While Seo Jun-Ho was talking with Kim Woo-Joong, Graham approached and asked, “Seo Jun-Ho! Have you already decided on what to request from us?”
Based on the fact that Graham’s tone of voice was slightly raised, he seemed to be in a good mood. Seo Jun-Ho nodded. “I’m ready.”
“Oh! Really? Then go ahead and tell me.”
“Now? Ayy, everyone’s enjoying the festival, so I will tell you tomorrow.”
“What? Hahahaha!“
Graham laughed loudly and tapped Seo Jun-Ho’s waist.
“Kim Woo-Joong! Please teach him properly about things like this!”
“Dwarves think of sweating and making equipment as the highlight of a festival.”
“Ah, I see.”
In a word, Seo Jun-Ho’s remarks had almost severed the spirit of the festival. As people gathered here and there and urged him to speak, Seo Jun-Ho took out the paper.
“Hmm-hmm, then I will tell you one by one from the beginning.”
“…Huh? From the beginning? One by one?”
The dwarves tilted their heads. However, as Seo Jun-Ho’s words continued past five minutes, everyone seemed to have sobered up as their mouths hung open.
“…Lastly, please pack a few throwing knives, please. That is all of it.”
“Ah, no, look here, Seo Jun-Ho.” Graham reached out with a bewildered look. “Are you asking me to make them all?”
“Can’t I?”
“That’s…”
It was not that he couldn’t, but it was just annoying.
Huh?!
Graham barked out a laugh in disbelief and shook his head. He looked at Kim Woo-Joong and apologized. “I’m sorry, Kim Woo-Joong. I said you would be the one who’ll take advantage of us, but clearly, I was wrong. It’s someone else!”
“Ayy, I know you guys won’t break from just this.”
“Why are humans so scary these days? They all used to be stupid in the past.” Graham grumbled, turned his back, and shouted, “Are you enjoying the festival?!”
“Yeaaah…!”
“Raspberry wine is the best!”
“Then, it’s time for the finale!”
Graham raised the hammer, which was on top of the ‘Desk of Wisdom,’ above his head.
“Light up the fire!”
“Light up the fire!”
Graham’s orders spread among the dwarves as they repeated his words. Then, the entire Del Ice turned hot. At the same time, lines engraved on the walls, ceilings, and floors of the cave glowed red. There was only one place the lines headed toward: a huge furnace that had occupied the entire wall on one side of Del Ice.
Hwaaaaa-!
After the red lines connected, the furnace soon began to emit tremendous heat.
“Consider this an honor. You’re one of the few people who have seen Del Ice’s true self.”
“At the same time, it’s the last breath of this earth.”
“Yes, after the fire is emitted this time, all the earth energy will be used up and things will be difficult for the time being.”
Soon after, the dwarves’ roles began to get divided. There were dwarves who went home and came back with an anvil and a hammer. There were dwarves starting to pile up metal in the open space. Lastly, there were even dwarves who spread out a huge blueprint and were having a discussion with each other!
As Seo Jun-Ho watched them busily move about, he opened his mouth to speak, “I feel a little strange.”
“…Right?” Kim Woo-Joong said in a voice of sympathy.
Something… Something felt strange. Perhaps because the dwarves all looked like children, it felt like child labor.
“Let’s all do our best!”
“Shall we shout a chant? Heave!”
“Ho!”
“Heave!”
“Ho!”
Bang, bang, bang! Tap, tap!
To the chant, the sound of hammering began to be heard throughout Del Ice.
“It’s incredible. It’s on a completely different level from the hammer sound you hear in Gilleon’s blacksmith shop.”
At best, one or two blacksmiths hammered here and there in Gilleon. But here, there were at least a few dozen hammers working simultaneously. In addition, the hammering was done by dwarves blessed by the God of the Earth. The echoes sounded clean, and they had their own deep rhythm.
“It has also been a while since I have seen this,” mentioned Kim Woo-Joong.
“Is that so?”
Since it had been a while it meant that Kim Woo-Joong had also received equipment from the dwarves. Perhaps his famous weapon, the Death Sword, was made by the dwarves. As the two looked at Del Ice’s majestic appearance, a message arrived.
“Please wait. I got a message…”
“Excuse me for a moment…”
The two spoke at the same time, then looked at each other with round eyes. Soon, a message window appeared in front of Seo Jun-Ho.
[A new announcement has been registered]
“…An announcement?”
“Oh, I knew it.” Kim Woo-Joong nodded.
“I knew it wouldn’t be a personal message after seeing your reaction, but I didn’t expect it to be an announcement from the system.”
“Did something big happen? A sudden announcement… It’s the first time I’ve seen this.”
“Hmm, it is probably not a big issue. I think it may be about the store. Let’s check it out first.”
An announcement about the store? Seo Jun-Ho hurriedly checked the announcement.
[Ugh, I’ll open the store in a week. Come if you want.
– Reiji, 2nd floor Administrator]
He was right. It seemed that the Administrator was about to open up their store.
“…But why is it written like this, though?”
“Oh,?that is because the personality of the 2nd floor Administrator is kind of…” Kim Woo-Joong stopped his words with an awkward expression and changed the subject. “Anyway, do you have enough PP?”
“I have a little over 80,000 points.”
Two videos—well, specifically, the second video, ‘Salmon in the Mountains,’ went viral. On the first day alone, he had received over 30,000 PP, so no more words needed to be said. Thanks to the steady PP flow, Seo Jun-Ho’s PP had just passed 80,000.
“Hmm, that amount is a little iffy.”
