Chapter 11

I had forgotten it amidst my joy at being able to use game abilities in reality, but I was still aware of it. Revenge—it was a trash game.

‘What if another type of game system had been applied to me?’

There were various games such as Real Stage, which dominated for 50 years as the most popular game in District 34 and was recognized as a masterpiece even after time passed; Blade & Magic, a power gamer’s game filled with high-level users; Great War 4, which was mandatory for gigas pilots; Emperor Quest, which took over all the gaming rooms within one year of its appearance, etc.

If any of these game systems had been applied to me, what I needed to do would’ve been simple.

All you had to do was play hard. Learn strategies, study the system, level up, farm items and send them to Ardenia. I would’ve acquired skills just by increasing proficiency, obtained legendary equipment by clearing dungeons, achieved job changes under specific conditions, and earned special rewards through quests.

But what about Revenge?

Job? You have to buy it with money.

Equipment? Farming can solve it to some extent but beyond that, you need to spend money.

Level? Without buying divine grace, there is no way to raise your level.

Skills? Once again, you must pay for them!

“No, this game is crazy.”

Setting aside everything else, having to buy skills with money seemed utterly insane. In-game currency called gold could only purchase normal or advanced-ranked skills (and even those were incredibly expensive), while rare or higher-ranked skills required buying random skill boxes.

Someone might ask if it’s not possible to farm items dropped by monsters, but the issue lies in their drop rates. Let me illustrate this using Revenge as an example:

[A player named ‘Unschooled Child’ has acquired Heart Ripper(Rare) from Alligator Marshes!]

A world message announcing both the skill name and username would pop up whenever someone obtained a rare-level skill! It was visible to all users playing the game!

“The Alligator Marshes are located in the southern region…almost on the opposite side of the continent, yet we can see it here.”

I knew this place well, having lived in Ardenia for twenty years. It was a swamp spanning several dozen kilometers inhabited by the dreaded Two-Headed Alligators—a nightmare among nightmares!

To think they’d broadcast something happening over two thousand kilometers away…

It wasn’t really about the distance; that didn’t bother me. The real issue was receiving a world message for merely acquiring a rare skill. If obtaining a rare skill were so common, would it warrant such notification? Millions of players were hunting at this very moment.

“Realistically, shouldn’t even killing regular monsters yield rare items frequently? This is a game, after all!”

He grumbled but knew why it was this way. In Revenge, there were no level requirements for gear or equipment.

Since only ranks mattered and not levels, the value of items remained relatively constant. If a level-1 character from ten years ago got lucky enough to acquire a legendary weapon, they would continue using that legendary item for another decade without any issue.

Unlike other games, ranks in Revenge truly represented the worth of an item or skill. Common weapons stayed common, while rare weapons genuinely seldom appeared. Legendary weapons lived up to their name, being as elusive as myths themselves.

There’s no way a level-10 legendary weapon could be weaker than a level-50 common one.

It wasn’t unheard of for players who had been dedicated to the game for several years to still not obtain a single legendary weapon.

It was a game where you couldn’t reach the top unless you paid money, even if you played for several years straight without stopping. That’s what Revenge was all about. And now, in this pay-to-win game, I had to start playing as a free player.

‘Hah…I wasted my entire fortune. Almost 40 million won, and now I have to play for free.’

However, there was no choice since I sent all the classes obtained through payments to Ardenia.

‘Should I contact customer service and ask them to restore it?’

The thought crossed my mind but it was risky. Firstly, I didn’t know the principle behind how the game system was affecting my physical body. If contacting the developers or administrators inadvertently led to losing this ability, how would I cope with that?

If this world hadn’t existed from the beginning, it might be different, but now that I knew about it, losing everything could make me hang myself.

Puhk! Puhk! Puhk! Bang! Chiiing!

Gwiik!

