Light of Arad: Forerunner

Chapter 4

Until late at night, Jinseong continued to stare at the monitor with bloodshot eyes.

The multiple internet windows and the small-sized video player displayed evidence of how busy he had been all day.

Naturally, the first thing he did was search for similar cases.

‘Here it is. The moment he died, he logged out instantly.’

After confirming the moment the user died through the video player, he rummaged through the internet windows again, but there were no cases identical to his.

Above all, no matter how many combinations of keywords like ‘party withdrawal, logout, character deletion’ he tried, such cases would be few and far between.

What Jinseong wanted,

Finding an exact case similar to the male ranger was impossible from the start.

That wasn’t all.

‘Okay, private sites might be excused. But the official site? Real-time updates?’

And what about the search sites that showed the character’s information completely when searched by nickname?

He looked into the mechanisms of these sites that utilized open APIs and even asked questions on various boards, but he couldn’t get the answers he wanted.

[Logout and then delete the character immediately]

[But even if you delete it, there will be a delay before the site reflects it]

[No, it’s real-time]

[Is it really that real-time?]

[What do you mean by “that real-time”?]

[But when you delete a character, don’t you have to type ‘delete now’?]

[If you type really fast, it’s possible]

On the contrary, Jinseong’s questions sparked heated debates among community users, making it even harder to find reliable information.

“It’s unsettling… really unsettling.”

In a situation where his doubts were not resolved at all, all Jinseong could do was keep watching the recording.

Maybe there was something special in what he said.

‘But there were more than a few strange things! And they weren’t just normally strange!’

However, finding a flaw in his statements and reaching a conclusion was not easy either.

Wasn’t he a user who played with a concept that was enough to baffle Jinseong?

‘If I think about it, it was as if a famous user from the past… was pretending to be an acquaintance? Or pretending to be himself? When I think about it, what happened to that user from 5 years ago ? I think I heard rumors that he quit after selling all his equipment, but those were just words floating around the community. In reality, I wouldn’t know… Come to think of it, if he said, ‘I’ve come this far after 5 years,’ maybe he really was…’

He couldn’t know if he really was that famous user from the past.

Still, recalling his statements, it could be assumed that he was a user returning to Dungeon Fighter Online after several years.

‘No, rather than returning after five years… if I interpret it as participating in a proper raid for the first time in five years, the actual return could have been earlier. But anyway…’

That wasn’t the important part.

The crucial thing was discovering that the famous user from the past had abruptly quit Dungeon Fighter Online and disappeared exactly five years ago.

“Hmm… no matter how I think about it, even if that person was him, the nickname is slightly different, and his equipment… Even if he returned after a long time, he wouldn’t raid with such equipment, surely.”

Considering the possibilities that he might have used a nickname change coupon, deleted the character five years ago, and created a new one, only to log in for the first time now…

Jinseong had to scratch his head.

“Argh! My head hurts!”

There were too many possibilities.

And there was no way to know which of those possibilities was true.

The only thing he could do now was to recall what that person had said.

‘What he wanted from me was the raid strategy. No help, no buffs, just ‘real-time instructions’. He even pleaded not to draw aggro… oh, aggro?’

As he sorted his thoughts, something clicked in Jinseong’s mind, and he replayed the video.

From the moment they first met, all their conversations had been strange, but there were moments when his demeanor changed drastically.

Among them, there was one particularly chilling moment.

[What?! We’re doing it together?!]

[…Yes, I definitely didn’t say we’d be doing it together. But I did explain that two dragons would appear, and we’d need to dodge them by moving up and down…]

The White Dragon and Black Dragon each targeted separate characters.

In other words, if two dragons appeared and were divided up and down, it was natural that aggro would be drawn to Jinseong in a party with only two members.

‘Hmm, my explanation was somewhat lacking… okay, that can happen!’

The user had said:

[Why are you telling me this now?! If that’s the case… it’s not a random boss attack, but it would ‘recognize and attack’ Baek Jinseong directly… gah-.]

It was a difficult expression for Jinseong to understand.

“Is the boss directly looking at me and attacking? Then it attacks after recognizing me directly. Does it attack indirectly after seeing me? If it uses an area-wide pattern to attack, is that indirect? If it comes close and hits me or uses a skill-type attack, is that direct?”

Though he couldn’t understand it, an even more incomprehensible scene followed immediately.

It was only for a moment, but a yellow pillar of light enveloped the user’s body.

‘Right. That one… there’s no debuff like this yellow pillar of light in Senbi Cloud. There definitely isn’t. This person didn’t see a new pattern because his damage was slow. Even when I raided as a veteran back then, I never saw this once.’

Hit by the pillar, the user gritted his teeth, making a gnashing sound.

And then, he couldn’t perform the ‘dodge control’ he had boasted about so much.

‘So he barely got caught by the White Dragon. From that point on…’

Jinseong replayed the video.

