Chapter 2
“Logout! Logout! …Damn it!”
The room was spacious but felt empty, with barely any furniture inside.
Ha-jun stood in front of the large mirror by the door, biting his lips in anxiety, unable to believe the situation before him.
‘This can’t be… Why? How did it come to this?’
He had just cleared the Nightmare difficulty of “Protect Humanity”, the first in the world, unlocking the Hell difficulty.
He only wanted a quick preview for his upcoming broadcast, excited to show it off.
Yet somehow…
All the other interfaces, like the status window, were working fine. Except for one.
The logout button didn’t respond.
‘Today I just cleared Nightmare difficulty, and viewers were flocking in the hundreds of thousands. What if I can’t start the stream tomorrow? I need to act fast before things settle down…’
At first, he thought it was just a simple glitch.
But as time passed, anxiety grew—what if something had really gone wrong?
What if he couldn’t log out at all?
Had he ever given his manager his home address?
What would happen to his body if he stayed trapped in the VR device without eating?
Ding-
Just as he anxiously chewed his nails, a cheerful notification popped up, filling the screen with new messages.
[You have started the game on “Protect Humanity” Hell difficulty.]
[Upon clearing the game, you will receive an enormous reward from the developers.]
[Players must clear the game to return to reality.]
[We wish good luck to player Lee Ha-jun.]
[Please protect humanity from the threat of monsters.]
Ha-jun’s expression stiffened as he read the trembling text.
“Hey, you crazy bastards! Are you joking? Stop messing around and just let me log out! NOW!”
Clatter- Clatter-
This wasn’t a bug.
Whatever the developers’ intentions were, it was clear that this situation had been deliberately designed. Ha-jun grabbed the mirror in a panic and shook it frantically.
“Ugh… Huff…”
After ten seconds of thrashing at the mirror in rage, he staggered back, his breath reaching his chin, arms trembling from just a few shakes, and moved his unsteady body aside.
Thud-
Crash-
“…Goddammit!”
The mirror toppled forward and shattered into pieces.
Clearing the game itself wasn’t actually that difficult.
For other gamers, perhaps—but he was the world’s first to clear the infamous Nightmare difficulty in a single attempt. He was a veteran of veterans.
‘If only the character I had to play wasn’t this damn sunfish and was Allen Atter instead…’
Catching his breath, Ha-jun tried to calmly assess his situation. His eyes fell on the protagonist’s stats, as bleak as expected for Hell difficulty, and he gritted his teeth.
<Eric Atter>
Level: -99
Strength [1]
Agility [1]
Stamina [1]
Magic [1]
A negative level? That was unheard of in over ten years and 10,000 hours of playing Protect Humanity.
Not just negative—minus ninety-nine—with stats all fixed at 1, worse than a puppy.
Rumors had already circulated among veterans that clearing Nightmare difficulty was impossible because max levels were capped at 50 instead of 99.
And now, he had to clear the game with all stats at 1, where even the kids running in the village square easily had stats totaling over 10.
‘These bastards… difficulty has limits!’
Of course, clearing the game wasn’t entirely impossible.
Protect Humanity is primarily a strategic defense game: you manage your territory, raise soldiers, and periodically fend off monster attacks.
Even if the player is weak, heroes and soldiers under their command could be used to tackle challenges.
‘The problem is, the lower the player’s level, the less the units listen…’
But the Atter Duchy, located in the northern region where the game takes place, had always been meritocratic due to constant monster invasions.
And now he, at level -99 with a body weaker than a child, had to command proud northern soldiers… and heroes capable of splitting mountains with a single sword strike and reshaping terrain with magic.
‘Can I…? No, I must!’
It was near-impossible, but there was no other option. He had to clear the game to return to reality.
‘Maybe it’s a cruel joke… but I can’t gamble my life for nothing. Even if it’s some hidden camera prank, I won’t lose anything by playing seriously, even for a moment.’
After a brief moment of thought, Ha-jun resolved to do whatever he could to tackle the problem.
‘First, I need to understand this body.’
Eric Atter.
The younger half-brother of Allen Atter, the protagonist in other difficulty modes of Protect Humanity.
And at the start, he was a dead character, only seen in a portrait on the family wall.
Ha-jun lowered his head to examine his reflection in the shattered mirror fragments on the floor, then began recalling scattered information about Eric Atter he had noticed throughout the game.
‘Disgrace of the Atter family. The Duchy’s black sheep. That was the nickname.’
In the North, constantly threatened by monsters outside the walls, weakness was equivalent to a grave crime.
