Stay-at-Home Summoner

[NPia Corporation, Chairman’s Office.]

“Nice!!”

The president, vice president, head of department, and even the overall PD of [Granad Impact: Redive] all raised their fists and cheered.

“Look! She put it back on because we buffed her!”

The president rewound the video playing on the screen.

It was a part that had been replayed several times already, but they couldn’t help but watch it again.

Brrrrr.

The sound of a rough helicopter.

Standing on the bridge of an American aircraft carrier, holding a scythe, was Elaine, flanked by marines lined up on either side.

They knew.

They knew she was a cosplayer maid.

Everyone knew she was cosplaying as an S-Rank hunter named Elaine.

Yet, the reason why people at NPia were so happy was that she had returned to her original form.

“Praise the Coser!”

“For the Master!”

“Ugh, I knew it… damn! Thinking about how the stock price fell when she appeared in that Chinese android cosplay…! Ugh…!”

If there was someone wondering why they were making such a fuss over a single person’s cosplay, they probably had just woken up from a month-long hospital stay with no memory.

“You guys worked hard. Huh? You really did.”

“Hahaha. Not at all.”

The president patted the overall PD on the shoulder while laughing.

The PD managed a sheepish smile at the president’s grin, but he couldn’t erase the dark shadows under his eyes.

“What about the user reactions?”

“Mixed.”

“Mixed?”

“Yes. There are people happy about the Elaine cosplay because we buffed her, and there are others grumbling about it.”

“They can’t say anything to our faces, but they talk a lot behind our backs.”

The president skimmed through the comments on YouTube, chuckling.

“If it weren’t for the Coser, we wouldn’t have the gacha currency distribution, Elaine’s buffs, or even the old character AS.”

Old character AS.

In most mobile subculture games, once a character is released, their performance is not patched or modified.

Even if they did, they’d only buff them if they were too weak to get players to spend money right after launch, not after a long time.

It’s not like they’re adding special equipment unique to that character, like ‘collectibles.’

It’s not just about increasing skill base damage either.

If it shakes the very mechanics of the existing system, does that mean we’d have to start pressing QWER now? They might even add D and F later on, right?

“Boss, this is a mobile game.”

“There are mobile games with four skills each. No, some have six. League of Legends came out on mobile, so what’s the problem?”

“It’s a bit different… sigh.”

The more the president was happy, the harder the vice president and overall PD had to force a smile.

“Guys, the sales are increasing. Bonuses are going up. I’m not throwing around empty checks, you just have to hold on for now!”

“We’re in a crunch state every day…”

“We’re coming in every day without a weekend…”

“You’re getting paid 2 million won a day, so are you going to keep complaining?”

Under the president’s stare, the vice president and PD exchanged glances.

Although they were already receiving much more than that in bonuses, perhaps because so much money had been deposited into their accounts in a short amount of time.

“Can we not take that 2 million won and take a day off…?”

“Exactly. Everyone is exhausted.”

“Ah…”

The president scratched his head, but he couldn’t forcibly mobilize people who seemed like they were about to collapse at any moment.

No matter how much money one makes, if they can’t spend it and end up dying from overwork, what meaning would that have for the individual?

“Okay. Then let’s take our time with adding new skills. Elaine was a special case; let’s focus on patching the regulars and the 1.0 characters step by step.”

“That’s still work… I mean, it’s better than saying we need to patch all the characters in 1.X. Sure.”

“If we re-release the characters with the new skills, it might have a bit of a positive impact on revenues—”

“No, no.”

The president waved his hand.

“Distribute.”

“Huh?”

“Distribute one every time we equip R-Skills for characters released from 1.0 to 1.7.”

“No, sir. Which crazy company would do that?”

“And to synergize with them, we need to overhaul the mechanics for the new characters being released this time.”

“…….”

The overall PD grimaced at the president’s wild ideas, but in the end, he was just another worker.

“Ah…”

“I’m sorry. I know you guys are really struggling, but that’s the only thing I can do. Financial treatment.”

“……How much treatment will you provide?”

“How much…?”

The president raised a finger while watching a video of the S-Rank Tower hovering above Dokdo.

“There can’t be a better advertisement effect than Coser succeeding in taking Dokdo and coming out looking exactly like the perfect Elaine. If that happens, I’ll give every employee 100 million won.”

“…Are you crazy, sir?”

“Yeah, crazy.”

The president replied, wiping his nose.

“If the Coser succeeds in conquering Dokdo, it would strongly affirm ‘Dokdo is Korean territory’ worldwide. Isn’t that worth it? It’s not like the company is broke.”

“…….”

“Let’s make an announcement. About Dokdo… well, including Jeju Island too. We sincerely wish for the S-Rank hunters’ conquest of the tower.”

“Um, president.”

