A Hard Way to Earn a Living
I was out of money.
The cash and T-money card allowance I had received when I first joined Sprout had finally run dry.
Honestly, money hadn't been all that necessary on the Internet.
There was no need for food, clothing, or shelter; the only expenses were transit fares or occasional entry fees.
Since Sprout had handed me a few tens of thousands of won as an allowance, I hadn't given finances a single thought.
"The day has finally come..."
"Fufu..."
"Heh, heh, heh..."
Inside the Sprout guild office.
At my announcement that I was broke, Yoo Hyeyeon, Kang Yeolchan, and Daenyang, who were sitting on the sofa, let out low chuckles.
Yoo Hyeyeon spoke up.
"Mr. Yoon Juhyuk, first of all, let me make one thing clear. To operate on the Internet, a Player must earn their own keep."
"Huh?"
"Our Sprout guild provides an initial allowance when you join. Honestly, very few guilds are as generous as we are. Usually, newcomers are taught how to make money on the Internet right off the bat."
"Do we... have to make money on the Internet too?"
"Of course," Yoo Hyeyeon said, crossing her stocking-clad legs. Her short hair swayed slightly. "The Internet is ultimately just a mimicry of society, after all. To live in a society, you need money."
"Hyeong-nim, you can technically operate without earning money. You'd just have to walk everywhere instead of using transit. But if you do that, you won't be able to keep up with the routes, which means you won't be able to enter the Event Zones."
"Believe it or not, we're all earning our keep too," Daenyang added.
Kang Yeolchan and Daenyang both chimed in.
"How do you all make your money?"
Yoo Hyeyeon was the first to answer.
"The flower shop on the first floor is my store. I get some income from that... and I lease out the second and third floors of this building. The rent from those is my main source of income."
"I go work at construction sites whenever I have free time! It's straightforward, and since my avatar can handle any physical labor with ease, it's easy money!" Kang Yeolchan added.
Finally, I turned to Daenyang. "What about you, Mr. Daenyang...?"
Daenyang squeezed out a brief, strained reply. "Stocks..."
I didn't ask any further. I simply learned that day that even a tiger could look like it was on the verge of tears.
"Then what kind of work should I do?"
"Honestly, we don't need a fortune. Just any part-time job will do."
Yoo Hyeyeon tapped on her phone, and a website link was sent to mine. It was a job-matching website for part-time gigs.
"You could do manual labor like Yeolchan... or delivery gigs are actually quite good. You can work whenever you want, and you set your own hours. As for a vehicle, you can just use the bike I gave you last time..."
The motorcycle I had received during the relic retrieval mission was currently parked at a bike shop a block away from the office. Come to think of it, the guild leader had dressed me up in a full deliveryman outfit back then, claiming it was a free pass to go anywhere. Was she planning ahead for this exact moment?
"If all else fails, you could always try pickpocketing," Daenyang suggested. "It's not reality anyway, so mugging or stealing to get by is perfectly fine. However, there are many things you need to be careful about if you go that route."
"If you cross the line, the police will come after you, Hyeong-nim." Kang Yeolchan showed me his phone screen. It was a wanted poster issued by the Internet police.
"It's one thing if they just show up. But if you keep doing it, they'll use CCTV footage or eyewitness testimonies to generate a sketch or a photo, which will then be distributed on wanted flyers. Once that happens, the police will recognize you and close in the moment you walk past them."
"It basically makes operating on the Internet impossible. I wouldn't recommend it."
"How about begging?" Daenyang offered.
Yoo Hyeyeon and Kang Yeolchan both chimed in, agreeing that it was a great idea.
"I've heard begging actually brings in a lot of money!"
"He's not with us anymore, but... the S-class Player, Wan Dalho, also made his money through begging."
I recalled the old man who could manipulate the environment. He had indeed dressed in shabby, homeless-looking clothes. I had assumed it was just a concept, but was it actually a fashion choice focused entirely on practicality?
Yoo Hyeyeon said, "I heard that if you just put a hat in front of you and lie down for a nap, you'll wake up to tens of thousands of won piled up. He told me he made far more than I'd ever expect..."
"And since Juhyuk's avatar fits the look perfectly, inheriting Wan Dalho's old spot might be a solid option."
"Oh, that's a wonderful idea." Yoo Hyeyeon clapped her hands in agreement with Daenyang's suggestion.
Clearing her throat, Yoo Hyeyeon spoke. "Don't think of it as a chore. Consider it part of the process of a Player getting accustomed to the Internet. You learned this when you were getting certified, right? The ability to adapt to the Internet world is crucial."
"Understood." I nodded.
What was so hard about making money? I was an employee of the great Maetan, having completed a grueling two-year internship, and now held a position responsible for tens of thousands of employees.
A simple part-time job should be a breeze given my career history.
...Or so I had thought.
"This isn't easy."
Sitting at an outdoor table in front of Chungmuro Station, I stared at the phone in my hand.
I had applied to several part-time jobs through the website Yoo Hyeyeon had recommended.
Restaurant serving, cleaning, kitchen assistance—you name it.
Yet, I hadn't passed a single interview.
The short, blonde girl sitting across from me spoke up. "With your looks, Uncle..."
"What's wrong with my looks? Besides, you shouldn't judge a book by its cover."
But CC's point was valid.
I hadn't expected lookism to be this rampant even in the virtual world of the Internet.
Serving was one thing, but why on earth did they care about looks for cleaning or kitchen duty?
CC said, "Why don't you take this opportunity to change your avatar?"
"My avatar?"
"Yeah. I'm the one handling the calculations anyway. You could use your default avatar, which is your real-world self, or buy a new one from Intra-Maetan. As long as I'm managing the processing, it doesn't matter how complex or realistic the avatar is."
