Side Story 4. One heart field day (4)

Amidst the commotion, the gourd-breaking competition gradually turned into an intense defensive battle. Park Jae-seon assessed the situation and rose up.

"You can't!"

At that, a hunter jumped up with arms spread as if blocking, and when Park Jae-seon had no choice but to aim the ball between his hands, another bean bag that easily predicted the direction flew in and burst together in mid-air.

"Nice!"

In that moment when the two hunters who succeeded in their coordinated strategy high-fived to congratulate themselves, the director instantly came down to the ground to... try to pick up a new bean bag, but the ground around Team 7's gourd had somehow become clean.

"Oops, I didn't expect this, and it's quite good."

When he tried to reach for a bean bag far away, a hunter from another team ran over like lightning, picked it up first, and threw it in another direction. If he managed to acquire a bean bag avoiding interference operations, those nearby would signal, and they would deploy an iron-clad defense in front of the gourd.

"Kho!"

The Team 4 hunter who caught the ice lump thrown by Park Jae-seon trembled at the thrill felt in his hand. He was so excited that he felt ashamed of his initial grumbling about what kind of field day this was at his age. Especially when he met Park Jae-seon's sheepish smile after blocking an attack, a sense of achievement as great as clearing a dungeon welled up.

Of course, if they let their guard down, gaps would be immediately penetrated. Park Jae-seon had already landed five attacks, bypassing the six hunters who were blocking without any gaps. However, the number of times the ground team alliance had blocked was much higher.

'How long has it been since I ran breathlessly while smiling like this?'

After awakening, they hadn't really been able to play ball sports like they did before. It was difficult to do things with non-awakened people, and for hunters who were chronically short-staffed to match their schedules as a group. Unintentionally, the participants in the gourd-breaking event were becoming intoxicated with the feeling of playing in a school playground after a long time.

[Hey!]

"?!"

At that moment, the Team 3 hunter who was playing the role of infielder suddenly raised his head. A teammate with telepathic special abilities shouted their name inside their head, then earnestly gestured upwards with their chin.

「The ice has all melted, you idiot!」

As he said, the gourds of the opposing teams that Park Jae-seon had frozen solid at the beginning of the match had all melted in the hot sunlight. Moreover, the moisture had seeped into the seams of the gourds, slightly weakening the joints compared to before.

He rolled on the ground, sweeping up an armful of bean bags. Then he ran towards Team 3's gourd and threw them all at once.

The hit gourd swayed violently, making clanging sounds.

"What the!"

"...! Traitor!"

"The match itself was an individual competition from the start, what are you talking about!"

Others also realized that their gourds were now in an attackable state and ran towards them. Thanks to this, there were no fierce interference operations like what Park Jae-seon had suffered from the Team 3 representative.

Now a scene worthy of gourd-breaking appeared.

Although everyone belatedly gave their all, they couldn't beat the person who had made the first move. Team 3's gourd, which had been hit squarely by about twenty balls in an instant, burst open first.

Pak! Pak!

"Oh dear."

Park Jae-seon, who noticed this, created ice bean bags again and threw them with all his might. But just before that, Team 2's gourd opened, leaving Team 7 in third place.

Not long after, the other gourds also spilled colorful paper confetti.

The confetti fell on the heads of all the participating hunters regardless of ranking. And it was incomprehensible why the remaining six, excluding Park Jae-seon, were hugging each other like heroes who had defeated the demon king, encouraging each other for a job well done.

Park Jae-seon brushed off the confetti piled on his suit and returned to Team 7. A sheepish smile appeared along with his slightly shrugging shoulders.

"It turned out disappointing. I'm sorry, kids."

"No, Director! We're third! That's totally in the top ranks! And we're first in the overall ranking!"

Team 7, which had placed 2nd in the first game and 3rd in the second game, became 1st in total points. This was because the top rankers from the previous game had performed poorly in this game. The director smiled as he saw the score table appear on the electronic display board.

"That's right. I'll trust and leave it to the next player. I'm parched from using my strength like this."

"There's water in the ice box over there. I'll bring it to you!"

"No. Ayoung needs to watch what the next game is."

Soram watched him move to the back of the tent and then quietly approached.

"You did it on purpose, right?"

"Hmm?"

