The Skill Maker

“Oh, Hyun-Soo! You really came!”

“Yeah, no way I would lie about it.”

“I thought you didn’t mean it when you said it…no, don’t misunderstand what I’m saying.”

He entered the Center Room after releasing the security with the Hunter Link.

The hunters that were inside all glared at Hyun-Soo at the same time.

Eugene was part of that crowd as well.

He waved at Hyun-Soo first and greeted him.

Hyun-Soo greeted back and as he approached Eugene, he greeted the other hunters around him.

“Hello.”

“…Hi.”

“What’s up?”

“I came because they said they wanted to see me.”

Hyun-Soo answered with a smile.

Maybe watching those DVDs were effective, because he was able to somewhat understand.

He would still stutter whenever he heard a word he didn’t know.

But, he was still confident.

The words that he actually knew were “I miss it, you, me, I’m here, so,” but the important part was that he was able to communicate.

“You look pretty confident.”

A tough-looking hunter with two scar lines on his head tilted his head from side to side.

Every time he moved his arms, his muscles would move in a violent manner.

“You’re right. He doesn’t look intimidated at all.”

“Let’s see if he’s bluffing or if that’s his actual personality, shall we?”

That’s what Hyun-Soo wanted.

‘It’s a bit disappointing that there aren’t that many watchers here…’

Perfecting it on the first attempt is difficult.

He decided to start with one and then take care of the rest later.

“How about friend? You up for it?”

“Of course.”

That’s why he was here.

Hyun-Soo smiled again.

“Hey! Eugene. Come here and explain. This is something he needs to really understand.”

The hunter called Eugene.

“First, you can use your fist. However, you cannot use a weapon. Second, if your back lands on the ground at least twice, you lose. Also, if you’re cornered and you don’t get out within 30 seconds, you lose. Third, acknowledge your defeat. The referee will step in if they feel that one person is getting beat pretty badly. Got it?”

The hunter made the rules.

Since they were sparing, the rules were made based on that. That’s why restrictions and conditions existed based on that.

Eugene approached and translated that.

‘Hm, trying to understand more than three lines is still difficult.’

Hyun-Soo tried to his best understand what the hunter was saying, but he gave up.

“Okay.”

Once Hyun-Soo answered without any hesitation, the hunter looked at him and smiled.

The hunter had pretty dark skin, so when they smiled, their white teeth were really noticeable.

“A long-distance attacker, right? Isn’t it easy for them to back out? Jack, go easy on them.”

The other hunters were jeering from behind.

‘Now I know how much they look down on me.’

Since he hasn’t shown anything, it’s possible for them to react that way.

‘But, your opinions of me will change very soon.’

There was no guarantee that he would be able to beat the A rank hunter.

However, he can do enough so that they wouldn’t look down on him.

If he slowly worked his way up, then their opinions on him will change completely.

“Since we’ll be sparing, Eugene, you be the referee.”

“OK.”

Tap, tap.

The hunter, Jack, tapped his feet on the ground as a way of introducing himself before the spar.

It seemed like he was warming up because his fist tightened.

He had thick fingers and large hands and the veins on top of his forearms were wriggling.

He took pride as an A rank hunter.

After changing his stance to make himself look cool, he motioned his hand and provoked him.

“Come.”

‘Then I won’t decline. Invisible Attack!’

Since he couldn’t use a weapon, he used a skill with a small amount of power and created a dull shape and threw it towards Jack.

It was to test it out.

He had to use his strength, but he couldn’t use a weapon.

He needed a standard to go by in order estimate the limit.

Invisible.

It was an attack that couldn’t be seen.

However, Jack must’ve felt something because he lowered his stance and raised his arms in front of him to create a shield.

The attack was flying towards his stomach, but his arm blocked the attack and the sound of metal clashing together filled the room.

“Hm?”

Jack made a sound as if something was odd, but laughed afterwards.

“So, that was your skill. I’m not sure what kind of skill it is, but that caught me off-guard.”

“Thanks for the compliment.”

Hyun-Soo used his skill again.

