Player 0.4 [You have died.] [Reset in progress.]

“You have to accept his offer! It’s a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.”

“Of course he will—what idiot would pass up an internship with a Red Royal Mage?” Helen adjusted her braids to the front, her voice clipped.

Dmitry was practically glowing with joy. One would have thought he’d been the one offered the internship, not me. There wasn’t the faintest shadow of resentment that he himself had not been chosen.

Helen, however, wasn’t as generous. She tried to mask it, but it was evident that she was jealous and was a bit irritated that I didn’t accept the offer on the spot.

“I just need some time to think about it,” I said, raising my hands up, as if that might shield me from their barrage.

My reasoning was simple.

Two hours ago, I didn’t even know the Red Royal Mages existed. And had no clue what an internship under one actually entailed.

Had I truly been handed the opportunity of a lifetime…

Or was this a Harzulump?

The story of ‘Pyrite and the Harzulump’ came to mind. It was a children's story that my grandmother read to me when I was perhaps seven or eight. The memory was a good one, with her soft arms wrapped around me, as I sat on her lap in the library.

It went like this:

A young traveler named Pyrite was passing through a village during their annual festival. There were games, music, laughter—and a grand lottery drawing. Pyrite was invited to participate despite not being a resident of the village. And against all odds, he drew the winning ticket.

“You’ve won the Harzulump!” the villagers cried out.

“How fortunate!”

“How lucky!”

“Oh, if only it had been me!”

The trouble was… Pyrite had no idea what a Harzulump was.

But everyone else wanted it. Everyone envied him. Some even offered coins in exchange for it. So he knew it had to be valuable.

He considered asking what it was… but feared that revealing his ignorance might cause them to revoke his prize. So he pretended to know.

They led him to the outskirts of the village, to a cavern carved into the mountain, its shadowed mouth draped in thick ivy as though nature itself were trying to conceal it.

“It’s inside,” they told him. “Only the winner may enter.”

Pyrite hesitated, and the villagers watched expectantly. He did not wish to appear foolish, and he certainly did not wish to give up what everyone else so desperately wanted.

And so he entered the dark cave. After walking deep inside, the ground suddenly gave way. He fell. Pyrite screamed, but the cave swallowed the sound.

He fell into a deep, deep hole, atop the skeletons of previous winners that had come before him. With his body broken, his consciousness did not last much beyond that.

The villagers waited outside through the night. When the sun rose, and he did not return, they cheered again.

“His soul must have ascended,” someone said reverently.

“Yes,” another agreed. “The Harzulump takes the worthy beyond this village. He was most fortunate.”

“Mommy, I hope I win the Harzulump next year!” a little girl called out.

“I hope so too, dear,” her mother smiled.

And the Harzulump was drawn again the following year.

To the villagers, it was considered an ascension to a better realm.

To Pyrite, it had simply been an early death.

​

***

​

I blinked, returning to the present.

Dmitry was still smiling. Helen was still watching me closely.

Sometimes, when everyone insists something is a prize… It’s worth pondering if it actually is, for you.

Helen studied me for a moment. Then a smirk appeared, tugging at her lips.

“Ah,” she said knowingly. “I see what you’re doing. You’re planning to negotiate.”

I blinked.

She nodded, pleased with herself. “I would too, if I had just set a record in the maze. No point in accepting the first offer. Better to negotiate for better pay and benefits.”

Just like that, the jealousy evaporated, replaced by approval.

Dmitry leaned closer. “How did you even get through it?” he inquired. “I made it through two sections, but when I had to relive that monster incident…” His voice faltered. “I froze again.”

Helen shot him a sharp look. “We don’t know what you’re talking about. The maze is different for each person.”

“What was yours like?” Dmitry asked her.

Before she could answer, a bright laugh rang out nearby.

Three girls, evidently from our academy given their uniforms, were seated at a terrace table of the high-end restaurant, sipping tea and nibbling delicately arranged finger foods. Three attendants stood discreetly behind them—staff reclaimed the moment they stepped beyond academy grounds.

