Chapter 25

Chapter. 25

“So?”

“That is all.”

Tap. Tap.

The Guild Master made no effort to hide his displeasure.

Every time his finger struck the table, a chill ran down the back of Kim Min-seok’s neck.

This feeling… was unmistakable.

Like a child plucking petals from a flower.

Do it. Do not do it.

That was the rhythm in which the Guild Master was thinking.

About Kim Min-seok.

About whether to kill him or not.

“I do not understand, so let me ask again.”

“Yes!”

“Would you like to report it one more time?”

“Yes, the situation is—”

“Ah.”

Just as Kim Min-seok was about to spill everything from his head,

the Guild Master raised a hand.

“If there is anything different from your earlier report, I will kill you.”

“Understood! The report is—”

“For the record, that is already twice.”

Instead of blurting out, “What?” Kim Min-seok shut his mouth.

“The first time, you started with, ‘I will make my report.’ Do you know how you started just now?”

“I do not.”

“The second time, it was ‘The situation is,’ and the third time, it was ‘The report is.’ Ahaha. This is entertaining.”

“…Master. That is enough.”

Beside Kim Min-seok, whose face was growing paler by the second, the Observer appeared.

“Why? I am enjoying this.”

“His report is worth reviewing. Stop tormenting him and listen.”

“Tch.”

“Master.”

“All right. Fine. I will let it slide, so make your report comfortably.”

The Observer gave Kim Min-seok’s stiff shoulder a light pat.

Only then did the breath trapped in Kim Min-seok’s chest burst out.

“Hah! Hah…!”

Kim Min-seok drew ragged breaths like a man who had been starved of air.

The Observer waited a moment for him to settle, then spoke quietly.

“suck, do not be nervous. Only the important parts, and precisely.”

After a long, shaky exhale, Kim Min-seok finally opened his mouth in a trembling voice.

“Scathach appeared, and Han Seol-ah faced him.”

“That is what is strange.”

“Indeed.”

The Guild Master’s eyes lit up with interest.

“I expected that she would not break.”

“Right. But the question is, how did she face him? According to our ‘calculations,’ Han Seol-ah should not have been able to withstand even a single strike from Scathach.”

“…According to Min-seok’s report, it looked as though Scathach was ‘playing with her.’”

“Why would Scathach show that kind of ‘pattern’? Is there something we do not know?”

“…”

The Observer could not answer.

“Answer me, Observer. Is that possible?”

“…Before hearing this report, I would have answered, ‘No, it is impossible.’ But now I will have to revise my answer.”

“To what?”

“I do not know.”

The Observer removed the sunglasses he was wearing.

Behind them were blank white eyes.

It looked as though he had no pupils at all.

“From what I have ‘observed,’ Scathach does not possess such a pattern. He is… a cruel and merciless being.”

“Hmm.”

The Guild Master went quiet for a moment, wearing a serious expression as though he were thinking something over.

Then—

“I do not know. Forget it.”

He tossed the words out in a bright voice again.

“Report the next part.”

“I sensed something extremely dangerous from far away and escaped immediately.”

The Guild Master turned to the Observer.

“What do you think that was?”

“suck is an outstanding Tanker straddling the boundary between A-rank and S-rank. His danger detection is especially exceptional. If even thought he had to flee without looking back, then at the absolute minimum it was Grand Magic.”

“And if it was Grand Magic?”

Instead of answering, the Observer pointed behind Kim Min-seok.

More precisely, to the Guild Master’s ‘Shadow Spike’ hidden within Kim Min-seok’s shadow.

“Kim Min-seok. Say it yourself. What does it feel like when that shadow is beside you?”

Kim Min-seok’s shoulders jolted violently.

He glanced down at his own shadow.

Fear. Disgust. And killing intent.

He was being asked to evaluate that horrific shadow which held absolute power over his life and death.

A revulsion so deep he did not even want to voice it crossed his face.

But if he did not answer, he would die.

Kim Min-seok forced his lips apart.

“…It is chilling.”

“Chilling?”

“Yes. It is like… hearing fingernails scraping across a chalkboard… like a blade laid against the back of my neck. It makes my skin crawl.”

“What? Really? That is all? Puhaha!”

The Guild Master laughed for quite a while.

Then, abruptly.

The laughter stopped.

“Ah, I am back. It has been a while since I had that much fun.”

The light vanished from the Guild Master’s eyes.

The expression that had looked like a mischievous child’s only moments ago was gone, leaving behind nothing but the cold face of an inorganic doll.

“Tch. Anyway, you are fairly impressive. To face my killing intent head-on and come away with no more than ‘it is chilling.’ You exceed my expectations.”

