Gaining experience by killing powerless NPCs was flat-out impossible under LOST’s system. The game was built so that users only grew stronger by contributing to Lostania. That meant killing monsters, hunting criminals who were just as toxic to the world as monsters, or protecting the weak and innocent.
Doing the opposite piled Chaos onto a player. Chaos dragged penalties behind it like a corpse trail, and every user knew that. And yet, a post went up on Lotranet claiming that killing a single helpless NPC rewarded experience on par with slaughtering multiple high-level monsters.
└ You expect anyone to buy that horseshit?
└ Follow garbage like this and you are riding the express train straight into account deletion, dumbass.
└ We were literally dragged here to protect Lostania, and you think murdering Lostanians would work? Are you fucking stupid?
Nobody believed it. Of course they didn’t. LOST had been live for over two years, and anyone dumb enough to fall for bargain-bin bait like this had already been filtered out. However, everything was made clear when the same user uploaded a video proving its existence.
[Title: Slaughter Quest Proof Video]
“Please... please don’t kill us!”
“Run!”
“Ghk—!”
NPCs died under silent blades. A village of roughly fifty people was reduced to a blood-soaked corpse pile within minutes. At the end of the footage, a level-up that was earned entirely through murder flashed brightly.
└ Jesus Christ. This guy is a straight-up psychopath.
└ This should be an instant ban. No discussion.
└ On what basis? He killed NPCs in a game.
└ Even if it is VR, act like a fucking human being.
└ This is exactly why regulation is needed. What happens when idiots copy this shit in real life?
└ You are Korean, right? Always screaming regulation. Politicians already got their heads chopped off trying that after nuking public support.
└ Fact is, violent crime dropped hard in countries with high VR adoption. People who would snap got a sandbox instead of a crime scene.
└ This is correct. Even losers at rock bottom can feel alive in VR, so they lose the urge to go nuclear in reality.
The comment section turned into a war zone, and every Lotranet board followed right after. Not everyone questioned the morality of it.
└ So how do you actually get that quest?
└ Share the quest info.
└ Stop hoarding it and let everyone eat, you greedy fucks.
Some people only saw numbers. To them, the game was just a game, and experience was experience.
└ Are people seriously trying to get this quest just to kill people?
└ They’re not people but NPCs u dumbfuck.
LOST’s user base split clean down the middle and started tearing into each other. When Do-Jin saw it, his blood ran cold.
“This wasn’t in my memories.”
If something this big had happened, it would have been carved into his mind. The timing made it worse, since this was around when he had first started LOST.
If I don’t remember this at all, then that means it never happened before.
That realization made his stomach drop. Regenians hunting Lostanians wasn’t just fucked up. It undermined the entire reason Regenians existed in the first place.
It’s just one sick bastard right now, but if this quest spreads, trust between NPCs and users will be broken.
Lostanians would stop seeing Regenians as protectors and start seeing them more as predators. Distrust toward the Holy See, which had branded Regenians as Bella’s chosen, would fester from the inside out. Users were already splitting into hostile camps and ripping at each other’s throats. Rather than merely a balance issue or some random drama, this could very well bring about the end of the world.
At this point, it’s almost admirable.
This was almost certainly the work of the Cult of Ruin. They had cooked up a scheme inside the game and shoved it straight through the screen, dragging the real world into the mess with it. Pulling something like that off was disgusting, but it was also frighteningly clever.
That was exactly why it had to be stopped fast. This wasn’t some one-off stunt that would gradually lose traction. The quest behaved like a virus. Once it started spreading, it would never stop on its own.
But... how the hell do I stop this?
If the problem was monsters, he’d killed them. If it was some pesky criminal organization, he’d wiped them out. This time, however, none of that applied. He couldn’t just swing a blade at an idea, nor could he stifle a rumor. A public “LOST purification campaign” might sound noble, but it would only backfire. The louder he shouted about justice, the more contrarian assholes would flock to the slaughter just to prove a point.
If it hasn’t fully spread yet, then I’ll start at the source.
Do-Jin moved toward the massacre site from the video, the only real lead he had. Pinpointing the location was easy since other users had already done it and shared the coordinates as soon as the footage went public.
Standing in the village, Do-Jin finally understood how bottomless human malice could be. Human history reeked of blood because humans were cruel by default. However, humanity was also capable of decency, and proof of that still lingered here.
“That’s... awful...”
A healer was searching through the ruins, crying openly as she looked for survivors she already knew she would not find. Do-Jin wasn’t the only one who had come. Flowers lay piled in one corner, placed there by users who had nothing else to offer. Other players were quietly gathering bodies, trying to restore some shred of dignity to the dead.
There’s nothing here.
