“Are you and Maseutyu working together?”
The Red Man just drew the two swords hanging on his waist instead of answering. Then a flash headed towards Alan who was rigid for 3 seconds. But the image that appeared in Alan’s eyes wasn’t the Red Man. An Asura with a frightening face attacked him with dozens of swords. The sword of light that the Asura wielded passed through Alan……
Chwa chwa chwa chwa chwa chwa!
Alan lost 5% health and he had almost no more left as his blood drained out.
“You, you bastard……!”
Alan stared at the Red Man with red eyes. The form of the Red Man was reflected in his eyes…..Alan vowed revenge but he had no more opportunity to achieve it. The reason was a message that surfaced in front of Alan.
-A special item has been triggered.
All of the character’s data has been absorbed by the ‘Token of Darkness.’ All the data absorbed by the Token of Darkness has been deleted from New World.
‘Oh my god, the thing the Avenger talked about…..!’
Alan felt his heart fall. It had what Alan had previously tried to ask Maseutyu. When Alan had escaped from Silvana to come here, the Avenger members who did had called him. The contents were what Alan witnessed in the information window just now.
“Alan-nim, something is strange!”
“When we died, we received the message that our character data was being sucked in by the necklace!”
“What on earth is going on?”
The Avenger members had seen the same message as Alan when they died. And when the Avenger members logged back into New World, there appeared in a new character creation screen. It meant all of their character data had been completely deleted from New World’s server.
‘Did Global Exos take some action against us?’
Alan had thought this at first. Alan knew that this situation was a threat to Global Exos. If it was possible then Global Exos would’ve immediately deleted their characters and seized their accounts. But Alan was aware that Global Exos had lost control of New World. Alan had participated in the plan because he knew that Global Exos couldn’t take action to suspend him. Then he could only think of one reason for his data being sucked into the necklace. Alan looked at the necklace pulsing on his chest.
-Token of Darkness (Rare)
Item Type: Necklace
Durability: 60/60
Weight: 10
User Restrictions: Level 300 more, chaotic value of more than 300.
The ancient power of darkness is lodged in this necklace. This necklace contains a wicked magic that was created by the forces of darkness a long time ago. The person who wears this necklace with receive the effect of Demonic Sphere of Influence. However, only a corrupted person can wear this necklace.
This was the necklace that the Red Man gave Alan and the Avenger members before they left for Silvana. It was an artifact which gave chaotic users a bonus equal to the demonic monsters when the entered the Demonic Sphere of Influence. That’s right. Like Ark guessed in the secret dungeon, this was the artifact which increased their abilities beyond their level. But other secrets were hidden in the artifact. When the wearer died, it absorbed the data and sent it somewhere else! That was the unidentified special option of the ‘Token of Darkness.’
‘This is ridiculous! An item which erases the information of the character!’
It was incomprehensible. But Alan encountered it so he couldn’t deny its existence. At the same time, numerous thoughts ran through Alan’s head.
‘This had been planned from the very beginning. Maseutyu said…..the immortal life of the users…..it means the users’ data. It is a sacrifice to resurrect the Dark Lord…… What is this? And the person trying to restore the Dark Lord…..’
Alan looked at the Red Man with confused eyes. At the same time, his body died and collapsed towards the Red Man.
Then Alan confirmed something about the Red Man as he fell. Perhaps Alan’s sword that he swung when hit by Chakra Wave hadn’t missed. In New World, when a equipment’s durability ended then it would disappear. Alan’s eyes concentrated on the mask as he fell. The moment he checked the mask, surprise and disbelief entered his eyes. The face of the Red Man hidden behind the mask……
‘T-this…..huck! Ah ah ah, wahhhhh!’
Alan suddenly felt a tremendous pain in his head. The pain felt like his head was exploding. It wasn’t pain from New World. His real self that was lying down in the unit in reality was in pain. Alan screamed from the pain. The next moment, a weird phenomenon occurred to Alan’s body. A deep black lump rose from the stone room and flew towards his body. Maseutyu also walked out from the stone room.
“Huhuhu, the Ruin Knight has absorbed the heart.”
Maseutyu looked at Alan’s dead body before saying towards the Red Man.
“The necessary souls have already been collected.”
“……Let’s move to the location.”
