Chapter 55 – Final Spurt
Scratch scratch!
Inside the drawing room, Kang Min-Hyuk sat at his desk, diligently sketching with a pencil across the manuscript paper.
Around him… dozens upon dozens of rough sketches were scattered across practice sheets.
Traces of the intense practice he’d poured in over the past few days.
‘The key is to bring out the utmost sense of blasphemy as much as possible.’
The final boss of this episode: the Reverse Heaven’s Monarch.
What Min-Hyuk wanted from this figure was “overwhelming dread.”
It sounded too abstract when put like that… but he planned to tie it directly to the character’s backstory and let that narrative unfold through the visuals.
‘One of the feudal lords of the Divine Empire, yet he refused to believe in the gods. A man convinced that only he was destined to become the true sovereign.’
He launched a rebellion, didn’t mind being branded a heretic… and was a tyrant who would stop at nothing—means or methods—to achieve his ends.
To show his rejection of the gods, he had attached the half-rotted head of a goddess to the pommel of his sword…
‘And woven into the waves of his armor are the bones and skulls of the imperial knights he slaughtered, embedded here and there.’
A colossal monstrous knight whose visuals would fit perfectly in a horror comic.
Slowly, the figure was beginning to take shape on the page.
Even though he himself was the one drawing it, an eerie, unpleasant chill crept up his spine.
But precisely because of that—it felt right.
Thump! Thump!
Anticipation surged.
The image played like a video in his mind: the Reverse Heaven’s Monarch cutting down everything in his path with overwhelming force, drenched head to toe in blood, striding toward the throne hall of Geunjeongjeon and finally sitting upon the dragon throne.
In an arrogant, insolent posture—as though that throne had always belonged to him from the very beginning.
And so…
He couldn’t wait to see what kind of reaction readers would have when they finally faced this boss, brimming with such overwhelming presence and charisma.
Once the pen inking was complete—
‘Let’s go.’
Scrape scrape! Scrape scrape!
He layered screen tones in doubles, then carefully shaved them away to bring out the signature grotesque texture.
His hand went numb, sweat beaded on his forehead… but Min-Hyuk never lost focus.
And just as drawing time was nearly over—
‘Done.’
On the manuscript page, a single full-page panel was finished.
A crescent moon hung in the night sky, with Geunjeongjeon visible far in the background…
And right in front, the Reverse Heaven’s Monarch stood with one foot planted atop the mangled corpses of more than a dozen characters he had torn apart.
Savage. Ferocious. Overwhelming. The raw intensity poured blatantly from the single page.
‘Good… this is the one.’
The most crucial weapon in his fight against Yang Jae-han… had just been completed.
***
From that day onward, Min-Hyuk’s daily life became an absolute whirlwind with no room to breathe.
“Min-Hyuk-kun, aren’t you going to the school store?”
“Ah, go on without me. I still haven’t finished my assignments.”
“Ahem… Then should I at least grab you some bread?”
“That’d be great. I’ll pay you back later.”
“Okey dokey!”
To focus entirely on the manuscript during drawing time, he had to squeeze in assignments during breaks, lunch periods—any spare moment he could find.
And when drawing time finally arrived—
‘In this panel, I need to arrange the direction of the blood splatter so it doesn’t obstruct the speech bubble’s line of sight. Actually… maybe it’s better to remove this cut entirely…’
He poured himself completely into Brave King.
It had gone beyond simply wanting to surpass Yang Jae-han.
Now, more than anything, he desperately wanted to captivate the readers properly through this episode.
Meanwhile, while Min-Hyuk was sweating blood and tears over this episode—
“Please revise panel 4 on page 5!”
“Tone replacement?”
“Yes—switch to tone No. 9!”
The atmosphere inside Yang Jae-han’s studio was no less intense.
The air inside felt exactly like a battlefield.
Their tension was no less intense… partly because they were now facing a full-on war against a true rookie—and a high school student at that—but also because—
‘His skill is improving.’