The Guild Master nodded.

“So it was magic powerful enough that even you decided to run without looking back? Then Grand Magic, was it….”

“Yes.”

“That is enough. You may leave now.”

The instant the Guild Master gave permission—

Tap-tap-tap!

Kim Min-seok bolted from the room without even bothering to say goodbye.

He looked like a deer fleeing from the jaws of a monster.

After waiting until Kim Min-seok had gotten far enough away, the Observer asked,

“What do you think?”

“…My suspicion is all but certain.”

The Guild Master had shed every trace of the playfulness he had shown around Kim Min-seok.

“…Could it be ‘First’?”

“What? How could it be? No, that cannot be it. First was not a mage. Probably….”

“…”

The Guild Master fell into thought for a moment.

The Observer waited silently.

At last.

The Guild Master spoke.

“…We will have to watch a little longer. At least until the next trial.”

“As you wish.”

“What was it called again? Some kind of… Rezoral?”

“Resonar.”

“Right, that. What sort of mob is it?”

“A dreadful… boss mob.”

The Observer slowly shook his head.

“They will not be able to stop it this time.”

***

After confirming what the Compendium could do, my head felt hot.

Too many thoughts were crashing into me at once.

“At times like this, you have to empty your brain.”

Complicated thoughts were fatal to brain health.

And there was only one perfect way to empty your brain.

Grinding.

“I might as well kill some Resonar while I check the strategy.”

I immediately logged into the Otherworld Gate and started slaughtering Resonar over and over without end.

…Several hours later.

The loot was zero. I had gained absolutely nothing.

“This trash mob!”

It was annoying to fight, irritating to handle, and its patterns were filthy.

And on top of that, its drop table was complete garbage.

No wonder players treated it like a complete trash-tier mob.

Hah.

If I did not make the developer pay for creating a monster this bad across the board, this irritation was never going away.

‘…The developer.’

Lost Honor was the miraculous game that had awakened me.

The developer who had created a game like this… surely was no ordinary person.

Thinking back on it, Lost Honor had been abnormal in many ways.

I had simply chosen not to think too deeply about it because it helped me survive.

‘What exactly is it?’

I thought about this game, and the developer who had created it.

The day after the Tower appeared.

When I regained consciousness in this tiny room…

Lost Honor had already been installed on my computer.

And as though I would regret it forever if I did not create a character that very instant, the entire monitor had been flashing with dazzling effects.

And then…

‘…What happened after that?’

I could not remember very clearly.

All I retained was a vague memory of creating a character and playing the game like a madman.

At the time, I had been mentally shattered by the reality of being an Awakening Failure, so perhaps it was only natural that my memory was fuzzy.

“Hmm.”

The point was simple.

Lost Honor had been a mysterious game from the very beginning.

And it still was.

“So what?”

Lost Honor had let me live.

It had even awakened me.

So what if it was full of mysteries?

As long as it helped me, that was enough.

I did not need to know anything more than that.

And there was no way to find out anyway.

“…My head is a mess, so I should go make the developer suffer.”

With practiced ease, I opened the Auction House tab.

Whenever stress had built up, I had always relieved it by tormenting the developer.

For ten years, no less!

If there was anyone on Earth best at pissing off a developer, it was me.

The sort of being who could torment one person for ten years and feel happy every single time.

That was me.

I opened my inventory.

“The crime of giving me a headache is grave, Developer.”

The items I kept ‘enshrined’ in my inventory were special.

Special enough that I carried them in my inventory instead of stashing them away in one of my ninety-nine personal storage Warehouses.

Items I had been saving to sell only for the very last moment—the moment when the Republic of Korea was going to perish tomorrow, and I myself was about to die.

The kind of moment where not even the last apple tree could still be planted.

Those were the things stored in Nebula’s inventory.

From among them, I took out yet another Genesis-rank item.

‘Nameless.’

This item had an absurdly cool name, yet true to that name, it had no name.

It sounded like nonsense, but it was true.

Squirm, squirm.

‘Nameless,’ caught beneath my mouse cursor, wriggled violently.

This item took the form of a blood-clot slime.

But that was not its true shape.

Nameless was an item that could become anything.

Which was why, until it was given a name, it had no name.

To put it in old-fashioned terms, it was the original form behind things like the philosopher’s stone, a magic lamp with a blue genie inside, a wish-granting jewel, or those dragon balls you had to gather seven of.

Any object said to grant wishes ultimately traced back to this—Nameless.

“Heh heh.”

I picked up the item just like that.

Click.

