Hyunckel, a Handsome Foil Character
Hyunckel is the foe-turned-friend that you don’t want to fight against because he’s immortal.
Hyunckel, the former general of the undead army, is the first student to train under Avan and the last one to join the main group. Like Popp, he shows a tremendous amount of character growth, but is very different from Popp in many ways.
Hyunckel the cool
Off the bat, Hyunckel and Popp look completely different. Hyunckel is the handsome guy in shining armor while Popp looks more or less like the average guy you see on the street.
These are from the same volume:
Hyunckel the immortal
The previous post has an image of Popp declaring that he’s an ordinary human. Hyunckel, on the other hand, says that he’s immortal:
Both are right about their own assessments. Popp actually died once by using the self-destruction spell on Baran (albeit without success), and is revived by Baran soon after.
Hyunckel plays with death multiple times in the series. First, he disappears into the depths of flowing lava, waiving goodbye to Maam and co, only to reappear later to kick Hadler’s butt. Then, at the end of his one-on-one fight with Baran, Baran says that Hyunckel is “no longer able to fight again” - only to have Hyunckel get up from bed to fight the chess group at the Field of Death. Soon after that, he takes some big hits from the big boss himself, gets imprisoned, then revives from of all of that by drinking some dark water given by Myst-Vearn.
Hyunckel’s last play with death is towards the very end of the series, after he fights with the King at Vearn Palace. One panel shows him peacefully fading out, only to be healed by Brokeena and is told again that he can no longer fight. Even under the unable-to-fight condition, he steps onto the battlefield yet again and even finishes off Myst-Vearn without physically fighting.
Hyunckel comes with heavy burdens
As a former general under Vearn, Hyunckel joins Dai’s group with a lot of emotional baggage, and it’s not hard to see why. He trained under Avan with a lot of hatred, he physically hurt Dai, Popp, and Maam in the coliseum, almost killed Crocodine, and led the force in destroying Papnica.
To make up for his past, Hyunckel fights with his life on the line. Although he isn’t as forthcoming as Popp is about his insecurities, he has talked about his relationship with his past multiple times.
When Popp’s life is in Borahorn’s grasp, Popp pleads Hyunckel to live because he doesn’t want to see Maam sad. Hyunckel responds by saying that he can’t make other people happy. (He repeats this sentiment again much later in the context of Maam - that he is incapable of making her happy. At least he is consistent.)
To Aimi, he reveals that the guilt he has can be temporarily subdued only when he goes on the battlefield.
With that, he rejects Aimi’s confession soon after the above panels.
Unable to overcome his past
Hyunckel and Popp are in very different places at the end of the series. Physical ability wise, Popp has probably become the best of his class - no other sage can beat him. Hyunckel, on the other hand, is said to have lost his ability to fight.
Relationship wise, taking a step back to the beginning - readers are constantly shown that Maam cares a great deal about Hyunckel since their first meeting, to the point that she is the very reason that he ends up joining the party.
In contrast, Popp doesn’t register as a love interest to Maam until they face the chess players inside Vearn Palace, which is much later in the series. But by that time, so much has happened that Popp has become just as attractive to Maam as she has been attracted to Hyunckel. In other words, when it comes to being on Maam’s radar, Popp starts out at close to zero and ends with Maam being very interested (whereas Hyunckel starts out and remains of high interest to her).
If Hyunckel hadn’t literally pushed Maam to go to Popp, the end result may be different. But since Hyunckel’s guilt about his past remains to haunt himself, the ending is an open-ended one - that Maam doesn’t end up with either man.
Rather, the very end of the series shows Hyunckel with Larhalt. I think this is a very reasonable outcome given what he’s said about uanble to bring happiness to humans - and thus he chooses to be with Larhalt, a half-human. And, just because he’s seen with Larhalt doesn’t necessary mean that he can’t end up with Maam. That is undecided.
Similarities
Despite their differences, Hyunckel and Popp do share some similarities. Both being students of Avan, they both respect each other a lot. Although Popp sees Hyunckel as a rival for Maam’s attention, he very much cares about Hyunckel and listens to his directive at times (eg. leaving the Field of Death at Hyuncke’s request due to Baran’s presence). Actually, all of Avan’s students respect each other. Thank goodness none of the main gang has any unnecessary misunderstandings in the series.
Secondly, they both pull off a round of “pretend to be bad while going off to face enemies alone” at some point in the series. Early on, Popp goes off by himself (after receiving a slap from Leona) to face Baran’s Dragon Riders; in Vearn Palace, Hyunckel bad-mouths Avan and stays behind to fend off monsters that attempt to pursue Dai and co.
Lastly, they both go through a good amount of character development, and are essentially different people by the end of the series compared to when readers first meet them. Although Hyunckel’s immortal reputation may overshadow his personal growth, they both develop impressively.
I end the post with one of Hyunckel’s many flashy entrances:
