The Tutorial Is Too Hard Chapter 262:
ditor: Tide, Rektsatan,
[Baek Sung-woong]
“Who do you want to kill?” asked Yong-yong . It was as if he were asking what her name was before he read the fortune . The problem was the question’s content .
Who do you want to kill?
This was what Yong-yong had uttered . These words made me shudder . Yong-yong saying words like ‘kill’ felt unnatural .
The woman’s body reflexively stiffened up . She, who had asked if she could achieve her goal, stared hostilely at Yong-yong as soon as she heard Yong-yong’s question
I knew Yong-yong’s power and ability . Of course, I didn’t know everything, but I knew quite a lot compared to other challengers . I was confident . That’s why I knew I would be of little help to Yong-yong if anything happened . However, I couldn’t just watch them, doing nothing .
I had to do something . I tried to pull off the cloth that was blocking my way to stand in between Yong-yong and the woman .
My heart wanted to protect him . Shortly after the cloth was removed, I noticed that my body could not move . It was as if invisible shackles had latched me into place . Flinching was not even an option . My arm ached when I tried to shift it, and my lips throbbed when I forced them apart . It was as if my skin and muscles were tightly bound by an invisible force that pierced my body whenever I attempted to budge .
“No one,” the woman replied . She was staring intensely at Yong-yong, but from her attitude, it seemed likely that she would continue the conversation, rather than attack him .
Did she want me to stay out of their conversation? But that didn’t mean I’d comply with her wishes . There was always something I could do, no matter how immobile my body was .
[Baek Sung-woong, 89th floor: Sir, this is an emergency . ]
I requested rescue teams and combat teams of the Order of Vigilance to be dispatched .
It would be a weaker dispatch compared to last year, but it would be better than nothing . There was also a 90th-floor Hard Difficulty challenger, in the militant group, so I was sure it would be of some help .
First, after I did what I could, I focused again on the conversation between Yong-yong and the woman . I was the only witness to this conversation, and I needed to remember this .
“Then what do you want to kill?” Yong-yong asked again .
Is it possible that what she wants to kill is not a person?
“I don’t want to kill anything . Why do you think I want to kill something?” asked the woman .
“Because Auntie wants to . ”
“I’m not your Auntie, you little brat . ”
Yong-yong didn’t answer the woman’s words, making her frown like she was offended by his silence . She continued, very firmly expressing her displeasure .
“Yes, I do want to kill something . I wish to kill this world . ”
Are you a crazy bitch?
In the past, there used to be a lot of psychopaths in the Tutorial . When people thought they didn’t have a future, they went insane, swinging their weapons madly . I heard that the Order of Vigilance was troubled by daily accidents back then and that some of those psychopaths were punished .
I thought that this woman fell into that category of psychopaths . Although the fact that one could go out soon had significantly reduced mental illness in the Tutorial, there were still some actual psychopaths . There was nothing strange about anyone who had a mental illness here .
“I want to cut off the restraints that bind me to this world,” said the woman . I could relate to that . It had been less than 30 seconds, but being **** was a real pain .
“Sometimes, I feel like untying these restraints by just cutting off my wrists and ankles . ”
That’s a little…
As expected, she was a madwoman .
“But that won’t untie all the restraints . Yeah, I want to kill as you said . If I kill everyone who’s tied me up, won’t I be free even if I can’t break the restraints? That’s what I think . ”
The woman carried on with her stupid remarks . Yong-yong answered her question with no sign of disgust .
“Understood . ”
“You understand?” The woman’s lips arched up in a smirk .
“How can a pretty little boy understand me?” she asked, mockery evident in her tone . She looked terrifying .
“That’s what everybody says,” she accused .
“Everyone says this?”
Unlike the woman, who seemed to be upset by something, Yong-yong remained calm .
“Because they’re all the same . ” Rather than get enraged at Yong-yong’s words, the woman accepted it .
“They’re all the same . Yeah, you’re right . After all, I’m only thinking about myself and forcing others to accept . They’re all the same, indeed . ”
The woman’s hands slammed the tabletop suddenly, creating a loud boom that reverberated in the tent . Her force would have made a hole in an iron plate, but much to my surprise, the table stayed intact . Neither Yong-yong nor the woman seemed interested in this fact .
“I was forced by a man into this sh*t . He urged me to move on . If he hadn’t, I would have become suicidal instead of forcing myself to survive on plain water and jerky . What else could I do? I had to move forward to survive . But since then, I haven’t been holding out well . I was forced to cheat, hurt, and kill . I couldn’t have survived if I didn’t do so . And now, here I am,” the woman spoke solemnly .
Each word of hers carried in a different tone .
“I’m grateful to Mister . He gave me the will to live and never forced me to do anything . ”
Mister? Who was she talking about?
“But in the end, there was something he wanted from me . He didn’t care about me . After all, they’re all the same . I’m tired of everything now . I want to throw it all away,” the woman murmured . “The problem is, I can’t get over it . I can’t break these restraints with my strength . ”
“So?” Yong-yong questioned .
