Holy B-Class Life

#012

As soon as Yoon Pa-ran realized the situation, his eyes widened. The sensation of something soft burrowing into him was quite disconcerting even in such a moment.

“Mmph!”

Yoon Pa-ran, who had been struggling, instinctively clenched his teeth.

Before he could fully exert his strength, his jaw was roughly grabbed. As the other person applied force to their grip, Yoon Pa-ran’s jaw was forced open as if it might dislocate.

Their gazes met fiercely. For whatever reason, Dan Joo-hyuk stared at Yoon Pa-ran without even blinking. His pitch-black eyes gleamed strangely, reflecting the light from behind.

Yoon Pa-ran swung his fist, but it was caught helplessly. The pain in his lungs intensified, contorting his expression.

In his powerlessness, Yoon Pa-ran glared back with wide eyes.

He conveyed emotions akin to profanity through his gaze. Seemingly noticing this, the other’s grip tightened even more.

Taking it a step further, Dan Joo-hyuk tilted his head and moved closer, as if to show off.

“Ha… hah…”

The other’s tongue moving inside his mouth felt like fire. The strange sensation of it hotly stirring his mouth burned all the way down to his lungs.

As he struggled and tensed his body, the pain in his chest only grew worse. The cough that was about to burst out was blocked by Dan Joo-hyuk’s mouth, forcing Yoon Pa-ran to swallow it back down.

The suffocation made him feel like he was going to snap. What on earth was this about? If he had been thrown in front of a monster instead, it wouldn’t have been this bewildering.

Has he really gone mad?

What felt like a fleeting moment seemed to last for eons. Just as Yoon Pa-ran was about to have a small seizure from lack of air—

He felt something being pulled out from inside his body.

What on earth?

His mind became even hazier. The empty sensation made him feel dizzy.

Only then did Dan Joo-hyuk’s tongue, which had been leisurely exploring Yoon Pa-ran’s mouth, slowly withdraw. As his airway cleared, Dan Joo-hyuk abruptly let go of him.

“Huk, huk… cough, kuh.”

Yoon Pa-ran collapsed to the ground, clutching his chest. The feeling of something being pulled out from earlier now rapidly spread into a sense of extreme fatigue.

Just then, the boss monster, whose feet had been trapped by the wall of fire, let out a great roar.

Kieeeeee!

Once again, the ground shook, and dirt spurted up like fountains from various places. Simultaneously, the boss monster finally tore through the wall of flames and leaped out in front of them.

We’re going to die for sure. In this dizzy, nauseous state, Yoon Pa-ran once again felt despair.

At that moment, something entered his field of vision as he lay sprawled on the ground.

Dan Joo-hyuk’s broad back.

And the white gleam of his blade.

…Huh?

Dan Joo-hyuk lightly kicked off the ground and rose. Unconsciously, Yoon Pa-ran’s gaze followed the trajectory he drew.

Instinctively, he could tell. That what was imbued in Dan Joo-hyuk’s blade was of the same nature as his own skill.

[Sacred Energy] was the kind of skill that couldn’t be transferred to others.

How on earth…?

Krok, krok!

He easily leaped up to the head of the boss monster, which was over 3 meters tall. The pure white light on his blade remained.

Dan Joo-hyuk brought his sword down.

Kwaaaaaaak!

The boss monster’s skin, which had been effortlessly blocking Dan Joo-hyuk’s sword until just moments ago, split like soft mud.

“…”

The monster’s corpse, cleanly cut in two vertically with a single stroke, slowly collapsed to either side. Rotten blood poured out like a waterfall. Between the splitting halves of its body, the wall of fire that Dan Joo-hyuk had created flickered.

We survived.

“Cough.”

Sadly, the hope that had just blossomed quickly withered.

Because he had seen something he shouldn’t have.

His mind was too hazy to endure any longer. As if his very soul had been sucked out by Dan Joo-hyuk, extreme fatigue and pain washed over him.

He had a feeling he was about to lose consciousness. Among the various questions that flitted through his barely held consciousness, the biggest issue was one:

That just as he had hidden this skill, this seemed to be something Dan Joo-hyuk had been hiding.

“S…hit…”

What if that bastard kills me for knowing his secret?

It was truly an unfair situation. He had barely survived that cursed gate, only to end up dying at the hands of a madman.

He needed to go home.

His heart felt heavy with worry for his siblings as his body went limp. He tried to force himself up, but despite his will, his consciousness flickered out.

