...
Saiki quickly sped through the known earlier plot. Clearly, Saiki was a little obsessed now. Even though he knew what to do, replaying it still dealt considerable mental damage to him.
He reached the village chief's daughter's question again: "Let's set off!"
This time Saiki chose to agree.
[Just treat her like air.]
Saiki controlled the character to take a few steps. The screen's view suddenly turned purple, and his HP bar began slowly draining.
[This is poison!]
The village chief's daughter scratched her head and smiled as she explained: "Yeah, every year around this time there are poisonous things near the village. But it's fine, you just get used to it."
[You might get used to it, but I can't.]
"It's okay, the poison area isn't big. We'll just walk out."
Saiki looked at his HP bar. Even if he walked out, he'd be left with critical health. He controlled the character to take one step and noticed some plants nearby labeled with the words "Antidote Herb."
[Such a straightforward name. Easy to understand at a glance.]
Saiki controlled the character to take two steps, picked up the antidote.
[Obtained Antidote Herb. Consume immediately?]
Saiki quickly chose to consume immediately, but his HP bar started draining even faster.
Only then did the village chief's daughter slowly say: "Why did you eat the antidote herb raw? This stuff has to be cooked first. Eating it raw makes the poison worse!"
[Why didn't you say that earlier!]
Saiki controlled the character to run quickly, but he only made it two-thirds out of the poison area before collapsing.
[Character death. Victory and defeat are common in war. Great hero, please try again.]
[Hahahahaha, fine, fine, fine.]
Saiki laughed as he stood up, picked up the game box, and flipped through to find the developer company's name.
[Sunshine Co., Ltd., huh? Nice name, nice name.]
Saiki opened his phone and searched online for the company's address, only to find it had gone bankrupt five years ago.
[Tch!]
Saiki noticed the official website on his phone and a video posted by a blogger who had played the game before. He clicked it open.
[A blogger opened the screen and introduced while playing: "Ah, bros, today I'm taking you guys to play this game rated 8.8 or higher, super… super fun, called Chaotic World. That's right, you heard correctly—not Chaos World, Chaotic World."]
[How awesome is it exactly? Let's dive in. Right after entering, you see two huge obvious boxes: Easy mode and Hard mode. But who are we? We have to challenge Hard mode, right? Click in—wow, the character models are incredibly detailed. You can barely tell it's a person!]
[Right after starting, it makes us craft equipment. See that tree? Yep, that's where our gear comes from. But surprise—every chop deducts from our own HP too. How do you recover? Eat fish, of course…]
[Then for this diamond, after chopping with the wooden club? Yep, durability loss again. What now? Eat fish, obviously. This designer is seriously a genius!]
[Then heading into the beginner village, see that old man getting bullied by monsters? No need to think—he's the village chief. Though you can't exactly say he matches the picture. More like no relation at all. Remember: don't follow the game box description saying this old man is super kind or whatever. One slip and he'll stab you…]
The blogger went on and introduced a ton of the trolling scenes that Saiki had suffered through. Saiki scrolled the progress bar to the part about how to clear it quickly.
[Ah bros, know how to clear it? See that Hard mode and Easy mode at the start? There's also a tiny shop up there. Just click in. You don't click? Big mistake. Click and you'll be shocked.]
[Why? Because right away there are six first-time recharge packs. Click into the character screen—yep, characters are buyable. And unlike the trash models inside, look: 50 bucks for Golden Legend skin, 88 bucks for Diamond skin.]
[Of course, there's also the weapon pavilion: Dragon Soul Sword, Heaven-Relying Dragon-Slaying Sword… all sorts of god-tier gear, not too many, just needs a 648. Super generous.]
[Ah, and of course, if you don't want to spend, no problem. Click the lottery in the top right—see it? Brave Lottery: watch one ad, draw once. There's also the Legend Lottery pool next to it, not bad. Gives you one free draw at the start. After that? It won't let you leave—pops up an ad to make you spend 648. Every draw is 18.8 bucks. Really makes you think…]
Saiki decisively closed it. He had already realized what kind of game this was: a stupid pay-to-win game where you couldn't progress without spending money.
Saiki felt a bit angry, but still unwilling to give up. He clicked back into the game—this time his hand slipped and accidentally selected Hard mode again. It loaded at the village entrance.
[Damn it, accidentally clicked Hard mode again. This time it loaded from the last save point…? Hm? What's going on? Where's the village chief?]
That's right—when Saiki clicked in this time, there was no familiar old man standing at the village entrance, and no exciting scene of demons beating up the old man.
Saiki had just controlled the character to walk a few steps forward when the village chief suddenly appeared from behind him with a smile, pulled out a small knife, struck first, and stabbed it into Saiki's chest. Saiki's controlled character rapidly lost HP, retreated two steps, fell to the ground, HP bar emptied—character death.
After seeing Saiki's controlled character die, the village chief raised an eyebrow, threw his head back, and laughed loudly: "A gentleman's revenge isn't too late even after ten years! Hahahahahaha…"
[Character death. Victory and defeat are common in war. Great hero, please try again…]
Saiki gripped the controller tightly with both hands, his face calm as he stared at the screen. From a first-person view, the reflection on Saiki's glasses completely hid his eyes—no one could tell what he was thinking.
The next second—
"Boom!"
A massive explosion-like sound erupted from the apartment, especially loud from Saiki's place, with black smoke rising.
"Knock knock knock knock."
Shiina Mahiru knocked on Saiki's door in a panic and asked anxiously: "Saiki-kun! Saiki-kun! What happened? Why was there such a big noise? Saiki-kun, are you there? I'm coming in!"
Shiina Mahiru didn't hear a reply from Saiki. Thinking there had been a gas explosion inside, she pushed the door open and saw Saiki standing with his hand in front of the TV, smiling at her.
[What's wrong, Shiina-san?]
Shiina Mahiru froze for a moment, then answered blankly: "Um, no, it's just… I thought I heard an explosion sound from your room earlier…"
[Oh, that. It's nothing. The table fell over and I propped it back up.]
Saiki answered with a perfectly calm expression.
"But there was black smoke coming from your room."
[Oh, that. It's nothing. The TV was about to catch fire, so I unplugged it. It's much better now.]
"Earlier I think I heard you shout 'Die already' or something…"
[Oh, it's nothing. You misheard. That was the TV.]
Shiina Mahiru: ...