Chapter 14. Novice
Dong Bong-su returned to the Danri Family and finished his daily routine as if nothing had happened. Outwardly, he was not even slightly different from before he had left the family.
To anyone's eyes, he was just Sosam.
A foolish, stupid mute who caught no one's attention.
That was the Dong Bong-su visible to others.
No one noticed the change in Dong Bong-su, who had taken a step forward.
Far before his eyes, the error box of New Murim Online—visible only to him—was still blinking.
[In the Murim Online system, a Critical ERROR has ... occurred. There will be no issues with continuing the game, but …..... .]
Creeeak. Thud.
The door closed, and the stable once again became his private space.
Critical ERROR.
"A fatal error, huh."
The very fact that he already existed here was itself a fatal error. How could there be any further errors beyond that? Most likely, that fatal error was also the result of a systemic discrepancy caused by his existence, which should not have been here in the first place.
He could roughly guess why that error message had appeared.
A kind of natural disaster caused by the "forced grafting" of this reality and the virtual reality known as Murim Online.
Dong Bong-su inferred that the problem had been latent all along and had finally surfaced as he leveled up.
And.
That inference was quite accurate. The laws of the 111th dimensional world, the 112th dimensional world, and Murim Online as the auxiliary dimension that connected them—these three dimensional worlds were colliding with one another upon level-up, producing a "fatal error."
Most likely, the Critical ERROR message would appear every time he leveled up. If the differences between the three dimensional worlds had not been so great, this would not have happened in the first place, but the three were fundamentally and entirely different. Naturally, there was no way all systems could be applied as-is. In most cases, they would appear before him as distorted systems.
Dong Bong-su did not understand such deep matters precisely, but he had managed to reason to something roughly similar.
The conclusion was simple.
All of that distortion did not matter much to him.
He simply needed to keep leveling up and adapt to the newly applied system, New Murim Online. That was the path to his survival and the method by which he would grow stronger.
Dong Bong-su raised his right hand and lightly clicked the X-shaped button on the right side of the error box. The error box disappeared, and as he became level 2, several newly available or changed windows glittered with a golden light.
"Inventory, Status window, Skill window, Quest window"
Dong Bong-su first opened the inventory, which had already become quite familiar.
Inside the inventory, a sword he had never seen before, a set of clothes, a pair of leather shoes, and a hood were neatly placed in one corner.
He pulled them out and laid them out on the floor one by one.
At a glance, they all looked like they were made of shabby cloth, but their hygienic condition was pristine. It was as if they were brand-new items fresh from a factory.
In truth, these were items that should have been given to Dong Bong-su the moment he logged into New Murim Online, but due to a fatal error, he was only receiving his basic equipment now. Of course, Dong Bong-su did not know this, nor did he care to know.
If it exists, he uses it.
That was a simple and clear principle for him.
After briefly examining the items, Dong Bong-su picked up the sword first without much hesitation.
Click—.
Just from holding the sword, a sound like metal accessories being fastened rang out. At the same time, he felt something strange.
"I feel stronger?"
It was difficult to put into words.
But he could clearly sense a peculiar feeling as if his strength, stamina, and agility had all increased.
Dong Bong-su immediately placed the shabby Horse Stable Hireling clothes he had been wearing into the inventory and equipped the laid-out items onto his body. Each time he equipped one, a clicking sound struck his ears, and just like when he held the sword, he felt stronger.
"Are these items?"
He could not help but be convinced that all of this was made up of game items.
Equipment that had naturally appeared inside the inventory.
A sensation of increased abilities every time he equipped one.
Mechanical sounds he could hear, though he could not tell whether they came from his head or his ears.
Putting it all together.
The feeling of becoming stronger—
"It's not an illusion."
By simply "equipping" them, his "stats" had actually increased.
Click.
He closed the inventory window. Perhaps because he had finished checking it, the golden blinking light disappeared. Since he had equipped his gear, it was now time to see just how much stronger he had become.
Dong Bong-su immediately opened the status window.
There, too, there were dramatic changes.
"So the equipment is finally being recognized?"
Items were displayed in the previously empty equipment slots. The ones he was currently wearing appeared exactly as they were.
[Novice's Sword], [Novice's Clothes], [Novice's Shoes], [Novice's Hood]
First, Dong Bong-su moved his hand like a mouse cursor and hovered it over the 'Novice's Sword.' A transparent window popped up beside it, displaying the description of the Novice's Sword.
