Max Talent Player

Just as I expected, Yoohyun’s big, calf-like eyes grew wide.

“…What?”

His massive arm moved, his bulging muscles squirming. He was sticking his pinky into his ear to scratch an itch, and the veins standing out on his biceps were like frickin’ earthworms. There was no doubt about it. They were overwhelming muscles. As far as outside appearances went, this guy was undoubtedly the (future) Fist King.

Yeonseo, who looked almost like a kid next to Yoohyun, stared blankly at me. “Are you serious right now?”

At about 160 centimetres, she had a cute appearance that didn’t suit the Sword Empress moniker. She poked my side and laughed with a “Come on! You’re joking, right?”

“I’m not joking.”

I really wasn’t. I meant every word. Yeonseo blinked at me, dumbfounded. She kind of gave me the impression of a chipmunk.

“So let me get this straight. You’ll pay for our flight tickets and accommodations, so let’s go on a vacation to Japan? Tomorrow?”

“…”

When did I ever say we were going on a vacation?

“Get your head on straight. We’re not going on a vacation. We’re going to do a raid.”

“Ah, yeah. Right. Sorry. Thought it was a vacation.”

I definitely said raid, but I guess she interpreted it as a vacation since it would require a flight on an airplane. It would apparently be Yeonseo’s first flight, or something like that.

“But we’re not that close, are we? Not enough to stay out overnight and go on a trip together,” she said.

“It’s fine if you don’t want to.”

“Jeez, why so harsh? It’s not that I don’t want to.” She seemed a bit troubled. “If I skip class again, I’ll get an F…”

Ah. The current Sword Empress was just an ordinary university student. The sight of the future Sword Empress being troubled over an F was almost fascinating to me. She was thinking about it really seriously.

Eye of Perception was telling me as much.

State: Serious / Thinking Hard

It was obvious even to Eye of Perception, which only picked out the most salient states.

“Ahh! Whatever. I’ll just think about it like a date. I’m coming, too.”

Actually, I thought Yeonseo would refuse. I might have saved her mom before, but we weren’t all that close, and it wasn’t like we were in an intimate relationship. Even so, she said she would come. I was going to go to Osaka even without her, but this was better.

‘It’s much better if Yeonseo comes along.’

After Yeonseo agreed to come, Yoohyun pounded his chest a couple of times with those bulky arms of his. He was like a human gorilla.

“I’ll go wherever hyungnim goes, no matter where! Even if that place is Japan!”

To be more precise, it was Osaka, Japan. It wasn’t possible to go to Tokyo at the moment because the Tutorial was still in progress there.

“I already owe you my life. Where wouldn’t I dare to go for you? I might hate Japan, but I’ll go anyway.”

It didn’t look like Yoohyun went through much mental calculation or anything. He didn’t ask what would happen if he came or what was there and simply gave me his answer first.

“If you’re a man, once you give your word, that’s that, right?”

I remembered his summary.

Summary: Debt-Repaying Magpie

Before, I only focused on the ‘Debt-Repaying’ part, but now, I was starting to understand why the ‘Magpie’ part was so apt.

Magpies are birds, and birds aren’t that smart. There was a reason why Eye of Perception referred to magpies, a type of bird. The Fist King ten years later seemed to have become smarter after rolling with the punches for a decade, but the current Yoohyun was the epitome of simplicity and honesty.

‘That’s not a bad thing.’

Though simple and honest, this ‘Debt-Repaying Magpie’ put an immensely high value on loyalty. The way he was right now, he would probably even sacrifice his life for me.

Sunhwa asked, “Oppa, what about me?”

Sunhwa, who was clutching a corner of my clothes, seemed to be saying, “I want to go too.”

“I’ll take care of your paperwork. If you don’t want to go, tell me.”

Like it or not, she was now my little sister. With President Song Kiyoung’s assistance, everything sorted itself out with lightning speed, almost like popping a bag of popcorn with a lightning bolt. This was the power of a chaebol. In any case, Sunhwa was now legally 100% my little sister, and her name was even changed to ‘Kim Sunhwa’.

