Chapter 202
Cheonchilbaek looked to see who had helped him. It was someone completely unexpected.
It was Samsao.
The 6-year veteran prisoner who shared a room with him.
He thought his prison life was completely ruined after getting on Samsao’s bad side from the very first day, but unexpectedly, Samsao, who hadn’t seemed to like him, stepped up to help him.
“What is this? Are you covering for him just because you share the same room? He’s a newcomer who barely just got here?”
Osai forcefully pulled his grabbed hand away and shouted bluntly.
As one could tell just from their numbers, Samsao was the senior, ahead in years.
However, if Samsao was a 6-year veteran, Osai was a 5-year veteran. In terms of rank, they were both essentially corporals.
Back when they were newcomers, they would respectfully use honorifics and treat seniors with more years under their belts with the utmost politeness, but things were different once they reached the point where they had both been rolling around in Glitch Hall for a long time.
A mere one-year difference was no longer enough to blindly suppress the other party.
Given Osai’s violent temperament, if Samsao had been just some ordinary person, he would have been eaten alive long ago.
But as evidenced by the severe pressure Cheonchilbaek had experienced on his first day, Samsao was by no means an easy opponent.
Such an easy opponent couldn’t last long in Glitch Hall.
Just because they weren’t forced to work and their health was strictly managed didn’t mean there were no prisoners who got “disposed of”.
Those who lasted a long time had their own qualifications, and Samsao was someone who met those qualifications.
“Rather than covering for the newcomer, I just really don’t like seeing you act like an ass. I spectated a bit from the outside, you know? It was a high-level ninja that couldn’t be handled with a newcomer’s level of detection ability in the first place, so is it right to blame the newcomer after getting taken down by it? Wasn’t it actually your mistake?”
Cheonchilbaek felt a refreshing sense of relief. This was exactly what he had wanted to say.
He had been forcibly dragged along when he wasn’t even used to the game yet and was given a mission that was impossible to succeed at from the start. And then to be blamed for failing - did that make any sense?
Osai must have had nothing to say, as he kept his mouth shut.
“To me, it looked like the plan was sloppy from the start. The plan to detonate a precision-guided bomb to bring down the maglev train was fine, but it wouldn’t have been strange at all if the reactor got damaged in the process. Fortunately, that didn’t happen, but blindly entering the train without proper preparation was an error from the get-go. If nothing else, you should have at least secured an escape route. Then you could have minimized the GP Loss from dying.”
GP, game points. It was the currency utilized in the VR Simulation.
Successfully completing a mission increased points, and failing didn’t result in a penalty, but dying during the execution would result in a massive point deduction.
Cheonchilbaek only knew that this GP could be used for various purposes inside the simulation, and that the Prisoners of Glitch Hall treated GP like real money.
He couldn’t understand it yet, but there were many people who were so frantic about GP that they seemed ready to risk their lives for it.
It was also the reason why life in Glitch Hall was never comfortable.
To be treated well here, to last a long time, one ultimately had to earn GP, and to earn GP, one had to endlessly perform missions similar to the Simulation from earlier and die over and over again.
One didn’t die in reality, and the pain of death faded once one came out, but calling it a simulation was just a word; it was essentially an endless Wheel of Hell in itself.
“Right, GP. GP is important. I actually have something to discuss with this newcomer regarding GP. I lent him some equipment for this mission, you see? But he died and all the items I lent him vanished. I need to get the loss covered in GP. If he doesn’t have it, he’ll have to pay it back some other way.”
Once again, it was an absolutely ridiculous provocation.
It was true that Osai had lent Cheonchilbaek equipment. However, he hadn’t heard a single thing about equipment damage.
He hadn’t even wanted to borrow it in the first place; Osai had forced it on him, claiming they needed to meet the appropriate level.
Samsao must have thought the same, as he snorted.
“Are you being serious right now? You forcibly dragged a newcomer into a mission that’s hard to clear even with only veterans, and now you’re telling him to pay for broken items? What kind of bullshit is this? Are you planning to work him like a slave until he pays back the GP?”
“Well. Even a rough calculation puts the equipment cost at 2 million GP… so he will probably have to work like a Slave to pay it off. It’s a shame. I didn’t want to do this either, but money is money and a promise is a promise, right?”
Samsao and Osai’s eyes met. A heavily tense atmosphere circulated as they glared at each other.
“Hey. You… I heard you’ve been getting close with the guys with fewer years lately. Was it for this? I heard you’ve been leading a gang around these days, so this was your method?”
At Samsao’s low voice, Osai flinched as if struck in a sore spot, but soon smiled fiercely.
