The Hero Returns

Lee Ju-ho circled around the exact same spot right in front of the Awakener Authority's building while looking quite anxious. Su-hyeun was sitting on a nearby bench reading a book while sipping on coffee the older man had brought earlier.

Lee Ju-ho just couldn't understand Su-hyeun. "We don't have much time left, yet how can you be so laid-back enough to read a book?"

"Well, I don't have any reason to feel rushed, so it's fine."

While making his reply, Su-hyeun flipped to the next page. His eyes moved quickly and busily as he read the words on the paper.

Seeing how relaxed his demeanor was, Lee Ju-ho could only sigh and pound on his chest. "In any case, why is that kid so late?"

"It's an S-Rank evaluation, after all. It's actually a relief that things are taking a while."

"What do you mean?"

"It means he avoided getting disqualified right at the beginning, doesn't it?"

Su-hyeun's reply caused Lee Ju-ho to form a dazed expression for a moment or two, but then he nodded his head in an exaggerated manner, as if he realized something just then.

"I-I see."

"That's why you should also calm down and patiently wait for him. Besides, by now he should be…"

"Hey, you two!"

Hak-joon was running towards them from the distance.

Without a doubt, his voice came from afar, yet he must've run so hard that he was already right in front of the waiting duo's noses.

"I did it! I really did it!"

Judging from how he was jumping around in excitement, there was no need to even ask him.

Su-hyeun closed the book and got up from the bench. And rather different from how Hak-joon was reacting, he simply smiled faintly as if he had already predicted this end result. "What did I say? I told you it's nothing to worry about."

"You were so right. It was really easy, you know?"

Hak-joon carried a triumphant look on his face, then pulled out a phone while looking as if he had forgotten about something and began typing text messages reserved for someone.

Lee Ju-ho, sounding unconvinced, raised his brows and asked, "What about your registration certificate?"

"Ah, that. Here."

Hak-joon pulled out the awakener registration certificate stuffed into his cross bag and showed it to Lee Ju-ho. It was the same thing that Su-hyeun received when he became an S-Rank one year ago.

Lee Ju-ho confirmed the certificate and breathed a sigh of relief. "Now that was too close for comfort."

"If I knew it'd be this easy, I would've taken the evaluation one or two months ago. I was so nervous since I can't retake the evaluation for a year, but this…"

"No time for idle chatter, unfortunately," said Su-hyeun as he lightly patted Lee Ju-ho and Hak-joon's shoulders. Then he turned around to leave. "Let's hurry and be on our way."

Act 7

The three men climbed aboard a private plane and departed right away for San Francisco, US.

Hak-joon had been stuck inside the tower and couldn't come outside for the past half-year, all for the sake of acquiring the S-Rank qualification. So, his jaw couldn't help but drop after checking out Su-hyeun's private plane.

"T-t-this thing is really yours?"

"You didn't believe me when I told you before, did you?"

"Isn't this even bigger than the one we borrowed from the Reaper Guild the last time? Just how much did you pay for this plane anyway? No, wait a minute. Just where did you get the money in the first place?"

"Out of all the Ether stones and the by-products of the monster corpses from that blue-colored dungeon, around 70% was judged to be mine. The money's from selling off all of my share of the loot."

"70 percent?"

Hak-joon's jaw dropped even further.

Since he also participated, he also received some money from the aftermath of the blue-colored dungeon raid.

He figured that the reward cash was pretty generous even by his standards, but at the moment, he was failing to even compute just how enormous the "70% of the entire earnings" from the same dungeon could actually be.

"Wait, Jordan said he'd yield his contributions to you, didn't he?"

"Right, and the Medical Guild's contribution was also mine, too."

"…Umm, bro? Can you even maintain this thing?"

"I still have some money left. Besides, if it becomes too much of a hassle, I'll just participate in another raid or something," Su-hyeun replied while looking completely unbothered by it, but Lee Ju-ho and Hak-joon were forming really depressed expressions.

Especially so with Lee Ju-ho — he was shaking his head and muttering out as if he had given up already. "The guy who eats tteokbokki for lunch and gimbap for dinner now owns a private plane…."

