Life Mission

Chapter 12

While Cha Jun Sung was busy with missions, a site called “Lifer World” went up. Its base was in English, but it could be translated into any language.

Lifers with a lot of imagination guessed that it was created in America. As time went by, the number of Lifers increased exponentially.

There is no such thing as a secret in this world – especially with the internet where rumors spread fast.

It did not matter whether or not it was created in America because no matter what, the reality version of Life Mission was growing its number of “players”.

Cha Jun Sung knew that there would be a rush between countries to identify Lifers within a few months.

The number of Lifers would become the measure of a nation’s power. It was inevitable.

“Let’s stay comfortable until then.”

Cha Jun Sung sat at his computer and looked through the Lifers’ notice board. It was a place to exchange information and trade points.

But that did not mean that hundreds of points were traded. Even one point could decide someone’s life – points were extremely valuable. So, most exchanges were done in one or two point increments, and the maximum was five.

The market rate of one point was the equivalent of $70 to $80.

It was better to just save them and buy weapons; it did not make sense to trade them.

“Class E.”

Hundreds of comments appeared and were erased from the information exchange board each day. 80% of it consisted of class E missions.

-[Writer: Anonymous]

-[Title: Level of Class E Missions]

-[Content: I am leaving this review after failing twice. The tutorial reward is around 150 points? I hope people will have some sense and buy the exit with 100 points. Anyway, if you complete this mission, you can buy a machine gun worth 500 points. But for a beginner to complete it alone? In reality, it’s impossible to complete with a piece of iron unless you are in the Special Forces or an equivalent field. I met a team that I worked well with in the beginning, and we succeeded at five missions and failed two. Even with three people, we had five successes and two fails. Don’t throw your lives away. Create parties.]

Mission fails meant death or giving up. In Class E, you could give up for 100 points. But as the difficulty increased, so did themount of points you have to sacrifice to give up.

There were a lot of similar comments. The subject matter was also pretty much the same. They all recommended refraining from solo missions and changing to party missions.

“It is too hard to keep trying to move forward alone – especially when your life is on the line.”

Cha Jun Sung was also in agreement. If he did not have the points he had earned in the special missions, he would have been suffering right now.

If he went into a Level 1 against 100 mutants holding just one dagger, it wouldn’t have been a fight. It would have been suicide, plain and simple.

He could expect a safer hunt if he gave up the take-all and joined a group. While slowly moving up the ladder, equipment and points would follow. Though slower, it was better than dying.

‘Heh..... There’s a Lifer who was able to break through 1000 points with a party.’

Click.

-[Writer: Anonymous]

-[Title: 1000 Point Boundary]

-[Content: I will say it briefly. Once you get past the boundary, Level 2 mutants appear. We each purchased the equipment that we wanted with the points we gathered over the past month and attempted the Class-E mission, ‘Red Building’. The process went smoothly. But in the middle of the mission, the boss Krollion began to lead the dwarves to bother us. Fortunately, we were able to gather our strength and beat them, but it is definitely different than Level 1. Be careful.]

Krollion was a humanoid mutant standing at 2 meters. It was a problem if someone got caught in its grip because it had 5 to 6 times the muscular strength of a human. But its shortcoming was that it was ignorant.

Woong!

Cha Jun Sung turned on the PDA and looked through the Class E list. They were listed in order of points, and a few at 3000 points stuck out.

They were not just any Class E missions, but ones that allowed the player to advance to Class D.

Mission success meant a whole slew of points. But, as with every pro, there were cons. There was a high chance of Level 2s swarming out. For this type of mission, a party was absolutely necessary.

There weren’t many of these missions available – just five. It seemed they were controlling the numbers. Cha Jun Sung chose the one that he liked best among them.

‘Field of Meat’

Just by looking at the name, he could tell it would reek of blood. The title and scenario seemed much harder than the mission he had completed the day before yesterday, ‘Our Mad Dog’.

‘It doesn’t mean I’ll attempt a Level D if I get through this, but it can be a kind of reference point for me.’

One thing he knew though was he needed to avoid meeting a Level 3 before his 2nd body modification was complete. There was an order to everything! He needed to maintain this order if he wanted to live long.

‘What should I do?’

It would take a long time for other Lifers to get to his level. But he needed to join a party.

Though he looked through the list, there was no party willing to try a 3000 point mission. It seemed like most groups took these out of the running because they were intimidated just by the number of points.

‘Isn’t there anyone willing to try? Well...at the same time, it’s not good to just go into any party. I have to be selective too. Shit.’

He needed to test out the people he would work with before going into ‘Field of Meat’.

1 plus 1 is 2.

Math is math. But when you added humans into the equation, you could potentially get a different result.

More people could mean easier battles...but the wrong person could also make things a whole lot worse.

“Odin, search for parties at the level of 1000 points in Korea.”

[6 parties have resulted. There are 2 in the Seoul region.]

One needed to write their qualifications in the application for parties. It was true of both the person who was adding people to a party and the person searching for a party.

“They’re all pretty much the same.”

The first party had 5 people, the second had 7. All they had was armor that barely protected their vitals and one weapon each.

-[Would you like to apply for the Kill-All team?]

“Yeah.”

-[You have applied for the team. Speaking with the team’s helper.]

Odin was familiar with Cha Jun Sung’s habits now. He did not need to talk too much. Odin would do well if left on his own. During this time, Cha Jun Sung would check his equipment.

‘What a waste. The body modification! Why does it have to be so damn expensive!’

He had gathered a total of 80,000 points. After the first modification, he had exactly 20,000 left. He wanted to try and stick it out without doing the mods, but his equipment had been ruined in Our Mad Dog.

Since he could not go around with a bare body with mutants abound, he changed his low class impact tights to high class, and got plastic armor made of strong plastic.

There was a vision sensor attached to his helmet. Night looked like day and he could detect enemies by body temperature.

In terms of equipment, he was ready to go at any time.

-[The conversation has ended.]

“What did he say?”

-[The leader of the Kill-All team cannot believe your qualifications.]

On party applications, qualifications can be played down but not up.

“So?”

-[He would like to meet you in person.]

“Picky. We’ll meet in the mission anyway. Arrange an appointment.”

-[Mission confirmed.]

Odin reserved a place to meet.

Cha Jun Sung hoped it would be a party that looked at the person rather than the points.