The First Registration
The registration of Je Hyeon-o was not my first. I had already registered Park Seong-gyeon as a sample before.
But this time was completely different.
The heat bubbling and sizzling like something crawling across my skin tore through my entire body.
It was clearly excruciating pain. Yet at the same time, a bizarre sensation found me and made me feel strangely off.
Release? Dissolution? Relief...?
The sensation whose exact expression I could not figure out pressed down on the pain and stabbed into my brain.
The surging ecstasy made the corners of my mouth curl up on their own.
Registration completed!
Registration completed!
I already knew what I had to do.
It was as natural as a newborn lamb instinctively seeking its mother’s milk.
'Binding. Transmission.'
'Bind Je Hyeon-o.'
You think of the transmission to send to Je Hyeon-o.
My nose throbbed. The hot air from my eyeballs seemed to descend.
I licked the bitter taste and sent the transmission. A message window appeared, blocking Je Hyeon-o’s front.
“Captain, don’t attack!”
Gwak Han-muk, who had been preparing to strike, staggered.
“Just hit!”
If Je Hyeon-o counterattacked, both of us would be horribly dismembered.
But there was no time to hesitate.
“Gwak Captain!!”
When I called him, Gwak Han-muk burst into mad laughter.
The prayer beads wrapped me and Gwak Han-muk together instead of attacking. To prevent us from falling no matter what happened.
“Damn it, Lieutenant Colonel! Receive the rookie!”
Gwak Han-muk’s roar and tearing gasp mixed. The motorcycle rushed straight ahead.
Je Hyeon-o, unable to move because of the binding, came into view.
The system window floating in front of him as well.
Stay still.
The gaze that had been looking at the system window turned toward me.
My face reflected on the smooth surface where no LED light entered.
However, the face behind the goggles remained unknown.
Just before the motorcycle was crushed.
The prayer beads completely covered the front. I and Gwak Han-muk were inside the cocoon created by the prayer beads.
BOOM!
It was a sound like hitting a steel wall. The rough shock seemed to shake my internal organs.
The binding released, and I and Gwak Han-muk rolled messily across the floor.
“Ugh...”
Gwak Han-muk vomited blood. The prayer beads had absorbed a significant part of the shock, but had not blocked it 100%.
The alien metal material that made up Je Hyeon-o was originally incompatible with metal and completely opposite to the thunder-struck peach wood prayer beads.
Gwak Han-muk, who had made a blood pool on the floor, checked Je Hyeon-o first rather than his own condition.
A short silence passed. Then a somewhat flustered voice came out from him.
“...Lieutenant Colonel?”
Je Hyeon-o lay on the long line left on the floor.
Gently, like a doll with loose strings.
Gwak Han-muk said, putting his hopes into it.
“Dead?”
Of course, I knew he would not say that.
I staggered and stood up, approaching Gwak Han-muk.
“Now... it would be good to move quickly.”
I could not miss this opportunity where Je Hyeon-o could not move.
But Gwak Han-muk suddenly grabbed my face with both hands.
He looked at me quietly.
My cheeks were pressed in his hands, so I quietly protested.
“It hurts...”
Gwak Han-muk did not nod even though I said it hurt. After staring at me fixedly for a while, he muttered.
“You came back.”
“What do you mean ‘came back’?”
“No. Are you okay?”
“I’m fine. What about Gwak Captain?”
“I’m fine, damn it.”
...Gwak Han-muk answered with a smile, blood flowing from the corners of his mouth.
My appearance was probably not much different. I pulled my clothes to wipe my nose and chin roughly.
“I have to move.”
“Yeah, let’s go.”
He rummaged through the backpack and duffel bag that had fallen far away.
He discarded the burst triangular kimbap, crushed cans, pet bottles, broken guns, and so on, and picked up the remaining intact food, axe, knife, and so on to make a new load.
Gwak Han-muk slung the duffel bag over his shoulder, set me behind him, and approached Je Hyeon-o.
Je Hyeon-o had been lying gently until then.
Gwak Han-muk flicked his hand, and I walked with a limp.
Just as I was passing by Je Hyeon-o’s side. Lights came on in the goggles.
X X
I think I understand why he is called the crazy patient...
Gwak Han-muk, seeing Je Hyeon-o’s goggles, immediately spat out a barrage of curses. But he did not linger any longer.
I and Gwak Han-muk entered the Yellow Zone, leaving Je Hyeon-o behind.
Even though it was midnight, the Yellow Zone was quiet without a single zombie.
It was thanks to all the nearby zombies being herded to the bridge and drowned in the water together.
Gwak Han-muk found a spherical jeep, tore open the key box, and started the engine with a screwdriver.
“Do you know how to drive?”
“I have a license, but I have only driven manual in games.”
Gwak Han-muk smiled and took the steering wheel at my answer.
“Let’s go to the base first?”
“Yes. Good idea.”
Before going to find Mo Hae-in, I needed to reorganize. In this state, I could not even catch a single zombie, let alone search.
While Gwak Han-muk was driving, I buried myself in the passenger seat like a stuck rice cake and decided to check Je Hyeon-o’s status.
'Je Hyeon-o status window.'
> Transmission
> Binding
> Execution
Additional things that were not there during Park Seong-gyeon’s time had been added. I examined each item.
