Chapter 142
The area in front of NoName's Private Room was swarming with people.
An even bigger bombshell than the controversy over her age had finally dropped.
How on earth had she brought a game NPC outside the game?
When a world was cleared, the NPCs who had joined the player as companions remained in the peaceful world of WoA.
That way, even while playing another game, players could visit Story Mode whenever they wanted to see them and interact with them.
The residents of Arseria were widely praised for displaying such outstanding emotional bonds that they could even serve as software for the emotional robots of the future.
One of them had escaped from the game.
The stream remained completely silent.
So a small number of viewers logged into VR SPACE, pinned the coordinates of NoName's Private Room, and waited.
“NoName, open the door!”
“Is Adella really inside?”
“Didn't you watch the stream? That was definitely her!”
“NoName must explain! Explain! Explain!”
The ownership of a cleared open world belonged to each individual player.
But could bringing an NPC into one's personal VR SPACE really be considered an infringement of intellectual property rights?
The public had no time for such complicated thoughts.
She was World of Arseria's undisputed star. And that wasn't a sentiment limited to Korea.
After all, Adella, the Cat of Dawn, was now vividly alive and moving before their eyes.
[▶Private Mode – OFF]
[▶Communication Mode – ON]
Before long, blue grass began growing across the empty space filled with a white background.
A fence rose up to mark the boundaries, and the transparent house regained its shape.
At the very moment everyone had been waiting for the door to open, a young girl opened it first and greeted the people outside.
“How many people are there?”
NoName squinted one eye and roughly counted the people who had come all the way to the house.
There had to be at least five hundred, and including those running up from behind, there were certainly several thousand.
Even with so many people gathered, a heavy silence hung in the air.
Not a single person dared to open their mouth.
Just as NoName was beginning to find it strange,
another girl wearing a black cloak stepped beneath the lights,
““Waaaaaaaaah!””
“Is that really Adella? Holy shit!”
A thunderous roar of cheers erupted.
“Adella! Adella! Adella! Adella! Adella!”
One spectator cried out her name at the top of their lungs.
The others joined in, and voices high and low merged together as her name echoed throughout the space.
Adella could only feel awkward in this situation.
“W-what is this supposed to be...?”
NoName lightly pushed Adella forward by the back as she instinctively took a step backward.
“Your fans.”
“I have fans? Why?”
Adella's face turned red, apparently genuinely embarrassed, and NoName let out a quiet chuckle.
“Because you were indisputably the most outstanding person in the world of Arseria.”
Adella's brows drew together slightly.
Even if the world she had lived in was riddled with fakes, Adella believed there were countless people who were more remarkable than she was.
And yet the name Adella continued to be chanted without end.
“You still don't believe me?”
NoName took her hand and stepped forward with her toward the crowd.
Even as they walked, Adella's head kept bobbing from side to side without pause.
Even the trembling of her long eyelashes looked pitiful.
In the meantime, NoName randomly selected one viewer and brought them inside the fence.
Before they knew it, the whole thing had turned into an interview.
“Your name?”
“Ah... yes! Aston Merlin. Please call me Merlin!”
“All right, Mr. Merlin, I'll do a quick interview. Why do you think ‘Adella’ was so loved in World of Arseria?”
At those words, Adella felt as if her heart had dropped into her stomach.
In some ways, she was the person furthest removed from love.
Her mother at the brothel had abandoned her, and her father at the Academy had never given her even a shred of recognition.
She had no one she could call a friend until she was eighteen, and her life had always been filled with betrayal and solitude.
Just as she was about to ask NoName to withdraw the question,
Merlin thoughtfully stroked his chin and slowly opened his mouth.
“If anything, I'd like to ask you a question in return. What possible reason could there be for Adella not to be considered the most charming character in WoA?”
At Merlin's words, NoName smiled with satisfaction.
Adella's head, which had been hanging low, gradually lifted.
“World of Arseria is wrapped in dreams and hope, but when you examine its inner workings closely, there is no dystopia quite like it. Every character moves according to their own desires and convictions, and as a result, they present us players with all kinds of trials.”
Merlin and Adella's eyes met.
Adella flinched at the smile Merlin gave with his eyes.
“But I think the dream you hold, Ms. Adella, is dazzling and beautiful. Even in the midst of a dark reality, you never lost sight of your dream, and you always quietly did your best at whatever task you were given.”
She had merely lacked finesse and been too eager to act.
