A New Path (2)
“Up! It’s above us!”
The red dots marking enemies had drawn right up to our noses, so I scanned both the floor and ceiling. A hazy cloud clung to the dungeon’s ceiling. At my shout, the thing reacted; multicolored sparks flickered through the mist. Unsettlingly, those sparks looked like a cluster of eyes.
“How is a Spirit Cloud here!” Sezanne clearly recognized the creature.
“It’s a Phantom-type monster! We need holy water!”
In other words, it was a spiritual entity. Yanne, proud of the magic she had learned, launched a Fire Bolt first. The spell struck the Spirit Cloud as it drifted downward. Or at least it looked like it did.
[BOOM!]
The Fire Bolt passed straight through the cloud-like body and detonated against the dungeon ceiling. Sezanne quickly explained.
“Normal magic and physical attacks don’t work. It drifts over like a cloud, wraps around people, and suffocates them to death.”
“Everyone fall back!”
Without holy water we had no choice but to retreat. Fortunately the creature was slow—slower than a walking human.
“It vaguely resembles a slime,” Pyutel the San warrior observed.
“Since it moves slowly and kills by enveloping its prey, can’t we simply ignore it and keep going?”
Now that he mentioned it, unless they had a quest, most people simply walked past slimes in dungeons. They were slow, and cracking the core inside their bodies was tedious. Ignoring this thing like a slime seemed to be the answer.
But a problem occurred to me.
“This is a dungeon. If more of them gather and grow larger, we’ll be in real trouble. It already looks like several have merged into this one.”
If the passage filled with creatures we had no reliable way to kill, we would be finished. I decided to test my own magic.
“Let me see if my spells work on it.”
As Sezanne had said, a phantom-type should be yin-attributed. My yang-based healing buffs ought to be its natural counter. The moment the healing buff sank into the cloud, a hideous sound leaked out.
Healing Buff
[Creeeeak— creak—]
Unlike the Sabre Tiger, the yin-yang opposition principle worked perfectly. The dark storm cloud began to tear apart. The many eye-like sparks lost their eerie glow one by one.
“Whoa!”
“Wow! That’s amazing!”
The others cheered as the Spirit Cloud crumbled into ash, but Sezanne frowned deeply.
No matter how different the principles or systems of magic are, this is strange. Using attribute-less mana to wield every element is already bizarre, but annihilating a phantom-type instantly with healing magic…?
She had once seen a healer use recovery magic offensively against undead. The opposition was real, yet the effect had never been this overwhelming. Sezanne’s doubts about Jinwoo’s true power grew stronger.
“All right. Since phantom-types are easy prey now, let’s keep moving.”
You have entered a new dungeon. Buff-enhanced ability gains will remain reduced by 20%. Dungeon mapping has been reapplied.
After walking for some time, the alert appeared. The map refreshed, showing dozens of red enemy markers. The straight path we had followed split into many branching routes. It seemed the route until now had simply connected one dungeon segment to another. The scale of this new area looked far larger, so we had no choice but to slow down.
“We’ve been walking for over five hours. Let’s rest before we push on.”
We had already covered more than twenty kilometers. Rest was necessary if we wanted to fight the newly detected enemies. Besides, my connection limit was approaching.
You have been connected for 7 hours and 21 minutes. Vital signs and other metrics are normal.
Although we had entered a new dungeon, nothing particularly noteworthy had happened, so I wrote a relaxed game report and sent it off. Then I followed my usual routine—eating and exercising.
As I left the gym, a well-dressed man and woman approached me.
“Sorry, I don’t buy anything. I don’t believe in anything. My ancestors are resting comfortably, so I don’t need any rites. And I don’t want to help with any university surveys.”
“That’s not why we’re here. You are Park Jinwoo, correct? I’m James Lee.”
How the hell do they know my personal information?
I had seen news about cults using stolen data for proselytizing, but hearing my real name still felt surreal.
“And if it is?”
“We are not from a cult or a pyramid scheme. We’d like to talk. We come from here.”
The man with the striking five-o’clock shadow handed me an ID. When I saw it, I almost laughed.
“FBI? In Korea? If you’re going to scam people, at least use a National Intelligence Service badge for local flavor. Let go of my arm.”
The lunatics refused to release me, apparently convinced an FBI badge worked in Korea.
“We have questions about the game you’re currently testing—Cliché World.”
“The game?”
The sudden mention of the game caught me off guard. The FBI had flown all the way to Korea because of a game?
“Doesn’t that sound too far-fetched? The FBI coming to Korea over a video game?”
For a moment I wondered if a rival company was impersonating federal agents to steal information.
“Would you like us to take you to the U.S. Embassy to verify our credentials? A car is waiting.”
“So you can kidnap me?”
“Then hail any passing taxi yourself. Only the female agent will ride with you. If you still don’t trust us, we can call a police car.”
His confident offer to involve the police made me hesitate. I hadn’t committed any crime, so they couldn’t force me to do anything except voluntary accompaniment. And since it concerned the game, I couldn’t simply ignore them.
“Let’s walk first.”
After walking for a while we reached an intersection. I flagged down a taxi going the opposite direction, had the woman sit in the passenger seat, and got in the back.
“U.S. Embassy in Gwanghwamun, please.”
The taxi arrived at the embassy. When the man and woman following us showed their IDs, we were allowed inside immediately. Even the main building let us pass without issue. When we reached the actual embassy offices—places civilians normally couldn’t enter—I had no choice but to believe they really were FBI.
