The outer city district of the Rivelhardt Empire’s capital.
To Min-jun, the place looked like a bustling neighborhood in medieval Europe.
Stone walls and wooden houses lined up in rows, forming a tangled, winding scene.
It was the sort of place where one could easily get lost and wander around, but there was a reason he had no trouble reaching the central area where the market had formed.
“A free gladiator is passing through!”
“The invincible gladiator who overcame the Victory Festival three times!”
“Wow, how can someone be that tall?”
“I heard His Majesty recognized him too, with the strength he used to catch an orc of Rohan.”
No sooner had he come out onto the street than a crowd swarmed around him like a cloud. They immediately surrounded him, and naturally began pushing him toward the city center.
‘What is this? Some obsessive fans following a celebrity around? What the hell…….’
Min-jun pulled his hood low without revealing his unsettled feelings.
He quickened his steps and tried to find a place where he could stay.
“Waaaaaaa!”
“Free gladiator!”
There were too many people. Far too many.
With no other choice, Min-jun looked at one child with a shabby appearance and sparkling eyes.
When he crooked his finger to call the child closer, the child hurried over.
“Me? Me?”
“Yeah, you. Where’s the inn with the fewest people around here?”
“An inn! I know! I know! Follow me this way!”
He had asked one child, but answers came from every direction.
The children, for some reason excited, began guiding him while running barefoot across the ground.
Since they had not listened to the part where he said “with the fewest people,” he had to filter out several inns that were clearly packed with people at a glance.
When he finally found a three-story inn that seemed relatively quiet.
Murmur, murmur.
The procession following him was more than enough to fill the whole alley.
“Oh my, oh my, welcome, free gladiator. To think you went out of your way to visit this place. What excellent eyes you have. This inn, ‘Ale and Rest,’ is very different from those shabby places only vagrants come and go from!”
The innkeeper introduced herself as “Parak.”
“Tch, for a free gladiator to come to a place like Ale and Rest, he has no eye for choosing lodging.”
“The food there is worse than a witch’s boiling cauldron. How about turning back even now?”
“I wouldn’t eat it even if it were given as dog food, no!”
“Inn, my ass. It’s just a trough! A trough!”
When the onlookers who had followed him all chimed in at once,
The expression of Parak, the innkeeper who had been wearing a good-natured smile, crumpled at once.
“What bullshit are you damned beggar bastards spouting?! Shut those shit-stinking mouths and get the hell out of here right now!”
“Wh-What? L-Look at that crooked witch’s way of talking.”
“Why don’t you do something about that shit-stinking cauldron in your inn first!”
“Where do you damned mobs think you’re swarming in and causing trouble? Get lost! Ah, what are you doing? Should I toss you straight into the cauldron?!”
At the torrent of filthy curses, the onlookers began backing away.
It did not take long for that massive crowd to disperse.
“Did that devilish old hag boil and eat her own rage……?”
“Get out now before I butcher you!”
After Parak’s shout frightened them into scattering in all directions, only the children remained, sneaking glances from afar.
“Ohoho, now then, please come inside, free gladiator. Oh my, oh my, what a fine body you have too.”
Honestly, he wanted to turn around and run, but it was already too late.
Under Parak’s momentum as she smacked his back and guided him inside, he awkwardly got sucked through the entrance.
“Why is your body so firm? Ohohoho!”
Her hand swept from his back and waist all the way down to his buttocks in one go.
It was the first time in his life he had felt someone so blatantly scan his body by touch.
Even his fine hairs stood on end all at once.
“P-Please give me a room on the highest floor.”
“Of course. I should give you the best room. A free gladiator who appeared after six years has graced us with his presence.”
At those words, Min-jun paused.
‘Six years?’
He had heard that this year marked the tenth year since the Victory Festival had been created in this empire.
Since free gladiator was the title given to those who overcame the third trial…….
‘Does that mean cases of passing the third stage were that rare?’
He had not thought there would be many, since the trial had been difficult even with a Hero’s body.
But for it to be that rare.
‘Six years.’
Parak handed him a blunt brass key.
“First room on the highest floor. If you feel lonely at night, come find me anytime. Hehe.”
“……I’ll pretend I didn’t hear that. I prefer being alone.”
“Oh my, what a lonely wolf you are.”
Avoiding Parak’s licking gaze, Min-jun quickly moved to his room.
“Hoo.”
As soon as he arrived in the comfortable room, he threw off his cumbersome armor.
When he flopped down on the bed spread-eagled and stretched, his bones loosened with a crackle, and he felt a thrilling pleasure.
“Aaaaargh, I’m going to die like this, seriously…….”
It was the first time since coming here that he felt he could truly relax.
How long had he lain there, feeling drowsy from the breeze gently blowing in through the window?
-Congratulations!
-You have achieved the most perfect and outstanding results among the Stage 2 Test participants!
‘What is this?’
A Hero Communications alarm suddenly appeared before his eyes.
Min-jun quickly sat up properly.
-Hero Candidate “Liz” has passed the Hero qualification review as a “special case.”
-As a reward, the “Guts System” will be installed for Hero Liz. Please do your best until the end!
‘What are they talking about?’
These people had always been full of mysterious things, but this time, he could not even interpret the meaning.
‘Guts System?’
Literally, a system of perseverance? What an absurd name.
-System Install: 10%
‘What is it, seriously?’
Perhaps because everything Hero Channel did always left him flustered, he could not feel pleased about this unidentified change at all.
