What a day. If Inso had known that learning about interdimensional death games would be this exhausting, he might've just stayed in bed and let the world end without him. But here he was, getting the crash course of his lifetime from Devi, who seemed to treat planet destructions like a mild inconvenience.
A while back...
"Now that the sore-to-the-eye bastard has finally left," Devi muttered, her fingers dancing across an invisible screen that only she could see, "let me explain what you need to know to not get us all killed."
She paused mid-gesture, rainwater dripping from her hair onto her nose. "But first—can we please get out of this downpour? I'm starting to feel stinky."
They were still standing in the rain like a pair of idiots. Inso blinked, suddenly aware that his clothes were plastered to his skin and making very uncomfortable squelching sounds.
Back in Inso's room, Devi casually waved her hand and—whoosh—the water evaporated from her clothes like she had an invisible dryer. She stood there, perfectly dry and annoyingly smug about it.
Inso stared at her with the most pitiful puppy-dog eyes he could muster, silently begging for the same treatment. He was far too lazy to actually take a shower, and the thought of peeling off wet clothes made him want to crawl under his blanket and hibernate.
Devi glanced at his pathetic expression and rolled her eyes. "Fine, you giant baby." Another wave, and Inso was instantly dry.
"You're the best, Noona!" he beamed.
"Don't get used to it," she grumbled, but there was fondness in her voice.
"Alright, Inso," Devi said, settling into business mode. "Do you have any artifacts from the system?"
Inso tilted his head, totally confused. "Artifact?"
"Like this." Devi tugged down her collar slightly, pointing at her pendant.
He shook his head. "Nope. Nothing like that."
Devi's eyes narrowed as she studied him like he was a particularly difficult puzzle. "That's... impossible," she muttered, then began circling him like a hawk. Before Inso could react, her hands were suddenly patting down his pockets like an airport security guard.
"NOONA!" Inso shrieked, jumping back and crossing his arms dramatically over his chest. His face turned to the color of a tomato. "What are you doing?!"
Devi gasped, pressing a hand to her heart. "Inso... how could you?" Tears began to glisten in her eyes—actual tears that would've fooled anyone who didn't know her. "You're like a little brother to me. How could you think such impure thoughts about your innocent, caring Noona?"
She covered her face with her hands and let out the most pitiful sniffle known to humankind.
[Polarum: Bombastic side eyes]
[Ekkril: ….]
Inso stared at her in horror. The performance was so over-the-top that it physically hurt his eyes to witness. "Noona... I can literally see you're acting."
The tears vanished instantly. Devi's expression morphed from tragic heroine to psycho killer in 0.2 seconds. "Oh, really?" Her voice dropped to a whisper that could freeze hell itself. "Then what the heck were you thinking?"
The temperature in the room seemed to plummet. Inso had seen this look before—it was the same one she'd given that guy who'd tried to cut in line at the convenience store. That guy had apologized so profusely he'd nearly became one of the tiles on the floor.
"Even if the system destroys the entire solar system and you're the last man standing", Devi continued, her smile sharp enough to cut diamond. "I'd rather date an alien with tentacles. So cut the bullshit and hand over the artifact before I demonstrate why I'm ranked in the top three."
[Polarum: She must be on her periods. LOL]
Thoroughly terrified, Inso turned his pockets inside out. Loose change, an extinct chocolate cover, a crumpled receipt from last week—everything tumbled to the floor in a sad little pile of his life's contents.
"I really don't have anything!" he protested.
[Nexus: Check your glasses.]
"My glasses?" Inso's hand casually moved to touch his glasses, and his fingers brushed against something small and smooth. When he removed his glasses to examine them, there it was—a tiny purple stone embedded in the frame, practically invisible unless you were looking for it.
His mind raced as the stone looked just like a normal stone he'd see with glasses. Why can't I see what it's made of? Come to think of it, those shadow creatures didn't look like normal molecules either. Could there be particles even smaller than what I can see? Lesser than 0.1nm....
"INSO!" Devi's voice cut through his thoughts. "Stop travelling to different galaxies and touch the stone for three seconds!"
He pressed his finger to the purple crystal, and suddenly, his vision exploded with light. A translucent screen appeared before him, filled with numbers and stats of his profile that made his heart soar.
"Noona!" His eyes lit up on looking it. "It says I'm level 150! That's pretty good, right? With over 300 players, being ranked 150th for a new player? My ability must be fucking awesome"
The silence that followed was deafening.
[Lars, Texar, Riliac, Ayame and Polaris have logged out]
[Polarum: We're TOAST]
[Polarum has logged out]
[Ekkril: 🥲 Hey, we can still make this work! Right? ...Right?]
