March 31st (2)
"Brave Saga... Online?"
I was the one who spoke the name of that game out loud in the middle of the crowd.
There was no mistaking it. The logo floating overhead belonged to Brave Saga Online—the MMORPG that had rocketed onto the scene like a comet a decade ago, conquered the world, and was still running strong on both PC and mobile. It was written out in plain English letters: BRAVE SAGA ONLINE. You couldn't even pretend it was some other title if you tried.
That game's logo was hanging in the sky right now. Directly above the digital clock embroidered across the heavens, sharp and unmistakable...!
Brave Saga Online turned out to be the perfect fit! First off, a billion accounts—matching the eight hundred million that make up ten percent of humanity! Plus it's a growth-type game that lets you level all the way to 200! And then there's the gacha. The gacha! The gacha!!!
Jesus Christ, my ears are going to split. Why the hell does it keep emphasizing the gacha?! This is pissing me off for real!
The game characters of Brave Saga Online, and the classes they possess! We will bestow that power upon the surviving members of humanity. The exact moment the timer hits 00:00:00, if a strange energy settles into your body? Wow, clap clap clap! Congratulations! You weren't chosen as a hero—just a plain old survivor!
It was so absurd I couldn't even react.
A zombie virus is going to break out. Just hearing that made me snort. And on top of that, monsters from another world were supposedly going to pour in.
I was so dumbfounded all I could do was sigh. And because humanity was just too pitiful, they were going to hand out the starter stats from a game you could play on computers and phones?
...Fuck, if you're going to mess with people, at least put some effort into the joke. What the hell is this? I wanted to scream it. No—hearing that voice this clearly made me wonder, weirdly, whether yelling right here might actually reach whoever was talking.
"What the hell is this—"
BUT! Handing that power out to just anyone wouldn't make sense, would it?!
"Fuck!"
My ears, my eaaaaaaars!
At this rate my eardrums are going to burst and start bleeding. You son of a biiiiiiiiitch!!
So! We will carefully select special members of humanity and grant them power. What are the selection criteria, you ask? Curious? Of course you are!
No I'm not curious at all! So could you please just lower your voice a little?
Brave Saga Online! Those who will receive a game character's class and starter stats will be limited exclusively to people who have created an account in Brave Saga Online!
Huh? Only people who made an account?
How many people on this planet even play that game... are you kidding me?
Brave Saga Online has one billion accounts! Ten percent of humanity is eight hundred million! Unfortunately, a full two hundred million of you players are going to get unlucky and wash out.
One... one biiiiillion?! Did Brave Saga really have that many users? Did they mess up the cumulative numbers?
No. The way they so confidently rattled off "two hundred million out of one billion"... they might actually be one of the people who run the game.
Right! Someone from a world-famous game studio must be running some kind of global event! You know, that augmented-reality thing or whatever!
...Was my delusion running a little too wild?
BUT don't worry!
"Gyaaaaaaah!"
"My, my eardrums... I can't hear a thing! I've turned into Beethoven!"
"Stop the noise complaint! Stop iiiiiit!"
Technically it wasn't a noise complaint between floors... but the description hit so hard I couldn't help relating. The volume was every bit as filthy as the worst upstairs neighbor. Fuck!
The survivor lottery is completely random! For those of you who have enjoyed Brave Saga, you get a twenty percent chance of becoming a zombie and an eighty percent chance of becoming an ability user. At least that's better than everyone else, right? Don't you think?
Those selected as survivors will receive a message from us before the collapse. So if you are a current or former player of Brave Saga! Wait with your heart going pitter-patter!
Pitter-patter? That dogshit volume is going to give me arrhythmia from how hard my heart's pounding. Fuck!
Well then! For the fun waiting twelve hours from now... I'll be disappearing. I'll leave the clock up, so keep an eye on it. And with that... poof!
"Ugh!"
"Kyaah!"
"My ears, my ears.... Ah, I can't hear anything. Nothing... I can't hear a single thing! I've turned into Beethoven!"
"Huuu..."
The voice that had been boring into my eardrums like it meant to shred them finally vanished—after lobbing one last garbage sound effect designed to finish the job.
