Matan’s Shooter

“Haha”

Browless laughed at Leeha’s expression. It was as if he knew what Leeha was thinking. As Leeha came out of the building, he saw a small yard that looked like a training ground. The building was shabby, but the space for training was excellent.

“This is the training ground. If you fail, you will never be able to use it again.”

He spoke with great pressure on purpose.

“Is that so?”

Leeha spoke calmly.

The elongated training ground resembled a training ground. There was a shooter’s seat, and a scarecrow with holes in several places was installed as a target on the other side.

‘40m. The default distance?’

If the combat assistance system was turned on, the musketeer’s default range was 40m.

“Piercing, Bull’s-eye, Rapid fire. What do you choose? If you fail, you will get expelled immediately. However, if you give up now, I’ll teach you the basics.”

It was Browless’ last act of kindness, or rather, his last warning. After answering, there was no second chance.

‘What’s piercing?’

‘ Does it mean hitting two targets with one bullet? I am getting tested on a musket, but how does it pierce? ’

‘Except the one that I don’t know of, what’s left is bullseye and rapid fire… ’

Leeha did not worry much. Anyway, he wasn’t proficient with rapid fire. However, if it was bullseye, then he was confident. Isn’t it only 40m away? 

“I choose bullseye.”

“Bullseye is it? This should be good.”

Browless took off his hat. His burn scars exposed in the sun looked even more terrible.

“Can I ask one question?” 

“What is it?”

Browless stopped pulling out the feathers from his hat.

“How many people have taken the test until now?”

Browless quietly spread his two fingers.

“Two people? Only two people tried it?”

“Try? There are only two people who passed.”

“What?”

Only two people succeeded? Is that all of them? Isn’t the default accuracy 50% at 40m? Leeha didn’t understand so he asked again.

“Then, how many challengers were there in total?”

“Well.”

“Yes?”

“I do not remember any cowards or failures.”

He was still pressured to give up. He did not need to give any consideration to Leeha. 

However, if he gives up, he will get laughed at and be branded as a coward.

If you fail, you are a failure, and if you give up, you’re a coward. Both of those terms were annoying.

Was it to shake his emotions and test his composure?

Leeha just wanted to pass the test. And he had an additional purpose, and that was to see Browless’ astonished expression.

“However, I remember that there were well over a thousand of failures. And there were more cowards than failures.”

“Thousands? The odds are not that great.”

He said that there were more than a thousand people who failed. Even if it was just a thousand, the passing rate is 2/1000. Only 0.2%. However, in Middle Earth with 100 million cumulative users, the number of musketeers is only a thousand.

Some of them might have already quit the game, but if the ones who had given up were included, there would be at least 5,000 people who have come to this place.

‘Two thousandths? Wouldn’t that be a 0.04% success rate? Why? This is the only shooting range, but why are there so few?’

Leeha didn’t understand. After answering Leeha’s question, Browless walked to the other end of the shooting range where the target was 40m.

He turned around and looked at Leeha.

‘What is he trying to do?’

And he started walking again. He passed the 40m mark, to the place where there were sandbags piled up. It was already 43m.

He continued to walk without stopping. The road outside the shooting range, where there was a big tree. 48m.

‘Where is he going?’

He didn’t stop. Browless’ steps didn’t stop until he reached the wall of the musket academy.

It was a whopping 55m away from where Leeha stood.

There, he saw small movements in  preparation for the exam.

After a while, Browless went away from the wall and Leeha knew what ‘bullseye’ meant.

‘Surely… Still, I need to wait. In case it really is.’ 

Leeha was correct, this was a test that was too much to be true.

However, Browless just walked back to the next position without saying a word.

Putting his hat on again, the only part that was not covered was his mouth.

“Begin.”

Attached to the wall 55m away was a feather removed from his hat.

The feather was the size of a little finger.

“Are you telling me to hit that?”

“Did you think that I took my hat off and walked over there just to pose?”

“Well, of course not.”

He just wanted to make sure but he got reprimanded hard. Leeha was 55m away from the target.

He was a sniper that didn’t just catch a rabbit 100m away, but caught a golden eagle 100m above. As stated in the description of ‘Sniper’s Etymology’, it was an extremely difficult achievement that only one player got aside from Leeha.

In other words, the musket has a terrible hit rate, still to get it meant that one had the sense and experience.

‘By the way… The size of the target was different!’

They have the size of a dog or a cat when seen up close. When the Golden Eagle was 100m into the sky, its actual size was around 10m.

However, what about the feather now? Was it 10cm? To put it 55m away and hit it?

In other words, the feather 55m away right now is harder to hit than the golden eagle that was 100m away.

