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Chapter 87: Tuna

Urok suppressed the blood welling up in his throat and engraved the faces of his enemies in his memory. He glared resentfully at the three men who had hindered his plans—Crockta, the orc warrior from the continent; Tiyo, the gnome soldier who had come with Crockta; and Anor, the forgotten descendant of necromancers who had appeared out of nowhere. If it hadn’t been for them, Nuridot would have fallen into his hands without the chiefdom suffering much loss. However, those three had ruined everything.

Urok tried to make a last-ditch effort with his axe, but his body refused to move. A red color seeped into the edges of his vision. He could sense that his end was approaching.

Urok wanted to at least ruin the three men\'s triumphant expressions, so he cursed them, “The chieftain... will chase after you guys.”

However, he didn\'t get the reaction he had anticipated. The three men appeared to be amused as if they had been waiting for him to say those exact words. Urok acknowledged his defeat. These men were much bolder and stronger than he had expected.

Urok then raised his gaze and saw Crockta’s greatsword flashing in the sun right in front of his eyes.

‘Ahh, that light,’ Urok thought wistfully.

He had always welcomed the sight of flashing blades under the sunlight on the battlefield.

Then, a pitch-black curtain started to descend on him, starting from the top of his head. Urok realized that the darkness was death coming to greet him, but he forced himself to keep his eyes open to see the light of the blade. Thus, Urok met his end with his eyes wide open.

“This is the end,” said Crockta.

Anor’s appearance earlier had completely changed the tide of war. With nothing to hold him back, Crockta began to ruthlessly slaughter the chiefdom orcs, and Anor revived the orcs that Crockta had killed and used them as their soldiers. The dark elves didn’t have to worry about accidentally injuring the undead, so they were able to freely shoot their arrows and attack the chiefdom orcs.

The chiefdom’s warriors fought back with all of their might, but they were unable to turn the tables. With Urok’s death as the signal, the orcs began retreating, and the dark elves let out cheers of victory. Despite this, the three men who had led the battle to victory seemed unhappy.

“Anor,” Crockta called out to Anor.

Anor immediately replied, “Which crazy bitch is calling... Ah, Crockta.”

“...”

The guy who had once been unable to say a mean word to anyone was now spewing curse words by reflex.

‘So what?’ Crockta shrugged.

“You seem to have gone through a lot. How are your ears?” asked Crockta.

“Ah, yes...” Anor murmured while touching his shortened ears.

With his short ears, he no longer looked like a dark elf. Instead, he looked like a human who was a bit tan.

Crockta gestured at the dark elves. “They seem to want an explanation.”

After the invading orcs retreated, the dark elves began eyeing Anor warily. The dark elves’ eyes were filled with fear and disgust. Anor reminded Crockta of the man he had met previously in Chesswood—Iron the necromancer, who had called himself ‘a man that\'s like fine wine.’ It had been the same for Iron as well; the power to raise beings from the dead always elicited fear in others.

“Yes,” said Anor as he straightened his back.

He decided he would no longer concern himself with others’ perception or judgment of him.

Anor could have explained to the dark elves that he had been forced to release his powers by cutting off his ears because he had been placed in danger. The fact that the selfish dark elves had tried to sacrifice him for their own safety would serve as compelling evidence of Nuridot’s duplicity as a village and allow him to declare that the severe discrimination he had faced from the dark elves, not the orcs, had driven him into a corner.

Nevertheless, Anor decided not to do so. He had been persecuted his whole life in Nuridot, but none of the dark elves had ever explained to him why he deserved such treatment. Nothing would change.

Anor grinned as he said, “What are you looking at, you fucking dogs?”

***

Yi-An disconnected from the server and checked the time. He had been logged on for quite a while this time, and he was hungry. Wondering what was in his fridge, Yi-An went to the kitchen to check.

“Is there anything...?” muttered Yi-An as he opened his fridge.

There wasn’t much. The fridge was mostly empty, but he discovered an airtight container that he had never seen before with a sticky note on it.

Written in round letters that seemed to be Yi-Yoo’s handwriting, the note wrote:

Quit playing games and eat something, you game addict.