[Nexus: ...]
[Nexus and Ekkril have logged out]
Inso watched the chat messages disappear one by one, his excitement slowly fading. "Um... why is everyone leaving? And why do you look like you've seen a ghost?"
Devi's smile was so forced it looked painful to watch. "It's... it's fine, Inso! We can totally work with this! Ahaha... haha... ha..." Her laugh sounded like a car engine dying.
She took a deep, steadying breath. "Just ignore the stats for now, okay? Let me explain what you actually need to do to not get everyone killed."
[D has sent a friend request]
"Accept this so I can see your full profile," she said, her voice carefully controlled.
The moment Inso accepted, Devi's expression went through approximately seventeen stages of grief in three seconds. She stared at her screen, slowly raised her hand, and smacked her forehead so hard that Inso sweated.
Placing both hands on his shoulders, she looked him dead right in the eye. "Inso, my little hoobae.[1].. you have a looooooooong way to go."
"Okay," Devi began, pulling out her pendant and touching it to Inso's glasses. "Let me break down how this nightmare works."
[System syncing...]
[D and Inso Park have merged systems. Shared interface activated. Key exchange enabled.]
"Keys?" Inso muttered, but his attention was immediately captured by Devi's profile, which had just become visible to him.
His jaw dropped. Where his profile looked like a barren wasteland that even weeds avoided, Devi's was absolutely stacked. Her experience points had so many zeros that Inso lost count. Her equipment section scrolled on forever, filled with weapons, potions and artifacts.
"Each player gets different daily tasks based on their unique abilities," Devi explained, gesturing to her screen. "I've already finished mine for today—see how they're grayed out? Complete all your dailies, and you get 500 EXP. Weekly tasks give you an extra 1,000. So you can earn about 4,500 EXP per week just doing these tasks."
Inso nodded along, trying to look like he understood.
"But here's the thing," Devi continued, her expression growing serious. "Everyone completes the daily and weekly tasks because, you know, planetary extinction is a pretty good motivator. The real game-changer is the missions."
She pointed to another section of her interface. "We get keys that transport us to different dimensions for missions. Each key is completely random—we never know what we're walking into until we're already there. Could be any genre, any difficulty level, any type of challenge."
"What kind of missions?" Inso asked, genuinely curious.
Devi shrugged casually. "Oh, you know. The usual. Slaying ancient dragons, infiltrating alien fortresses, preventing interdimensional wars..." She paused thoughtfully. "Sometimes we have to cook for picky food critics or babysit."
Inso blinked. "That... doesn't sound so bad? I mean, babysitting is pretty easy—"
"The babies are usually the size of continents," Devi added facts. "But don't worry! If you make it to the top 20 rankings, you'll probably only get crushed to death instead of completely vaporized. Much more dignified."
Inso's last bit of hope shriveled up and died. His smile became so strained it looked like his face might crack.
"How do we get these keys?" he asked weakly.
"Our party leader, Nexus, receives them based on our collective ranking. Since we're the 3rd-ranked party, we get high-level keys—which means high-level 'congratulations, you're probably going to die horribly' missions. That's why we need to trade with lower-ranked parties for their easier keys for your level up."
Inso processed all this information, but one question kept nagging at him. "Noona, you said I'm an NPC. How can I even participate in player missions? And also, didn't you say one from each solar system? Then how come you have suddenly chosen me?"
For the first time since he'd known her, Devi's confident facade cracked. Her expression grew distant and achingly sad.
"Because the system is desperate," she said quietly. "So many planets have already been destroyed, Inso. Entire civilizations, wiped out because the players couldn't keep their ranks. But the game doesn't stop. The quests keep coming, and there aren't enough players left to handle them all in time."
Her voice grew smaller. "So the system started emergency recruitment. One additional player per surviving planet, chosen from NPCs who show potential abilities."
Inso felt his stomach drop. "How many... how many players are left?"
Devi was quiet for so long that Inso wondered if she'd heard him. When she finally spoke, her voice was barely above a whisper.
"With 100 planets still standing, and each recruiting one extra player... there are about 150 players in total now."
The world tilted sideways. Inso felt like he was falling through space, through time, through the crushing weight of realization.
"So I'm..." His voice cracked. "I'm dead last? Rock bottom? The absolute worst player in the entire universe?"
Everything went silent. Even the birds outside seemed to hold their breath.
Then Inso's composure finally shattered.
"I'M FUCKING LAST?!"
His anguished scream was so loud that every bird within a three-block radius took flight in terror, probably traumatized for life. Somewhere in the distance, a car alarm went off.
To be continued...
[1] It means Junior.