Prologue
"The incident involving the disappearance of Mr. Noh, CEO of Daedo Trading, occurred on X day of X month, 20XX ..."
Dong Bong-su, as usual, was cleaning up after finishing his hobby.
The whooosh of running water, the whirring of the vacuum cleaner, and the scrape-scrape of sweeping didn't last long. Lastly, he rolled up the special vinyl sheet he had spread across the floor to keep blood from soaking in, and tossed it into the trash.
Thud.
What remained was the result of his hobby, lying there all alone. Unlike the bodies he had handled until now, this one was enormous. Even so, Dong Bong-su effortlessly hoisted it onto his back and headed for the freezer.
Creeeak—
With an unpleasant noise, the large hinged door opened.
He went to the corner of the freezer and neatly arranged the still-warm corpse.
Inside, the earlier "veterans" were already lined up, leaning against the wall. Of course, though this one was a freshly arrived rookie for now, before long it too would become a veteran.
"The police are continuing to track down Mr. Noh's whereabouts while also investigating the company funds he embezzled ..."
The news playing from his smartphone was about the fat man who had just become a new member of the freezer.
Why had Mr. Noh been targeted?
There was nothing special about it. Simply because this fat man was a carnivore.
Most humans are herbivores. Even when their territory is invaded, they laugh it off. Even when subjected to violence, if the other party is stronger, they endure it and move on. Endurance is their everyday state.
But carnivores actively hunt. They attack, kill, and devour their prey. When another competitor challenges them, they bite and tear until the opponent's throat is crushed—just like lions or tigers that stand atop the living pyramid.
Dong Bong-su enjoyed killing those carnivores. As an apex predator himself, it was his sole reason for living, and his hobby.
"During the investigation, police discovered more than a dozen people bound with chains in the basement of Mr. Noh's home. All of them were women, and at the time of discovery, their tongues had been cut out, rendering them unable to speak.… The National Forensic Service… confirmed that they were all girls who had gone missing several years ago..."
Rattle—bang.
With the freezer's steel door closing, the cleanup was complete.
Still listening to the news streaming from his smartphone, Dong Bong-su leisurely exited the storage room.
"Next news. Claims have been raised that a recently developed virtual reality game has led to an increase in murder cases, drawing the attention of the academic community..."
As was typical of the news, once the report about the recently killed fat rookie, Mr. Noh, ended, a new story immediately followed.
"..."
Tap.
Dong Bong-su's steps halted on the stairs.
The interview was being passed from the anchor to a reporter, and then from the reporter to an expert.
"Murim Online must immediately suspend its service or be patched so that its excessive synchronization with reality becomes impossible. By indiscriminately and vividly depicting scenes of bloodshed and the severing of limbs and heads, it stimulates murderous impulses in young students and immature adults. This has a very high likelihood of being linked to real murder cases..."
It wasn't unusual for the news to inform him of new prey.
But—
"Murim Online, huh."
Being told about an entirely new hunting ground was a first.
Dong Bong-su stood there for a long time, staring intently at his smartphone until the news ended. After it was over, he returned to his room and ordered a single item online.
"This should be fun."
A Murim Online–exclusive capsule.
A new hunting ground.
***
Chapter 1. Reincarnation
Abandon all hope, ye who enter this gate.
***
The Soul Reaper Belteruk was bored.
It wasn't that he had nothing to do—there was more work than he could handle. Even now, tasks were piled up like a mountain. He was merely indulging in a brief moment of leisure.
The primary duty of Soul Reapers was to collect the souls of those whose lifespans had ended.
Finding the dead, the dying, or those who must die, and severing the tether of the soul—that was their job.
He didn't particularly dislike the work. It was simply the monotony of doing the same thing every day that bored him. Gods weren't fundamentally different from humans. They felt most of the same emotions humans did. The only difference was that, depending on their duties, they might be unable to feel certain emotions, or feel others far more intensely.
The unique creator god or a perfect god that humans imagined?
That didn't exist. Or perhaps it did in some world somewhere. But at least as far as Belteruk knew, no such being existed in this universe.
The difference between humans and gods—at least in Belteruk's understanding—was merely lifespan and occupation. If one had to add something else, perhaps a difference in strength.