The head of department quietly raised his hand.

“But the Coser is attempting it alone; wouldn’t it be late for Dokdo?”

“…….”

* * *

Should it be called a special skill?

Or perhaps a powerful extermination skill.

Although the existing skills were quite strong, the newly added skill was indeed impactful, as expected of a special skill.

[Kiiiiiii!!]

The sound of monsters dying rang sharply in their ears.

In the waters near Dokdo, which had turned into a wasteland, it was not whales that were undulating but colossal earthworms. Whenever Elaine took out one, three more would come dashing in, eager to devour her.

Slash!

Elaine’s attack split the earthworms in one blow.

I could’ve controlled her to slice the earthworms, but Elaine did not and instead cut them down with her own strength as much as possible.

[Elaine: Please find the way to the boss.]

Elaine wanted it.

The method to conquer this S-Rank dungeon in Dokdo.

‘I need to find it.’

There were videos of other hunters attempting to conquer Dokdo before.

They were not materials I could get individually, but among the gifts President Louis gave me when I said I was conquering the S-Rank Tower in Dokdo, there was such a video.

A video full of Japanese dialogue.

It was an unofficial, inappropriate ‘Japanese Dokdo conquest video’ that President Louis possessed.

It made me wonder how such unaired materials could be in America, but it seemed they were kept as copies on an analog computer that only played old CDs without internet access, just like those who loved analog.

Even if it weren’t that video, I could gather information through journals or other materials that a hunter in Japan had, but the footage obtained through espionage by the U.S. contained some ungarnished content.

– We’ve been fighting earthworms for a week; what can we do now!

– Ugh, no way. If we keep fooling around trying to conquer this, we’ll all die.

The ‘raid party’ in Japan had given up.

The raid party of 3 S-Ranks and 19 A-Ranks had sneakily approached Dokdo at night via a submarine to assault the tower but returned without any results.

They did have some outcomes.

– I can’t see the way up to the boss room!

No matter how much they walked and observed, all they encountered were the earthworms popping out of the ground.

No matter how many hundreds or thousands of monsters they defeated, they only gained fatigue and stress, leading the illegal raid party in Japan to abandon the conquest.

The situation in Korea was no different.

They had even attempted this raid when an S-Rank tank who had died in Mungyeong was alive, so there was information remaining about it in Korea.

[Elaine: If it’s the Master, you will definitely find the way to the boss room.]

Elaine kept slicing down monsters while encouraging me.

Although gaining kills didn’t equate to experience, and only consumed mana, she diligently ran around the battlefield to show me as much as she could.

However, all that appeared was the massive and vast wasteland.

‘Those who came in before must have tried just about everything.’

Both the Korean raid party and the illegal Japanese one had attempted various strategies.

Especially, those who had come in secretly from Japan used every method to claim “we conquered it, so it’s ours” once they managed to take Dokdo.

Killing 6666 earthworms or digging down into the ground.

Trying to fly as high as they could into the sky.

[Elaine, do you see anything?]

[Elaine: I only see earthworms so far.]

[Then….]

For now.

[Try to jump as high as you can on the earthworms. And take a stance as if you’re swinging your sword downward.]

[Elaine: Yes. Following your orders.]

Elaine jumped high into the air as per my instructions without striking the earthworms.

She then assumed a posture looking down at the ground, gripping her sword.

Swoosh.

I controlled Elaine.

Since I was trying to manipulate her in the air, Elaine’s body stiffened, and the earthworms below began to panic one by one.

The gap between game and reality.

Although it wasn’t intentionally caused, inside that world, which had transformed into a game, I saw it.

A wide bar that appeared on the screen.

The boss’s health bar.

“…….”

Should I call it a blind spot?

Or was it that this was something only I could perceive by viewing this battlefield as a game?

‘Whether in a game or reality, there are things that cannot be seen by the human eye.’

Unless one looks down from a high place, or if they’re not observing like a deity, some things simply can’t be seen.

[Elaine.]

I gave instructions to Elaine without hesitation.

[While dealing with the earthworms, make sure the ground looks like a ‘wall’. I’ll deal damage to the boss in the meantime.]

Releasing the control, Elaine dropped downwards.

Quickly regaining her stance, she ran along the ground parallel to it while stepping on the head of the earthworm that had popped out.

And as she adjusted her body to face the ground as if standing above the void.

Clink.

I unleashed a full combo with Elaine.

Although I couldn’t split the black earth, the sword’s aura slashed down towards the ground.

Yet, one thing that was only visible to me.

The boss’s health bar decreased.

“…As expected.”

It might have been wishful thinking, but as anticipated.

Or perhaps because it had never been so before.

“Looking for the boss room while being in front of it made it invisible.”

The wasteland, where earthworms poured out.

That in itself was the boss.

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