You could tell he was definitely a user who had seen the ending.
It was probably the warrior version of the game.
The instant his leg shattered, multiple abilities burst out and started restoring his body.
They were abilities like 『Pain Endurance』, 『Hardened Blood』, and 『High-Speed Recovery』, and his recovery tick timing was set up pretty well.
Because of that, the leg that had been smashed to pieces unfolded back out in an instant and became fine again, but that didn’t change the situation at all.
Crack!
“Aaaaagh!”
Just because you tape broken straw together doesn’t mean it turns into rebar.
The next moment, light flashed in his hand. Armor clung to his body, and a sword appeared in his hand.
He raised his head while holding the blade and looked at me.
Then he froze.
I froze too.
Because I was curious what he was going to try.
He didn’t try anything in particular and just stood there.
“What.”
“.......”
“What are you gonna do with that.”
“.......”
“If you don’t answer when I ask you something, you die.”
“Ah, yes. This is nothing special. I don’t want to do anything. The sword and armor just come out reflexively.”
“Looks like you don’t want to die. You’re getting talkative.”
“I don’t want to die.”
“Why. Because you don’t want to lose your Star Runes?”
“No. I can just give you the Star Runes, but if I die, I drop all my other items too.”
“How much could a guy lurking around the beginner zone even have.”
“I gathered it for almost ten years without dying. ...Still, it’s not much.”
He flared up for a second, then, as if he realized it felt like he was bragging about a gold ring in front of a robber, he hurriedly changed the subject.
“Let me see the sword.”
“Yes.”
I checked the options on the blue longsword. The grade was [Rare]. It wasn’t an in-game weapon.
“How much is it.”
“About 500,000 runes.”
“That’s a treasure. To you?”
“......Ah, um, it’s like honey to a bee.”
End Ocean functions as another world. I can’t use national treasures and the like that I obtained in my own world.
Only personal growth stats carry over, excluding equipment. [Overall Combat Power].
At that point, for sure. Having something like this or not would make a huge difference.
“Call all your friends.”
“Yes.”
He pulled out something like a summon button. Then he hesitated and asked.
“What are you going to do?”
“I’m going to ask for your Star Runes.”
“Ah.”
His expression turned pitch-black.
“Looks like you’re thinking something stupid?”
“No, I’m not.”
“You thinking you can rush and spend it all at the shop?”
“N-no. Even if I do that, if you kill me you’ll take everything anyway, so it doesn’t mean much.... But there’s something I’m kind of worried about.”
“What.”
“We’re mostly Easy clearers so we’re weak, but that’s why we have an affiliation. We’re under Lord Balthazar. If you take this, the people above will move....”
Even now, the way he tried to act like he was worried about me was pathetic.
“Tell me about Lord Balthazar’s faction.”
“Ah, yes.”
From what I heard after that, ranks were divided by difficulty.
“Above Easy is Normal, above Normal is Hard. And...... you probably overcame Normal difficulty, right? But the Hard difficulty people have been exploiting this place like crazy for years. They’re insanely strong.”
When I glanced down, Ran, who was hidden in my clothes, nodded. It wasn’t different from what she’d said.
“So you should stop here and just leave...”
“Yoonchan.”
“Yes, bro.”
“I’ll handle it.”
“Yes.”
“Don’t mess around. Go gather your friends.”
A few minutes later, Robin (Kim Yoonchan) brought his friends. The guys who stabbed me in the back yesterday.
“Kim Yoonchan explained it properly, right. I don’t really like long conversations, so let’s keep it simple. If you do what I tell you, I’ll let you live. If you don’t like it, you can die.”
They shuffled and still narrowed their eyes. It seemed like they still weren’t sure whether I was really strong.
“Spit out all the Star Runes you have. Keep your eyes nice and obedient.”
As I said that, I lightly slapped his cheek a couple times. “Ah, damn!” Then one guy jerked his head and raised his eyes.
“Who the hell are you.”
He asked, turning toward me.
“What am I supposed to be.”
“No, what the fXck are you, you piece of shit. What are you. Huh? Who are you under? Even if we’re Easy trash, we’re under Balthazar, so what the hell do you think you’re doing? You got something backing you up?”
He wasn’t asking who I was as a person to a person.
He was asking who I was ‘inside the system.’
Instead of answering, I raised one finger.
Then I pushed his chest with it.
There was a palm tree behind him, and his body got pinned between my finger and the palm tree.
“Ugh, uuuugh...!”
I kept pressing my finger in. With a million combat power, the [Strength] stat is enough that you can crush a steel rod like clay with your grip. That finger smashed his flesh. I didn’t stop there and kept pushing him into the palm tree.
“Uuuuuuugh!! Aagh!!”
When I started to feel a strange vibration inside his ribcage, I pulled my hand away. The palm tree had lifted slightly, roots and all.
“.......”
“Uh, uh....”
The guys next to him went stiff-faced. Because they knew that even on Normal difficulty, this kind of [Strength] was impossible.
“Hand over the runes. And go attach your islands.”
“Y-yes. ...Hey, you ten motherfXckers. Answer him, hurry up.”
Robin answered alone, then spoke while looking at his friends.
“Yes.”
“Yes...!”
I looked at Robin. Separate from the fact that he stabbed me in the back, he was a funny kind of guy in how he handled things.
Smack!
“Ugh! W-why....”
I kicked the aggrieved guy. Go do what you need to do.
< Transferring Star Runes. (Fee 17%) >
Soon, the currency they’d gathered flew over in the form of small spheres and seeped into me.