Based on the rules of Ethereal Academy, I knew that students were not permitted to have their staff follow them inside the academy grounds. And the magic barriers on the dorm rooms would not allow them in.

Helen’s gaze drifted to them for half a second. She lifted her chin and straightened her back.

“That’s private,” she said coolly.

And then she walked ahead, as though the conversation had never mattered in the first place.

​

* ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ *

​

“Where should I check out next…?” Andrew Hwang muttered, rubbing his chin.

After learning that the poor guy ahead of him had been waiting in the Agency of Order and Game Development’s queue for over two hundred years, Andrew had come to a decisive conclusion: he had to escape that miserable place.

The waiting hall was a sterile expanse of gray flooring and raspy elevator music. And the decor aside, the biggest issue was the lack of anything redeemably edible. The coffee machine dispensed undrinkable brown liquid, and the complimentary salted crackers he’d managed to find tasted as though regret had been baked into them.

Andrew refused to waste his time there.

He didn’t leave the realm—exiting would have voided his place in line, and he wasn’t willing to give up filing his complaint just yet. But sitting around while sipping battery-acid coffee?

Absolutely not.

However, he could remain within the realm and retain his spot. There was still a risk of losing his spot in line if the guy ahead of him was called, and Andrew wasn’t around when his ticket was called.

But he would have bet every single Nexus coin in his possession that such a scenario would not happen.

Thus, Andrew decided to explore AAAA0000AB, the realm that was responsible for the development and management of Games, and everything else regarding realms, NPCs, Players, Celestials, and beyond.

Based on its ID alone, it was clearly ancient—the second realm ever cataloged. No one really knew what realm AAAA0000AA was, as only error messages ever appeared when it was searched.

As for AAAA0000AB, it was one of the largest realms in existence.

It wasn’t contained within a planet, or if the realm had space travel, a galaxy. It was a patchwork of divided spaces stitched together by portals, corridors, and elevators. Entire agencies existed in floating partitions.

And then there were the backrooms. That’s where the residents and workers who maintained this realm existed. However, only a small number of Players had ever gained access to them, so much of the knowledge about them was little better than rumor.

Andrew had no interest in those. Well… unless they had good snacks. But he doubted it, as the residents of this realm didn’t seem to be particularly partial towards food. Not good food in any case.

He pulled up his blog interface.

Realm Bites: A Player’s Guide to Survival Through Cuisine

While Andrew was, by every measurable metric, a terrible Player and could hardly count on clearing Games to earn enough Nexus coins to avoid deletion, he did carve out a niche for himself.

Information. Specifically: gourmet information.

Best realms for ramen under the equivalent of five Nexus coins. Hidden cafés inside monster-filled dungeon lobbies. A vending machine that was broken and could provide legendary potato chips if one hit it at just the right angle.

His blog had proved to be a very popular and lucrative venture. It turned out that in an infinite multiversal Game system, nothing united beings more than hunger and the need for something better than the rations in the Game Store.

Given that he was stuck in AAAA0000AB for a while, and no one else had ever bothered to map it out, he decided to take it upon himself to explore the realm and identify the corners for the best possible food.

And his recent posts about AAAA0000AB were exploding.

It was fair to say that the realm AAAA0000AB had the largest number of Players within it at any given time. And all of them were sick and tired of the undrinkable coffee and sad crackers.

The comment section scrolled upward rapidly.

Orange_Orange: THANK YOU for the hidden vending machine tip in the Agency of Regressor Management! I’ve been hanging out here for so long that I have almost acquired a taste for the terrible coffee. When I opened a can of Blueberry Bliss Soda, I thought I had discovered nirvana.

NeonSpecter: I owe you my sanity. Also, my tastebuds.

ToadMilk: Dropped 500 Nexus coins as a thank you.

Andrew grinned as donations ticked upward in real time.

Why didn’t I think of mapping this bureaucratic realm sooner?

