Chapter 5
Chapter 5
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 4
Chapter Title: Discharge Day
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* * *
"Loyalty! Sergeant Han Jaeyeon has been ordered to discharge as of August 3, 2089. Reporting accordingly. Loyalty!"
"Yeah. So our mad dog is finally getting out? Things are gonna be boring from now on. But you made my military life one hell of a show."
Major General Shin Donggyu (True), the 2nd Army Space Infantry Training Commander, chuckled around his cigarette. I bowed my head deeply.
"Thank you for everything up until now."
At my words, Major General Shin Donggyu paused for a moment before nodding.
"...Yeah. I heard you finally started acting human toward the end. Not sure how long it'll last, but it looks good. After all the hell you put me through, you better turn into a new man. That way, I can feel some pride in this brutal military life. Oh, by the way, I heard from the infirmary that you got hit with some kind of curse or whatever. What's that about?"
I gave him the prepared answer to Major General Shin Donggyu's question.
"I'm not sure if it was a curse or what... but it's fine now. No need to worry."
"Tch. Even if it looks okay, go straight to a hospital and get checked. That quack specializes in healing magic and couldn't detect it, but a capital comprehensive hospital will spot it for sure."
With that, Major General Shin Donggyu opened a drawer and pulled out my pre-prepared discharge certificate.
Then he tossed it into the air with a flick.
"Hey~ meow!"
A cat—I assumed it had been under the desk—leaped up and snatched the discharge certificate in its mouth before landing in front of me. The brown cat's eyes sparkled like jewels as it looked up at me.
"...Commander?"
"When you're in a position like this, all sorts of gifts come your way. I don't need it, so take care of it."
"But this is the latest model... Doesn't it cost like 4 million won?"
2080. About ten years ago, several innovative core technologies were declassified to the private sector. If you had a teleport terminal, you could receive teleport-based [delivery] anywhere via [Portable Teleport]. [Energy Network] allowed continuous energy supply from afar. And [Magic Store] let you buy magic without strain if you were on the infrastructure.
At first, these were household furniture-sized devices. But as the tech settled in, people started thinking.
'Could we use these features individually?'
People even wanted them in smartphones, but it was impossible. No matter how advanced the tech got, they required over 8 kilograms and nearly desktop volumes. Early adopters carried them in bags, but they were cumbersome and heavy, so they didn't catch on widely.
But people found a way eventually.
If smartphones were too heavy and bulky to carry, what if the smartphone followed its owner on its own?
The result was this: integration with smart pets.
This thing looked like a real cat, but it wasn't alive. It was an artificial lifeform powered by rare metals, enchantments, and cutting-edge components.
'I heard these are trending lately, but I didn't expect to get one as a gift.'
Caught off guard by the unexpected situation, Major General Shin Donggyu snapped his fingers.
Whing!
The smartphone on the bookshelf flew into Major General Shin Donggyu's hand. He fiddled with it.
And then.
"Meow! Meow! Meow! Meow!"
"Uh, Commander. This guy's crying..."
"Ah, you country bumpkin. No sense at all. It's the ringtone. I called, so press its nose to answer. Once you register the device name, you can even take calls by voice command."
As he said, I pressed the cat's nose.
The cat looked at me and spoke. Its voice was a clear woman's, as if the meowing had been a lie.
"Call from discharged mage Major General Shin Donggyu. Beep! Can you hear me? It's my number, so save it."
Speaking in Major General Shin Donggyu's voice, the cat lightly pushed off the ground and leaped, hovering right at face level as if someone were holding it.
1st-class basic magic, Fixing.
It curled up round like it was flopping belly-up on the floor, and its belly turned into a display showing the contacts.
'Amazing.'
From here, it was like any smartphone, so I manipulated the screen to save the number. Watching me, Major General Shin Donggyu spoke up.
"The world changed a lot in the three years of your service. You were a real pain in the ass who tired me out... which is exactly why I'm worried."
Major General Shin Donggyu looked at me and clicked his tongue. His eyes, which had always scolded and even beaten me, were filled with concern.
"Society doesn't give breaks or chances like the military. People bitch about how shitty military life is, but for those without connections, society is the real shit. At least you seem to have your head on straight now... If things get totally hopeless, call me. I'll hook you up with a job at least."
"..."
I gazed at Major General Shin Donggyu puffing on his cigarette.
Back then—about twenty years ago in my perception—I despised him as an irredeemable old fart. But the man I saw now was completely different. Only a day had passed on Earth, so he hadn't changed.
'Oh, I was the irredeemable bastard.'
"What're you staring at? I'm done talking. Get out."
I bowed deeply to Major General Shin Donggyu, who furrowed his brow amid the cigarette smoke.
"Really... thank you."
His eyes widened for a split second, then curved into half-moons.
"You punk. Yeah. Congrats on your discharge."
It was August 3, 2089.
The day I finally ended my military service and stepped into society.