< Star Runes held: 1,544,252 >
At the same time, they moved their islands and attached them to my island that I’d had Ran summon.
About fifteen islands merged into one, and then the name changed.
[ Dante Hiacapo Island (17) ]
Because my island was so small, there weren’t really any new structures added. It was basically just a bit of land reclamation.
Instead, every structure here was now in my grasp.
From as small as a single chick in the animal farm, to as big as the motor attached under the island.
“.......”
“.......”
“.......”
In the meantime, their expressions kept getting darker and darker.
It made sense.
Yesterday, I was just the guy they’d robbed.
Today, I was taking all their money and ordering them around.
And on top of that, they didn’t even know who I was, so it had to feel like they were losing their minds.
‘He said he’d been here nearly ten years.’
They said that half of the users who saw the ending didn’t come to this [End Ocean].
That made sense too. In their own world, they’d be the savior and a god.
Why would they come here and become someone else’s servant again?
And yet, a lot of people volunteer to become a doormat in an online game rather than become a god in a console game.
Because they want to feel bonds that bloom among people who lived through the same culture and society, and an irreplaceable sense of solidarity.
You can’t expect that from NPCs.
‘R-Robin...!’
Then, for a moment, flustered voices came from a secluded corner of the island—guys whispering among themselves.
‘Why. Why? What is it?’
‘Look at this. Holy fXck!’
‘Huh? ...Oh, shXt!!!’
Kim Yoonchan made a sound like his breath was caught as he checked something, so I also spread the illusion art of 『Recognition-Blocking Shroud』 and looked over there.
It was End Ocean’s in-game community.
My login record had been caught there, and the place was going crazy about it.
- Hell difficulty is here! Hell difficulty is here! Hell difficulty is here! Hell difficulty is here! Hell difficulty is here! Hell difficulty is here!
- Wow lmaoooooooooooooooo it’s here
- No, for real, a clearer actually showed up, holy shXt... wow, nobody’s cleared it even once for 10 years
- Hell bro! ㅠㅠㅠㅠ Wherever you are, please leave a post on the board! There aren’t just one or two of us who’ve been waiting for you like our necks are about to snap ㅠㅠㅠㅠ
Hundreds of posts had gone up in an instant.
The reaction was truly explosive.
- I logged in, but where is he? Do Hell difficulty logins also start in the Sea of Beginnings?
- I’m heading to the Sea of Beginnings right now, yeah;; I’m even bringing an island to give to our bro
└ You idiot.
└ ???
└ Even Hard difficulty spams teleport and went somewhere else, do you think Hell difficulty would still be sitting there?
Next were posts wondering where I was, and while they read those, Robin and two guys tore their mouths open while pointing at where I’d been.
They’d realized it reflexively too.
“You crazy bastard. You tried to stab someone like this in the back and eat him?”
“Ha, this is driving me insane. Like I wanted to pick a fight?? It’s just that he was in the Sea of Beginnings, so I...”
For an unprecedented combat power newbie to appear, and for it to happen this late—clearing the ending and showing up now—there was only one possibility.
- The savior is here, holy shXt, you Hard bastards, lol
Before long, the community’s arrows turned somewhere else.
- Balthazar, you Hard coward who’s trembling at home, come out!!!!
- If that bastard Balthazar’s butthole is on fire right now, upvote lololololololololol
- Hell difficulty bro, you absolutely cannot team up with Balthazar. That bastard is pure trash!! He’s even stabbed Hard difficulty people in the back and killed them before!!
It was the same old thing.
The expectation that I would catch the Hard difficulty guys who were running wild.
‘Who said I’d do it?’
The guy who’s going to hand out rice cakes isn’t even thinking about it, and they were still guzzling kimchi soup straight out of a bucket.
Meanwhile—
- Garlok, Balthazar, Veil, Ibamon, Raqtasiya <---- list of guys who miss their mom right now lol
So those were the names of five Hard difficulty guys. I memorized them all separately.
Then, when I searched my exploded (+999) inbox—
[Sender: Balthazar]
[Sender: Garlok]
Two of them had actually sent messages.
‘Balthazar is the lord, and Garlok is the Sub-king.’
They were the owners of the two factions currently splitting End Ocean’s power.
The guys who owned islands up in that high sky.
I was about to check the messages once—
Then stopped.
Because if you read them, it shows proof you read them.
So I only checked the previews briefly.
───
- Balthazar: Welcome to my End Ocean. There is no need for us to make scabs between us, so let us jo... (See more)
───
- Garlok: Hey, are you really Hell difficulty? Impressive. I’m Sub-king Garlok, I’ll tell you my location so come fin... (See more)
───
Just from those previews alone, I could get a feel for what kind of guys they were.
Lord Balthazar seemed really authoritarian.
Garlok seemed freer than that.
The problem was—
‘They start like that from the first meeting?’
If it were me, even if I were the lord, if a Hell difficulty clearer showed up, I think I’d start with “Hello. You worked hard.”
‘......After playing king for about 10 years, did his personality change into that kind of seriously intense mode?’
You know, that famous ➤ NоvеⅠight ➤ (Read more on our source) social experiment where they take normal people, put them in guard uniforms, and make them control prisoners.
And in three days, they became real guards and started beating and oppressing the prisoners.
‘What a mess.’
Well, I figured it probably didn’t matter.
The reason I came here was to get information about the 100-series curse and the bugs in the game.
Beating up Robin’s crew was nothing more than minor revenge.
With that in mind,
A few hours later,
I wrote a single post on the public board.
< This is Hell difficulty clearer Dante Hiacapo. >
And then, the reaction of every single End Ocean login exploded.