Chapter Text
Hobin’s days were typically pretty mundane, waking up early to go to work, making coffee and talking to Jiksae, going home, and sleeping before doing it all over again. Maybe he'd go out to buy something or eat out if he felt like it, but that was about all that was ever different in his daily life.
He was quite content with that cycle too, it may not have been the most thrilling or interesting, but it was nice to have a stable routine with little to no deviation. That being said, what made his daily cycle so nice and comfortable was also what made him so eager to get to the bottom of the tacky flyer.
Obviously some of the things he had imagined were unlikely or were just straight-up impossible, and from an outsider’s perspective there was no reason to get so passionate about a dumpster paper, but it had been a while since he’d gone on a little adventure like this.
In addition to thinking up outlandish possibilities and theories, Hobin also had time to think about actually learning martial arts. The idea had always intrigued him, like when he would watch action movies or play fighting games, the thought of him doing something like that would occasionally cross his mind before he dismissed it as nothing more than fantasy.
In other words, even if his little investigation led him to a normal taekwondo studio, which it most likely would, he wouldn’t mind. It would be nice to have something to do after work that had always interested him. Compared to getting off work and killing time by watching shows or playing games, taekwondo was much more productive.
Looking around, Hobin finally noticed how close he was getting to the dojang. He had been pretty caught up in his thoughts during the entire walk and hadn’t been paying much attention to his surroundings.
Beginning to feel slightly nervous both on account of deviating from his normal daily schedule and some of the not-so-fun theories making their way to the front of his mind, Hobin fished the wrinkled flyer out of his pocket.
Taking a quick glance at it to make sure he got the address and time right, he stuffed it back inside of his pocket. There was still a sense of uneasiness present, even after making sure he was going the right way, but he had already come so far and gotten so curious that he might as well follow through.
Turning the final street corner to his destination, Hobin took a breath in and mentally prepared himself. He had thought up everything imaginable, he was ready for whatever the universe had in store for him whether that be a normal dojang desperate for students, or some sort of elaborate and poorly thought out scam.
Crossing the street and getting even closer, he couldn’t help but notice the lack of noticeable things. He was no expert on how martial arts establishments were supposed to look, but this one looked like how he imagined a basic one would be.
Big glass windows that let you see all the people practicing although there weren’t any at the moment, a big sign at the top of the building that said “taekwondo”, some well-worn green mats, a red hanging bag, just a bunch of regular fighting stuff.
As anticlimactic as it was to find an ordinary dojang, Hobin couldn’t help but be relieved and a little embarrassed for getting so worked up. As long as the lessons weren’t a scam, all that was left to do was sign up for classes, and that would conclude his trip.
He pushed open the glass doors and took another breath, clutching the flyer in his fist. He did a quick mental run-through of talking to whoever was in charge here then signing up for lessons, just to further prepare himself.
“Hello,” Hobin called out into the empty dojang. He had already noticed the absence of people from the outside but wanted to say something instead of just standing there waiting for someone to come back. “Uh, is anyone here?” he called one more time a little louder.
Well, this was a little awkward, standing alone by the door waiting for something to happen. He briefly considered turning back before deciding to stay there and tough it out. The door was unlocked and there was no closed sign anywhere so maybe there just wasn’t class today and the person who worked here had just stepped out for a moment.
He had left his job standing all day and twiddling his thumbs only to go to another place and do the same thing, funny how that worked.
Resorting to his normal bored activities, he ran through some drama episodes in his head, fiddled with his hands, played a running game on his phone and put in some earbuds to lessen the awkwardness of standing alone in silence.
After maybe 2 or 3 minutes he wasn’t counting, while in the middle of making his character avoid some obstacles, he got that feeling of someone watching him. For a split second, he felt creeped out before remembering where he was and the instructor was probably back.
Quickly, he took his earbuds out and turned around only to see- wait no it couldn’t be. Hobin was having his second major crisis today trying to figure out why Mullet was here. Maybe he finally decided to end their rivalry once and for all.
It didn’t take long for that lovely logical part of his brain to butt in and point out the dobak he was wearing, meaning he was either an instructor or student, but probably the instructor seeing as he was the only person there. Throughout all of this Mullet was wearing that same scowl Hobin had seen many times before, just with a slightly confused element.
“Fuck are you doing here?” Mullet asked once Hobin had gotten enough composure back to not look like he was going through an existential crisis.
Still too surprised to form any real sentences, Hobin opened up the crumpled paper quick enough to cause a small tear in the side, using the only words he could manage to get out, “Found this flyer…” he said.
