==============================
CHAPTER 124 – CLEANER
[Top-Grade Tough Leather]
[Category: Inventory]
[Description: Tough, high-quality leather from a top-grade monster. Suitable for crafting items.]
[Seller: dontgo95]
[Price: 2,000,000 won]
[Haggling: Not allowed]
[Chat: Not allowed]
[Transaction Method: Delivery]
Ryu Min let out a satisfied smile at the item Joo Seong-tak had posted.
It was a fresh, just-uploaded Legendary material.
‘Looks like he killed the Round 8 boss, the Ogre, and brought back an item.’
There must’ve been plenty of human corpses, so he would’ve been able to use Corpse Explosion to his heart’s content.
If he’d been alone, he obviously wouldn’t have been able to kill it, but either way, the fact that he killed the Ogre was fortunate for Ryu Min.
‘Even a psychopathic murderer is useful sometimes.’
With that pointless thought, he pressed the purchase button.
Since the phone wasn’t his, the ID wasn’t Ryu Min’s, of course—it was Lostyak’s ID.
And he set the delivery address to Lostyak’s one-room apartment.
Ryu Min smiled toward Joo Seong-tak, who would be hunched over staring at his phone.
‘That Legendary material you got me—I’ll put it to good use. In return, I’m sending you living expenses, so don’t feel slighted.’
With one arm and one leg missing, he wouldn’t be able to get any part-time job anyway.
The sale money would obviously go toward living expenses.
‘Now I only need to gather one more Legendary material.’
As Ryu Min was debating whether to make a weapon or a necklace, a call came in.
Not to Lostyak’s phone—Ryu Min’s phone.
“Yeah.”
-My lord. This is Kim Ye-dam.
“I know. Don’t use your real name—use Yamtti.”
-Ah, yesss.
“Since you called, I’m guessing you finished what I told you to do?”
-Yes. As you instructed, I organized the Plseba sign-up list file and emailed it just now.
“Good. Until I give you other instructions, lie low for the time being. Assemblyman Lee Seong-hyeon will be searching for you with fire in his eyes.”
-Understood.
“And keep the chairman under control so he doesn’t get any funny ideas.”
-Don’t worryyy.
“Hey. Don’t act cute with me. How dare you flirt with your lord. Tsk.”
-S-sorry. I’ll correct it.
“Yeah. Good work.”
After ending the call, Ryu Min opened his email.
There was a message from Yamtti.
[Plseba Kill List Roster.xlsx]
‘Why did you save the file name like this? What if someone traces it?’
Thinking he’d have to chew her out properly later, he opened the file.
A list of Players who had joined Plseba appeared in a long stream.
[Nickname] [Real Name] [Level] [Join Date] [Occupation] [Charge] [Current Status]
Minchojoa / Park Sae-rom / Age 20 / April 11 / University student / Aiding and abetting murder / Alive
Gu Yeonseung / Gu Yeonseung / Age 29 / April 5 / Actor / Murder / Alive
Chimaek-eun Jinri / Park Hyun-min / Age 28 / April 11 / Office worker / Aiding and abetting murder, rape / Alive
……………………
………………
…………
From nickname to real name, occupation, and even the charges committed during the interview.
Everything was organized clearly at a glance.
Maybe because Yamtti had experience working at a company, she handled this kind of task well.
‘So there are this many pieces of trash that need to be dealt with?’
The exact number was 1,031 people.
It was a number that made a sigh come out on its own.
‘There’s no way I can build and run the café together with scum like this.’
The current Plseba was moving in a different direction than before.
Even interviews were conducted with no regard to skill and purely focused on character, and if someone had a criminal record, they were rejected without exception.
It wasn’t like the old days, when they let criminals join indiscriminately.
They were going through a purge, but the existing water was the problem.
‘Because I can’t force the ones who already joined to leave.’
If he forcibly expelled them, who knew what they might do outside?
It would be like releasing criminals who had been locked up in prison into society.
‘So for the existing members, the right move is to make a list like this and clean them up step by step.’
You could call it “organizing” in nicer words—if you put it badly, it was a purge.
‘First, I should entrust the cleaning of the trash.’
For cleaning trash on this kind of scale, you need, by all means, a professional.
And there just happened to be a garbage cleaner that came to mind.
‘Shall I go ask him?’
Ryu Min’s lips twisted upward.
A shabby warehouse.
Five Players had gathered there, smoking cigarettes.
“Haa… F*ck. How did it come to this?”
“Seriously.”
Along with the smoke, natural sighs and curses spilled from their mouths.
No wonder—there were flyers in front of them.
Wanted posters with their faces on them.
“Fck, they used a fcking awful photo.”
“I’m not that ugly.”
“No, you’re ugly as hell. It’s a perfect match.”
“F*ck you—don’t you guys have mirrors at home? That’s like spitting into the air while lying down, dumbass.”
They snickered and laughed, but then another sigh leaked out again.
Even as they laughed, it was only to release tension.
They knew it was a serious situation.
“We’ve got wanted posters out—can’t even move around freely. What the hell do we do?”
“Get plastic surgery or something, I guess.”
“What f*cking plastic surgery? If they use the Tracking skill, feels like it’s only a matter of time before we’re caught.”
“Ah, right. Damn it. That exists.”
As if on cue, sighs poured out of all five mouths with the cigarette smoke.
“They say it was Assemblyman Lee Seong-hyeon—that bastard proposed a bill. To make an anti-Player organization.”