As his vision faded to black, he thought he might have caught Dan Joo-hyuk’s gaze one last time.

The buzzing noise was like a lullaby heard from a cradle.

It was laughable. Yoon Pa-ran, who had been shuffled between orphanages since infancy, would never have heard a lullaby from a peaceful cradle.

“…Pa…”

Still, the faintly audible voices weren’t unpleasant. They even sounded somewhat familiar.

Suddenly, a voice pierced clearly through the veil of consciousness.

“…Brother…”

“Oppa… sob…”

His siblings.

As soon as he realized his siblings were crying, Yoon Pa-ran’s eyes snapped open. However, contrary to his will, his heavy eyelids rose slowly.

Even in that brief moment, he felt anxious. As soon as his vision cleared, he saw the familiar ceiling. It was the room in the orphanage he shared with Min-woong.

“Brother?”

“Oppa, are you awake?”

Chirping sounds like birds came from beside him. Min-woong and Ju-hee’s faces suddenly appeared above Yoon Pa-ran’s.

Both of their chubby cheeks were wet with tears, as if they had been crying continuously.

“Mom!”

As soon as she made eye contact with Yoon Pa-ran, Ju-hee ran out. It seemed she was going to call the orphanage director, acting like the older sister she was by two years.

“Brother, waaah!”

Min-woong grabbed one of Yoon Pa-ran’s hands with his tiny ones and started crying even harder.

He had been worried something terrible had happened, but it seemed they were just crying because he had been lying unconscious.

“…Min-woong…”

As he opened his mouth, he felt a scratchy sensation in his throat.

Swallowing dry saliva, Yoon Pa-ran slowly raised his free hand to pat Min-woong’s small head. His skull felt very heavy, but as he opened his eyes, his mind gradually cleared.

He quickly checked his body condition. As he extended his senses slowly in all directions, he could hear Ju-hee’s small feet running busily. The pain in his chest was gone, and there was no part of his body, from his limbs to his fingertips, that he couldn’t move.

I made it back safely.

I didn’t die.

“Stop crying. Brother is okay.”

“Okay… sniff…”

A sense of relief washed over him like the ebb of a tide. Only after basking in that pleasant feeling for a while did Yoon Pa-ran recall the events just before he had lost consciousness.

What exactly happened?

…Why did Dan Joo-hyuk let me live?

“Min-woong. Where’s my phone?”

“Here it is.”

Yoon Pa-ran’s belongings were neatly placed to one side. Seeing his things spread out, Yoon Pa-ran quickly stopped Min-woong, who was about to go fetch them.

“I’ll get it. You didn’t touch my equipment, right?”

“Nope!”

His heart skipped a beat at the thought that the dangerous sword might have been lying around near the children all this time. He hurriedly sat up and looked, but fortunately, his cursed equipment wasn’t there.

He figured the government official who had brought him here must have taken care of it appropriately. It was part of their job to prevent civilians from touching hunters’ equipment.

But why was he lying in the orphanage instead of the studio apartment registered on his hunter ID?

“That, that famous brother brought you here.”

“…Huh?”

Min-woong suddenly said something strange. Was there a famous hunter among the government officials that Min-woong would know?

Please contact us when you regain consciousness, Hunter Yoon Pa-ran. Thank you for your hard work.

When he picked up his phone, he saw a text message from the Gate Management Office.

The details of the incident resolution and settlement were briefly written, but he’d need to call to find out the specifics. He also needed to retrieve his equipment, and this gate had been an anomaly among anomalies in many ways.

“And he said to call him when you wake up.”

“Did the government official uncles say that?”

Min-woong, fidgeting with his fingers beside him, spoke up. It seemed the hunters had left a message when they handed him over.

“No, that brother said so. The really tall brother. You know, the S-rank brother.”

However, Yoon Pa-ran froze in the middle of checking his phone at Min-woong’s next words.

For a moment, he couldn’t understand what his brother was saying. But no matter how he thought about it, there were no S-rank hunters among the government officials. To begin with, there had only been one S-rank who went into the gate with them.

With a voice tinged with disbelief, Yoon Pa-ran asked reluctantly.

“…Are you talking about Hunter Dan Joo-hyuk?”

“That’s right!”

Min-woong nodded with a bright smile. Yoon Pa-ran reflexively wiped his brother’s cheeks, which were still wet and shiny.

Unaware of Yoon Pa-ran’s confusion, Min-woong continued chattering while letting his face be cleaned.

“He seemed like a nice brother. He left this for you too.”