Chapter 317

Kim Shinrok saw something he didn’t see last time.

He began to explain what he witnessed, step by step from the beginning.

‘The only difference so far is he remembered more detail… Just what in the world is the new thing he saw?’

I thought that Kim Shinrok, who’s become aware that he was in a dream, might have taken a different strategy from what he originally did, but all the actions he took and the results were as it is.

“I vaguely felt that I was in a dream, but I couldn’t control my behavior or actions at all.”

“So the events turned out the same.”

“Yes, but what changed was after I went to the gym where the students were. Yoo Sanghoon, Jang Namwook, and Son Minki were there.”

“Jo Euishin wasn’t there?”

When Yellow Tiger asked, the tigers’ eyes briefly landed on me.

Kim Shinrok hesitated.

“…There was a fourth student. But I’m not sure if it’s Jo Euishin.”

“Was that fourth student there last time?”

“I don’t remember. If he was, then he must’ve been not moving at all.”

He doesn’t know whether there was a fourth student in the first time he dreamt.

However, if the fourth student was there, he wouldn’t have moved.

While waiting for his next words, I tried to organize my thoughts.

“The student did something strange. At first, he looked confused, and then he looked at a wall, and then stopped moving all of a sudden.”

Kim Shinrok described what he saw.

In his dream, Kim Shinrok was unable to move, but his mind was clearer than the first time we did this, so he seemed to be able to fully remember what he saw.

The fourth student, as described by Kim Shinrok, was acting strangely.

‘Why do I feel… weak?’

Kim Shinrok’s words that followed made the feeling more intense.

“And then he went through his pocket and opened a random box…but before he could check what the item he got was, the rhinoceron used a skill. That student probably died too.”

I was reminded of something.

The fourth student moved strangely and then looked at a wall.

He survived by luck by trying not to make a sound.

He opened a random box but then died from the rhinoceron’s attack before being able to check the contents.

This matched my playing record.

‘Kim Shinrok saw my second attempt in the second replay…!’

I was reminded of myself playing PMH in the past.

* * *

The Nation’s Failed Game, Player Master High School, was the first mobile RPG game I played in my life.

Until I quit chess, that was the only thing that I knew, but after that, I realized I had no time to play anymore.

When I graduated from high school, I wanted to move out and stop living with my family.

I had to struggle through high school because I had to get a full scholarship and pass the university that had potential and fit my aptitude.

When I barely had any time to play chess, I encountered an for PMH.

Fooled by the fancy ads, I became one of the 3 million pre-registered players.

Just in time, the college entrance exams were over, and I was able to play the infamous ‘Nameless Supporting Role’s Tutorial’.

I watched with excitement the scene where the supporting character, whose face wasn’t clearly visible and whose name was unmentioned, entered the examination hall after signing a pledge.

And that’s when the slaughter began.

‘What is this…?’

I watched the screen turn red in despair.

I didn’t even know that the game started already, but I just watched as the characters died in vain.

I didn’t know how to control the player, and I didn’t understand what had happened.

The supervisor covered in blood just suddenly appeared, followed by a strange announcement, and the prospective high school students taking the practical test were all wiped out.

‘…What was I supposed to do?’

My fingertips went cold as they tapped on the bezels of my smartphone.

As I was trying to warm up my frozen fingertips and calm myself from the shock, there was a change in the screen.

Friendly teachers and students in uniform rushed into the gym.

They overpowered the enemy in an instant, but there was no one they could save.

Everyone looked eaten by despair.

Then the screen stopped, and two options appeared.

[1. Continue after the tutorial.]

[2. Replay.]

Although the characters in the game were wiped out, the game seemed to proceed as if nothing happened.

But I couldn’t bare to do it.

I couldn’t just let it go when I saw the disastrous sight for the first time.

I chose replay.

I had to wander for a long time because PMH, like the failed game that it was, didn’t give me any information at all.

‘The character moves to the direction where I touch… I should’ve touched something from the beginning.’

I learned how to move the character and interact with specific objects by moving things directly.

At first, the character moved in the wrong direction and looked quite awkward as I struggled to press the screen correctly.

After learning how to move in the game, I had to learn how to activate the menu myself.

Even during the second try, I didn’t know which was which.

