This Is the Story I Know
The sound of footsteps echoed through the fog—thud, thud. As Yoon Tae-oh made his way back toward his comrades, the thick mist of the forest carried the metallic tang of blood. He clutched his throbbing back and pushed through the undergrowth, each step sending fresh waves of pain through his body.
“Ugh, fuck… I didn’t break anything, did I?”
The potion’s effects were fading fast, and every muscle in his body screamed in protest. Yet the grin on his face refused to fade. It was the same rush he used to feel in Soul Like after taking down a brand-new boss monster on his very first try. The sheer satisfaction of soloing a monster with overwhelming size and power still had his blood boiling with adrenaline.
Next time, I’ll take one down with pure physical stats alone.
He felt a twinge of regret for having relied on items, but still—this was something to be proud of.
Clang—!Kang—!
He hadn’t gone far before the clash of weapons and harsh shouts reached his ears. It was the clearing where the Imperial camp had been.
“Don’t fall back! Hold the formation! We just have to last until Tae-oh gets here!”
Rolls’s hoarse voice cut through the fog. Tae-oh crouched low and observed the scene. Rolls was at the front, covered in blood, simultaneously fighting three Imperial soldiers. On his own, he could have survived easily, but he was desperately protecting the rest of the squad.
If not for Rolls, they would have been wiped out already.
Behind him, Kyle and Bruce stood shoulder to shoulder with their shields, holding on for dear life. Rian was further back, drawing her bow and keeping the enemy at bay. Fear filled every squad member’s eyes, but not a single one had run. They held their ground.
“Looks like they’re earning their keep after all,” Tae-oh muttered.
He flicked the War Wolf’s black blood off his sword. On the other side, the Imperial soldiers’ morale had clearly plummeted. Their prized war beast had vanished into the forest, followed by a horrific scream and the sound of something crashing down a cliff. They kept glancing nervously toward the treeline as they fought.
“Hey, you mutt handlers.”
Tae-oh stepped out of the mist into the clearing. His entire body was caked in dirt, red human blood, and the War Wolf’s black ichor. He looked like a demon that had crawled straight up from the pits of hell.
At his appearance, the Imperial soldiers pinning down Rolls froze in unison.
“You little shit, you’re alive? What took you so long? I thought you were dead,” Rolls spat blood and sneered.
“Th-that… that monster…!” The Imperial sergeant’s lips trembled violently. The War Wolf—the very magic beast that had taken over a dozen elite soldiers and heavy chains to control—had been killed by a single conscript. And now that conscript had returned.
Tae-oh rested his sword on his shoulder and gave a cold, mocking smile.
“Time to clean up the small fry.”
That smile shattered what remained of the Imperial soldiers’ will to fight.
“R-run! That thing’s knight-class!”
The moment one man threw down his weapon and turned to flee, the entire line collapsed.
“Where do you think you’re going?! Everyone, charge! Don’t let a single one escape!”
At Tae-oh’s command, Rolls and the squad members surged forward, seizing the opportunity to strike the enemy’s backs.
“You were real tough when you were attacking, huh?! You bastards!”
In war, the greatest casualties usually came during retreat, not in the heat of battle. Tae-oh squeezed out the last of his strength and charged after the fleeing sergeant.
Slice—!
It was far easier than before. With one clean cut, he severed the sergeant’s head. Tae-oh breathed raggedly and collapsed to the ground.
Tsk. Guess that means no heart drop.
It was a little disappointing, but he figured he had done everything he needed to do.
“Damn, that was brutal. I’m about to die, so the rest of you handle cleanup! Rian! Shoot the ones running farthest first!”
“Got it!!”
A short while later, the battle was over. Only the corpses of Imperial soldiers littered the clearing.
“Huff… huff… C-Commander.”
Kyle approached, still gripping his blood-soaked spear. Rian and the rest of the squad gathered around Tae-oh as if by unspoken agreement. The look in their eyes had completely changed. It was no longer the gaze of comrades or a lucky leader. It was closer to blind faith directed at the being who had saved them from the jaws of death.
“Commander… did you really kill that monster by yourself?”
“Can’t you tell by looking? It fell off a cliff. You think it survived? Want to go check together?”
When Tae-oh answered gruffly, the entire squad shook their heads at once.
“N-no!! We’ll follow you and only you for the rest of our lives!”
Tae-oh chuckled and stood up. Securing their loyalty was nice, but there was something far more important to do right now.
The most sacred ritual a gamer could perform after defeating a boss.
“Everyone, take care of the wounded and search the Imperial tents. Grab any usable weapons and food. Rolls, you come with me.”
“Ugh, I’m dead tired. Where are we going now?”
“To collect the loot, obviously. When you clear a raid, you’re supposed to take the rewards.”
***
Tae-oh and Rolls descended once again to the valley floor beneath the cliff. Seeing the War Wolf’s corpse impaled on the rocks up close was even more horrifying.
Rolls whistled in disbelief.
“Fuck… no matter how many times I look, you’re insane. You really killed this thing alone?”
“I got lucky. If the terrain hadn’t helped, I’d be the one stuck on those rocks.”
“Lucky? You call that lucky? A guy who can’t even use aura took down a magic beast like this?”
“I borrowed the power of items, so yeah, I got lucky.”
“Wow… I don’t even know what to say anymore…”
That’s just basic difficulty in Soul Like.
Tae-oh pulled out a dismantling dagger from his pouch and approached the War Wolf’s carcass.
Early game, this thing is a treasure from head to toe.
A smile crept across his face.
“We’ll start with the hide. Even just turning it into a cloak will give better defense than most steel armor. It’s flexible, so movement is easy too. If we cut it properly, we should have enough to make chest plates for the whole squad. And let’s pull out all the teeth and claws. We can make weapons out of them later.”