And put it up on the Auction House.

Ding!

At once, an offered price was entered.

[Offered Price: 5,000,000,000 Points]

The instant I pressed the register button, a notification appeared before even a tenth of a second had passed.

A response speed so immediate it was as if it had been waiting for this.

‘As expected, it bit right away.’

That was why I was certain my counterpart was the developer.

The Auction House system in Lost Honor was strict.

Normally, when you listed an item, it took three full days for the system to appraise its value and return an offered bid.

Even if you wanted to sell a simple iron sword, you had to wait three days.

But this one was different.

Only when I listed items capable of collapsing the system’s balance—Genesis-rank or Mythic-rank items—it responded ‘immediately,’ as though it had been waiting.

The authority to ignore the system process and intervene in real time.

There was only one being in this game with that level of authority.

The administrator.

In other words, the developer.

‘The last time I did this, it was 4 billion. It raised it by another billion?’

Click.

I pressed cancel auction.

Nameless vanished from the Auction House.

After waiting a moment—Click.

I listed it again.

“Heh.”

[Offered Price: 5,050,000,000 Points]

It had already gone up by another fifty million Points.

Not even close.

I canceled it again.

“Hehehe.”

Click. Click. Click. Click.

Register. Cancel. Register. Cancel.

I repeated it over and over.

Until when?

Until I felt like stopping.

“5.1 billion, 5.2 billion, 5.5 billion…. Hehehe. Getting desperate, aren’t you, you bastard?”

The developer was probably going out of his mind.

The greatest item on the server was appearing and disappearing before his eyes over and over again.

By now, he was probably biting his nails in front of his monitor, watching my every move.

“Nope, not giving it to you.”

Click. Click.

After confirming that the offered price had climbed from 5 billion all the way to 7 billion,

I shut down the Auction House.

“I feel better.”

Justice had been served.

And my head had cooled down just enough.

‘Now then, back to the real issue.’

If I wanted to move forward with my plans, I was going to need an enormous amount of Points.

A truly enormous amount.

That did not mean I was going to sell Nameless.

If you handed over what the other party wanted most just because you were short on a little money, their thirst disappeared.

A card that favored me had to be held until the very end.

And then shown only at the one moment when the other side had absolutely no choice but to accept.

‘So should I flood the market with elixirs? No, that is a poor move too.’

The developer was very cunning.

If I dumped a large quantity all at once, it would obviously think, Are you that desperate for money? and start slashing the price.

Hmm…

‘Thinking is annoying!’

Worrying over what to sell was the mindset of the weak.

I was the absolute superior.

‘Why should I be the one agonizing over it?’

For an ultimate merchant, one sentence was enough.

“Make an offer.”

I placed a single [Wooden Box] on the Auction House.

Ding—

An answer came immediately again.

‘This bastard is standing at full attention now.’

Once you strung him along with Nameless like this, you could force the usual three-day process down to an extreme.

It was a method that filled the developer with expectation—Maybe this time he will really sell it—and made him watch the Auction House in real time.

Stress relief and reduced Auction House time.

Killing two birds with one stone.

The answer to my “Make an offer” could be read directly from the price placed on the Wooden Box.

[Offered Price: 99 Points]

Our code.

Listing the box meant, Which storage Warehouse do you want?

Ninety-nine Points meant it wanted Warehouse Number 99.

“Look at this bastard. How dare he covet Warehouse Number 99?”

Warehouse Number 99 held Legendary and Unique-grade equipment items.

“Not a chance.”

They were not quite on the level of the items I kept in my inventory, but they were still more than magnificent enough.

By my reckoning, they needed to be aged a little longer.

I took the box down, then put it back up.

‘Rejected. Make another offer.’

…That was what it meant.

This time, the price came back as 297 Points.

“?”

The meaning of that number was obvious.

‘Three times the price, for Warehouse Number 99.’

…That was the ‘method of trade’ I had spent ten years teaching the developer through the Auction House.

But.

“How arrogant.”

After ten years of dealing with me, and it still did not know who I was.

“There is no such thing as negotiation in my dictionary.”

I opened Warehouse Number 1 and dragged out ‘Goblin Dung,’ then placed it on the Auction House.

“Did you forget what kind of person I am? Stand at attention.”

Starting with that, I began shoving all sorts of garbage onto the Auction House—things with repulsive names and appearances, like ‘Rotten Apple,’ ‘Food Waste,’ and ‘Vomitus from the Other World.’

And of course, the technique of slipping Nameless back into the mix so that it could never take its eyes off the Auction House was essential.

I repeated it.

Until when?

Until the developer surrendered.