[Welcome To The Jungle]
Three days, that's long Jack Ho has been attending J High. Sadly for him, he made no new friends but at the very least he was reunited with two of his closest friends from the good old times. He spent most if not all of his free time with Vin Jin and Mary Kim, the former of the two seemed quite annoyed but it was just the way he was. The three of them spent the time together catching up and exchanging a few stories from the three years that Jack was absent from their group. It gave Jack a warm feeling thinking back to the time they spent together, having good friends was simply the best. Jack heard Vin had two other friends he used to hang out with but they were strangely absent whenever he was with him, which was quite often. He just hoped he didn't get in Vin's way whenever he wanted to hang out with his other friends.
The group of three reunited friends found themselves walking down one of the many of J High's hallways, their destination? The lunchroom. It was time for lunch and both Jack and Mary were quite hungry, Vin wanted to be a tough guy and denied his desire to eat a delicious piece of cooked pork but his friends knew better.
"I hope they have fried pork today!" loudly proclaimed Mary, already fantasizing about the delicious lunch in her mind.
The image of sizzling fresh pork meat coupled with some rice and vegetables made Jack's stomach quietly growl. While Jack and Mary talked about food, god they were getting hungrier by the second, Vin appeared either lost in thought or completely disinterested in the conversation.
"Hey, Vin, you okay there?" it was about time someone pulled Vin back into reality, and that someone was Jack as he temporarily paused his rant about spicy curry to talk to his other friend who was strangely silent.
"I'm fine, just thinking. I heard Zack Lee from the fashion department got his ass kicked by a new transfer student," neither Mary nor Jack missed the copious amounts of snark in Vin's tone, but they were used to it already, it was Vin after all.
"Eh? There's another transfer student? Cool... So who's Zack Lee?" nobody could really put Jack to fault for not knowing who some random guy from the fashion department was, even if he was quite famous during his middle school years.
"He used to be a rising boxing star in middle school from what I've heard," Mary added her own voice into the chatter about a new topic that wasn't oriented around food.
Jack just hummed, he never really took interest in boxing. After all, it was one of the most restricted fighting sports in the whole world. Not to mention Koreans aren't exactly known for being buff and tall, so not many people actually did boxing, to begin with. Most preferred some other kind of martial arts, like taekwondo, judo, and more. Hell, a lot of people liked karate nowadays because of some karate king who went by the name of Orochi Doppo. Still, boxing was the most restricted and short-ranged fighting sport Jack knew about, not counting sumo of course.
"So what kind of fighting style did the new guy use then?" there was a brief flash from the past of Jack asking the same question, however, that time it was directed at younger Vin and Mary who involuntarily shivered at the memory of what followed.
"Dunno, apparently he just punched Zack and won, just like that, a single punch," Jack hummed in response, the new guy must be quite impressive if he could finish a fight with a single punch.
The conversation fell silent as they arrived at the cafeteria, and immediately Vin brought the whole room's attention to himself the moment he saw Zack standing around with his group of three ugly-as-shit friends. But it wasn't actually him who Vin took interest in, no, it was another boy roughly in the same age category as the three of them but extremely, and I mean EXTREMELY handsome. Jack immediately scanned the sitting boy, he sat with some busty brunette and a short and timid guy wearing glasses, but that wasn't important. His posture was and he... didn't seem like much. To Jack, it was easy to discern this new guy wasn't a fighter, let alone a warrior, but he could definitely see the endless potential he downright radiated with. Scary~
Daniel Park, the former main protagonist of Lookism. He has a secret he can't disclose with anyone and the natural talent of a genius for battle.
"Oh~ That's him? The guy who beat Zack~?" Jack could merely sweatdrop at Vin's clear attempt at intimidation and humiliation, Zack of course immediately took notice and wasn't happy about the comment.
"...Well, I lost to the pretty boy but I could probably take you. That walking fashion disaster and the blonde bimbo don't look like much either," it was safe to say Zack's comment angered Vin to no small extent, and while he looked mad as shit Jack and Mary just sort of didn't.
This is Zack Lee, the former rising star of middle school in boxing.
Neither Jack nor Mary wanted to cause a commotion and get into trouble, and Jack was new for crying out loud! He didn't want to become that one guy everyone is afraid of to approach and talk shit about him behind his back! That was the worst feeling in the world, just a little better than being kicked in the balls. But of course, Vin Jin is hardly someone to think things through and was still as easy to piss off as he was back during middle school, some things just never change.
"Hey. Wanna fucking die?" but Vin's threat didn't seem to intimidate Zack in the slightest.
In the blink of an eye, Zack's fist nearly connected with Vin's face if he didn't stop himself in time. But the taste of the small victory didn't linger long for Zack when he noticed Vin's palm just a few centimetres away from his shirt. Should he take a hit, Vin could and would have thrown Zack like a ragdoll.
'...That's a dumb stalemate,' silently thought Jack as he observed the situation before him, 'Vin would have definitely been able to take the punch and throw Zack, but that's the whole problem with judo and boxing. In judo, you need something to grab onto and in boxing, most fighters advance too quickly to be able to shift back and dodge once they attack.'
Luckily for everyone involved the fight was stopped before it could escalate as a third party joined the fray. A group of three guys immediately snagged everyone's attention. They were dressed in plain grey worker's clothes and looked at least a couple of years too old to attend J High. Jack immediately recognized one of the guys, the man was a legend among some delinquents as a Robin Hood of sorts who helped out weak people but didn't quite look like a nice guy.
