137 - Crowds Swarm Superstar Nami's Private Room in World of Arceria
In front of Superstar Nami's private room in World of Arceria, a massive crowd had gathered. Bigger than the controversy over her age was the bombshell that had finally dropped: how the hell had she brought an NPC out of the game?
When you cleared the world, your companion NPCs stayed behind in the peaceful realm of World of Arceria. If you missed them while playing other games, you could always drop into story mode for some interaction anytime. The residents of Arceria were renowned for their exceptional emotional depth—praised as perfect software candidates for future emotional robots. And now, one of them had broken free from the game.
The stream remained silent as ever. So a handful of viewers logged into 'VR Space,' pinned Nami's private room coordinates, and waited.
"Nami, open the door!"
"Is Adella really in there?"
"Didn't you watch the stream? It was definitely her!"
"Nami, explain yourself! Explain! Explain! Explain!"
The cleared open world's ownership belonged to each player. But could dragging an NPC into your personal VR Space really be called intellectual property infringement? The masses had no time for such complicated thoughts.
The World of Arceria gallery wasn't just a Korean thing. Not when Dawn Cat Adella was alive and kicking right here in the flesh.
[▶Private Mode – OFF]
[▶Communication Mode – ON]
Soon, blue grass sprouted across the blank white field. Fences rose to mark the boundaries, and the transparent house took solid form. The moment everyone had been waiting for—the door to swing open—the first to emerge was a girl who looked barely old enough to be out alone.
"How many people is this?"
Nami squinted with one eye, roughly counting the crowd that had shown up at her doorstep. At least five hundred, and with more streaming in from behind, it had to be thousands by now. Despite the throng, a heavy silence hung in the air. No one dared speak first.
Just as it started feeling eerie, another girl in a fluttering black cloak stepped into the light.
"Whoaaaaaaaa!"
"Holy shit, it's really Adella!"
A thunderous roar erupted.
"Adella! Adella! Adella! Adella! Adella!"
One fan shouted her name loud and clear. Others joined in, high and low voices blending into an echoing chant that filled the space.
Adella found the whole scene utterly bewildering.
"Wh-what... the hell...?"
She instinctively backed away, but Nami gave her a light shove forward.
"Your fans."
"I have fans? Why?!"
Adella flushed beet red with genuine embarrassment, and Nami couldn't help but smirk.
"Because you were, without a doubt, the most outstanding person in the world of Arceria."
Adella's brow furrowed slightly. Even if her world had been a fake riddled with illusions, she knew plenty of people far superior to her. But the chants of "Adella" showed no sign of stopping.
"Still can't believe it?"
Nami took her hand and led her toward the crowd. Adella's head swiveled left and right nonstop, her long eyelashes trembling pitifully.
In the meantime, Nami randomly pulled one viewer inside the fence. It turned into an impromptu interview.
"Name?"
"Uh... um! Easton Merlin. Just call me Merlin!"
"Got it, Merlin. Mind a quick interview? In your opinion, why do you think 'Adella' from World of Arceria became so beloved?"
Adella's heart sank at the question. She was, in a way, the character furthest from love. Abandoned by her observatory mother, unrecognized by her academy father. No friends until she turned eighteen, her life filled with betrayal and solitude.
Just as she was about to ask Nami to drop it, Merlin stroked his chin thoughtfully and spoke.
"Actually, I'd like to ask the opposite: what reason could there possibly be for Adella not to be the most captivating character in WoA?"
Nami beamed with satisfaction. Adella's drooping head slowly lifted.
"World of Arceria is packaged as a tale of dreams and hope, but dig deeper, and it's a dystopia like no other. Every character moves with their own greed and convictions, throwing trial after trial at us players."
Merlin's eyes met Adella's. She flinched at his warm smile.
"But I think Adella's dream shines bright and beautiful. Even in that dark reality, she never lost it, always giving her all to her duties."
She'd just been clumsy and overeager. Despite failing countless missions in the Abyss, she'd always gotten back up.
"Those who didn't truly understand her value just trashed her, but in the end, her true worth shone through in that noble sacrifice no one saw coming."
The crowd's chatter faded as the serious interview continued.
"No situation has ever handed full agency to an NPC like this. If Adella had taken Nami's body, she could've achieved her dream. But she didn't. Because what she truly wanted wasn't money or fame—it was recognition from her comrades."
Nami leaned close to the quietly trembling Adella and whispered, you okay? She nodded faintly, lips pressed tight.
Confirming the girls were fine, Merlin wrapped up.
"Sure, there are plenty of NPCs with killer skills and stats. But remember World of Arceria's catchphrase?"
Purity, exploration, and in the end... may what remains be camaraderie.
Not just Nami—many in the crowd nodded.
"Ultimately, Adella embodied 'comradeship' more perfectly than anyone. It's a heroic virtue ordinary folks can't have, so she deserves all this praise. Adella, you're the best!"
"Whoaaaaaaaa!"
"I love you, Adella!"
"You were so cool taking down Asmodeus!"
"You're too pretty, Adella!"
Whistles and wordless cheers battered the cat girl's ears. Merlin slipped back outside the fence and waved along with the rest. To the statue-still Adella, Nami said casually,
"They all cheered for us with one heart to save you. Because you're worth it."
"I... I..."
Adella's voice was hoarse. The unfamiliar sensation surging through her must've been dizziness.
"If you want, I can send you back to your world. You'd be the hero who slew the demon lord, showered with riches and titles from the empire."
That was the right of any NPC after clearing the game.
"You'd sleep in the capital's finest inn, eat whatever you crave. The whole world would be yours."
But Adella, barely furrowing her brow as if the outcome was decided, shook her head vigorously.
Still, out of courtesy, she asked,
"What if I said I wanted to stay here?"
"You'd get to meet your legion of fans in this world. Sure, it's virtual reality with real stakes, so you'd be crashing in this 'cramped room' for now."
"Sis, you really hold grudges...!"
Adella wiped her tears and grinned brightly.
"But getting a real body in the physical world will take time. I can't freely use golem magic like before, but I'll do my best."
"Feels like living here right now would be pretty great."
Her legs started moving on their own. The thousands who'd come to see Adella now encircled the fence completely. Taking them all in, her chest swelled strangely.
"Somehow... this place feels like it'd be a blast."
"VR Space is a fun world."
"Can I head out now?"
"Hold on—just gotta set your name first."
Please enter a nickname.
"So, what's our cat beastkin girl's name?"
Nami teased playfully while fiddling with the interface. Adella beamed back.
"My name is Adella. Adella, the Dawn Cat!"
The name she'd protected through seventeen regressions. Nami's verdict on this first AI to live in a new world:
"No idea who named you, but it's a shitty name."
"Sis!"
[▶Would you like to log into World of Arceria?]
[May the blessing of the World Tree be upon you.]
While Adella was off having a blast, I logged back into the game right away to check my inventory.
◈ A fragment of Mephistopheles scattered in the Fog of Death. No curses detected in the fog.
[Cast: Appraisal]
It was a worthless trinket given as spoils for clearing the final boss. My admin privileges unfortunately vanished on logout, but appraising it seemed fine.
The familiar ten-line item code scrolled by. Short, since it had no special powers.
But the file showed as 57,344 bytes—opening it revealed 57,345 bytes of data. One extra byte in the middle.
Could I peek at the most recently added info? Yep.
> search: 4
"So that's how it works. That's why it kept telling me to beat Mephisto over and over."
A message broadcast to the masses. And Mephistopheles as an object mostly spawned in Challenger ranks or higher.
Looks like my World of Arceria streams were gonna drag on way longer than I'd thought.