CHAPTER 176 – The People Chasing the Black Scythe
After Round 11 began, Ma Kyung-rok looked around.
With a more flustered expression than usual.
‘Damn it, we got scattered all over the place?’
Since it was a team battle, he’d assumed everyone would move together, but they’d split up like it was an individual match.
It was an unexpected situation—one he’d never even heard about from the Prophet—so it left him even more rattled.
‘What happened? Did the Prophet forget and not mention it? Or could it be…?’
Ma Kyung-rok shook his head.
No way the Prophet would’ve deliberately withheld information.
There’d be nothing to gain from it.
‘He probably didn’t know we’d be scattered.’
Even the Prophet, who seemed perfect, sometimes forgot crucial information like this.
‘Tch. Like this, there’s no way to find Christine.’
Ma Kyung-rok had intended to protect Christine, his fiancée.
He needed to at least put on an act of saving her, or people would have something to nitpick him for.
‘Honestly, I’m not in love with her. After dating for just a few months, how could I feel that kind of emotion for a foreigner?’
A fiancée in name only.
Even so, he didn’t wish for anything to happen to her.
No businessman in the world would want a business relationship to fall apart.
‘I wanted to protect her… but if this happens, I can’t even track her down.’
He knew her nickname was Krissy, but he’d never met her in the other world, so he didn’t know her face.
Like this, he didn’t meet the conditions, so tracking was impossible.
He felt completely in the dark about where he should look for Christine.
‘Then I should just do quests and rack up points, right?’
No matter how he thought about it, there was no way to help Christine.
The best he could do was earn points diligently and keep the team alive.
‘There’s no need to worry. The Prophet said it, didn’t he? That a lifesaver would appear and save Christine.’
If things went exactly as foretold, it meant she wouldn’t die, so there was no need for him to step in.
Though even if he wanted to, he wasn’t in a position to.
‘Let’s focus on building points. Where should I go to find quests?’
Just then, there was a well-maintained road in front of him—one that looked like carriages would travel on it.
At the end of that road, he could see a huge city ringed by walls.
‘A kingdom? There’ll be plenty of quests there.’
As he started walking, Ma Kyung-rok suddenly had a thought.
‘What if I run into other players while I’m wandering around?’
If they were Korean players, he’d smile and greet them—but if they were players from another country?
‘By the rules, there’s nothing good about teaming up with foreign players.’
They lived in different places, and they weren’t on the same team.
They couldn’t share points, and they couldn’t even communicate.
They were nothing but competitors who needed to be taken down.
‘They said you get points if you kill other players. A lot of points, too.’
From that perspective, foreign players were perfect prey to kill.
It wouldn’t be an exaggeration to call them walking points.
‘If I don’t kill them, they’ll try to kill me first. I’m not the only one thinking this.’
After thinking it through, Ma Kyung-rok made a decision.
If he met foreign players, he’d assess the situation and then kill them.
For survival, it couldn’t be helped.
‘Wait. Maybe instead of doing quests, hunting down and killing foreign players is even better for stacking points?’
If things went well, he might even take Rank 1 and become the Zone Representative.
‘No. Even if I become the Zone Representative, there’s nothing good about it. I’d just get killed by the Black Scythe and it’d be taken right away.’
Since dominion wouldn’t work on a high-level player, even if he became the Zone Representative, he couldn’t stop the Black Scythe.
‘For now, the best is to take Rank 2. Rank 1 will be the Black Scythe anyway.’
First, he should clear a subquest and then think about which method was better for earning points.
Whether killing players was faster, or clearing quests was faster.
‘For now, should I check if there are people nearby?’
He used a surrounding-detection skill to see if there were any red dots.
‘Huh? Behind me… there’s one?’
Seeing a red dot approaching him from behind, Ma Kyung-rok drew his sword and turned.
“Who the— Manager An?”
“CEO!”
The person running over with the joy of a puppy finding its owner was none other than An Sang-cheol.
“What happened, Manager An? Did you follow me?”
“Of course. The moment we got dropped in that weird place, I decided to track you down first, CEO. We’re on the same team—wouldn’t it be better to move together?”
Ma Kyung-rok nodded.
He’d felt uneasy traveling alone anyway, and having his right-hand man beside him was reassuring.
“Shall we go do quests together?”
“Yes, CEO. But…”
“…?”
“Wouldn’t it be better if we moved with a Buffer’s help?”
“A Buffer—do you mean Min Juri?”
“Yes. I’m used to getting buffs right beside her, and now that I’m not, it feels empty… and like I’m losing out.”
That made sense.
One buff could raise stats by as much as 70%, so the difference between receiving it and not receiving it was huge.
Not receiving it now even made him feel like he was under a debuff.
“That’s true. If we get that buff called Bless, we’ll be set for three hours.”
“Then I’ll track Min Juri.”
As An Sang-cheol was about to use his tracking skill, Ma Kyung-rok stopped him.
“No. Rather than Min Juri, let’s go to the Black Scythe.”
“Pardon? The Black Scythe?”
“Min Juri will definitely try to move together with the Black Scythe. If we go to her, when we’re not that close, we’ll just make her wary for no reason. If we stick to the Black Scythe instead—someone we at least have some connection with—we’ll naturally receive Min Juri’s buff too, and we can watch from the side how he builds points.”
“Well, the Black Scythe has maintained unrivaled results in every round. Like you said, CEO, that seems best.”
The two of them smiled and changed direction.
Their target to track was none other than the Black Scythe.