Unfortunately, buying a new avatar was out of the question.
My Maetan Points were currently frozen at a cap of 500,000.
It was hard to buy a decent avatar with only 500,000 points.
"Then at least use your default avatar. Your real face is decent enough, so with just a bit of touching up, it'll look fine." CC urged me eagerly.
But I wasn't particularly keen on the idea.
"I'm going to keep using the Goblin avatar."
"Huh? Why are you being so stubborn?"
"It's not just stubbornness. First of all, I want to conserve your processing power as much as possible. Just like when we fought F at the Monolith Gate, there might come an unexpected moment where we need your absolute maximum performance. I don't want to place unnecessary strain on you with a high-end avatar."
CC stared at me, looking quite surprised.
"And we also have to prepare for the possibility of you suddenly being gone. Right now, thanks to you, I'm maintaining a D-grade computation rank. But if we're separated for any reason, I'll drop back down to E-grade. That's a rank where even rendering my default avatar is a struggle. To avoid raising suspicion and keep acting normal if that happens, I need to stick with the Goblin avatar."
The Goblin avatar had the lowest processing requirements of any humanoid avatar in Maetan.
This was because it left as many unseen parts unrendered as possible.
There were no feet inside the shoes—the shoes themselves were the feet—and nothing was rendered beneath the clothes. The Goblin avatar was the epitome of cutting corners.
However, that was only the case in Intra-Maetan.
Once we entered the Internet, some kind of correction seemed to apply; the moment I took off my shoes, feet materialized, and the moment I took off my pants, my lower half appeared.
I had witnessed this firsthand at the Dogok-dong apartment.
"Then what are you going to do? You can't even land a part-time job..."
With a Goblin's stamina, manual labor was out of the question.
While using the Duoesini's Ring granted me immense strength, the body's inherent durability was so low that working all day was impossible.
...Was begging really my only option?
I scrolled down my phone, searching for other listings.
"Oh, this looks decent."
"Let me see."
"A clinical trial for a new drug...? It says anyone in good health is eligible. All you have to do is take the medicine, sleep, and wake up. And the pay is a whopping 150,000 won a day."
150,000 won was the exact same amount as the initial support fund I had received from Sprout.
CC gave me a strange look.
"Well... I suppose it wouldn't hurt to try it once..."
"You agree, right? Great. Let's go!"
CC dissolved into particles of light and vanished.
If CC kept her avatar active, our bus fare would double.
"The location is a bit far, though... Paju...? Where on earth is that...?"
I transferred buses several times as I headed toward the job site.
The T-money card I had borrowed from Kang Yeolchan and loaded with 10,000 won was already on the verge of running out.
If I got rejected from this job too, I might have to walk all the way back.
When I called to confirm my application from the bus, the coordinator welcomed me warmly and urged me to arrive as quickly as possible.
He mentioned that the others had already started, but if I hurried, I could still make it.
I spent nearly two hours transferring between buses and subways, heading toward Unjeong Station in Paju.
Upon arriving and stepping outside the station, a short, stout man with cropped hair got out of a van parked nearby and approached me.
"Are you here for the clinical trial gig?"
"Yes, that's me."
"Ah, you must have had a long trip. Get in, quick. Let's get there before it gets dark."
Inside the van, two other young men who had applied for the same job were already waiting.
The short-haired man sitting in the passenger seat spoke up. "By the way, none of you have any health issues, right? Clinical trials are strictly for healthy people."
"None."
My avatar was a bit frail, but it didn't have any illnesses.
"No medications or topical treatments either?"
"None."
Several other questions followed. Any chronic conditions? Any hereditary diseases in the family? We repeated "none" like a flock of parrots.
Just as the urban scenery began to give way to rural mountain roads, the man in the passenger seat handed us purple cans of soda.
Crack!
The sound of tabs popping echoed through the vehicle.
"You all worked hard to get here, so have a drink. Have it while it's cold."
It was a grape-flavored carbonated drink, but it tasted unlike anything I had ever had before.
I gazed out the window, pondering what I should buy first once I got paid.
And then, I fell asleep.
Uncle, wake up! Uncle!!
A faint light filtered through my closed eyelids.
In the darkness, CC's messages filled my vision.
"...CC?"
You're finally awake. Open your eyes and look around.
I tried to sit up, but my body wouldn't budge.
With great effort, I forced my eyes open and turned my head.
A pitch-black room.
Layers of plastic sheeting lined the floor and walls.
On a stainless steel table lay a man, completely naked and asleep.
I was stripped bare as well.
A black marker line was drawn across my abdomen.
Get a grip! You're going to die at this rate.
"My... body won't move."
What on earth did they put in that drink to make you this groggy...?
BZZZT!
A sensation like an electric current coursing through my entire body jolted me.
It wasn't the sensation of the Goblin body.
It was the physical sensation of my real-world body.
But thanks to that, my brain finally began to clear.
"Ugh...!"
I forced myself upright.
Standing before me was a man staring back in sheer panic.
He wore a white lab coat stained heavily with blood.
In front of him lay one of the naked young men. A scalpel had clearly just been used, as a long, red line of blood was pooling across the youth's abdomen.
They're organ harvesters.
"You... bastards... How dare you try to take my organs..."
I slid off the metal table.
Wake up first!
SMACK!
I slapped myself hard across the face.
My senses finally snapped into focus.
The men, armed with various weapons, quickly surrounded me.
"Unbelievable..."
I reached over to the tray beside my stainless steel table and snatched a scalpel.
"Making a living is tough."
The men lunged at me all at once.