NOVEL NEXT Chapter 2 - Tutorial Challenge (1)
Chapter 2: Tutorial Challenge (1)
The date was January 1, 2030, marking the beginning of Elthera Online’s history.
It was the day the world’s first and most perfect virtual reality game was released.
Immediately after its launch, the game surpassed 10 million concurrent users online and secured 3 billion players within two years, making it the largest game in human history.
It was another world, another life.
Naturally, some people began living entirely within the game, leading to various social issues being raised.
[2030 Youth Lost in Games]
[Declining Communication Rates]
[Office Gatherings? No thanks. I’d rather go home and play games! Deepening Generation Gaps]
[Unemployment Rate Hits 50% in 2030… The Greatest Crisis in History]
[Earning Money in a Game? What is Elthera Online Anyway?]
Even superstars who graced the media daily, politicians who argued passionately with presidents, and entrepreneurs and scientists who unveiled new technologies almost every day…
All abandoned reality equally and became immersed in the game.
Later, people would say:
Those who gave up reality early and bet everything on the game… had an unusually strong survival instinct.
* * *
[Experience the world’s most perfect virtual reality!]
[Agriculture, exploration, politics, technology, hunting.]
[Do everything you desire, become everything you dream of.]
[Unleash your dreams!]
The slogan was outdated, the font amateurish.
It was an old advertisement.
However, two years after the game’s release, such advertisements no longer mattered.
Anyone with internet access knew about Elthera Online.
Yeon Seo-Jun woke up in his small studio apartment, staring at that very advertisement, and suddenly became acutely aware of reality.
“Sigh…”
He let out a deep sigh and ran his hands down his face.
After the Synchronization Incident, countless bizarre and absurd events had occurred, but ‘time regression’ was entirely unprecedented.
Or was it?
In the continent of Elthera, incidents involving traveling to the past had occasionally occurred. But on Earth, this was the first.
Was this how the protagonist of Back to the Future felt?
“I’m not Marty McFly, though.”
It didn’t feel real.
The world had just been destroyed, and his heart had been shattered, making the current situation even harder to grasp.
But when he raised his right foot and felt a dull pain, reality hit him hard.
“Ugh…!”
Pain.
The sharp sting of it reminded Seo-Jun of the long-forgotten sensation.
He grabbed his right thigh in response.
Years ago, he had suffered an accident that left his right leg severely damaged.
It wasn’t just that he couldn’t use it properly; when he tried, it felt as if it were on fire.
After the Synchronization Incident, the disabilities of one’s real body were healed by merging with their in-game character, but… that was still eight years away.
[February 18, 2032]
Seo-Jun checked the calendar, his expression turning grim.
The Synchronization Incident wouldn’t occur for another eight years, in 2040.
On that day, high-level rankers would become nobles, wielding godlike powers to reshape the world at will.
‘It’s good to be back, but why did it have to be two years after the game’s release?’
Seo-Jun wondered why he hadn’t returned to the day he first created his account.
The game had launched on January 1, 2030, meaning two entire years had already passed.
By now, the rankers who started early would have already devoured hidden quests and dungeons, leaving everyone else far behind.
Elthera Online was a growth-based RPG.
In an RPG, a two-year gap was monumental, making it almost impossible to catch up with the rankers.
But then, a thought struck him, and Seo-Jun’s eyes lit up.
“No, if it’s only been two years, there must still be plenty of hidden classes and pieces left.”
Hidden classes were rare professions that couldn’t be obtained through normal means.
Naturally, they offered better-than-average stats but were only available to a select few.
When Seo-Jun had played the game extensively, most hidden classes had already been claimed by veteran players, leaving him stuck with a mundane production role.
‘If it’s only the second year since launch, there should be many hidden classes I can still obtain. I can think of countless items already.’
Hidden classes.
Seo-Jun recalled the message he saw at the moment of his death.
‘S-Rank Class: Necromancer.’
In Elthera, every profession held by NPCs could also be obtained by players.
No matter how rare or legendary, all professions— even the jobs of mythical heroes—could be acquired as S-rank classes.
However, there was one profession, the strongest and most notorious, that no player had ever obtained.
‘Necromancer.’
It was the most powerful job, one that once plunged half of Elthera into death.
Seo-Jun thought of the atrocities committed by Arch Lich Riolis, the sole necromancer.
Riolis single-handedly raised an army of the dead, attempting to conquer the continent.
Though he wasn’t entirely defeated, he later resurrected on Earth, becoming a massive threat.
It was a job powerful enough to threaten the entire world, yet no player had ever managed to acquire it.
As if the gods themselves had forbidden it.
The clue to that unattainable job came to him in the moment of death.
‘Ha, I see. The condition for obtaining the class is dying by Riolis’ relic… No wonder no one figured it out.’
This raised a question.
There was a time gap between past and present lives.
Technically, the future was ahead, and now was the past.
Would the conditions for a class achieved at the time of future death still apply to the present?
‘Well, I’ll know once I log in. Even if the condition doesn’t apply… I have a wealth of information.’
Seo-Jun’s memory was packed with countless details about the game.
The game’s world was vast, with a colossal player base, making it impossible to remember everything.
Undoubtedly, he knew less than he didn’t know.