Yi-An opened the container and saw that there were several sandwiches inside. They looked a bit sloppy as if Yi-Yoo had made them herself. Yi-An grinned, took out a sandwich, and bit into it. He relished the flavor of canned tuna between the crunchy vegetables. Despite the sandwich’s sloppy appearance, it tasted quite good.

“Hmm...”

After finishing the sandwich, Yi-An walked over to the living room and reviewed what had happened in the game. He had been logged on for a very long time.

He had been able to further immerse himself in the game in the northern region because there weren’t any players around. In fact, he had even forgotten his real name, Jung Yi-An, and lived like Crockta for a while. If the system hadn’t warned him about his game usage, then it was likely he would still be playing the game.

“I really am a game addict now,” he muttered to himself.

Yi-An checked his phone. He had received several messages from Han Yeo-Ri. Most of them were about trivial matters, but he felt bad because he hadn’t seen her for a while. He realized then that he needed to visit the café and do something for Han Yeo-Ri, who was running the café on his behalf. Yi-An hummed a song as he showered and prepared to go out.

The café was quite empty when he arrived. There were fewer customers during this time of the year because students were on vacation.

Yi-An approached the counter with a smiling face and asked, “How have you been?”

When Han Yeo-Ri noticed Yi-An, her eyes widened in shock.

She then rolled her eyes and whispered to Yoo Soo-Yeon next to her, “Soo-Yeon, do you know that face?”

“The boss?” said Soo-Yeon.

“No, he’s not our boss. That’s the face of a demon, a demon.”

Yoo Soo-Yeon giggled. The two women seemed very close now.

“That’s the face of a capitalistic demon who enjoys a free-spirited life while entrusting the store to lesser beings,” said Han Yeo-Ri.

“I can hear everything,” stated Yi-An.

“I said it for you to hear,” retorted Han Yeo-Ri, glancing over at him.

Yi-An smiled bitterly. He had indeed been neglecting the store. After all, he had been logged into Elder Lord all day long.

“Fine. Is everyone free after work?” asked Yi-An.

He always said this whenever he was treating his staff to a meal.

“Tuna sashimi,” replied Han Yeo-Ri immediately.

“...”

“Let’s eat something classy. Tuna,” repeated Han Yeo-Ri.

Yoo Soo-Yeon just tilted her head curiously.

“Based on that reaction, it seems you’ve never had tuna sashimi before. The boss will show us today that even demons have a conscience,” whispered Yeo-Ri to Soo-Yeon while glancing over at Yi-An again.

Yi-An couldn’t help but laugh as he watched them. “Fine, fine. Yes.”

“Yes!” Han Yeo-Ri beamed.

Yi-An couldn’t understand how someone so small had such a large appetite, but he expected to see a hefty bill today.

Just then, a group of customers entered the café. Yi-An looked around the café and organized some things while Han Yeo-Ri and Yoo Soo-Yeon received their orders. He aligned the tables with the chairs, picked up some trash, and re-stocked the supplies. Then he sat in a corner of the café and blankly watched the scene before him. Yi-An always felt very content whenever he observed his café, which he’d decorated according to his tastes, like this.

Starting from his childhood to his time as a member of foreign troops, Yi-An had lived in environments where he could not express himself. When he was a kid, he didn’t know anything, and when he was a little older, he needed to take care of Yi-Yoo. When he became a soldier, he didn’t have much freedom. He only had the freedom to choose what kind of gun or weapons he wanted to use. It was only after returning to his country and setting up the café that Yi-An learned what he liked for the first time in his life.

Decorating the store according to his tastes rehabilitated him back to normalcy after being in the military for so long. Yi-An had chosen everything in Café Reason—the dark walnut-colored table, the steel chairs that provided ample back support, the steampunk-style pipe light fixtures, and a partition that divided the interior of the store to guide the customers’ trajectories. He had even picked the font for the menu hanging at the counter. Yi-An had also adjusted the height of the counter so that the customers and staff members could face each other comfortably.

“Welcome,” Han Yeo-Ri greeted cheerfully and smiled with her eyes.

Yes, even Han Yeo-Ri had been chosen by Yi-An. He had picked her because he liked the way she smiled with her eyes.

Suddenly, their eyes met.

Han Yeo-Ri mouthed ‘What are you looking at?’ to Yi-An and raised an eyebrow. However, as soon as a customer came up to the counter, she immediately changed her expression and smiled brightly.