“All right, you’re really FBI. What do you want with me?”
“We received a very strange report.”
A few days earlier, a man had visited the association claiming his older brother had died suddenly while playing a game. He said his brother had been a tester for a game developed by the global conglomerate Changing Group. The deceased’s background was unusual—he had once been a champion pro gamer in a now-unpopular FPS title.
Susan had ordered an investigation, thinking the combination of Changing Group and a former champion’s sudden death would make good headlines. The deeper they dug, the more they uncovered: seven former famous pro gamers had died suddenly while playing games in the past two years. Every single one had been working as a tester for Changing Group’s new title. Something was clearly wrong.
At first she had planned to use it as a simple publicity stunt to link the deaths to game addiction and shape public opinion. But this was no ordinary case. Real players were actually dying.
Cases kept appearing—not only in the United States but in Canada and Europe as well. Medical records showing death during gameplay were obtainable, yet the hardware and software used at the time of death were not. Changing Group had collected every capsule the very next day.
“There’s definitely something dirty going on.”
The group’s tight control over the devices convinced her something was being hidden. However, proving the victims’ claims was difficult, so Susan had been unable to make any official statement. She suspected the new capsule-type connection device was the key, but she had no way to investigate it. She knew there was one tester each in the U.S. and Canada, but Changing Group had blocked every move the association made.
“Director, neither the press nor any gaming webzines have released a single piece of information about Changing’s Cliché World.”
Normally, the mere rumor of a major corporation developing a game would trigger investigative reports. Yet after more than two years of development, there were zero reviews or articles. Realizing Changing was suppressing everything, Susan had no choice but to hand the compiled materials over to the FBI.
“You’re saying the testers for Cliché World, the game Changing Group is developing, are dying? Is that true?”
“Yes. We have confirmed twenty-two deaths so far.”
The FBI agent named James Lee spoke calmly, but my head was spinning.
“Then… what are the causes of death?”
“Mostly heart attacks, some epileptic seizures. Of course I know gamers sometimes die of heart attacks after playing for long periods. But Changing Group supposedly enforced strict eight-hour testing limits.”
Only then did I remember the secretary constantly pressuring me to follow the eight-hour daily guideline without exception.
“From your perspective, Mr. Park, does it seem normal for people strictly limited to eight hours of play to die from heart attacks and seizures?”
If it were simply a matter of playtime, professional gamers who played twelve hours or more every day should all be dead.
“What exactly do you want from me?”
“We need you to become an anonymous informant. Information on Cliché World is almost nonexistent.”
“You seem to know quite a lot already.”
“Everything we have was obtained from the families of the deceased. There may be inaccuracies.”
“Aren’t there American testers as well?”
“Changing is blocking us. While looking into testers from other countries, we found this SNS post.”
What James Lee showed me was a Twitter post. The gaming team director Kang Il was smiling brightly, saying he had met Elon Busker today and that his close younger brother had joined Changing. I was faintly visible beside him.
“The common link among all the dead testers is that they were former pro gamers. You, Mr. Park, are also…”
I understood what his trailing words implied without needing to hear them.
“But you still haven’t confirmed the cause of death is the game, correct?”
“Exactly. That’s why we need your cooperation. If something bad happens because of the game, there may be no one to protect you or your family. Shouldn’t you prepare in advance if there’s danger? Isn’t that what gamers do—prepare for the unknown?”
He was telling me to hand over information for the sake of my own life. Still, it felt like betrayal to leak details about Elon Busker and Changing Group after they had scouted me and paid my salary.
“I know Koreans value loyalty and affection. Then how about this?”
“…What do you mean?”
“Forget you ever met us today. Instead, simply move from your current officetel back to your family home in Daejeon.”
“You want me to move?”
“Yes. Your family home is a regular house. Your room is on the second floor and has large windows.”
“Ah, I understand. I shouldn’t put up curtains, right?”
“Hahaha. That too, but with family present the chance of sudden death drops considerably.”
“That makes sense.”
“Whether you tell Changing about today’s meeting or not is up to you. But if you move back home, we can watch over you and provide help.”
This way, it wouldn’t be me who leaked anything; the FBI would have discovered it themselves. My conscience would be clear. Besides, I had grown tired of living alone in that cramped space. Going back to my family home suddenly sounded appealing.
When I said I would move back home, Changing Group’s secretary Kim sent the technical team the moment my connection ended to help with the move.
“So you have to work at the American headquarters, but instead of video calls you use this? You’re not playing games with it, are you?”
Mom saw the capsule and immediately assumed the worst.
“It’s not a game. You’ve heard of the metaverse, right? If you want to work inside a virtual space, this kind of equipment is unavoidable.”
“I don’t know if it’s a mega version or a truck, but you’re saying you have to connect for eight hours a day to work in America?”
“Yes. If you get called out by Mom in the middle and it interrupts work, they won’t count the hours and my pay gets cut.”
“Then you mustn’t come out. So you can eat after you finish work?”
“Yeah. That’s how foreigners schedule things, apparently.”
“What strange people. Anyway, eat first.”
While eating Mom’s bubbling doenjang stew, I looked out the window. Buildings and apartments surrounded the residential complex. Somewhere out there, FBI agents were probably watching. Or maybe they had already installed listening devices on the phone lines.
Now that I think about it, there are more than one or two things that feel off.