* * *
In the unmanned taxi, I tapped the belly of the brown cat sitting on my thigh, belly exposed.
Of course, not playing with a pet—I was registering the smart pet.
"Alright. Your name's Cheddar."
"Please state the device name again."
I answered the cat's clear woman's voice.
"Cheddar."
"Registered."
I registered my DNA and ether pattern, downloaded the apps. First things first, I needed a place to live. Location: Seoul. With warp gates and teleports erasing distance barriers, capital region real estate had crashed, but it was still holy ground.
A place in Seoul near Gwanghwamun Square cost a fortune even for a studio.
'But living in Seoul once was my dream.'
I used over half of the 80 million won I'd saved during three years of service to buy a studio.
The place was under 10 pyeong, cramped as hell, but for a loner basically estranged from his parents, it didn't matter.
I tapped Cheddar's belly to start searching.
Ardenia Continent.
Killians Mountains.
Baron Han of the Bronze Sword.
Results came up fast.
-One Stat Changes Your Life!-
-Starting a Real War. Revenge!-
-Revenge. The Beginning and the End.-
"Ha. Fucking hell."
It was an online game.
Playable via VR headset or PC, but mostly on mobile.
"And it's blowing up."
Revenge was the world's number one game by revenue.
Peak daily revenue: 92 billion.
Average daily: 11 billion.
Average spend per user: 2.8 million won.
It propelled developer Nemesis Soft into the global top 10 companies—a massive hit.
But netizens' reviews weren't great.
-Shit game. Wait, no, it prints money, so not shit. Trash game.
-Avg spend per user? 2.8 mil ㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋ insane? My salary's under 3 mil ㅋㅋㅋ
-So many free-to-play users, yet avg 2.8 mil? ㅋㅋㅋ How much are the whales dropping?
-This crap's held #1 for 10 years straight, so every new game rips it off to suck pockets dry --+
-Lol but Revenge does rake in cash.
-To make money ㅋㅋㅋ you gotta ㅋㅋㅋ work ㅋㅋㅋㅋ
-Student ^^ Take it down ^^
I'd heard the name Revenge so often it was drilled into my head. That's how big it was.
But I'd never played.
Because Revenge was a textbook pay-to-win game.
"Didn't play it, so no wonder I didn't know the place names."
I'd often thought it was weird.
A continent shaped like a go board?
Rivers and mountains drawn in straight lines—unnatural to anyone. And Ardenia Continent's common tongue was Korean, script Hangul. Yet place names and proper nouns were Western. Totally abnormal.
All signs pointed to one fact.
"A game."
My body felt limp, strength draining away.
"The place I lived in for twenty years was inside a game..."
Twenty years of countless events. Crossing life and death, enduring humiliation to survive, bitter defeats, dramatic victories.
A punk who was a thug in school, NEET in society, and a greenhorn torture officer in the military had become a battle-hardened knight, general, and lord over those decades.
But it all happened in a game world?
"Still... it's a bit different."
Search results showed Ardenia Continent and Killians Mountains, but nothing on Baron Han of the Bronze Sword or his territory. I even pinpointed the location—totally different name.
"So I entered a world that looks exactly like the game."
Assuming that, I picked up Cheddar and installed Revenge. Linked to my PC, the PC version installed too.
If I'd had a headset at home, it'd install there too.
While it installed.
"Log in."
In an instant, the studio vanished, vast sky filling my view. Looking down, a square continent appeared.
19 lines horizontal and vertical.
Each square 100 kilometers—a massive go board.
A world where flowing rivers and soaring mountains served as lines.
"Waaah! Mommy! Mommy, where are you! Waaah!"
"Tinya. Sorry... Daddy's sorry."
"What the hell are those monsters? Where'd they come from?"
"It's the end... Everything's over..."
"Arrrgh! It hurts! It hurts!"
We'd gathered in the training grounds north of the territory. Since I'd only seen this place as a starting point, the sizable grounds easily fit all the territory folk.
No—there was even space and gear to spare.
"Damn it."
Only about a thousand civilians had made it safely to the training grounds. Two-thirds of the population vanished in a blink.
Some might've fled every which way, but after waiting over a day with no shows, more waiting was pointless.
"Gonna be rough."
Outrage surged at the absurd reality, but I couldn't show frustration or despair. Even without the territory, I was still their leader. If I wavered, the territory's two knights, sole mage, and panicked soldiers would crumble.
"Steelstone."
"Yes, my lord."
"Finally got a territory, and now I'm leading these people wandering again. Reminds you of twenty years ago, huh?"
At my words, a faint smile bloomed on Steelstone's stone-like face. Steelstone was the man I'd saved from the nobles' [human hunt] when I first arrived in this world. The only one in his village who'd resisted the nobles—a talented vigilante.
He'd become a bandit running a mountain fort, a mercenary in wars. When I became a baron, he knighted up and stayed by my side.
And now, he was still my comrade at my flank.