"It's a dokkaebi!" someone shouted as a creature appeared.
There were people murmuring.
The creature began to speak, but it was a language I couldn't understand, which meant it wasn't an earthly language. Is it something alien or magical?
It seems like no one knows what's going on…
I got up from my seat to inspect the train car a bit more, since it seems like this is about to get out of control. I could break down the train car doors, but that would draw too much attention.
"Testing, testing. Can everyone hear me?" the creature said. "The language system failed for a moment." Can everyone hear me now?
The other passengers began to scream and shout at the creature. At which point, as was to be expected, it became enraged.
"I told you to shut up!" he shouted.
As soon as he said that, some people's heads started to explode.
"You had a pretty comfortable ride, didn't you? You could do whatever you wanted. But now your peaceful lives are over. Nothing in life is free, right?"
he's right, nothing in this life is free, especially for the less privileged... it seems that in the end we weren't at the top of the food chain.
"Do you want money?" a man with glasses offered him money, although I don't think money will solve anything in this situation.
"How much do you need? One million? Two million?"
"Are you offering me your money?"
"I'll give you everything you want if you let me go."
"Money is good. But it's only valid within its spatial and temporal limits."
The dokkaebi snapped its fingers and set the money on fire.
"That paper is useless in my dimension; if you try it again, I'll blow your head off," he said.
"I'm tired of your chatter; I'd rather skip the explanations. You'd better try earning money on your own."
He snapped his fingers again, and his horns grew larger, at which point a sound was heard.
"Channel #BI-7623 OPEN"
"The constellations have entered."
A type of screen appeared in front of me that said:
Main Event Notification
[SHOW YOUR WORTH]
KILL ONE OR MORE LIVING BEINGS
CATEGORY: MAIN
DIFFICULTY: F
TIME LIMIT: 30 MINUTES
REWARD: 300 COINS
PUNISHMENT IF YOU FAIL: DEATH
"Well, good luck to everyone," said the dokkaebi. "I HOPE YOU SHOW ME AN INTERESTING STORY"
As soon as the dokkaebi left, almost everyone panicked; some were terrified and covered in blood, an old woman was praying, others were simply crying, and some were trying to break down the door.
The most important thing is to complete this mission; if I have to kill someone to do it, so be it... but luckily for everyone else, there's another way to complete this mission without anyone dying, or at least without too many people dying.
"Attention, calm down," said an enormous and robust man.
Since when has he been in the car? I didn't see him get on. Now that I look, I hadn't even noticed that white-haired, red-eyed guy…
"Take a deep breath and stop what you're doing."
Most people listened to him; maybe he's a soldier or something like that, since he knows how to handle this situation without any problems.
"Are you all calmer now?" he said. "Can you pay attention to me?"
"As you know, in a national emergency, even a small disturbance can cause many casualties. So I will be in charge of the situation."
"What? Who the hell are you?"
"National emergency?"
"I'm an army lieutenant and I'm currently serving in Unit 6502," he said, showing his wallet with his army ID card.
*Lieutenant Hyenseong Lee*
Many people approached him, some to feel safe and others just to complain since there was nothing to help them feel calm.
"The prime minister is giving a speech!" someone shouted.
I would like to see it, but I don't have a cell phone.
After a brief moment, some people put down their phones, so I deduced that the prime minister had died.
The time began to shrink until it reached 10 minutes. Which means the chaos will begin right now.
And it's even worse now that if the first death doesn't happen in five minutes, we'll all die…
Some people tried to go through the door, but there was a kind of invisible wall blocking their way.
A large screen appeared in the middle of everyone, showing a classroom full of women and what happened when time ran out.
They were all dying except for one who killed another student.
"The survivor of channel #BAY23515 is Jihye Lee"
"Don't you think it's fun?" the dokkaebi said.
Everyone in the train car began to tremble and tense up.
It's time to put an end to this.
I approached the boy I saw a while ago with the insects.
"Hey, I'll take one of these if you don't mind," I said, grabbing one of the insects and crushing it.
[You have earned the achievement "First Kill"]
[You will receive a bonus of 100 coins]
Hmm, so if I kill an insect, I earn coins like in a game. Maybe I should take advantage of this a bit more.
I saw that there were two grasshopper eggs, so I grabbed one and crushed it, killing possibly more than 100 living beings; to be exact, there were 132.
[You have killed 133 living beings]
Details of the massacre:
-1 grasshopper
-132 grasshopper eggs
[Since you have killed living beings who could not defend themselves, you will receive half the coins.]
[You have received 6,650 coins]
[You have unlocked the Exterminator achievement due to excessive killing]
[You received coins. Would you like to see a tutorial on how to use them?]
Yes
I saw a tutorial pop up, which I quickly learned.
"Shut your mouth," said a white-haired boy as he punched an old woman.
"Please let me go!"
"Didn't I tell you to shut up?"
He kept hitting her.
punch, punch, paf.
"What do you think you're doing, brat?" the man with glasses said. "Didn't they teach you to respect your elders?"
"What the hell did you say, old man? You want to die too?" said the white-haired boy.
"What?"
"Don't you see what's happening here?"