“Then they can find us f*cking easily with Tracking, huh?”
“We’re about to end up living on the run, damn it.”
“F*ck… if we change our names, can we avoid being tracked?”
How did they, Players, end up as wanted criminals?
With a bitter sigh, when they thought about it, there was only one cause.
“This is all because we joined the café.”
“Yeah. Because we committed our first murder there…”
Players change the world.
A lot of people joined because they liked that slogan, but there was no way anyone joined to kill people.
“Those f*cking bastards set a trap for us.”
That’s right. We fell into a trap.
If they hadn’t forced—forced without forcing—us to commit murder, things wouldn’t have gotten this bad.
“Hey, but honestly… it was fun back then.”
“Mm…”
“Heh-heh… Ah. Thinking about it now, seriously…”
A few of them wore expressions of ecstasy.
When they were told they had to kill someone to join the café, all of them had been shocked.
What kind of café does that?
But the world runs strictly on power.
Players survive, and ordinary people will be weeded out.
Right now, ordinary people are basically livestock to Players.
Do you want to live a life being ignored by beings like that?
You have to show ordinary people how terrifying Players are. As they listened to that logic, it started to sound somewhat reasonable.
And after going through Round 4, they didn’t even feel much resistance to killing people anymore.
Even if that wasn’t the case, all of them did have red-lined histories, in their own ways.
“Still, I’d never murdered or raped in real life, not even once.”
“Me neither.”
“But it wasn’t as bad as I thought. Heh-heh.”
Another person agreed, curling the corners of his mouth upward with a snicker.
Even though they were now being hunted, the memory of their first murder wasn’t all that bad.
If anything, the woman they’d gang-raped back then kept popping into their minds.
Some of them even bounced their hips as if it had been really fun.
“No, but… we’re not the only ones with wanted posters out for us, right?”
“Of course not. All the bastards who joined the café either committed murder or aided it, just like us.”
“Then we didn’t have to be this scared on our own, did we?”
The five of them found a bit of comfort.
Thinking there were thousands of comrades in the same boat calmed them down.
If it came down to it, they’d report everything to the police and sink the whole ship.
“That’s why the café chairman called us. He’s sending us to another country.”
Today, they’d all received the same text from the Plseba chairman.
[Player. This is the café manager, ‘Chairman’. The police have begun investigating the murder you committed during the April 8 interview. I’m sorry, but you will need to flee to another country. All costs related to that will be fully covered by Plseba. For details, please come to the location marked on the map by 23:00……]
They couldn’t dismiss it as some idiot’s pathetic prank.
The text had a photo attached—of their wanted posters.
And when they came to the promised location, the flyers were scattered around brazenly, as if on display.
That was why all five were chain-smoking.
“Now I get it. If we report it, the chairman bastard gets in trouble too, so he called us in a hurry.”
“Ha… we have to run to another country all of a sudden.”
“Well, how’s he planning to get us there? Did he get a smuggling boat or something?”
They’d been told they didn’t need to bring luggage, so they didn’t.
They were too rushed to even think straight.
“Looks like I’m about to live abroad for the first time in my life.”
“I wanted to get out of Hell Joseon—this works out, f*ck.”
They’d cursed the Republic of Korea every day, but when it came time to leave, it felt bittersweet.
“There’s no country better than this for criminals to live in, though…”
“That’s an old saying now, f*ck. Because of Assemblyman Lee Seong-hyeon, all Players are about to be screwed.”
The Players pulled out fresh cigarettes, put them to their lips, and let out heavy sighs again.
“But when is that chairman bastard coming?”
“Seriously. It’s almost the promised time.”
“If the one who needs us is the one who shows up last, what kind of bullshit is that? F*ck.”
“I’m about to just spill everything to the cops.”
Just as their dissatisfaction was about to hit the ceiling—
Drrrrr—
The warehouse door opened, and a man appeared.
“Is that the chairman?”
They didn’t know what the chairman looked like, but they couldn’t help thinking that.
He’d shown up at exactly the time they were told to gather at the warehouse.
Thud—!
After closing the warehouse door, the man stared at the Players in silence.
He was a neat-looking man, but for some reason, his atmosphere felt strange.
“You the chairman?”
“……”
“Hey—this thing about sending us overseas, it’s true?”
“……”
“And you’re paying all the money we need to live over there, too?”
“……”
“There really won’t be any problems, right?”
Each of them threw out questions, but the only thing that came back was silence.
“Ah, f*ck—say something already. Because of you, things ended up like—”
“Trash blaming other people.”
“What?”
“Fine. I’ll send you.”
And at the same time, the Players saw it.
The man’s entire body being armed with equipment in an instant.
A sword gripped in his hand—one overflowing with black energy.
Tssssssss—
“I’ll send you. To hell.”
Ma Kyung-rok’s sword danced.
With slicing sounds—chop, chop—arms and legs went flying.
“Guuaaah!”
“Aaagh! You crazy bastard!”
In an instant, the scene was filled with screams and blood.
There was nowhere to run.
In barely ten seconds, all five lost their limbs.
“Don’t worry. I won’t kill you yet. Not until you cough up your items.”
From Ma Kyung-rok’s sword, Dark Aura flowed like a snake.
“Devour them. Don’t kill them.”
At the order, Dark Aura surged over the Players as if it were alive.
Kwaddeudeudeuk—!
“Guuuuuaaaagh!”
A wicked smile formed on Ma Kyung-rok’s lips.