And I, too, was freed from the dumb posture of standing there like an idiot. In other words, I was no longer standing.
Thud. I dropped onto my ass right there on the pavement, so at least I wasn't standing around looking stupid anymore. Instead I had become a different kind of idiot—the kind sitting in the middle of the street.
The silver lining was that everyone else was in the exact same boat.
...This had to be the most ridiculous nationwide hidden-camera prank of all time.
They hung a digital-clock timer and the Brave Saga Online logo in the sky with drones, then blasted a voice that could peel eardrums so the bizarre message got jammed straight into people's skulls.
Did the government really have nothing better to do? Tomorrow was April Fool's Day... were they trying to pull a nationwide April Fool's prank? If they had the budget for this, they could at least use it to create some jobs and stimulate the economy, for fuck's sake!
...Ah. And if—just if—this nationwide prank turned out to be real...
My life was guaranteed to be hell. No—it was just over.
Why?
Because I never did it.
Brave Saga Online.
I don't have an account.
Brave Saga Online...!
April 1st.
3:00 p.m.
"Ah, Mom! Stop talking nonsense and just sit still! The end of the world or whatever... the world doesn't just suddenly collapse like that! No matter how you look at it, this is just a nationwide scam, a scam! Dad doesn't believe it either!"
"What? Come down? And do what once I'm there! Even if I catch a bus it'll take over five hours, what are you talking about! A plane? Where am I supposed to get money for that when I'm already scraping by on job-hunting expenses!"
"If you're really that worried, just stay put for the day. Seriously...! Calling me over something this weird. What's Hyun doing that he's just watching you freak out? Huh? Don't call him a little shit! He's my little brother, so what if I do!"
"Anyway, I'll call you later. I'm a little busy right now... Ah, for real! I said I'm fine! If you're that anxious, just stay inside the house. Just for today! I'm hanging up!"
Click!
I hung up roughly and immediately started hammering at my phone, diving into the chat app.
Naturally, I picked the room where the bastards I call friends—and secretly call my personal hell—were spamming messages nonstop.
I skipped the PC bang and headed straight back to my cramped little room.
On the third floor of the villa, where the tiniest one-rooms were clustered together, unit 304 was mine. The place my mother had put up the key money for and occasionally helped with the monthly rent.
The room where, if I couldn't pay next month, I had to brace myself for a full verbal thrashing from the landlord.
The second I got back I plugged my phone in to charge and started hammering out messages. I asked my friends if they'd seen it. If they'd heard it.
They gave me the kind of answer that should have made them jump out of their skins. They'd all heard it.
Whoa. Minsu was either properly pissed or running on pure desperation. He never sent walls of text like that.
The only other time I could remember him dropping a novel-length message was when he told us he'd walked in on his girlfriend in bed with another guy. Back then it had been... honestly, not hilarious at all. I'd felt pretty damn sorry for him.
I was about to pile on with my own string of lols when Sibal-nom—no, Siban—stole the lead and started spamming messages one after another.
Sibal... no, no—Siban was actually trying to soothe Minsu for once in a long while.
Jeon Siban. The moment you heard the name, the first syllable of the family name plus the first of the given name should have been enough to get him endlessly roasted, but this Siban bastard was so flippant and full of himself that the nickname had naturally settled into Sibal, Sibal-nom.
The fact that he didn't even get mad about it and wore the nickname like a badge of honor only made him more infuriating. And this guy was my friend? Fuck!
You're the one who asked me! Once a Sibal-nom, always a Sibal-nom.
But then...
Why hadn't Byeongtae answered since earlier?
For the record, his real name was Shin Byeongtae. I don't need to explain why I set his nickname to Byeongshin.
What was that? Weird typo?
Byeongtae didn't touch the chat for a full two minutes after that. He didn't even open the messages.
What the hell... this is actually terrifying. Did he see a ghost in his room or something?
Why was this bastard suddenly dragging the mood into horror territory!
Thankfully, two minutes later he checked our messages and even replied, putting us at ease.
Byeongtae uploaded a photo.
And the contents of that photo were...