“Yes. But what about those people shivering outside?”
“……Kill them.”
The Red Man replied in a low voice.
———————————————————————————————————————-
“Don’t think of them as ordinary users. Think of them as terrorists.”
A middle age leaning next to the door said in a low voice. The 10 people in a circle around the door nodded with tense expressions. The foreigners with blond hair and a south-east Asian origin had badges engraved with G·A·S·P attached to their chest. G· A· S· P…..it stood for Global Exos Special Security Personnel.That’s right. These were the special security agents that Global Exos had dispatched. And they were currently surrounded a villa in the suburbs of Hong Kong.
“Everybody move to their assigned positions.
The members scattered from the leader’s order. It resembled a scene of FBIs fighting against terrorists in a movie or drama. Although they weren’t holding real pistols, they had gas guns in their hands. They were blocking the villa because of an order that came from the headquarters in Korea. They wanted to seal off the Hong Kong villa 1134-46 in order to meet a user playing New World. The relevant legal procedures had already been handled between headquarters and the Hong Kong police.
The reason for the order was related to a top secret project that headquarters was working on. It was a project that Kim Gwon-tae had rallied a large number of hackers to work on. The project started after Hyun-woo told them that Alan was working with the demons. However, by that time Alan had already escaped to Hong Kong. Kim Gwon-tae had rallied the programmers to hack the Hong Kong servers so they could find Alan’s residence. And they finally succeeded in the backtracking and discovered Alan’s residence. But the villa that the special security agents sealed wasn’t Alan’s residence. It was because of Kim Gwon-tae’s opinion.
“Okay. Mobilize the security staff in Hong King to arrest Alan!”
When Ha Myung-woo first received Kim Gwon-tae’s report, he immediately mobilized the troops. Kim Gwon-tae shook his head and explained.
“No, just wait.”
“What does that mean? Don’t you know the current situation in New World? We have to arrest him and appease our customers. The first thing to do is stop those guys!”
“Don’t you think it would become a problem if people discover that we hired hackers to hack our own servers?”
“Then what?”
Ha Myung-woo wrinkled his forehead as he frowned. Kim Kwon-tae tapped a thick paper file with his finger and explained.
“After we discovered Alan’s server tracks, we traced his movements. As expected, Alan is deeply involved with this event. But he is not the mastermind.”
“He’s not? Then…..?”
“Yes. Using Alan’s circuit, we tapped all of the Avenger members and the transcripts of the NPCs he talked to. As a result, we’re certain that the Red Man is the mastermind.”
“Didn’t we expect that? But what does this have to do with holding back on punishing Alan?”
“If we want to fry a large fish then it is better to leave the small fish as bait.”
Ha Myung-woo’s eyes narrowed at Kim Gwon-tae’s answer.
“You’re saying…..there is a way to catch the larger fish?”
“Didn’t I tell you from the beginning?”
Kim Gwon-tae pointed to the office infested with hackers.
“We’ve hacked into the Hong Kong circuits and are keeping track of Alan. So we can intercept all data exchanged with the main server. That doesn’t just mean that we can see information only related to Alan.”
That’s right. Whenever a user took some action in the game, the commands would be sent to the main server. For example, if Alan swung his sword when fighting an enemy then a command would be sent to the main server telling it that Alan swung the sword. But if the enemy attacked Alan then the main server would communicate that action to Alan. In other words, all actions applied to Alan within the game relied information exchange with the main server. If they hacked the circuit where the information was exchanged then they could discover all users, items and NPCs that Alan got in contact with. That’s why there were 100 hackers analyzing the data day and night……
Anyway, Kim Gwon-tae and the 100 hackers discovered all of the information exchanged with the main server in a few days. That’s why they were convinced that the Red Man was the main person in charge of this event.
“Alan made contact with the Red Man last time.”
Kim Gwon-tae said with sharp eyes.
“We’ve figured out Alan’s residence so we no longer need to track him. So he rallied all the hackers and chased the Red Man’s circuit that had got in contact with Alan’s. There were a few minor problems but they were professionals…..eventually they found the place he was connecting from.
“Where is it?”
“That fellow is also in Hong Kong.”
“Hong Kong? Then that is why Alan went to Hong Kong in the first place……”
“He must’ve ma