NOVEL NEXT 08.
08.
After this strange monologue, I fearlessly pick up nearby stones and charge at the man, but he easily subdues me. However, for some reason, he doesn’t kill me. He just pins me down and says ominously:
“This is an inescapable fate…”
It was a meaningless statement. The man’s silver hair briefly shone in the moonlight from under his hood, and he released me. As soon as I’m free, I recklessly swing a dagger at the man, but I only manage to cut a small part of his robe. The man had somehow disappeared, leaving only an afterimage.
I vow to avenge my family and villagers and track down the bad guys, eventually learning that they are a force called the “Black Light.”
And ten years later…
While Feisia found peace after the Human-Demon War ended, I did not. As I was training, thinking only of revenge as usual, I hear monster roars and people’s screams from a ruined open space. I quickly grab my dagger and “Glory Harp” and run there.
The video ends.
I gulp down the water I had poured. This should have been alcohol. I should have stocked up on some drinks instead of just lying around.
Beep beep beep.
I turn off the stress alarm and cover my face with my hands, taking deep breaths.
Jin probably didn’t know about this part.
That the protagonist would be an orphan who lost his parents and sister.
No, even if he knew, he probably wouldn’t have thought much of it.
This world is full of orphan protagonists in movies, comics, novels, and even games like this.
Why are there so many orphans? Why do people keep creating orphans?
Why am I getting so upset over a non-existent game character being an orphan…
I’m really annoyed.
I’m so angry.
As I stare at the monitor, an explanation window pops up. A cute character introduces itself as Nyang-nyang, the forest helper spirit, and instructs me to click the left mouse button to move.
“Sigh.”
It’s my brother’s assignment, so I should bear with it.
Thanks to the helper spirit Nyang-nyang, I easily figure out the basic game mechanics. As expected, there was the difficulty of memorizing keyboard positions. It’s hard enough with Korean, but now I have to know the English keyboard too…
Following Nyang-nyang’s instructions, I press C.
[Angryy Lv1
Race – Teisia
Gender – Male
Forest Quest – S1_01. Leave the Forest
Life: 50 │ Mana: 30
Stamina: 5 │ Endurance: 5
Wisdom: 5 │ Luck: 5
Agility, Accuracy, Strength, Defense – Unopened]
If life is 50 and the others are 5, is 50 the maximum score? Or is it 100? If 100 is the maximum, it seems like a very distant number.
While following Nyang-nyang’s instructions, I encounter several large wolves.
[Nyang-nyang
You’ve encountered monsters! But don’t worry. Angryy-nim is a very strong adventurer.
Press the shortcut key A to use the awesome Flame Attack skill!]
Faced with the monsters, I press A, and my character plays the harp, shooting fireballs towards the monsters. This skill is called
The monsters collapse with flashy effects.
I still can’t quite grasp how playing an instrument creates fireballs that attack monsters, but…
After defeating the monsters by alternating between three skills, the people who were screaming earlier appear. They greet me first.
“Lido Arden (Guild Master of Lido Guild)
Thank you so much for saving us! You have amazing skills to defeat those huge monsters. What’s your name?
Ah, Angryy. You have a good name.
I’m Lido Arden, the guild master of Lido Guild. We’re currently on a guild request, but our guide was taken out by monsters, making it difficult for us to get out of this forest. Could you possibly guide us to ‘Weak Village’ where our guild branch is? We’ll compensate you well!”
[Main Quest
Safely escort Lido Arden and two others to Weak Village.
Reward: 300G, 100 EXP]
A new window pops up. Nyang-nyang tells me it’s a quest window. When I accept the quest, Nyang-nyang also informs me that I’ve joined their party. So ‘party’ seems to mean being on the same team. I wonder how I’m supposed to guide them when I don’t know the way myself, but fortunately, Nyang-nyang takes care of the navigation.
Monsters appear on the way too, but I defeat them by alternating between three attack skills:
Burning, freezing, and blowing them away with wind…
Before I know it, I level up and leave the forest. Weak turns out to be a village straight out of a medieval fantasy movie. After completing the first quest and running errands for Lido Arden and others around Weak, I get a call from Jin.
“Yeah.”
– Hyung, are you playing the game well?
“I don’t know about ‘well’, but I’m playing it anyway.”
– It’s not as hard as you thought, right? The person who recommended it said it was made so that even first-time gamers could easily play it.
“What do you mean, ‘the person who recommended it’? I thought it was a lecture assignment.”
