Chapter 140 - Chapter 140

Chapter 140

【Read only at hivetoons.org】

“Wow! Wow! Yun-ho! You did this? Hey, hey! I believed in you!!!”

Rumi screamed from the side.

And Alpaca clenched his fists, bracing his body as he prepared to cheer.

Wind Sword seemed awkward in this kind of atmosphere and could not make a sound, but he still appeared to be watching with immense focus.

'It is quite tense.'

Seo-jun watched the battle of the limp, floppy characters with excitement.

The player characters in Beast Cartel were dolls that had a clay-like texture.

Fitting their appearance, their movements were also incredibly limp and lacked strength to the point where one would wonder if it was okay for the physics engine to be like that, but surprisingly, there was still a solid sense of impact.

Thwack!

Thwack, thwack, thwack!

[Team Leader Ha Yun-ho's floppy punch!]

[Ah! Is he getting grabbed by the collar? He has been grabbed! Player Weed! He is carrying Team Leader Ha Yun-ho's character toward the shredder on the side of the map!]

[Only two remain! And if he cannot kill Ha Yun-ho here, it is over!]

“No! If we win this round, we are in first place, but if we lose, we have to play one more round!”

At the moment Rumi spoke worriedly and Alpaca and Wind Sword's eyes widened!

The opponent's character, a lump of yellow clay, lost its grip on Yun-ho's blue character.

As if on the moon where gravity was lacking, the character fell to the floor, bounced boing-boing a couple of times, and then,

Yun-ho stood up and this time, conversely, grabbed the opponent and lifted them up.

[Are we going for a comeback!]

Bounce, bounce, bounce, bounce!

As the character, demonstrating a moonwalk in the truest sense of the word, shoved the opponent into the shredder next to them, a text popped up.

[GAME OVER!]

[Winner: Ha Yun-ho!]

[Waaaaah! Congratulations. The points for the first game go to Team Leader Ha Yun-ho's team, who was the first to secure 3 wins!]

“Wow! Yun-ho really pulled it off, didn't he?”

“Indeed!”

“That's because...”

Wind Sword was about to say something but stopped himself.

For some reason, Seo-jun felt he could deduce what came after. Not just Seo-jun, but anyone who knew the team's atmosphere from a moment ago could easily deduce it.

'If Mr. Yun-ho didn't pull it off, he might have died.'

That was just the way the team atmosphere was.

While the other Grade E players had come with the simple desire to win, for Ha Yun-ho, it was a matter of life and death.

Since there was a difference starting from their mindset, Seo-jun thought that was why he was able to win.

[Haha! Then please reveal the points!]

[Yes! The points going to Team Leader Ha Yun-ho's team are 500 points!]

The points obtained by winning the game mentioned here were indeed those same points from the auction.

The team with the most points remaining at the end of today would have the right to choose their group.

This was how they utilized the remaining points after the auction ended.

“With 500 points?!”

Alpaca's eyes widened.

“We have the most!”

Even if they had not spent many points in the auction, no team had saved as much as 500 points.

- Wow!

- They're giving so much lol

- They won't need to use it tomorrow anyway, so they're just handing it out

[Ah, and we will prepare for the second game now. For your information, the winning team of the second game will obtain 2,000 points! Then, everyone, keep fighting until the end!]

Arin winked, and an advertisement started playing.

- Holy crap LMAO

- So if you just win Ground Zero, you get to choose the group lol

- What's with this school retreat meta LMAO

- Operations Team: We bet everything on the last game because we were worried you wouldn't keep fighting until the end haha

Making everything accumulated before meaningless in the final battle was called the school retreat meta.

Seo-jun thought it was truly appropriate and wore a smile.

It was not an unpleasant smile.

After all, it was a tournament where everyone came to enjoy themselves.

The team members did not burst into anger either.

“Ah, that's right. It was originally this kind of tournament, wasn't it?”

At Rumi's words, everyone nodded in agreement.

***

“The winner has arrived!”

The lobby owner returned. He wore a highly triumphant expression on his face.

However, since the school retreat meta had already been revealed, it was difficult to get a good response.

“Oh, you're here?”

“Good job.”

“We enjoyed watching it!”

“Good work.”

Bewildered by the lukewarm response, Ha Yun-ho shook his head. And the moment he opened his mouth to boast,

“Now, then, let's discuss what to do for our next game.”

Alpaca said.

Ha Yun-ho shot sentences like 'What about my victory? What about my congratulations? Didn't I do well this time?' with his eyes, but Alpaca lightly ignored him.

“You heard the explanation about the battle royal earlier, right?”

The words were directed at Seo-jun. In the first place, Seo-jun was the only person who had not played that game.

“Yes.”

Ground Zero.

It was an FPS battle royale game.