“Why? Is there a problem? Are you going to interfere with what this junior is doing?”
At those words, the other Prisoners who had been doing other things nearby subtly approached and narrowed the distance.
It was Osai’s gang. None of them had been here for very many years, but their numbers were a pressure in themselves.
It would be normal to be intimidated, but the opponent was Samsao.
A veteran vicious criminal who had survived 6 years in Glitch Hall. Perhaps because of that, the expressions of Osai’s Gang weren’t good either.
Trying to defy the rules in a place where years meant rank meant they couldn’t feel comfortable no matter how many of them there were.
“Ha.”
Samsao smirked with his arms crossed. His attitude was dismissive. He seemed to think nothing of this level of threat.
How exactly would he teach Osai a lesson? Cheonchilbaek’s eyes filled with anxiety and anticipation.
“Right, do whatever you want. I can’t interfere with what our junior is doing.”
And that anticipation crumbled in an instant.
Samsao unexpectedly shrugged and immediately turned his back.
“You probably know this too, but… it’s all pointless. You’ll get sick of it before long. You’d better keep it in moderation.”
Clicking his tongue, he said that to Osai and then left without giving Cheonchilbaek a single glance.
For Cheonchilbaek, who had been treating Samsao like a savior, it was an incredibly terrible situation.
He had acted like he was going to help, only to get scared by Osai’s Gang and run away without looking back.
Cheonchilbaek resented himself for being moved, even for a moment, by such a cowardly person.
Osai giggled with his people. He was deliberately acting exaggeratedly cocky to hide the fact that he had been momentarily intimidated by Samsao.
“Boys, did you see that? Was he saying 'it’s all pointless~'? If anyone saw him, they’d think he’d been here for over 10 years. Even so, he’s only a year apart from me. He’s putting on airs for nothing… That guy is a has-been too.”
Basking in his victory, Osai beckoned to Cheonchilbaek with his finger. The fangs revealed by his crooked smile were eerie.
“Hey, newcomer. Come here.”
“Yep.”
Cheonchilbaek was a man with tact.
Now that he had been abandoned by Samsao, whom he had firmly believed in, his only remaining option was to grovel before Osai. If he bowed and scraped well enough, a way to survive would surely open up.
As he quickly approached and knelt down, Osai patted his own head as if satisfied.
“You know you owe me, right? 2 million GP. Shouldn’t you pay it back?”
“Yes. Of course I have to pay it back.”
“Right, you punk. Right now, you’re probably just feeling wronged and pissed off. You’d want to kill me if you could. You don’t? Don’t bullshit me. You think I don’t know what’s inside your head? The guys here were all like that at first too.”
Was it that being treated poorly a hundred times and well once felt more appreciated than being treated well a hundred times and poorly once?
Unexpectedly, Osai’s affectionately approaching words sounded quite sweet.
“Don’t worry too much. It’s only a debt in name; do you think I’d try to collect every last bit of it from a Junior? It’s fine if you don’t pay it back. Just remember that you and I are on the same side starting today. You know what I mean?”
In short, it meant standing in his line.
From Cheonchilbaek’s perspective, as he had no other lifeline to grab onto, it was an offer he couldn’t refuse. It didn’t even seem like an offer in the first place.
When he nodded in a daze, Osai laughed refreshingly.
“Yeah, yeah! It’s great that this newcomer is easy to talk to. You saw earlier, right? No matter how well you cater to those Has-beens, they won’t help you when you actually need it. I’m different, see? Glitch Hall is now -”
“A has-been, you say. This has-been listening is starting to feel heartbroken. You didn’t say that for me to hear, did you, Osai?”
The air turned cold. At the somewhat familiar voice, Cheonchilbaek turned his head.
As if he had been there from the beginning, a person was sitting on the floor in an incredibly familiar posture, mumbling something.
“E-elder?”
Osai cried out in a fluster. His Number Was 17, but no one called him Sipchil. They just called him elder.
However, the elder shook his head.
“Osai, you act like you know everything in front of the newcomer… but your news is slow. I’ve decided on a name to use. From now on, call me Paradox. You can do that, right?”
“Ah, yes. Paradox-nim.”
Even though he blatantly broke the unwritten rule of using prisoner numbers as names, everyone accepted it as if it were natural. Paradox was that kind of existence.
The oldest inmate was standing above the unwritten rules.
He smiled like a mischievous boy and spoke.
“So, this Has-been eavesdropped a little on what you guys were saying… That friend Cheonchilbaek owes a debt? And 2 million GP at that?”
Osai’s complexion crumpled.
On the contrary, Cheonchilbaek’s face lit up.