HACKED 33

“What? You definitely… you died earlier….”

“Shush! Be quiet. What if the monster hears and chases us?”

“Right, let’s hide for now.”

It was not the time to harbor unnecessary doubts. The knights hurriedly brought their comrade and hid themselves together.

“Let’s retreat for now and regroup. Two out of the six unit members have already been taken. At least we should survive.”

“What do you mean retreat? We can’t go back anyway until we kill at least one of them!”

Formation Bonus: ‘Chivalric Order (Orden de Caballería)’

: Do not draw your sword without reason, and do not sheath your sword without honor.

(No me saques sin razón ni me enbaines sin honor.)

Activated when all unit members possess the ‘Knight’ trait.

Once they enter battle, they do not voluntarily end the fight until they achieve ‘military merit.’ ‘Military merit’ refers to the death of at least one enemy.

The formation bonus that <IsItPresbyopiaCrap> must have carefully chosen. This bonus had now become a shackle. A shackle that prevented them from fleeing even if they wanted to escape the battlefield filled only with fear.

“I’m not saying we should retreat completely. We’re just facing them again after reorganizing. We’ll devise a new tactic based on a four-man unit, and this time, we’ll thoroughly prepare our posture so we won’t be defeated so easily…”

“A four-man unit?”

A casual question that did not fit the solemn atmosphere at all flew in. It was the comrade who had joined last, the one they thought was dead.

“…”

The three knights shut their mouths all at once.

The comrade before their eyes looked exactly as they knew him. The face, the hairstyle, the build, the weapon, the outfit. Even the marks on his clothes where they had been torn and splattered with blood while being attacked by that monster earlier remained intact.

But something was strange. Something that could not be explained by reason or logic…

“You should count the numbers correctly. It’s not four people, it’s three.”

The sense of incompatibility and anxiety kept growing. Amidst that, the comrade in question casually brought his hand under his chin. Then, he made a motion as if lifting something.

Rip.

The comrade’s face, no, what used to be a face, was torn off all too easily. Whether he had skinned it and worn it immediately, the inner section visible for a moment was bloodied.

“Uh, uh…”

Instinctive loathing and fear crawled up from the tips of the three knights’ toes.

Skinning a corpse and changing clothes to disguise himself? If it were someone sane, someone with normal ethics and values, it was a method they could never easily choose.

Moreover, it made no sense that they hadn’t noticed it at all until now. To think that not just one, but three of them were simultaneously fooled by such a basic level of disguise.

The mysterious opponent completely threw off the skin of the corpse. The face revealed beneath it was one they were seeing for the first time…

“I’ve done one job, so I wonder if it will be reflected in my performance review? I hope it is. Haha.”

A face wearing the habitual fatigue unique to office workers. His black hair, which should have been neatly parted and combed back, was a bit disheveled as he put on and took off the skin.

He was a man of a strange impression. No part of his appearance could be called ugly, yet he did not possess any noticeably flashy beauty either.

Whether he was born that way or intended it, the man’s presence was extremely faint. For an ordinary person, after just a few minutes, no, a few seconds after encountering him, they would remember nothing more than that the person they just saw had black hair and was wearing a black suit.

Active Skill: ‘State Secret (國家機密)’

: In the constitutions of modern liberal democratic states, the principle is to disclose state actions and information of state organs to the citizens based on the citizens’ right to know, but the exception to this principle is state secrets.

Manipulates the perception of targets within a specific range. Can conceal the ‘actual reality’ perceived by the target or forcibly inject a ‘falsified reality.’

Unfortunately, the three knights were not Compilers and had no terminals, so they could not see that message. However, doesn’t every sentient being have a survival instinct? They realized instinctively.

Ah, we barely avoided one disaster… and another disaster has come.

˙✧˖°🎮 ⋆｡˚

[<The Knight on the Boat Drawn by Swans> has died and returned to fragments of the narrative.]

[<The Lover Discouraged by Black Sails> has died and returned to fragments of the narrative.]

[<The Dragon Slayer Pierced by a Spear> has died and returned to fragments of the narrative.]

[<The Red Paladin of Iberia> has died and returned to fragments of the narrative.]

[<The Inquisitor of Montaillou> has died and returned to fragments of the narrative.]

[<The One Who Could Not Reach the Grail> has died and returned to fragments of the narrative.]

<The First Unit> has been annihilated. (Location: <UserMyeong808>’s Pantheon)

Since there are no members capable of action, the battle is automatically stopped.