Battle royale referred to a rule where participants were gathered in one place and fought until the last person or the last team was determined.

When a large number competed at once—meaning in a situation like now—it could be seen as the perfect genre to play a light round.

“Aha! I received 500 points, but if we win this, it's 2,000 points!”

Ha Yun-ho realized the cause through the chat window and talked to himself. Now that he knew the reason, his sense of injustice completely vanished, and Ha Yun-ho immediately joined the meeting.

“Seo-jun knows about it too, right? Then! Let's go with Gandhi.”

Since battle royale was a system where you won as long as you became the last survivor by any means, there were various paths to reach that end.

The most representative of them were the camping meta, the Gandhi meta, and the Lu Bu meta.

The camping meta was holding out in one place as much as possible and only dealing with incoming enemies.

It could be seen as similar to the Gandhi meta, which aimed for non-violence by avoiding engagement as much as possible.

And the Lu Bu meta, which was the exact opposite of this, referred to gameplay that actively sought out combat.

Besides these, Seo-jun heard that there were numerous metas, such as the real-estate agent meta where you pre-empted a building in a good location beforehand, and the prayer meta where you simply prayed to the heavens, but most of them could be considered for entertainment purposes.

Ha Yun-ho said.

“First of all, the number of participants is quite small, right? There are 24 people. Even if it's a narrow map, it will probably be leisurely to farm items. If so, how about we farm fully in a safe and stable manner, and then fight when the number of people has decreased? By that time, the accustomed Seo-jun might even be flying around.”

It meant avoiding early engagements as much as possible.

“If we are lucky and get our hands on a supply drop, we will give it to Seo-jun.”

Everyone nodded as if they agreed this time as well.

“Do you trust me?”

Seo-jun spoke with a meaningful smile.

“Yes.”

“Since we don't have a streamer specializing in Ground Zero, there is indeed no one to trust but you, Seo-jun.”

I see.

“Ah, but you don't necessarily have to win. It is nice to be able to fight against the people you want in the group stage, but it doesn't give us a massive advantage.”

It was a statement meant to ease the burden.

However, Seo-jun did not feel any burden to begin with.

'Since I'm doing it anyway, I might as well win.'

A game he was playing for the first time?

It was fine. Unless it had truly bizarre controls, they were all pretty much the same, and wouldn't the method to win be identical?

“Then, how about we do both the Gandhi meta and the Lu Bu meta?”

“Pardon?”

- Lol what is he trying to do again

- Were those two even compatible?

- He's talking crazy again.

***

Seo-jun launched Ground Zero. Then, he received an invitation from the tournament organizers.

A list of as many as twenty people appeared on the interface before his eyes.

The number of participants in the game was 24, with 4 members per team.

Even the map with the smallest player count was played with 64 players.

Of course, there were maps played with 32 people for events, but in any case, it was certain that the number of people was smaller than in a typical game.

[Now! Then, we begin!]

As the game started, the official broadcast that Seo-jun was watching was cut off.

Subsequently, the place where he opened his eyes was a massive, somewhat dark warehouse. In addition, large vibrations and a roaring sound were being transmitted to him through the walls.

'Ah. They said it's a plane, not a warehouse, right? We start fighting after descending to the map from here.'

Twenty-four users were sitting in a single file line against the wall by team.

Some wore strange helmets, others were covered in pink, and even more shockingly, there was a streamer wearing only underpants.

Even if it was just an avatar, it was a scan of their own body, showing immense confidence.

'I should be a bit careful of that person.'

In the martial world, there was a saying:

Beware of women, children, and the elderly.

Similarly, in games, there was a saying:

Beware of users wearing only underpants.

Because they were either a newbie who was truly weak, or a monstrous expert who had nothing left to do in the game. It was one of the two.

However, since the attire of Seo-jun, a beginner, was just plain pants and a jacket, that person was highly likely to be an expert.

“Seo-jun! The plane door will open very soon. Prepare to drop! First, we need to inspect what the map is, but we can only see the mini-map after the door opens. First, we will check the map and the situation...”

While Rumi, who was next to Seo-jun, was speaking, a loud clanging sound echoed.

Clank!

Whirrrr!

And the plane's door began to open.

Among the users, those with sharp observation skills noticed where they were just by looking at the color of the sky even before seeing the terrain below.

“It's the Great Desert!”

“Are they crazy? There are only 24 people, and they gave us the largest map?”

“Quickly, check the mini-map!”

A commotion broke out.

In contrast, his team members were peaceful. This was because they had decided to just watch the people drop and head to the most vacant spot.

It was the Gandhi meta.

“Let's check it first as well.”

The plane's route was always the same for each map. Therefore, the moment they confirmed the map, there was originally no reason for anyone who knew the game to some extent to be in a hurry.

