Emperor of Solo Play

 ­ Golden Skeleton (2)

Skeletons hunting skeletons.

In the middle of a battlefield of a one-sided slaughter, Hyrkan sat on a rock, watching a video. In the video, one of Hyrkan’s Skeleton Warrior was swinging a hammer like a baseball bat, making another skeleton’s head fly out to the distance. Watching the scene, Hyrkan simply shook his head.

‘It was fun filming it, but it’s pretty meh now that I look at it.’

10 days had passed since Hyrkan uploaded Skull Clown to his YouTube page.

‘The fun atmosphere isn’t bad, but it’s too light… but releasing two of the same battle videos…’

Skull Clown had blown up just like Hyrkan had thought. It had surpassed 100,000 views in just 4 days, and it was currently at 310,000 views.

He had earned a lot as well. His ad revenue had increased, and he received more than double his usual donation amount. Although no one had contacted him yet for a sponsorship, with his YouTube page now at 30,000 subscribers, his chances of getting a sponsor were ever increasing.

It couldn’t have been any better!

However, Hyrkan was more worried than happy.

The cause of his worry was none other than the follow-up video for Skull Clown. Although he had been filming videos of himself hunting, he didn’t find any of them to his liking.

Hyrkan took off his hahoe mask for a moment as he massaged his face.

‘I can’t get a feel for it.’

It’s not that he couldn’t fight well.

In fact, his battle strength was higher than the one shown in Skull Clown.

First, thanks to Skin Sewing, Hyrkan could be a bit more daring in his battles. It was easy to tell that he was showing his aggressive side.

On the other hand, although he was stronger than he was in Skull Clown, not much had changed. It was like looking at a same car design with the only difference being the horse power. Furthermore, because the opponent was still skeletons, anything Hyrkan would make seemed to similar to Skull Clown.

‘This isn’t good enough.’

Hyrkan knew the tendencies of people who enjoyed watching Warlord videos. Subscribers knew when a YouTuber released videos just to get more views. If this were revealed, their deep affection and interest quickly turned to a frightful dagger.

Hyrkan needed something new.

No matter how he fought, he would only be able to make videos of hunting skeletons in the Dead Woods.

Furthermore, Hyrkan no longer had any troubles killing skeletons and Skeleton Warriors. If the fight was close, it might be worth showing, but the current Hyrkan simply slaughtered them one-sidedly. It was to the point that Hyrkan just made his Skeleton Warriors fight by themselves as he sat back. It was one of the reason why he made a light atmosphere video like the one just now.

‘It’s a problem to fight too well.’

Hyrkan couldn’t help but be dumbfounded.

‘I can’t believe this is a problem.’

It was boring because he fought too well! He couldn’t believe it.

‘This is the best place for leveling up though…’

In the end, the solution was to change his hunting ground. He had to change his opponent.

However, for the current Hyrkan, Dead Woods was the best place to level-up. Even if there was a better place, it was too far. It would take over a day to get there, and once he did, he would have to learn the area, look for hunting points, and build his Skeleton Warrior’s battle experience again. It wasn’t that he was lazy, it was that it was too inefficient.

‘If I kill a little more, I can get the Skeleton Destroyer title too.’

There was a title on the line as well.

Once a player hunted certain number of skeletons, he received the ‘Skeleton Destroyer’ title. It raised magic power and stamina by 3 points each.

“Tsk.”

Hyrkan clicked his tongue. Meanwhile, his Skeleton Warriors had mercilessly beaten up the nearby skeletons to the point that they couldn’t restore their body. It represented their death.

[You have leveled up.]

It was the last bit of EXP he needed for a level up. Hearing the alert, Hyrkan smiled.

‘This is just too good.’

As always, nothing was better than a level-up alert. Hyrkan liked the current situation even more. It was a happiness only necromancers could feel.

‘I see why Rich Lich spent all that money.’

Hyrkan smiled, as he once again checked the view count and comments of Skull Clown.

‘Hm?’

What caught Hyrkan’s attention was a new comment made just now. As it was sent privately, only Hyrkan and the original commenter could see it. After reading the comment, Hyrkan’s expression changed.

‘What’s this?’

★★★

YouTube videos naturally came with comments, and among them were all sorts of weird ones. There were those that cursed incessantly, those that spammed, those that cried for no reason, those that said strange things, and even those that asked for money.

Hyrkan was immune to these things.

