Chapter 123: The Accusation
Joo Joowon felt somewhat puzzled.
He opened them and discovered that every single one was telling him to look at the comment section.
He opened his newest strategy post and glanced through it.
The comment section had already become completely filled with the same message.
[ @DefinitelyNotAFinalBoss: @Ashfall, aren’t you going to come out and explain yourself? ]
Joo Joowon calmly read through the comments before opening the only popular comment that looked different from the rest.
The title read [ Exposing the True Face of Player Ashfall. ]
After entering the user’s profile, he discovered that the only item they had listed for sale contained exactly the same content.
...
[ @MusclePotato404: I know everyone is probably going to think that I’m exaggerating or trying to scare people, but what I’m about to say is absolutely going to overturn everything you think you know! Everyone still remembers what Ashfall said before, right? About telling us not to get caught in the rain. I can say without hesitation that all those strategy guides Ashfall posted before were only meant to gain everyone’s trust so that he could manipulate us over this matter!
Originally, I trusted Ashfall quite a lot too. After all, his guides helped me a lot and proved that he wasn’t lying. But unfortunately, before Ashfall posted his guide telling everyone not to get wet in the rain, I had already been caught in it. That very night, I developed a high fever.
Anyone who has read web novels should know what that means, right? That’s right. After I woke up from unconsciousness, I awakened an ability! Not only that, my level even increased by two levels all at once!
And today, Ashfall’s level increase only further proves my theory! He deliberately prevented us from coming into contact with the rain so that he could keep his own level advantage over everyone else. He was completely acting out of selfishness and didn’t care about our lives at all! That rain was never dangerous! It was a Rain of Evolution! Of course, I know that everyone probably won’t believe me based on my words alone. You can simply watch the video I’ve uploaded and decide for yourselves whether I’m lying or not. Ashfall simply doesn’t deserve our trust! ]
...
As Joo Joowon read through what the person had written, he could not help raising an eyebrow.
He had indeed seen more than a few comments in the discussion section yesterday from people claiming that they had developed fevers after getting caught in the rain.
At the time, however, he hadn’t considered this possibility at all.
With his talent already clearly warning him of danger, he had naturally assumed the worst possible outcome.
For example, turning into a zombie after getting soaked by the rain would have been a perfectly reasonable conclusion.
Abilities?
With Lord Bosses, equipment drops complete with production chains, Lord Qualification Tokens, and territorial examinations all already existing in the game, this hardly seemed like the kind of system that would settle for an overly simplistic class structure.
Furthermore, Joo Joowon didn’t believe that his talent would deceive him.
After all, that talent had been granted by the game itself.
That wasn’t to say he trusted the apocalypse game very much.
After all, a game that suddenly descended upon the world and brought catastrophe with it could hardly be considered benevolent.
However, there was simply no reason for the game to deceive players in this regard.
The reason was simple.
If the developers truly didn’t want players to come into contact with the class system too early, then there were countless more direct methods available to them.
They could simply lock the class system entirely until a later stage or they could impose level caps on players.
In fact, wasn’t Joo Joowon himself currently stuck in exactly such a situation?
In short, the game possessed countless better methods for preventing players from accessing the class system ahead of schedule.
There was absolutely no need to resort to deceiving players through talents.
How bored would someone have to be to do something like that?
Humanity had possessed absolutely no ability to resist when the game first descended.
They had been completely powerless from the very beginning.
Because of that, Joo Joowon couldn’t help but feel that even if this method really could allow people to enter the supernatural realm ahead of time, it almost certainly came with significant hidden dangers.
Perhaps the consequences would end up being even more severe than directly swallowing zombie core.
At the very least, after watching Byeol consume zombie core and awaken a skill, Joo Joowon had already realized that zombie core could indeed be consumed directly without any kind of processing.
However, the risks involved were simply far too great.
That was why he had never shared this discovery with anyone else.
After all, he had already earned a certain amount of trust from some players.
If he publicly revealed this information, there would definitely be people willing to try it.
Right now, players hadn’t even encountered proper NPCs yet, so who could guarantee what kind of severe consequences such a method might bring?
Although it was true that in an apocalypse, immediate benefits often had to come before everything else and surviving one more day was already considered a victory, the current situation wasn’t so desperate that failing to become extraordinary immediately would result in death.
What if reckless actions during the beginner stage ended up making future class advancement impossible?
Joo Joowon wasn’t trying to scare people.
The game itself had already provided plenty of hints.
A shop that only opened fully at Level 10.
A temporary trading platform that only lasted seven days.
Elite monsters that gained skills after the rain.
Mutated beasts and mutated plants that had never appeared before suddenly emerging everywhere.
These were only the things Joo Joowon had personally experienced himself.
Who knew how many other changes were still hidden in the shadows?
Everyone knew that once human beings could gather together and exchange information, fear and negative emotions became far easier to control.