All my life.
I had never cursed my life.
Even though I was born a noble orphan, with nothing in my hands.
I lost my memory in a freak accident and was left alone in the world.
I've never let it bother me, and I've lived with it.
But…
There is good in even the most generous of nations.
[Patient... Do not be alarmed, but listen carefully].
[You are on a time limit].
[…What?]
Very bad timing. In a chance medical examination, I learned that my death was preordained.
…Just like that.
Two years since I was diagnosed with a terminal illness.
Just when I thought there were no more surprises.
I was shocked once again.
[Appearance] – Partial synchronization with "Knox Von Reinhafer" has been completed!
[Caution! You will not be able to return to the original world until you complete the game].
*According to the [Time Limit] trait, the remaining players have one year to live.
I am now possessed by the game I was playing.
And it's time-limited once again.
Shoot.
*Upset crash landing
[The hell... why the hell did you make that choice, Knox von Reinhafer. Why did you make a deal with the devil? Why did you betray us?]
The sickly scent of blood and the clash of cold weapons.
On the outskirts of the battlefield, where the only sounds are the groans of dying soldiers, you hear the shaky voice of a girl clutching a sword.
[…Answer me, what the hell was that...!]
Shaaaah....
The sound of the wind whispering in my ears was silent.
The stars that filled the night sky spilled over the girl's head.
The scene was like a painting.
The girl's face was obscured by the inky darkness, but the figure of the man opposite her was clearly visible.
He had bleached white hair and lavender eyes.
And a handsome man with skin so pale it could have been sauce.
Knox von Reinhafer.
Dressed in black, emblazoned with the family emblem of a black sword, his mysterious eyes the owner of the sword that pierced his own heart. He turns to the girl.
His lips, stained blue, open.
[Betrayal..., yes, betrayal to you].
The man called Knox von Reinhaber mocked, clearly dying.
There was no sadness in his voice, no regret, no wistfulness.
There was none of that.
In fact, given his many misdeeds in the past, his treatment now was extremely deserved.
He had awakened the demon Baal,
and possessed him within his own body,
and sought to color the world with evil.
It was the worst crime ever committed, one that no one could tolerate.
And yet, even in his dying moments.
Knox was nonchalant. He spoke, as he always did, in a calm voice.
[I did not betray you. It was you… who betrayed me].
[Cut the crap! Say it! Say it! Since when… when did you become so broken…!]
Nox smiled lightly at the sound of the girl's exasperated voice.
And so far away.
Recalling some past, he muttered to himself.
[It began… with a crash landing].
And then the final, meaningful line.
"After...."
A short sigh escapes my lips and a cold sweat pours out like rain.
A phrase flashed across the lighted monitor.
[You have cleared part 1 of 'Inner Lunatic'].
[Total number of clears: 27]
[The end credits then play].
[Thank you for playing our game].
The voice that accompanied the message lifted my spirits.
I hummed and muttered.
"Okay. Not bad. I unlocked quite a few hidden achievements this time. I also got a bunch of items."
With a smile on my face, I took a moment to review my clearance record.
This time, it was especially difficult because of all the variables.
"Putting down the rebellion in Eastern Tahalin. To investigating the murder of the Empress in the Outer Castle, to rallying the survivors to kill the worst villain of them all, Knox von Reinhafer… well, you get the idea."
Despite all my penance, I eventually beat the game.
As always. This time, too.
"Actually, even for me, this is the first time I've ever beaten a game so close to perfection."
The final boss of Part 1, Nox, is the toughest of the tough.
From all sorts of CC moves, to possessing a demon, he unleashes a barrage of terrifying attacks that only minions can use.
To be fair, he's more of a handsome monster....
The bottom line.
A boss named villain that is difficult to defeat, even for the oldest.
That's the identity of Knox von Reinhafer.
I had just succeeded in killing 'yet another' such boss.
"I like it."
I muttered,
I couldn't help but add a depressing comment.
"Except for the fact that I'm going to be killed next month...."
My gaze drifted to the wall where a red X had been scrawled haphazardly.
I turn to the calendar on the wall.
Immediately, a sense of gloom enveloped my entire body.
No matter how positive I am, it's not easy to premiere in front of death.
"Kulk!"
I let out a thick cough.
I quickly wiped the bloody phlegm away with my sleeve. Should I throw this away again? It won't come off well with water… I thought to myself.
Looking at the ashtray, which was piled high with cigarette butts, I couldn't help but let out a hollow sigh.
I'm really going to die.
Even in this moment. I'm dying dozens of times faster than everyone else.
Like the end of the last villain in a video game.
It's true.
It's been a long time since I've played this game.
About two years.
After being given a shocking time limit by my doctor, I holed myself up in the corner like an invalid and immersed myself in the game.
Inner Lunatic.
I've already cleared it multiple times.
I had memorized every hidden piece and character lore.
It's a fantasy open-world genre that was highly anticipated by many, but crashed and burned due to overly high difficulty.
