The First Large-Scale Update

Knights from both armies rode out and reined in at a measured distance.

"Do you dare raise your banners against His Holiness the Pope?!"

The man in the magnificent white armor spoke first.

"Holy Knight Commander, look at what the Holy Church is doing! They are slaughtering the people of the territories!"

Duke Dgon — supreme commander of the allied forces, and the current Emperor — answered him directly.

"How insolent, Duke Dgon!"

The Holy Knight Commander spat the title as if it were an accusation.

"What did you just say?!"

"How dare you address His Majesty that way!"

"Even the Holy Knight Commander has no right to speak to the Emperor like that!"

The allied knights erupted in a single voice.

Duke Dgon was the reigning Emperor of the Holy Royal Empire, and still the Holy Knight Commander called him Duke. He did not even grant him the courtesy of an honorific — this, while Duke Dgon had been treating him with every mark of respect.

"Doun, is the Duke the Emperor?"

Na-eun clearly had not read the background lore for Hero.

"That's right. The Emperor of the Holy Royal Empire is an elected office."

"Elected?"

"Yeah. The lords vote among themselves to choose the Emperor."

"That's kind of amazing..."

"It's because imperial power is so weak."

I gave Na-eun the short version and turned my attention back to the game footage.

The Humiliation of Kasa.

Emperor and Pope had clashed once before. In that earlier age the Pope had deposed the Emperor, and the Emperor — stripped of the nobility's support — had walked barefoot all the way to the Kasa Papal Fief to beg for forgiveness. That was the history the Holy Knight was throwing in his face.

"Holy Knight Commander, you go too far. I gathered these troops not for the sake of imperial power, but for the people of the territories."

The Holy Knight Commander did not even listen. He drew a document from his robes.

"Ah..."

"What's wrong, Doun?"

The situation had just gone very, very bad.

In my previous life I had watched a video called The History of Hero. In that video, the imperial side won the civil war. That much I remembered. What I had not remembered — because the video was so short — was anything about how the war actually unfolded. That gap in my knowledge was about to cost us.

The Emperor had just been deposed in front of the entire army. What came next was obvious, if you thought about it. The command staff — the Emperor, the lords, the knights — might have seen this coming. The rank and file were another matter entirely.

While I was still turning it over, the event cinematic ended.

"Eunhye, Na-eun, get back to your spots. Focus on staying alive. Nothing else."

"Okay!"

"Got it!"

"Cain! The status ailments—"

"It's because the Emperor was deposed. Stay ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠sharp. They're coming."

"Okay!"

The regular soldiers had it even worse. They stood slack and empty-eyed, as if Panic had locked them in place, and did not move at all.

"Snap out of it, all of you!"

"The enemy is coming!"

"What the hell are you doing?!!"

The officers shouted themselves hoarse trying to break the status ailments. It was not working. In ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠the Holy Royal Empire, these were people who had believed in God from the day they were born. The idea of fighting for a man the Church had just deposed had never once entered their imaginations.

Crash after crash rolled down the line as the two armies slammed together.

I caught the spear of an enemy mercenary on my shield as he closed in from the front.

"This is bad..."

The D-rank mercenary badge hanging at his throat caught my eye. D-rank covered levels 50 through 99. I had crossed 100 and become C-rank — and I was still having trouble with him. It was not only the ailments hanging on our side. ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠The enemy, as far as I could tell, had the opposite: Morale Boost and Elation stacked on top of everything else.

Blow after blow hammered into my shield.

"Haha. This is gonna be an EXP jackpot!"

The user swinging at me sounded like he was having the time of his life.

I kept his rapid strikes on the shield and watched for a gap.

"C-rank mercenary, huh? That's some juicy EXP."

The hits kept coming.

"A lucky break in this RNG trash fire of a game! I'm power-leveling today!"

One side of the field had been hit with a mass buff. The other had been hit with a mass debuff. From the enemy's point of view, the table had been set for a leveling feast — a chance to kill people thirty levels above them.

Even so.

I poured Aura into my shield and drove it into his sword.

"Kh—"

The instant the stiffness caught him, I put my blade through his throat.

He stared at me, gurgling, as if he could not believe he had died that easily. Status ailments could close a gap in stats. They could not close a gap in skill. I had crossed level 100. I could use Aura. And on top of that, the Gambler DNA trait handed me two extra stat points every time I leveled.

He was still making those wet, broken sounds.

"Still alive?"

I lifted the sword and finished him.

Killing one man did nothing for the rest of the field. The overall situation was collapsing.

"Gyaaaaah!"

"Kill them! Kill them!!!"

Users who did not fit the regular military structure had been pulled out and grouped as their own force — and the enemy had done the same. The result, inside a war already the size of a nation, was a second war fought entirely between players. Across the line, enemy users were slaughtering ours.

The exception was the three of us. Seolhwa, Fersin, and I had Aura, and we used it to kill them right back.

Steel flashed. Steel flashed again.

Of the three of us, Seolhwa was in a different class. No one on the other side could stop the Ice Dragon's Sword once she started swinging it. She tore through the enemy users like a wolf loosed among sheep.

I killed them as they came. And killed them. And killed them.

"There's no end to them."

Even as the imperial army's front was driven backward, the allied users held. It was not only our party. The players who had come from Shurie Territory were fighting like they belonged here — and they did. Shurie had a beginner dungeon, and they had grown up in it.

The ones who stood out most of all were the whales, now down to eight.

"Blood Demon..."