Moreover, the Atter Duchy was one of the most prestigious families, tasked with defending the North and ensuring the empire’s peace. That its heir was weaker than a child was more than a mere family disgrace.
‘Normally, even a member of the Duchy would have been cast out beyond the walls… but the problem is that Eric is the only legitimate heir of the current Duke.’
This was the only reason he could cling to the family, despite being despised by all.
By the time the player started as his half-brother Allen, Eric had long been buried in the cold North.
‘So this is a few years before the actual start of the game… Wait. How exactly did Eric die…?’
Clack-
‘Huh?’
Just as he recalled the most crucial fact—his body’s death—someone suddenly swung the door open.
“…I heard some noise from inside again. So, this time, you broke the mirror?”
A sluggish, shadowed face approached, stepping lazily.
Fearlessly staring at the legitimate heir of the Duchy with contempt.
A loosely strapped sword at the waist, plain armor with no insignia.
‘What? Is this a guard assigned to Eric?’
Judging by his appearance, he was definitely a knight of the Duchy.
But his tone was brimming with hostility, as if daring to insult a noble, making Ha-jun frown in displeasure.
“Allen’s guards are already out on the battlefield, earning honors. So why am I stuck with such an incompetent one…?”
He had just looked at the disrespectful knight for a moment, then glanced at the messy floor, sighing as the guard muttered something to himself. A sense of unease made Ha-jun step back.
‘Wait. Eric Atter’s cause of death was definitely…’
Shrrk-
‘An unexplained accident… wasn’t it?’
“Don’t blame me too much. Just handle your part, and they said you’d be sent where you want.”
Whoosh-
As the guard’s hand slowly rose to his waist, drawing the sword sharply, Ha-jun threw himself aside.
Crash-
“Ugh! This… crazy!”
Despite the guard’s flattering words, he had tried to attack his master. The blade brushed his side and smashed the floor. Ha-jun looked up in shock.
‘Right. No way an unexplained accident would happen in a Duke’s mansion. Someone must’ve hired this guy for an assassination disguised as an accident.’
Ding-
<Dylan>
Level: 28
Strength [50]
Agility [42]
Stamina [55]
Magic [8]
Ha-jun’s gaze pierced the guard’s stats.
Level 28. Not comparable to heroes who change the tide of battle alone, but respectable for a Duke’s knight.
‘Damn… I’m dead if this continues!’
-99 level, all stats 1. Already at a disadvantage, and though he noticed early and dodged, the sword’s reach was still deadly.
“Ugh!”
Ha-jun clutched his side, wet palms and pain rising, biting his lip.
Even though Protect Humanity emphasized realism, normally the pain players feel is limited.
But in this cursed difficulty, the problem wasn’t only the logout button.
‘Pain doesn’t matter now. Move… I have to move first!’
His eyes scanned for anything usable.
Thunk-
Mirror fragments scattered from earlier. Instinctively, Ha-jun picked one up and charged at the guard, who was struggling to remove his sword from the floor.
“Ha. A black sheep who never held a sword… thinks he can swing it properly…”
Thud-
Contrary to the guard’s expectations, the mirror shard stabbed precisely into his neck.
“Gah… Huh, what…?”
Whoosh-
Thud-
“Ugh!”
The guard swung reflexively, but his body hit the floor, rolling into the wall.
Plop-
“Ugh, huff…”
Ha-jun lay down, catching his breath as the guard collapsed in shock.
‘That was close.’
Not some legendary sword, just a piece of mirror. Normally, it shouldn’t have worked given the difference in levels and stats.
But in Protect Humanity, low-level characters could still defeat high-level ones under the right circumstances.
[Critical Hit!]
[You exploited the enemy’s weakness at the perfect timing!]
Critical Hits—Ha-jun’s signature move—ignored defense when striking perfectly, regardless of level.
Even with a Critical Hit, taking out a knight with one shard was impossible. But he had struck the exposed neck, making it fatal.
The guard’s body went limp as he tried and failed to stop the blood.
‘…Yeah. That’ll do.’
Level -99, stats fixed at 1. A Duke’s knight collapses from a single hit, and now Ha-jun must clear the game.
No matter how veteran he was, the difficulty was absurd. But now, he had no choice.
‘Might as well smash through it!’
Just then, Ha-jun—no, Eric—resolved his determination.
Thunk-
“Ah, ah…”
At the same time, a small, strained voice came from the door.
“Kyaaaaaaaah!”
A maid, drawn by the commotion, arrived late, screaming through the mansion.