“No! I want to go! A lot! I’ve never gone on a plane before!”

With that, our party was set. The future Fist King, the future Sword Empress. Me, the person familiar with the strategy. And finally, our little tank, who I felt was even more talented than the Fist King or Sword Empress.

‘With this combo… It’s got to be the strongest for the beginner level.’

Yoohyun was a tank/DPS.

Yeonseo was a DPS.

Sunhwa was a tank.

‘And me?’

What was I? It was a bit hard to say. I was also a tank/DPS, but… It didn’t feel quite right to just put it as that.

‘Whatever.’

That wasn’t important. The important thing was that our party was formed and we’d be going to Osaka tomorrow.

* * *

My sister’s reaction was exactly as I expected.

“…”

She didn’t let much of her feelings show, simply staring at me once with a curt expression. Then, she asked, “The hell is this?”

“Our house.”

“So, I’m asking, the hell is this?”

“The house where we’ll be living.”

“Explain.”

For now, my sister didn’t seem too happy.

State: Uneasy / Doubt / Worry

It was a natural reaction. I suddenly brought her to a 110 m² newly built apartment in downtown Seoul, something ordinary folks could hardly dream of, so she was more taken aback and fearful than happy. She was worrying about whether I did something bad, or what in the world I did to get this. Her suspicion and fear was all too natural and reasonable.

“I won something like the lottery.”

“…Lottery?”

It would take a long time to explain, and I couldn’t explain everything in detail anyway. I also had no real desire to do so. The Playing I was going to keep doing was dangerous, no two ways around it, and both my mom and sister would worry greatly about me if they knew. I didn’t really want to worry them.

“Noona. Listen. I’ve become a Player, and I’m now enjoying first-mover advantages. I recently met with the president of Sungshin and got a sponsorship.”

I gave her a bare-bones explanation.

“So I bought a house. Mom, you, and me. Sunhwa getting adopted as a daughter of our family was also super easy thanks to this.”

“…”

“Don’t worry. I won’t do anything really dangerous. You know me, noona. I’m a wuss.”

Though I did kill a lycanthrope and a magic troll in the Tutorial, cleared the Seoul Station Dungeon and a gate, and was leaving the country to go to Osaka tomorrow. Ah, right. I also caught a six-tailed fox. All of those things screamed Danger with a capital D, but I said it was safe.

“The world is changing quickly, and I’m adapting to it.”

There was no need for my mom and sister to adapt. They could live as they always had. They just had to keep going, staying safe. I would do all the adapting. I alone was more than enough.

“I’m adapting really well, you know?”

The former civil service student was gone. I was combing through strats hundreds—even thousands—of times a day, making plans for the future. And with every passing day, I was making those plans a reality. Because I didn’t want to be filtered out by natural selection like last time, I was spending every second like it was precious and doing my best. This time, I was determined to live well.

“So don’t worry. This is a house I purchased through totally reasonable and not dangerous means by enjoying my first-mover advantage. Noona, explain it to mom for me later.”

My sister’s ‘state’ changed a little.

State: Doubt / Uneasy / Relief

Relief was added, and she became a little more relaxed. For today, that was enough.

“Noona. Trust me. I don’t do bullshit things.”

I asked her to explain things to mom for me. My mom was a woman of many worries. She wouldn’t accept things as easily as my sister, and it would take time to explain every little thing.

I grinned.

“I’m getting on an early morning flight to go on a trip to Japan. With my friends. I’ve won the lottery, so I’m gonna go enjoy it once.”

* * *

Our destination was Osaka. In order to get to Osaka, our plane landed in the ‘Kansai International Airport’.

“Awesome. Awesome. Freaking awesome.”

Yeonseo, who was donning a light and fluttery sky-blue dress, kept spewing out ‘awesome’, her face full of excitement. There was no need for her to be tense yet, so I just let her be.

