Judge Park Changseok
"Hello, I'm Assemblyman Park Changseok from Player Headquarters."
The bearded man held out a huge hand.
Baek Jinwoo took it without thinking.
"Ah, yes."
"I was rather rude earlier. Still, thanks to you, we were able to take care of a vicious terrorist."
"No, well."
I was just trying to survive.
As Baek Jinwoo scratched his head, the bearded man bared his teeth in a grin.
"By any chance, are you affiliated with any player organization?"
"Pardon?"
"Ah, are you not part of a guild? I haven't seen you at Headquarters… Then I suppose you're in FA status."
FA?
Did he mean free agent status?
"Uh…"
How was he supposed to explain this?
Talking about affiliation and free agency to a total rookie who hadn't even registered yet…
This was awkward.
"You may find it rude of me to ask for personal information, but this is so Headquarters can compensate you appropriately."
"Compensate me?"
Baek Jinwoo's eyes widened.
He was short on everything right now.
He had no money, no runes, and no summoning scrolls.
He wasn't in any position to refuse if someone was offering him something.
"Haha, yes. In a sense, you're also my savior, and you helped us take down a gang, so of course we should compensate you. However, your identity must be verified. I hope you understand."
Park Changseok couldn't help it either.
To get approval from Headquarters, he needed the proper materials and procedures.
"Uh… I haven't registered with Headquarters yet. Is that still okay?"
"What?"
Park Changseok blinked.
The one who had casually helped him, a C-rank summoner, with a few words was an unregistered player?
He looked at Baek Jinwoo with suspicion.
But Baek Jinwoo didn't care. Because he had nothing to hide.
Well, I suppose.
He could be a player who hadn't been active last year.
The law had only been established this year in the first place, so cases like this did happen once in a while.
"Hmm, then do you have your ID?"
As long as he had the identity information, everything would come up.
"Yes, here."
Swoosh.
Baek Jinwoo opened his wallet and handed over his resident registration card.
He had been thinking of just leaving, but if they were going to reward him, what choice did he have?
He might as well cooperate.
If he refused here, it would only make him look suspicious.
After taking a picture of the ID, the bearded man courteously bowed his head.
"Thank you once again. Once the identity verification is complete, compensation will be provided in accordance with our internal regulations."
"Oh, really?"
"Yes."
The bearded man smiled once more.
* * *
"Huh? Are you sure?"
"If you don't believe me, check the CCTV. Besides, how many people saw it with their own eyes?"
"Haha, true enough."
"Yeah."
Park Changseok answered absentmindedly.
That young man still lingered in his thoughts and refused to leave.
The place where Baek Jinwoo and the civilians had departed.
Crash! Bang!
"Senior!"
"Are you alright, Senior?"
Only now had the Headquarters players arrived. It was long after the emergency alarm had gone off.
"Hey, you bastards."
Park Changseok spoke irritably.
"All this happened right next to Headquarters, so you should've run over immediately. Why the hell are you so late? Useless punks."
"S-sorry, sir."
"It's already been cleaned up here. You handle the aftermath."
"What about the terrorists?"
"They've been dealt with."
Park Changseok glanced to the side.
The C-rank Woodman was trimming its roots with a satisfied expression.
"I fed them to it as nutrients."
— No, that's not the point. The Flame Turtle's skill timing was weird.
— The buffers behind that Blood Orc were casting Flame Resistance. How could you use the skill at that moment…?
At that critical moment.
He had presented the solution calmly, frighteningly so, and with room to spare.
What was more, he had known the exact names of summoners and skills like Flame Turtle, Blood Orc, and Flame Resistance.
And that from a player who hadn't even registered.
'No matter how I think about it, something's off.'
Ring ring ring!
Park Changseok made a phone call.
It was to a junior in Headquarters' Information Department.
"Yeah."
"I just sent you a capture, right?"
"Mm-hm, Baek Jinwoo. Look into that guy for me."
* * *
After leaving the café, Baek Jinwoo bought a few cream buns at a nearby bakery.
After that, he headed to a quiet corner of a neighborhood park.
"You can talk now."