Su-hyeun didn't even eat proper meals unless it was with Lee Ju-ho, yet here he was, spending his money so carefreely like this. It was a bit hard to reconcile these two images of the same man.

However, only one matter of interest would cause Su-hyeun to splurge, and that would be on how to save himself some time, even if only by a little bit.

The private plane flew non-stop for half a day.

Soon, the American continent gradually entered their visual range, and as the plane slowly descended from flying altitude, the three men catching some quick Z's woke up one by one.

"Ahh! Are we there yet?"

"Looks that way."

After seeing the two yawn so loudly, even Su-hyeun ended up yawning, too.

The seats on the plane could be folded back almost flat like real beds, which allowed him to get a fairly relaxing rest. He began wondering just when was the last time he slept so soundly like this.

"We're not late, I hope?" Hak-joon asked while packing his luggage, perhaps beginning to feel a bit concerned that now he was here.

Su-hyeun confirmed the date and time once more and replied, "We're not late. We still have a cushion of one day, so you don't have to worry so much."

"That's a relief."

It seemed that they still had some time before the start of the Ranking Wars.

Not wanting to be late because of unexpected delays, Hak-joon even took the S-Rank evaluation test in secret. If reporters or the guilds somehow caught wind of the situation and showed up, then that would lead to unnecessary delays.

Su-hyeun glanced outside through the plane's window.

He could see a building standing tall in the center-most spot of San Francisco in the distance. A grin spread over his lips after he recalled the name of the building in question.

<<The Gordon Tower.>>

What a laughable name that was. A building named after its owner.

One might be tempted to think that such a thing wasn't strange, but Su-hyeun knew what Gordon Rohan's personality was like, so he couldn't help but chuckle.

That man would never be satisfied unless he was acknowledged as the best at whatever. Su-hyeun knew all too well why such a man decided to organize the Ranking Wars.

<<It's all because he wants to prove that he is the best in the world.>>

Since when did it start?

Gordon Rohan was born into a wealthy American oil baron's family, meaning he was born a billionaire. People jokingly said that half of San Francisco belonged to him, so it was rather easy to estimate the depth of his financial wherewithal.

He was one of three men that people always mentioned when talking about the wealthiest individuals in the world.

He used his bottomless wealth to acquire a football team, and it continued to win its league every season. His corporations focusing on smart technology and Ether stone energy refinement always stayed as the number one in their respective fields. To top it all off, he even possessed talents that made others acknowledge him as the world's best awakener.

He lived with the modifier "the best" seemingly for his entire life.

"The best, is it…?"

Su-hyeun occupied that position. The spot that Gordon Rohan so desperately wished to make his.

<<He's definitely eccentric, that guy.>>

Hak-joon heard Su-hyuen's muttering from the side, so he abruptly pushed his head into the latter's line of sight to ask a question. "What about the best?"

"Mm?"

"I thought you said something about the best and stuff just now."

That was something he blurted out without even realizing, so Su-hyeun simply shook his head and replieㅇ, "Nah, it's nothing important."

"What do you mean, it's nothing? It's true that the Gordon Tower is the tallest building in the world, isn't it? I can't wait to see it up close."

Hak-joon looked really pumped up as if he came here to sightsee.

In the meantime, the private plane finally landed. Su-hyeun smirked and after grabbing his luggage, got up from his chair. The Gordon Tower looked even more imposing once he climbed outside the plane.

"I'll unpack our luggage at the lodging and find out the schedules for the Ranking Wars, so you two, go and be tourists for a while," said Lee Ju-ho while checking out their itinerary through his smartphone.

They still had some time to kill. They needed to get in touch with the Reaper Guild, but as Park Ji-yeon was running late, Su-hyeun no longer had a need to show his face.

Unlike Hak-joon, whose expression had brightened in an instant, Su-hyeun shook his head and refused the offer. "No need to do all of that. Besides, what do you mean, us as tourists?"

"You may not be keen, but the dude next to you does seem to be, wouldn't you say so?"

Lee Ju-ho's words caused Hak-joon to flinch and quickly avoid meeting the gazes of the others. Although he hadn't said anything yet, he must've been really looking forward to it.

Su-hyeun pondered this for a bit before nodding his head. It wasn't as if he had anything special to do whether or not he went around with Hak-joon in tow. "In that case, I'll leave it to you."

