Chapter 252
Chapter 252
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Translator: penny
Chapter: 251
Chapter Title: Geumnang's Resolve
-----------------------------------------------------------------
He was always the type to be content with whatever situation he was given.
From a young age, he'd been quick on the uptake and adapted easily anywhere. When something went wrong, he looked for the reason within himself rather than blaming others, so even the owner of the gladiator arena, Baron Tain, had taken a liking to him.
He had no idea that his current situation was abnormal. Everything had been decided from the moment he was born, so he couldn't even harbor any doubts.
Yes, he wasn't the type to complain about the hand he was dealt.
Not even about his carelessly given name, "Smashed Sack," or the grueling 18 hours of labor each day, or watching his fellow workers die in the factory due to inadequate safety measures—he just pitied their misfortune.
But then he entered the game, Blade & Magic.
And he encountered the lingering shadows of [Players] living in another world.
That's when he realized it.
That he—and all of them—were slaves.
[Welcome to the Grand Rift.]
He entered the field. Geumnang dumped all his level 1 stats into Strength and Vitality, picked the beginner's greatsword, and set off from the fountain.
A tackle came right away.
Construction Company Lady: Dude, you're not putting any points into Agility? You'll get killed by minions, not even champions.
Digimon Kaiser: No Vitality either...
Prism: Can I report this guy?
Geumnang quickly posted in the all-chat. Getting [ganked] early in the game could spell disaster. Even winnable fights could turn sour.
Geumnang: Brothers! Don't judge too soon—trust me once! Every match is life or death! Serious gamer Geumnang here! Check my match history if you're skeptical!
Construction Company Lady: Loss win loss win win? That's not normal?
Geumnang: Bad teammates! Look at my KDA. I never die and carry the team's damage!
Digimon Kaiser: Whoa, you really don't die. 7/0/16, 1/0/8...
Construction Company Lady: No deaths even in losses? How do you play like that without any Agility or Vitality? Does that even make sense?
Prism: Wait, last game too... one before... three before... never died? No deaths in the last 10 games? How is that possible? Win rate isn't even that high.
Digimon Kaiser: Wow, unique. Someone this unique should have a recognizable ID at least.
Construction Company Lady: Geumnang... Geumnang... What is that? Never seen it before.
As his teammates grew puzzled, Geumnang gave a wry smile.
'Of course you'd never have seen it. I'm not on the real rankings.'
His world, Blade & Magic, was divided into two realms.
One was the Summoner's world: [Elderium].
Elderium, with its setting of thin dimensional barriers allowing easy summons of monsters, heroes, weapons, and more, was a place to fight and grow by calling forth all sorts of beings.
Naturally, it wasn't a real existing world. It was just the backdrop for Blade & Magic!
'In Elderium, they just think of me as some guy who fell from another realm.'
But the other world made such misconceptions impossible.
[Eternal Battlefield]
Composed of the Grand Rift and four other battlegrounds, it shared Elderium's lore but... strictly speaking, it wasn't Elderium.
It was the game Blade & Magic itself.
Those who entered the Eternal Battlefield weren't Elderium champions or summons—they were real-world [Players].
'Not the real ones, though.'
Sadly, he couldn't build friendships or bonds with them.
The players he met in the Eternal Battlefield weren't true players; they were mere lingering shadows mimicking real-world players.
Even if he made friends or enemies and they remembered his name in-game... they'd forget Geumnang the next time they met.
[First Blood!]
Geumnang gritted his teeth and focused on his lane. He killed the minions and took the champion who dove in.
He didn't even stop at the fountain shop. He stuck to his lane doggedly, pumping only Strength and Vitality with each level-up. The extra Vitality gave him staying power in lane, while the raw Strength delivered damage to shred enemies.
[Double Kill!]
With his abnormally low Agility, he couldn't even sense enemy attacks. His paper-thin health pool meant a single hit would put him on death's door.
'Here it comes.'
But he didn't get hit. He could foresee his death—or any worst-case scenario.
Pop!
The instant he envisioned his head splitting open, he tensed his big toe and flung himself down like a falling tree. The sword whistled past his cheek, slammed into the ground, and he slashed the enemy's exposed shoulder in the opening.
"Ah! Shit! How do you dodge even one hit? That wasn't even fancy footwork!"
He ignored the enemy's shout.
He just focused on the flow of sword strikes and the back-and-forth of combat.
'Here it comes...'
[Geumnang has slain Hyacinth!]
'Here it comes...!'
The fight was going smoothly.
But right when victory was in sight...
Prism: Huh? Geumnang, Gold rank if you win this one?
An ominous chat popped up. Geumnang steadied his dizzying mind and replied.
Geumnang: Yes! Doing my best, brothers!
Prism: Ah, can't make Gold too easy...
"No, what the hell..."
Geumnang, buying Ironblood Greatsword and Berserker's Boots at the fountain shop, cursed involuntarily.
But he forced himself to calm down and typed.
Geumnang: It was a real struggle to get here. Brothers! Grinding my teeth and giving it everything!
Prism: Pfft, no deaths in 10 games. You'll think you're just that good.
Geumnang: No way! Got lucky! Great teammates this time too! Please carry me to Gold!
Even after Geumnang's polite plea, the chat went silent.
He returned to lane, praying.
"Please... please..."
And then.
Prism: Sigh.
With that final word.
Prism charged across the Eternal Battlefield. Died, died, and died again.
Digimon Kaiser: What a psycho, suddenly rage-quitting like that.
Construction Company Lady: Talked about reporting, turns out he's the report king. Fucker.
