly against Han Sang-ah and Jeong O-hoon right out of the gate.

“Do we have any intel on their backgrounds?”

Jeong O-hoon provided an update.

“I looked into it. A contact of mine with expertise in this area suggested there is a high probability that they are competing under fabricated personas.”

If that was the case, looking into their history was a waste of time. I turned to my two companions and remarked,

“Even if both of you manage to win your initial bouts and move forward, your run ends the moment you have to step into the ring with me.”

“Do you always have to be so blunt?”

“I’m just stating the facts. You don’t stand a prayer of beating me.”

Jeong O-hoon let out a disgruntled huff, but Han Sang-ah was quick to fire back a retort.

“Regardless of what you think, I’m going to be the one to take you down. I refuse to let people say I rode your coattails to the top. I plan to fight with enough skill that no one can question my position.”

If it actually came down to a match against either of them, my victory was certain—though I intended to make the fight look competitive. Against anyone else, however, I planned to exert total dominance.

Following our brief conversation, we parted ways and headed to our respective private waiting areas.

I passed the time in solitude until it was nearly my turn, but then I stumbled upon a startling update on my phone.

Jeong O-hoon had been knocked out of the tournament.

“What kind of nonsense is this?”

I stared at the screen, momentarily paralyzed by shock. Out? That meant… he actually lost? Stunned into silence, I quickly opened the specific details of his match.

“That absolute bastard.”

Jeong O-hoon hadn’t lost a fair fight; he had been disqualified for committing a foul.

“I don’t even know what to call this.”

His adversary had employed a incredibly deceptive tactic. Jeong O-hoon hadn’t actually launched any strikes that should have been fatal. However, the opponent had purposefully maneuvered himself so that Jeong O-hoon’s hits landed on vulnerable spots.

Essentially, the man had taken a strike intended for his shoulder and intentionally steered his own temple directly into the path of the blow.

“That lunatic. Is the elite unit of Taebaek actually a bunch of kamikaze fighters?”

A stunt like that could easily result in permanent brain damage or death. Yet, the man had acted with total indifference, calmly offering up his life-threatening vitals to Jeong O-hoon’s offensive.

Naturally, the disqualification only applied to this specific bracket. Jeong O-hoon still possessed the opportunity to fight his way back through the rankings on Hope’s List.

I clicked my tongue in annoyance and leaned back against the wall, my eyes fixed on the device in my hand.

Looking at the bracket, if I won my upcoming match, I would be slated to fight the very individual who had baited Jeong O-hoon into a foul.

“It seems the guy who took out Jeong O-hoon has a death wish.”

Fine. I’ll be happy to grant it. At the very least, Han Sang-ah had secured her own victory. Jeong O-hoon was likely feeling incredibly demoralized right now.

He had every reason to feel cheated. No one could have anticipated an opponent who would actively try to get themselves killed just to trigger a disqualification.

“Hunter Yoo Chan-seok, you are up next. Please get ready.”

A staff member opened the door to notify me. I exited the room and walked out onto the arena floor. My opponent was already there, watching me with a look of extreme nerves.

“I really didn’t want to have to do it this way.”

I tightened my grip on my spear and stared him down. The audience in the arena let out a roar, while the commentators frantically began reciting statistics and background info on both of us.

The buzzer finally signaled the start. My opponent immediately dropped into a defensive stance.

My spear slammed into his midsection, and in a heartbeat, the blade was resting against his windpipe.

The encounter concluded so rapidly it was almost a joke.

“My bad.”

The stadium—and the broadcast booth—fell into a stunned silence. The fight had lasted only 0.73 seconds.

There was nothing for the analysts to talk about, and the crowd didn’t even have time to process what they’d seen. I pulled my spear back and walked off the platform.

For the spectators who had come for a show, it must have been a letdown. But their entertainment wasn’t my priority.

I wanted to end this quickly and get ready for what was coming next. The leaders at Taebaek were likely panicking after seeing that.

They had clearly underestimated my current strength—likely basing their plans on my power levels from before I had used the Banshee’s Tear Shard.

As I exited the stage, I headed back toward the waiting area.

“Uh… the organizing committee has issued a statement,” a staff member said to me.

I cut him off.

“Tell them the next match won’t end like that.”

They could look forward to it. I was going to show them exactly what it looked like when I decided to dismantle an opponent piece by piece.

If that guy was truly a member of Taebaek’s elite force, he was a valuable asset. Breaking him so thoroughly that he could never fight again would be a significant blow to their strength.

The other special forces members in the bracket would lose their nerve, and once the word spread through Taebaek’s ranks, they would learn to fear my name.

“Understood… I will relay the message. Since this is also a televised event, please try to make the next one more engaging.”

“Don’t worry about it. It’ll be a show.”

I was going to ensure that Taebaek regretted ever trying to play games with me.

I waited until my number was called again. Soon, I was standing back on the main stage.

Because the previous match had ended in the blink of an eye, the atmosphere in the crowd was noticeably more cautious as they watched us.

“… .”

My new opponent was equipped with a cutlass and a shield. He squeezed the hilt of his blade tighter, his eyes locked on mine. I decided to poke at him.

“You’re shaking. Are you scared?”

“I am not.”