Yi-An grinned and closed his eyes, leaning back against the steel chair.

That’s right. He had chosen everything here. Everything at Café Reason was according to his tastes, and he hoped to see this sight for as long as he wanted.

***

[Boss, where are you? Unnie is buying antacids right now, lol.] Yoo Soo-Yeon had sent Yi-An a text.

When Yi-An read the message, he thought about the first time he met Yoo Soo-Yeon. It had been the day that Lenox died. Yi-An had just disconnected from the server in a state of confusion after returning to Orcrox and informing the orcs about the emergency. He had been taking a walk at dawn to calm himself. That was when he’d seen her and rescued her from a group of bullies.

Now, Yoo Soo-Yeon’s profile picture on her messenger was a picture of her smiling widely with Café Reason in the background. In the corner of the picture was Han Yeo-Ri making a peace sign during work. Yoo Soo-Yeon seemed to be doing well. Yi-An didn’t know the specifics of her situation because he didn’t pry into her personal life, but she seemed a lot happier lately.

[I’m at the café near Gumang-ro. Yeo-Ri knows the location. Take your time,] Yi-An replied. He was about to close the messenger app when he added a joke, [Buy some antacids for yourself as well.]

Yi-An felt bad that he hadn’t been able to pay much attention to Café Reason lately, so he was planning to treat them to a nice meal. He was going to go all out and let them eat to their heart’s content. Yi-An had just received the sponsorship funds for Elder Lord’s high-rankers, so he was loaded now. The sponsorship funds for high-rankers were even more than he had expected. It was an enormous amount; the sum had many more zeros than he had anticipated.

“Should... I just buy the whole building that the Café is in?” wondered Yi-An.

He had only received his first payment, but buying the building seemed feasible if he took out some loans. Yi-An thought of the kind-hearted landlord lady who occasionally came to the café and complimented him on the taste of the coffee. Now that he had a lot of money, he couldn’t believe that he had been on the brink of death so many times in the past just to earn money.

Yi-An had hesitated when the system told him to enter his bank account information for the sponsorship funds. The thought of Ji Ha-Yeon, the heir of Myeongsong Group, had weighed on his mind. She had a strange affinity for him from his time in the military, so he had been concerned that his information could be leaked to her. It didn’t really matter to him if she found out that he was Crockta, but he felt like he wouldn’t be able to enjoy Elder Lord as much once she knew.

Later on, Yi-An did some research and found out about Elder Lord’s core system and how the payments worked. All sponsorship funds for high-rankers were transferred to a bank account managed by Elder Lord’s core system Albino, which would then transfer the sponsorship funds once again to a virtual bank account of its creation. Then, Albino would distribute the funds to the top five hundred high-rankers based on their achievements. After distributing the money, Albino would delete the virtual bank account and any information associated with the players every time. It was a confidential system that had been created in consideration of the high-ranking players who might opt to keep their personal information private. Even the developers weren’t able to look up a player’s private information.

Yi-An was about to close his messenger app when he heard a voice nearby.

-The Heaven and Earth clan led by Choi Han-Sung, also known as Rommel, declared war on the Metatron clan, which ranks first in Elder Lord’s power ranking. Both clans mainly consist of players from their own countries, so some people see it as a battle of pride between Korean and American players.

It was the voice of the show host of Elder Lord Times, which Yi-An had grown used to hearing. Someone was watching the show on their cell phone. Yi-An also turned on Elder Lord Times out of curiosity. He hadn’t been keeping track of what was going on in Elder Lord ever since he departed for the northern region in the game.

-The Heaven and Earth clan has greatly expanded its influence after developing close relations with NPCs. This tactic of expanding a clan’s scope of influence through NPCs reminds us of the now-disbanded Haedong Balhae clan. Choi Han-Sung recruited...

Yi-An furrowed his eyebrows. He had looked into Choi Han-Sung’s information in the past. Choi Han-Sung was a handsome and talented player. He was the type of person who would be the main character in a movie or a television series.

-Choi Han-Sung is currently number two in Elder Lord’s ranking—the highest among Koreans. His value skyrocketed recently, and he has been featured in many commercials.

