I’ll Retire After Saving the World - Chapter 120: Favorite Disciple (7)

TL: SHW

My eyes opened wide.

It was loud, but it didn’t hurt. Still, I was startled and looked at Hong Seok-young.

Hong Seok-young opened and closed his hand with a subtle expression.

“Sorry. But I won’t apologize.”

What nonsense is that? You already just apologized.

However, instead of pointing out Hong Seok-young’s nonsense, I nodded.

Just because the old man acted logically for a moment doesn’t mean he’s a logical person.

“…No. I know I said something stupid too.”

“No. That’s not what I meant.”

Hong Seok-young looked at me with a complicated expression.

“You said I died there, right?”

Even if my mouth were torn apart, I would never answer that question. Once is enough.

Maybe Hong Seok-young wasn’t really expecting an answer, as he chewed over his own words.

“Everyone died.”

“……”

“You said it was all destroyed.”

Hong Seok-young chuckled. For a moment I wondered if this old man had finally gone crazy. Yeah. He held out long enough.

“Then I suppose the monsters succeeded in the end.”

“……”

“Thank you for telling me. It must have been hard to say.”

“…What?”

Hong Seok-young held both of my shoulders and patted them. It felt different from how he had playfully patted my shoulders before. It was like acknowledging someone’s hardship after finishing a difficult project.

It was a heavy touch.

But it was also warm enough to bring tears to my eyes.

“You’ve gone through a lot. Now you can leave it to me and take a rest.”

“……”

I silently looked at Hong Seok-young.

Normally, this would be the moment when someone would be touched.

The problem is, the speaker isn’t a normal person.

What is this?

I stared at Hong Seok-young, unable to figure out his true intentions behind those words.

Father is a bit extreme. Think about what he used to say about the students at Pilot High School. In the end, look at how Park Seo-hyun and Oh Hyun-wook turned out. Put nicely, he believed in their abilities, but put poorly, he abandoned them.

Later, even Father admitted it while talking with Lee Mi-seon.

‘I should never have become a teacher.’

Even so, Father pushed through that path until the end because there was no one else who could do it but him.

After knowing that, he became much more gentle… I overheard Lee Mi-seon telling Yoo Ji-eun.

Will a moment come when Hong Seok-young can have that kind of realization like Father did? Even if it does, it’ll be a long time from now.

The current Hong Seok-young… his standard is himself. He thinks everyone should at least be able to do what he can. Can’t do that? Then you’re treated like an idiot who can’t even hold chopsticks properly.

The Hong Seok-young that I heard about from Lee Mi-seon and the other Pilot High School graduates… is not someone who would say something like, “You can rest now.” Especially not to a subordinate or a successor.

Look at Yoo Ji-eun. Father never told her to rest. At best, he’d tell her to manage her stamina well.

“Why are you looking at me with such a suspicious face?”

Hong Seok-young seemed quite offended by my reaction.

“Well….”

I answered awkwardly.

“The words Hunters should be most wary of are…”

“Leave it to me?”

“The words, ‘leave it to me’….”

“Did I teach you that too?”

Hong Seok-young widened his eyes, then looked annoyingly delighted.

“…Rather than teaching me, it’s something you always say.”

“Kukuk. Yeah, that’s true.”

After laughing for a while, Hong Seok-young spoke. Despite all that laughing, his voice was serious.

“But I mean it this time.”

“……”

“I don’t really know how I ended up taking you in as a disciple or successor, but there must be a reason.”

“Th-that’s…”

“No. You don’t have to tell me. Spoilers ruin the fun.”

It can’t even be a spoiler… Because I already cut that entire scene out.

It was hard to find the right words, so I just listened to what Hong Seok-young was saying.

“You said coming to the past wasn’t what you wanted? Then I have no reason to be greedy with you. Honestly, just five minutes of talking with you now has given me more clues than I got in the past ten years.”

“……”

“If you want, I’ll make sure you can live peacefully with your brother, completely unrelated to work.”

This old man has never acted the way I expected him to.

“…Huh?”

“Well. Of course… I might ask about things regarding the future. But I won’t ask for more than that. It must have been hard working at Pilot High School all this time, right? If you were my successor, then you must have recognized everyone. Ji-eun… you said Ji-eun died, too.”

“……”

“It must have been hard to see the dead walking around.”

Hong Seok-young’s hand fell from my shoulder. Instead, he pulled me into a firm embrace.

“So it’s okay to rest. You don’t have to help me.”

“…What are you saying? You said there are monsters from the future.”

“Hmm.”

“If the monsters’ purpose is to kill you to achieve their goals… don’t you need my help to stop that? Everyone dies in twenty years! All the world’s dungeons burst simultaneously! How could I do nothing about it!!!”

“That’s exactly what I’m saying.”

While holding me tightly, Hong Seok-young chuckled lightly in a relaxed tone.

“You see. About twenty years ago, ever since I met that fairy bastard in France, I’ve been dealing with monsters trying to kill me. The ones who said they came from the future to kill me.”

“……”

“I told you it was easy for me to handle them, right? Yeah. Let me be honest too. Do you think that was really easy?”

Strength gathered in Hong Seok-young’s hands. If I were a non-Awakened, I would’ve screamed already.

“Do you think it was really easy to kill monsters that came from the future just to kill me?”

“……”

“Future me must’ve become something great. That’s probably why he went crazy and rushed in. So I couldn’t die. I had to desperately survive and become a threat to those monsters. Because if I died, the final stronghold would disappear.”

I don’t know what that last stronghold was for, but my instincts told me as much.

Hong Seok-young added lightly.

