Chapter 20: Ranked Match Comes First
Donape stepped into his personal VR Capsule and selected Counter-Injustice for the first time.
As the shopkeeper, he could use every product in the store for free—as long as he abided by the System’s terms of use. But when it came to playtime limits, he was the sole exception. While ordinary customers were strictly restricted to a maximum of five hours a day, the System granted him unlimited access. If he wanted to sit in the capsule 24/7, no one would stop him.
Once inside the lobby, Donape opened the local network channel and sent a message.
"Young Master Baek, are you playing Counter-Injustice?"
Inside his own capsule, Ji-Hong jumped as a translucent chat window popped up on the right side of his vision. "Whoa, Boss?! How are you messaging me? Can you send texts into the capsules from the main counter?"
"No. It’s a built-in feature of the VR Capsules," Donape replied. "This public channel links every active capsule in Branch 01. You can silence the notifications, but just like the Share-Track feature, you can’t disable it completely."
"Oh, wow, that’s awesome! Ah, right. What’s up, Boss? I’m just going through the Counter-Injustice tutorial right now."
"Finish it up so we can team up," Donape said. "Unlike The Path of the Heavenly Martial Arts, this game doesn’t have a main storyline. But the quest rewards are just as vital, and the skills you gain here will directly impact your real-world condition."
Ji-Hong’s eyes lit up. "Count me in! I’ve already felt my body improving from playing the first game—I can actually move around like a normal person now without getting exhausted immediately. Though it’s a pity my in-game stats hit a cap and my synchronization won’t go any higher, so the physical feedback has stalled."
"Don’t worry about the stat cap," Donape reassured him flatly. "Once you get familiar with the gunplay and mechanics in Counter-Injustice, your overall synchronization will rise. That mental sharpness will make it much easier for you to gain enlightenment back in Heavenly Martial Arts."
"Understood, Boss!" Ji-Hong replied enthusiastically.
Meanwhile, everyone currently logged into the shop’s VR Capsules saw the text exchange pop up across their displays.
Because the Public Channel was tied directly to the shop’s internal network, it broadcast across every single VR Capsule in the facility—meaning even Jae-Woong, Kennedy, and the nine bodyguards deep inside The Path of the Heavenly Martial Arts caught the entire conversation.
Donape, however, couldn’t care less about what the onlookers thought of his public broadcast to Ji-Hong.
’By now, every one of them has realized the benefits of these capsules to some degree,’ Donape reasoned inwardly. ’Even if they try to deny the physical feedback, the sheer realism and vividness of the virtual world is an undeniable fact. Nothing I said on the public channel will confuse them—if anything, it’ll just stir their doubts.’
Setting aside whatever subtle stir his message had caused, Donape breezed through the Counter-Injustice tutorial himself.
Across the virtual landscape, Ji-Hong’s bodyguards exchanged awkward glances in their respective games, debating whether it was appropriate to chime in on the shop-wide broadcast.
Butler Lee was wrestling with his own pride, wondering if he should shamelessly ask for an invite to the party while experiencing Counter-Injustice’s tutorial.
At the same time, Jae-Woong and Kennedy used The Path of the Heavenly Martial Arts’ internal friend system to whisper back and forth in a private lobby chat.
Unlike the universal Public Channel, multiplayer party features and private messaging only worked between registered friends inside the same specific game—which was precisely why Donape had used the shop-wide broadcast to reach Ji-Hong in the first place.
Donape needed a player partner to clear a specific quest in Counter-Injustice.
And for this one, dumb AI NPCs just weren’t going to cut it.
Meanwhile, Irene fiddled with her smartphone while taking a break from her college assignment alongside Ga-Eun and Mira.
Tilting her head slightly, she decided to do Donape a favor after all.
Taking a quick photo of the digital menu board above the counter—capturing both the absurd prices and the strict shop rules—she uploaded it to her social media account with a caption:
"Testing out this weird, expensive cafe."
Below the photo, she casually added that the shopkeeper was the same guy behind last night’s viral five-on-one fight video outside the restaurant.
To be honest, she was initially reluctant to promote the cafe, worrying it would become too crowded and take away their easy access to the capsules.
But looking at the freshly added row of machines, another thought crossed her mind.
’If the shop is consistently packed, the shopkeeper will have no choice but to keep expanding. Thus, new games, drinks, or perks will keep coming too.’
With that belief in mind, she didn’t hesitate to broadcast it to her two million followers.