I watched my avatar diligently hunting inside the monitor. Since I sent the starter package to Ardenia, my character was just a regular Archer with ordinary collection items registered as drops. ‘Kilian’ was extremely weak, akin to the lowest commoner in Revenge. This character remained so feeble that even after running the game non-stop for 10 days, they were still hunting [Regular] grade monsters. Hunting in areas with [Advanced] grade monsters became unsustainable due to the cost of potions used automatically.

“Level 37 and still this…”

In Revenge, as levels increased, the required experience points skyrocketed exponentially, making it increasingly difficult to level up. Despite hunting continuously for 24 hours today, I couldn’t even raise my experience by 30%. The only progress came from allocating free stat points upon leveling up, but even that was becoming harder. No matter how much I played, there was hardly any growth!

“Is this really a game?”

The only satisfaction lay in gradually accumulating gold through auto-play, yet not enough to afford a single advanced skill. Even then, the amount fell short of what was needed.

Ping!

[Your inventory weight exceeds 50%!]

[Due to exceeding 50% inventory weight, Health and Mana will not naturally regenerate!]

I looked at the text appearing on the screen while sitting in front of my computer. Cheeda, who had been hitting my stomach, also got off the bed and sat next to the chair.

“It’s full.”

My character was hunting Highland Wild Boars (General) in Windbreak Highlands located west of the starting area. Hunting one boar every 15 seconds meant four per minute, or 240 per hour.

‘The drop table for highland wild boars is…’

I turned on the homepage to check the monster information.

[Highland Wild Boar (General) Drop Items]

Ordinary Class Summoning Stone (No Rank), Bone Dagger (General), Bone Long Sword (General), Leather Shield (General).

Wild Boar Ham (Material), Wild Boar Skin (Material), Wild Boar Tusk (Shop Sale), Gold.

“Equipment includes dagger, sword, shield - three items, and the rest are meat and leather.”

The drop table was so poor that there were no high-level items. Of course, it contained the Class Summoning Stone but I didn’t bother looking at it. It had been more than 200 hours since I started hunting wild boars here yet I hadn’t even seen it once. Even when others ate, I never saw this stone. Despite other characters constantly hunting around me, nobody paid attention to it.

“Before they disappear.”

I moved through the hunting grounds and recovered items left by other characters.

[You have acquired Bone Dagger (Ordinary)!]

[You have acquired Leather Shield (Ordinary)!]

[You have acquired Wild Boar’s Ham x12!]

[Bone Sword…]

In Revenge, ownership of dropped items lasted for one minute. After that time limit, anyone could pick them up, and after 10 minutes, they would vanish entirely.

Other players didn’t care if I picked up these items. Why were there so many items piled on the ground in the first place? It was because they had set their options not to collect them. They judged that it wasn’t worth filling their inventory weight with such items.

‘Indeed, this is a place where people come for leather grinding, and everything else is just heavy trash.’

In Revenge, crafting content existed, and among them, leather was quite commonly used. Of course, the leather from highland wild boars was only low-grade but combining 10 pieces of low-grade leather with 1,000 gold allowed obtaining mid-grade leather. Similarly, it could be upgraded to high-grade and superior-grade leather, which is why many people automated farming here despite it being a regular hunting ground.

Good thing they’re leaving behind meat instead of leather.

Wild boar hindquarters were popular ingredients for cooking content but weren’t valued as highly as their hides. Unlike leather, wild boar hindquarters couldn’t be upgraded to higher-quality meats. Although one could cook them, who would want to use such low-grade food when it provided buffs lasting at least an hour? To most Players, wild boar hindquarters were just trash that added unnecessary weight to their inventories.

[Your inventory exceeds 75 percent capacity!]

[Exceeding 75 percent will slow your movement speed!]

[Your inventory exceeds 100 percent capacity!]

[Your inventory weight exceeds 100%, causing extreme movement slowdown and gradual decrease of Stamina, Health, Life Force, and Mana!]

I continued grabbing items from the ground until my inventory was full.

