I Woke Up as the Villain

Chapter 77

Jin Do-Yoon still looked suspicious when he saw the message. Yu-Seong simply smiled, shook his hand, and checked his cell phone again.

‘It’s 12:30, not a bad time to go to the gym.’?

Once a new ability was gained, it had to be utilized for it to become completely his. For the first time in a long time, Yu-Seong felt a desire for training, so he was about to open his mouth to tell Do-Yoon. Then, he suddenly froze.

‘A text message?’?

To be exact, it was a message sent to Coconut Talk. Yu-Seong never looked at most of those messages properly, but the name that popped up on the screen could not be ignored. He asked, "Do-Yoon, does my father know how to use Coconut Talk?"

"I heard that he uses it from time to time," answered Do-Yoon.

"Umm..."

At least it was not a spam message.

Looking back, Yu-Seong never received it himself, but there was information that Choi Woo-Jae was quite good at handling new technologies.

‘And Kim Do-Jin sent a coconut talk message a few days ago.’?

Before opening Choi Woo-Jae's message, Yu-Seong checked Do-Jin’s message briefly. The content of the message had a video and some Internet articles.

‘I'm not interested. I'll reply later. It's nice to be quiet these days.'?

Yu-Seong casually ignored the message. Do-Jin would have rolled his eyes if he found out. Subsequently, Yu-Seong read Choi Woo-Jae's message, which was a short and sweet one.

-Father: Do you have a gift you want?

Choi Yu-Seong briefly agonized over the message that delighted him.

‘Obviously there's a lot I want to get as a gift.’

However, Yu-Seong shouldn't ask for too much nor too little. In a way, Choi Woo-Jae's question was both easy and difficult to answer.

Yu-Seong slightly scratched his cheeks and wrote exactly what he needed. Then, he sent the message to Woo-Jae.

‘I shouldn’t ignore him after reading his message.’

Yu-Seong confirmed that his reply had been sent to Woo-Jae in the Coconut Talk app. He then rose from bed and asked, "Jin Do-Yoon, you're an A-rank now, right?"

"Yes."

"What's your schedule for today?"

"I don’t have much planned," answered Do-Yoon. Perhaps he read Yu-Seong's thoughts roughly, because he was soon saying with a smile, "I guess you got a good reward from the promotion evaluation."

"Yeah, a pretty good one."

"Then..."

“Don’t do your best against a D-rank beginner, but let’s warm up moderately,” said Yu-Seong.

"I should be careful not to get too excited,” said Do-Yoon.

Laughing and chatting, the two men naturally headed for the hunter-only gym.

***

Fortunately, the gym was empty for about six hours. Choi Yu-Seong and Jin Do-Yoon rented the entire building and changed into their usual uniforms. They warmed up lightly by exchanging hands and feet. During this moderately-paced process, Do-Yoon smiled and said, “It seems like you’re in a good condition.”

"Do I look so? I think I'm definitely lighter thanks to the promotion effect. Shall we get started?” said Yu-Seong.

"Yes, sir."

After warming up for about an hour, Yu-Seong held a training wooden stick and Jin Do-Yoon raised his body obliquely with two fists. At first glance, one could be reminded of a kickboxing posture after observing Jin Do-Yoon's fighting style, which had him putting both feet neatly back and forth, but it was actually far from sports with such set rules.

‘Instead, it's very instinctive.’

Do-Yoon’s style of fighting was rough and ferocious, with no hesitation. It was essential that the movement of the body was very anomalous. In general, even the areas that were seldom struck would be hit without hesitation.

Still, during the confrontation with Yu-Seong, Do-Yoon seemed to be suppressing his movements. Then, in the middle of the battle, he started to clearly strike out with his hands and feet.

‘There was a time when he tried to bite me with his teeth.’?

It felt somewhat threatening, but Yu-Seong really enjoyed the battle with Jin Do-Yoon.

‘It’s good practice to gain the sense of actual fighting. It's a bonus that most of the potential monster’s threatening vibe becomes nothing from this practice too.'?

If there were skills such as immunity regarding the threatening vibe, Yu-Seong would have naturally become a D-rank by now. Today's battle was no different. Actually, it was rougher than before. Even though Jin Do-Yoon showed as much restraint as possible after becoming an A-ranked player, he still stabbed Yu-Seong fiercely and sharply during battle.

Yu-Seong, when looking into Do-Yoon’s eyes during a practice battle, could already feel his body stiffening up.

‘It's not as terrifying as Rachel's threatening vibe…’

Considering that Jin Do-Yoon was not doing his best in the first place, it was clearly proof that he had made great progress due to his promotion.

.

‘He's an unusually strong player amongst those within the same ranking in the first place.’

Do-Yoon was not an Irregular, but by ordinary standards, he was a talented person who could handle two or three hunters of the same rank alone. Likewise, it was because of the efforts he put in and the talent he already had. In that sense, there was something strange about it.

'Jin Do-Yoon is still strong, for sure.’?

Despite Do-Yoon using less strength upon considering Yu-Seong's lower ranking, Yu-Seong still found it difficult to even stop him and find a chance to counterattack. From fighting intensely, there were moments when his vision was blurred from the sweat dripping down his eyebrows. Still, for some reason, he felt less burdened than before the promotion evaluation.