"What the hell are you talking about, brat?!"
"Look at that, can't you see?" said the boy, pointing at the floating blue screen.
which showed other scenarios of what was happening in the city or the world
"Don't you understand? The army isn't going to save us, and someone has to die."
"B-but what?"
"We must choose who must die."
It seems this kid adapted to this new world too quickly... I wonder how long it'll take him to die. He could be useful in the future, but first let's take a look at the other tools.
"I know what you're thinking," the boy continued, "you think we're better than that. How could we kill others to survive, as if we were animals?"
Everyone who heard the boy seemed nervous, tense, and, though they didn't want to admit it, somewhat agreed with him.
"Normally I'd agree, but look at the situation we're in." -he said- "We have no other choice: you kill or you'll be killed. Who can blame us if our lives are at stake?"
After finishing his speech, he continued beating the old woman, and everyone else finally decided to join in to save themselves. Even the man with glasses who had defended her earlier started kicking her. Although there were people who still couldn't decide what to do.
There was the boy, the lieutenant, and the other two who sat next to me.
"They're going to kill her!" the brown-haired girl shouted.
"Don't go. It's dangerous!" said the boy with black hair.
"I know, but..."
"If you interfere, they'll kill you too."
It seems that the girl is very nervous and also afraid, although in a situation like this I think everyone is afraid—even I could be afraid.
The man seems to have some plan in mind, since he's inhaling and exhaling; he's psyching himself up to do something.
There was an explosion in the car behind ours, and at that moment the man lunged at the white-haired boy—what a strange coincidence that there was an explosion just then; it almost seems like he already knew it was going to happen.
The subject deliberately bumped into the white-haired boy to make him fall, then quickly went over to the bug boy and grabbed one for himself and the child.
"Everyone stop!" he said. "Killing that old woman won't save us!"
Everyone turned to look at him, some with anger, others nervously.
"Suppose we kill her, then what?" he began a speech—"if that old woman dies, we'll only have bought ourselves more time by killing something within the deadline, but what happens after that?"
Everyone, upon hearing that, became even more tense than they already were.
"If what the goblin said is true, then each of you has to kill someone. Who are you going to kill next? The person next to you?"
"Ha, hahaha," the white-haired boy began to laugh. "And what's the problem? We'll just have to keep killing losers like you! Don't worry about being next; after all, the odds are 50/50."
There's no need to take risks; there's a way to survive without being a killer.
"What?"
"How?"
"The event said we had to kill a living being, not specifically a human," the man said, holding up an insect.
Upon seeing the insects, everyone lunged at him in desperation, to which the man tossed the insects away with a smile.
Everyone started looking for an insect to save themselves, even though there were only three insects left.
I had already finished my part, so all I had to do was wait for the others to either die or survive; in any case, the only thing I could do was wait and watch.
I saw how the dark-haired man and the white-haired boy started fighting because the man wants to save the old woman, although it won't do any good anyway—she'll die either by the boy's hand or by the passage of time.
It seems like the man just wants to finish off that kid. The only thing that surprised me was that the white-haired kid seems to have some kind of power, since his punches are accompanied by a dark aura.
"Aaah, shit!" the boy shouted. "Why can't I hit you?"
The boy kept trying to hit the man in his right shoulder, which the man dodged, and then the boy threw another punch toward his face, which the man barely managed to evade.
"Agh, damn it! You slippery know-it-all."
"There are only two minutes left, kid," said the man.
The boy turned to look at the woman to make the man believe he was going for her, but as soon as the man turned away, the boy pulled out a knife and stabbed him straight in the heart, which the man dodged, but he still received a cut on his shoulder.
The man got up and began walking with the elderly woman in his arms, at which point I approached.
"Hey, why did you save that old woman?" I said, looking him in the eyes. "She's going to die anyway, don't you think?"
The man seemed a bit scared when he saw me because he thought I would attack him.
"You're only doing it to kill that guy, right?"
Just as I said that, the boy attacked the man with the knife, but the man dodged it.
"And who the hell are you now?" the boy asked.
I saw his uniform, which had his name on it.
"Namwoon Kim," I said to myself.
"If you're just here to annoy me, get out of the way," Namwoon said, trying to stab me.
I dodged and stepped back a bit to let them get on with their thing.
Before Namwoon attacked, the man began to say something:
Is an insect egg a living being?
"What the hell are you talking about?"
"The answer is... yes," he said, crushing the grasshopper's eggs.
"How am I supposed to know?" Namwoon said, slashing at the man with his knife, but it had no effect.
"What? How?"
"Grasshoppers lay more than 100 eggs during mating season."
"W-what?"
"I'm not the one who's going to die," said the man, "it's you."
Namwoon kept attacking the man, but now neither punches nor stabs had any effect on him, since he had used coins to improve his constitution. which led to his death.
[TIME'S UP. PROCESSING PAYMENT]
Screams began to be heard from everyone who couldn't find a grasshopper.
[MAIN EVENT #1: PROVE YOUR WORTH HAS ENDED]
[SURVIVORS IN CAR NUMBER 3807 OF TRAIN 3434 TO BULGWANG: 6]