Episode 14
Episode 14: Building a Study Villa - House Building Arc (2)
“This is…….”
“Yeah. I’m looking forward to it.”
The Lv.1 abilities alone had been tremendously helpful for studying, so what would happen at Lv.2?
He couldn’t even imagine it.
Gyeongjun clicked on the skill names as Timo said and checked the Lv.2 unlocked abilities.
[Limitless Study Lv.2]
▶Until now, you have pondered deeply on how to utilize magic, carpentry, and architectural knowledge to aid your studies, and have achieved some degree of success.
This ability will help you devour even more knowledge in the future.
※When crafting items related to studying, abilities that aid studying will be attached.
[Just a Rather Very Intelligent System Lv.2]
▶Until now, you have used the ‘Just a Rather Very Intelligent System (hereafter Timo)’ to measure, explore, acquire information, manifest quests, and so on.
This ability will allow Timo to help you more efficiently in the future.
※The Magic Engineering skill tree is unlocked.
[Dimensional Study Room Lv.2]
▶Until now, you have used the Dimensional Study Room for approximately 412 hours (824 hours when time ratio is applied) for studying, research, crafting, etc.
This ability will help you use your time even more efficiently in the future.
※An upgrade function is added to the Dimensional Study Room.
“Wow. All three look like amazing abilities?”
Gyeongjun was greatly impressed.
Unlike other skills where levels merely increased stats, mythical skills added entirely new abilities!
He was experiencing that grandeur in real time.
[Once you choose one of the three, you cannot choose the remaining two.]
[The remaining two will be given another chance to be selected when more knowledge has accumulated later.]
But he couldn’t have all three.
If he continued studying, he would eventually be able to have all three, but for now, he could only choose one.
A careful choice was required.
Gyeongjun looked at Timo and asked.
“If I choose the second one and raise your level, what happens to you? The explanation says the Magic Engineering skill tree is unlocked? What even is Magic Engineering in the first place?”
“So there are things you don’t know either. But a technology combining magic and science…….”
Gyeongjun racked his brain, wondering what that could be, imagining this and that.
Then, Timo said something unexpected.
“Me?”
“That thing is Magic Engineering?”
That’s right!
Gyeongjun had already demonstrated a fragment of Magic Engineering.
He combined Physics 1 knowledge and magic theory knowledge to carve ‘physical rain sound’ into the ‘Magic Memory Stone’.
It wasn’t that there were no magics that remembered sound at all, but carving sound in this way was something only Gyeongjun had done in the current World.
“It seems like it would be incredibly fun. But I’ll have to put it off for later. I haven’t properly studied magic or science yet.”
For Gyeongjun was still on Physics 1 and Chemistry 1.
He hadn’t fully completed magic theory either.
With his current knowledge, combining magic and science was far too premature.
“Haha, sure. I’ll definitely level you up later.”
Then what remained now were 『Limitless Study』 and 『Dimensional Study Room』.
He had to choose one of the two.
Fortunately, both abilities were clear, so the deliberation was easy.
“Limitless Study lets me make items that help with studying, and the Dimensional Study Room upgrade function is…….”
“Yeah. I think so too.”
Items that help studying vs time to study!
The battle between the two was narrowed down to this.
“Honestly, for now, the time ratio of 2x is enough time to study. Rather, even if the ratio increases more, I don’t think my concentration can keep up.”
“Yeah. What on earth is an item that helps with studying?”
Gyeongjun finished deliberating and chose 『Limitless Study』.
[You have selected the mythical skill 『Limitless Study』.]
[The level of 『Limitless Study』 has increased to 2.]
[The Lv.2 unlocked ability has been added.]
The status window did not end here.
[The rare item 『Gyeongjun’s Ash Chair with Posture Correction』 has had a Tenacity buff added.]
[The normal building 『Study Villa』 has had a Tenacity buff added.]
“Huh? Tenacity buff……?”
Gyeongjun couldn’t help but be greatly bewildered.
* * *
“Team Leader, User Gyeongjun has finally completed his house.”
“Hoo, I had thought he might since he started studying the architecture skill book, but to think he would actually complete it…….”
The Team Leader shook his head, already sighing.
“A player obtaining the Territory System shouldn’t be appearing already…….”
Territory System!
The flower of all virtual reality games, and The World’s greatest content that would surface a few years later!
The benefits of having territory were tremendous.
First, you could hire NPCs to operate the territory, and collect taxes to earn money incomparable to hunting.
Currently, the operations team predicted that in about 5 years, or quickly in 3 years, The World would become not a simple level war but a territory war.
Therefore, not just the Team Leader of the 10th Branch, but all monitoring team leaders were closely watching who would be the first to obtain territory.