With her striking red hair and sharp looks, Irene was quite well-known online despite not being a full-time influencer. Her posts frequently went viral—a photo of her in a red one-piece dress highlighting her silhouette had easily racked up over nine million likes.
Yet, ironically, the girl currently promoting a high-tech gaming lounge wasn’t a gamer at all.
Neither were Ga-Eun nor Mira.
They had zero interest in grinding stats, fighting beasts, or mastering complex martial arts techniques. To the three of them, The Path of the Heavenly Martial Arts wasn’t an action game—it was a hyper-realistic life simulator.
Doing simple, mundane chores, wandering through quiet mountain villages, and soaking in the undisturbed scenery provided a rare chance to calm their minds and heal from their hectic college lives. For them, those five hours inside the capsule weren’t about gaming.
They were about pure, uninterrupted therapy—and they couldn’t wait for the current players to wrap up so they could step back into their peaceful virtual sanctuary.
"Ugh! I’m hungry. When is our food getting here?" Mira grumbled, stretching her stiff fingers after typing her college assignment for hours.
Right on cue, a heavy, impatient knock rattled the glass door of the shop.
"It’s here!" Realizing the delivery had arrived, Irene and Ga-Eun immediately sprang up from their seats.
"Thank you for—"
Irene’s cheerful greeting died in her throat the moment she reached for the food bags.
Standing in the doorway was a slouching man in a grime-streaked high-visibility jacket worn over a baggy black hoodie. He didn’t have the hurried, polite hustle of a typical delivery driver—instead, he stood there with a lazy, lingering sneer, smelling faintly of stale tobacco and cheap exhaust fumes.
Unkempt, oil-slicked hair stuck out from under his stained baseball cap. But what made Irene instantly pull her hand back was his eyes—beady, bloodshot, and filthy, scanning both her and Ga-Eun with an unvarnished, predatory sleaze.
Instead of handing over the food, he deliberately held the bags back, leaning against the doorframe to block their path.
Irene frowned, pulling her hand back slightly as she met his greasy stare. "Is there something wrong with the order? The payment was already processed online."
The delivery man completely ignored her. Instead, his bloodshot eyes slid past her shoulder, casually scanning the shop—taking note of the empty tables, the quiet atmosphere, and the total lack of visible security.
A creepy, unsettling smile spread across his face as he finally thrust the plastic bags toward her.
"Here," he muttered, turning on his heel and walking out without even checking the recipient’s name.
Irene grabbed the food and quickly pulled Ga-Eun back inside, shutting the glass door tight. She reached for a deadbolt or handle to lock it, only to realize with a shock that the door didn’t have a lock at all.
’What kind of shop doesn’t even have a lock on the front door?!’ Irene thought, a wave of anxiety washing over her.
Not wanting to freak out Ga-Eun or Mira, she swallowed her unease and brought the food over to their table.
Thirty minutes later, the three of them were finishing up their meal, their mood mostly restored.
Just as Irene stood up to throw away the trash, the front door was violently shoved open with a heavy BANG.
The food delivery man barged back inside, flanked by four sketchy-looking thugs, all chuckling with lecherous grins.
"Hehehe, girls shouldn’t be eating all alone," the delivery guy sneered. "Why don’t we keep you company?"
Irene, Ga-Eun, and Mira gasped, instinctively stepping back and grabbing each other’s hands.
"Shopkeeper! Help! There are intruders!" Irene shouted frantically toward the VR Capsule area.
Inside his sealed capsule, Donape heard her desperate cries through his Share Track feature. Unbothered, he casually replied, "Huh? Intruders? Ah, don’t worry about it. Let me finish this map first—I’m currently top of the scoreboard because my aim is cracking."
Hearing the shopkeeper’s absurdly nonchalant response, Irene, Ga-Eun, and Mira felt their knees go weak in sheer disbelief.
Meanwhile, the thugs exchanged glances, suddenly noticing the voice coming from the sleek machines.
"You said there was no one in this place except these chicks?" one grumbled.
"Shut up, you idiot!" another snapped. "So what if there’s one guy hiding in a box? With five of us, beating him up will take two seconds."
With greasy smirks, the five assholes lunged forward toward the helpless girls.
But before a single hand could touch them—
A crimson system box flashed across Donape’s vision inside Counter-Injustice:
[Intruders detected within shop perimeter!]
[Initiating Defense Protocol: Divine Lightning!]
ZAP! ZAP!