D.I.O

Whoosh!

Merlin rushed up to the surface, shot out of the water, and landed softly atop a floating piece of ice. He had collected about a thousand drop items.

“Oh, since I have the data, I can calculate the general drop rate. Since I killed off about three thousand undead monsters, I guess the drop rate is about thirty percent?”

That wasn’t correct. The average monster’s drop rate was actually closer to ten percent. When a monster’s level was higher, the drop rate would also increase respectively, but the large number of drops that occurred this time around was due to Merlin’s luck. Merlin possessed talent as well as luck!

“I’ll… organize everything later… yeah, later.”

Since he had collected so many items, they didn’t all fit into his inventory. So Merlin opened his residence and stuffed the remaining items in his house.

Crack. Crack.

Some time had passed, and the ice was beginning to melt and crack. The southern region that Merlin was in was also considered a tropical region, so it was generally warm throughout the year. Moreover, the ice had retained its shape and presence due to magic power rather than cold temperature, so once the magic power faded, the ice started to melt as normal.

“I guess I should be heading back. But where should I go?”

Merlin had not planned ahead, so he was unsure where to go next. He was playing the game for his own enjoyment, so leveling up wasn’t a particularly high priority goal for him. Moreover, he wasn’t really interested in the Seven Holy Lands. If he wanted to improve his techniques and martial arts, he may have considered the Magic Tower Babel or Valiant Heavenly City, but this was not the case either.

After falling into thought for a while, a new song played in Merlin’s ear.

/What’s beyond that expansive sea~/

Since Merlin had about 30 songs on his playlist, it was a coincidence that this particular song, and this line, played at this exact moment. However, as if it were fate, Merlin mumbled to himself,

“… I do wonder what’s beyond this sea.”

If anyone else had been listening in, they would have scoffed at Merlin’s offhand comment. However, Merlin was serious.

“What’s beyond?”

After stating the question out loud, Merlin broke into a smile. He had found his next destination!

“Okay!”

Merlin kicked off of the large, melting ice block and jumped into the sea. Like a torpedo shot from a submarine, Merlin rushed through the water to his next destination.

***

Around the same time, in Starting…

“Why are they late?”

Numerous users had gathered at the South gate to engage in battle with the Siege Quest’s invading monster corps. Many users had died in previous battles, so the overall number of users present now was comparatively low. The users who had died at the Western gate battle twenty four hours ago weren’t able to make it to this battle. However, the users who were able to make it were enthusiastic and raring to go. Most had participated in at least one Siege Quest battle, and some had even been in all three.

“Why aren’t they coming?”

However, their eyes that had glowed with enthusiasm slowly grew more upset and confused. The expected time of arrival had passed, but there was no undead monster corps in sight.

“What’s going on?”

“Enhanced Eyesight users, do you guys see anything?”

“Nothing. I don’t even see a trail of dust anywhere.”

Feeling that something was off, some of the archer-type users went up to the watchtowers to get a better view of the surroundings. However, they too didn’t see anything. Some of the more accomplished Enhanced Eyesight users could see all the way to the sea’s shore, but none of them had the ability to see far into the sea, where they would have seen the decrepit remains of the Dead Man’s Ship.

“Is the Lich planning on using teleport?”

“Teleporting a monster corps of ten thousand monsters… are you serious? Just because you’re not a mage doesn’t mean it’s okay to spout such nonsense.”

The sound of grumbling and bickering grew from the gathered group of users. Some began to repeatedly refresh the Announcement Board, and some even started patrolling the area around the gate, as they suspected that the monster corps may be approaching them using a massive invisibility spell. However, most of the gathered users just waited patiently.

“Don’t be in such a rush. The Announcement Board wouldn’t have said that the monster corps would attack the South gate and have the monster corps attack some other place, right?”

“Yeah, that makes sense.”

“If we just wait here a bit, we’ll also have reinforcements from those users who died in the last battle. A little bit of extra time isn’t necessarily a bad thing.”

The users murmured in agreement and seemed to reach a logical conclusion. However, no matter how long they waited…

The monster corps, the Undead army, would never make an appearance.

***End of Test***

DIO, or Dynamic Island Online, was operated on an island, as the name suggests. Though the setting for the online game was an island, this didn’t mean that gameplay or space was limited. The diameter of Dynamic Island spanned six hundred kilometers.

Considering that the distance between Seoul and Busan is about three hundred kilometers, the size of Dynamic Island was as large as many modern nations. Moreover, Dynamic Island only contained Starting, some hunting fields, some other villages, and the Seven Holy Lands. There wasn’t even a village for NPCs. Additionally, quests and tests were usually conducted in a separate space, outside of Dynamic Island’s physical space, in order to maximize efficiency. Thus, DIO could easily host billions of users with ease, without overcrowding.

