Chapter 53
“So even a scammer can dodge something like that through skill, huh.”
What’s with this guy now?
Even in virtual reality, it wasn’t common for someone to suddenly start a fight for absolutely no reason.
Of course, enemies encountered during gameplay were an exception.
Because once you beat someone, emotions naturally ran high, and the easiest way to enjoy that feeling was by provoking your opponent.
Anyway.
Seojun checked the ID of the person who had just entered and spoken.
‘Dangso.’
Considering the Tang surname, the green-decorated outfit, and the hidden weapon thrown earlier, the guy was definitely a Tang Clan player.
“Excuse me, who are you?”
The Swordsman stood up and asked.
Dangso walked toward them.
“Me?”
“Yes.”
“To think you dare not know who this body is.”
“I’m telling you I don’t.”
“How vulgar.”
“?”
For a moment, it genuinely looked as if a question mark had appeared above the Swordsman’s head.
Watching silently, Seojun increasingly felt the desire to avoid joining this conversation at all costs.
Ignoring Seojun’s wishes, however, the two continued talking.
“Y-You don’t recognize the ID?”
“Dangso?”
“Correct.”
“What does Dangso even mean?”
What meaning could it possibly have? It was probably just a name.
That was what Seojun assumed, but—
“It means the Young Patriarch of the Tang Clan.”
Dangso proudly declared it, the Swordsman gasped in admiration, and Seojun stared off into the distance.
So that’s what it meant.
Well, usernames weren’t that important anyway. As long as the owner understood it, that was enough.
Seojun desperately rationalized.
“Then what meaning does World’s Greatest Swordsman have? Explain.”
“It doesn’t really mean anything.”
“I see.”
A brief silence followed.
The judgment came swiftly.
This guy’s an idiot.
-That Dangso bastard is famous lololol. He’s always baiting people.
-He’s the guy who wrote the callout post yesterday.
-You can just ignore him lololol.
-Posting the link again. (Link)
Through the chat, Seojun figured out who this so-called Dangso was.
This was what he liked about streaming.
No need to search things up yourself.
And perhaps because For the Sake of Chivalry was such an old game, everyone seemed to know each other fairly well.
“So why did you suddenly throw a dagger?”
Seojun addressed Dangso using the Heavenly Demon speech style.
The Tang Clan belonged to the Unorthodox Factions—in other words, enemies of the Demonic Cult.
So speaking down to him sounded more fun.
Especially since the other side was doing the same thing.
Besides, For the Sake of Chivalry had so many eccentric players that nobody really cared about speech etiquette anymore.
Dangso lifted his chin.
“Heavenly Demon the 14th.”
“What.”
“While this body is a direct descendant and Young Patriarch of the Tang Clan, are you not merely the fourteenth replacement? Mind your tone.”
What kind of absurd roleplay concept is this?
Shaking his head, Seojun decided to play along.
“Are you proud to be the Young Patriarch of a clan labeled unorthodox merely for using poison?”
In his previous life, the Tang Clan hadn’t been classified as unorthodox, but they’d still been avoided and despised.
Because they used poison.
Dangso listened to Seojun’s words and casually replied as if it were nothing.
“And what exactly is the Demonic Cult supposed to say about that?”
Hearing this, Seojun suddenly found himself speechless.
Was this why people joined powerful factions?!
Ah. I shouldn’t have indulged his roleplay.
“Anyway, Heavenly Demon the 14th.”
“Yes, speak.”
“What kind of scam did you use?”
“A scam?”
“Yes, a scam. That Grandmaster title stuck next to your nickname.”
As expected, this was about Grandmaster again.
“It’s not a scam though.”
“Then what did you do to get it? Seeing it in person like this proves it isn’t fake. I’m curious what sort of trick you used. Is Grandmaster obtained somewhere other than the Demonic Cult test?”
Dangso tilted his head.
-The live stream is literally all there. What is this guy talking about lol.
