Chapter 182

Once I saw the opening, I kept seeing it.

'Everything else aside…

Pedro had a subclass. How was it that he had a subclass at just level 30?

'An Irregular.'

I was already seeing several Irregulars, anomalies I would have been unlikely to meet even once in my past life. Probably because I now lived in a different world, meaning I met different people. They were a class of humans I couldn't even have dreamed of meeting in the past, but now, it felt all too ordinary.

'Starting with CEO Song Kiyoung awakening as a Player at such an advanced age and showing outstanding performance.'

There was also Ahn Seohye, who was currently one with the Guardian Tower. And now, there was a Master with the 'Thief' class. Such rare facts completely unknown to the world were now a part of my daily life.

And the fun thing was, the manly man obsessed Pedro was a biological woman.

'Though him being a girl isn't really important.'

Whether Pedro was a woman, a man, nonbinary, or anything under the rainbow didn't matter to me. But a thief? Master and thief was a seriously mismatched combo.

'Whatever the case, I've gotten another card up my sleeve.'

That was a good thing.

"You're not thinking about something wicked, are you?" Pedro squinted warily at me.

"Wicked? What exactly would that be?"

"Your smile felt kinda evil somehow."

Evil? I'm only thinking about how to best use the info you're hiding to profit me, that's all.

"You're mistaken. There's no reason to have wicked thoughts towards a manly man, no?"

Pedro was easily convinced. "That's true. Manly men need no words to communicate."

No, sir. Men need to speak to communicate, too. Your idea of 'manly man' is probably an ideal that doesn't exist in reality.

But I left that unsaid.

In any case, we arrived at Piazza Navona. It was bustling with countless picture-taking tourists. We headed to the fountain.

'There are quite a lot of Players.'

Senia showed herself.

"Player Kim Hyukjin. I will give this as a gift. A certain Guardian sponsored it for the sake of smooth Playing."

She gave me a Translation Marble.

'Nice.'

It sure was convenient. Playing well really did pay off. With the Translation Marble, I heard murmurs from the vicinity.

"Intermediate Administrator?"

"There was an Intermediate Administrator that beautiful out there?"

The gazes of countless people immediately focused on us. The culprit? Senia's appearance.

"My god…"

That she was beautiful, that she was noble, that she was like a lily; such words were thrown around all over the plaza.

"Senia. Switch to invisible mode."

"Is that necessary?"

"You draw too much attention."

"Why is that so?"

"That's…"

That sparkle in Senia's eyes was just my imagination, right? It had to be. When I looked at her again, her expression was as much of an ice block as ever. As expected of the epitome of expressionlessness, Senia.

But for whatever reason, she was being a little stubborn today.

"Why is it that I draw attention?"

"..."

"What does Player Kim Hyukjin think that reason is?"

Obviously because you're overly pretty. Pointlessly so.

"Please tell me the reason."

What did this angel want to hear?

"Because, well, you look interesting."

Senia's wings fluttered for a very brief moment.

"Interesting?"

"You have wings."

"Is that interesting? Wilson over there is a tree. Isn't that more interesting?"

Was it just my imagination that she was getting particularly irritated today?

"Anyway, you're getting in the way of Playing."

Your appearance attracts too much attention, okay?

"This interesting-looking angel will switch to invisible mode."

Her prim way of speech was the same as usual, but it felt even more curt today. Well, her coldness wasn't a one or two day thing. I decided not to think about it anymore.

'Let's see...'

In the past, the Italian server fell short in combat Player competence compared to the Korean server.

'Now… they're on a similar level with Korea, I guess.'

It was true that the level of Korean Players had declined because of me. They also had less crisis awareness.

'But it still feels like the combat ability of Korean Players is a touch higher.'

I scanned my surroundings with Observer's Eye. The result of my observation was that on average, Korean Players had a little more combat prowess than Italian Players.

'However, the craftsman and production classes…'

There was bound to be a big difference there. In the first place, the Italian server tended to have high growth in Players of that area. With that, I finished my general evaluation of the server.

