Chapter 287
Chapter 287
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Translator: Ryuma
Chapter: 287
Chapter Title: 116. Goal (1)
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One of the perks of having more people around is that your workload lightens up.
Assigning bunkers and guiding new settlers is now someone else's job.
"That's the bathroom over there. The well's that way. Use the electricity from this side for now. We'll get construction started soon."
With a weight off his mind, Cheon Youngjae moved with a noticeably lighter step as he handled the orientation single-handedly.
I wasn't sure if he'd fully committed to my turf or not, but our mutual trust had definitely gone up—that much was certain.
Sure, my tasks inside the bunker had dropped off sharply, but that didn't mean the overall workload had shrunk even a little.
I had another, far more important mission on my plate.
"SKELTON, sir. It's finally here."
Valentine tapped away at the keyboard with cheerful vigor.
The backdoor between Viva! Apocalypse! and the Jeju intranet was finally complete.
Now we could hop between the two sites freely.
"I infected some poorly secured computers with zombie PC malware to widen the breach, and in the process, found a few more PCs linked to other satellite systems. The specs differ from Viva! Apocalypse!, but the principles are the same, so it wasn't hard to hijack them. Even if the source PC at your Jeju safehouse gets powered down, no issues there."
Jeju couldn't stop us now.
"Well, as a last resort, they could shut down the entire intranet. But they handle almost all admin tasks through it, just like pre-war days—think that'll fly? Even if they shut it all down for a full sweep, it doesn't matter. Unless they format every PC, the protocols I've planted will quickly restore our tunnel."
I wiped the sweat beading on my forehead as I listened to Valentine and logged into the Red Archive board proper.
Same interface as before.
"......"
Tap tap tap.
"Huh?"
Valentine, watching from the side, tilted his head.
"Not using your usual nickname?"
"Yeah. Just scouting for now."
"Gotta say, it fits the board's vibe perfectly. 'NoCharge' or whatever—we don't see words like that on ours much."
"True."
Not to brag, but this Park Gyu climbed to named user status on the Red Archive board without breaking a sweat.
Minus scouting hours, I'd spent all my time there, so no one knew the ecosystem better.
But still.
Tap tap.
"......"
My fingers froze.
Which left the input box looking like this:
NoChargeNewbie: Skeleton spawn or quantum bomb spam?
Valentine turned to me, eyeing the unfinished draft before I hit enter.
"......SKELTON, sir?"
Smack smack smack smack.
I hammered backspace to erase the message.
"SKELTON, sir?!"
I sighed and answered his puzzled look.
"Thought it over, and nah, this ain't it."
"Pardon?"
"I mean, yeah, we've opened a path between our board and the Jeju intranet."
"Right."
"But check the post rate here. Insane refresh, right?"
"Active users gotta be over 3,000 easy."
"What's our peak?"
"Around 120, but we dip below 10 plenty of times."
Exactly.
What's the point of a tunnel if we don't have the numbers?
Worse, Red Archive users were spry teens and early twenty-somethings, while ours was a "dad board" averaging 40+, survivors from the early days.
If we could rewind to our Renaissance or PaleNet influx era, we'd have a shot. But now? Our crew looked worn out, energy sapped.
Could this handful of geezers even invade Red Archive?
Wouldn't we just get overrun by their fresh faces instead?
Inflow's good either way, but this backdoor's for my revenge.
Turning the tables on the sparrows who roasted and booted SKELTON—that's why I risked it all to recruit Valentine.
"Can we take that board like this?"
I asked straight.
Valentine, operator of post-war giant PaleNet, answered without hesitation.
"No chance."
"......"
"Sure, 24/7 macros and gross pic spam could annoy them, but that's not conquering a board. Communities run on people, right?"
Bottom line: we needed bodies.
Lots of them.
A figure flashed in my mind—my role model, unyielding even against history's tides.
Fate stirred, a divine mission sense washing over me. I turned to Valentine.
"Valentine."
"Yes, SKELTON, sir."
"For us..."
I proposed.
"How about we build a second PaleNet?"
*
John_nenon's bunker still housed his final legacy: PaleNet, wheezing its last breaths.
But barely clinging on.
"Servers have been unmanageable for ages. Last check, over 75% storage was fried. Natural death, basically. Official cause was comms gear silence, but fixing that wouldn't save it."
PaleNet was dead.
Irrevivable.
Clinging to easy, familiar paths felt lazy even to me.
True paths demand fierce pursuit.
