[Senbing: SaintNice, I’m really sorry, but I think we’ll have to ask you to leave our raid group.]
[SaintessNice: Huh??]
[SaintessNice: Why? Did I do something wrong or—]
[Senbing: It’s nothing like that.]
[Senbing: You know most of our raid members are streamers, right?]
[SaintessNice: Yes.]
[Senbing: Since we’re ultimately a streamer raid group, we can’t help but be conscious of how the viewers see us...]
[Senbing: Your build is off-meta... and your gear score has basically been stagnant for almost six months...]
[SaintessNice: No, that’s because there haven’t been any updates.]
[SaintessNice: And with my build and gear score, we never had any trouble clearing raids.]
[Senbing: That’s true, but... there are just too many viewers who are negative about ssalmeok.]
[SaintessNice: I’m not a ssalmeok;;]
[SaintessNice: I mean, sure, I’ve sold gold and bought chicken a few times, but I’m not a ssalmeok.]
[Senbing: I’m truly sorry, SaintNice... but I think this is as far as we go together.]
I was kicked out of the raid group I’d been part of for half a year.
The reason was that my gear score was low.
[Your party application has been rejected.]
[To Hosipui (Whisper): I’m seriously super experienced.]
[To Hosipui (Whisper): I’m confident I can do well.]
[Hosipui (Whisper): With a build like that, what makes you think anyone would accept you?]
[Hosipui (Whisper): A Saintess running a one-handed sword build without a Holy Scripture? Are you fucking kidding me?]
[To Hosipui (Whisper): One-handed sword Saintess is good too...]
Even public parties wouldn’t really take me.
The reason was that my build was off-meta.
[Ias Gallery]
[Title: What the hell is up with public parties these days?]
[Author: SaintessNice]
It said it was a homework room, so I applied, and they insta-rejected me.
I asked in whispers, and they said it was because I had an off-meta build. But if it’s a homework room, shouldn’t that not matter at all??
As long as we clear, it’s fine, right? Agreed?
ㄴThen make your own room lol
ㄴThis ssalmeok bastard is whining so much
ㄴㄴAgreed
ㄴIf you’re pissed, you be the raid leader
ㄴ(Author) If I make a room, no one comes...
ㄴㄴGee, wonder why? lololol
ㄴㄴAre you genuinely asking because you don’t know?
ㄴInfo) This bastard SaintNice is a legendary ssalmeok who raised all six alts as Saintesses and rotates gear between them
ㄴㄴ(Author) I just made them because I like Saintess...
Even when I complained to people around me, no one took my side.
It was unfair.
The reason I used an off-meta build wasn’t because the setup was cheap. It was just because that build suited me well.
The reason I sold gold for cash was because there was no content, and it felt like a waste to let gold just pile up.
The reason I raised all my alts as the same character wasn’t to save money. It was because I liked being a supporter who took care of others.
It’s unfair.
Unfair, unfair, unfair.
I’m not a ssalmeok. I’m not.
If the reason I couldn’t find a raid group, and the reason public parties wouldn’t accept me, was because they thought I was a ssalmeok...
Then all I had to do was show them proof that I wasn’t.
[Mythic Weapon]
A whale weapon that only the top 0.1% among high-spec players could even attempt.
With this, no one would be able to call me a ssalmeok.
I might have been an unemployed bum who’d only played games in my room, but with the money I’d saved up from selling gold, it was more than worth trying.
And so, after steeling myself, I bought a Mythic Weapon.
With one click, I blew through about a year and a half’s worth of living expenses, but if this let me find parties, then it didn’t matter at all.
That was how serious I was about this game, and how much I loved it.
And a few days later.
[Update Notes]
New T4 Gear Released
My Mythic Weapon became worthless.
[Ias Gallery]
[Title: Upvote if this is the worst fucking patch of all time]
[Author: SaintessNice]
They said they were doing a major update, then suddenly hard reset??
There’s a limit to how much they can depreciate users’ gear;; What the hell is this??
Patch is fucking ruined. I’m just quitting. GG.
ㄴYou’re right, but it sounds weird coming from you
ㄴIt’s SaintNice himself
ㄴIf it resets, isn’t that good for a ssalmeok like you?
ㄴWhen a hard reset comes out, rice prices go up. You should be happy
ㄴInfo) This bastard went Mythic Weapon recently lolololol
ㄴㄴFor real??
ㄴㄴThe reason he wrote this is so fucking obvious lolololol
ㄴㄴBro, you should’ve just kept ssalmeoking like usual lol
ㄴㄴI heard Senbing kicked him because his specs were trash lately
[Ias Gallery]
[Title: Users who are fucked in real time]
[Author: ㅇㅇ(121.31)]
That would be Mythic Weapon owners
Other users can just click once and move on to the next tier of gear
But these guys have to spend even more money lolololol
They’re not spending to become stronger than others. They have to spend a ton of money just to become similar to everyone else lolololol
But what if they just throw away their Mythic Weapon and switch to other gear?
