Chapter 15 - Critical Error

Dong Bongsu tried grabbing the Skills and dragging them into the Skill shortcut slots, but it did not work. These three techniques were all passive, taking effect automatically without needing to be used deliberately. He had not tried because he was unaware of that; he had simply wanted to check.

WHOOSH, SWISH, TAP.

He immediately raised his sword and tried slashing, thrusting, throwing, and blocking. Then he checked his proficiency. Every Skill had risen by 0.1%. In other words, repeating each action a thousand times would raise its proficiency level to Lv.2. It was obvious that leveling them up would gradually become harder after that.

He had discovered yet another way to grow stronger. He would have to raise their levels to see how effective they were, but this method would surely have advantages of its own. Being able to grow stronger without hunting would give him a considerable advantage in playing the game.

After swinging his sword a few more times, he closed the Skill Window.

Only one window was still flashing.

《Quest》

This was the part he had paid the least attention to since beginning New Murim Online. Not only had the Quest Window remained inactive until now, but he had also doubted that any Quests would appear.

CLICK.

Hoping things would be different this time, he clicked the Quest Window, the last one left.

At that instant...

BEEP.

[Critical ERROR detected! Critical ERROR detected! Critical ERROR detected! The NPCs required for Quest progression do not exist! Quests cannot proceed without NPCs!]

A red warning light began flashing as a loud alarm blared, and error messages tore through his mind.

'No NPCs, huh.'

Now it was clear: the discrepancies between reality and the system were causing all these errors. Strictly speaking, only MURIM ONLINE's system and the character Dong Bongsu had probably been implemented under this reality's physical laws and the martial laws unique to this world.

Viewed in that light, the reason the Quest Window produced such an unusually severe critical error was obvious. Unlike Skills or stats, the NPCs that would serve as the original framework for any system adjustments simply did not exist in this “Murim” to begin with.

Dong Bongsu did not know much about games, but he at least knew that Quests were the central thread running through an entire game. With something that important broken, no wonder the system was making such a fuss. This problem would probably remain unresolved unless beings called NPCs spontaneously came into existence in Murim.

He promptly closed the Quest Window to stop the mechanical voice from making any more noise. He had caught a glimpse of several active Quests, but each had an X beside it, so he was certain none could be completed. They were active in name only; without NPCs, they would serve no practical purpose.

However loudly the alarm blared, it was all happening within his interface, so no one in the Danri Family could hear it. But the noise was unwelcome all the same.

When hearing was overstimulated, the other senses naturally weakened. The five senses and instincts always needed to remain in balance. That was far better for survival.

And so, without agonizing over it, he abandoned any lingering attachment to Quests.

Only then did the world fall quiet again.

Those silent surroundings were his own world: New Murim Online. In truth, “online” was a wholly inappropriate description for this real world, but with the system functioning here, he supposed it applied to some extent.

“Whew.”

Even that brief burst of noise had left his head throbbing. Dong Bongsu took a deep breath and collected himself.

At last, he had finished at least a rough inspection of everything he had gained from his first Level Up. Now it was time to sort it all out in his head.

DING, DING.

Just as he was about to organize the day's gains, a strange chime sounded inside his head.

[Spirit Eye's activation conditions have been met. Spirit Eye will activate automatically.]

[An enemy at least 10 levels higher than you has approached within 20 meters. 19, 18, 17...]

DING, DING, DING, DINGDINGDINGDING...

As the number decreased, the chimes grew increasingly urgent.

'What's this...? Some kind of early-warning system?'

From the holographic message and the urgent chimes, Dong Bongsu could infer what Spirit Eye did.

To enhance its realism, MURIM ONLINE made all its monsters and enemies as lifelike as possible, giving them a tangible presence. Unlike conventional 3D online games, it was programmed so that players could not determine an NPC's level or Vitality simply by looking. Naturally, access to all other NPC information was restricted as well. This was how it sought to distinguish itself from existing 3D online games.

Experience it. Try things. Throw yourself into challenges and learn through failure. Find the fun in that.

That was MURIM ONLINE's motto.

By now, much about MURIM ONLINE had been uncovered and shared over the internet. But because of this “differentiation policy,” many first-time players had charged blindly at enemies they knew nothing about and died.

That policy had always remained in place, and it still did.

The same applied to testers. Like ordinary players, they could struggle against monsters or enemies they faced for the first time, sometimes finding themselves completely exposed. That was why tester-exclusive Skills were necessary—Skills that could drastically reduce testing time while keeping the process efficient and realistic.