However, this was not a normal game. There was no telling what the tournament organizers might have done.

Sure enough.

“Wait! Why has the storm already formed!”

“Wow. We're going to fight like crazy.”

“If we had jumped out just now, we would have died from storm damage while heading to the safe zone. Phew.”

The storm.

It was an essential device of battle royales.

Seo-jun examined the circle drawn on the mini-map in detail.

“If you are outside this circle, your health continually drains, right?”

“Yes. And that circle continues to shrink over time, restricting the safe play area.”

To avoid the storm, users had no choice but to enter the circle, and thus the users who had been scattered across the map naturally gathered and fought.

“But for the circle to be at a size that doesn't even contain half the map right now...”

It meant they should be close to each other from the start.

“Yes. It's the tricks of the organizers.”

- Shiver

- True, would they want to watch streamers leisurely farming fully and then fighting? Lol

- Real lol

“What are you going to do?”

Alpaca asked Seo-jun if he would reconsider the strategy.

And Seo-jun answered without a single moment of hesitation.

“Let's go as planned.”

Narrow? All the better.

***

Once the transport plane entered the safe zone, users began to jump out one by one.

And in that line, Challenger jungler Dokkaebi was also present.

‘We will take the camp.’

Whoosh!

Dokkaebi, who had begun his free fall along with a sensation of his heart dropping, controlled his speed and scanned the surroundings.

The former was because the parachute would not deploy if the speed was too fast, and the latter was to check how many competitors there were to fight over the camp.

One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight.

‘Huh?’

He counted once more.

One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight.

‘Huh? What is this?’

It was the same.

There was no way it could be.

Because the number of people he had just counted did not include himself, he could not help but be flustered.

Including himself, it meant 9 people were heading toward a single spot; was 9 a figure that could even come out in a game with 4-player teams?

- Huh? Isn't that Jin Seo-jun?

- That loud guy from the beginning?

- He was the loudest during the auction today too LMAO

- He's a pricey piece of body worth 995 points

Dokkaebi, who grasped the players properly one by one after reading the chat, became able to see the situation clearly.

Jin Seo-jun.

He was the player who was the biggest mystery of this auction, whom three team leaders had gone all-in with their points for.

‘He must have jumped to the wrong place by himself.’

Until then, Dokkaebi did not think much of it.

‘I should quickly take the camp and go underground...'

Shoooosh!

However, as a certain object falling vertically passed by him rapidly, he was deeply startled.

‘He's not controlling his speed? If he does that...'

The identity of the object that passed him was Seo-jun. And his acceleration was no joke.

As expected, the parachute did not deploy due to the system.

Crash!!!

Seo-jun landed on the rooftop of a building. Earlier than anyone else among the 9 people.

‘Wow. In the midst of that, he turned his body at the last moment and landed properly.’

Dokkaebi deployed his parachute, marveling.

- What a total alpha male LMAO

- Coming alone and skydiving bare-bodied alone lol

- His health is practically zero. Let's go catch him

“It's dangerous to go catch him.”

The advantage of falling without deploying a parachute was that one could land on the ground faster than anyone else to farm items.

Still, there was a reason why people did not do it.

- He has enough health to die in just one hit, can you really resist this?

- Let's just go and give him a light poke

- He looks like a clueless newbie at a glance, let's show him the bitter taste of battle royale

Fall damage.

A term meaning damage from falling, it referred to a game system where one suffered damage to their health when falling from a position above a certain height.

“With that health, he'll be gone soon even if it's not by my hands.”

While descending slowly via the parachute, Dokkaebi set his direction toward a building slightly away from Seo-jun.

Glancing over, by good fortune, there was a handgun on the rooftop of the building where Seo-jun had dropped.

‘Ah, I was planning to go there first.’

Dokkaebi put his lingering regret behind him and watched Seo-jun.

At first, Seo-jun scratched his head as if flustered.

Then, after saying something or other to the viewers, he shrugged his shoulders and walked ploddingly toward the handgun.

The handgun was held in Seo-jun's hand.

‘Should I widen the distance a bit?’

And at that moment.

Seo-jun and Dokkaebi's eyes met.

Seo-jun grinned.

Then, he flung the handgun in his hand far away.

‘What is this?’

It was an incomprehensible development.

However, the action of Seo-jun that followed next was even more of a spectacle.

‘He's raising both hands? Is that a boxing stance? He's doing that to me, right?’

- Dokkaebi, he's telling you to come for a bare-handed fight? Lol

- No lol his health is low enough to die in one hit, but why did he throw away the handgun again

- Ah lol Dokkaebi is practically semi-pro in real-life boxing, yet he's telling him to bring it on

- What's certain is that he's definitely a total alpha male.

‘Wow... This is something I cannot hold back on.’

Dokkaebi turned the direction of his parachute.