Taeyang's shoulders ached so badly that just lifting his arms to tie his cheap hoodie strings felt like punishment an unbelievable pain like thousands of needles being poked in his body . Every step down the narrow street toward the old mountain made his ribs complain, his knees whisper turn back.
He didn't.
The city behind him pulsed with neon and promise he couldn't touch — a world of gates and hunters who had power dropped in their hands by glowing blue screens. For him, there was only dirt, cold wind, and bruises.
He reached the trail at the base of the mountain just past midnight. The wind carried the smell of old pine and cold stone. Somewhere far off, a siren wailed — nothing to do with him anymore.
Up the winding path, through the same thorny shrubs — he found Gramps waiting, exactly where he'd been the night before. Same tiny fire, same unmoving posture. Like the mountain had grown him out of its roots just to wait for Taeyang.
The old man didn't look up. "Sit."
Taeyang lowered himself onto the cold dirt without a word. His thighs burned from the motion. His forearm still bore the faint lines of last night's cane strikes. He flexed his fingers to keep the stiffness away.
Gramps didn't open his eyes. The fire cracked softly between them, throwing sparks into the shadows.
Minutes passed. Taeyang's breath made little clouds in the cold. His heartbeat slowed, matched to the hush of wind in the trees.
When Gramps finally spoke, his voice sounded heavier than before — deeper, like the mountain itself had spoken through him.
"Tonight you bleed for real."
Taeyang's lips twitched in something like a smile. He wasn't sure why. Maybe because the fear felt different now — not the cold pit in his stomach it used to be, but something sharper.
"More beatings?" he asked, throat hoarse.
Gramps cracked an eye open — it gleamed like a wolf's in the flickering light. "No cane tonight." He tapped the ground once with a knuckle. "Stand."
Taeyang obeyed. His legs groaned but held.
"Show me your fists," Gramps said.
Taeyang raised them — raw knuckles, bruised wrists, skin torn around the edges where he'd gripped frozen branches too long.
"Again," Gramps said.
Taeyang struck the air — a sloppy punch, then another. Gramps circled him like a hawk, silent except for the scrape of his sandals on frozen dirt.
"Again."
Punch. Step. Breath. His shoulders ached, his wrists flared with heat.
"Lower your center. Don't swing your chin out like a drunk."
Taeyang adjusted. Breathed. Hit again. And again.
Behind them, the trees rustled. Not with wind — something heavier. A crunch of leaves where no foot should step.
Gramps' eyes flicked past Taeyang's shoulder. He didn't say anything, didn't warn him — just stepped back, folding his arms.
Taeyang froze mid-punch. "What?"
Gramps tilted his head at the darkness behind him. "Lesson two. Tonight, the mountain tests you."
Taeyang turned.
Two yellow eyes blinked at him from the brush — low to the ground, but moving with a jerkiness that screamed alive. A shape slithered out of the shrubs — hunched, knobbly limbs, skin pale and stretched thin over wiry muscle. Its breath steamed the cold air, nostrils flaring as it sniffed.
A stray gate spawn. A goblin, maybe — low-grade monster, weak enough to slip through the cracks of an unstable rift. Hunters cleared them like weeds — pests that didn't deserve headlines.
It locked eyes with Taeyang — and hissed.
Every cell in Taeyang's body screamed to run. His instincts roared: Back away. Get out. Now.
He stepped back — straight into Gramps' cane, now held sideways like a gate.
"No," Gramps murmured. "Run, and you die tired. Fight, and maybe you live."
The goblin lurched forward. Its claws scraped the frozen dirt.
Taeyang's throat closed. His feet wanted to bolt — muscles tensed to flee down the slope, back to the neon city and the safety of locked doors.
But the cane pressed harder into his spine.
Kill it. Or die here.
The goblin shrieked and lunged.
Pain came first — white-hot across his forearm as claws raked his sleeve open. Taeyang fell back, instincts taking over. He kicked at it wildly — missed — scrambled to his feet just in time to duck another swipe that hissed past his ear.
Somewhere behind him, Gramps didn't move. Didn't shout. Didn't help.
The goblin lunged again — faster than its knobbly limbs should allow. It slammed into Taeyang's chest, driving him into a tree so hard the bark bit through his hoodie. Its breath stank — rotting meat and wet leaves.
Taeyang's vision blurred. The monster's claws rose — black, chipped. It was going for his throat.
He moved without thinking. Pain made everything bright and sharp — his father's voice echoed in the back of his mind, memories of half-forgotten street fights behind Busan's docks. He slammed his forehead into the goblin's nose. Something cracked — wet and sharp.
The monster hissed, reeled back. Blood — darker than human — splattered Taeyang's cheek.
He stumbled forward — grabbed a fallen branch half his arm's length. It was brittle and splintered at the tip, but it felt solid in his raw hands.
The goblin shrieked again — lunged with jaws wide. Taeyang drove the branch into its throat. It hit halfway, then snapped, but the force shoved the monster back, gagging and coughing up black spit.
He didn't stop to think. He threw himself at it, fists hammering into its skull. Each punch sent pain through his bones — like his knuckles were splitting open all over again. But the goblin's snarls turned into wet gurgles.
It scrabbled at his chest, claws scraping ribs — but weaker now, slower.
One last punch. Another. He didn't even know which hit ended it. The body twitched — then went limp, bones folding like wet paper.
Taeyang fell back, gasping. His fists dripped blood — his or the goblin's, he couldn't tell.
Silence swallowed the clearing again. The trees loomed overhead, witness to the blood soaking the dirt between his knees.
Gramps stood exactly where he'd been. No shock in his eyes — just a flicker of something darker. Approval, maybe. Or hunger.
Taeyang wiped a shaking hand across his mouth. His breath sawed in and out of his raw throat.
Gramps spoke, voice soft but sharp as a knife. "A hunter kills. A beast dies. Now you understand."
Taeyang looked down at the thing at his feet — already dissolving at the edges, breaking down into gray ash as the faint gate that spat it out flickered shut somewhere beyond the trees.
No fancy pop-up screens. No system reward. Just pain. And blood. And the burning in his chest that told him he'd done it — no rank, no skill, no help.
Gramps stepped forward, dropped a dirty rag onto Taeyang's lap.
"Clean up," he said. "Tomorrow, the mountain gives you something bigger to kill. And you'll bleed twice as much."
Taeyang pressed the rag to his split knuckles. The sting made him hiss — then laugh, short and raw.
He looked up at the old man — eyes wild, teeth bared in something that felt too sharp to be called a smile.
"Good," he rasped. "Bring it on."