At Tae-oh’s instructions, Rolls grumbled but drew his knife. However, skinning a magic beast was no easy task. In the game, you just toggled a button and it went straight into your inventory…
Shit, this is no joke…
Eventually, Rolls started complaining.
“Hey… have you ever skinned anything before?”
“Not something this big, no.”
“Move over. Grab it here and cut along the grain, dumbass. Size doesn’t matter—the principle’s the same.”
Thanks to Rolls’s guidance, Tae-oh quickly got the hang of it. Before long, they had a neat pile of hide, teeth, and claws.
But the real prize was still waiting.
“Alright. Time to collect the actual loot.”
He plunged the dagger deep into the War Wolf’s chest, right where the heart should be.
Schlick—!
As he cut through the tough muscle, a stone emitting a soft blue glow emerged from the dark red blood.
“Oh…”
A gasp of admiration escaped Tae-oh’s lips. It was the size of an adult man’s fist—a core formed from condensed pure mana.
A Mana Stone.
It was exactly the item used as a top-tier alchemy material in the game. With this, one could create not just simple healing potions or fatigue remedies, but permanent body-enhancing elixirs or bombs with devastating destructive power.
“Hey… you’re really lucky. That Mana Stone is pretty big,” Rolls said, stepping closer with fascination.
“Heh heh heh. All that hard work paid off.”
Tae-oh carefully wrapped the Mana Stone in his outer garment and tucked it deep into his backpack. The spoils from this creature would be a massive help in surviving this romance-fantasy world.
***
After finishing the dissection, the two returned to the clearing. The squad had gathered a mountain of loot—sturdy Imperial longswords and spears, dried jerky, and various rations.
“Not a bad haul. This should last us a while even without resupply,” Tae-oh said, rummaging through a sack of food.
At that moment, Kyle came running from the Imperial sergeant’s tent, looking urgent.
“Commander! You need to see this!”
In Kyle’s hands was a thick ledger bound in black leather. Tae-oh took it and flipped through the pages. It was filled with incomprehensible numbers and cryptic symbols.
His pupils shook as if struck by an earthquake.
I can’t read this… fuck. Why isn’t it in Korean…?
Feeling the urgent need to learn the local script, Tae-oh frowned. Rolls snatched the ledger away.
“Are you illiterate? Move. Let me see.”
Rolls’s eyes scanned the pages rapidly. After flipping through several sheets, his hand suddenly stopped. A string of harsh curses burst from his mouth.
“Fuck… these sons of bitches really…”
“What? What is it?”
In response to Tae-oh’s question, Rolls pointed at one page. There, familiar unit names and personal names were written.
“Look. ‘Magic Beast Biological Experiment and Live Combat Deployment Test.’ And do you know what unit name is written underneath?”
Rolls ground his teeth.
“Rose-rion Kingdom Reconnaissance Scout Unit, Third Squad. That’s us.”
“What?”
A shock like being hit in the head with a hammer flashed through Tae-oh.
“And here. ‘Final payment upon confirmation of test results. Recipient…’ Wait, fuck. Hold on.”
Rolls’s voice suddenly trembled and stopped. His eyes shook with disbelief.
“Why? Is it that bastard, Commander Carlo?” Tae-oh asked.
Rolls shook his head and handed the ledger back to him.
“Not Carlo. It’s Valik. Second Knight Order Commander Valik.”
“Valik?”
“You know, the guy who promoted us to regular soldiers.”
Valik. The commander in silver armor who had appeared the day they killed the sergeant and promoted them to regular troops. Only now did the foggy situation within the unit start to make sense.
“Ah… fuck. So that’s what it was.”
A hollow curse slipped from between Tae-oh’s lips. They hadn’t been promoted for killing the sergeant. Valik had simply sold them off for money. From the Empire’s perspective, they were useful meat shields—tough bastards who had survived poison gas and even taken the heads of elite Imperial soldiers. Perfect test subjects for their modified War Wolves.
The word “betrayal” the assassin had spoken. And what Commander Carlo had said a few days ago—that the line between ally and enemy was far blurrier than he thought. Carlo wasn’t the mastermind. He was merely a bystander who had turned a blind eye to his direct superior Valik’s dirty dealings and pushed them into the jaws of death.
“Commander… we were sold? To a Knight Commander?”
Rian muttered, her face pale. The squad members trembled with fear and betrayal. Not just a company commander, but a Knight Commander—one of the kingdom’s core figures—was the mastermind behind this. What was more terrifying than the enemy was the highest echelons of their own army stabbing them in the back.
Rolls clutched his head and shouted.
“We’re finished! If it was just the company commander we could try for a court-martial, but if a Knight Commander is colluding with the Empire, that means the entire upper command is rotten!!”
The agitated Rolls and the despairing squad members all turned their eyes to Tae-oh at once. There was nowhere left to return to. In front of them were the Empire and magic beasts. Behind them stood a Knight Commander who had sold them out.
But Tae-oh calmly picked up the ledger from the ground and brushed the dust off it. Far from being angry, a smile slowly spread across his face.
Oh, fuck. This is the story I know.
It was an original plot from the romance-fantasy novel that hadn’t existed in the game. It had only been mentioned in a few short sentences, but Tae-oh remembered the contents clearly.
– After exposing the Knight Commander’s corruption, Commander Carlo was recognized for his achievement and rose to become a key talent in the Rose-rion Kingdom. He would later receive an even higher title, gaining enough influence to stand before the Empire’s Crown Prince.
It was a short passage, but it meant only one thing.
Carlo! That company commander is our lifeline!
Without realizing it, Tae-oh let out a sly laugh.
“Kuhuhuhuhuhuhu…!!”
Rolls stared at him in disbelief.
“What the hell is wrong with that guy? Has he finally lost it?”