The RPG game called <Blackout> which was briefly popular 10 years ago was a game that held many memories for Lee Jeong-jun.
During the busy time of preparing for the college entrance exams.
The experience of playing for one to two hours a day provided him with great comfort amidst the pressures of studying.
Unfortunately,
The game disappeared forever into his memory as the company collapsed due to financial difficulties.
However.
“Crowdfunding for a remake…”
<Blackout> was said to be coming back. But this time in the form of a user-funded project.
“Is this the graphic stage of development?”
The video streaming on the monitor showcased such exquisite graphics that it was hard to believe it was created with current technology.
“How can I not spend money on this?”
Now that he was a proper member of society, spending money on his hobbies was not difficult for him.
“How much should I invest? Wait, are there perks according to the amount of funding…”
Typically, the perk was the inclusion of the contributor’s name as an Easter egg in the game.
The game company of <Blackout> had prepared a unique type of perk.
“If you contribute more than 100,000 won, they’ll unlock some features of a planned DLC?”
This was a carrot that was more than enough to catch Lee Jeong-jun’s interest.
He was willing to invest around 100,000 won without hesitation.
“Alright, let’s give it a shot.”
As a veteran user of the original game, Lee Jeong-jun did not hesitate to pledge money for the game’s remake and his name was the first to appear on the crowdfunding list.
***
Time seemed to flow faster as he got older.
Two years had passed in the blink of an eye, and the game company of <Blackout> had successfully completed its crowdfunding campaign before they launched the game as planned.
With a pounding heart, Lee Jeong-jun sat in front of his computer and was deep in thought about the character creation stage.
“What character should I develop this time?”
During his school days, he had always been short on time.
Back then, Lee Jeong-jun pursued extreme efficiency in his gameplay. This resulted in most of his characters displaying excellent performance.
But playing that way isn’t fun.
It felt like walking down a predetermined path.
During his school days, just playing games made him happy but that was no longer the case.
With the current monotony of his daily office work, he needed new experiences.
“How about a mage?”
A mage.
A class that used mysterious powers and boasted the most overwhelming firepower among all the classes in <Blackout>.
The mages played by other users looked so fun.
However, the mage had a fatal flaw.
The class structure made it impossible for newbie players to even develop.
“It was the class that consumed a ridiculous amount of resources in the beginning.”
A mage’s equipment was expensive to begin with.
Due to the setting of the world in <Blackout>, magical artifacts were selling for high prices and the problem was that these artifacts were the mage’s main equipment.
And that’s not all.
In the early stages, you would have to consistently consume expensive magic potions and purchase “grimoires” which were very different from “skill books”.
Naturally, these grimoires were also incredibly expensive.
You had to read books constantly to increase your knowledge, and also do research to maintain your magical proficiency …
All of this costs money.
Naturally, it was impossible for anyone to gather all these resources from the first playthrough.
And having overlooked that fact, Lee Jeong-jun in the past had tasted the bitterness of life by trying to raise a mage without any support.
After forcing myself to invest in grimoires, I didn’t even have money for potions.
What happened then?
He often collapsed in dungeons, which caused his character’s reputation to plummet and made NPC companions reluctant to join his party.
He was forced into solo play.
And <Blackout> was a game where solo play was impossible due to its setting.
It’s impossible to play without companion NPCs from the gimmick stage onward.
Eventually, his progress in the game completely halted and at that moment, Lee Jeong-jun had to raise another character with tears in his eyes.
“Still, this time, I feel like I can do well……”
He didn’t want to start with an easy class and do multiple playthroughs like he did ten years ago.
As a working adult, his time was limited.
Even if it was just for an hour, he wanted to play in a meaningful and enjoyable way.
“Well, let’s give it a try. There’s no harm in trying.”
If the character failed, it would still be a valuable experience for him.
With that determination in mind, Lee Jeong-jun moved the cursor and pressed the create mage character button.
[Please set your skills.]
“Skills, huh.”
The most important system was skills in this game.
How you allocated them determined your class.
The total points given were 50P.
“Magic… It wouldn’t help to allocate points to various spells early on anyway. I wouldn’t have enough magic to use them all.”
He thought about the skills he needed to assign as he recalled his past memories.
“The important thing is how much I can contribute to the party. Earning resources is the most important.”
In the past, he had ignored this and blindly allocated points to various magic-related skills.
“I can’t repeat the same mistakes.”
It would take a bit longer, but it was a necessary choice to enjoy the game for a long time.
[Herbology -5P]
[Potion Making -5P]
[Basic Magic Talent -10P]
[Keen Eyesight -5P]
[Excellent Memory -6P]
[Steadfast Will -7P]
[Unwavering Heart -7P]
[Luck -5P]
“Herbology and Potion Making are essential to save resources. Keen Eyesight also helps a lot with dungeon mapping.”
Lee Jeong-jun decided to create a balanced character.
Of course, it wasn’t as if he chose any skills without thinking.
In the beginning, a mage had low magical power and low health.
Because of this, it seemed necessary to choose magic-related skills.
Actually, magic-related skills are almost all useless.
Magic-related skills, in particular, consumed a lot of points.
Even if he chose those skills, his magical power regeneration wouldn’t increase.
It would just mean more spending on potions.
But was their performance guaranteed?
He could only cast a few more spells at most.
It was better to boldly give up on the magical power stat.
“There are many ways to increase magical power in the game.”
So he chose Herbology and Potion Making.
He could self-supply the expensive potions early on, and if he had a surplus, he could sell them for profit.
This would establish a foundation for him to endure into the mid and late stages of the game.
“This should be enough.”
Though he would go through various hardships, it wasn’t difficult to make that effort if he could eventually experience the spectacle of upgraded graphics and dazzling magic.
With this, he confirmed the creation of his character.
