Chapter 24 – Isolation Zone (5)

23 – Isolation Zone (5)

And with that, Cha Hyewon burst open the front door, and I followed her inside. The moment she glared at Irian, something appeared before my eyes.

▼Subquest
▶Create a party! → Completed!

Why now?
Cha Hyewon, who was walking ahead, also stopped, so it seemed that the same system message had popped up for her as well. Until now, I had been with Diana, Irian, and even Carsilla, who was a bit ambiguous, so why now?

Could it be… that only parties with players are recognized?

This was the third time I had encountered Cha Hyewon. The first time, I could understand, but in the second meeting, even though we had been growling at each other, we had agreed to enter the isolation zone together. We weren’t entering at the same time or right next to each other, but we had decided to hunt in the same map.

More than anything, why didn’t it pop up when we met a little while ago, and why now? In our third and most recent meeting, we decided to enter this mansion together. Yet, the fact that it was completed now… could it be because I healed? Or was it considered a battle?

“You too?”

I was lost in thought, staring blankly, when Cha Hyewon asked. So, it popped up for both of us. Then, would Irian also see or have a system message appear?

“What are you doing? Why are you stopping… Ah, seriously. I said I was sorry. I’m really sorry. I’m sorry!”

Well, of course.

“No, it’s okay. It happens.”
“…What’s gotten into you?”
“What do you mean? Should I take it back?”
“No! You’re still the same Yurian. You’re great!”
“Of course. I am the great Yurian.”
“Hmph, the great Yurian.”

At first, I was a bit annoyed, but looking at the dazed Irian, I quickly calmed down. Maybe I should use this opportunity.

“Are you very sorry?”
“…A little.”
“Tsk.”
“Okay, a lot. Very much. Is that enough?”
“Then, Irian, let’s share something good as much as you’re sorry. How about it?”
“……?”

A naive expression that didn’t understand what I was saying. It was a bit much to say it to Cha Hyewon, so I brought my mouth to Irian’s ear, and she recoiled in horror.

“You’re going to shout!”
“…Am I a kid? No, I’m not.”
“You’re not lying, right?”
“No, I’m not.”

Do I look that childish?
…I’ll do it later.

With a cautious movement, I whispered into Irian’s ear.

“That underwear from last time. I used it well. It was very good. Please get me some more.”
“……Y-you, you crazy bastard! You airhead!”
“Oh, right. I still have it, you know? When are you going to come get it?”
“Throw away that contaminated thing!”

It’s too good to throw away. I’ll make her wear it later. Until then, I’ll keep it safe.
I gave a bright smile to Cha Hyewon, who was looking at me with a rotten expression, but her expression seemed to get even worse.

“Shall we get going?”
“You’re melee, right? Lead the way. I’ll prepare heals and buffs.”

Cha Hyewon took the lead, I was in the middle, and Irian, whose face was red, took the rear as we entered the mansion. I had a thought to give buffs right away, but I decided to hold back.

In games, there was something called a cooldown.
It was applied to buffs, elemental magic, divine magic, and all sorts of other magic, which made infinite buffs and infinite magic impossible.

The reason why I was frustrated that even ranged classes needed physical skills was because of this.
Because of the cooldown, even if you were a mage, if you didn’t hit each shot properly, you would be stuck sucking your fingers during the cooldown. The important stat here was ‘Wisdom’.

【Yurian】 ● Priest

▼ Stats
[Strength: 10] [Agility: 12] [Knowledge: 59] [Wisdom: 52] [Luck: 55]

▶ Skills
▶ Traits

I was satisfied with the slightly increased physical stats, but they still couldn’t compare to Knowledge and Wisdom, the main stats for mages and priests.

Knowledge determines the power of magic. It is also essential for learning high-rank magic.
Wisdom affects all other aspects related to magic. Mana amount, mana recovery speed, cooldown, duration of magic, etc. In the case of priests, it’s the same common trait, just with ‘divine’ added in front.

In other words, if only Knowledge is high, the power of magic is incredibly strong, but it becomes a type that focuses on one big hit, and if only Wisdom is high, it becomes possible to spam magic with short cooldowns.
With my Knowledge and Wisdom stats, the duration of buffs is about 1 hour, although it varies depending on the type of buff. And there is a cooldown of about 20 minutes.

If I use buffs against weak mobs in the beginning, I might be on cooldown when facing an important strong enemy. So, the ability to judge when to use them is important. If this were a game, I could just wait indefinitely during the cooldown, but this is a game world that isn’t a game, so the enemy won’t wait stupidly.

“There’s nothing here?”

Irian, who had been silently following behind, muttered while scanning the surroundings.
It was a large mansion, and we hadn’t even finished exploring the first floor, so what was she talking about? There should be a clue around here.

“Here. Above the fireplace.”

I found it as soon as we arrived in what seemed to be a reception room. Originally, we would have to proceed with the quest step by step, gathering clues, but I had repeated this quest so many times that I could recognize it without any clues.

“A picture? Why is this here?”

Irian tilted her head, but Cha Hyewon seemed to know, nodding her head and taking the picture out of the frame.

“Huh? Isn’t this picture the mayor?”
“That’s right. Mayor Grunhildt. It’s him when he was young.”

While answering, my gaze was fixed on the picture Cha Hyewon was holding. As the picture was slowly turned over, the writing engraved on the back appeared.

【Until death do us part】

So, this is the pattern this time.
Random patterns were applied here as well, so the phrase changed every game. Depending on the phrase, the quest content also changed slightly, so I couldn’t finish the quest right away.

“Huh? Why is the phrase different?”
“Hmm?”