-Reality denial?
-Info) On the community forums, about half the people genuinely think he pulled some trick.
-This idiot lol.
It should still be in the Travel VOD too.
Wanting to get rid of the annoying pest, Seojun opened his mouth.
“Yeah, I cheated.”
At the same time, Dangso also spoke.
“Then prove—wait, what? You cheated?”
“Yep.”
“I knew it. Obviously. Hmph. How hard do you think it was for this body to earn Transcendent Peak? There’s no way an outsider to martial arts like you could obtain a rank above that using mere standard forms.”
Seojun hadn’t realized there was such a tragic backstory behind it.
Silently, he closed his mouth and nodded sympathetically.
Now please leave.
The battlefield was about to start.
-How does one achieve eternal happiness?
-By not arguing with fools.
-I disagree with that statement.
-Yes. You are correct.
-LMAOOOO the teamwork is incredible.
Unfortunately, Dangso wasn’t quite stupid enough to leave that easily.
“Then how exactly did you obtain Grandmaster? And the edited Travel footage?”
“I hired professionals to edit it. Since Grandmaster can only be obtained after joining the Demonic Cult, telling you would be useless anyway.”
He wasn’t fully stupid.
Just ambiguously stupid.
“Are you trying to drive me away right now? But then Grandmaster would actually have to be real… and that makes no sense either. Indeed.”
“That makes no sense.”
“Hurry up and go.”
Seo-jun didn’t particularly feel like persuading him.
“Fine. Prove it. Go stand before Baek Wi-gang and prove you’re not a fraud.”
“No thanks.”
“Hm. Since you can’t prove it, I guess you really are a scammer. Then I’ve proven my point.”
After declaring that, Dang So turned around and walked toward the door.
- Ah damn, Dang So lmaoooo
- This counts as proof?
- How did he even get rank 13?
Seo-jun shrugged.
Since when did not proving something become the same as being unable to prove it?
But thinking about it, the battlefield would be starting soon anyway, and he had nothing to do during the spare time.
Guess I’ll play along a little.
“So you’re saying his brain got damaged from consuming too much poison? Ahem, everyone, you really shouldn’t say things like that.”
- Then who are you talking about?
- Here we go again lmfaooooo
- Dude’s provoking skills are insane lol
- Mouth fighter
- I can only admire this
Step.
Dang So’s footsteps stopped as he was heading outside.
Then he turned around.
“Were you talking about me?”
“Nope.”
“Sure sounded like you were.”
“So what?”
“You little—!”
Daggers appeared in both of Dang So’s hands as he charged at Seo-jun.
Just what you’d expect from a game set in a world where people start sword fights the moment eyes meet.
The player base is really something.
Clicking his tongue, Seo-jun knocked away the daggers with the sword in his hand.
Clang!
Then he immediately retaliated by throwing his sword.
Swoooosh!
The sword Seo-jun threw grazed Dang So’s cheek before flying past him.
“Well? Do I still look like a scammer?”
Gulp.
Dang So’s Adam’s apple bobbed at the sudden turn of events.
Smiling kindly, Seo-jun clasped his hands behind his back.
He wondered what someone who had completely lost their fighting spirit would do next.
Dang So opened his mouth.
“Hah, acting all smug when you missed. The battlefield’s opening soon anyway. Pick the battlefield in the Unorthodox Faction borderlands.
I’ll expose your true identity there!”
Right. This time it’s the battlefield, huh?
Seo-jun let out a hollow laugh while Dang So left the sparring hall, once again acting overly imposing.
Seo-jun didn’t stop him. Instead, he waved goodbye.
“Hm, but I’m not fighting the Unorthodox Faction today.”
That said, he had no intention of changing his original plan just because of Dang So.
- You should though lmaoooo
- Dude’s brain really got pickled in poison lol
- He’s supposedly a ranker but doesn’t even know today’s battlefield mode?