Mullet took the flyer from his hands to get a closer look. It was a bit hard to read because of all the creases, but after a few seconds, Mullet sighed. He turned back to Hobin, making an unreadable expression.
“So uh is this a bad time or…” Hobin trailed off again. Of all the things he had prepared himself for, seeing Mullet definitely wasn’t one of them.
Seeming to come back to his senses, Mullet pointed to the floor, with a quick “Sit”. After ordering Hobin to stay, he went off somewhere in the back.
He really should have left right there, there was no reason to listen to that guy, but for some reason, he didn’t. As nervous as he was for what was to come, whatever that may have been, he was also curious. As bad a decision as it was, at least it wasn’t the most impulsive thing he’d done that day.
After a few minutes and a bit of a call he was able to overhear, Mullet stepped out from what he assumed was the office area, looking more pissed than he usually did. Expecting him to say something, Hobin waited for him to speak, and waited, and waited. All Mullet did was look at him with that same scowl he always had on.
Hobin had never really considered himself a patient person, especially not with rude people such as the one standing in front of him. He could feel himself growing frustrated, all he wanted was a good mystery or some cheap fighting lessons with a professional, now he had to deal with this guy twice in one day.
Just as he was about to insult, yell at, or simply hit his tormentor without the fear of losing his job, Mullet finally spoke.
“Follow me to the backroom,” he said plainly.
He couldn’t seriously expect Hobin to just listen to him, all he’d done in the whole 3 months they’d known each other was be an asshole, there was no way Hobin would just come with him.
“What? I just wanted to learn taekwondo, I’m not going to listen to you,” Hobin said as he jumped up. What a waste of time, Mullet obviously wasn’t a professional, there was no reason to stay here.
Looking irritated and ready to hit Hobin, he took a deep breath in, looking like he was forcing himself to remain calm.
“You need to sign up for lessons to learn taekwondo, follow me”
Somewhat reluctantly Hobin followed him to the backroom and watched him type a number into the phone on the desk, press the speaker button, then walk back to the main practice room in the dojang.
“Hello,” he heard the voice of a middle-aged friendly sounding man say. “You must be the new student Taehoon told me about”
From there, the process of signing up hadn’t been as long as he’d expected, he was given a brief history of the dojang and another brief description of how taekwondo was used and its history.
He’d also learned the man on the phone was none other than Seong Hansoo, taekwondo legend, and father of Mullet, also known as Seong Taehoon. From what he’d been told, the number of students actually wanting to learn taekwondo had gone down, most of the revenue now coming from parents signing their kids up due to it being cheaper than daycare.
As far as pricing went, it was surprisingly cheap considering how much came with it. Though he did feel bad about taking something so inexpensive from an establishment that was struggling, it wasn’t like he had all that much spending money on hand and he would be crazy not to take something like that. An impulsive buy, yes, but it definitely seemed worth it.
This all sounded so great, however, there was one thing Seong Hansoo hadn’t mentioned until the end when Hobin was already too invested and hadn’t stopped to truly think through what that small thing would entail.
It turned out Seong Hansoo was away on business at the moment and would be for a while, meaning his instructor would be Mullet. After a long day at work he would have to see Mullet who was arguably the worst part of his day. He had agreed because it didn’t seem so bad at first, but as soon as the call ended and the reality of spending that much time alone with Mullet set in, he really wished he had just put off starting until Seong Hansoo got back.
So now here he was, alone in a room with Mullet, the very person who he always dreaded seeing and always managed to put him in a bad mood. And yes, he now knew that his name was Taehoon, but Mullet suited him better.
“Oi, pay attention,” Mullet said, jabbing Hobin with his foot to really get the point across.
Ah, so this is what he had to look forward to for the next year, being injured and ordered around by some punk. So much for being able to do something active and useful after work with a professional in taekwondo.
Wait, he could just not come until Mullet’s father came back from his trip, couldn’t he? There was no reason to put up with Mullet for longer than necessary, if he just got through this one class he could just wait to resume his lessons later without Mullet. As unpredictable as Mullet was, Hobin felt like if he tried to leave right now he might do something to him, so all he had to do was wait until the end of this class-
“What did I just tell you to do?” another jab to his ribs, just on the opposite side.
“Ah,” Hobin jumped back while wincing. “Maybe your shitty attitude’s the reason you don’t have any students, taekwondo’s still one of the best martial arts, you just can't teach '' wow great going, insulting the trained fighter who just kicked you and could definitely do much worse. Hobin braced himself for the next wave of pain, but it never came.
“You think taekwondo is the best?” he asked, narrowing his eyes at Hobin.
