Chapter 19: Taking Over

“…Stop talking nonsense. What did he do wrong to have his account deleted? This is 80% your fault and 20% my fault. We need to find another way, not some playful method!”

─ Don’t humans usually choose to destroy the evidence in times like this?

“…Did you watch a thriller drama yesterday or something?”

─ Oh, how did you know? The new one that came out recently was really fun.

“Please, think of a proper solution first. What are you doing with that good brain of yours…”

─ There is one thing.

“What.”

Nicholas glared at Noah with a sullen face, as if to say, ‘Let’s just hear what other nonsense you have to say.’

─ You, Nicholas, directly access Khan’s Account.

…What did I just hear?

Nicholas’s eyes widened as he stared at Noah.

“What, I told you to stop talking nonsense?”

─ As long as you don’t get caught, it’ll be fine. Then the player, and that boss monster named ‘Khan’, will all be fine.

“You were the one who first said it would be troublesome to approach an NPC carelessly, Noah. And I agreed with that.

That’s why we use the form of an oracle to approach NPCs, to deliberately reduce bugs, right? Such direct intervention would cause confusion in the already formed personality…”

─ But this monster is a bit peculiar. The setting is that it has lost its memory, right?

Let’s make good use of that. Since its memory is full of holes, it won’t easily notice even if another personality is added, will it? And even if it does notice something strange, wouldn’t the quest be over by then?

Nicholas’s mouth opened and closed, then he took off his glasses and wiped his face with his palm.

“…Noah, you can’t say everything with certainty. The future is always subject to change. Even if you read countless possibilities in advance, living people don’t move exactly as if measured with a ruler.”

─ …

“The moment that boss monster spoke to the player, something we didn’t expect already happened.”

─ …

“You…”

At the continued silence, Nicholas looked at Noah with narrowed eyes.

Then Noah replied in a monotonous voice.

─ But I, for one, hope this quest goes all the way to the end.

Noah’s voice, combined with the emoticon, came across as a little eerie.

Somehow, the temperature in the room seemed to have dropped…

“…”

─ (0-0)

Nicholas narrowed his eyes and glared at Noah before letting out a sigh.

“…Turn the air conditioner temperature back up. And restore the lighting brightness to its original state.”

─ (-3-)

“You, you’re banned from thriller dramas for the time being.”

─ (0◇0)!

“Ha, so this is where it was. The birthplace of conspiracy theories like an AI invasion. That was genuinely creepy just now. Look, just look at my arm, will you?”

─ (;-;)

Nicholas pretended not to see Noah and leaned back into the sofa as if sinking into it.

“Really…”

‘In the end, do I have to leave it like this?’

Since there was no alternative that came to mind right now, it might be better to watch for a little while.

‘If I’m lucky, I might not get caught until the quest is over…’

Nicholas’s eyes followed Paul, who had started to descend the snowy mountain with excitement.

And the man like a totem pole who was silently following behind him.

“…How long do you think a boss monster that has left its dungeon can last?”

The moment Khan left the dungeon, the curse-like benefits he enjoyed inside the dungeon disappeared.

“If he dies, he can’t be revived again. The place he can return to will also disappear soon. Do you really think Paul can protect Khan properly? Even if it proceeds like this, it’s a quest that is bound to fail midway.”

He thought it would be better not to start at all if that was the case.

That’s why he intervened when the quest first appeared.

“…I just don’t want him to get hurt.”

Soon, news that an anomaly had occurred in Flora would spread, and the players related to this quest were all rankers on the verge of max level.

“He’ll be surrounded by enemies… Paul is so pitiful.”

As he said that, Nicholas’s face was filled with shock.

“…Oh, my goodness. Am I managing a game with such biased feelings?”

Nicholas was taken aback by his own statement.

He, who had to make a more fair and just judgment than anyone else, was showing such favor to a single player?

This was a very big problem.

This was why he had stayed away from playing the game directly unless it was for a test, for fear of this happening…!