The team rained abuse, but Prism ignored it and kept dying. With each death, the enemies' stats climbed, their gear upgraded.
Geumnang gritted his teeth and tried to push through, but past a certain point, the enemies' specs skyrocketed. So much so that he could literally see [Death] coming the moment they engaged!
And the result.
[Defeat.]
[Promotion match failed.]
[Silver 0 -> Silver 1]
"...Log out."
Geumnang returned to his world, the Millian Continent. His comrades didn't know, but in the greater universe, it was the Pharaoh Planet of the Clock Galaxy's Pharaoh System.
"Ah, damn it. Wanted to hit Gold before work."
He sighed deeply. The last player's trolling was the biggest issue, but obsessing over uncontrollable variables was pointless.
'My skill's the real problem anyway.'
Blade & Magic was a pure skill game. Everyone started with the same stats, but skill varied wildly.
Even with identical specs, a master could crush multiple foes.
If he could truly carry 2v1 or 3v1, one troll wouldn't matter much.
'And not dying is the problem. Earlier... even with one throwing, there were moments we could've won if I'd gone all-in.'
AOS games like Blade & Magic were designed around player deaths—sometimes you had to die for the team. But Geumnang always had to bail.
For him, death was the end of everything.
He couldn't play sacrificially like other players.
Without the Sentinel class trait Han Jaeyeon had passed him, [Empire's Watcher], he couldn't even hold lane and would've been stuck in Bronze.
"Captain. It's time."
An elf warrior entered. At Cheongik's words, Geumnang stepped outside.
"Is that... the Liberation Legion captain?"
"Is he really the savior? Looks like an ordinary guy..."
"Cough! Cough! Can he really stop the disaster?"
"Impossible. How could a mere human..."
"Don't care, just give food... You promised..."
Outside, hundreds had gathered. But none looked normal.
Most wore rags, over half staggered unable to stand properly. Many had bald patches, some vomited everywhere. Bodies wasted away, wounds bled freely.
'Pathetic...'
Even on Pharaoh Planet, where dwarves dominated and enslaved all other races, monsters appeared.
Low-grade ones matched wild beasts; high-grade rivaled the continent's rarest master-level fighters!
Dwarf empires and kingdoms armed to the teeth couldn't stand against that monstrous calamity.
Hundreds of millions dead, dozens, hundreds of nations crumbled. The monster hordes didn't just get culled—they multiplied daily, driving even arrogant dwarf realms to terrified madness.
In the end, they resorted to their last measure: nukes.
The blast zones? Abandoned lands or the weakest dwarf kingdoms.
"...Let's begin."
He declared, then whispered softly.
"Champion loading. Mana Ravager. Kelga."
Wooong—!
In an instant, a man's form overlaid his body, and potent mana surged from Geumnang. The spell Merlin gifted him efficiently digested and utilized external energy, but for semi-permanent use, he had to feed it mana startup each time.
"Activate."
Ching!
A 10-meter-wide holographic magic circle bloomed above Geumnang's head. Ultimate magic beyond what his now-5th class knowledge could grasp.
[Disaster Devourer.]
Wooong—!
A massive wave radiated outward. The vibration sweeping their bodies made refugees and patients flinch.
And then.
Wooo—!
Tiny particles rushed in—from nearby people to kilometers away.
Widespread radiation converged, triggering Cherenkov radiation in blue glow. But Disaster Devourer's power trapped it in the force field, unable to escape.
Beep-beep! Beep-beep!
Dwarf refugees with Geiger counters cried out in shock.
"O-oh my god... The readings are dropping. For real."
"How is this possible..."
"Physically possible?"
Merlin's two ultimate spells gifted to Geumnang: one absorbed and devoured ambient radiation—Disaster Devourer.
The other fused that radiation with graphite into semi-permanent batteries: [Diamond Battery—True Final 2].
Geumnang took a deep breath and commanded his lined-up legionaries behind him.
"Alright, now hand out the bread."
"Yes, Legion Captain! Magic bread production!"
"Magic bread production!"
"Magic bread production!"
The Liberation Legion [Players] who followed Geumnang activated purchased mana coin spells. Nearby grass, trees, even animal and human corpses disintegrated, reforming into steaming hot bread.
That wasn't all.
"Cure!"
"Cure!"
"Cure!"
Recovery spells poured onto the gravely ill. Patients dying from radiation poisoning opened their eyes.
"Oooh! God... Savior!"
"Long live Liberation Legion Captain! Eternal Legion...!"
The crowd marveled at the miracle, but Geumnang just waved casually and moved on. First time for them, but he'd done it over ten times already.
"Hoo..."
Exhaustion wracked him. He'd drained his mana to the limit.
'That's why I wanted Gold rank.'
"Savior! Savior Geumnang!"
"Great hero! Divine being!"
"Liberation Legion Captain!"
The people began praising him. Refugees clinging to a speck of hope, witnessing this miracle—what else would they think?
But Geumnang smiled bitterly.
'Divine being, huh.'
He knew better.
'Frog in a well.'
Having seen all sorts of players in Blade & Magic—and especially Han Jaeyeon and Merlin—he knew the vastness of the great universe and the transcendents who roamed it.
"Hm?"
Something arrived in his [channel]. He blinked, materializing it into reality.
A single card deck.
Text scrawled atop it.
[You got picked as beta tester. Get stronger quick. - Merlin]
"Haha."
Geumnang, whose expression had been heavy, laughed foolishly. He looked up at the sky—and the universe beyond.
"Yeah. Gotta get stronger."
His eyes gleamed with firm resolve.
"Definitely."
It happened around the midpoint of the 14-night, 15-day journey—Re연's fervent intensity.