Every two weeks, when a new issue of <New Chance> came out and Brave King’s manuscript arrived, Yang Jae-han was personally witnessing the content with his own eyes.
To ordinary readers, it might just seem like “Oh, Brave King is fun this week” and that’s it…
But to someone of Yang Jae-han’s level, simply reading <New Chance> was enough to catch the strong scent.
‘This kid is building up to explode something big in Chapter 15.’
The unmistakable smell of “something” that David was meticulously crafting in order to slay Goliath.
Honestly… it made him let out a hollow laugh.
‘It’s just too unfair. If a high schooler draws comics like this, what are other artists supposed to feel but robbed?’
Forget high schoolers—even most professional comic artists didn’t draw with this level of care.
For nine out of ten creators, they were too busy just churning out weekly manuscripts to even worry whether their current chapter was actually enjoyable.
Comic work is labor-intensive to begin with, and staring at your own work for so long naturally dulls your sensitivity to it.
But this friend using the pen name “David” was managing all of that… while also paying attention to the user experience of readers flipping through <New Chance>.
How could one sum it up in a single phrase?
‘He’s like a seasoned venomous snake.’
Whether this was pure instinct or the result of an exceptionally capable editor, it was impossible to say.
But one thing was certain…
‘Damn it, now I really don’t want to lose.’
The appearance and provocation of this David was setting the blood of one outstanding commercial comic artist—YANG JAE-HAN—boiling.
And while this invisible war raged on behind the scenes…
The editorial office of Jangsan Publishing’s <New Chance>—caught right in the middle—was pure chaos.
“Yeah, yeah, another round of revisions? Which panels? Ah, dialogue fixes, got it.”
“Oh—yes, yes. You sent the new version already, sunbaenim?”
Kang Min-Hyuk’s editor, Go Gwang-jin, and Yang Jae-han’s editor were exchanging feedback non-stop, revising manuscripts without pause.
“How’s the cover design coming along?”
“It’s in progress—would you like to take a look?”
“Any delays with the merch production company?”
“Yes, yes—I’ll double-check right away.”
Song Mi-hyeon, the editorial director who could be called their commander-in-chief, continued directing the battlefield without a single moment’s rest.
And…
<Korean Comics Bulletin Board>
[sailman: Yo wtf, this week’s Brave King is insane?? Why is he dropping so many breadcrumbs like this?]
[jjbho: Right?? Feels like the scale is about to blow up compared to the first episode.]
[RolinaNight: Yang Jae-han’s new work vs. BrKing—who’s gonna win this showdown lol]
[dogqp: Lmao come on, no matter what, it’s Yang Jae-han. Lose to a rookie? No way.]
[shaman-do: Still… looking at Brave King’s recent form, I’m not so sure anymore? I’m calling it 50/50.]
Every internet community was bubbling and boiling over.
Of course, with the situation like this…
“Hey, did you see last chapter of Brave King?”
“Man, it was no joke. Isn’t Coup-ler gonna get involved soon?”
“Ughhhh, so jealous… A rookie getting mentioned in the same breath as Yang Jae-han sunbaenim…”
At AniGo—especially among the Comic Creation Department students—the names David and Yang Jae-han were constantly on everyone’s lips.
A level of attention rarely seen in the Korean comics industry these days.
And so, as the heat kept rising from the bottom up, time continued to pass…
The day of reckoning—the first Tuesday of May—was drawing ever closer.
***
About a five-minute walk from Exit 4 of Hongik University Station lies Buksaetong Bookstore.
It was the largest specialty bookstore in the area dealing exclusively in comics and light novels.
Thanks to the demand from art academy students in the nearby art cram-school district, the heavy foot traffic, and the relatively high concentration of otaku(?) residents in Hongdae, Buksaetong Bookstore lived up to its name—it was always packed with people.