'But…'

A group of Players was camped in front of the fountain. I knew one of them.

* * *

'What was his name again?'

I couldn't remember his name—he wasn't a Ranker. I just remembered his face.

Name: Beratto

Ah, right. Beratto. An extremely famous racist and Youtuber Player.

'He assaulted Koreans multiple times, inciting public rage.'

There was another thing he was famous for.

'His class is similar to Lee Sungcheol's.'

He was a Player with a power similar to the Gatekeeper Lee Sungcheol's, someone who was most powerful in places set as 'entrances'.

His group noticed ours.

'Hostility?'

Out of nowhere?

'Not towards me.'

It wasn't directed at me, but at Vela.

"Vela. Do you know that person?"

"Who?"

"One of the Players camping in front of the fountain."

Vela peered at the group.

"No?"

"You don't know that man in the middle wearing the blue t-shirt?"

"I don't remember him at all?"

"I see."

He had no memory of him. Just then, Wilson showed himself.

"Vela, he's the guy you beat the living daylights out of fourteen days ago. You even brought him to the verge of death."

"Really? Why?"

He appeared to have zero memory of the person he hit.

"He was beaten for being a jackass in front of a gate."

"Ah…!" Vela seemed to remember now. "But wasn't that a Korean? And didn't he die?"

The green leaf on Wilson's forehead shook. He immediately pressed a hand to it, very careful not to let it shake anymore.

"That's someone else."

"Eh?"

"That was the Korean server."

Vela still looked like he didn't remember this guy at all.

'Well… Vela's always had a lot of enemies.'

His fiery personality had earned him a lot of fans, but also a lot of enemies. Beratto was probably one of Vela's many enemies.

'Passing through without trouble is gonna be hard.'

For now, we walked up to the fountain.

'But do they know there's a gate at the fountain?'

Even in the Italian server, only production class Players were maybe aware of it. It might be that Beratto's gatekeeper ability allowed him to sniff out the gate.

I heard a voice.

"Stay back."

It was Beratto.

"Come any closer, and I'll kill you," he growled.

"Are you talking to me?"

"That's right. You."

The hostility that had been directed at Vela earlier was now pointed at me. I had a good idea of why Beratto was doing that.

'His attitude is influenced by a Guardian.'

And the Guardian wholeheartedly backing him most likely had a racist disposition.

"What does this yellow monkey think he's doing, stinking up the air with his breath?"

He was intentionally using provoking language.

"It will be difficult to capture the hearts of many Guardians with such an extreme style of Playing."

"What are you saying, you damn monkey…!"

He didn't even dare look at Vela. Apparently, this battle nut had given him a really severe beating.

Vela squinted at the guy. "Were you ever beaten by me, by any chance?"

"..."

Beratto flinched. There was a spark of rage in him, but fear won over his anger. Just how badly had Vela thrashed him?

"Looks like you need another beating today."

"Shut up…!" Beratto shouted despite his fear.

'Because he gets stronger in front of a gate.'

The fountain itself was a gate. Activating it by fulfilling special conditions would allow us to teleport to the Forest of Dwarfs.

The confidence slowly began to return to Beratto's face.

'Well, he prolly got some support or something.'

Fighting Beratto wasn't my objective, and I had no intention of wasting a bunch of time here.

"You must have camped here knowing there was a gate, but we will be going through."

"Shut up, monkey. How dare a mere monkey butt in when humans are talking."

Vela brandished a fist.

"Wilson. I'm killing him, okay?"

I stepped in front of him. "You can't kill."

This was related to what I said earlier. Guardians with extreme dispositions would like to see this guy killed, but the majority of Guardians with moderate dispositions wouldn't be particularly pleased with killing someone over something so minor. In other words, it was a polarizing Play. To achieve great success, it was best to aim for Play that wasn't polarizing.

'Also…'

Even outside of that reason—

'Murder isn't right.'