After a long moment of thought, Nicholas opened his mouth again.

“…Noah, connect the token.”

─ Oh, have you made up your mind?

“Shut up.”

In fact, there was almost nothing that would substantially change just because there was a person behind the NPC.

Since there was an already formed personality, there weren’t many things that could be interfered with in the first place.

Rash intervention would only cause confusion in the existing personality.

It might be a little easier to understand if you think of it as multiple personalities.

It’s like having two personalities in one body.

How could it not be confusing?

So, to gain complete control, one had to erase the other existing personality.

It was more convenient for the administrator to control an NPC that had become an empty shell in that way.

But then, another problem arises.

An NPC is not an independent entity.

It’s the same as a human’s way.

They are intertwined with other NPCs, building tens of thousands of connections and growing based on them, truly a single person.

Could the memories of such a being be theirs alone?

In the end, it becomes a matter of having to act as another person, so you can’t prevent gaps in memory from occurring in conversations or in trivial places.

No matter how good your memory is, gaps that can’t be filled keep appearing.

At first, it would be ‘Huh?’.

Then, they would doubt their existence.

And you can’t just dismiss it as simple amnesia, because they are important NPCs already included in the main flow.

Of course, a ridiculous excuse like amnesia wouldn’t easily work, would it?

Players are so sharp these days.

Once things start to go wrong like that, it’s like touching a domino, and everything comes crashing down at once.

And if this were just a personal problem, it would be better, but it’s an even bigger issue because it also has a negative impact on other NPCs.

‘That problem was always there during the beta test too.’

As a result, they had come to use a slightly different approach now.

First, they modified the program so that only minor interventions were possible when the NPC was awake.

For example, a slight pause when grabbing an object.

Or forgetting what they were supposed to do just a moment ago, such trivial interventions.

Don’t people also have moments where they think, ‘Huh, what was I about to do?’

You can think of it as something similar.

Other than that, it would be about temporarily taking complete control when the NPC is asleep or unconscious.

That way, the NPC wouldn’t know what happened, and to others, it would just be seen as being a little clumsy or sleepwalking, avoiding deep suspicion.

If not that, they would approach using the ‘oracle’ mentioned earlier.

For large-scale quests or events that require approaching multiple NPCs at once, they usually use an oracle.

Since Noah was the creator god, and there were several gods right below it, moving in that way caused the least trouble.

Anyway, for these reasons, changing just one person’s face was so troublesome.

“I’ll just watch for now. Intervention will come later… when I think it’s really necessary.”

But even as he said that, Nicholas clutched his head.

In reality, even if Nicholas were to use Khan’s account right now, nothing would change significantly, and there wasn’t much he could do.

He would just be indirectly experiencing it together through Khan’s eyes and Khan’s body.

And yet, looking at Paul’s face, his conscience pricked him.

“D*mn it, I still don’t know if this is okay…”

Ah, this was all his fault for raising his younger brother wrong.

1. The Lucky Man.

As they say, going down a mountain is faster than going up, and the two were able to safely arrive near Flora Village before the sun set.

As they got closer to the guard at the back gate, Paul felt inwardly nervous.

But he thought that if he acted suspicious here, they would find him even more suspicious, so he deliberately held Khan’s hand confidently and moved vigorously.

“Hold on, stop right there.”

“…Yes?”

Just as the two were about to enter the village naturally, a guard named [Wonthes] stopped them.

‘Oh my god, why is he suddenly doing something he never does?’

For a moment, Paul was so surprised that he almost jumped in place.

Since there were very few people visiting the village, the security in Flora was rather lax.

The guards at the back gate were even more negligent.

So normally, they wouldn’t call someone over like this…

‘Ah, no. Didn’t he strike up a conversation last time because he thought the mask was strange?’

Other than that time, he had only glanced at the people coming and going, but never stopped them.

So Paul was nervous.

He looked at Wonthes, feigning as much calm as possible, and saw that he had a puzzled expression on his face.