[Novice's Sword]
Attribute: None
Required Class: Common
Required Level: 2
Minimum Attack Power: 2
Maximum Attack Power: 5
Hit value increase effect: ?
Minimum martial arts attack power: 3
Maximum martial arts attack power: 8
Martial arts hit value increase effect: ?
Additional stat increase: None
He then checked the remaining items in the same manner, and all of them had similar descriptions. The only difference from the sword's description was that defense replaced attack power, and martial defense replaced martial attack power. Other than that, the format itself was identical.
Another common point was that the increase effects for hit value or defense value were consistently marked with '?'
Dong Bong-su judged that this, too, was one of the phenomena caused by the critical error.
He briefly pondered what kind of effects they might have, but soon shook the thought away. No matter how much he worried, it was something he could not know at present anyway. There was no need to waste mental energy on it.
What mattered was—
"That I really have become stronger."
That alone.
He examined the changes in the status window once more. Along with equipping the gear, there had been major changes to his stats as well.
The base stats of strength, agility, and intelligence had all changed from the previous '?' into yellow gauge bars. It was difficult to know the exact values since they were not displayed as Arabic numerals, but it was undoubtedly a tremendous change. Though subtle to the naked eye, every gauge bar had filled slightly.
As he leveled up, the stat gauges had finally begun to activate.
Gauge bars also appeared for stamina, accuracy, evasion, attack power, defense, martial attack power, martial defense power, elemental resistance, true energy/internal energy, and more—all of which increased in proportion to level, strength, agility, and intelligence. Likewise, none of them were precisely quantified.
After checking several more things, Dong Bong-su closed the status window.
Just like with the inventory, once the check was complete, the blinking of the status window disappeared.
Click.
Next was the skill window.
There were five skills in total. More precisely, there were no 'Active Skills' at all, and all of them were 'Passive Skills.' Four basic actions that should have existed from the moment the game character was created were present, along with one mysterious skill added.
The four were things he already knew well. Although he had not played for many hours, he did have experience with Murim Online.
He immediately checked the descriptions of the five skills.
[Slash (Passive) Lv.1 Proficiency: 0%]
A technique for swinging a weapon.
Swinging a weapon up, down, left, and right to subdue enemies is one of the most basic forms of attack.
Current action bonus: 0%
[Thrust (Passive) Lv.1 Proficiency: 0%]
A technique for thrusting a weapon.
Moving the weapon forward and backward to inflict penetrating wounds on enemies is one of the most basic attack techniques.
Current action bonus: 0%
[Throw (Passive) L1:1 Proficiency: 0%]
A technique for throwing a weapon.
Throwing sharp or blunt objects at enemies to injure them is one of the basic attack techniques passed down since ancient times.
Current action bonus: 0%
[Block (Passive) L1:1 Proficiency: 0%]
A technique for blocking with a weapon.
Holding a weapon vertically or horizontally to block enemy attacks.
Current action bonus: 0%
These four were basic actions that all Murim Online characters acquired upon creation.
However—
[Spirit Eye (Tester Passive) L1:1 Proficiency: 0%]
Tester-exclusive skill.
Current action bonus: 0%
This was something he had never seen before.
Aside from being labeled tester-exclusive, there was no special explanation, so Dong Bong-su had no idea what it did. All he could guess was that it was a skill unavailable to ordinary gamers.
In principle, everything within Murim Online—monsters, items, environments, skills, and so on—were server constructs and, as complete artificial structures, were finished entities each endowed with its own artificial intelligence.
Nevertheless, there were a few exceptional cases.
Testing.
Newly opened servers, newly created dungeons, and newly added monsters were sometimes clumsy or incomplete in their construction. Thus, before releasing them to the public, testers would play them in advance to check whether they were incomplete. To assist those testers, special skills were prepared separately.
Those were tester-exclusive skills.
Now, one of those skills had been applied to Dong Bong-su through an unknown route—most likely due to the critical error.
Why would a mere player like Dong Bong-su receive a tester-exclusive skill?
There were several reasons, but the most important was the collision between the system of New Murim Online and the real Murim of this world, just as Dong Bong-su had thought. The system of New Murim Online possessed a highly advanced artificial intelligence in and of itself, but it was currently badly damaged and tangled. Things that should have existed on the actual Murim Online servers were, naturally, almost nonexistent in this Murim. Because of this, the system of New Murim Online began to regard all of Dong Bong-su's actions as new actions—that is, as "test actions."
Dong Bong-su was completely unaware of this fact, but to him it was tremendous fortune, and to Murim, it would become a great misfortune.