Somehow, I made the character turn around and look at a wall, and suddenly a menu button appeared and so I checked that out.

‘Oh, so if I press this button the game menu comes up. Item window… It’s like checking the things that I have. Skill and light skill? What the heck, they’re all disabled. Let’s check the item window.’

[View list of items.]

I thought it would be empty, but there were some items in the item window.

Most of them were items that a student would carry around, but there was one that caught my eye.

‘I have items! Student ID, test certificate, test-takers pledge… What’s this? Random Item Box for Test?’

That item boxed seemed to have something to do with how to clear the tutorial level.

I hurriedly tried to use the item, but since I was a beginner, I didn’t know what it was or how to use it.

I learned only after I was able to move around.

When I long-pressed the item, a system message appeared asking if I want to use it.

‘Double-click doesn’t work. But if I press ‘use’ maybe I could…’

[Using Random Item Box for Test.]

After the system message popped up, the item box opened and an item card spun around in front of my eyes.

I was about to check what item it was when…

Fwaaa!

The smartphone emitted light.

It’s the effect that comes out when the enemy uses a skill.

Before I could check what the item card was, the screen turned red again.

‘Oh? Oh…’

As the time limit ran out while I was wandering, the monster used a wide-area skill.

I belatedly realized that the monster attacks targets that make noises.

After my second failure, I searched the game’s bulletin board and learned how to properly control the character.

I read many people’s posts, gathered information, and tried to replay the level again.

‘I can waste some time by using specific items! But after some time, the enemy uses a wide-area skill…’

‘Should I try again…?’

‘I think I can survive if I operate it more carefully.’

‘…Why can’t I give instructions to the other characters?!’

I gave up on clearing the tutorial level after accepting the fact that there was a limit to the degree of freedom I’d have in PMH’s system.

Even after I gave up on it, the options always popped up.

Should I proceed, or should I replay?

Each time, I always chose the replay option and played the level again and again until I was sufficiently convinced.

But I wasn’t just simply retrying.

Just in case other people would get clues from my gameplay, I recorded my progress and posted everything.

[Heol, there’s someone who kept replaying the level LOL maybe I should try it again LOL.]

[Gave up after a few tries.]

[Hmm… Did you really have to go through this? Will there be a rare item given if you clear the level?]

[There won’t be anything like that so don’t even try LOL.]

[You can proceed without clearing the level. Kind people should have to go through this;]

[Stop this and go back to reality.]

At first, the other users tried to replay the level, but everyone eventually abandoned the game.

The game slowly became a failed game, and people decided it wasn’t worth it to play it at all.

At some point, the number of views on my post became stagnant.

[Looks like there are still black sheep playing this game.]

[Maybe they’re doing a part-time job for the game’s management team? How much money is he paid to play a failed game LOL how amusing]

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At some point, I only received comments advertising some other things, but I kept posting and left the comments open.

I still hoped some other person would find a way to clear it.

There have been many cases in which the tricks and tactics rendered unusable became useful hundreds or thousands of years later.

That’s the thought that kept me going.

Even until White Tiger died and the game ended with a bad ending.

*

Before I fully recalled and compared my second attempt and the dream he had, Kim Shinrok continued speaking.

Kim Shinrok showed a bit of hesitation.

“…And as for the fourth student, I want Jo Euishin to use his skill again because I’m still uncertain.”

Of course, Kim Shinrok’s words were ignored by the tigers.n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om

A colorful energy wave appeared around Red Tiger, expressing that he has no intention of watching his son suffer again.

“Son, take a rest. Stop talking now!”

“…Follow Red Tiger’s orders. Rest up for today.”

“But…”

“I told you to stop speaking!”

Hwang Jiho sided with the angry Red Tiger, and Kim Shinrok hesitated but continued to protest.

Watching them like this, I decided that I should do something.

‘I can’t keep making the tigers watch their descendants suffer like this. We have to come to a conclusion.’

Kim Shinrok’s words made me realize more things about the Replay function.

The target on who I use the function seems to witness the replays that I did in the game.

As in the tutorial, I eventually failed to save all the characters in the game and had to proceed to the next level, but there’s a question of whether I would always replay a level where a character dies to try to save them again.

‘Perhaps the replay function is related to that.’

While I was lost in thought, a system notification came up.