Park Jae-seon asked back as if he didn't know what Soram meant, but his expression seemed to already know that Soram had noticed something. After moving a bit further away from Tae-un and Ayoung, he whispered in response.

"It's more fun to have one villain, and for the scores to be close, isn't it?"

Team 3, which came in 1st this time, was the team that had come in last in the first event, the pole vault. Conversely, the top rankers from the previous game were pushed back, adjusting the total scores to be roughly similar. While everything was generally similar, he had allowed the Flight Team to maintain the current 1st place.

"It's just like you, Director, but now we're going to surge ahead, so you shouldn't interfere. Team 7 is going to be first."

"Sure. I cheer for all hunters, but of course, I especially cheer for our Flight Team. I'll be coming and going, so call me when you need manpower."

"Oh, aren't you staying with the Flight Team throughout the field day? Is something going on?"

"We shouldn't ruin the fun while everyone's playing hard, so the higher-ups are planning to move around a bit today."

"Ah..."

Just because it's a day for the headquarters hunters to have fun doesn't mean the number of rift occurrences in the metropolitan area will also take a holiday. It seems the director, deputy director, and the Field Operations Bureau director and deputy director were trying to handle it as much as possible.

"You're working hard."

"It's nothing. I don't even go out on dispatches normally now, so I need to keep my body from getting rusty at times like this."

The director reached out and gently patted Soram's head. Even after knowing that Soram had lived much longer than him, his attitude remained surprisingly unchanged. He was still Soram's greatest adult figure.

"Have fun. I'll be back in a bit."

"Yes. We'll be winning everything."

His hair was ruffled once more. Soram, who twitched his nose to shake off the tingling sensation that had come to his nose bridge, turned around and ran to his teammates.

After that, the full-fledged field day began. As Director Shin had led teams for a long time, he created a composition where representative players could be evenly selected even within teams with many members.

Depending on the nature of the games, most people could come out at least once, but teams with fewer members inevitably had frequent multiple participations. The Flight Team was a prime example.

3RD Match – Three-legged Race

In the three-legged race, it's advantageous for two people with similar physical conditions to come out. However, Team 7 had no choice but to send out Tae-un and Soram, who had a difference of nearly 10cm.

"Han Tae-un, on 'one' step with the inside foot, on 'two' step with the outside foot."

"Okay."

–Everyone ready, start!

Bang!

"One!"

"Ah."

As soon as they started, Soram bit his tongue as he was dragged along by Tae-un's large stride.

Ayoung's cheering baton, which had been enthusiastically waving, gradually lowered from that moment on.

The result was Tae-un returning with Soram biting his head in frustration. They placed 6th. The only achievement was giving Ayoung a big laugh as they returned covered in dirt.

The next event was shooting. Targets were set up, and hunters who had been given modified rifles stood far away from them. From where the hunters were standing, the targets looked smaller than fingernails, but everyone clearly aimed at the center of the tiny concentric circles.

From Team 7, Tae-un, the team's only military veteran, went out.

–Wow, watching chief Han is like watching a noir film. He looks like a handsome mafia boss, hey.

Though he received generous praise, there were hunters in other teams whose main weapons were guns, so he ended up in 3rd place.

"Geez, Soram oppa, why are you taking so many photos?"

"Ahem, it's nothing. I didn't take that many."

"Huh? What did you say? I can't hear because of the click click sound."

"..."

Soram's phone was filled with dozens of photos of Tae-un concentrating on shooting. Soram turned off the album screen before Tae-un returned, and as soon as he came back, grumbled about only getting 3rd place.

Next, they pleasantly broke through the wall that had a slight crack in the handball court while playing dodgeball, and thoroughly compacted the road while rolling balls on the cracked road.

After six games passed noisily during the morning hours, lunchtime arrived. When they returned to the baseball stadium where the hunters had first gathered, food trucks were already prepared.

Yoo Tae-kyung, the Team 2 leader who received his lunch box, furrowed his brows deeply.

"Why on earth are they going this far..."

The menu consisted of kimbap and inari sushi in cute plastic lunch boxes, along with orange juice. The inside, filled with plain kimbap, egg kimbap, and nude kimbap, was incredibly colorful. Yoo Tae-kyung, Team 2 leader and Shin's colleague, narrowed his eyes at the flag-shaped toothpicks stuck in the mini fruits.