Then all the materials they dumped into their Mythic Weapon become worthless. They’re just stuck holding the bag
These bastards really did hit them with a legendary backstab this time
ㄴ(Basically Kang Ho-dong “as long as it’s not me” meme)
ㄴIt really does feel like these devs all took drugs together
ㄴㄴNo, spend more money lol
ㄴ???: Shut down the servers, you insolent bastards
ㄴIs this really that big of a problem??
ㄴHonestly, upvote if you don’t care about Mythic Weapons lol
ㄴDid someone hold a knife to your throat and force you to go Mythic??
[Ias Gallery]
[Title: Is SaintessNice really quitting?]
[Author: ㅇㅇ(180.226)]
He sold all his gear and accessories??
ㄴIt’s true
ㄴHe says he’s quitting after his Mythic Weapon got depreciated to hell
ㄴㄴ(Author) For real?
ㄴㄴYeah, check the hot post
ㄴㄴ(Author) No, it really is true. But why the hell did this hardcore ssalmeok bitch go Mythic??
ㄴㄴNo one knows
Naturally, if it could be called natural, the patch was not rolled back.
“Haha.”
In the end, I quit the game, and with my mind completely broken, I applied to enlist in the military.
A year and six months passed in the blink of an eye.
“Loyalty! Sergeant Lee Minuk is—”
“Yeah, Minuk. You worked hard during your military service. I hope you achieve excellent results in society too, just like you did here.”
“Thank you, sir. Thank you for everything.”
Having experienced all sorts of human specimens in there, I came to keenly realize how precious society was.
Still, in the end, I was discharged.
Even when I earned money, I had nowhere in particular to spend it. Even when I went out on leave, I had no one to meet.
As a result, I ended up with an amount of money far beyond what was appropriate for a twenty-two-year-old, and I planned to use it to loaf around for a while.
As I happily wondered what I should do with this money, I fell asleep feeling the joy of my discharge.
ㅡㅡㅡㅡ
When I woke up, many things had changed.
It wasn’t simply that my status had been promoted from soldier to civilian.
The first change I noticed was my hair.
Despite the fact that, just yesterday, I had been a sergeant in the Republic of Korea Army, my hair had become long enough to fall below my shoulders.
The next thing that stood out was my field of vision.
I had clearly gotten up the same way as always, and yet my eye level had become unfamiliar enough to feel low.
After that came my body.
Something that should have been there was gone, and something that shouldn’t have been there had appeared.
My brand-new, unopened joystick that I had yet to even use had vanished without a trace, and in its place, two heavy lumps of flesh had appeared on my chest.
“Huh?”
A beautiful voice rang out, to the point where I wondered if it had really come from my own mouth.
Of course, that wasn’t even remotely important.
“M-my money...!”
My money was gone.
[Balance: 199,443 won]
In the account where countless zeroes should have been lined up, there was only an amount that didn’t even reach 200,000 won.
“My military savings...!”
My year and six months of hellish grinding had been replaced by two lumps of flesh on my chest.
ㅡㅡㅡㅡ
Still, humans are creatures of adaptation, and it didn’t take very long to grasp the situation.
[Lee Minji]
[22 years old]
“Lee Minji? My name is Lee Minuk.”
What had changed wasn’t just my body and the money in my account. My identity had changed too.
When I checked my contacts, it still didn’t look like I had many acquaintances.
And when I checked the memo app on my phone, I was able to obtain various additional pieces of information.
[Memo: Part-time job schedule...]
“Ugh, why are there so many part-time jobs?”
A part-time job schedule packed full not only on weekdays, but even on weekends.
I could say with certainty that I had never once lived this diligently in my entire life.
“Is this some kind of... parallel world?”
The owner of this body, Lee Minji, was clearly me, and at the same time, not me.
Another version of me, who had the same family environment and background as I did, but had lived life as a different gender.
For now, that was the only way I could think of it.
I had no idea when I would be able to return to my original body.
[Memo: Next month’s rent 300,000]
“Hmm...”
And in this situation, the biggest obstacle was the rent that was right around the corner.
If I were in my original body, Lee Minuk, it would have been an amount I could pay lightly and still have money left over. But for Lee Minji, it was completely out of reach.
If I didn’t want to be kicked out and die on the streets, I absolutely had to find a way to make money.
“...Should I work part-time?”
And just then, the money-making method I was best at came to mind.
Ssalmeok.
The act of exchanging and selling in-game currency for cash.
And at the same time, a term encompassing gamers who made a living through that act.
If I did ssalmeok, I could easily pay the rent and still have money left over.
Of course, cash trading was an act that violated the terms and conditions set by the game company.
[Update Notes]
New T4 Gear Released
Even now, I had not forgotten Ias, which had turned my Mythic Weapon into trash.
There was no reason for me to go out of my way to enjoy their game purely as a clean user.
This was revenge. Revenge in the form of thorough economic retaliation against the game company that betrayed me.
I’ll keep selling rice.
I’ll sell and sell and keep selling, until I drag the currency’s value all the way down to rock bottom.
This was the greatest reven—
“Huh.”
There was no computer in the house.
This is kind of a problem, isn’t it?