At the mention of commercials, Yi-An recalled that the ‘Choi Han-Sung Ramen,’ which had been released recently, was quite popular. Choi Han-Sung had said that he ate a lot of instant noodles to quickly finish his meals before playing games, so he developed a refined palate for instant noodles. He had assured that the Choi Han-Sung Ramen did not pale in comparison to other top-tier instant noodles.

The show hosts of Elder Lord Times then quickly changed the topic and introduced the current events in Elder Lord. Yi-An learned through the show that the war between the Heaven and Earth clan and the Metatron clan had begun. He also learned that the independent player village Shangri-La, which public official Elaine had set up, was prospering and that a new king had ascended as the leader of the Confederation of Human Cities. The show hosts mentioned other familiar names as well.

-A group of individuals who follow the will of the justice-seeking orc, Crockta, has emerged. Although Crockta has been hiding from the public eye for some time, many follow in his footsteps and strive to bring forth justice. Recently, the necromancer Iron, who is trending as ‘the man that’s like fine wine,’ revealed that he is a member of Crockta’s fan club, Praise the Orc. He said he is punishing ill-mannered players all over Elder Lord.

-The Rebirth Brotherhood has succeeded in executing the ‘concrete method’ on Tiger Mask—the clan master of the ET Clan, which is infamous for its scoundrel players. Thus, the drawn-out fighting between the Rebirth Brotherhood and the ET Clan has finally come to an end. Let’s listen to their interviews.

Yi-An smiled contentedly. The members of his fan club, Praise the Orc, were continuously increasing in number. Youvidser Laney, who had become a celebrity overnight thanks to Crockta, revealed that she was a member of Crockta’s fan club, and even celebrities had begun to bandwagon on the trend and said they were Crockta’s fans. Everyone was eagerly waiting for Crockta’s return.

Crockta planned to return to the continent once he had the chieftain’s head in his hands. Yi-An cackled while thinking about this and then realized he was laughing in the manner of orcs.

He grew self-conscious and coughed awkwardly, “Ahem.”

Yi-An realized that he had truly adopted Crockta’s speech mannerisms. Yi-Yoo had also noticed this before and warned him to stop talking in such a lofty manner. He had to be more careful and make sure his habits from the game didn’t slip out.

“Boss,” someone called out.

When Yi-An raised his head, he saw Han Yeo-Ri and Yoo Soo-Yeon approach him.

Han Yeo-Ri grabbed Yi-An\'s sleeve and pulled him up. “Why are you increasing another café’s sales? Shouldn’t you be worried about your own?”

“Who cares,” retorted Yi-An.

“Let’s go quickly,” said Han Yeo-Ri.

Yoo Soo-Yeon watched them with a smile, while Yi-An grinned.

“You promised us tuna. You can’t go back on your word,” warned Han Yeo-Ri.

“I know,” replied Yi-An.

“I’m not gonna hold back tonight. Let’s go, Soo-Yeon!”

Han Yeo-Ri grabbed Yoo Soo-Yeon’s arm and went outside. Yi-An followed after them. Seeing the petite Han Yeo-Ri brimming with excitement suddenly reminded him of someone else.

If it were that person, he would have said, “Crockta! You can’t go back on your word! Tuna!”

Yi-An came to a stop. Would that guy know the taste of tuna? He felt as if the borders of reality were shaking.

‘Ah, that’s why.’

As Han Yeo-Ri beckoned him to walk faster, Yi-An realized why he liked Elder Lord so much, why he wore a bandana to hide his player status and preferred to hang out with NPCs, and why he fought for NPCS rather than players.

“Boss,” beckoned Han Yeo-Ri.

Yi-An quickened his pace. He had new people in his life who were important to him now. They happened to be characters in a game, but they occupied a section of his heart that was as large as the sections that Han Yeo-Ri and Yoo Soo-Yeon occupied.

‘If something were to happen to Tiyo, I would be very angry,’ thought Yi-An.

Suddenly, Yoo Soo-Yeon bumped shoulders with someone passing by. The passerby cursed under his breath.

Yoo Soo-Yeon apologized, “Ah, I’m sorry.”

Seeing the passerby walk away, Yi-An thought, ‘Isn’t it instinct to protect those precious to me?’