CHAPTER 25

 Newly Discovered Rules

As soon as he absorbed the vitality, Seowoon picked up the healing scroll he had tossed aside for bait and tore it open, checking his elbow as he moved his arm.

"This is the first time I've lost in a contest of strength."

Even though he used internal energy , he couldn't ignore the sheer physical power of the otherworldly knights.

Recalling the previous game, where his arm had trembled from an opponent's attack even with a divine artifact wrapped around it, he was convinced that people from that world possessed mysterious powers beyond internal energy.

He lifted an axe that radiated overwhelming presence the moment he opened the chest, then shook his head.

"Even with a strength ring on, lifting this with one hand is too much."

He had heard stories of the legendary craftsman Guan Yu swinging an 82-jin Green Dragon Crescent Blade with one hand and beheading enemy generals. Until now, he'd dismissed it as the continent's typical bravado — but he was starting to change his mind.

'This axe might even surpass that blade in weight and power.'

Setting the axe aside, he looked inside the chest again.

[Ding! You have obtained the Power Glove.]

[Ding! You have obtained the Skill Book: Wheel.]

As expected, it was the items that drew his attention more than the skill book.

[Power Glove: A mass-produced item that increases the wearer's strength.]

Seowoon put on the gray leather gloves, their fingers cut off at the ends, and clenched his fist.

The snug fit and the solid grip weren't bad.

– Strength +45

It wasn't an exceptional item, granting only around +10 to strength, but it was better than nothing.

Next, he opened the mage's chest, which contained far more items than the knight's.

[Ding! You have obtained the Magic Amplification Scroll.]

[Ding! You have obtained the Potion of Awakening.]

[Ding! You have obtained the Shield Scroll.]

[Ding! You have obtained the Philosopher's Stone.]

[Ding! You have obtained the Cursed Brooch.]

[Ding! You have obtained a Torn Secret Manual.]

Even after discarding the useless items, there were still quite a few unique ones.

"First… explain this one."

[Philosopher's Stone: A rare stone that allows the user to learn one Askro-type spell one level higher than their current circle. Crafted by the great sage Askro. Cooldown: 1 hour.]

"Oh? Depending on who uses it, this could be incredibly valuable."

For someone like him — barely able to call himself a mage with just a level 2 circle and a single Wind Ball spell — it wasn't very useful. But for intermediate or advanced mages, it would be a priceless treasure.

"And this?"

[Cursed Brooch: Grants a physical curse in exchange for increasing one's magic circle by one level. Created using a lich's crystal orb.]

Seowoon tilted his head at the mention of a "physical curse" and tossed the brooch into the pile of junk items and spare clothes beside him instead of storing it in his pocket dimension.

He wiped his hand vigorously on his clothes, uncomfortable from having touched it, then reached for the last item.

[Torn Secret Manual: The first piece of a secret manual. Collect all 8 pieces to reveal its true name.]

"Huh?"

He furrowed his brows at the unusually vague description.

'A nameless secret manual piece, huh…'

As someone devoted to learning martial arts, the mystery piqued his curiosity.

"Map!"

Since it was the first day of the game, the map was vast and unrestricted. Seowoon studied it carefully.

'Argas carved a path through here… About 30 teams dropped behind me… Should I head toward the center of the canyon, or farm the outskirts and ambush the trailing teams?'

Looking at the overall layout, the map was as large as a major metropolitan area.

At the center lay the massive Kantros Canyon. He debated whether to plan his route through the canyon or farm in the surrounding villages.

"Well, I've already started. Might as well see it through to the end."

He didn't know why, but this was a tutorial that had triggered on his second playthrough.

Rather than focus on simply surviving, he decided to prioritize gaining more experience and testing his strength. With resolve, he marked the nearest of the seven entrances to the canyon.

First, he restored his greatly depleted internal energy through controlled breathing and began to run at a steady pace.

He avoided wasting energy by maintaining a moderate speed and planned a route through mountainous terrain and forests.

Of course, there were some fairly well-paved main roads, but he wasn't bold enough to run openly along them.

He had no desire to repeat the experience of getting hit by an arrow without even knowing where the enemy was.

After about an hour of light running that worked up a sweat, the sun began to set.

Wearing the robe of the mage who had died with a broken spine and pulling the hood low over his face, he stopped and checked the map.

"Just a little further. I was hoping to arrive before dark."

He took a deep breath and started running a little faster. Soon, the forest ended, and a reddish terrain appeared.

Instead of fine soil, the ground was made of hard stone. On the red earth, where not a single tree could be seen, rows of houses built from red bricks stretched out.

The already red land and buildings took on an even more vivid crimson hue under the setting sun, creating a strangely poignant sight.

"Now's not the time to be admiring scenery."

Just as Seowoon, momentarily mesmerized by the view, stepped onto the red earth, a notification sound made him freeze.

[Ding! You have entered a monster area.]

"Huh? A monster area?"

[Tutorial Notice: Certain areas of the designated map are monster zones where specific monsters spawn. The types of monsters vary widely. Defeating them may drop specific items.]

"Wama… What? Why not just throw in a boss monster too… No wonder that random werewolf showed up."

As if responding to his complaint, the system chimed in again.

[Boss Monster: Each map has one designated boss monster based on the map's characteristics. These vary from map to map. Defeating a boss monster drops special items.]

"R-Really? What, no mini-bosses or other mobs?"

He asked sarcastically, and the system responded as if to say, "Of course there are."

[Buff Monster: In addition to regular and boss monsters, some maps contain designated buff monsters. Buff monsters do not drop items, but instead grant special buffs to the player for a limited time. These buffs are given only to the player or team who delivers the final blow, so don't miss out.]