It was chat. The font wasn’t special, nor was it a system expression accompanied by a cinematic video.

Just an ordinary chat.

‘He screamed… Haha, it felt so desperate, to the point where I felt like an idiot for saying that.’

He screamed desperately.

That was another odd thing for Jinseong.

‘He didn’t even move. Even if he missed the timing to use the skill… If he’s a returning user who leveled up to 95, he should at least be able to use right away in a temporary stiff state. It was the best timing to escape with invincibility. Even if he hadn’t learned , he could have moved and used , or he could have quickly widened the distance with .’

Considering the user had risked his life to move and avoid getting hit, it was even harder to understand.

[Groan, gasp… Up to here… How did I get this far…]

Did he obsess over chatting more than using skills to survive?

‘Someone who tried so hard not to die. Someone who didn’t even deal damage to avoid getting hit…’

Gulp.

Jinseong swallowed his dry saliva.

Then, after a moment, he exhaled a long breath.

“Phew… It’s really unsettling, but it’s already over.”

Although it was unresolved and curious, he didn’t have the leisure or need to dwell on this matter alone.

More importantly, wasn’t there something else that mattered?

“I should check if tomorrow’s patch notes are up and go to sleep.”

Because tomorrow, the world of Dungeon Fighter Online would expand once again. (EN : Much more than you know, wish or hope….)

After a simple stretch, Jinseong launched Dungeon Fighter Online.

“Huh?”

What he saw soon was not the familiar homepage.

It wasn’t the game launch screen either.

“What is this?”

It felt as if the monitor screen was gradually getting brighter.

It was an abrupt situation, but Jinseong responded quickly.

At least he tried to respond.

Opening the task manager to close abnormal programs or lowering the monitor’s brightness while checking for issues with the monitor and main unit connection or the graphics driver problem, these thoughts flashed through his mind in an instant…

“A? Huh?”

But when the light started to overflow from the monitor and reached towards him, Jinseong realized it wasn’t simply a ‘screen brightness’ problem.

Problem was, he couldn’t move.

───────────……!!!!

“What-. Uaaargh-!”

It happened in an instant.

The light swallowed Jinseong entirely.

* * *

A feeling of being sucked in and falling somewhere.

There wouldn’t be many who had experienced their brain, suddenly facing an abnormal situation, conjuring up random thoughts like ‘What should I eat for lunch tomorrow?’ as a desperate escapism from reality.

“Uwaa… Ah?!”

Then suddenly, Jinseong realized his body had come to a halt.

However, he couldn’t tell if he had truly stopped.

In a place where everything except his own form was merely white, he couldn’t tell if his feet were touching the ground, if he was swimming underwater, was upside down or what. He couldn’t even control his body properly in this strange space.

“Uh, uh! Uh!”

Jinseong immediately started flailing.

Could this really be happening?

But such questions were a luxury for him at the moment.

First, he needed to wildly move around.

It was only natural to check if his senses were working properly.

“Ha! Hah!”

He tried to see if he could breathe, if sounds would come out.

It was only after making these instinctive and bizarre sounds that Jinseong looked around.

Everything he saw was the same space.

A space of nothing but light, without shadows, making it impossible to grasp anything.

‘What is this? What’s going on?’

He couldn’t even tell how much time had passed.

Fortunately, Jinseong’s thoughts were gradually returning to normal.

“What? Hello! What’s happening? Who’s there? Where am I? What’s going on? The f**k ?!!!”

Although all he could do was scream like an animal, barely managing to shout like a human, that alone was sufficient.

“What-. Hmm?”

It seemed as if the purely white space reacted to Jinseong’s screams, as another color finally began to ripple through it.

Until now, the light had been purely white, but this was different.

Just as Jinseong felt that the golden light rippling throughout the space was like some kind of mass, it began to take shape.

And then, a sound was heard.

It wasn’t the sound of the light mass moving.

It was language.

『It is light, and it is darkness. Discussing it is meaningless, for it is holy and great, yet it is also an abyss and chaos. Its essence lies within.』

As one verse finished, what Jinseong saw were golden wings.

『The foolish cannot see, the ordinary can only see, the wise can recognize, and those wiser still will see the essence within.』

As another verse finished, what Jinseong saw was a golden weapon.

『It will return to the great will, taking a step towards the opening of a new age, becoming renewed and eternal within.』

And as another verse finished, what was revealed was golden armor.

Jinseong understood.

He had perceived it even before the rippling golden light gathered into a face and began to spread a gentle, serene glow.

Golden wings, several times larger than Jinseong himself, decorated the expansive white space.

A gigantic form that was impossible to accept as ‘human.’

Above all, the verses recited before Jinseong’s very eyes.

“This can’t be.”

He realized what, and who, was before him.

A fragment of Kalosso.

The first sage and the final guide.

Or, the Lady of Light. (EN : Fire Keeper with wings ?)

“……Nemer.”

The transcendent Nemer revealed herself before Jinseong.