Euntae Lee, better known as Vasco amongst his peers and other delinquents. He had a reputation for "rehabilitating" troublesome people and inspiring them to be good people. He was muscular and tall for his age, which Jack almost doubted was 18 and not around 23 or more. Vasco ticked all the boxes for looking like a gangster, the tattoos didn't help much either. Euntae is the current leader of Burn Knuckles, a sort of group that's not quite a gang but also kind of is. Jack only took a quick glance at the people who were with him, a tall and muscular bald guy who was too much of a side character to make a note of and a guy with... HUGE EARS holy fuck it's an elephant!
Jace Park, the brains of Burn Knuckles with VERY, VERY noticeable ears that could put a small elephant to shame. He must store all his brainpower in his ears cause there's no way those are just for show.
"...That guy probably hears in 8K UHD..." Jack's little comment made Mary nearly burst out laughing, she desperately tried to hold back herself from laughing but couldn't stop the chuckles and giggles from escaping.
Jack only seconds later realised he said it out loud and cursed at himself mentally for doing so as it grabbed Vasco's attention. And boy did the look Vasco gave him make him regret his slip of the tongue. But in Vasco's and everyone else's eyes, Jack just appeared bored as he always had. His poker face was quite godly, almost too good in certain situations. In seconds Vasco was pretty much in Jack's face, doing his damn best trying to intimidate the new guy. However... Jack was more afraid of the attention he was now getting than Vasco. Jack didn't move a muscle as Vasco grabbed his shoulder, although he did make a note that everyone who saw the interaction paled, well, everyone except Mary and Vin. The former just sighed while the latter just watched with interest.
"It's rude to talk about someone like that," and then came the sudden pain from the pressure point on Jack's shoulder.
'Wow, that's new. But... he isn't pressing it correctly...' Jack didn't so much as move under the strain of Vasco's strength, in fact, he didn't look bothered at all.
It came as a surprise that there was someone who could just shrug off Vasco's "death grip" or whatever the other students called it. The pain would have been much worse if Vasco could actually push the pressure point correctly and not just apply raw strength to it. Nobody was more surprised though, than Vasco himself, his signature technique has never failed him before. No... it has failed him once before but that was to a completely different monster than this.
"...You're pressing it wrong, Tesco," in an instant Jack pretty much replicated Vasco's technique and stance, placing his hand leisurely on Vasco's shoulder, "You are supposed to use the tip of your finger."
And then, just like that, Vasco was suddenly brought to his knees in less than a second as unbearable pain erupted from his shoulder. Suffice to say, the whole cafeteria erupted in not so silent chatter at what in blazes just happened. But again, not Jace, not Mary, not Vin and not anyone else was more surprised than Vasco himself who was currently being subjected to torturous amounts of pain.
Fortunately for Vasco though, the cavalry has just arrived and it was starving, "Oi, the fuck are you two doing?! Fuck off would ya?! Some people actually come here to eat ya know?!"
The new arrival brought with him a sense of dread that pretty easily seeped into almost everyone present. The once loud students quieted down, but some brave ones still continued to whisper to most kept their heads low, doing their best to avoid eye contact at all costs. Jack felt a slight tingle at the pressure the new arrival brought with him, it was like an instinct everyone has.
...The distinct feeling of an apex predator closing in...
Jack noticed that both Mary and Vin were panicking, signalling him to not do something crazy with a bunch of mish-mash hand signals that he somehow understood. He let go of Vasco's shoulder who start to sweat profusely from the pain and fully set his attention on the man standing before him. Roughly his age, muscular build, quite tall, black hair, deep crimson eyes and a wild look on his face... The description directly fit a character he heard about, but he thought that the man in question was older, a gangster, but no, it would seem he was just a student just like him.
'Myul Mang...? The hell... I heard that he's a gangster, but he's actually just a delinquent? And by the looks of it, he's in the architectural department too...' a bead of sweat slid down Jack's neck as he analyzed Myul Mang's posture, body type and of course appearance, 'No stance, this guy... I heard he fights like a dog without a leash but I didn't expect him to give off this kind of feeling...'
"Oi new guy, stop staring at me and go take a fucking seat! I wanna eat in peace, ya hear?!" Jack couldn't help but blink, wasn't Myul Vasco's friend?
Why wasn't he trying to fight him then? Maybe it was because he's hungry? Or maybe... Jack just isn't worth his time? The thought annoyed Jack to no small extent, however, he didn't want to stand out more than he had to so he just nodded and strolled to an unoccupied table, his two friends joining soon after. Myul helped Vasco up to his feet before leaving to get a triple portion of normal school lunch. Vasco took one final look at Jack before walking away, following Myul with Jace and his other friend in tow.
"That was fucking scary..." Jack was surprised by Vin's seemingly scared tone, he knew Vin long enough to know that he doesn't do this kind of tone, ever.
A second later Jack flinched as someone bonked him on the head, hard. That someone was Mary who looked both worried, angry and relieved at the same time. The surprises just kept pilling up today as Jack was NOT EXPECTING that level of anger from Mary just for getting into a confrontation with Myul Mang.
"Dumbass! Do you have any idea how lucky you just got?! I don't give a toss about how strong your taekwondo is, that guy is a goddamn monster! Don't fight with him, got it?!" it took Jack a minute to recollect his thoughts and give Mary a dumb nod in reply.
"Sigh... anyway, wanna go out this evening?" YET ANOTHER SURPRISE, THIS TIME FROM VIN!
Both Mary and Jack looked at their friend with wide eyes, like saucers, even if Jack's were hidden behind his red-tinted glasses. They weren't used to Vin telling them that he wanted to go out and spend some time with them, so of course, they didn't protest at all and gratefully accepted. Lunch and the rest of the classes flew by as Jack impatiently waited for the time to be right so that he could go out with his friends. Although he couldn't quite stop his train of thought ending at his confrontation with Myul Mang.
...
...
...
"...Just what the hell did I get myself into...?"