At the same time.
There were many people in other countries thinking the same thing as Ma Kyung-rok.
“The angel definitely said it, right? That you get points if you kill other players.”
“That’s correct.”
The Chinese player [Shizkang] curled his lips into a greasy smile.
An ordinary person might hesitate at murder, but not him.
For someone like him—who’d used uncommon talent to secure a gang executive position in his late twenties—killing was easy.
“Earning points is damn easy. We just grab the guys we see and kill them, right?”
“That’s right, boss. Just don’t kill Chinese people.”
“You think I don’t fucking know that, you bastard? Huh?!”
When he took a posture like he might hit him, the subordinate apologized at once.
“I spoke out of turn. I’m sorry.”
Even in the other world, he was still acting like a lackey, but he had no complaints.
Because Shizkang was someone whose skill at killing people was recognized.
“Listen good if you don’t wanna die today. You’ve gotta survive to the end and sit in an executive seat too, right? Tch.”
“I’m sorry!”
“We’ll follow and trust only Shizkang-nim!”
When the nine subordinates bowed their heads, Shizkang smiled in satisfaction.
“I’m telling you to listen. I’ll make sure you all survive.”
A world centered on Players would come.
Ordinary people would fall into slavery, and only Players who survived to the very end would reign as kings.
‘Same with the gang. If we just endure the rounds, I can crush every competitor.’
Right now, the gang was controlled by Players.
The older ordinary executives had already been purged and replaced long ago.
The Players holding real power now were naturally in their twenties, and Shizkang, recognized for his strength as one of them, had been able to climb quickly into an executive position.
‘It’s not the strong who eat the gang. It’s the ones who endure the rounds who end up taking the top.’
Shizkang also had a dream of rising to an even higher position.
And for that dream, he could kill as many foreign Players as he wanted.
Killing people was also the specialty of his Berserker class.
“From now on, we hunt players from other countries. Think of them as monsters. The moment you see them, kill them with not even a shred of mercy. That’s how we survive.”
“But, Shizkang-nim. How do we tell whether they’re from another country? We can’t see nicknames, and their appearance will be customized too.”
“You dumb bastard. You’ll know if you talk. The language won’t be the same.”
“Ah.”
“If you understand, then move. Turn on your surrounding-detection skill, find every bastard you see, and kill them.”
“Heh heh, understood.”
Chuckling together with his subordinates, Shizkang immediately put it into action.
Just then, he saw two red dots nearby.
“Let’s go!”
He ran with his sword drawn, and the distance closed quickly.
Judging by their looks, they seemed to be Western Players.
“What the?”
The Westerner had sensed their approach with presence detection, but it was already too late.
“Hey, you guys. You’re not Chinese, right?”
“What…?”
“Knew it. You big-nosed bastards.”
Without hesitation, Shizkang used a skill.
‘Bloody Grip.’
Out of thin air, a gigantic hand of red light appeared and seized one Westerner.
In an instant, the Westerner was dragged right up in front of him, and a blade of red light dropped onto his head.
Slice—!
“H-holy shit!!!”
When his companion was hit, the other Westerner panicked and turned tail without even looking back.
No—he tried to.
Right up until Shizkang’s subordinates stabbed him.
Thud— thud— thud—!
“Guhk…!”
Looking at the Westerner who died like he’d been skewered on a spit, Shizkang asked his men.
“Who got the last hit?”
“I think I did.”
“How many points did you get?”
“I got 290 points.”
“Yeah? I got 350. That’s weird.”
Setting aside high or low, why were points increasing differently for each person?
With the corpse in front of him, Shizkang fell into thought.
Then he reached one conclusion.
‘Don’t tell me it depends on level?’
If the level was low, you got less; if it was high, you got much more—was that how it worked?
‘Then the higher the level, the more points you get?’
A certain person came to mind.
The Black Scythe, the player who held an unrivaled level and was the overall Zone Rank 1.
‘That guy’s level was 90, right?’
If he could kill the Black Scythe, he might monopolize an unimaginable amount of points.
‘It’s common knowledge that he’s a Korean player. If I kill him, I can shoot up to Rank 1 instantly. Becoming the Zone Representative would just be a bonus.’
A grin tugged at his lips, but the problem was how to kill him.
As he mulled it over, Shizkang’s gaze slid toward his subordinates.
‘What if I use these subordinates as sacrifices? And I can speak a little Korean, too.’
If he approached while pretending to be Korean, then used his men as shields to land a fatal blow… wouldn’t he have a chance?
Surprisingly, it might be possible.
‘I need to keep it secret from the subordinates for now. There might be a moron who pisses himself the moment he hears the name Black Scythe.’
Just then.
A subordinate dragged in a certain Asian man, hauling him along.
“Shizkang-nim! We caught a guy trying to run nearby. You should kill him yourself and build points.”
“W-why are you doing this! I don’t want to fight! I was just passing by!”
“Wait.”
As Shizkang listened to him, his eyes gleamed.
“You’re Korean?”
“Huh? Y-you can speak Korean?”
“A little.”
“Haha, thank goodness. P-please tell these people to let me go. Please…”
“Before that, one question. Have you seen the Black Scythe?”
“The Black Scythe? Yeah, I’ve seen him. We were in the same zone.”
“Yeah?”
Shizkang smiled broadly and pressed a blade to the Korean’s throat.
“Eek!”
“You have the tracking skill, or not?”
“I-I-I do!”
“Then guide me to the Black Scythe right now. If you don’t want to die.”