— Hooah, hooaaah!
Cute little Lamba, having apparently held it in for a long time, let out a harsh, deep breath.
— I thought I was gonna die from wanting to talk! So this is what it feels like when your mouth is itching to speak?
"You did well. Here, bread."
— Kyaaaah! C-creeeam breeeead!
For the record, the Wind Fairy's favorite food was bread.
More specifically, whipped cream bread.
"I'm giving it to you because you held back so well. If you keep working hard, I'll buy you even more."
— I'm so happyyyyy, chomp chomp!
Crunch crunch!
The fairy devoured the bread like a starving glutton despite its tiny body.
It was amazing that all of that fit inside it.
Anyway.
Lamba was very convenient.
There was none of that conflict with one's summon that almost every player supposedly experienced.
This one bread solved everything.
Of course, discovering that cream bread was its favorite food had taken a great deal of trial and error.
Nothing should happen, right?
He originally hadn't intended to step in, but he had done it to survive.
If that caused troublesome consequences, then he would just have to accept them now.
"Hoo."
Baek Jinwoo let out a short sigh.
He needed to start hunting quickly.
The game made real life was far more complicated than he had expected.
At least in the game, there were no crazy terrorists or governments controlling every little thing.
'First, I should register, then gather as many summoning scrolls as possible.'
Of the summons Baek Jinwoo had once possessed, ten had disappeared due to balance patches.
Wind Fairy, Training Instructor, Explosive Dragon Sorcerer, Little Giant, Dampir, Gale Slayer, Rune Dwarf, Aso, Magic Cat, and Ruination…
Just how broken each of them was could be explained later.
'For now, I need to get Training Instructor and Explosive Dragon Sorcerer first.'
Training Instructor was E-rank, and Explosive Dragon Sorcerer was D-rank.
That meant that if he just opened enough low-grade summoning scrolls, he would obtain them eventually.
Starting from Little Giant, they were C-rank and above, so they couldn't be obtained from low-grade summoning scrolls.
— Hooah! I'm done eating! Thanks, Jinwoo! It's been forever since I had bread!
"Yeah, yeah."
— So what are we doing now?
"What do you mean, what are we doing? Now that you've eaten, it's time to move."
For the record, summons could be trained.
No matter how good a summon's rank was, if you didn't train it, it couldn't become strong.
In Lamba's case, it needed to build up its arm muscles a bit.
That way it would be able to swing its wand faster.
"You know it too. With that attack speed, forget the 10th floor of the Tower of Trials, you wouldn't even clear the 1st floor."
— Tch! So that's why you fed me bread?
"Let's do it together, together."
Clenching his fist, Baek Jinwoo started exercising.
Squats, jumping in place, push-ups, and then some light stepping drills.
He rotated his waist and carefully checked his joints and muscles too.
'No matter what I do, my body has to be strong.'
He had to rebuild the muscles he had lost from lying down for three years.
He had to improve his cardiovascular endurance too.
If he didn't have stamina?
He wouldn't even be able to stay up all night, and his concentration would drop.
Stamina was a ranker's most basic qualification.
Whoosh, whoosh!
Beside the exercising Baek Jinwoo, Lamba also adorably swung its wand.
* * *
— About that person named Baek Jinwoo you asked me to look into.
"Yeah."
— First of all, he's an unregistered player. He also has a record of being hospitalized for three years due to a car accident.
"What?"
Park Changseok, who was receiving the report by phone, frowned.
"Are you sure? Three years would be right around when the world changed completely."
The day all humanity awakened.
— I'm sure. He hasn't even been out of the hospital for very long. What's strange is that he applied for player registration as soon as he was discharged.
What?
Raising his eyes sharply, Park Changseok pulled out the documents from his bag.
The player registration waiting list.
He wedged the phone between his shoulder and ear and flipped through the pages with fingers dampened in spit.
There it was.
Baek Jinwoo's application form.
"It's real?"
— Yes. Is something going on?
"No, no. Nothing like that. Who's the judge in charge this month?"
"Judge Oh Areum."
"Oh Areum? The training is scheduled for tomorrow, right?"