What, did this guy have some sort of taekwondo complex or something? Really, Hobin had just added that detail to be even more insulting to Mullet, but it didn’t look like he was focused on that at all. Whatever, as long as it got him out of getting jabbed again he would compliment taekwondo as much as Mullet wanted.
“Yeah, it’s really strong!” Okay, that was a little too enthusiastic, dial it back. “It seems like something that requires a lot of discipline and focus and from what Mr. Seong told me it also seems pretty strong. I don’t really get why people only think of it as a sport, if you remove all of the showy stuff from it and tweak it a bit to work in real fights like blocks or punches, it would make a really good base for building up fighting skills. But uh yeah, taekwondo really does feel like the best, I’m surprised more people don’t use it.”
Hobin looked back to Mullet hoping his whole speech was convincing enough to make him forget the remark about his shitty personality and not get him any further on Mullet’s bad side. Mullet didn’t say anything but it did look like his mood slightly improved. Obviously he didn’t look happy, Hobin didn’t even know if that was possible for him, but his scowl did disappear for a brief moment, and when it came back it was a little less menacing. After a few seconds, Mullet cleared his throat.
“You’re starting off with learning stances, it’s important to have a solid foundation before you start learning kicks,” Mullet said in a way that would have made Hobin think he was a real professional instructor if they hadn’t met before that.
Well, at least they were doing something easy for his first and last class with Mullet. After a few more words of explanation from Mullet that Hobin only half-listened to, Mullet told him to get into what he thought would be a good fighting stance. Mimicking something he had seen in a fighting video game, Hobin put one foot in front of the other, with his hands in front of his chest.
“Okay now watch closely and try to stay still,” walking over to Hobin, Mullet balanced himself on one foot and used the other to push Hobin. It wasn’t a kick or anything, more like a slow nudge without much power, but Hobin found himself falling onto the mats rather quickly.
“You wanna avoid falling over in a real fight,” Mullet said in a plain tone, which was better than the threatening one he had earlier, but the matter-of-fact tone with the obvious statement felt condescending, much like everything else about him.
“Well yeah, but of course I’m gonna fall over if you push me”
“Call me Master Seong,” he said, completely disregarding what Hobin had just said. “Now get up and back into that stance”
Grumbling as he did so, Hobin got up and resumed his previous position, both hands up, one foot in front of the other, awaiting whatever Mullet would do next.
“Okay, now bend your knees more, bring the leading foot back some then widen your stance, when the push comes lean into it more instead of away from it, move one hand in front of the other and raise it a little.”
Wow, that kinda sounded like something an actual teacher would say, how surprising. Hobin followed all of Mullet’s instructions and adjusted his stance. The same as before, Mullet started to push Hobin with his foot. Leaning into it more just as Mullet had said, he was able to hold his ground for longer before falling over.
“Oh wait, that actually worked,” Hobin said stunned, never would’ve expected Mullet to say anything of any value.
“It's almost like when you start taking lessons somewhere you learn something,” he said in that same ordinary asshole tone.
Leave it to that guy to say something like that just when Hobin was starting to put some worth into what he said, typical Mullet.
After that, they repeated that a few more times with Hobin getting knocked over and Mullet telling him what he was doing wrong, which didn’t seem like the best way of learning, but it actually worked surprisingly well. For the rest of class Mullet or rather “Master Seong” had him work on that stance, being able to get into it quickly, making sure he was stable, and introduced him to a few more basic stances.
As stunned as he was that Mullet could actually do his job, he was even more shocked by how much he enjoyed learning from him. Sure the insults and violence were less than appreciated, but once he got past that, the way Mullet explained and presented new things made a lot of sense.
“Lesson’s over,” Mullet said after knocking Hobin over one more time.
Looking up at the clock as he got to his feet, he realized how much time had actually passed. He had expected the class to drag on like his morning work shift, but the lesson almost felt like it was over too fast.
“Bye Master Seong,” he awkwardly called out from the door. In typical Mullet fashion, he ignored Hobin and started walking to the back room. “Uhm, see you next class,” he even more awkwardly called out before finally leaving. Mullet didn’t respond to that either but Hobin hadn’t expected much different.
It took a bit of walking and thinking through his day for him to realize what he had said. “see you next class”, that implied he was going back. Well, the class with Mullet was actually kind of not terrible, he still didn’t like the guy but all things considered, he was a pretty good teacher.
Hobin had known Mullet for a few months at this point and from their interactions he had been able to get a pretty good idea of what kind of guy he was so Hobin couldn’t say that he was completely on board with adding taekwondo lessons to his routine, but going back one more time couldn’t hurt. Just to decide if he would make a habit of it, nothing more.