Comic books and light novels lined the shelves, along with merch for sale. In the corners were tables where people could sit and read. Everywhere you looked, there were handwritten autographs from comic artists and promotional posters.
Even at a glance, the scale was enormous.
In fact, when it came to sheer size, Buksaetong ranked among the top three comic specialty bookstores in all of Korea.
And precisely because it was that kind of place, just walking through the aisles allowed one to absorb a tremendous amount of information.
The placement of displays, the number of books on the shelves.
Character stands erected everywhere, autographs from creators, and so on.
Just by looking at the interior of this place, one could clearly tell which comics were selling well and which ones were being pushed to the fringes.
For example, long-running steady sellers or mega-hits like One Piece or Naruto—the ones that sold consistently without needing promotion—were prominently placed in the center, acting as landmarks that naturally drew readers deeper into the store.
On the other hand, books that weren’t selling and were turning into dead stock were shoved into the very back corners.
And at the entrance displays…
New releases or titles that publishers were actively pushing were usually placed there.
In fact, the fiercest competition among publishers happened right at these entrance stands.
This was the first spot any potential customer saw, and the one with the highest visibility.
That’s why only new volumes from famous works or well-known creators could claim that space.
Or… in rare cases, brand-new series that had just debuted and were already receiving massive hype—super rookies—would occasionally appear there too.
But today, the scene at the entrance was a little different from usual.
[New Chance May Issue! The hottest comic artists clash! ‘David’s’ Brave King VS ‘Yang Jae-han’s’ School of Deadline. Acrylic bookmark included!]
A huge paper sign hung above the display stand, and beneath it, towers of the New Chance May issue were stacked high.
And…
Around that stand, groups of seven or eight people kept gathering, flipping through copies of New Chance.
“What? Is Aureka-sensei starting a new serialization?”
“Brave King? What the hell is this that they’re giving it such prime real estate?”
“You seriously haven’t seen this yet? It’s the hottest comic right now.”
“…Isn’t this a Korean comic?”
“Yeah, it is.”
The people standing nearby muttered one or two comments each, buzzing with curiosity.
And…
“Um, I’ll take this one, this one, and one copy of New Chance too.”
“Ah, here’s the freebie. Please give me the last four digits of your number.”
“9001, Kim Jin-ah.”
“Kim Jin-ah-ssi… Points have been added.”
In fact, quite a few customers were slipping one or two copies of New Chance in among the other comics they were buying and bringing them to the counter.
The face of Buksaetong’s owner, who was handling the calculations, showed clear surprise.
And for good reason…
‘Wow… A magazine selling this well?’
He had opened this bookstore and made his living from comics for over a decade now.
Sure, there had been occasional bursts of interest in Korean comics in the past… but a magazine selling this briskly? It had been a really long time since he’d seen anything like it.
A large part of the credit went to the New Chance editorial team, who had aggressively promoted the “two-author showdown” angle, turning it into a hot issue, and had gone around to distributors and major bookstores doing sales pitches.
But that was only secondary.
‘Putting that aside… it’s just insane for two creators of this level to appear in the same comic magazine to begin with.’
At this point, even Kim Pan-geol—the owner of Buksaetong—was dying of curiosity about what kind of comic could possibly be causing this frenzy.
The problem was…
‘Damn it, I don’t even have time to take a piss.’
People kept pouring in without end, and the line showed no sign of shrinking…
As the owner, he was inevitably stuck behind the counter, unable to move an inch.
While he was enduring this torturous stretch—
A familiar voice came from the side.
“B-Boss… why are there so many customers today?”
“Ah, you’re here!”
One of the part-timers who usually came in around this time asked with wide eyes.
The boss immediately handed over the POS machine.
“Quick, take over the register for a bit. I need to run to the bathroom real quick!”
“Ah, yes!”
But on his way out—
Grab!
He snatched a copy of New Chance from the display stand and slipped out the door with it.
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