But for me, it's a game I wouldn't trade for anything. It was a ray of light for me when I was diagnosed with a terminal illness.
I've beaten Inner Lunatic a whopping 27 times.
I was the perfect dead man walking for this game.
"Huh… I wonder if this is a safe ending...."
After enjoying the afterglow of the ending.
I grabbed the mouse again and maneuvered the cursor.
As the end credits rolled on the monitor, I saw the screen light up again. The time had come.
Time to start a new game.
Excitedly, I went ahead and started creating my character.
"So, what kind of character should I make this time...."
I muttered to myself, lost in thought.
Character creation.
This is my favorite part of playing Inner Lunatic, after all.
[Please enter your player information].
[What is the player's name?]
"Carl."
I typed in an appropriate name in the window that popped up, then flipped through the subsequent windows to start customizing in earnest.
One of the biggest differences between Inner Lunatic and other games is this. It's the customization.
"I thought, 'I can make my character ridiculously detailed. The problem is that they take so long to create that this is often a barrier to entry.
After the name, I set the traits next.
This time I was going to create a character that I could really get into.
This might be the last game I ever play.
"Let's see… I gave him both [Mana Sensitivity Genius] and [Sword and Martial Arts Genius]...."
A new character with two [Genius] traits.
When I saw this, my heart began to pound.
My gamer instincts, the ones that made me helpless in the face of death, were coming alive.
"Okay, next up…."
I gave him the two main traits and moved on to the next window.
It's actually almost impossible to create a character this way in the first place.
There are a number of talents in the Inner Lunatic named [Genius], but you can't have more than one per character, as a rule.
You can have many sub-talents underneath it, such as Demonic Talent or Universal Talent, but Genius has a completely different function in the game.
It's a talent that, if you have it and develop it well, you can easily reach the top of your field.
That's the power of genius.
But I gave him two of them.
There was a very good reason for that.
The game has something called a trait penalty.
This means that by penalizing a character with a negative trait, you can give them an additional positive stat or trait.
It's a feature that beginners can't really utilize, but it's not hard for me.
I told you. I'm an old hand.
I scrolled down the page and stopped at a spot, my eyes fixed on the words.
[Citation needed].
It was the disease I was suffering from, and the disease this character was going to suffer from.
No, not exactly a disease, but a predetermined one. More like a great, irresistible fate.
Anyway. I was able to pour both of my [Genius] traits into the character, with a hefty penalty of [Time Limit].
A glass cannon. Or, to put it another way, I created a character that said.
"That's it."
The character would die exactly one year after creation.
It's possible to prolong their lives with artifacts, but it won't be easy.
No regrets.
A game I've already played many times. It was a thrill to be able to roam the continent as a character that looked exactly like me.
I don't know, but I must have been a gamer before I lost my memory.
Like, right down to the bone.
"Let's get started."
And so I did.
I hovered my mouse cursor over the Create Character button and pressed it.
Poof!
For a brief moment, there was the sound of sparks flying, followed by the sensation of electricity.
I looked up, feeling my breath catch in my throat as if I were being swallowed up by a vortex.
My vision was blacked out as if I had a blackout film over it, and at the same time, my heart was pounding in my chest.
What the hell is going on?
The pain I was experiencing was unfamiliar, like nothing I'd ever felt before.
Suddenly, a disturbing thought flashed through my mind.
"…Am I going to die now, all of a sudden, in the middle of a game?
Death was all too familiar to me, but I didn't want to die like this.
At least not when I was ready.
I wanted to die the way I wanted to die.
But… is this how it's going to end?
There are still things I want to do,
things I wanted to eat,
I still had a lot of games I wanted to play….
That was the moment I realized.
[You have successfully created a character].
[Character name not allowed].
[The character's name has been forcibly changed!]
The name was… forcibly changed?
Along with that, the intense pain that had been plaguing me a moment ago suddenly subsided. My eyes glazed over as my darkened vision returned to normal.
A warm glow settled over my closed eyelids.
And then.
When I opened my eyes, I couldn't help but panic once again.
"Where am I...?"
Dark curtains surrounded me, and a brown rug lay beneath them. And the fluffy futon.
This place was unfamiliar, yet very familiar to me.
A game I'd played to death over the past two years.
I had.
I've just woken up inside the Inner Lunatic. Inside the mansion of one of the game's biggest villains, the Reinhafer family.
One of the dark masters of the Inner Lunatic, with deep ties to the world's worst criminal organization, the Lunatic.
I quickly scanned my surroundings, then rushed to a nearby mirror to check my reflection.
Sure enough, there was a familiar face there.
Shiny, cascading white hair and clear, lavender eyes like rainwater. A silk robe emblazoned with the family's signature black sword, surrounded by gilt.
And a smug face that would make anyone passing by turn around.
I wiped my forehead, convinced.
I was possessed by Knox von Reinhafer, the youngest son of the Reinhafer family, the greatest villain in the Inner Lunatic.
In that moment, I don't know why that phrase came to mind.
It started, yes. It was a crash landing.