Of course, it was still far away.
It had only been released for 1 year, and currently The World’s rankers were still only in the early level 200s.
There were countless NPCs stronger than rankers who had just completed their 2nd advancement.
To obtain territory, one had to beat all these NPCs and steal the lord position, or spend a fortune to buy the lord position, which was out of the question for current rankers.
“Why is a level 1 pulling off what rankers can’t and causing a scene!”
“P-please calm down, Team Leader. You’ll lose what little hair you have left!”
Kim Buha barely stopped the Team Leader who was tearing at his own hair.
The Team Leader of the 10th Branch was now at an age where he had to admit to himself that he was balding!
For such a man to tear at his own hair, what Gyeongjun had done was extremely headache-inducing.
“If this continues, there’s a high probability that User Gyeongjun will unlock the Territory System…….”
In fact, to unlock the Territory System, there was no need to steal the lord position by force, nor to buy it.
You just had to build territory yourself!
But as simple as it looked, the conditions were extremely simple and demanding.
『Territory System Unlock Conditions』
①Steal from a Lord NPC by force.
②Buy the lord position for a large sum.
③Build territory directly on ownerless land (requires 1,500+ hours of residence).
1,500+ hours of residence!
By ranker standards, assuming they log into the game for more than 10 hours a day.
Then to unlock the Territory System by building a house directly, they would have to live in that house for at least half a year.
In other words, while logged into the game, they couldn’t hunt or clear quests, and just had to wander around the house they built!
“What lunatic other than User Gyeongjun would do such a crazy thing!”
“T-that’s true…….”
Gyeongjun, who logged into the game for more than 2 hours a day just to study.
For him, unlocking the Territory System was not a very difficult task.
“He’s definitely going to keep studying in the house he built!”
“In the end, it’s just a matter of time. But wouldn’t it take 5 years if he only studies 2 hours a day?”
“He increased his study time these days! On weekends he logs in all day and only studies! The log shows he had 500 hours of connection time in 3 months!”
“Then in just a year and a half, the Territory System will unlock. The other rankers said it would take 3–5 years at best. That’s insane.”
“Do you want to know what’s even scarier?”
The Team Leader had a half-mad expression.
“Vacation is coming soon, vacation! He’s a high school student! He’ll obviously log in all day and only study! Every single day! Uhehehe!”
“P-please calm down, Team Leader……! Didn’t you just get hair transplant surgery not long ago!”
Kim Buha struggled continuously to stop the Team Leader tearing at his own hair.
While thinking to himself…….
‘……Surely he won’t study more than 10 hours every single day without rest?’
People who can sustain studying more than 10 hours a day are quite rare.
No matter how tenacious a person is, there is ultimately a limit.
Everyone has a set amount of tenacity.
‘Right. There’s no need to worry as much as the Team Leader. Looking at the monitoring data until now, there were really few times he studied more than 10 hours a day, so.’
“Team Leader! I’ll go make some tea at least. Please calm down while drinking that!”
“Kyaaak!”
Kim Buha doubled his efforts to restrain the Team Leader while thinking that.
But at this moment, Kim Buha did not see.
[User Gyeongjun’s rare item 『Gyeongjun’s Ash Chair with Posture Correction』 has had a Tenacity buff added.]
[User Gyeongjun’s normal building 『Study Villa』 has had a Tenacity buff added.]
The scene where a 『Tenacity Buff』 was added to Gyeongjun’s chair and Study Villa…….
* * *
[Gyeongjun’s Study Villa]
▶When used by a seeker of limitless knowledge: Tenacity +10%
[Gyeongjun’s Ash Chair with Posture Correction]
▶When used by a seeker of limitless knowledge: Tenacity +10%
“Tenacity goes up? Does that even make sense?”
Gyeongjun couldn’t believe the buff written in the status window before his eyes.
Of course, The World was a virtual reality game.
You could use magic that couldn’t be used in reality, and sword skills like sword-drawing that only existed in fiction could be used freely as long as you learned them.
Just as Gyeongjun, a mere high school student, had made a chair by himself, built a house, and cast magic.
But that didn’t mean the mental strength of the person playing changed.
Tenacity was a type of mental strength.
This was something Gyeongjun had never seen, nor heard about from friends.
Even though several of his friends had risen to quasi-ranker status in The World.
“Yeah. Let’s do that.”
He had originally intended to study after making a desk as well.
But the current Gyeongjun could think of nothing but testing that Tenacity buff right now.
Thud.
Gyeongjun entered the Study Villa, placed the chair, and sat down immediately.
Then a status window appeared before his eyes, and a strange sensation began to arise throughout his body.