[Thank you, ‘Lee Jeong-jun’ for participating in the <Blackout> remake crowdfunding.]
“Ah.”
Then he remembered something he had forgotten.
Crowdfunding.
He had completely forgotten about it since it was from two years ago.
“There was supposed to be a perk, right?”
[This game is preparing for future DLC. As a small reward for participating in the crowdfunding phase, we would like to introduce the reincarnation system to ‘Lee Jeong-jun’.]
Lee Jeong-jun tilted his head as he read the message on the monitor.
“Reincarnation? Could it be …”
It was a system he had seen in other games.
[The reincarnation system allows you to select one character from your previous <Blackout> gameplay and transfer one skill from that character to your current character.]
[Loading characters registered to ‘Lee Jeong-jun’s account…]
[Registration complete. Please select the character to apply the reincarnation system.]
“Seriously!”
He never imagined they would include such a feature.
Lee Jeong-jun’s lips curled into a smile at the unexpected reward.
“I can choose one from these?”
Lee Jeong-jun examined the characters he had raised in the past.
A warrior boasting bulging muscles.
A hunter with a sharp look who was equipped with a bow and daggers.
And a mage draped in rags with a frail body.
“Hmm…”
Naturally, Lee Jeong-jun fell into a happy dilemma.
“If I choose the warrior, I can solve the mage’s chronic problem.”
That problem was none other than a lack of stamina.
If he selected the warrior’s supreme skill, [Immortal Body], he could create an unprecedented “tank mage” character.
But this wasn’t an attractive option for him right now.
“I chose the mage because I got bored with the warrior class.”
If that were the case, he would have aimed for multiple playthroughs as a warrior; there was no reason for him to play as a mage.
“How about the hunter?”
This was quite appealing as well.
The unique thrill of slicing through enemies with the hunter’s quick movements was enticing.
Like the warrior, it wouldn’t be impossible if he learned the supreme skill [Dragon Hunter].
If he learned equipment enhancement magic in the future, he might complete a versatile long-range character that could use a bow, dagger, and magic.
“Tsk…”
As his mouse pointer hovered over the hunter character, a feeble mage character suddenly caught his eye.
Was it just his imagination?
For some reason, he felt as if he had made eye contact with the character.
“Mage… hmm…”
That character held many bittersweet memories for Lee Jeong-jun.
In the past, he had harbored great fantasies about a mage character he saw on a community forum.
Thinking that, “I’m a veteran player; do I really need to raise a character with the same multi-playthrough buffs as everyone else?” he had raised the character without any support from anyone.
Thanks to this, he enjoyed the challenge of overcoming difficult trials, but in the end, that character became impossible to grow any further.
“Still, I was really happy when I got the ‘Legendary’ grade skill.”
When his reputation score plummeted to the abyss, which prevented him from recruiting any NPC companions and forced him into solo play.
In order to somehow find a way to revive the character, Lee Jeong-jun boldly entered a dungeon solo at that time.
“I sold all the equipment I had. And then I entered the temple with just a staff and some potions.”
And there, he discovered a hidden piece by chance and obtained a legendary skill.
The skill’s name was [Mana Body].
The name meant “mana is the body”. It was a skill that was practically the ultimate goal for any mage.
It expanded the mage’s already scarce mana pool to a balance-breaking level and greatly increased magical power regeneration.
Moreover, since it was a hidden skill that couldn’t be found in the community, young Lee Jeong-jun felt as if he had the world at his feet.
Until his character got hit by a strange bug.
“That was the first time I realized just how much a game company could screw over its players.”
As soon as he obtained the [Mana Body] skill, a strange error occurred and his character got hit with a curse debuff. And just like that, his character was ruined.
“Seriously, how does it make sense for a mage to get a ‘Mana Disabled’ curse?”
The curse prevented him from using magical power. This forced young Lee Jeong-jun to abandon his mage character.
“But this mage character still has that legendary skill, right?”
So the mouse pointer which had been hovering over the hunter moved to the mage.
“Yeah, I decided to raise a mage anyway. Might as well go all in.”
Rather than taking a pointless risk and ending up with a trash character, it made sense to obtain the reliable [Mana Body] skill.
“It’s still frustrating just thinking about it.”
He hadn’t even been able to use the legendary skill he had painstakingly acquired before his character was ruined.
It was a chance to resolve the regret he felt from that time.
As soon as he finished setting up the reincarnation character, a notification window appeared with elegant graphics. It announced the successful creation of the character.
“Let’s live the life of a splendid mage.”
Lee Jung-jun looked at the game’s loading screen and started imagining the splendid magic that would unfold in the future.
And that was the last scene Lee Jeong-jun saw as “Lee Jeong-jun”.
***
A year had passed since he opened his eyes inside the world of the game.
Swords and shields. Magic and monsters.
The battle cries from the battlefield offered a thrill that he couldn’t have felt when he only watched the game on a screen.
The shouts of his companions.
The various smells that pierced his nose in the air.
Experiencing all of these things firsthand was unlike anything he had ever felt before.
And in the midst of that battlefield.
Lee Jeong-jun imagined.
He imagined his magic bursting among the gathered monsters.
The magical power that surged from his heart absorbed his imagination and twisted reality to bring the once-imagined scene before his eyes.
He imagined the overwhelming magic spreading out like an ocean beyond the horizon and pouring over the monsters.
“Jun, you punk! What are you doing not moving quickly!”
“That lazy bastard, seriously!”
“Hey! We’re out of healing potions here! Where the hell is Jun?”
However, the reality he heard was dismal.
Lee Jeong-jun, or rather, “Jun”, hung his head at the shouting voices.
“F*ck…”
A year had passed since he entered the game world.
Jun’s class was a low-ranking mercenary mage.
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