Even before he got his nickname as the Hero Slaughterer, he had prepared himself for such comments. His targets had always been Rankers, those with many fans. Even when they plotted against him and paid for it, Hyrkan still received a lot of hate. There was a time that he got hate for almost anything he did.

The hate came in all forms.

Someone would randomly pour water on him while he was walking down the street, or he would be cursed at or called names for no reason.

As such, Hyrkan wasn’t easily fazed by hate or cynicism.

Naturally, what made Hyrkan’s expression change wasn’t a hate comment or the like.

-Hello, I am a player called Bledge from England. I am writing to you as it seems you are currently hunting in the Dead Woods. I was recently PKed in the area, and I would like you to get revenge for me.

A revenge request.

It wasn’t anything special. With Warlord being such a lawless place, many players sought out skilled players to get revenge for themselves.

Even so, this content of this request made Hyrkan’s senses tingle.

‘A revenge request…’

In Warlord, it was quite rare to get PKed randomly. That said, Hyrkan had already been a target of PKs consecutively. It could be said that he was truly born under the stars of pushover-ness.

In any case, Hyrkan welcomed this request with arms wide open.

‘Should I go with hunting these fools?’

At a point where he needed fresh material for his next video, this request to kill PKers couldn’t be better. Not to mention, he would be able to get fully-crafted items from their watches!

There was no reason for him to refuse.

Of course, if the PKers were too strong, he could simply run away. It’s not like he was a hero of justice.

‘I’ll see how it is.’

Hyrkan moved carefully.

★★★

When Hyrkan arrived at the spot the commenter told him about, he could luckily see the PK happening in action.

1 vs 2.

The player left alone was wearing an expression full of despair, while the other two attacked him mercilessly. The situation resolved itself quickly. There was no unnecessary sound other than the curses spurted by the victim. The offenders acted swiftly and silently like robots.

‘Hm?’

Hyrkan couldn’t help but be suspicious.

‘What’s this?’

PKers didn’t simply kill their victims. They played with them until they died. That was why they PKed in the first place. It’s not that people didn’t PK simply to take items, but that it was just extremely rare.

Even so, the PKers in front of them were clean. They moved to kill their opponents in the shortest time possible. There was no unnecessary talk or hesitation.

‘These guys aren’t those psychos that are into PKs.’

It meant that they didn’t enjoy PKs, just that it was a mean to an end.

With his body lowered, Hyrkan watched the PKers movements more closely.

After having killed their victim, they swiftly took his watch and took off. Hyrkan could tell that they were moving with intent, meaning that they had a destination. The chances were that they had allies nearby.

Hyrkan’s senses tingled again.

‘They discovered something and they’re killing people before they find out?’

They weren’t PKing for the fun of it, but to eliminate any variable or witness.

‘It must be a Golden Skeleton.’

Hyrkan quickly arrived at a conclusion.

Golden Skeleton!

It was a boss monster that appeared in the Dead Woods, just like how Dragon Lizards spawned in the Lizard Swamp. Golden Skeletons, however, were several times more expensive than Dragon Lizards.

‘At the current market price, a Golden Skeleton’s Golden Bone should cost 5,000,000 won or more.’

Golden Skeletons were hard to kill and took 10 days to respawn. Not only that, they disappeared if one didn’t catch them within a time limit. Once it got away, the hunter would have the wait another day.

Moreover, Golden Skeleton’s Golden Bone was a crafting item used to make a level 70 Rare item. Although it wasn’t a main component, considering the cost of level 70 Rare item at this point in time, its price was justified. It was obvious why players would go to the point to PK other players.

The current situation was likely that whoever found the Golden Skeletons missed their first chance to kill the Golden Skeleton and was now PKing others to hide the information.

‘There’s no problem with me getting some then.’

It went without saying that there was no problem with Hyrkan dealing with them. Hunting them down would be considered just.

Hyrkan laughed out loud.

No matter how one put it, he was the Hero Slaughterer. Rather than hunting monsters, he enjoyed hunting players.

★★★

There were two types of guilds in Warlord.

One that played to earn money and one that played to spend money.

Blue Cat Guild.

Although they weren’t well-known, with a total of 100 members, they were a guild that played to earn money. Of course, they never dealt with large amount of money. Balancing out the money they spent and money they earned, they received no more than pocket change.

