chapter 6
chapter 6
Suspicious Secret Merchant (2)
I hid myself in an alley and glanced back.
She seemed to hesitate as if lingering, then hurriedly moved away.
Worried someone might see, I removed the suspicious-looking hood.
“Phew…”
Maybe it’s because this is the academy city.
There are too many things to pay attention to.
That just shows how wide the gap in lifestyle is between commoners and nobles.
‘It’s ridiculous that they won’t even let you in if you don’t take care of your appearance.’
Commoners who couldn’t manage their looks, and nobles who maintained their beauty through all kinds of means.
In this world, grooming one’s appearance was considered a virtue of nobles.
Even among nobles, there were unattractive people, but as long as they showed signs of consistent care, they were acknowledged as nobles.
No matter how naturally good-looking a commoner was, they couldn’t be mistaken for a noble, because that distinct ‘refined look’ wasn’t something easily imitated.
To begin with, commoners didn’t even have the concept of maintaining their appearance.
But for me, the lifestyle of nobles wasn’t unfamiliar.
After all, I was a man from South Korea, a country known for its beauty culture.
‘I have a rough idea of how to take care of myself.’
The face packs my girlfriend used to put on me.
The days I was forced to apply sunscreen.
In the game, there were items that increased a character’s charm to boost sociability, and I used those charm-enhancing items generously on myself to enter the academy city.
Thanks to that, my once unkempt face transformed into a ‘well-maintained’ appearance.
‘Fortunately, nobles are quite tolerant of scars.’
Perhaps because nobles had to fight monsters in contaminated zones, scars on the face or body were generally overlooked.
As for clothing, I spent as much as I could afford and bought a dark navy suit.
My identity had already been prepared beforehand, so as long as my appearance didn’t raise suspicion, I was fine—and I covered that with items.
“When I first got these, I really wanted to throw them all away… but now that I have them, they’re finally useful.”
These beauty products would probably sell well to nobles.
However, in terms of game mechanics, beauty items were basically trash.
After rolling hundreds of times for character weapons, you’d end up with piles of beauty items.
‘Raising sociability for character synergy wasn’t bad, but it was just an annoying feature that made you click a few extra times.’
But now that the game had become reality, they were quite useful.
‘Girls would love these as gifts.’
After all, what girl wasn’t interested in beauty?
Well, that could be considered later if I got close to them.
For now—
I entered the inn and let out a deep sigh.
“This was exhausting.”
It had taken me fourteen—no, nearly fifteen years to get here.
All that time, I pushed myself just to get close to the academy.
The time it took for a mere commoner to reach nobles.
Fourteen years.
‘Damn, they should’ve balanced the difficulty better.’
But even after infiltrating near the academy, my hardships didn’t end easily.
Before retiring, when I took on my final mission to buy a special package, I went near the contaminated zone with a mercenary group.
I successfully purchased the special package.
I also managed to kill the monsters I encountered after the kobold and gained confidence in my skills.
And that was probably the best point.
‘I shouldn’t have killed it so easily…’
I must have been too excited after defeating a monster that used special abilities.
I was also a bit drunk on the power I got from scrolls.
What do overconfident men do after killing a powerful monster?
‘Cause trouble, of course.’
The kind that gets you killed.
Before the effect of my scroll ran out, I got greedy and wanted to hunt more monsters.
The mercenary leader also thought one wasn’t enough.
We were… too in sync.
We shouldn’t have been.
‘In the end, we used another tracking scroll.’
Without realizing how close we had gotten to the contaminated zone, we chased after monsters recklessly.
Unfortunately, we soon encountered one.
A monster so powerful we couldn’t even scratch it.
‘What a waste of my scroll.’
To survive, I had no choice but to use my scrolls.
Because of that, I used one of my rarest magic scrolls—something I only had one of—to kill the monster.
‘I made money, but…’
Honestly, it still hurt thinking about using that scroll there.
‘Still, selling that thing left me with enough money even after buying the special package. That’s how I was able to summon her.’
I recalled the girl I had just met.
After arriving at the academy, I realized once again that this world was truly the game.
There was no way I wouldn’t.
‘The character summon window finally opened.’
A massive city built around the academy.
Only nobles with verified identities could enter freely, and commoners could only enter if they had a noble’s sponsorship.
If a sponsored commoner caused trouble?
The noble who vouched for them would bear full responsibility.
Because of that, nobles were reluctant to sponsor commoners.
Unless it was absolutely necessary or someone trustworthy.
Some might question why entry had to be so strict…
‘But the justification that the academy must be protected was stronger.’
Because of that, I had to put in a lot of effort to enter this place.
That effort took fourteen years.
‘Honestly, after taking fourteen years to get here, I was worried the characters I knew might have already graduated.’
Fourteen years.
Long enough for someone to enroll and graduate.
Whenever special packages appeared, I had consistently spent money to obtain character-exclusive weapons, but I didn’t expect to sell all of them.
Rather than wasting time searching for characters who might have already graduated, it made more sense to sell to whoever was available.
But—
‘It’s not that easy.’
Even after arriving at the academy and watching students for days, there wasn’t a single familiar face.
At first, I thought I had arrived too late and felt disappointed.
I even started thinking about how to contact them after they enlisted in the military.
Then suddenly, I realized there must be a reason the summoning system unlocked the moment I arrived.
So I used the remaining currency and tried summoning.
“Turns out spending money really is the answer.”
The shock from that moment still lingered.
When I did my first summon with flashy effects, I got a pretty good start.
I got an SSR character.
But that wasn’t what shocked me.
The moment I summoned—
The character appeared in front of me in reality.
“Huh? What am I doing here?”
From a single summon, ten characters appeared.
[R] [R] [R] [R] [SR] [R] [R] [R] [SSR] [R]
There were no duplicates, and all ten looked confused before scattering to wherever they wanted.
Most of them were R and SR—barely worth raising.
I was so shocked that I couldn’t stop them from leaving, and only after they were gone did I fully understand the situation.
‘They weren’t missing because I was late—they simply didn’t exist before.’
Even now, thinking back to that moment gave me chills.
I later found those ten characters at the academy.
They were mingling with other students as if they had always existed.
New noble families appeared out of nowhere, yet no one questioned it.
‘So that means I need to at least summon every character, even just once?’
What kind of impact did their absence have on this world?
Even if not directly used, summoned characters would still be stronger than background figures.
‘And if they graduate and reduce the contamination rate by even 1%…’
In the end, I had to keep spending.
The fate of the world depended on how much I invested.
I didn’t know why someone like me had been given this power, or why I had to bear this burden.
‘In the end, it’s all about money again.’
The answer was to make money.
It was exhausting, but at least now that I was in the academy, life would be far better than when I was earning money as a mercenary.
I used up my remaining currency and summoned characters.
Unfortunately, the only one worth raising was the SSR I got at the very beginning.
And that SSR character—
Was the girl I had just spoken with.
[ Name: Shine (SSR) ]
[ Rank: B ]
[ Skills: ]
[ Stats: Power (B) Stamina (C) Agility (B) Mana (C) Charm (C) ]
Looking at her stats, they weren’t that impressive.
To make her truly useful, I would need to summon duplicates and raise her to five stars.
On top of that, I’d need to clear her character scenario quests to improve her stats.
Among those stats, her main ones—Power and Agility—needed to reach SSS, and her Mana at least SS for her to perform at a second-tier level.
‘And it’d be even better if she had her exclusive equipment.’
Fortunately—
I already had Shine’s exclusive equipment in my inventory.
A weapon so perfect that once she saw it, she wouldn’t be able to resist buying it.