The World of Masks

"Shit, I missed it!"

The man with the rifle, Vik, rolls his feet into the ground as if furious. Once, twice. You continue to strike the ground with your feet until the fury does not loosen. Suddenly, you see the shells scattered and clips that have fallen apart, fulfilling their duties. I kicked him with my bare feet in anger. The clip disappears over the bush.

"Well, there are days like this, aren't there? So it's hard to catch two rabbits."

By comparison, Creed didn't seem to care much about the man in iron armor who put his shield to the ground. Vik tries to shoot Creed as hard as he can with his colleague's stern remarks. It felt like I was blaming myself for making an enemy of the man I met by chance. But despite Vik's appearance, Creed scratched his chin and ignored it. In the end, Big had no choice but to silence his anger. Creed walks back to where Jack was, as if his colleague had roughly fixed his rage.

"But I didn't expect to find another game like this. NPC mercenaries?"

There were often mercenaries wandering around on their own, taking on rare herb gatherings, monster hunts, and other small quests. The first thing that came to mind was the NPC mercenaries who didn't wear masks. But Vik shakes his head decisively.

"No, he's also a player."

"Yes? Why?"

"He responded to the gun."

Creed says, "Oh!" and reacted. The NPCs in this game don't even know the concept of guns. To them, guns are just a peculiarly shaped club made of wood and iron. However, the man they bumped into responded swiftly to the gun. The reaction was clearly a weapon with a dangerous gun, and it was the reaction of someone who knew how the attack would take place.

There were usually two reactions from the people they hunted. NPC stood there screaming, not knowing what kind of weapon the gun was, and players were stunned by the appearance of unlikely firearms in this game and were killed indiscriminately by their air strike. But this time, the player cleverly slipped out of their clutches.

"You were Asian, right?"

"Huh."

It was hard to see a bare face because of its fluffy hair and hot beard, but its shape was clearly different from that of an Asian.

There were not many, but there were NPCs that looked like Orientals that could not be counted as few. According to the gaming worldview from NPC, people originally living in the north, black eyes, and black heads, were chased down to the south when the Demon King invaded and settled here. There were surprisingly various races that had different shapes, so it was impossible to distinguish between players and NPCs just by what appeared in the game.

"Let's find out in real life."

Vik wants to release the dark-haired Asian somehow.

"How? You couldn't even see your face because of your hair and your beard, and now you want to start exploring one in a billion people with just the information in our heads? You do it. I'm out."

"That, too."

Vik accepts it calmly.

"By the way, when I see him without his mask, he's got some game juice, some balls."

I knew it was more dangerous to wear a mask, but it was different from what I knew. It could be a target in real life by exposing your naked face if you're unlucky. In that sense, Creed bought Jack a little high, but Vic remembers what he missed again.

Creed starts packing shields and cannons. He was trying to clear the battlefield. But it seems that Vik still has the heat of battle.

"Damn, I could've let him go with a semi-automatic rifle!"

It took me too long to reload the bullet after I fired one shot and took out the shell. He was a quick one, but the balance was crumbling when he dodged the bullet, making sure it was too much to dodge. If it was a semi-automatic rifle that could fire bullets in a row without reloading, it would have been enough to hunt.

There was too little ammo. What am I supposed to do with a marvel that only takes five rounds? You missed the game again because you ran out of bullets in your gun. But Creed slaughters on Vik's sanctuary.

"Hey, hey. Aren't you a little greedy? You have no idea how hard it was to reproduce a gun in this game, do you?"

Vik, his colleague, was late to his organization. So I only knew that guns were good, and I didn't really know how much effort it took to reproduce them.

"I'm sure you've had a hard time, but what's with all the blueprints in real life? The AK series has already reached the essentials level for terrorists."

"Hey, Vik. The terrorists you're talking about are 21C terrorists? You can't compare to this place."

Creed says, "Nansen." He shakes his head, raising his hands to his shoulders. Then he raises his shield and starts down the mountain. The cannon was already recovered from the bracelet. Big Doe Creed steps forward, holding his gun to his shoulder. As Vik walks side-by-side, Creed takes a deep breath.

"This place is all out of reality. Everything is completely medieval except for the fact that there is literally magic and skills. Science, technology, politics, ideas, hygiene, the taste of food. A world where you can't even imagine metallurgy and gunpowder? In that sense, the boss who tried and succeeded in recreating the gun in a place like this is a truly admirable man."

Then I tapped Vik on the shoulder, walking next to him.

"The gun you're holding right now, it's been a lot of work. Half a year in real time. You went there in a year and a half with game time? Your superiors, who used guns before you, they shot worse than you. We started with the wick matchlock. Good thing you're not holding a flintstone musket."

"I've heard enough of that."

"Listen more. You don't understand. You don't know how annoying it is to put gunpowder in a barrel, poke it with a skewer, put a round bullet in the wick, light it in the wick, because it's not an accessory, right? There were gunpowder and black gunpowder, so the smoke was so heavy, the sight was obscured, and there was so much soot that I would wipe the inside of the gun heat every time. Your seniors did all that."

"What's the point of that?"

"There's been enough. We were no different from normal humans when we were at that level. No matter how bad the gunpowder weapon was, it was worth it. Accuracy was poor, but power was good, so we load the gun and fire when the monsters get close. Missed me by the sound of the gun, so I cringed, and if I got hit, I could hunt easily because it was instant or critical."

Then Creed touches Vik's rifle.

"So if you've got such a nice gun, thank you and use it without complaining."

But Vik still complained.

"But you can still make a rifle like an AK. Do I have to start with a matchlock and follow the history of the gun?"

You don't get it, do you? Creed sighs deeply because of this stone-headed fellow who keeps making me repeat the same words. He grumbled, adding that it was all about the AK series carrying dogs and cows.

"Hey, Vik. Listen to me. Technology, especially technology dealing with iron, doesn't just add up. We kidnap a few Blacksmiths and forcefully inject them with skills and produce guns and whatnot, but no matter how good the skills are, the blacksmiths will need time to be skilled. Let me teach you something good. When the gun was made, there was a guy carrying a prototype of a matchlock that was made in the first place. I was leveling up some pretty tough monsters with that gun, and one day I suddenly died. Do you know why he died?"

Vik shakes his head.

"The gun exploded when he tried to shoot." Boom! ""

You raise your hands to the sky and take a detonating gesture.

"I found out later that the iron on his gun was bad. Now do you understand? Matchlocks do, too, but how do you make an AK series from scratch? Why don't you start making sense now?"

Vic nods reluctantly, but doesn't seem to convince himself. Creed is in trouble because of his colleague. It's not like I'm trying to calm down a kid. I had no choice but to hope this guy gets a satisfactory gun from the boss' workshop as soon as possible.

"Are you going back to the hangar?"

Creed looks up at the sky for a moment, thinking about Vik's question.

"· · · · · · · · No. Let's go to the capital and keep an eye on things for a while. That's the only city nearby. We need some supplies, too."

Boom.

You slap the tree next to you with the giant shield you were holding. A thud breaks the middle of the tree and falls to the ground.

"· · · · · · · · You might find some kites you just missed. Wouldn't the name Player Hunter cry to get out of this?"

Creed lets out a ferocious smile inside the mask.

Artwork Reviews

A feast and 100th anniversary of yesterday's fishers. But maybe this won't be a duplicate either? No way.