Since it was a battlefield and not a butcher’s floor, the killer had carved up these NPCs the way one would farm monsters and walked away clean. All that remained was scenery designed to rot one’s mind.
Not wanting to draw any attention to himself, Do-Jin left without a word. One day passed, then another, and then a third. Nothing surfaced. No clues appeared. His irritation grew heavier by the hour, and eventually, the situation took a turn for the worse.
[Title: Hear me, demons who choose evil.]
The post came from a streamer infamous for being human garbage. His handle was Benga.
[Sorry for the bait, guys. But this is huge. The guy who posted that massacre video contacted me directly. He’s forming a small elite guild, and he’s sharing that quest with all members. I already got it. I gained two levels in a single day. I’m streaming with him tonight to promote the guild, so don’t miss it.]
That same day, Benga went live with the butcher himself.
“You see that?” one of them said to the other.
“Yep. That right there is an experience box. A walking experience box.”
That was the exchange they had before attacking an orphanage. Children whose parents had already been killed by monsters screamed as their blades came down. While the chat exploded with curses, Benga laughed like he was having the time of his life.
“Holy shit, I’ve never had this many viewers!” Benga exclaimed.
“This isn’t MeTube, by the way. This is pirate streaming. No moderation. No bans,” the butcher replied.
“Alright, forced ad break. See you in one minute.”
Do-Jin started tracking them the moment he saw the stream, but he was too late. The distance between cities with long-range teleportation and the crime scene was too far. By the time he arrived, an hour later, it was already over. Both Benga and the murderer who hid beneath a black robe were gone. They had taken the experience and vanished.
“Those fucking pieces of shit. Where did they go?”
Other users who had rushed in just like him stood there shaking with rage, accomplishing nothing. For the first time in this life, Do-Jin felt truly helpless. He couldn’t shake the feeling that something far worse was beginning to boil underneath this farce.
As he was lost in thought, a voice came from behind him. “Pretty fucking horrific, right? Human nature.”
Do-Jin reacted on instinct, putting distance between them in a single step.
This spot was nowhere near the massacre site. He had been observing the scene through Insight, which meant his physical body was positioned far away. Someone walking up and speaking to him out of nowhere was more than enough to set off alarms.
“Wait. Don’t jump straight to attacking.” The woman waved both hands when she saw his Magic Circuits flare to life.
“Who are you?” Do-Jin didn’t bother hiding the hostility in his voice. His spell stayed primed and ready to fire.
The woman sighed. “I get that you’re pissed, but that isn’t my fault, is it?”
She wore a mask that hid everything except her mouth. Her exposed lips pushed into a mild pout as she raised a sealed letter.
“For the record, I’m here to help you,” Cecilia clarified, though she didn’t mention her role as a Contractor. “Well, technically I’m running an errand. My employer told me to deliver this to you. They’re in a real fucking hurry, by the way. Sounds like their feet are already on fire. Want to take it?”
She flicked the letter lightly between her fingers.
“Aren’t you going to tell me who you’re working for?”
“That’s a bit much. Honestly, I’d like to tell you myself, but I can’t. That’s just how it is.”
“Can’t?” Do-Jin raised an eyebrow.
“That’s what the people jerking my leash say, so I roll with it. Either way, I’m not here to screw you over, so how about you take the letter already? They’re yelling in my head nonstop about keeping this short.”
Cecilia finished speaking and threw the letter as if pitching a dart. Do-Jin caught it with Psychokinesis.
“Oh, by the way, I’m a fan.”
“Wait—” Do-Jin reached for her, but she vanished before his fingers could close.
Teleportation.
Spatial manipulation was still outside the reach of mage players, yet this woman had just done so with no incantation, preparation, or even a visible trigger. At least one thing was clear: based on that fan comment, she was definitely a player.
Do-Jin stared at the letter she left behind, then tore through the wax seal. A small light rose from the envelope.
“Hello. It’s been a while.”
It was that light again. The one he had encountered several times already. As always, it was unsettlingly expressive for an entity without a face.
“You’re...”
“Unfortunately, we don’t have time for a long conversation. Listen first.”
Do-Jin closed his mouth.
“Your enemies crossed the line. Because of that, you’ve been given the chance to cross one as well. But I won’t sugarcoat this. If you take that step, it will be dangerous for you too. This is a choice that demands resolve.”
Before he could ask what kind of resolve, the light continued. “Your star can grant you the authority to permanently exile the Regenians who willingly became apostles of Laves. But that power comes with a price. If you lose to them, you will be the one exiled forever.”
The light flickered anxiously. It looked almost worried, as if it feared rejection. However, that fear was completely misplaced.
“Start it now,” Do-Jin said, not hesitating for even a second.
A character deletion gamble against human trash was always welcome.
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