Chapter 10
Chapter 10
2. Reconstructing the Incident -2
I hadn’t even had any caffeine, but my eyes flew wide open.
Hidden Piece. Those two words carried that much excitement. Of course, it was probably just wishful thinking. How often does life hand you luck that convenient?
But still... Sohye wasn’t the type to say empty words. She could barely even strike up a conversation with a stranger, and I didn’t see her as the sort to play pranks on someone she wasn’t even close to.
I replied right away.
[Noah Won : Would you mind explaining?]
[Kim Sohye : I was looking through the stage list and found a tutorial stage. The tutorial already ended, but it looks like you can enter it again.]
[Noah Won : You're saying there's a Tutorial Stage in the Stage list?]
If she meant stages, she was talking about this.
[D-rank Stage List (Abbreviated)]
[Dungeon | 3 days | Designated Target Hunt | 100 Credits + D-rank Random Box]
[Restoration | 1 day | Terminal Reinstallation | 500 Credits]
I hadn’t actually gone into one yet, but from what I’d heard, you generally went to another world to do contract work, eliminated the plant bastards, and came back. And she was saying a tutorial was mixed in among these?
[Kim Sohye : Well...]
Sohye explained in detail how she had discovered it.
I opened the Stage list and filtered it repeatedly, just as Sohye had told me. Then I narrowed the search results according to specific conditions.
Stage type: Dungeon, no time limit, no reward. Even after filtering like that, there were still over a hundred pages, and after flipping through dozens of pages, I saw something strange.
[D-rank Stage List (Filtered)]
[Dungeon | - days | Tutorial | No Reward]
It really was a tutorial stage.
No, it was too early to jump to conclusions. I decided to go over this carefully.
[Noah Won : Couldn’t it just share the name and be a completely separate tutorial?]
[Kim Sohye : No. I went inside myself. It was the field surrounded by the forest we went to. The traces of your fight with the mentor were still there, exactly as they were.]
“........”
So that’s how it was.
I sat cross-legged on the bed and glared at the system window.
This was a matter of “why bother.”
Why would there be any reason to bother letting hunters re-enter the tutorial stage? It wasn’t like they left it there so you could stay behind with your mentor for extra lessons.
Unless there was some other intention...
This seemed worth taking seriously.
[Kim Sohye : I think something was hidden in the tutorial.]
[Kim Sohye : If you’re not busy, could you come to the tutorial stage?]
[Party invitation has arrived from Kim Sohye Y / N]
I thought it over for a moment, then glanced out the window. Seoul's nightscape was utterly black and silent, without a single sign of life. As if it were slowly dying.
“...I accept.”
Light.
Along with a white light, I moved to the tutorial stage once again.
When I opened my eyes, I was in a clearing with the sun blazing down.
Sohye was right. The deeply gouged footprints where I had deflected the spear, the scorched grass, the traces we had left behind—all of it remained exactly as it was. This was the tutorial stage.
“O-over here, Noah!”
I looked around and saw Sohye awkwardly waving from the side. We’d seemed to get fairly close by the time we parted, but apparently not seeing each other for half a day was enough to make things awkward again. I greeted her to break the ice.
“Thanks for calling me, Sohye.”
“Oh, n-no. It’s nothing. You helped me far more... I thought I should repay you. And also, um, it’s not certain yet. It’s just that there might be a Hidden Piece... I think.”
“But... you seem pretty much convinced that it exists?”
She was someone who had gone inside herself to confirm whether this tutorial was the same one. For someone like that to tell another person she thought she’d found a Hidden Piece, she had to have pretty solid grounds.
She gave a small nod and pushed her glasses up.
Sohye raised a question first.
“I have a lot of free time. On days when zombies or monsters aren’t causing trouble... I have to spend long hours in the nest. So I had a lot of time to think. That’s probably why I was able to notice.”
“I see.”
"The tutorial is strange. From the beginning, through the process, and... all the way to the end. To get straight to the point, wasn't the curriculum we went through overall too sloppy?"
...Let me sort through it.
When we first entered the tutorial area, we soon received our first mission.
[Tutorial: Form a team of up to 3 members]
After that, a mentor appeared, and the second mission was announced: hunt the 『Erect Violet』 placed in the forest. Teams were given priority in choosing a mentor according to their mission ranking.
[Mentor transfer complete. Up to 7 tutorial participants may be assigned to a single mentor. Please note.]
[Tutorial: Hunt the 『Erect Violet』 placed in the forest - Teams that complete the mission may select a mentor first.]
After that, you could get information from the mentor you chose. But the amount of information you could obtain wasn't uniform, and there wasn't even a lower limit.
The people who chose that insane spear-wielder didn’t hear a single piece of information from him.
[The tutorial has ended. You may now return.]
And... at some point, it was over. We returned rather anticlimactically.
“...Hm.”
Right.
The more I chewed on it, the stranger it tasted.
If the goal was to teach hunters how to operate the system, there were easier ways. They could just hand out a simple manual without summoning anyone.
If the goal was to give weak hunters an easy task like the 『Erect Violet hunt』, in the end the strong ones pushed forward and took all the top spots, so the weak ones all got crushed at the bottom and eliminated.