I let out a small laugh.

“Don’t bother lying. You’re terrified. I’m significantly more powerful than you accounted for.”

I gave my spear a casual spin and then struck the butt of the weapon against the floor. A sharp, ringing sound vibrated through the air.

“That’s alright. What I have planned for you is much worse than whatever you’re imagining anyway.”

The introductions concluded, and the start signal echoed through the stadium.

I lunged forward, swinging the spear. I didn’t use my full speed. I moved just slowly enough that he was able to intercept the blow.

— *Look at that! It’s a different game this time! He managed to block! This isn’t going to be a repeat of that sub-second finish.*
— *It appears Yoo Chan-seok is taking a much more measured approach here.*

His face turned pale the moment our weapons clashed. I continued with lazy, sweeping strikes. As he struggled to parry and get out of the way, the shaft of my spear clipped his shoulder.

A dull thud sounded out.

His eyes went wide with panic. He likely wanted to scream for the match to end, but he found he couldn’t make a sound. The mana I had injected through his shoulder was constricting his vocal cords.

The moment he tried to drop his weapon to signal a surrender, the shaft of my spear tapped both of his arms in rapid succession. Again, the mana surged through him, locking his muscles into a rigid state.

He was now physically incapable of letting go of his sword or shield. For the next half hour, he would be forced to hold them, unable to utter a single word.

In a real fight to the death, this would be a pointless waste of energy. It was far too inefficient.

In a real fight, you just break the limbs and crush the throat.

But this wasn’t a fight; it was a performance.

“This is where the fun begins.”

From this point on, it wasn’t a competition; it was an interrogation. I was going to traumatize him so deeply he would be afraid to even look at a sword again.

— *This is turning into a real struggle!*
— *Wait… it’s completely one-sided. All the opponent can do is try to survive Hunter Yoo Chan-seok’s onslaught! He can’t even keep up with the defense. This is looking grim!*
— *Is this allowed? He needs to find a way to counter!*
— *He’s just playing with him! Look—those are just light taps! Is the power gap between them really this massive, Hunter Yoo Chan-seok?!*

I wasn’t doing anything as simple as cutting tendons or snapping bones. I was inflicting a level of agony that surpassed physical injury.

“You can’t give up, and every time this spear touches you, it’s going to hurt.”

He began flailing his weapons desperately to keep me away. I played along, engaging in a few mock exchanges before tapping another non-vital area with the wooden shaft.

With every contact, more mana entered his system, triggering waves of unbearable pain. It felt like his nerves were being burned, his muscles were being shredded, and his bones were being scraped raw.

He opened his mouth in a silent plea, but nothing came out.

— *Wait, something looks wrong with the challenger’s physical state?!*

After fifteen minutes of this rhythmic torture, his eyes began to glaze over. Saliva started leaking from the corner of his mouth.

— *Stop the match—wait. The officials are stopping the fight!*

The moment his bladder and bowels failed him right there on the arena floor, the referees finally intervened.

“Is there a problem?”

I gave the official a look of feigned confusion as they signaled the end of the bout.

“Your opponent is clearly in no condition to continue.”

“I can see that, but he hasn’t conceded the match.”

I had released the mana suppression, so he was capable of speaking now—but he could only let out low, guttural moans of “Ugh… uuuugh.”

“What exactly did you do to him?”

“We’re in a tournament. Weren’t you watching? I didn’t ‘do’ anything; we were fighting.”

The referee looked down at my opponent with a grim expression.

“We are going to conduct a medical evaluation. Hunter Yoo Chan-seok, if we find foul play, you could be facing a disqualification.”

I gave him a look of pure disbelief and let out an exhausted sigh.

“Fine. Whatever.”

Of course, there was no disqualification. The man’s body was physically intact—there wasn’t a single internal injury to find.

“What’s the verdict?” I asked a short while later when the referee returned.

“Physically, he is unharmed. However, he is experiencing extreme psychological trauma. To push someone that far…”

“What are you even talking about? If he was in trouble, he should have said something. Or dropped his gear.”

I raised my voice in frustration.

“He didn’t say a word, he kept attacking me aggressively, and he never once showed a sign of giving up. What was I supposed to do, just let him hit me?”

“Well…”

The official had no response to that. Because legally, there wasn’t one. We had a sanctioned match. If a fighter can’t handle the pressure, it’s on them to signal the end. He hadn’t.

Technically, he couldn’t, but there was no way for the referee to prove that.

It wasn’t like I had used some forbidden internal strike. He looked fine on the surface, and the medical scans showed he was fine under it.

“So, I assume he’s unable to go on regardless?”

The official nodded slowly.

“Then I’m the winner. I have no idea why he had a breakdown like that, but…”

After a brief internal discussion among the judges, the victory was officially handed to me. The crowd and officials felt that something was off, but I was satisfied.

For the following matches, I decided to play it straight. I had already irritated the committee twice; it was time to actually give them the show they wanted.

I still won every match with ease, but I made sure they were flashy and exciting enough to keep the audience cheering.

And then, it arrived.

— *At long last, the match everyone has been waiting for is about to begin. It’s the ultimate Headhunter showdown!*

“So that’s how they’re billing it? I suppose this is a pretty significant meeting after all.”