"Alright. Have fun, you two."

Su-hyeun and Hak-joon went separate ways from Lee Ju-ho and grabbed a taxi.

As it turned out, the Gordon Tower that looked so imposingly tall was located pretty far away. But then again, it was massive enough to be seen no matter where you were in San Francisco. It took 30 minutes just to get there.

<<If I knew it would take this long, we could've just run there.>>

They could've arrived at their destination in a few minutes by doing that.

Unlike Su-hyeun, who was getting bored out of his mind during the ride, Hak-joon was busy boasting to Yun-seon over the video chat.

Eventually, they paid for the taxi fee, which was noticeably higher than in South Korea, and stood in front of the Gordon Tower.

Hak-joon's eyes widened as he scanned the building all the way up till its rooftop. "Now that I look at it from close by, it's…no joke."

"Yeah, I agree."

While Hak-joon was busy looking up at the skyscraper, Su-hyeun was scanning the huge crowd of people currently surrounding the structure itself.

As he did so, his gaze soon locked on a black man in the crowd. That man's face was rather familiar to him.

<<Royce Guzman.>>

Su-hyeun walked over to the building's interior while his gaze shifted in a different direction next. A white woman of Russian heritage could be spotted rather easily among the crowd.

<<Elena Ann.>>

Besides these two, he could spot several other famous faces.

Every single one of them was an S-Rank awakener.

They all came to San Francisco to participate in the Ranking Wars. And since they were in the city already, it seemed that they all had the same idea of coming to take a gander at the Gordon Tower, reputedly the greatest structure in the world.

On average, only one or two S-Ranks existed per nation, or three at most — yet right here in this place, so many could be spotted quite easily.

This was a gathering of the stars, in other words.

"Well, it's no joke, alright," muttered Su-hyeun.

He went through all sorts of experiences in his previous life, but even then, this would be his first time participating in the Ranking Wars. Back then, Su-hyeun was merely an A-Rank. In other words, he couldn't participate as he hadn't become an S-rank on time.

<<Will this be fine, I wonder?>>

Not just any awakeners, but S-Ranks had gathered here in quite a large number. And not a single one of them could be "controlled" properly.

They surely wouldn't start anything idiotic when there were so many people gathered here, but human nature was and always would be unpredictable.

Indeed, folks with a few screws loose always existed.

And sure enough…

<<…I knew it.>>

Su-hyeun hurriedly turned around and spoke. "Hey, Hak-joon."

"Dude, over th… Eh?"

"I'll call you later."

"Ehh? Where are you…?"

Swiiish—

Su-hyeun's figure rapidly fleeted in and out of the crowd. He moved so suddenly that Hak-joon failed to catch the departing back in time. He had vanished in the literal blink of an eye.

Su-hyeun entered the elevator right away. It was powered by several low-grade Ether stones and up to 50 people could ride on it.

As so many were already riding on it, the elevator kept stopping on different floors. They needed quite a lot of time to reach only the tenth floor.

<<This won't do.>>

He would've liked to avoid damaging another's private property, but it couldn't be helped this time.

Craaack-—

Su-hyeun leapt up and broke through the ceiling of the elevator. Other passengers all screamed in fright, but he ignored them for now. He glanced below, and as expected, the elevator was operating just fine with no signs of error.

Tap—

Su-hyeun used the Leap skill and traveled up through the elevator shaft. This was a lot faster than the elevator's climbing speed.

The destination he reached by doing this was the highest floor of the Gordon Tower, the 200th: the place where the entire view of San Francisco could be captured in one glance.

That place had already succumbed to pandemonium by then.

"Kkyahhk—!"

"It-it's a fight!"

There was nothing besides Gordon Rohan's statue installed on the 200th floor, yet now it was filled by the screams of the panicking people.

The handful of elevators available hadn't arrived yet, and the emergency exit was too narrow for a lot of people to escape in a hurry.

In the midst of all this, two men were glaring at each other right in the center of the 200th floor.

<<Wang Wu and Sugimoto Kenya.>>

Two S-Ranks — one from China and the other from Japan — well-known to be hostile towards each other, had come to blows in this very place.