Even after failing many missions in the Abyss, she rose again and overcame those failures.
“Everyone who failed to truly recognize her worth was too busy cursing her, but in the end, her true value was revealed through a noble sacrifice that no one could have anticipated.”
As the interview continued in a solemn tone, the voices of the chattering crowd gradually died down.
“There has never been another case in which an NPC was given complete control of the situation like this. If Adella had taken over NoName's body, she could have achieved the dream she carried. But Adella didn't do that. What she wanted wasn't money or honor, but recognition from her companion.”
NoName approached Adella, whose body was trembling quietly, and asked in a soft voice if she was all right.
Adella bit her lips tightly and gave a small nod.
After checking on the two girls, Merlin brought the interview to a close.
“There are probably many NPCs with outstanding skills and stats. But do you remember World of Arseria's catchphrase?”
-Purity, exploration, and, finally, companionship-
Not only NoName but many others nodded as well.
“Ultimately, Adella was the only person who realized ‘companionship’ in its most perfect form. It is a heroic virtue that ordinary people cannot possess, so I believe she deserves all this praise. Adella, you’re the best!”
“Waaaaaaaaah!”
“I love you, Adella!”
“You were so cool when you defeated Asmodeus!”
“Adella, you're so pretty!”
Whistles and inarticulate cheers pounded against the cat girl's eardrums.
Merlin slipped back outside the fence, returned to his place, and waved along with everyone else.
To Adella, who stood stiff as a board, NoName spoke as though it were nothing special.
“They all cheered for us with one heart to save you. You are someone worthy of that.”
“I... I...”
Adella's voice was slightly hoarse.
The unfamiliar sensation of receiving something she had never experienced before must have made her dizzy.
“If you want, I can send you back to your world. You'd become the hero who defeated the demons, and the Imperial family would bestow all kinds of wealth and titles upon you.”
That was the privilege every NPC who cleared the game was entitled to enjoy.
“You'd sleep in the finest inn in the capital and eat anything you wanted. An entire world would become yours.”
But Adella's brows furrowed faintly as though the outcome had already been decided, and she soon shook her head vigorously.
Even so, Adella asked once more out of courtesy.
“What if I said I wanted to stay here?”
“You'd get to meet your countless fans in this world. Even though this place is virtual reality, it still costs real currency, so you'd have to sleep in a ‘cramped room’ for the time being.”
“Wow, sis, you really know how to hold a grudge...!”
Adella wiped away her tears and smiled brightly.
“However, it will take time to obtain a physical body in the real world. I can't use golem magic freely like I did in the past, so I'll do my best.”
“For now, I think it might be nice to live here.”
Her legs began to move slowly.
The thousands of people who had come to see Adella had surrounded the fence before they knew it.
As Adella took in each of their faces, her heart swelled strangely.
“This place somehow... seems like it could be really fun.”
“VR SPACE is a fun world too.”
“Can I go outside right now?”
“Wait, I'll set your name before you go.”
[▶Please enter a nickname.]
“What name shall we give our cat beastkin lady?”
NoName asked playfully while manipulating the interface.
Adella answered with a bright smile.
“My name is Adella. I'm Adella, the Cat of Dawn!”
A name she had protected through seventeen regressions.
NoName appraised the name of the first artificial intelligence to live in a new world as follows.
“Whoever came up with it, that's a really shitty name.”
“Ah, sis!”
* * *
[▶Would you like to enter World of Arseria?]
[May the World Tree's blessing be upon you.]
While Adella was having fun, I immediately logged back into the game to check my inventory.
[Mephistopheles's Memory - α]
[The memories of Mephistopheles scattered throughout the Mist of Death. No curse can be found in the mist.]
[Cast: Appraisal]
It was a completely useless item given as loot after clearing the final boss.
Unfortunately, the administrator privileges had vanished when I logged out of the account, but it seemed I could still use Appraisal magic to peek inside.
The same simple ten-line item code as before was listed.
Since it had no special abilities, its length was short as well.
Yet when I opened the file displayed as 57,344 bytes, it contained 57,345 bytes of information.
One extra byte had been added in the middle.
Could I inspect the most recently added information?
I could.
[search: 4]
“So that's how it was. That's why you kept telling me to defeat Mephisto.”
A message addressed to an unspecified multitude.
And the ranks in which Mephistopheles most frequently appeared as an object were mostly Challenger and above.
It seemed the WoA stream would last far longer than I had expected.