“It’s my first time ever going on an airplane, and it’s not even to Jeju Island, but over frickin’ seas. And for free.” She raised her thumb at me. “Our magnanimous Mr. Hyukjin is covering all our costs. Are you actually a chaebol? I’ve never heard or seen of this. Usually, you’re supposed to carefully plan a vacation several months in advance while saving up before you go.”

“My god, you have a lot to say.”

“Anyhoo, thanks. I don’t know you all that well yet, but I’ll definitely buy you a meal.”

A meal? She would be doing quite a bit more than that. I didn’t tell her yet. There was no point in telling her—she just had to experience it first-hand.

We took the bus all the way to the ‘Nanba Terminal’.

It was called the Nanba Terminal or Nanba Station, but despite being a station, it was a place for buses to go in and out, not a subway.

‘The place where the Nanba Terminal Dungeon will form.’

I hadn’t decided yet whether I would come back here to clear that dungeon or not. It was still a minimum of one year in the future, after all. Nevertheless, it was good to learn the layout of this area in advance.

I’d seen it many times on Youtube, but seeing it in person was a different experience. It was especially important to take note of ‘means of transportation’ like the stairs, escalators, elevators, and ‘cover’ where you could hide. It was also good to visually confirm areas (spots) where you could run to in case of emergency.

‘I think I’ve got a pretty good grasp of it now.’

I made a point of coming here to walk around in order to engrave this place in my mind.

‘Though well, there’s nothing special yet.’

I took the kids on a trip around the Nanba area, absorbing information the entire time. Now that we were in Osaka, it was time to start getting a little more serious.

“Let me remind you once again that we’re not here to play.”

When the dungeon was first generated here in Nanba Terminal, 300 people died. That was what Playing was like. Not just one, or maybe two victims, but hundreds, sometimes thousands, could be slaughtered in one fell swoop. In just Jongno alone, a staggering 145,000 people had died.

“We’re going to the hotel to rest a little, and then we’ll go to Dotonbori.”

Dotonbori. You could think of it as Japan’s version of Korea’s Myeongdong. It was a bustling place with all sorts of restaurants and shops. It was essentially the main street of Osaka. Running along the main street was a canal far bigger than Seoul’s Cheonggyecheon, but still too small to be called a real river.

At that, Yeonseo started to become a little tense.

“…A gate will form in Dotonbori, right?”

Yes. I didn’t know exactly where, but there was no mistake. A gate would be generated there, almost at the same time Japan’s Tutorial ended.

‘If you look at the time at which the gate broke… It either formed right after the Tutorial, or… formed even before the Tutorial was cleared.’

Originally, this gate wasn’t successfully cleared. After a certain amount of time, it ‘broke’. From the gate spilled out ‘Gold Turtles’ that dragged over 100 people into the water and ruthlessly devoured them.

‘If possible, I want to find the gate and clear it.’

And if that was impossible…

‘We have to catch them, even if we have to do it outside the gate.’

Gold Turtles. Like their name suggested, they were creatures that dropped a huge amount of Coins, creatures I absolutely needed to kill.

On the first day, we weren’t able to find any particular things of note in Dotonbori.

The second day was the same. We didn’t gain much. However, there was a big change in Japan. On the second day, the ‘Tutorial Field’ in ‘Tokyo’ was cleared, and the Tutorial Ender of Japan, ‘Seijuro’, was born.

–The survival rate has been tallied at around 33%… 

Far more people survived in Japan’s Tutorial than in Korea’s. Most of the advanced countries were familiar with Korea’s situation in advance, and they had made some preparations, just in case.

Soon, the world’s Tutorial would come to an end. Everyone would enter ‘beginner’ fields. The levels of Players would surpass 30, going past the beginner period into level 40. When that happened, Playing in the true sense of the word would begin.

The second day was as fruitless as the first. But on the third day, while we were combing through the Dotonbori region like before, we suddenly heard a voice.

“I’ll start off by telling you in advance that you are the only ones who can see me.”