It was smaller.

It looked much smaller.

‘That’s crazy…’

Leeha tried to focus his eyes, but he could not see it properly.

There was only a blue dot on the wall that could not be seen properly and he was having doubts if he was seeing things properly.

He was barely able to recognize it because he saw the feathers attached in Browless’ hat, and if he moved or if the color changed even a little due to the refraction of light, he would not be able to see it anymore.

‘There were two people who managed to pass this?’

No, he said that there was piercing and rapid fire, so it might not be two. If the bullseye is this difficult, what about the other tests? They must be ridiculous tests as well.

‘For rapid fire, maybe they need 4 or 5 shots per minute. What kind of task did they do?’

Whether it was rapid fire or piercing, it must have been definitely crazy.

And the one who was about to do such a crazy task was Leeha.

Leeha, who was straining his eyes wide open, looked at his target and suddenly said to Browless.

“Excuse me. Can you give me a moment to prepare?”

“Take your time.”

Now that he had time, what could he do? 

However, the NPC did not know what users could change.

He needed to maximize his senses.

Although Leeha would not be able to enlarge the feathers that are 55m away, at least he could control his movements as much as possible.

And Leeha knew one sensation that he could change.

‘Adjust assimilation rate.’

[Adjusting assimilation rate. Current setting: 20%.]

30%? 40%? Will it matter if he only changed it that much?

‘Raise assimilation rate to 50%.’

He wanted to raise it to 100%, however if it exceeded 50%, users would not be able to adjust it at will. He could raise the assimilation rate to 50% at most.

[Changing Assimilation Rate. Current setting: 50%.]

[Excessive adjustment to Assimilation Rate will interfere with the playing experience.]

[Goople will not be responsible for any in-game or external responsibility for the user changing the Assimilation Rate. This requires user approval to continue. Do you agree?]

‘Agree!’

Trrng

, A strange feeling went through his spine and reached his head. After the feeling disappeared, Leeha walked to the shooting range.

The leather shoes that touched the sole of his feet. The sun that hit his skin. He also tried moving his back and swung his toes.

‘It definitely feels more…. Huu, it’s really amazing. Now I want to try 100%.’

He thought about how it would hurt getting bitten a ‘little’ by the bear cub  right now but Leeha ignored it.

It was not the time to think of other things.

“Huu, huu.”

He took the gunpowder out of his bag. Even the texture of paper felt different than before, and Leeha began to quickly reload.

“Ohh. Tap loading.”

Browless, who watched Leeha reload, let out a little admiration.

“But I’m glad you didn’t choose rapid fire. If you chose that, you would have failed 100%.”

“I-is that so?”

Obviously the last statement wasn’t a compliment. He just admired it for a moment.

It was a fairly difficult loading method, but it looked trivial to Browless.

It meant that his reload speed could get faster in the future! Leeha felt better.

After he finished reloading in a relaxed and delicate manner, Leeha leaned carefully against the shooting wall. He posed in a stable position with his knees slightly bent.

However, it shouldn’t be about maintaining posture.

He needed to aim toward the 10cm target from 55m away.

Because it was a situation where he had to fire in an unknown location because the target cannot be seen.

‘It’s okay.’

One only missed when their pulse is unstable.

‘I can do it.’

Because it is similar to shooting at a target 250m away. Having a feel for it should be enough.

‘Rifles and muskets are incomparable.’

Browless watched as Leeha leaned over with his eyes on the sight.

He induced fear to frighten the test takers and make them give up, however, they did not hinder the ones who took on the challenge. No, it was enough to see their guts.

However, it was under the premise that they could walk the talk.

Browless wouldn’t tolerate braggarts that weren’t good enough.

As Leeha had guessed, Browless is also a musketeer and was the director of the Musket Academy.

Of course, his desire was to have a lot of excellent students. As such, he wanted the young man in front of him named Leeha to succeed.

‘Let’s see. Let’s see.’

In fact, he couldn’t see the target well. However, Leeha convinced himself that he could see it clearly.

‘I can see it well. Targets that you can see tend to appear bigger. It’s really big.’

It was very small.

“Huuu…”

Leeha slowly controlled his breathing.

With his slowed breathing, it also caused his heart to beat slowly. With the musket’s butt pressed against his shoulder, his index finger moved slowly.

Just before he pressed the trigger, he did not forget to say a word.

‘Calm Mind.’

Huuuk-. His skill activated. His armpit tightened, and his body stiffened.

The stillness seemed to have stopped even his pulse.

Taaang—-.

A gunshot rang loudly.

(End of Volume 2…)

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