“I need more trump cards . ”
Yong-yong raised his hand and said, pointing to himself, “And that’s me . ”
“Yes . ”
“I’m sorry, but I don’t want to be one,” Yong-yong replied, as if he were in a restaurant, commenting that he didn’t want to eat some side dishes .
The woman smiled at the remark, making me feel a sudden urge of deja vu . Her gruesome smile was eerily familiar, reminding me of when I interviewed new employees in the district . Yeah, that was the smile I saw there then . Of course, the smiles of the people left in my memory didn’t seem so eerie, but they had a similar expression .
“You don’t have to be sorry . I’ll take you even if you don’t want to . ”
As the woman expressed her intention to kidnap, I shouted inwardly .
When’s the **** team coming?
This place was less than three minutes away from what the Order of Vigilance was using as headquarters .
The woman raised her hand, and a red dot appeared on it as if someone were pointing at it with a laser pointer . The space between her and Yong-yong fluctuated before anyone could identify the power . Someone had shown up, dividing the space between them .
* * * * * *
[Lee Hochi]
The place Park Jung-ah told me to go was a lounge next to the Order of Vigilance’s conference room . I assumed that Park Jung-ah was talking to Seo-hyeon . I was relieved that he was safe .
When I asked Ho-jae why I couldn’t reach Seok-hyeon, Ho-jae said Seok-hyeon must have died in an accident . And that it was normal . It was a cold-hearted response .
But apparently, his response was valid, and when I asked Park Jung-ah to find out where Seok-hyeon was, somehow, her attitude seemed no different from Ho-jae’s, which made me more anxious .
“Oh . You’re here?” asked Park Jung-ah .
It was as if a man lying inside a bathhouse was asking a friend who came late . Oh, of course, I had never been to a bathhouse, but that’s what it felt like . Park Jung-ah was getting more comfortable with me . I didn’t think we were that close yet, so I was still a bit awkward . Was it because of the difference in our age? Beside Park Jung-ah sat Seok-hyeon .
“Hi,” a boy awkwardly greeted me .
I had heard it many times, but this was my first time seeing it . He was very young . Seok-hyeon’s appearance was slightly unusual as the Tutorial did not summon young people under a certain age .
“Yes . Hi . ”
I also said hello to Seok-hyeon . I was acting weird, too . We had talked a lot through messages, but seeing his face in person like this made me feel embarrassed .
Park Jung-ah left the room with a smile on her face . It only occurred to me later that her mischievous smile seemed to make fun of me .
* * * * * *
Fortunately, I was able to get close to Seok-hyeon quickly . No, it was safe to say that we were close, so we got into sync .
Seok-hyeon was stuck on a stage as expected . Among the stages of Easy difficulty, there was said to be a stage that was quite unusual .
“So the stage goal was to **** the prince and the princess till they get married, and remove all sources of danger . The danger is spread all over, and it’s a bit risky . ”
That sounded easy . You had to wait for the danger to come, and if you solved it, it would be fine, right?
“I’ve challenged the stage many times . ”
“You’ve tried it many times?”
“Yes . ”
Seok-hyeon said he had already challenged the 72nd floor more than ten times . I couldn’t help but ask why .
“Why?”
“Because it’s fun . ”
Unlike other stages, the 72nd floor of Easy Difficulty had a luxurious lifestyle . Of course, there was a mission, but it was easy to clear . So Seok-hyeon explained that he was challenging it several times to recreate the feelings he had experienced there, almost like role-play .
“It’s fun . No matter what I do, the people don’t remember it the next time . Once I had a big fight with a man, but next time, he was friendly . Oh, there, I’m a wanderer who has gone into hiding . Also, everyone wants to be close to me because I’m so strong . ”
The stage’s characteristics that no one knew anything about was enough to awaken a child’s curiosity . Seok-hyeon had tested everything he could do there .
The princess and prince’s marriage came to an end due to Seok-hyeon’s mischief, and he was unable to get out of the stage because of this complicated situation . Fortunately, with the help of the Order of Vigilance, he was able to return to the waiting room after failing .
Seok-hyeon, who had explained this to me, looked happy . I had seen something similar in the community before . Stages with pretty characters couldn’t be challenged repeatedly, so challengers memorized lines or the mission’s sequence . They also shared the location, the way to visit, how they spoke, the way they liked each other, and gifts . They spoke as if they were really enjoying the game, failing, and then meeting up the floor’s characters again while retrying the stage .
It was a disgusting thought . Ho-jae once thought the same . But then he looked at people on the floor who were repeating these incidents forever when the challengers met them again after failing to clear the stage . That was when Ho-jae could only feel sorry for them . Ho-jae had admitted that their deaths and lives were worthless and had no qualms about cutting them down, but they were not toys .
I saw that Seok-hyeon was still excited . This child was not particularly evil . But the attitude of others towards him was strange . Was that how people normally behaved? Or was I just different?
< Tournament Chapter (9) > End