DIO therefore wouldn’t face problems like not having enough hunting areas or villages. In fact, the map of DIO was so large, many users faced problems when crisscrossing within the large island to move from one village to another.

Tap. Tap.

A mid-twenties looking man ran on a stone-tiled road. He was running one hundred meters every twelve seconds, but in the world of DIO, this type of speed was nothing to write home about. Even magic users, if they invested some points into physical power and muscular power, could reach these speeds. However, this man was not a magic user, but a fighter; an aura user. The only reason he was running so slowly was because he had exhausted all his energy and strength.

“Ugh!!”

Upon arriving at his destination, he started vomiting. However, he hadn’t eaten anything in a long time, so all that came up was his stomach bile. Steam rose from every part of his body. His aura had all been used up. He was completely empty.

“Ugh… huff… I still have a long way to go, but two hours and fifty five minutes have already passed…”

The young man, Lancelot, caught his breath and straightened himself up. In front of him was the gate that led to the holy land for aura users: Thousand Scent’s Land. There was a large sculpture of a dragon at the entrance to the gate, representing Thousand Scent, the white dragon who was overseer and administrator of this holy land.

Bang! Bang!

Lancelot’s hands shook as he took off his gloves and threw them to the ground, which caused two heavy banging sounds to ring out. At first glance, it seemed that the gloves were made of a cloth-like material, but the gloves were actually made from solid iron, each weighing around five kilograms. Of course, for users with special skills, five kilograms wouldn’t have presented much of a burden. But a mass increasing spell had been applied, causing the gloves to weigh in at fifteen kilograms each. Additionally, the mass increasing spell wasn’t just applied to his gloves; they were also applied to his boots, which now weighed fifteen kilograms each as well, and his vest, which now weighed eighty kilograms. In total, Lancelot was lugging around an additional one hundred and forty kilograms due to the mass-increasing spell.

“My top speed is one hundred kilometers per hour, but it took me almost three hours… I don’t have enough stamina, and I already used up all my aura at the halfway point.”

Outside of Starting, there were seven other developed lands that users could go to. Among these seven lands, the closest was Thousand Scent’s Land. Though it was the closest developed land outside of Starting, it was still one hundred kilometers away from Starting. It was the same distance from Seoul to Chun-An. Lancelot had traversed this distance on foot, running non-stop.

“What can I do though… The gate price is too expensive.”

Users could pool together and pay to be teleported using a gate system; however, since most of the users had been busy with the Siege Quest, Lancelot had not been able to find anyone else to divide the cost of the teleportation gate. He had decided to run to save some money, and also to train. He was fortunate that his destination was Thousand Scent’s Land rather than Babel, which was three hundred kilometers away from Starting, and the furthest holy land from the beginner village. Moreover, the path to Babel was winding, so users traveling by foot would have to traverse closer to four hundred kilometers.

“Those aura points I lost on my last death are really coming back to haunt me.”

Lancelot had taken his gloves off to wipe his sweat. After he did so, he put his gloves back on and changed into normal attire. He knew that simply running to train wasn’t enough, but his aura capacity had already been fully emptied, and his main purpose in visiting Thousand Scent’s Land wasn’t to train anyway.

“Welcome to Thousand Scent’s Land, Mr. Lancelot.”

A beautiful blonde-haired woman bowed as she spoke aloud. Atop her head was her name tag, which read [Guard Delila 7]. It was the same type of guard that was placed in all eight developed lands. Like those in Starting, the NPC Delila in Thousand Scent’s Land was also well built and had an outward appearance that rivaled that of a model or celebrity in real life. However, Delila was just another beautiful NPC, one of many. Lancelot was certain that there were 99 other Delilas walking around somewhere within this city.

“You’re sweating profusely. Shall I tidy you up?”

A blue-haired girl with a name tag that read [Guard Kara 7] approached Lancelot. Hearing what she said, Lancelot looked perplexed.

“Tidy me up? What does that mean?”

“Ohohoho. Of course, I wouldn’t be the one who helps you tidy up.”

Once she finished speaking, a cool breeze blew in from nowhere and gathered several droplets of Lancelot’s sweat. The sweat morphed and materialized into a small girl, so small that she could fit inside one’s palm. Kara had used a spirit technique to summon a spirit using Lancelot’s sweat.

“Ah, I see. I would be very grateful, thank you.”

Once Lancelot answered in the affirmative, Guard Kara 7 gently waved her hands and instantly collected all the remaining sweat on Lancelot’s body. While Kara was doing this, Lancelot assessed her aura. He didn’t really have any specific reason for doing this, he was just curious what power the NPC used to conduct her spirit summoning technique.

‘She’s an aura user.’

Moreover, she was a high-leveled expert. This was to be expected, as all the guards in DIO were stationed to protect and guard DIO, so every one of them were at a level of ten or above. If Guard Kara 7, who was still collecting all the sweat off his body, ever decided to attack Lancelot, he would be dead within seconds.

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