It was understandable that Irian was floating question marks while looking at the phrase, but why didn’t Cha Hyewon know?

“Is this right?”
“It must be. Why? What’s the problem?”
“Tsk. It’s strange, really. Why does the content change subtly?”

Does she not know about the randomness of this game?

“How much have you played this?”
“I played up to the middle, and then I started a second time to raise something else, and it turned out like this.”

I spoke indirectly so that Irian wouldn’t understand, but there was no problem in interpreting it. I see. This was her second game, so she didn’t know.

I felt a strange sense of relief.
Until now, after entering the game world, I had wondered if I might be the protagonist of this world. It could be dismissed as a delusional case of chuunibyou, but before meeting Cha Hyewon, I didn’t know there were other players, so it was a natural thought.

Of course, I was glad to meet Cha Hyewon, another player. No matter how much I had Diana, Irian, and Carsilla, I sometimes felt a surge of loneliness, but after recognizing Cha Hyewon’s existence, I felt more comforted than I thought.

The relief that I wasn’t the only one who had fallen into this strange world. At the same time, I was afraid of losing my ‘specialness’. My greatest weapon was knowing the many secrets of this world and what would happen in the future, and I thought that another player wouldn’t be much different in this regard.

However, when I realized that Cha Hyewon was only on her second game, and that she hadn’t even seen the ending like me, a sense of relief welled up from deep within my heart… I guess it’s because I’m a selfish bastard.

It didn’t matter how strong Cha Hyewon was. Individual strength? A high-ranking position in the Empire? That was fine.
There were NPCs with overwhelming strength in this game world, but that was all. Cha Hyewon, who didn’t know the details of this game, was just like a powerful NPC, except for the fact that she was a ‘player’.

The fact that all the secrets and knowledge of this world were ultimately mine was what reassured me.
Every time I had these thoughts, self-loathing would suddenly rise up, but what could I do? This is who I am, after all.

“You know something, don’t you?”
“Hmm? Ah, I’ll explain it later. Let’s solve this first.”
“You guys keep talking about things only you know. It’s annoying.”

Irian grumbled, perhaps because of the eardrum incident earlier, but she didn’t say anything more. I took the picture from Cha Hyewon, checked the phrase on the back one more time, and put it back in the frame.

“That’s one of the keys, right?”
“You know it well. We have to find the other two keys.”
“It’s more annoying because it’s subtly different.”
“Is it a key again this time? Fine, you guys do it all.”

She seemed to have given up, muttering in a weak voice, so I felt sorry for her and patted her head. She started chirping energetically as if she had never been down. Cute girl.

The dilapidated mansion was dark and looked even more eerie. Since there was no electricity, there should have been large windows to let in light, but this mansion had small windows, so there was a lack of light. Since no one lived here, there were no lit candles either.

The creaking sound from the rotting wooden floor added to the gloom of the dark, old mansion. It was like a horror movie, and even when it was in dot graphics, the background music was eerie and quite scary.

“If we go this way, there will be stairs. Let’s go to the second floor.”

Now that I knew the pattern of this quest, the rest was easy.
I had the structure of the mansion in my head, so without wandering around anymore, I quickly found the stairs and headed to the second floor. Creak, creak, with every step, the wooden stairs screamed like sound effects, but thankfully they didn’t collapse.
Irian, who was the last to step onto the second floor, looked around and tilted her head.

“Is the second floor this big? The first floor too, it seems much bigger than it looked from the outside.”

She was only now realizing that the size of the mansion was strange.

“It’s a subspace.”
“Ah. A subspace…? Really?”

I followed Cha Hyewon, who was walking ahead, and briefly explained it to Irian. After all, all the facts would be revealed soon as we finished the quest.

“Look around carefully with your divine power.”
“…It’s subtle. You figured out it was a subspace with just this?”

If you look at me like that, it’s a yes.
Yes, praise me. Look up to me more.
I felt my shoulders rise for the first time in a while at Irian’s sparkling eyes. Of course, it wasn’t that I had figured it out with divine power. I just pretended to fit the already known result. Heh, sweet.

“What is going on? Why is there a picture of the mayor when he was young in the mansion, and why is there a subspace?”
“Do you remember the picture we saw earlier? Think about the picture and the phrase written on the back.”
“A friendly picture of the mayor and a young woman? Well, maybe… his wife or a lover from his youth. The phrase is something like loving each other until death, right?”
“That’s right.”

I stopped Cha Hyewon, who was about to search each room, and walked straight ahead. To the end of the long corridor. Towards a particularly dark door.

“That woman is the mayor’s wife, and the phrase means that they love each other until death separates them. But his wife died, right?”
“Huh? The mayor’s wife died? Could it be because of this incident…”
“No. She died about 10 years ago.”

It was around 10 years ago, but I don’t remember exactly. It’s not that important. I remember this because I’ve done it so often, but there are so many quests, how can I remember the details of each one?

“If she died that long ago, it has nothing to do with it.”
“If that were the case, why would I have explained it so elaborately, Irian?”

In front of the blackened door.
Irian, who was about to answer curtly, shut her mouth. She must have felt the dark energy that stimulated divine power beyond the door.

“It’s an ominous room. I can even feel the energy of a demon inside.”
“Do you get it now?”
“…Could it be that they’re trying to resurrect the dead?”
“Correct.”

It’s a common story.
The struggle of not accepting the death of a loved one and trying to bring them back to life.
The result is the ‘Demon Sickness’.

And the reason why the result is ‘Demon Sickness’ is probably beyond this door.
Cha Hyewon, despite the ominous appearance of the door, immediately burst it open without any hesitation.

“Ugh! What is that smell?”