With PaleNet revival off the table, my gaze shifted to our board's roots—the birthplace of the internet, North America.
There, not only ran Viva! Apocalypse! on a massive scale, but they'd birthed a crude yet accessible new community for the masses, like John_nenon's PaleNet.
Necropolis.
I connected to Necropolis with Valentine.
The process was intricate.
We tweaked the Obelisk's satellite signal to mimic standard gear, scanned North American bands for the Necropolis current—a data stream—then latched on.
Success brought staggered text outputs.
Using Viva! Apocalypse!'s standard tools, translation was seamless—no language barriers.
It was sweltering.
I fetched an extra fan to beat the heat, enduring the bunker-cramped blaze from computers and gear, as we peered at the screen together.
...
A world of raw text, no frills.
It evoked old Foxgame titles.
Seemed simple on the surface.
Didn't look like it needed fancy tech.
Valentine disagreed.
He typed messages, scanned others, fired up tools I didn't know to probe the site.
Soon, he shook his head and closed the window.
"Not easy. This."
"No?"
"I couldn't build this."
"This?"
"Looks crude, but it's top-tier North American genius work. Algorithms, concepts, mechanics—nothing I can replicate."
Even that arrogant Melon Mask was tense around it, Valentine said. Necropolis hid far more complexity and advanced tech than it let on.
Seemed P2P—endless peer-to-peer like torrents, per Valentine—but packed eclectic tech no single label fit.
"Necropolis's core is simulating massive server flows without real servers. Like grid computing on steroids—insulting to compare. It's leaped humanity's networking ahead stages!"
Valentine gushed.
Foxgame-tier to me; monumental to him.
"How's it stack against Melon Mask's Viva! Apocalypse!?"
He laughed heartily.
"Tech-wise? Medieval vs. modern. Viva!'s medieval, Necropolis modern. That gap. But Viva! has a beefy main server and sats for a robust net—scales bigger."
"That huge?"
"Say Viva!'s Florida-or-wherever HQ gets hit, servers lost? And those small sats crashing 5% yearly all gone? End times. Necropolis? Eternal. Even if we all die, it'll carry the dead's voices on Earth's magnetosphere forever."
Valentine declared.
"No mind-reading, but Melon Mask? Necropolis scarred him deep. Guaranteed."
The visit ended in awe, despair, and an uncopyable verdict.
But uncloneable didn't mean impossible.
"Can't copy Necropolis, but..."
Deflated briefly, Valentine swigged water from his namesake bottle and grinned.
"Infiltrating Viva! Apocalypse!? That's my wheelhouse."
His new plan: simple.
"Connect to Viva! via generic sat gear, not Obelisk."
Simple not easy.
Viva!'s net was hackable by a John_nenon in years, but sat hardware security and encryption rivaled top gov agencies.
Even cocky Valentine admitted flaws.
"Ah, tricky. Hardware locks are insanely tough."
Good idea, zero feasibility.
Tasting bitter, he fell back on his forte.
"Guess second PaleNet's the way?"
No free lunch there either.
John_nenon ran massive nuclear-powered servers, but fed data via established comms rails to normies.
Scrounge gear for a pseudo-PaleNet? Useless without relaying messages both ways.
"......Sorry. This won't be easy either."
"No worries. You already tunneled Jeju. Just my greed wanting more users."
Population drop was old news, but PaleNet's silence and Legion splinter gutted our already thin ranks further.
Mascot Emgu barely posted beyond "house shaking." Senior Baek Seung-hyeon vanished post-Scrap Island.
Just Foxgame apologies and declining user terror.
Vibe soured; even vets fled Korean board for English.
I, a named anchor, slacked too—no excuses.
I wouldn't admit losing interest.
If I bailed, Viva! Apocalypse! Korean board might truly perish.
Bang!
Gunshot, then Bang Jae-hyuk's cheer.
"Got it! You mangy cat bastard!"
Mangy cat differed from my mental image, but one turf issue down.
Expected, dragging him here.
My worries loomed farther, higher.
Gazing at dusk-shrouded plains, faint lights dotting the vastness, I pondered.
"......"
Could I breathe life into the board like John_nenon?
Tackle near-impossible feats with his immortal will?
Won't be easy.
Really won't.
Heavy-hearted, I returned to my now-cozy dark bunker.
Sat on the central throne, legs crossed, pondering—but no thoughts, no results.
Sighed, plopped at the laptop after ages, eyed the screen.
"Hm?"
A notice. Rare on free boards.
I opened it.
VivaBot.