Hyeon-hyeon seemed to be the name Je Hyeon-o received in the trial.
The job was simply displayed as soldier without rank, probably because there were no specific settings for the player’s job in the game.
Items were divided into acquired and held.
'Acquired is the item obtained in the current trial entered, and held is... the item I already had like Mo Hae-in’s Black Moon Blade?'
I waited a moment.
Since no counter system window appeared, my guess seemed correct.
The held item list was just the Crow party.
Je Hyeon-o always wore his items in the trial, and I learned for the first time that they were all the same set items.
'And the binding.'
The ability I had used on Je Hyeon-o earlier.
Binding temporarily restricted registered people from doing any action.
But the effective time was not long. At best, about 3 seconds subjectively?
It seemed to be the limit of my current ability.
Even after 3 seconds, Je Hyeon-o had not moved because I had sent the transmission “stay still” right after.
From Je Hyeon-o’s perspective, since an incomprehensible phenomenon had occurred, he probably followed the system window’s instructions.
'I don’t know I sent this.'
I could use this a few more times on Je Hyeon-o.
The problem was that this was just a temporary measure.
With my current abilities, I could not fully control Je Hyeon-o.
I could not use the binding ability consecutively.
Thinking about the pain I had experienced when using the abilities, it was clearly an act that put a significant strain on the body.
I might die while trying to catch Je Hyeon-o.
'Are there no attack skills?'
You feel a great sense of achievement from your advanced self.
I thought this had been a truly successful first registration and vowed to put in more effort to develop further.
With rapid growth, I thought it was good to fill all 3 character registration slots to obtain new abilities.
The system window looked happy.
Normally it would have just sent a 'shortage' word, but the response had been quite thoughtful.
It was probably because of registering Je Hyeon-o.
But I did not want to register normally.
It had already been suspicious, and registering Je Hyeon-o had made me realize it more clearly.
It was burdensome to have one human completely on a leash, but decisively...
I felt strange when registering Je Hyeon-o.
The emotions and thought processes I had felt at the moment of registering Je Hyeon-o had been abnormal.
There had been some weird thought, but only a vague feeling remained and I could not remember it properly.
It was like falling into a kind of trance state and waking up.
I was the type who pursued a quiet life like a name.
Just becoming the Earth’s system had already been overwhelming.
It was burdensome to add elements that could negatively affect my mind here.
Could I upgrade system abilities only by clearing trials?
I would find out when I cleared this time with the True Ending.
'Let’s solve it mostly by myself.'
Je Hyeon-o was already registered, so there was nothing I could do about it.
After finishing the rough thought organization, I looked at Gwak Han-muk.
He was the supporter who allowed me to move actively now.
Even if there were suspicious parts, he followed me completely.
It had been possible because Gwak Han-muk had hit Je Hyeon-o according to my opinion earlier.
Of course, he might have listened to my words just because it was fun to do crazy things.
“Why?”
After staring for a while, Gwak Han-muk glanced at me. Since it had come to this, I created a question.
“Gwak Captain, can I ask about the name you received in the trial?”
I was curious about information about him that could not be known in the game. Gwak Han-muk answered readily.
“Cheongroe.”
“...”
“You thought why Cheongroe when my hair is red now.”
“...How did you know?”
“Haha!”
Gwak Han-muk burst into a refreshing laugh.
I held back my bitter feelings and envied him.
I should have named my game name more coolly when playing. The price of naming it roughly and carelessly had been painful.
'Can I not change the name.'
I wanted to buy a name change privilege.
While feeling disappointed, I was curious why Gwak Han-muk had been named Cheongroe. His eyes were also gray.
Gwak Han-muk, who could not ask, held the steering wheel with one hand and gave me something.
A sigh escaped me unknowingly.
“Wow...”
It was a portable cassette player with wired headphones connected.
“It was in the glove box. Did you see it for the first time, Goyo?”
“I’ve seen something like a data screen before.”
Gwak Han-muk muttered “data screen...” Probably because there was a slight generational difference between us.
I looked at the cassette player with curious eyes.
This was an item I had not seen in the game. Because in the game, the vehicle glove box did not open.
The item description was simple.
Portable music device: Contains 6 fun music cassettes.
“Don’t listen to the music.”
I was about to try the headphones and lowered my hand with an “ah”.
It was the era’s rule not to use trial items lightly.
It was natural for safety, not knowing what infection might occur.
'I want to listen.'
It probably would not be possible now. I put the cassette player in the duffel bag.
Then, the triangular kimbap from the convenience store or bulgogi ramyeon were the latest, but guns, jeeps, cassettes were old.
It felt like time zones were mixed up arbitrarily.
When roaming the trial with the game, the parts I had not noticed in reality made me feel quite out of place.
It was a bit unsettling to dismiss this as just a trial.
Assuming the trial was based on games created by the creator.
I knew the creator would not spoil such details.
The delicate settings were one of the reasons I liked his games.
If the setting of mixed time zones had been original from the beginning, and the game had hidden it...
“AAAH!”
Screeeech-!
Gwak Han-muk suddenly shouted and slammed the brakes.
Clunk, my body shot forward, but barely held by the seatbelt.
I almost hit my forehead on the front glass and looked ahead with startled eyes.
“Mo Captain...?”
Mo Hae-in, turned into a zombie, was hitchhiking.