If the goal was to have teams stick together, they then placed a member limit on each mentor. Quite a few teams got split up because of that.
If the goal was to have mentors pass on hands-on, field-based knowledge, the randomness of the mentors was too severe. And there didn’t seem to be any major restrictions placed on them either.
If this wasn’t pure incompetence—if there had been a very clear purpose—
“I got stuck on this part. So I wanted to hear your opinion too, Noah. What do you think? What is the system’s intention?”
“........”
I think I have a rough idea.
This was something that happened back in my idol days.
Our company used to frequently rent a recording studio on the cheap, and the owner was the kind of man whose motives were painfully obvious.
“A recording studio?”
"Ah, that... a karaoke place. A karaoke place."
He used to nag at us—idols who were practically nobodies—saying, “Use it yourselves and clean up yourselves before you leave. If the equipment gets even a little dirty, I’m charging you for it, so keep it clean.” He had never once been kind.
Even though we were clearly paying customers, there was nowhere else we could use for cheap, so we had to swallow our resentment and keep going. (Of course, the facilities were also a wreck.)
After we gained some fame from the “Red Ginseng Idol” viral incident, that guy suddenly started tiptoeing around us and brought over a cup of yulmu tea from the vending machine. He said to drink it while we worked.
And then he shamelessly made a request—apparently his daughter had taken an interest in us, so could we talk to her on the phone and take some photos with her?
Just a cup of yulmu tea. And from a vending machine, at that. It was ridiculous that he was asking for that kind of favor with something like that.
“There was this unfriendly noraebang owner, but when I brought a fancy-looking friend along, his attitude changed.”
“Aha...”
The point was that certain kinds of "kindness" came with an agenda.
I can say with certainty: the system is unfriendly.
There was no manual. I only learned the requirements for ranking up to C-rank, the various restrictions, and the existence of fines from my mentor. Even the most basic part—how to operate the thing—I had to figure out on my own.
I was lucky to be from a world familiar with the internet. What if a hunter from an isolated world with no developed communication technology received the system?
They'd have been lost for ages trying to figure out what the Community even was, what Credits were, and so on.
So, if you instead think, “The system has no intention of educating hunters. It just wants them to survive and adapt on their own, like wild animals,” then a lot of things start to make sense.
The tutorial curriculum being a chaotic mess—that was purely because they just didn’t care to do it well. You could wrap it up that way.
But—looked at that way, something stood out all the more. Just like the unfriendly recording studio owner holding out a cup of yulmu tea, there was a kindness the System had deliberately extended to Hunters.
That negates the “system incompetence theory.” It keeps making me think about the tutorial. We might be barking up the wrong tree, but if something really is hidden in the tutorial...
Then there had to be an 『intention』 behind that part.
“That sense of wrongness you felt too, Sohye. If you dig into that part, there’s something strangely kind.”
"Kindness... kindness, huh..."
First of all, the [Tutorial] itself.
[(Notice) Tutorial stage progression is recommended. Until the next tutorial stage: 22 : 07 : 39...]
It sent notifications recommending new hunters to proceed with the tutorial. The system expected something from the hunters who participated in the tutorial.
And then the missions that followed. Form a team, hunt the Erect Violet, choose a mentor.
The only place where you could glimpse kindness was...
“The 『Erect Violet』 hunt mission!”
“Yes.”
The system didn’t give any information needed for judgment—not for team formation, not for mentor selection. New hunters had to find teams on their own and pick good mentors on their own.
And it didn’t explain what you could gain from any of it either.
But the 『Erect Violet』 hunt was different.
[Mentor transfer complete. Up to 7 tutorial participants may be assigned to a single mentor. Please note.]
[Tutorial: Hunt the 『Erect Violet』 placed in the forest - Teams that complete the mission may select a mentor first.]
What to do, where the target was, what benefits you could gain from the results—it was all described with perfect clarity.
The text itself was much longer than the others to begin with.
If something was hidden, it was definitely this part.
Hearing my reasoning, Sohye clutched her chest with a flushed face and bounced on her heels. Her heart was pounding from the surging dopamine, and she couldn't contain herself.
“...S-so, what’s the identity of the hidden secret...?”
“Of course, I don’t know either.”
“What?”
“If I could figure that out at this point, I’d have set up shop as a shaman. My guess could be wrong too. But it seems like we’ve figured out where to start looking.”
If we didn’t know the exact conditions and only had a hunch, the only thing left was to throw ourselves at it. I dusted off my hands and gripped my dagger and shield firmly.
“Let’s say you’re the unfriendly system. You support hunters with various functions like the Shop and Party. If you wanted to pick a few out of those countless hunters and bestow something on them... who do you think you’d choose?”
“People who listen well...?”
“Right. You’d choose people who align with the system’s interests. And the system seems to be hostile toward the plant bastards. So then?”
“...It would like hunters who are good at killing monsters!”
Right. I think that’s the way to get on the system’s good side.
So what I was going to do first was tear through this forest, investigate whether anything was hidden, and on top of that—wipe out every last 『Erect Violet』 in the tutorial stage.