Even that wasn't absolute. Occasionally, among humans, there were those who trained to the point of encroaching upon the realm of gods. Their lifespans could be enormous, and their power could rival that of deities. Collecting the souls of such beings wasn't easy for Soul Reapers.
Generally, when that happened, the reapers would be plagued with headaches. In extreme cases, the entire underworld would be put on emergency alert.
'Me?'
Belteruk shook his head, snapping himself out of his thoughts.
Like that motion, he was an exception. If only he could get rid of this eternal, snowfield-like boredom, he would actually welcome such incidents happening en masse.
But such events occurred once every tens of thousands of years, if at all.
'Nothing like that will happen today either.'
As always, Belteruk took out the Reaper's Register. The moment he faced the sea of text, a yawn spilled out. It really was unbearably dull.
Creeeak—
Still, he couldn't neglect his duties as a Soul Reaper. Being annihilated for dereliction of duty would be far too absurd. Yawning widely, he stood up from his chair and glanced over the very top entry in the register.
3789028376.
The first reaper number. Today's first customer.
Since he had previously collected a soul from the 110th dimensional world, this one would definitely be from the 111th. Cycling through dimensions in order was a long-standing rule among Soul Reapers, taught by their predecessors to prevent them from being tainted by lingering too long in one dimension.
Ignoring the dimensional number, he checked the entry once more.
3789028376.
Belteruk stored the register in a divine subspace and pulled out his reaper-exclusive terminal. Made of black crystal, the palm-sized device was a powerful tool capable of connecting to countless dimensions.
Beep-beep—
With a few light movements of his fingers, the surrounding scenery changed in an instant. The gray mist and cold air of the underworld vanished, replaced by the warm, humid atmosphere unique to the 111th dimension. He had teleported directly from the underworld.
Belteruk manipulated the terminal again, searching for the location of soul number 3789028376.
Republic of Korea, Seoul Special City, Gangnam District, XX-dong, XX Villa.
He flew straight to the indicated location. Weaving between buildings dense with greedy emotions, he soon arrived. Though humans couldn't see it, to a reaper's eyes, murky smoke-like auras of desire and obsession rose from every building. This was especially intense in an area like Gangnam.
Today's first customer lived in a neatly kept villa.
"Yaaawn—."
Belteruk poked his drowsy eyes once with his reaper's scythe. Letting the scythe's chilling aura seep into them was his personal habit for driving away sleep.
Having shaken off his drowsiness, he entered the villa. The interior was just as clean as the exterior. Despite the villa's size, there was no sign of any other soul's presence—it seemed the owner lived alone.
He headed to the fifth floor, where the soul's vibrations were strongest. Passing through the wall and entering, he saw the presumed owner of soul number 3789028376 sitting in a strangely shaped chair.
'Another one of those, huh?'
Belteruk knew exactly what the sealed black chair was. It was a virtual reality game capsule.
He didn't know how humans had developed such capabilities, but they had created a new dimensional realm known as virtual reality. Of course, it was a subordinate concept, distinct from true dimensions, but it was impressive nonetheless.
Virtual reality.
True to its name, it was a virtual world, meaning souls couldn't truly belong to it. Even so, souls from true dimensions could enter and exit it via those capsules. Humans themselves weren't aware of this, but Soul Reapers knew well that their souls were repeatedly passing through.
Because of that, some high-ranking reapers took the matter quite seriously.
It might still have the label of "virtual," but if it continued to develop like this, could it not evolve into a genuine "realm" within a few dozen generations? Perhaps even within one or two?
…An absurd, overcautious worry.
Humans were variables that were difficult to control, but still.
'That's going too far.'
Snorting lightly as he dismissed the old high-ranking reapers' concerns, Belteruk passed through the capsule wall and entered. Inside lay an utterly ordinary man, with an average face and build, wearing a headset for connecting to the virtual reality server.
Belteruk glanced at him once, then, without the slightest hesitation, raised his scythe high and severed the neck of the owner of soul number 3789028376.
There was no blood, nor was the physical neck actually cut.
A reaper's scythe didn't cut matter—it severed only the tether of the soul. To the eye, it seemed as though nothing had happened, but the body of soul number 3789028376 was already dead.