Chapter 79: Chapter 79: Tutorial Skipped, Backstory Skipped, Cutscene Skipped, Then Kill Kill Kill
Inside the Gymnasium, patches of gray fog burst into view and then quickly vanished, giving off the illusion that maybe it was just a trick of the eye. The entire space twisted slightly.
Shrill screeches rang out one after another, accompanied by faint explosions, like dust being blown up by gusts of air. It was as if an invisible fireworks display had gone off in the Gymnasium.
Lu Ce could clearly feel that the vast amount of “malice” previously fixated on him in the Gym was rapidly decreasing—like clearing rows in a game of Tetris.
And the previously noisy Gym was gradually becoming calm. The once bustling sounds of athletic activity were also fading away and eventually vanished completely.
Turns out, even that was the work of Beom In’s Spirit Forms. Everything in the Gymnasium was a distraction, meant to confuse Lu Ce and keep him stuck here.
Park Bu Seong and Beom In had planned everything—except for accounting for Lu Ce’s strength...
An S-Tier Sealed Artifact had only been released for a few minutes, and the Gym was already eerily silent. Those hundreds of Spirit Form clones? Completely wiped out!
Bang!
Lu Ce slammed his book shut and put away Confessions of the Disillusioned.
The negative effects on him were mostly emotional and mental, but thanks to the Wrath Mask, he couldn’t feel any of that.
What Lu Ce could feel was that the moment the book opened, a wave of nameless rage surged inside him—as if everything in the world pissed him off.
Beom In looked super annoying—wanted to kill. This Gymnasium looked like trash—wanted to smash it. This school was an eyesore—wanted to blow it up...
In short, nothing in the world sat right with him!
It was like a black hole that devoured all warmth and rationality in his heart, turning it into pure wrath that wanted to burn the world down.
Now Lu Ce finally understood that line describing Wrath—I am the fire that will burn the world to ash.
This book really shouldn’t be read too much...
Too many sacred texts, and you'll start killing without blinking.
After putting the book away, the Gym became unnaturally quiet. All the earlier chaos and noise now seemed like a hallucination—as if none of it had ever happened.
Peace and quiet was better...
Except for one person...
“I’m such a failure...”
“I’m nothing...”
“Might as well just die...”
Beom In collapsed weakly on the ground, mumbling nonsense like he’d been broken.
His nerves had been twisted too many times. First he was terrified by the Wrath Mask, then overwhelmed by the conceptual power of Confessions of the Disillusioned—his mental state was on the verge of collapse.
Lu Ce, already in a bad mood, looked at the pitiful sight and asked with a kind, sincere tone:
“So, you wanna die?”
“Need a hand with that?”
Beom In’s eyes suddenly lit up, and he shot up off the ground like a spring, staggering back several steps.
“No bro, no! I was just messing around!”
“I was talking nonsense—I want to live, I want to live so bad I can’t even sleep at night, terrified I’ll never wake up again...”
All the negative emotions in his head were wiped clean. His intense survival instinct left no room for disillusionment. Right now, he knew how hard it was to cling to life in front of “Sin.”
Even though the Challenge Mode didn’t have win-or-die rules, if you got caught and beaten to death by “Sin,” that was all on you.
From the corner of his eye, Beom In glanced at the Exit Token on the ground and was just about to figure out how to get it back when Lu Ce casually bent down and picked it up.
Beom In: ?!
Lu Ce didn’t bother with his internal breakdown. He took a few steps toward the center of the Gym and seemed to faintly hear a basketball bouncing.
But his beast-like instincts didn’t pick up anything—no hostility, no signs of being watched. Nothing seemed off.
Though he’d eliminated all the distractions, he couldn’t quite figure out what the real Game content was.
Eliminating wrong choices ≠ finding the right one.
Lu Ce had fought for a long time already. Facing this kind of situation, he didn’t feel like playing it the “proper” way—wasn’t there a ready-made person right here?
He turned to Beom In, who looked completely lost, and asked:
“What’s this Game about?”
Beom In cautiously replied:
“If I tell you, will you not kill me?”
“You could choose not to tell me,” Lu Ce said calmly.
“No! I’ll tell you! I have to tell you!” Beom In snapped to attention. “Basketball. The opponent plays basketball.”
His instant shift in tone shocked all the spectators—but honestly, it was a pretty effective survival tactic.
“And then?” Seeing the cooperation, Lu Ce continued.
“Then I don’t know... seriously. I only had some sense of it because I could spread out Spirit Forms. Only Park Bu Seong knows the real method to clear it.”
“Why not go find Park Bu Seong? Torture him, not me. Torturing me won’t get you anything.”
Lu Ce: ......
At this point, Beom In had completely abandoned his dignity. Sell out a teammate? Sure, do it fast. If it weren’t for Park Bu Seong, he wouldn’t be facing this killing machine in the first place.
Lu Ce: ......
Spirit Forms—effort-intensive, no Pain Points to farm—not worth the hassle. He didn’t feel like overanalyzing. He just wanted to clear this Horror Mystery and move on.
“This might have to be analyzed from the backstory. I think the protagonist of this Horror Mystery is always waiting for someone who can beat him in basketball...”
“Also, his background might be tragic...”
Dignity? Once it drops once, there’s no psychological burden left. Beom In was fully committed now, acting like he was Lu Ce’s teammate.
“Enough. Stop talking.” Lu Ce cut him off. “Just tell me where he is?”
If you think about it in Game terms, decoding and analyzing are super inefficient.
If he was in the Greed Mask, maybe he’d care more about that kind of thing. But right now, he was in Wrath—and Wrath only bothered to use its brain in battle.
It’s like when you play a Game—you skip the tutorial, skip the backstory, skip the cutscene, and just go straight to gameplay, grab your gun, and start blasting.
—I don’t know who I am, I don’t know where I am, I only know it’s time to kill, kill, kill!
Beom In didn’t really get Lu Ce, but he was in “I’m already cooperating, please spare me” mode, so he pointed toward a certain spot.
That area had already been wrecked—Lu Ce had smashed the basketball hoop there earlier, and it had fallen into another part of the court.
Lu Ce walked over, picked up the fallen hoop, and with a thud, stabbed it upright into the floor.
Then, once again, he pulled out Confessions of the Disillusioned, opened it, and laid it flat across the hoop.