The leader of the whales. Blood Demon. The man who would go on to become guild master of the Blood Alliance. His party was wearing the best gear money ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠could buy, and even with the field tilted against them they were putting on a clinic.

And then—

A war horn bellowed, long and low, across the whole of the plain.

"That's the retreat signal."

"Run! Everyone run!!"

The fighting between users was only a sliver of the war. It was nowhere near large enough to turn the tide.

The thunder of hooves rolled over us. The knights and cavalry were already falling back, and the enemy cavalry and Holy Knights had begun concentrating their attacks on our infantry.

"Seolhwa! Fersin! Elena! Sarah! Over here!"

I pulled the party with me and ran.

The hoofbeats came on like a storm. Enemy cavalry smashed a charging attack into the rear of the allied users who were trying to withdraw. The players at the back — mostly the low-level ones — died in a matter of seconds.

The dying among our infantry went on until the Imperial Knight Order and the cavalry managed to regroup and check the pursuit. Only then did it stop.

Leon Castle.

The imperial army had fallen all the way back to Leon Territory, on the southern edge of the Golden Plains. The users were herded into the training grounds inside Leon Castle. That was the entire space they had been given to rest.

"Cain..."

"It's all right. We'll be fine."

"But the Emperor was deposed."

"Elena. Watch what you say."

"Sorry..."

We were only users packed into a training yard, but that was not the kind of thing you wanted overheard.

"The enemy has Leon Castle surrounded. What do we do? We can't even run."

"It'll be fine. Probably..."

I could not actually swear to that. What I did know was the ending: this war finished as an imperial victory. That meant Leon Castle — the fortress where the Emperor had taken refuge — would not fall. If the Emperor were captured and forced to surrender, the Church would have already won.

So how do they win?

The Emperor has been deposed. How did they possibly win from here?

Does some hero just appear out of the imperial army, like in a comic book?

Hero was set in a fantasy world, which meant Swordmasters existed. The imperial camp had one. The problem was that the Holy Knights had Swordmasters of their own — and theirs were stronger.

It was not that the Holy Knight class was inherently better than Knight. Historically, papal power in the Holy Royal Empire had always outweighed the Emperor's. Holy Knights were treated better, so the talented ones preferred that path, and over the years the Holy Knights of the Empire had simply become stronger than its knights.

Then how did they win?

Dammit...

If I had watched a proper, detailed video instead of that short clip called The History of Hero, I would have known how this war actually moved. I had regressed. That footage was another ten years away. The one thin comfort I had was that the imperial army won in the end.

"You... it's been a while."

Blood Demon had walked over.

"Good to see you, sir."

"We meet again."

"Yes..."

The imperial army had conscripted every user in the south, and the result was a reunion hall with walls. Behind him I could see the companions who always traveled with Blood Demon. There were only five of them now.

"Your numbers have thinned out quite a bit..."

"Can't be helped. Hero doesn't pull its punches. You lot... still at full strength?"

"Yes. We got lucky."

Blood Demon sat down as if he meant to have a real conversation.

"I've been gaming a long time, you know. And my gut is telling me I ought to get on your good side."

"Your gut, sir?"

"Experience, more like. The game world is survival of the fittest — crueler than real life, even. Times like these, you need strong friends."

"Yes..."

I could not argue with that. It was the same reason I had gotten close to Seolhwa, and the same reason I had kept on good terms with Inhyungsulsa.

"Anyway. You holding any game currency? I'd like to buy some with cash."

"Right now?"

"Yeah. Given the circumstances... how about a discount?"

The situation was dangerous, so knock a little off the price. If you died in this war, every coin of game currency you were carrying went with you.

"All right."

"Excellent!"

I handed him most of what I had earned in the Apse Mountain Range. I sold at twenty percent below the current market rate and walked away with forty million won. The market had dropped hard since I had first sold for eighty-two million. There was nothing to be done about that. It was not that the price was low now. It had simply been insanely high back then.

"Must be hard on you, Blood Demon."

"What is?"

"You keep spending money."

"Haha. This is nothing."

As expected of a man who had come out of the game with the most whales in all of Korea.

"You ever play mobile games?"

"No..."

I never had. Before the regression, middle school had been PC games. After high school there had been no time. When I did pick up a game again later, Hero had already swallowed the entire market, so that was what I played — briefly. After the regression, it had been Hero and nothing else.

"You know the biggest advantage Hero has?"

"I don't."

A dozen answers rose in my head. Picking the single best one was harder than it sounded.

"The cash-out."

"The cash-out..."

"That's right. I've put three hundred million into this thing, and I am confident I will make more than three hundred million with what I've spent."

"I see..."

But was that not true of mobile games as well? I had heard people traded items and currency unofficially there too.

"Can't you cash out of mobile games too?"

"You can, but... it's different from Hero. Item and currency values over there tank fast."

He leaned into the point and kept going. Back in the PC era, an item's value actually held. A month later it would not have dropped much. Then mobile games sped everything up, and there was only one reason for that: they had to keep pumping out new items, or people would stop spending. You spent money to buy whatever had just dropped. That was the only way to hold your ranking. Players poured cash in like they had fallen into a pit they could never climb out of. Drop a hundred million won and you climbed into the upper-middle ranks — then you needed tens of millions more every month just to stay there. And while you were spending, the values crashed underneath you. The gear that first hundred million had bought was not worth a million later. The equipment you had been buying with tens of millions a month was worth less than half in a month or two.

Blood Demon told the old stories with a self-deprecating laugh.