A hunter who slaughters the plant bastards like he has a personal vendetta, even though the mission is complete after killing just one. Wouldn’t that look plausible enough to earn a Hidden Piece?
“Let’s start the weeding. I’ll do the killing like last time, so you help with tracking, Sohye.”
“...Okay!”
We began combing through the quiet, empty tutorial stage.
Dodge, close in, thrust. Thunk.
It was repetitive labor with no fun and no emotion. Even if plant roots that could slice your ankle flew at you if you slipped up, I'd been through far too much by now to make a mistake against attacks like these. I killed them practically half-asleep.
A competent person kills two birds with one stone. Around the time we'd killed about ten 『Erect Violets』, I made a suggestion to Sohye.
“Want to practice?”
“...What?”
“I haven’t formally learned combat either, but I think I can teach you some of the basics. That way, even if we were barking up the wrong tree, at least something will come of it.”
“Oh, if you’re willing to teach me, I’d be so grateful...!”
Good. Now even if the Hidden Piece turned out not to exist, I could count this as earning goodwill with a potential ally. That way I wouldn’t be tossing and turning all night.
“Gauging distance is important. If you make a mistake, I’ll block for you, so try to learn the safe distance with your body. In my experience, that’s the most efficient way to learn.”
“...S-so you’re saying I should deliberately go inside the Erect Violet’s attack range? Bare-handed?”
“Yes.”
It was part of developing her combat skills. From what I could see, Sohye had gotten through most fights using stealth and camouflage. Well, in a zombie apocalypse, that made sense.
In a situation where one wrong move could bring a whole city’s worth of zombies swarming in, her abilities would have developed toward avoiding combat as much as possible.
But the plant bastards were different. These things were basically experts at planting themselves in one spot, so the Hunter had to go on the offensive first. Aggression was key.
Sohye’s tracking ability was excellent. It had saved us considerable time when we set out to find the flowers this time too. So there was even more reason to raise her survival ability. Wasn’t she a talent too precious to lose?
With search ability like that, maybe... she could even find the location of the secret Seoul bunker that the dead “Viscount of Dobong-gu” had hidden away before he got killed in the coup.
Around the time we’d killed about forty-nine 『Erect Violets』—
“C-can we... can we rest for just a little...”
"Perfect timing. Then why don't we practice pushing through when you're exhausted? If you can dodge even in that state, you won't have to worry about getting hurt by similar bastards anywhere else."
“Are you serious...?”
Just as I was dragging Sohye—now limp as a dried-out fish—toward the fiftieth Erect Violet for practice—
[Hunt completion confirmed.]
[Your team’s record is 1st place.]
[Temporary access to higher-tier information through a mentor is now possible in this area.]
[Please designate a mentor within the time limit, starting with the 1st place team (2 members).]
The system message I’d seen in the tutorial appeared once more. It worked. I snapped my fingers in delight.
“Looks like we guessed right! If this isn’t an error, then there really is something here.”
“...I-I’m so happy! We finally found it! Finally! Now, shall we head back to the central clearing...? Let’s stop hunting...”
Somehow, Sohye seemed happier about the training being over than about the Hidden Piece.
We couldn’t confirm any notable changes deeper in the forest, so Sohye and I left the forest and headed for the clearing.
And there—
“...A telescope?”
Conspicuously floating in midair was a telescope. It was a little different from what I'd expected. What on earth was the intent here?
The moment I carefully took hold of the telescope—
RUMBLE—!!
“...Eek!”
A roar like the world collapsing echoed out. I raised my shield and looked around. Then I found the source of the sound.
The sky.
The sky shook wildly, and the sun hanging at its zenith flipped over, turning to darkness in an instant. An unnaturally deep darkness covered the entire celestial sphere.
And... one by one, stars began to shine. The total number of stars that rose in the night sky was five.
One star blazed so fiercely it was impossible to look at directly, three stars glittered brilliantly, and the remaining one shone faintly.
“...Is it telling us to look through the telescope?”
“Probably.”
For some reason, I broke out in a cold sweat and my hands trembled faintly. I swallowed hard and pressed the telescope to my eye. I shifted the direction the telescope was pointing. Toward the star burning brightest.
Ah.
And then I witnessed it.
Above a celestial body whose surface blazed like the sun, meditating in the lotus position—a burning giant so immense that it used an entire planet as its chair.
That mass of fire looked at me without opening its eyes.
[A-rank Hunter 『Flame That Burns All Vegetation』 is observing you.]
[Due to incompatible hierarchy, the appearance of the True Form (眞體) is automatically filtered.]
[(Caution) Contact with a higher-rank hunter may cause irreversible damage.]
Shit.
I frantically threw the telescope aside. My eyes stung, and the area around my mouth was wet. I felt around with my hand and found blood streaming from my nose and mouth. As if the very act of looking was too much for my body to bear.
Sohye seemed to be saying something in concern, but I couldn't hear well. Actually, even if I had heard, I wasn't in any state to answer.
What was that just now? Did I just witness a god? That thing was far too powerful for a single being.
“........”
And then it hit me.
This 『System』, and the beings called hunters who belonged to it...
They were on a scale far more absurdly vast than I'd imagined.