Among them, Spirit Eye maintained the balance between realism and efficiency in testing.

Rather than giving testers complete information about an opponent, Spirit Eye provided only a minimal warning of danger, encouraging more realistic testing. It allowed testers to approach and observe unfamiliar enemies with greater caution and attention. By reducing pointless character deaths, it also cut down the time required for testing.

A seventh sense.

The moment Dong Bongsu understood Spirit Eye's effect, those words came to mind. A sixth sense was based on uncertain premonitions or warning signs, but Spirit Eye went beyond that, scanning every enemy within twenty meters and issuing a warning. Wasn't that remarkable?

He already possessed an unrivaled sixth sense. Now he had gained a seventh as well.

The five senses, a sixth sense, and a seventh.

He—Dong Bongsu—was steadily becoming a monster.

[14, 13, 12, 11...]

All the while, time continued to pass, and the “enemy” Spirit Eye had detected kept approaching the stable.

But Dong Bongsu was not particularly worried.

Spirit Eye was presumably programmed to scan anyone approaching. Its intended targets would not be users, but MURIM ONLINE's NPCs—monsters, bosses, and the like.

Here, however, he was the only user, and no actual MURIM ONLINE NPCs existed. No, perhaps some had been implemented, but if so, the system would tell him through some system function, such as a Quest notification.

In that case, this was an “NPC of this world.”

One of the people who lived here. And with an alarm warning him of danger, it was almost certainly a martial artist.

And a martial artist approaching him now...

'Can't be an enemy.'

Dong Bongsu concluded that the approaching “enemy” was not an enemy at all.

[10...]

The count was passing ten, meaning the person had come within ten meters. Dong Bongsu remained calm. He merely rose slowly to his feet.

His reason for deciding that the approaching “enemy” was not hostile lay in the person's speed.

Setting aside how few people had the nerve to infiltrate the Danri Family estate in the first place, an enemy sneaking into the grounds would not move that slowly.

That meant the approaching person was an expert from within the Danri Family—and someone of greater standing and strength than he might have expected.

He did not yet know exactly how much a ten-level gap represented. But considering the effort and the lives it had cost him to reach level 2, he could infer that it was considerable.

How many ordinary people would he have to kill to reach level 10? Thousands? Tens of thousands?

Perhaps...

'Hundreds of thousands?'

He could neither calculate it nor imagine it.

Someone who had grown stronger through training to a degree equivalent to that many lives was approaching him.

His mind rapidly narrowed down the candidates.

Meanwhile, Dong Bongsu immediately put every piece of his basic equipment into his Inventory, then took out his old clothes and put them on. It seemed possible that he could eject them straight from his Inventory onto his body, but he could not yet control the Inventory with that degree of precision.

[5, 4, 3...]

Already, Dong Bongsu had become the old Horse-Mute Sam again.

Dull eyes, an unremarkable face, a slightly open mouth, and shabby clothes. Even if Sosam came back to life, he would not be able to tell which of them—himself or Dong Bongsu—was the real Sosam.

CREEEAK.

The old door swung back, letting moonlight seep inside, and two long shadows fell across the stable. A middle-aged man with his hands clasped behind his back entered, followed by a solidly built man in his twenties.

They were Gi Daehyo and Gi Manji. After spending the entire day investigating the Suicide Plague, they had only now returned to the Danri Family estate.

They had come all the way to this shabby stable for one final inquiry.

The moment Gi Daehyo entered, he went straight to the point without wasting words.

“Are you Sosam?”

“...”

Faithful to his role as a mute, Dong Bongsu gave no answer. He simply blinked, looking startled. He was not particularly surprised in truth, but outwardly he looked utterly taken aback.

Dong Bongsu knew Gi Daehyo and Gi Manji well. Over the past few months, he had not merely prepared to level up; he had also studied every corner of the Danri Family. Investigating its people had been central to that effort.

The moment he saw Gi Daehyo, he realized the man had come about the Suicide Plague. His current expression was merely one of several false faces he had prepared.

In those brief moments, he had narrowed the “enemy” down to three candidates: the head of the Danri Family, the Black Crow Unit Leader, and the Cross Heaven Sword Unit Leader.

He had been ready to act appropriately for any of the three, while also considering why each might visit.

In the end, the man who entered the stable was Black Crow Unit Leader Gi Daehyo, and Dong Bongsu had adjusted his expression accordingly.

And there was only one reason for Gi Daehyo, the Black Crow Unit Leader, to visit this place at this hour.

“Did you kill Machil?”

Machil's death.

That, and nothing else.