A person killing another person wasn't right. I wanted to avoid unnecessary killing if it wasn't a special case like with Seo Joohwan. That was what I thought in the past, and that was what I would continue to think.

"The monkey can't go through. If you guys wanna go through, cough up the Coins."

"..."

"Ah, right. If the monkey wants to go through, just gimme 10,000 Coins. It'll be 7,000 Coins for you guys."

Pedro appeared to know Beratto already.

"It was 5,000 Coins before!"

"That was then. The price has gone up today."

"Killing him would be easier," Vela muttered.

I took one step forward. I felt a weak authority from the gate. Water surged skyward from the fountain and formed a spear.

"Monkeys need to be beaten to see reason."

The spear made of water rushed towards me. I didn't dodge. I just let it hit me.

Szzzz–!

The spear vaporized and disappeared when it hit me. That was because the fire ki within me was far stronger than the water ki the spear possessed.

"You seem to be rather confident in your skills."

I once destroyed a distorted authority made by the Shepherd Boy as well as the distorted authority of the Yellow Charm Gate. Compared to that, breaking an authority of this level was child's play.

"Your Playing doesn't break the rules."

This Play of occupying a gate and displaying great power there to extort tolls wasn't against the rules. That was his ability, after all.

"But it's also not an upright and fair style of Playing."

The System had a tendency to seek 'fair Play'.

"Distorted authorities can be easily broken, you see."

Basically, I had the type advantage. Freeing a gate was closer to 'fairness' than blocking it with force. Gates were made by the System to be entered, not blocked. The System settings would take my side.

"I'll give you one chance before I break it. Back off."

It wasn't that great to cause a fuss in another server. The Guardians of that server didn't really like it when Players from another server made a ruckus in theirs. At least the majority didn't.

Beratto chortled. "Is a dog barking somewhere?"

…And that was the last thing he said before Vela's fist met his face.

[May all lies.]

[Be shattered.]

Beratto's authority shattered with my quiet incantation, and Beratto was beaten half an inch from death by Vela.

"Sp-Spare me."

"Apologize for calling my friend a monkey and all that. If you don't, I'll pull out your tongue."

Beratto kneeled in front of me, desperately rubbing his hands. Snot and tears ran down his face as he professed he would never do it again, but I didn't pay him much heed. It was a waste of time and mental energy to pay attention to a small fry like Beratto.

A lot of people started filming us in the process. Of course, I was using Cognitive Dissonance.

"...I will activate the gate," said Pedro.

A gate that could only be activated by a special class. I was suddenly able to click the fountain.

[Move to the 'Forest of Dwarfs'?]

After a short ruckus, we were able to make it to the Forest of Dwarfs, a forest of steel. It was indeed a forest, but one made of iron, gold, and countless other minerals.

'That's…'

I spotted an object I could click with my eyes, a silver stone laying on the ground.

[Ten-Thousand-Year-Old Cold Iron]

Cold iron that is at least ten thousand years old. A mineral with an extremely cold nature, only special people can handle Ten-Thousand-Year-Old Cold Iron.

*Cannot be collected

I couldn't collect it.

'There's Ten-Thousand-Year-Old Cold Iron here?'

As I examined the surroundings, Vela interrupted me.

"Hyukjin. Can I just ask one thing?"

"What?"

"That gate just now, how did you do it? You muttered something and that guy totally freaked out."

I shrugged. I learned an incantation from Vela, a very basic one. That meant Vela would one day come to know about the existence of incantations as well.

"An incantation."

Not just Vela, but Pedro was focusing on me. Pedro seemed extremely fascinated with me breaking Beratto's authority as well.

"An incantation? What's that?"

"It's like a chant that draws out a special strength. You'll learn about them later, too."

"..."

Vela scratched his head. "You really do amaze me more and more. And here I was, priding myself as a Ranker. Next to you, I'm such a country bumpkin that I'm not even from this planet." Something seemed to occur to him. "But that gate earlier, could it have been broken with this, too? I was actually thinking of using it."

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