"Yes. Today was the deadline."
"Tell them I'm going in this time."
"Pardon?"
"Don't ask why."
"Ah, understood."
Something smelled off.
He had been in the hospital for three years, yet he registered the moment he got out.
And he seemed deeply knowledgeable about summons?
There were only two possibilities.
Either he was a genius, or he was a gamer.
Gamer.
That was the term for those who had played the game Battle of Summoners before the Awakening.
Whether they had played for a year or only three months, they were all called gamers.
Among the current rankers, the percentage of gamers was nearly 70%.
An absolutely overwhelming ratio.
"Hoo."
Park Changseok's long-held dream was to find a talent who could bring glory to South Korea.
To find a hero who could pull South Korea out of its pit as the perennial last-place loser in player-versus-player competition.
And.
His instincts told him that Baek Jinwoo had the scent of extraordinary talent.
'No, don't get excited.'
Nothing was certain yet.
'First, I'll go tomorrow and meet him again.'
Strength entered the fist of Park Changseok as he gripped the documents.
* * *
The next day.
[Hello, Mr. Baek Jinwoo. This is Player Headquarters.]
[Please gather at Lecture Hall 3 of Player Headquarters by 9:00 a.m.]
[A map is attached.]
[The schedule is attached.]
After receiving the text, Baek Jinwoo arrived at Headquarters ten minutes early.
Quite a lot of people had already gathered.
About 1,000, maybe?
Together with them, he would receive training and then take the written and practical exams.
And after that?
He would have to play three matches in the player battle held at the end of the month, and if he simply placed within the top 50 by score, that was enough.
Only then would he officially get the player badge and be allowed to enter dungeons.
Swoosh.
As soon as he sat down in an appropriate seat—
"Hahaha, back in my day, I was called the Dungeon Killer, you know? I just took a break, so my auto-registration didn't go through. Just watch, I'll register as number one this month."
"Ha, this new law really is something, isn't it? My summon is C-rank, so why do I need training? If I put my mind to it, I could probably make ranker too."
"If I'd known it'd be like this, I would've just run dungeons last year."
"I played Baeo-seo a little when I was younger."
"Baeo-seo, as in Battle of Summoners?! No way, you were a gamer?"
"Yes, haha. Though I quit after about a month…"
"Wow, still… I heard people with gamer backgrounds fight incredibly well."
He could hear the applicants introducing themselves to one another and showing off.
Ah, maybe it wasn't just bluffing?
Most of the applicants did seem experienced.
You could feel a certain composure in the way they sat.
Hmph.
This…
Could it actually be harder than expected?
First, he needed to see how the tests were conducted.
Eh, still.
Who was Baek Jinwoo?
God Ji-nu!
Was he not God Ji-nu himself, the one once called the Heaven of Battle of Summoners?
Someone who could match his knowledge in this field?
There basically wasn't anyone.
How much time had passed?
Thump, thump-thump!
The microphone made a thudding noise.
— Alright, is everyone here?
Someone at the front began speaking.
— Nice to meet you all for the first time. I'm Park Changseok, and I serve as a judge at Headquarters.
Huh?
That ajusshi!
Baek Jinwoo's eyes widened.
He was a judge?
The training itself was easy.
Very basic content!
To Baek Jinwoo, who had once been world rank number one, it was bound to be boring.
Most of the combinations and theories that rankers studied these days had originally been established by Baek Jinwoo in the past.
And among those countless theories, only the ones worth publicly revealing had been shared. The truly important information existed only in Baek Jinwoo's head.
Of course.
Because Battle of Summoners had been a competitive game.
There had been no reason for him to teach important information or know-how to other rankers.
Well, the Five Emperors were somewhat close to him, so from time to time he would help them out when they got stuck.
That was all.
The truly valuable information that had made him Ilcheon—One Heaven—had never been released anywhere.
'This is boring.'
By the time the training ended and they were given a one-hour lunch break—
"Excuse me."
Someone who looked like a staff member approached and called out to Baek Jinwoo.
"Yes?"
"Uh… the judge would like to see you for a moment."
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