He used more of his power this time.

Clank!

Jack quickly waved his arm around and he blocked the skill that was heading towards Jack’s thigh.

With a loud noise, there was a small spark.

Jack easily blocked Hyun-Soo’s first attack, but he took one step back for the second one and blocked it.

‘This should be enough.’

As soon as Hyun-Soo had an idea of how much of his power he needed to use, Jack started moving.

Click, clack, click, clack!

Jack extended both of his arms out and ran towards Hyun-Soo like a bull.

As soon as Hyun-Soo was right in front of him, Jack wrapped his open arms and pulled them in.

If Hyun-Soo just stood there, his arms probably could’ve broken his back!

But, Hyun-Soo had already stepped to the side.

‘This is how fast an A rank hunter is. It’s definitely different than the guys that I fought at the weaponry. That was really close. If I didn’t step aside in time…’

He quickly jumped back and kept his distance.

After Jack showed off his strong and rough attack, he fixed his stance and smirked at Hyun-Soo, who dodged his attack.

It was like his expression was telling him that he was impressed.

A battle with an A rank.

He knew it wasn’t going to be easy, but after actually battling him, he was worthy of being an A rank.

Just like the opponents he faced at the weaponry, his movements were slow, but not as slow as the previous opponents and it was probably because he was an A rank.

‘It’s different from what I expected, but it’s too early for me to give up.’

If he was going to give up just because things didn’t go his way, he wouldn’t have started this battle in the first place.

‘I’m actually pretty motivated.’

He already knew that it wasn’t going to be easy.

But, he was prepared.

Since there was a bit of handicap, his fighting spirit was overflowing within him.

He wondered how effective his powers were on Jack.

Even though there was a difference in rank and skill, he wondered how effective it was.

Fighting spirit. And wanting to win.

Those helped Hyun-Soo concentrate better.

‘Invisible Attack!’

They’ve exchanged one attacks.

Click, clack!

Hyun-Soo distanced himself by running and released several attacks that were as big as a fist.

Clank! Claaank! Clank!

The sound of Jack’s fist blocking Hyun-Soo’s skill filled the room.

“Your skills aren’t working on me. What are you going to do?”

Maybe it’s because he was an A rank.

Jack didn’t realize it until Hyun-Soo used his attack.

However, he knew of Hyun-Soo’s skill right before it attacked him and Hyun-Soo didn’t know how he knew. Jack was able to block it.

That’s why, he purposely released several attacks so that he wouldn’t be able to block them, but Jack blocked them with ease and smiled.

This was a pretty tough situation.

It meant that none of Hyun-Soo’s attacks were working.

“I guess you’ve reached your limit.”

That’s what he assumed Jack’s eyes were saying to him.

However, Hyun-Soo just smiled.

Jack raised his eyebrow.

Click, clack, click, clack!

Jack raised his fist and ran towards Hyun-Soo.

And then.

Swoosh!

It was as if he shortened the distance between them because his fist was right in front of Hyun-Soo’s nose.

“…..!”

Hyun-Soo was surprised this time.

Despite of the slow movement, he moved so fast that Hyun-Soo missed it!

If this continues, he’ll eventually get punched by Jack’s fist.

However, instead of dodging, he raised his fist.

‘Attacking is the best way to block it!’

It was better to have the upper hand by attacking instead of running away in order to dodge the attack.

That was the method that Hyun-Soo thought of.

“You’re going to go against me with your fist? Ha ha. It’ll take you more than 100 years!”

‘Is that so?’

Jack looked down on Hyun-Soo as if he was watching a child perform cute tricks.

Since he knew that Hyun-Soo was a long-distance attacker, he probably thought Hyun-Soo was going to attack with his bare fist.

However.

Bam!

“Ack!”

Jack’s body stumbled when Hyun-Soo’s fist hit his body. A small groan escaped his mouth as he gritted his teeth.

‘It worked!’

Hyun-Soo’s lips slightly went up.

He decided to give it a try after coming up with various assumptions.

That attack worked.

