Chapter 92

Father, having confirmed Theo’s login, dashed to the guild house without delay. Since her residence was in Lucilvania, it didn’t take long.

Bursting through the door as if about to shatter it, she charged toward Theo in the central hall, intending to grab him by the collar. But seeing Theo’s face, she froze mid-motion.

“What happened to your face?”

She immediately grabbed Theo’s face, examining it from every angle. Both cheeks were pressed and contorted. Blaine flailed his hands in panic, stamping his feet helplessly. Theo, being roughly handled, finally managed to pull her hands away.

“M-My face… what’s wrong with it?”

“You look like a corpse.”

“A corpse…?”

Theo furrowed his brow, feeling the gravity of the comment. He touched his own face, but that alone couldn’t reveal his condition. Seeking confirmation, he glanced at Blaine, who simply nodded silently.

“A corpse, huh?”

[Guild] [Marco: Huh?!]

[Guild] [Marco: It’s Theo!!]

At that moment, a flurry of shouting messages popped up in chat. There wasn’t time to debate the “corpse” remark.

[Guild] [Yorkshire: Oh! It’s really him!]

[Guild] [Leather Flute Hip Song: Hyung’s online?!]

[Guild] [If It’s You Then Me: When did you get here, dude?!]

[Guild] [If It’s Not You Then Me: What?! You’re okay?!]

[Guild] [Noquia: You bastard! What happened?!]

[Guild] [Bastard Kid: Hyung, what happened?]

[Guild] [Red Snapper: Hyung ㅠㅠ]

[Guild] [Mastar: We were so worried ㅠ]

[Guild] [Holanghee: Sweetie! When did you get here?! Where are you now?!]

Perhaps Marco’s message triggered the notifications, as one excited message after another flooded in.

Upon realizing Theo was at the guild house, guild members rushed over, turning the place into complete chaos. Theo found himself trapped in a barrage of questions, his pale face growing even paler until Father finally intervened, freeing him from the relentless interrogation.

“So… what exactly happened that day?”

Holanghee asked. Theo recalled the tactile filter surging in front of him as he began to explain.

“It was because of the tactile filter.”

“Huh?”

“When those weird guys attacked me, the tactile filter activated automatically. The level gauge spiked past the limit. When the sensory system becomes overly sensitive, the game itself blocks sensations to protect the player and forces an exit. I think that’s what kicked me out.”

“The tactile filter spiked? Why? How?”

“I don’t know.”

“Then… why couldn’t we contact you after you were kicked out?”

“I must have lost consciousness. When I woke up, it was already dawn.”

Hearing that he’d been unconscious for over half a day made everyone shudder. If anything had gone wrong…

Shivering at the thought, Noquia rubbed his arm and asked,

“Getting kicked out of the game like that must’ve been quite a shock. Are you okay?”

“Yeah… when I woke up, I couldn’t even move a finger. I barely managed to call for a medicol. My biological rhythm was thrown off by the shock, but there’s no major problem. With enough rest and stabilization, I should recover quickly.”

Only then did everyone understand why Theo’s face was so pale. They considered ushering him into the guild dorm immediately to rest, though Father still looked completely bewildered.

“No… aside from the tactile filter, how did they even attack you? Those weren’t murderers back then, right?”

At Father’s question, Theo shook his head.

“I don’t know either. I was too out of it at the time.”

A brief silence fell. Thoughts scrambled through everyone’s mind, chaotic and overwhelming. Yet, despite the uncertainty, Bastard Kid cautiously spoke up.

“Could it… be a bug?”

“Where would a bug come at such perfect timing?”

Marco immediately shot down the assumption, refusing to entertain it. The sense of unease grew; whispering among themselves wouldn’t solve anything. Father rose from his chair with determination.

“First, let’s report this to the admin. This doesn’t seem like something we can dismiss as a simple bug.”

Everyone nodded in agreement, gathering around Father as if to help draft a report. Theo exhaled slowly in the relative quiet, glancing at Blaine.

If Blaine had been the one attacked instead of him, his data might have completely burned out on the spot. Whether it was a bug or not would only be clarified by the admin, but if it wasn’t, Blaine could have been in real danger.