But Seo-Jun was confident that he had far more knowledge of hidden pieces, bugs, and rare opportunities than others.
During his years confined to the hospital due to his leg, he had spent every day scouring “wiki sites” for Elthera Online information.
He was more knowledgeable about items and skills than most gamers and had a profound understanding of the nations and NPCs within the game.
‘…My leg couldn’t be cured with modern medicine.’
Being confined to the hospital left him trailing behind others in the game, and by the Synchronization Incident, he only reached a level below the ranking threshold.
‘I won’t worry about my leg. When the Synchronization Incident happens, disabilities like this will be easy to heal.’
He scanned his studio apartment.
A package that had just been delivered lay in front of the door.
Inside it was a VR connection device, the “SyncLink.”
Seo-Jun set his resolve.
When I started the game before, it was merely a pastime, but now I had a clear goal.
“Chensolla. And something about gods, wasn’t it?”
My primary objective was to reach those entities that had been etched into my death.
I closed my eyes.
Why didn’t Chensolla choose to regress and live through a second life himself?
“If he had regressed and aimed to dominate Earth with his power, he could’ve done it with ease.”
But he didn’t.
Why not?
Even in my past life, Chensolla had demonstrated overwhelming power.
Had he regressed, he might have become the strongest being, perhaps even reaching those so-called ‘gods’ he spoke of in his final moments.
“It means simply becoming stronger isn’t enough.”
Supreme ruler above all, the unparalleled Rank 1—Chensolla.
He possessed a power no one in the world could challenge, yet he stood against every player on Earth.
It was because the path he chose was excessively violent and destructive.
In the end, Chensolla turned humanity itself into his enemy, though ironically, his ultimate goal had been the salvation of humanity.
His methods, however, were utterly misguided.
“Chensolla may have possessed an unapproachable power, but in the end, he couldn’t protect the world alone.”
He was remarkably self-aware, knowing that he couldn’t fix the fundamental flaws in his approach.
So, what exactly was the problem?
No need to worry.
In the past, as a lowly production-class alchemist, I had to rely on others.
But things would be different this time.
[Would you like to create a character?]
The God of Control, a legendary unranked alchemist, a revolutionary fighter among production classes.
Though I was a low-level player, I had once earned all these lofty nicknames.
And now, I was standing before Elthera Online once more.
“There will no longer be a powerless me.”
[Welcome, Player ‘Yeonwol.’]
As I opened my eyes to this new world, I clenched my fist tightly.
“From now on, I’ll fight for myself.”
[Character creation complete.]
[Entering ‘Tutorial.’]
* * *
One day, on “Edit,” the largest online community dedicated to Elthera Online, a post appeared:
[Author: Is it even possible to beat the Tutorial Boss?]
People from around the world replied in English, Japanese, Chinese, and other languages.
Though the languages differed, the auto-translation revealed a unanimous sentiment.
[User2: No way.]
[User5: Impossible.]
[User21: That boss was made to kill you. No way 3 billion people tried over two years and no one succeeded otherwise.]
└[User23: Exactly.]
This was a recurring topic.
The Tutorial Boss was a common point of interest for all gamers and the subject of countless debates.
Players encountered it immediately upon starting the game, and it was designed to kill them at least once.
You had one chance to face it, right after creating your character.
Since the game didn’t allow character deletion, every player essentially had just one attempt.
A boss you could only challenge once, yet no one could defeat—truly unbeatable.
[User34: Did you know the user who managed to shave 10% off Khazaram’s HP is ranked 120th as a berserker?]
└[User35: That berserker? Wasn’t he a real-life martial arts expert with over 30 combined disciplines?]
└[User34: Even someone with that level of physical prowess could barely scratch it. How can anyone beat it? The developers just made it unbeatable.]
Opinions flooded in.
Some argued the developers deliberately made it unbeatable.
Others claimed no game would create an undefeatable boss—it’s just that no one had succeeded yet.
The topic was so contentious that even television stations invited martial arts experts to discuss Khazaram, the Tutorial Boss.
-Let’s hear from Mr. John, a combat analysis expert.
-After months of researching Khazaram’s patterns… I’ve concluded it’s unbeatable.
-Sorry, what?
-I mean, you just can’t beat it.
There was plenty of footage.
Over 3 billion players worldwide had logged into the game and faced the Tutorial Boss.
Thanks to this, months of analysis revealed that one swordsmanship expert managed to survive for a record 2 minutes and 49 seconds!
-What an incredible feat.
-Thanks to this record, we’ve learned a lot about Khazaram.
-Exactly. And what did we learn?
-That at Level 1, it’s absolutely impossible to defeat Khazaram.
Even world-class swordmasters, UFC champions, Muay Thai grandmasters, and martial arts veterans with 50 years of experience had all admitted defeat.
Surviving for 10 seconds against Khazaram earned you praise, and lasting beyond 30 seconds marked you as a prodigy destined to become a top-ranked player.
Those who survived over a minute inevitably made a name for themselves.
Ultimately, the challenge was about endurance, but victory seemed unattainable.
Everyone believed this.
[User14: Then, what’s this video that was just uploaded of someone defeating the Tutorial Boss?]
That was until someone uploaded a video of the supposedly invincible Tutorial Boss being defeated.