-System Install: 100% Complete
The next moment, an opaque notification window appeared before his eyes.
-Grade: Hero
-Hero Level: 7
-Class: Fanatic Assassin
-Contractor: Berserker Zeroph
-Owned Traits: Touch of Darkness(S)
“Why is this…….”
He did not know why it was showing him this now, but the contents themselves were familiar.
It was something he had seen before in Hero Communications.
-Your level is too low to carry out the test.
The notification window did not end there.
-Please reach Level 10 and acquire a new reward.
‘It’s a game.’
Min-jun slowly began to grasp what this “Guts System” was.
‘If this were a game, is it something like a user interface?’
It seemed like one of the privileges granted when rising from Hero Candidate to Hero.
‘Still, having it is better than not having it.’
But…… he understood that it meant he should raise his level and grow stronger.
‘They should also tell me how that level goes up.’
As if it had read Min-jun’s thoughts,
Another notification window flashed before his eyes.
-Your level rises by accumulating real combat experience or resolving requests.
He already knew very well that real combat experience was needed. Had he not raised his level by fighting matches?
However.
“Requests?”
-Exploration is required to refresh the list of general requests.
-The recommended location from your current position is the slum district on the outskirts of the Rivelhardt Empire.
Min-jun nodded.
‘This seems pretty good, doesn’t it? It even gives me something like a conversation, so I won’t be lonely by myself. Not bad.’
It felt different from when he had been racking his brain alone.
Having something he could communicate with, even if only roughly, was far more comforting than before.
‘Whatever it is, it seems like this system was created to help me. I should gladly make use of it.’
Just as he thought that, another notification window appeared.
-The empire’s slum district is also a base for local order groups such as criminal organizations, armed groups, and mafias.
-It is an excellent place not only to discover requests, but also to accumulate real combat experience.
‘A slum.’
Even in modern society, the word slum was not attached to just anywhere. Anyone would feel the image of a breeding ground for crime.
Then what about in a world like this?
Just thinking about it made his body shiver.
‘Still, I have to go.’
There was no choice from the start.
‘I need to build strength somehow before the next match.’
Just as going to work and doing one’s job was the life of an office worker, for a Hero, raising levels and resolving requests was the way of life.
In order to raise his chances of survival even a little, he had no choice but to fight as naturally as breathing.
‘I won’t even have time to rest.’
Min-jun had secretly wanted to rest comfortably for about a day, but one had to strike while the iron was hot.
“Fine. Let’s go.”
He immediately got dressed and left the room.
When he went down to the first floor where the dining area was, Parak recognized him like a ghost.
“Oh my. Leaving already? You should take your time and have a meal before you go, gladiator.”
She pointed to the cauldron boiling in the distance.
He had no idea what she had thrown into it, but unidentified ingredients in all kinds of colors were bubbling and diving inside.
A strange smell seemed to drift from it, the sort of smell that should not come from food.
“I-I’ll do that later when I come back. I don’t have an appetite right now…….”
“Haa, what a shame. I really wanted to let you taste it!”
Ignoring her words, thick with a nasal tone, Min-jun fled outside.
***
-Title: Spirit Channel has foreign servers now?? lolol
-Content: What is this lol? I got curious and looked it up, and since yesterday, Japan, China, America, Europe, and all sorts of places have opened too. Only the Korean server has videos so far, though. What is this? lol. Link attached.
-Comment: This site is urban-legend level, for real.
-Comment: I don’t even know who’s running it, and the people who made the videos and the people appearing in them are all undisclosed. What kind of mysticism is this?
-Comment: It feels like the Korean server hasn’t uploaded videos in a while either.
-Comment: The domestic service is already a mystery, and now they’re starting a global service?
In internet-broadcasting communities, talk about Spirit Channel began appearing again for the first time in a while.
Not long ago, videos had been uploaded like mad, then from a certain point, news had stopped, and people had practically begun to forget it.
Then suddenly, global pages had been created.
Whether they had fallen from the sky or sprung from the ground, it was enough to make even ghosts wail.
-Title: There’s a notice on the homepage?
The situation changed rapidly a few hours later.
The cause was a notice that appeared on the Korean server of Spirit Channel.
-Notice: At midnight today, advance recruitment for the 2nd batch of Hero Candidates will begin.
A mysterious notice.
And that was not the end.
Because on the other foreign servers, all at once,
-Advance recruitment for the 1st batch of Hero Candidates will begin.
That message appeared.
-Title: So it was a game after all.
-Title: What the hell are these bastards trying to say?
-Title: We’ll know if we wait.
-Title: Is the angle for god-world reincarnation here?
Spirit Channel had not become widely known, but within certain communities, its name had circulated quite a bit as a mysterious site.
Because the site was mysterious from head to toe, curious people willingly waited until midnight that day.
And when the promised time arrived.
-In a world where order between dimensions has broken, the only ones we can trust are you Heroes! Apply right now!
-For the 2nd batch of Hero Candidates, a total of 5,000 people will be selected per server!
-Name:
-Age:
-Nickname:
The opinion dominating the communities changed in an instant.
-Title: So it really was a game.
Toward that side.
-Title: I didn’t think it would really be a game promotion. If they were going to do this, why not just make a movie?
Even the people who had been half in doubt at first eventually had to acknowledge that the site’s purpose was game promotion.
-Title: There’s no way a game promotion would be done like this…….
While only a small number of people remained suspicious, the number of applicants steadily rose.