He had already explored two divisions. Currently, he was still inside the Agency of Regressor Management, deciding on what division to explore next. Unlike the barren stillness of the Order and Game Development waiting hall, this place buzzed with desperate hope for a second chance.

They were not Players. Technically, they were NPCs. However, unlike regular NPCs, they were sponsored by a powerful Celestial or a Divinarch who took either pity or simply an interest in the individual, allowing their realm to experience a time rewind. Their lives would be reset. Their tragedies undone.

Men and women sat clutching thick folders labeled Second Life Plan. Some flipped nervously through pages of revised strategies—career shifts, marriage alternatives, revenge outlines. Others rehearsed speeches under their breath.

“I won’t make the same mistake this time.”

“I know exactly where I went wrong in that fight.”

“If I just avoid him on the third day…”

The walls were plastered with glossy posters of successful regressors.

“I was betrayed by my fiancé and murdered in my first life. I returned to the past, and now I’m married to the crown prince!”

Below the text, a radiant queen smiled beside a golden-haired monarch.

“I was a talentless son of a great swordmaster. I was cast out and died, but I returned and became a Grandmaster Swordsman in my second life!”

Below that, a broad-shouldered man gripped a blade thicker than Andrew’s thigh.

Poster after poster lined the walls with beautiful people, victorious endings, golden crowns, and gleaming blades.

Andrew swiped the blog screen from view, taking in a final look of this division.

A scam.

He had existed long enough to recognize selective advertising when he saw it. The posters weren’t lies. They were exceptions. Exceptionally rare ones. The kind that were copied, printed, and broadcast across countless realms to keep hope alive among the masses of NPCs. His own realm had been flooded with similar tales before it ascended from Playable Tier to Celestial-managed status.

What the posters didn’t show were the failures.

The Agency of Regressor Management had two sections. This floor was for the hopeful. A discreet elevator—accessible only to non-NPCs—led to the level above. Andrew had found it on his first day here. Upstairs was where the Celestials and other higher beings gathered.

There, they watched and wagered Nexus coins on the success or failure of the NPCs in their attempt on a second chance. Holographic displays tracked “Projected Outcome Stability.” Nexus coin pools fluctuated in real time. Names scrolled. Odds shifted. And the odds were rarely kind. They skewed heavily toward stagnation, collapse, and the repetition of past errors.

Very few NPCs successfully altered the trajectory of their fate. Most regressed… and failed again.

Andrew exhaled.

Well, that’s not my problem.

He turned away from the posters and stretched. The real question was far more pressing.

Where’s the next best place to explore and find something worthwhile to eat?

He pulled up the realm-wide chat logs, scanning for chatter that might lead somewhere interesting. The feed flickered to life.

Lint-marshfellow: The #7 ranking Player is applying for Celestialism!

Sunny543: No kidding?

HeavenlyTart: Yeah, he’s at the Agency of Celestial Realm Management right now. And if you think that’s wild, there’s another applicant who was never a Player. She was an NPC.

​Lint-marshfellow: Bullshit.

​Benchpress_Pen: I’m at ACRM too. It’s real.

​HeavenlyTart: And get this. She somehow convinced them to deliver food from the Top 10 List on the Realm Bites blog.

​This grasped Andrew’s attention.

​The NPC part was curious. His blog being mentioned was heartwarming. But someone—an NPC, no less—had manipulated the Agency’s bureaucracy well enough to gain access to the Top 10 gourmet list across all realms? Without clearing a Game? Without earning Nexus coins? Without even being a Player?

​That wasn’t merely impressive. That was revolutionary.

​This unknown NPC, in the process of ascending to Celestialism, eclipsed every other existing Celestial and Celestial-to-be in the way she bent cosmic administration, securing a proper feast.

​Andrew’s eyes gleamed.

​I need to meet her and figure out how she did that.

​Andrew walked over to a portal connecting the Agency of Celestial Realm Management and stepped through without hesitation. After all, if there was one thing worth investigating more than food… It was the loopholes that delivered it.

​

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