"…"

Now too annoyed to respond, he just shook his head and started walking again.

Monsters? He had figured they might appear.

After all, they were beings that existed in this otherworld.

But after hearing about boss and buff monsters, he once again found himself curious about the face of the madman who had created this absurd, real-life game.

"So they threw together FPS, AOS, and MMORPG elements, huh."

With that thought, he took a few more steps, and the blazing red sunset finally faded into darkness.

At the same time, terrible, piercing screams began echoing around him.

– Kyaaaaahhh!

– Aaaaaargh!

– Gwaaaargh!

Anyone could tell those weren't human voices.

The high-pitched, grating shrieks made him instinctively clench his fists in tension.

Despite the loud noise and the sense that something could leap out at any moment, nothing actually appeared. Remaining alert, he pressed himself against the wall of the nearest house and checked for any presence inside.

Sensing nothing with his intuition, he cautiously peeked through a small window to look inside.

"No guarantee there isn't another one of those cloaks of invisibility."

He knew better than anyone just how unreliable that cursed glass-like cloak was.

Though the eerie screams continued now and then, slicing through the night sky and heightening the tension, Seowoon entered the empty house.

Sure enough, a lantern hanging from the ceiling lit up the room brightly.

After checking for any useless junk like daggers or arrows, he sat briefly against a wall and took a leather pouch filled with jerky from his subspace.

"Ah!"

Just as he was chewing the tough, gamey jerky, he suddenly remembered something he had stored in the subspace not long after returning to Earth.

"How could I forget about that?"

A box of instant ramen and a portable burner-cookset combo.

He had bought them online at the lowest price and completely forgotten about them.

"I got those so I wouldn't have to keep gnawing on jerky every day!"

He quickly reached into the subspace with rising anticipation, but his expression turned sour.

As if to mock him, the moment his hand brushed around aimlessly inside, a system message rang out.

[The player's subspace ring allows you to bring items from this world into your own, but not the other way around. However, if the player is eliminated, other players may obtain those items.]

"Son of a…"

In the end, the stuff he couldn't even use could just end up in someone else's hands.

He couldn't help but curse.

It wasn't like he had invested a ton of money, but knowing it might fatten someone else's inventory still irritated him.

Staring down at the piece of jerky he had spit on the floor, he pulled out a new piece from the subspace and put it in his mouth.

"So I'm stuck eating this damned jerky again."

He regretted leaving the ham he'd stocked up on sitting in the fridge, but there was nothing he could do now.

– Kyaaaaahhh!

Boom!

At the explosive sound that burst out with a subtle vibration, he stopped chewing on the jerky.

'Someone's here.'

Well, there was no rule that said he had to be the only one in this place.

As soon as he sensed the wave of mana, Seowoon's lips, which had been curving upward, began to twitch.

'A martial artist?'

Not just the wave of mana—he could also feel the distinct presence unique to a martial artist.

Now that he thought about it, aside from Jang Docheon and Nam Sagwang, he hadn't encountered anyone else from the Murim.

'They're the ones I tried the hardest to avoid.'

If it were just a magician, he could finish things with a surprise attack and a one-shot kill, but if the opponent was a magician and martial artist combo, it was a whole different story.

The most troublesome combination to face—just thinking about it made his forehead involuntarily wrinkle into a "川" shape.

Even as he pondered, the screams of monsters and the sounds of battle continued without end.

'Let's see how things go.'

He swallowed the jerky he'd been chewing and stood up, a bow from his subspace already in his hand.

What first caught his eye was the softly glowing orb that floated out and illuminated the surroundings under the night sky.

'That damn mage bastard used a similar technique.'

The magician who bore Escrow's name had fired off countless orbs far brighter than this one into the sky, turning night into day during their group ambush. Still, even the dimmer orb currently floating was bright enough to make out nearby objects without issue.

Avoiding the light as much as possible, he stuck close to the walls of nearby houses and leapt up to the roof of what looked like the tallest two-story building, flattening himself against the tiles.

In the distance, he spotted a long-haired man with his hair neatly tied, calmly swinging a saber, and a robed figure firing magic from behind the martial artist—a duo came into view.

'Disgusting pair.'

But what caught his eye even more than the duo were the bizarre monsters that looked like they had the lower body of a snake and the upper body of a woman.

Their red-scaled lower halves writhed ceaselessly as they slithered along the ground—the sight alone made his skin crawl.

For someone who already felt intense disgust toward reptiles, these were monsters he never wanted to face.

'About twenty of them.'

Excluding the ones already dead and sprawled on the ground, about that many were closing in around the duo.

Yet the magician and martial artist never let the monsters close the distance, retreating while still fighting them off.

Maybe the martial artist, who stood at the front slashing rapidly with a short blade, had drawn their attention? The monsters trying to surround the pair gradually began to converge on the martial artist.

Meanwhile, the magician stopped retreating and formed a rather large ice spear in the air.

Seeing him freeze one of the monsters' lower bodies by conjuring two ice spears deepened Seowoon's contemplation.

As soon as the spear struck, the surrounding area froze white, and the monster was rendered immobile—it was a very annoying spell.

'They've got to be shielded, for sure.'

Ideally, those two would just get killed by the monsters, but no matter how he looked at it, that seemed unlikely.

At the very least, the martial artist seemed skilled enough to escape even in the worst-case scenario.

After a moment of thought, Seowoon nocked an arrow to his bow and began to take careful aim.

READ MORE CHAPTERS HERE : https://ko-fi.com/pokemon1920