The viewers were laughing.
Seo-jun quickly realized why.
“Oh right. Today’s game mode is different from yesterday, isn’t it?”
- Yep, today’s a raid mode lmfaooo
- A battlefield-only mode where you fight the opposing faction’s NPCs!
- Next one’s escort!
That’s right. Today’s battlefield mode wasn’t PVP.
And yet the guy had been talking about stream-sniping and exposing him.
“The Tang Clan’s future sure looks bright.”
He was only the Young Clan Head in name, but at this point, Seo-jun felt like the Tang Clan should sue him for defamation.
- Too bright to even see lol
- Whether it’s too bright or too dark, you can’t see either way lmaoooo
- Easy mistake to make kekekeke
- This is the Tang Clan speaking. We want to get rid of that bastard.
Then the swordsman who had been silently standing nearby spoke up.
“Nice. It’s almost 7. Thanks to him, I don’t have to train any longer.”
After returning to town, Seo-jun adjusted his traits.
Since this morning, while attending lectures at university, he had carefully read every detailed explanation of the traits on his phone.
And he optimized them in the best possible direction.
The day before, he had rushed things and ended up losing efficiency in the finer details.
[Inner Demons manifest more quickly, but the power of the Absorption Technique increases.]
[The technique is canceled upon killing an enemy.]
These core traits remained unchanged.
Traits that greatly increased power at the cost of harsher penalties.
If he had chosen other traits, both the power and penalties would have been softened, while granting him higher HP and defense.
After deciding on the overall direction, he fine-tuned the smaller traits.
[Sword Aura damage against enemies increases.]
[Internal Energy consumption decreases.]
[Movement speed increases for 3 seconds after stealing HP from an enemy.]
And so on.
If he had to summarize the traits Seo-jun selected in one phrase—
- Look at him refusing to pick anything defensive lololol
- I get the build idea, but it still doesn’t fix the core issue. It’s just for pub-stomping
- Will this even work later on?
A pub-stomping build.
It was heavily focused on offense, so allowing even a single enemy attack through could be fatal.
‘But I can just refill my HP again.’
That was Seo-jun’s way of thinking.
Right as he finished setting his traits, it became 7 PM—the time the battlefield opened.
Seo-jun opened the game window and entered the battlefield.
A map appeared, and icons rose over the battle regions, kicking up clouds of dust to briefly indicate where fighting had occurred.
Then, after day and night switched places, the result appeared.
“Looks like every side successfully defended for now.”
No different from yesterday.
It meant every faction had successfully defended every region.
In other words, nobody had succeeded in attacking.
- Let’s check streamer’s contribution score
- Based on reputation points, he was rank 1 among the people we saw
- Gotta see contribution
In the battlefield, contribution rankings were only publicly revealed once half the event duration had passed.
So until the official rankings came out, people could only estimate based on the contribution scores that streamers and rankers revealed themselves.
Which was why the viewers wanted him to show it.
But—
“Why are you trying to see it already? It’s only the first day.”
Seo-jun didn’t particularly want to reveal it.
His personality leaned more toward simply doing what needed to be done rather than obsessing over every little result.
- Streamer, reveal your contribution score now! Reveal it!
- Didn’t you say you were aiming for rank 16? We need to plan strategies together lol
- I’m just curious
“But even if I don’t reveal it to you guys, we can still make strategies, right?”
- Fact ban
- No, we’ll make the strategies for you
- Aren’t you guys all Bronze? lmfao
- Whatever, we’re good at this
- Just trust us!
- Streamer be like: “I’m not getting tutoring from someone with a bottom-tier SAT score.” (rough paraphrase)
- He said fact ban
And not just Seo-jun—most people seriously aiming for rank 16 didn’t reveal information either.
Because there was nothing to gain from doing so.
At best, it would just invite interference.
So even the viewers seemed to understand.
“Alright then, let’s begin.”