Of course it wasn’t an attack where he just blindly kept on attacking him.

‘So the skill is effective up to his forearms.’

He made this assumption after seeing him block the attacks with just his arms. He could’ve dodged it or blocked it with other parts of his body, but he didn’t.

And that assumption was right.

When he purposely attacked an area that wasn’t near his forearm, the attack worked.

“Weren’t you…a long-distance attacker?”

“Are there rules that say that I can only do long-distance attacks?”

“Ha ha. A weird one joined this time.”

Jack looked at the area that Hyun-Soo attacked.

It was already bruised.

“I was wondering why you were using your first, but I guess you didn’t use your bare fist. I thought it was a desperate attempt, but this is pretty…”

He used this same method before.

When a group of hunters attacked him and he when her performed an uppercut on them, he sent them flying into the roof of the training room.

He materialized the skill in the shape of a glove and enveloped it around his hand.

‘Of course I wouldn’t attack with just my bare fist.’

Since Jack belittled him and didn’t dodge, it allowed Hyun-Soo to see that his attack worked.

Hyun-Soo knew that his attack was effective when he saw the surprising expression on Jack’s face.

Hyun-Soo wanted to show off his skills.

He purposely used his fist and through that attack, he damaged Jack.

‘I’ll make sure your opinion of me changes.’

That he wasn’t some ordinary, boring hunter.

He wanted to show that to them.

There aren’t that many people who are able to naturally switch from a long-distance attacker to a close-range attacker within the same battle.

It didn’t matter whether he was a long-distance or a close-range attacker because he couldn’t use a weapon anyways.

However, he used both methods so naturally that it seemed like he used it before.

It was obvious as to why he was surprised.

A smile appeared on Hyun-Soo’s face.

He was really proud about the fact that he shocked his opponent by using a method they weren’t expecting.

Since it was a positive surprise and admiration, it was definitely going to change their original thoughts about him.

‘And that will soon connect to me being acknowledged.’

He knew it would happen even if he didn’t think too deeply about it.

A bigger smile appeared on his face when he was satisfied with the result. His desire to win was starting to be replaced by pride.

“Then I guess it’s my turn to attack you!”

Jack raised his fist as soon as he finished talking.

Hyun-Soo thought he was going to charge at him again so he moved back.

Even though he managed to hit him by closing the distance, he didn’t have the skill to block the attack of an A rank hunter.

“…..!”

However, even though he distanced himself, Jack was already close to him.

“Hello.”

And then, he threw his large, iron-like fist towards Hyun-Soo.

Hyun-Soo quickly crossed his arms and blocked his fist.

He enveloped his arms with his skill and hoped it would block it.

Clank!

“Grr!”

When Hyun-Soo’s skill and Jack’s skill clashed, a spark appeared.

‘Damn it! He’s putting everything he’s got!’

Thump, thump!

It didn’t seem like it was broken, but pain started filling his arms.

‘The pain feels like I got hurt in the stomach and the chest too.’

It seemed like Jack’s skill didn’t just strengthen his arms.

The pain spread throughout his arms, chest and stomach.

“Wow, you were able to endure my attack even though I put a lot of my strength into it? Are you really a C rank?”

Jack started shaking his fist and asked with a surprised look.

Hyun-Soo didn’t really care because a thought suddenly popped into Hyun-Soo’s head and he was busy thinking about that.

‘It would’ve been nice if I had a defensive skill.’

Hyun-Soo understood why he needed a defensive skill.

‘I need a defensive skill that can envelop my entire body.’

He released the Invisible Attack that was on his arm and massaged them.

Like the name states, Invisible Attack was an offensive skill.

However, depending on how it’s used, there were unlimited possibilities.

But, enveloping it all over his body was still too tough for him to perform.

An unfortunate event can happen where he might not be able to attack at all because he’s too focused on defending himself.

‘But, if it’s possible…’

It could become really useful when he’s hunting a monster by himself.

‘Let’s think about that later.’

Deciding on how to take down that hunter was the most important right now.

Hyun-Soo shook his painful arms and started focusing on Jack.