His voice was bright and cheerful, as if he were joking. But the strength with which he held onto me wasn’t.

This old man. He’s hugging me because he doesn’t want to show me his face.

It was exactly what I used to do to Mini-me, and I couldn’t laugh. Did I even learn this from Father? It would have been stranger if he hadn’t recognized my behavior.

“I don’t know whether I’m doing this right, or how long I have to keep doing this. What? Monsters from the future are trying to kill me? Who would I even tell that to?”

“…There’s Hunter Lee, right?”

“Hunter Lee would ask me to show proof. I’m not confident I can keep one of those monsters alive and present it to Hunter Lee. I can’t bring Hunter Lee into a dungeon I’m raiding either.”

“……”

“I didn’t know how long I’d be able to hold on, so I built a school as a form of preparation. It’s still at the crawling level, not even walking yet, but I thought it’s better than nothing.”

Hong Seok-young’s voice gradually lowered.

“Just when I was wondering if that was the right thing to do, you appeared.”

“…Did you know right from the beginning?”

“That you came from the future? Of course not. If the way you moved while teaching the kids hadn’t resembled mine, I wouldn’t have noticed. Even then, I wasn’t consciously aware. But it seems my instincts picked up on it.”

“……”

“Yeah. If it hadn’t been for you, those people in Myeong-dong probably would’ve died too. Right?”

“……”

“Judging from the lack of an answer, I suppose that’s correct.”

He clenched his fist tightly.

“You changed the past. And even right now, this moment is filled with events that never happened in the timeline you know.”

I wouldn’t survive if that kind of thing happened twice.

“Then I can change it too.”

“…The past?”

“The future.”

Hong Seok-young spoke in a firm voice, as if he would not be shaken by any storm.

“That future you said you came from, I will change it. I now have the belief that I can.”

“……”

That might also mean that Hong Seok-young would not survive twenty more years precisely because he could change the future.

But neither he nor I mentioned that possibility.

“You are my hope. At the very least, you’re proof that I can endure for twenty more years, and that the future can be changed.”

He relaxed his grip.

Did Father always hold on to such thoughts whenever he entered a dungeon?

Was it because of that, too, that he endured the monsters from the future, built Pilot High School, and established the Ability Management Agency?

Th𝒾𝐬 𝗰hɒpţ𝘦r 𝗂𝐬 p◎ѕṯ℮𝕕 b𝗒 𝘬𝖎𝖙𝕖ṉ0𝓋𝕖𝙡

Was he always thinking like that behind his confident smile, the skill and feats that backed up his confidence?

For the first time, I realized that Father was human.

Not that he was always a perfect person… but that behind that cheerful part of him, there was someone tormented by uncertainty about the future and distrust in himself.

Father never shared such things with me.

Because he wasn’t the type to say depressing things to his son.

Would he have told me if I had stepped forward to succeed him instead of Yoo Ji-eun? Did Yoo Ji-eun know all this?

What did Hong Seok-young see in me to share all these inner thoughts?

But I already knew the answer. Because I had been thinking the same way.

It meant he was desperate enough to cling to the vague connection of a successor from the future.

“So don’t say anything about how it might’ve been easier to die.”

“…Yes. I’m sorry.”

Maybe I didn’t just want to be a spoiled son to my father… but rather, I wanted to be a reliable son who could listen and share difficult things. That’s why I joined the Ability Management Agency and helped him.

I’m this capable. I can help you, Father.

That’s what I wanted to say.

It’s funny. I only realize my feelings now when it’s become something I can never achieve.

“You’ve done enough. So it’s okay to leave it to me and rest.”

“…What if you fail?”

“Why speak so gloomily? I’m Hong Seok-young. I don’t fail.”

“You did.”

“You can’t become a great Hunter by dwelling on the past.”

“Technically, it’s the future.”

“Hmm… should I train Ji-eun? You mentioned her name right after mine, after all.”

Trying to make Yoo Ji-eun your successor again?

I pushed Hong Seok-young away.

“I’m not going to rest.”

“You shouldn’t make such a hasty decision.”

“I said I won’t rest. Without me, you’re just a half-wit guy who can’t do anything.”

“Half-wit…”

I’ve given up on being his son. And maybe to make up for that, I should at least be his successor.

For the first time, I have an opportunity to have a conversation with Father as equals. Would I be crazy enough to give this up?

“The Myeong-dong incident was resolved smoothly, so opposition to Pilot High School has decreased. But thanks to that, the establishment of the Management Agency seems to be dragging… The related laws are the same. I should check on this. I can’t leave everything just to you. First…”

“W-wait. These things need to be decided with careful consideration! If you rush it, you’ll regret it later.”

“I’ve already considered it plenty.”

“If you put it that way, I really have nothing more to say!”

Hong Seok-young flailed his hands in a panic. The way he scratched his head in confusion was just like Father.

This person is not Father. I know that. But he is also Father. That too, I’ve come to understand.

If it were Father, I would’ve scolded him to calm down, but I couldn’t do that with this man.

I suddenly reached out my hand to Hong Seok-young.

“Please let me help you, Teacher.”

“……”

Hong Seok-young pursed his lips as if somewhat displeased, then sighed and took my hand. It was the gesture he made when giving in to my stubbornness.

“If you ever need to take a break, just say so.”

“Any thoughts on raising my salary?”

“Wait until the results of your rank re-evaluation come out.”

“…Does the salary vary by rank?”

“Of course. Look up industry salaries sometime later. I gave you exactly the average.”

“Aha…?”

Hong Seok-young looked at my dumbfounded face and burst into laughter. I shrugged my shoulders and smiled in return.

***

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