“Th-this! How does this make sense!”

A thunderous scream echoed through the spacious library director’s office. A hardcover book, which the Compiler of this Pantheon cherished like his own life, flew across the air.

Thud!

The thick, heavy book rolled unsightly. Without even glancing at it, <IsItPresbyopiaCrap> grabbed his hair and collapsed onto the desk.

“They’re all dead? My First Unit, six Incarnations… in less than an hour after being dispatched? To that stupid newbie brat?”

No matter how much he thought about it, it made no sense. Because he wanted to handle it as quickly and cleanly as possible, he had sent a powerful elite unit hand-picked from among numerous Incarnations… To think that not one, but all six were annihilated side by side.

<IsItPresbyopiaCrap> grabbed his thinning hair with bloodshot eyes. Then he suddenly sprang up.

“I must have misread the text. This can’t be. I must have misread it, yeah, of course…”

Muttering like a madman, he walked to the corner and brought back the book he had thrown away. He placed the book gently on the desk and blew on it, worried that there might be dust on it. Then he opened it carefully.

Exactly three seconds later.

“Nooo!”

A scream erupted once again.

“Why? Why? For what reason? Why did they die? They’re absolutely not a force that would be easily defeated anywhere!”

He obsessively scanned the sentences written in the book over and over again. As if doing so would make the hidden meaning between the lines appear. But everything remained the same. The letters once written on the blank pages of the book did not change no matter how much he glared at them.

The cruel reality visited him again. The main unit he had ambitiously dispatched to the enemy camp was wiped out by an opponent he didn’t even know. All too futilely.

“Just why…”

There were no flaws in his plan. He even fully considered the possibility that <UserMyeong808> might not be as dim-witted and clumsy a newbie as he appeared on the outside.

<UserMyeong808> ― Level Private

Currently applied title: (None)

One-line self-introduction: (None)

Wasn’t it a profile that looked suspicious to anyone? Even putting aside the fact that there were no titles or self-introductions, to have ‘Level Private.’ If he were a real newbie, he wouldn’t even know such a function existed.

Perhaps <UserMyeong808> was one of two things. A shy newbie who disliked privacy exposure, or an old hand who was hiding his power on purpose. However, the message from <UserMyeong808> saying he was hearing for the first time what dimensional merging was didn’t seem to be a lie.

‘Even though a Compiler couldn’t possibly not know about dimensional merging.’

Even a rookie among rookies who was just appointed knows what dimensional merging is. Because it is included as a mandatory course in the Narrative Compilation Union’s training for newcomers. In the training, they even kindly provide simulations so that they won’t be flustered when they experience the real thing.

So, while one could make an excuse like ‘I’m clumsy because I haven’t experienced merging many times,’ one could not say ‘I don’t know what that is.’ The opponent’s claim was so absurd that it felt more truthful.

‘Besides, he also said strange things… like something was abnormal, or asking to request help from the Union side. I refused, saying let’s solve the situation right in front of us first before talking.’

Those words also didn’t seem like lies. What benefit would that guy gain by babbling strange things that couldn’t even be understood?

After rational thinking, <IsItPresbyopiaCrap> reached a conclusion. <UserMyeong808> was indeed a nobody. He might not be a total amateur and might have hidden his skills to some extent, but even so, he would be weaker than himself.

“But I’m asking why they lost!”

Thump! Thump! Thump!

He punched the innocent book. And he immediately regretted it. The thick hardcover boasted a hardness and weight comparable to a weapon. The joints of his clenched fists began to ache.

“ I can’t back down like this. I’ve already suffered a huge loss, so if I tuck my tail and run away here… then I really won’t even be able to get my investment back. Yes, that’s right.”

<IsItPresbyopiaCrap> poured out a mad self-justification. If there had been anyone by his side… at least a helper fairy that the Narrative Compilation Union gives to every Compiler, which <UserMyeong808> calls ‘Chirpy’… things wouldn’t have come to this point.

But there hadn’t been a helper fairy in his Pantheon for quite some time. Was it around the time he just started hunting newbies? Because it was annoying to hear that insolent fairy chirping, ‘This is not right, you shouldn’t do this, I will report to the Union,’ he had the Incarnation who happened to be nearby kill it.

He didn’t even remember what he did with that fairy’s body. It must have been thrown in a corner somewhere or rotted away.

“Second Unit… set out. This time, kill him properly.”

He muttered gloomily.