Kim Woo-Joong gave him a slight hint about the store’s prices.
“What?! It’s that expensive?”
“But they are worth it. These things are really hard to get otherwise.”
Kim Woo-Joong confessed that he had also bought that day’s elixir from there. 𝘯𝑜𝑣𝘦𝘭.𝘦𝑡
“Hmmm, Player Kim Woo-Joong, how do you get PPs?”
“The Guild takes care of it for me. They take pictures of my hunting and daily life and they upload them as pictures and videos. Then, they would give me a percentage of the PPs earned.”
“…Isn’t that a relationship between a celebrity and an agency?”
“Guilds are like that these days…”
Kim Woo-Joong smiled with some self-deprecation and continued. “Come to think of it, I enjoyed watching your video, too. You did a great job.”
“Thank you. I thought I had enough PPs thanks to the video, so I’m a little shocked to hear you say it’s not.”
“Hmmm, but for you, I think there is one way for you to make up for the lack of PP.”
“A way?” Seo Jun-Ho’s eyes sparkled.
“Yes, have you unlocked all the features of the community forums yet?” asked Kim Woo-Joong.
“No, just the information boards and news,” responded Seo Jun-Ho.
“Then, try opening the matching bulletin board later.”
“…Matching bulletin board?”
“Yes. It will probably be fun for you. I sometimes go there when I’m bored.”
Until now, Seo Jun-Ho hadn’t felt the need to unlock other bulletin boards, so he hadn’t opened them. Even if he had made quite a bit of PP, he had no plans to use them recklessly.
“I recommend you to open the bulletin boards whenever you have time. They’re very helpful for a Player’s career.”
“I’ll keep that in mind.”
Then, Kim Woo-Joong checked the time with the Vita in his left hand and said, “Then, I think I should get going.”
“Thank you for your help…”
“No, Player Seo Jun-Ho, you worked harder than I did. If it were me, I probably would have just cut down the banshee and come back.”
Kim Woo-Joong was done saying his farewell in a rather formal way, and he hesitated for a while before saying, “May I speak more casually the next time I see you? We’re not that many years apart, after all.”
Seo Jun-Ho was almost as old as Kim Woo-Joong’s father, though. But Seo Jun-Ho could only hide his awkwardness and nodded. “That sounds good.”
“I am looking forward to seeing you again.”
Kim Woo-Joong nodded. He greeted the dwarves before leaving Del Ice. Seo Jun-Ho was assigned a house along with being told to wait for his request to be completed. He wondered if the house they had assigned to him would be uncomfortable because of the dwarves’ height, but he was mistaken.
“It’s a relief that there’s a house for Kim Woo-Joong.”
In a word, it was a residence for guest use. Seo Jun-Ho sat on the sofa and opened the community window. The Frost Queen stared at it over the top of his head.
“Are you going to try the matching bulletin board or whatever it was called?” asked the Frost Queen.
“Yeah, I can’t really tell what it is from the name.”
Based on the name, he thought it could be something like a match or a competition.
[Do you want to read the matching bulletin board? 500 PP will be consumed.]
“Wow, that’s crazy! Why is it so expensive?”
“Contractor, it’s too expensive…”
The Frost Queen clenched his hair with her trembling hands. It was their hard-earned PPs. However, Seo Jun-Ho was determined.
“But it can’t be helped. Should I not buy it just because it’s expensive?”
“Ca-can you not buy it?”
“Of course not…”
When he opened the matching bulletin board with a touch, the Frost Queen made a small groan.
‘By the way…’
Seo Jun-Ho’s expression as he was looking through the matching bulletin board turned strange. After a careful examination, he nodded. “This, in a word, is a dueling arena.”
“…A dueling arena?”
“Yeah, it’s a system that I experienced several times in games when I was a student.”
It was a system that matched Players of similar levels to fight with each other. Although it varied slightly from game to game, the rewards were usually about the same.
‘A winner-takes-all structure.’
This meant that the winner would take everything that was on the line in the duel.
“So this is what Kim Woo-Joong meant when he said he used this sometimes.”
There was no better way to develop a Player’s actual fighting experience than this.
‘There are even a variety of functions…’
Starting with the “Unknown” function that made you anonymous, there was even a function that would give you more PPs when you challenged a higher-level opponent.
“Oho. There’s a ranking, too.”
“Ohhh,?does that show who is the strongest among the Players?” asked the Frost Queen.
“Of course not. There could be people who only do this for a living.”
But to begin with, no information was available from the ranking table.
“I’ve never seen any of these names,” spoke Seo Jun-Ho, surprised.
“It seems that everyone used fake names,” mentioned the Frost Queen.
“…Well, there’s no way anyone would want their identities known.”
To put it nicely, it was a match and duel, but in the end, it was just a fight. There was no way Players who were extremely reluctant to expose their abilities would leave this matching bulletin board alone, after all, you could be here as an anonymous individual.
‘The system is really cunning.’
This part was cleverly thought of. In short, it knew how to acquire PPs very well.
“With the Unknown system, 10 points for hiding your appearance, 10 points for each match…”
Simply repeating one win and one loss didn’t mean you would break even. If you continued to lose, you would be in at least a 20-point deficit per match.
“Mmhm. It’s not bad.”
Kim Woo-Joong had recommended saving at least 200,000 points so Seo Jun-Ho could buy at least one item he wanted.
“If my bet is 80,000 points…”
Seo Jun-Ho touched his chin for a while, then put on a playful smile. A smile full of confidence.
1. these bulletin boards are like specific threads in the community forums. Like the video forums, AKA video bulletin board.