‘I became a D-ranker, and Jin Do-Yoon became an A-ranker. Our gap would still remain the same…’

For some reason, Yu-Seong felt like the gap had become slightly smaller. He was not the only one who felt that way.

During the fast-running battle, Jin Do-Yoon stretched his hand, grabbed Yu-Seong's stick, and jumped into the air as if he were performing a stunt. Few of Yu-Seong’s hairs were pulled out as he bowed his head and swung the stick at Jin Do-Yoon's ankle.

‘What happened? I'm sure the young master is just D-rank, level 1…’?

Jin Do-Yoon then remembered that Yu-Seong clearly had a somewhat unique aspect within the same E-rank. In fact, after the E-rank 50 level, Yu-Seong had shown a stronger combat power than other average D-rank players. But even so, D-rank and C-rank were very much different.

There was a saying in the hunter's world that ‘There's a thin line between E-rank and D-rank…’.?But in reality, it was extremely hard to overcome the difference between the D-rank and the C-rank. It was like going beyond one great stage. As if to prove it, there were quite a few hunters up to the D-rank around the world, but the number of C-rank hunters and above were less than half that number.

About six out of 10 D-rank Max-level hunters remained in the same rank and level forever. That was because they couldn’t pass the general difficulty level promotion evaluation. This was the gap that existed, causing such a difference in numbers.

However, Do-Yoon could feel the gap closing during this battle with Yu-Seong.

‘He's gotten this strong after going up by one rank?’

Of course, when discussing the world's top five strongest hunters, there was a story about a hunter named William Rothschild, who was in the D-rank when he won over the two or three C-rank hunters alone. However, it was just an urban legend that was full of rumors. In fact, there were very few people who confirmed this story, making this an unbelievable myth.

'If the story is true, the young master’s on the same level as such a monster.’?

Even if the story remained a mere myth, Yu-Seong’s growth was clearly beyond the level that Jin Do-Yoon could imagine. While Do-Yoon was happier with Yu-Seong's growth than anyone else, he also felt suspicious about the unbelievable situation.

Do-Yoon grabbed Yu-Seong's wooden stick with one hand, roughly tearing the air, and asked while feeling the pain in his palms, "Did you raise your level after the promotion evaluation?"

"No way. I woke up for the first time yesterday morning,” answered Yu-Seong.

Do-Yoon knew that for a fact. Nevertheless, the reason why he had no choice but to ask was because of Yu-Seong’s unbelievable growth.

From the short conversation, Yu-Seong was convinced of one fact. Jin Do-Yoon shared the thoughts that he kept to himself. With a smile, he then asked Do-Yoon, "Jin Do-Yoon. Can you raise your tension a little more?”

"It's possible, but it might get a little dangerous."

So far, Do-Yoon had refrained from his lycanthropic ability to become a wolf as much as possible. Once he became a werewolf, it would become many times harder to suppress his reflexive battle instincts.

"I don't care, so raise it more," said Yu-Seong. Despite the danger, he wanted to check. He needed confidence in the growth that was happening within him. He also had some clarity regarding why he became so much stronger with only one raise of rank.

‘God's Chakra.’

The new skill was always applied to Yu-Seong and made his physical ability no different from an ordinary physical type player.

‘Actually, the special effects made me stronger than a physical player of the same rank and level as me.’

When he first saw the message, Yu-Seong didn't think too much. Although he was an all-rounder type player, which was a rather ambiguous type, he had no reason to be dissatisfied with his physical ability. After all, he had become much stronger and agile than when he was a normal person. However, the feeling was completely different when the God's Chakra was activated with the stylish skill as well.

‘I mean, talented physical type players like Jin Do-Yoon live in a world like this.’?

It was a whole other level. There was a reason that the ordinary all-rounder type players were called ambiguous, with no specialties.

While Yu-Seong was organizing his thoughts, Do-Yoon groaned and also fell into agony. "Um..."

"Don't worry too much. How do you feel about me?” said Yu-Seong.

"In fact, it's safe to say that you're above the state of D-rank level 50. This is my estimation from the talent I’ve witnessed when you’re E-rank. But, you know, this is all quite absurd…” said Do-Yoon.

"That's enough. I don't have to doubt how good your instincts are," said Yu-Seong.

In terms of simple intuition, Do-Yoon's instinct was as good as Kim Do-Jin's. That was why Yu-Seong could believe Do-Yoon’s evaluation.

"So, don't worry and try to do it. You have to learn to control that wildness to a certain extent. If I'm the only one trained by this sparring, there's no point. Most of all, I'm not fully showing my power yet either,” said Yu-Seong.

As the Dalian was becoming more intense, more and more additional effects were being added to the stylish skill. Actually, Yu-Seong had not even developed skills related to the psychic type yet.

‘No. If I really want to see it clearly…’?

Yu-Seong had to use insight, which only had four uses left. He activated the skill—although he wanted to save it as much as possible—and his eyes became blue-naturalized.

‘Now, the number of trials remaining is three.’

It was a shame, but its usage was a necessity.

‘It is necessary to know my current state clearly.’?

As seen from the famous saying of Chungmugong, ’If you know both your enemy and yourself, you will never be defeated.’, Yu-Seong thought it was also important to grasp his limitations.

Naturally, rough hairs began to sprout on Jin Do-Yoon’s arms.