The Blue Cat Guild was run in a simple way. Its members mostly did as they liked and they gathered when they needed to. Most guilds were run in this way. Not all guilds could be like the Top 30 Guilds, working like gears in a machine for a single project.

It was seven members of the Blue Cat Guild that found a Golden Skeleton while hunting in the Dead Woods.

They, of course, came to a single conclusion.

“Let’s take it for ourselves.”

Even if they reported it to the guild, they would get nothing more than chump change.

Of course, not reporting such a boss spawn to the guild was a violation of its rules. One that would get them expelled.

Even so, no one voiced any opposition at this suggestion. As with most small and medium sized guilds, players simply chose to leave guilds if they had to. Most did not think it was such a big problem.

The problem was that their first raid had failed. They spent a full day doing nothing before the Golden Skeleton appeared again. They failed on their second try as well. That’s when things began to go awry.

First and foremost, they were spiteful. They vowed that they would kill the Golden Skeleton at all cost!

At the same time, they got rid of variables that could hinder their Golden Skeleton raid. Although they were hesitant during their first PK, it was fine after that. They knew it was a bad mannered action, but they were blinded by the money.

And now it was their third time to try to hunt the Golden Skeleton.

“There’s a guy nearby hunting skeletons. What should we do?”

“Alone? Was he left behind?”

“Let’s just get rid of it. We’ve already gone this far. We might as well go all in.”

When they were bored and irritated, a perfect prey had appeared in front of them.

“Joint, it’s enough with just the two of you right?”

“Of course.”

“Hurry and come back. We’re going to have to go all in for the Golden Skeleton. We won’t get a fourth try.”

“We’ll take care of it in 3 minutes.”

Two people had begun to move to hunt down their prey.

They were the swordsman, Join, and magician, Int. Together, they were called Joint. As they were quite skilled, they were fairly well-known even before they joined the Blue Cat Guild. Now that they had gone out, the situation was most likely taken care of. Thinking this, the remaining five players solely focused on their strategy for killing the Golden Skeleton.

On the other hand, the Joint duo tilted their head as they watched the player fight a skeleton holding a hammer.

‘That’s a skeleton I’ve never seen before.’

‘Is it a rare-type?’

Although the skeleton the player was fighting was one that they had never seen before, they didn’t think much about it. What was important to the two of them was killing the player without him even realizing what had happened.

They saw an opening, and the Joint duo rushed in.

First, the magician, Int, threw an ice grenade at the player. The ice grenade drew a parabola as it flew towards the player. When it hit the ground, countless ice shards exploded out in all directions.

“Aaak!”

The player barely dodged the ice shards as he screamed, and the swordsman, Join, closed his distance to finish him off. It was then that the player shouted out.

“What was that? What’s wrong with you!?”

The distance between Join and the player had shortened. The moment Join got in range, he swung his sword at the player without hesitation.

Whish!

The player narrowly dodged Join’s sword, causing Join to flinch.

‘This guy is no joke.’

A skilled player.

Join immediately tensed up.

Meanwhile, the player shouted at Join with a surprised look on his face.

“Are you trying to PK me? Do you know who I am? You’ll pay for it if you kill me!”

At this warning, Join only smirked.

‘Funny.’

A threat from someone who couldn’t even kill a skeleton was laughable.

“What if I am? What are you going to do about it?”

With that, Join threw his body towards the player once again. Although the player might be skilled, Join believed that he was still advantageous. If he just bought time, Int would throw another magic spell at him. Join might even kill him off before then. What he knew for sure was that the two of them had perfect coordination. They were strong. The number of players they PKed so far was a proof of that.

Just that…

‘What am I going to do? Be thankful, that’s what.’

The player they were up against was Hyrkan who had finished his preparations.

The Joint duo was unlucky. Hyrkan had already made a trap for them.

Before Join could close the gap between himself and Hyrkan, the Skeleton Warrior threw its body at Join.

‘What!’

Join couldn’t help but to be surprised at the Skeleton Warrior suddenly helping Hyrkan. To him, the Skeleton Warrior seemed like a monster, not a summon.

At the same time Hyrkan snapped his fingers twice, another two Skeleton Warriors that had been in hiding came out. They charged towards the magician still in the middle of casting another spell. Knowing that the opponent moved as swordsman and magician duo, Hyrkan had already made his plans.

‘Thanks for the meal.’

Hyrkan once again expressed his gratitude to Warlord for providing him with his dinner.