– Ah, well, the lecture assignment was to reach level 50 in other games besides Forest Effect, and I chose Forest among those games. A friend who’s good at games recommended it because it’s easy.
Something seems fishy.
– What’s your character’s name, hyung?
“Angryy.”
– Don’t be angry. It really is an assignment. I need to tell the professor the character name, that’s why I’m asking. I’m innocent.
“That’s why I’m saying it’s Angryy.”
– Huh?
“The character’s name is Angryy.”
– Oh… Angryy.
My brother’s voice was mixed with complex emotions.
Thinking about it, I worried that the name might be too casual for a proper university assignment.
“You said I could name the character whatever I wanted, so I thought it was okay. Should I have named it something like ‘Whatever Department Ha Jin’? Do you think the professor will say I’m rebelling against them?”
– No, no. It doesn’t matter. You could have named it ‘Fucking Pissed’ and it would have been fine. Well, I’ll be counting on you from now on.
“Okay.”
– But like… are you so angry about playing the game? Are you angry because you hate doing it so much…?
My brother asked cautiously.
I was angry earlier when naming the character. How could I not be angry when I kept typing diligently only to be rejected for duplicates? And I got angry again when war appeared in the initial video, and when I learned that the protagonist was an orphan. I wish they wouldn’t kill off families so easily, even if it’s a fictional character. At least the younger sibling should have survived.
But now, my anger has subsided. The video was… okay. Although there were frustrating parts in the story (Why didn’t they unseal the jade seal or whatever earlier?), above all, the satisfaction of killing monsters improved my mood.
Who knew killing monsters could be so exciting?
It was even thrilling to gather five or six monsters and kill them all at once.
Now I’m in a village where people live, so it’s gotten a bit boring again. I want to go out and fight soon.
“I’m not angry. It’s manageable, so don’t worry.”
– That’s a relief. You’ll level up to 50 for me, right?
“Yeah.”
– Thanks, hyung.
My brother reminded me again that he’d be late today and hung up.
I went back to playing the game.
*
Ding- Click.
I jumped up, startled by the sound of the door opening. As soon as I left my brother’s room, I met eyes with my brother who was just coming in. My brother, with flushed cheeks, opened his eyes wide.
“Hyung, why are you coming out of my room? Did you come looking for hidden alcohol?”
“What nonsense. I was playing the game you told me to play.”
“The game… you’ve been… playing it all this time?”
“Time flew by while I was playing. Did you drink a lot?”
“Oh, ah, yeah. A little. Did you eat?”
“Yeah, did you?”
Actually, I didn’t eat. I forgot to eat, but I answered shamelessly. Jin blinked.
“Of course I ate until I was stuffed. But the game…. Uh, thanks. Hyung. For doing the game assignment.”
“Sure. Go wash up quickly. You smell of alcohol.”
“Okay. I’ll drink some water first.”
Now that the laptop owner is back, I should stop playing the game. I went back to my brother’s room and sat in front of the laptop. But how do I turn off the game? How do I save this…
As I was fiddling with it, Jin, who said he was going to wash up, poked his head in while undressing.
“Oh, you chose Teisia race. Teisia is good. You’re already level 5? Hyung, you did the character customization really well.”
“What’s character customization?”
“It means the appearance. Skin color, hairstyle, eye color, face shape, things like that. We call it ‘chama’ for short, from customization.”
“I just did it randomly and this is how it turned out.”
“Random? Hyung, you could have ended up as a bald or bearded muscle man.”
…Muscle man and beard aside, there are even bald options? That was a close call.
“I told you to go wash up. I’m going to turn off the game now.”
“Why turn it off? Keep playing.”
“You need to sleep.”
“Take the laptop to your room and play. I don’t use that laptop.”
Jin said casually and went to wash up. After some consideration, I took the laptop to my room. If I don’t have to turn it off, I might as well continue what I was doing.
I’m currently being introduced to ‘Mischievous Mino’. The only swordsmanship instructor in Weak Village gave me a quest to bring his mischievous trainee to me, a skilled adventurer.
Mino was sitting alone by the well on the outskirts of the village and was younger than I expected. I mean, about twelve years old? I wonder if it’s okay to force training on such a young child.
When I approach him, Mino suddenly bursts into tears and shouts that he doesn’t want to hold a sword.
[Main Quest
Press enter and then type /comfort to comfort the crying, mischievous Mino who doesn’t want to train.
Reward: 1 Stamina Potion (50)]
How am I supposed to comfort a game character when I’ve never comforted anyone in real life?