The next day, Father received a reply from the admin. The verdict: it wasn’t a simple bug. The phenomenon, which inflicted “shock” on online players, had emerged suddenly and was spreading rapidly. Victims were increasing, and it appeared to be a targeted attack against fourth-generation players.

However, the attackers couldn’t precisely identify fourth-generation players, so they struck indiscriminately. Fourth-generation players would die immediately as their data burned out, whereas first, second, and third-generation players would only experience minor aftereffects.

Apparently, one fourth-generation player had already died from it.

Father, reading the email on the display, sighed before adding,

“They’re still in the stage of identifying the culprit, so there’s no concrete information yet. They plan to hand the case over to the central government soon. It seems this has arisen because some fourth-generation players refused the bioethics law.”

“So the terrorists are probably first or second-generation, right?”

“Completely insane.”

“This is hate crime territory…”

Everyone chimed in, glancing at Blaine. He seemed quite shocked that this was a fourth-generation-related incident. It made Theo being attacked even more alarming.

A soft voice then came from Theo.

“Thank goodness…”

His gaze was on Blaine. Blaine, not understanding the meaning behind Theo’s words and gaze, asked, “Huh?”

Theo murmured with a relieved expression,

“I was the one attacked… and you were right there beside me.”

Theo’s hand trembled slightly—fear unmistakable.

But Blaine didn’t notice the subtle trembling. All he felt was the sharp relief embedded in Theo’s words: I almost died instead of you.

It wasn’t me, yet Theo almost died in my place… and that’s supposed to be relieving?

Blaine’s chest swelled with emotion, blinding him to Theo’s fear and relief. He couldn’t grasp just how terrified Theo had been, nor how intensely he had worried.

Ignoring the guild members gossiping loudly about the “terrorists worse than Kilimanjaro,” Theo and Blaine decided to head back to Lateon.

With fourth-generation players being targeted, hunting was out of the question. And Blaine couldn’t be left alone. Staying together in the village until the situation calmed seemed safest.

As they walked toward the relay station, chatting along the way, it suddenly struck them: the relay station was outside the village, meaning it wasn’t in a safe zone either.

“Let’s skip the relay station today and ride the horses directly. Waiting for the carriage outside the village could be too dangerous.”

“Huh?”

Startled by the unexpected command, Blaine looked at Theo. Then his gaze shifted toward the relay station outside the village, and he reached out.

“Uh… the carriage is here. Can’t we just run and get on it?”

“Huh?”

Theo glanced toward the relay station. Sure enough, a carriage was pulling in. He was about to suggest that they ride on horseback instead, but Blaine was already hurrying toward the station.

“Come on, hurry!”

He didn’t even bother urging Theo politely.

Before Theo could stop him, Blaine was already moving, and he had no choice but to follow quickly. His heart pounded violently—an ominous thudding. As he closed the distance to Blaine’s back, two figures suddenly shot out from either side.

His heart dropped. They weren’t wearing the faceless masks, but every face he glimpsed twisted into a grin. Weapons were drawn, aimed directly at Blaine.

“Blaine!”

Theo screamed, but before Blaine could even turn, the assailants used mobility skills to reach him in a flash, grabbing him. At the same time, weapons rained down.

Narrowly evading the attack together with Blaine, Theo quickly regained his stance and stared at the assailants.

“?”

No targeting appeared. Normally, monsters show attackable targets, and other players show restricted targeting. But nothing appeared for these attackers. That meant one thing—they were in Murderer Mode.

To fight them, Theo switched to Murderer Mode as well and shouted to Blaine behind him,

“Go to the village!”

Blaine, hearing Theo’s urgent voice, froze in place. His attention was glued to the red tactile filter gauge skyrocketing in front of him.

Seeing Blaine not move, Theo barked at him, incredulous. Then he realized something horrifying.

A red targeting icon hovered over Blaine. Theo snapped back to attention and shouted,

“What are you doing?! Why did you activate Murderer Mode?!”

“Huh?”

Blaine, still overwhelmed by the surging tactile filter, blinked at Theo in confusion. Murderer Mode? He couldn’t understand.

Because Theo had red targeting over him.

“I-I didn’t turn it on…!”

“What?!”