“Okay. Then log in.”

As I spoke…

I arrived in Ardenia.

“You have returned safely. Are you alright?”

Once I caught up with the group of villagers, the knight leading them approached me. His name was Hundred SilverSword, one of only two knights in our territory.

Unlike Stonestone, who had complex job changes from commoner to bandit, mercenary, and finally knight, Hundred was born into the prestigious SilverSword Count’s family and became an elite among elites at the age of 15.

‘Of course, that doesn’t mean he wields any significant power.’

The head of the SilverSword family, Count Illain, had fathered twelve sons and nineteen daughters—a staggering number of children—and Hundred was the twenty-fifth offspring. Moreover, since his mother was merely one of the knights guarding the count, his chances of inheriting the SilverSword title were virtually nil, likely less than 0.1%.

‘I suppose that’s why he was sent to this remote border region.’

Shaking off these thoughts, I addressed Hundred.

“No problem at all. We’ve completely shaken them off and put enough distance between us, so there’s no need to worry about further pursuit.”

“You’re truly remarkable, dealing with those monstrous creatures…”

His once-proud, meticulously maintained armor now bore dents from battling orcs. Considering how he bravely stood against them for the villagers, it was impressive that the damage to his armor wasn’t more extensive.

“Those damn creatures. Anyway, let’s eat dinner.”

“Oh! Yes, Lord. Come on! It’s dinnertime!”

“Dinnertime! The Lord has arrived!”

“Light the fire! Put on the pots!”

“Let’s eat!”

The villagers, who had been laboring along the mountain path, started to cheer and make space for themselves. There was no shortage of firewood due to the abundance of trees in this forest. However, feeding over a thousand subjects remained a concern.

“Take turns getting your share!”

“Yes! Line up and get your portion! Start cooking right away!”

There were unlimited wild boar hams available here! I reached into Revenge’s inventory and pulled out as many hind legs as I could carry, tossing them around.

“Wah! Look at these! These hams are incredibly huge even upon second glance.”

“But where did you catch such a number of wild boars?”

“Moreover, they are all right hind legs. Where are the other legs and bodies? Only the right hind legs…”

The villagers were puzzled by this recurring phenomenon but readily accepted the hams to grill or boil them. Despite being forced from their homes due to the worst-case scenario, the abundant food supply lifted their spirits somewhat.

“And take these too.” I handed over dozens of wild boar hides that I had previously gathered on one side for the villagers. Although it was still summer, my territory was primarily located in the northern region, and we were moving even further north. To avoid freezing, adequate protection against the cold was essential.

“My lord.” Hundreed observed me closely before speaking up.

Hundred observed this and opened his mouth, “What is it?”

“I know this isn’t the time to ask…but what are these skins? They are perfectly tanned wild boar hides.”

“It’s hard to explain. Since the world has become like this…you can think of it as me gaining a special ability. I can bring items from afar. Haven’t you seen things dropping when orcs die?”

Currently, in Ardenia, items and gold dropped whenever monsters were killed. The drop rates were low due to the lack of the goddess’s favor (a cash service providing significant buffs for experience points and drop rates). However, even with the reduced drop rate, gold still fell frequently, so Hundred must’ve witnessed this phenomenon before.

“Really…the world has changed beyond recognition.”

“Yes. By the way.” I took out numerous Bone Daggers (General), Bone Swords (General), and Leather Shields (General) from my inventory. If I dismantled this equipment, I could obtain Soul Crystals to strengthen the gatekeeper. However, dismantling required Dragon’s Stones, which had to be purchased from the shop (they weren’t free). Additionally, there were success rates, great successes, and failures, making it uneconomical to dismantle ordinary equipment.

“Arm the villagers. Give shields to those with good strength.”

“But Lord, the orcs aren’t chasing us anymore…”

“Do you think other territories will remain unharmed? Do you believe we’re the only ones facing monsters?”

”…”

“Arm them.”

“As ordered.”