I Became the Final Boss in the Game

Chapter 15 : Chapter 15

Chapter 15. Daily Life in Seoul

Sometime after Riman left the gukbap restaurant.

One of the merchants asked another.

“How much did you give that man?”

“40 million.”

“Was that all of it?”

“It was everything in the safe.”

“Ahem…”

“Why?”

“But honestly, did we have to give him all of it? Our money was mixed in there too…”

The merchant who heard this chuckled and suddenly took out his phone.

He then displayed something on the screen and showed it to him.

“Look at this.”

“What is it?”

“The wanted poster for Alex Boyman. It came out yesterday.”

“Wait, the bounty is… 80 million?!”

“That’s right. And the man who just left was a Headhunter who came to catch Alex. But what did we do to Alex?”

There was no need to answer.

Everyone here had seen the result.

“So we… personally blew that person's chance to earn 80 million Credits… is that it?”

“That's right. We blew away that person's profit. The profit of a monster who wiped out an organization of dozens of people by himself.”

“……!”

“A person like that took 40 million and went back smiling. We got off cheap. If that man had been displeased, all of us here could have died.”

At his words, all the merchants nodded their heads.

“And honestly, think about it. We only spent 40 million to kill an Enhanced Human like Alex. At this rate…”

“It’s reasonable.”

“It's not reasonable, it's cheap. How could you hire a problem-solver of that caliber for that amount of money, you old fool.”

“I suppose so…”

“So, what we have to do now is…”

He let out a light sigh and said.

“…Let’s start by holding a funeral for our Merchant Association chairman.”

* * *

Immediately after returning to the hotel room.

Riman opened the bag and counted the money first.

Was there anything in the world as beautiful as a neatly stacked bundle of cash?

Riman flicked through the bills with quick and precise hand movements.

‘Total: 40,050,000 Credits.’

Roughly 40 million.

The money he was supposed to receive for catching Alex was 4 million, so he had ended up earning almost ten times more.

With so much money in front of him, a thought suddenly occurred to him.

‘Wait a minute, in that case, wouldn't it be better to hand over my achievement to someone trustworthy, have them collect 100% of the bounty on my behalf, and I would still get more bounty money even if I only received half?’

At first glance, it was a pretty good idea.

But Riman soon shook his head.

The first reason was that it was impossible to find a ‘trustworthy’ person in this city.

And the second reason was that Riman's top priority right now was not money.

Riman's top priority was to catch as many escapees as possible, be recognized for his achievements, and receive a pardon.

The more others took credit for his bounty hunts, the lower Riman's value would become.

So, Riman had to catch the escapees himself.

Even if he could only receive 5% of the bounty.

‘Still, 5% is too much, that Lancelot is a real son of a bitch.’

Well, that was enough of the stray thoughts.

Riman looked at the pile of 40 million Credits and thought.

‘Where should I spend this.’

In his past life, he might have put it in a fixed deposit, but here, saving wasn't that important.

Getting stronger was what mattered.

Among the escapees he hadn't caught yet, there were those who were stronger than the current Riman.

‘Should I buy equipment?’

Buying equipment.

Come to think of it, this was the best option.

It was the easiest way to get stronger by spending money.

‘Then the question is what kind of equipment to buy.’

Buying equipment meant obtaining a tool to compensate for one's shortcomings.

‘Let's think. What was the most disappointing part about myself in this last hunt?’

After just a little thought, the answer popped out easily.

‘Reconnaissance ability.’

The biggest failure in this hunt was that he had lost Alex.

Of course, a prey can run away.

But even so, one must not lose track of the prey's location.

In today's case as well, after losing Alex, Riman had been searching in the wrong places.

In the end, it was because of the gunshots that he was able to find Alex.

And because of that, he had been subjected to a snatching-that-wasn't-a-snatching.

Of course, he had earned 10 times the money as a result, but that was just the outcome.

In any case, if he could just widen his reconnaissance range more than it was now, he could prevent such things from happening in advance.

And the best way to increase the detection range was…

‘To buy a golem.’

A golem was a type of magical robot.

It moved in conjunction with its master's mana, could share its senses with its master, or even use its master's magic in their stead.

‘If I buy a flying-type golem, both the detection distance and range will increase dramatically.’

A flying-type golem was, simply put, a magical drone.

The difference was that it moved with its master's mana, unlike a drone that runs on electricity.

‘A low-grade flying-type golem can be bought for about 40 million. Let's see, then the models I can afford are…’

As he was going through the list of flying-type golems in his head.

‘No.’

Just then, a forgotten memory flashed through his mind like lightning.

‘What am I even thinking about, there's only one thing I have to buy right now…!’

An equipment that he could never buy at this price if not now.

And an equipment that the current Riman needed.

If he didn't have the money, it would be a different story, but now that the money was secured, he had to buy it no matter what.

Because later, it would become an item that he couldn't buy even if he paid tens or hundreds of times the current price.

Riman turned on his phone and called someone.

“Ah, Mr. Ruger, I called because I had something to ask about the Black Market.”

* * *

The Black Market.

A place also known as the dark market.

An underground market where items that cannot be legally traded are distributed.

For now, the Black Market was the only answer to purchase magical items.

Of course, the trade of magical items itself was not illegal.

To be precise, the trade of magical items by those ‘without a license’ was illegal.

With a license, both selling and buying could be done in the open.

However, this licensing system was created because a significant number of magical items were equipped with dangerous functions or were too expensive.

There were two ways to obtain this license.

Either graduate from a Magic Tower and obtain a certified magician's qualification.

Or separately pass the World Federation Government's review.

Naturally, there were no options for Riman to choose from between these two.

So, he had no choice but to go to the Black Market.

Besides…

‘Right now, I have to go to the Black Market even if I had a license.’

The item Riman wanted was at the Black Market at this very moment.

He had no choice but to go.

However, the Black Market was not a place one could go to just because they wanted to.

All illegal activities have their own secrecy and entry barriers.

The entry barrier to the Black Market Riman was trying to go to was an ‘introduction’.

It was a structure where entry was only possible by being introduced by someone related to the place.

Naturally, the person who could give such an introduction would not be someone from the open world.

That's why Riman had contacted Ruger, the owner of the Noksan Junkyard.

Ruger, too, was a junkyard owner only by title, but in reality, he was the boss of a small gang.

“The Black Market, you say? Of course, you can go with just my introduction!”

“Oh.”

He had actually just taken a wild guess, but it was the right answer.

“Come to our junkyard around 1 o'clock tomorrow. The Black Market won't be open today anyway. Come and we'll go together.”

“Thanks. It must be a bother.”

“Haha, not at all. See you tomorrow!”

Riman hung up the phone.

‘Things are getting easier now that I’m friendly with Noksan.’

In the game, there were some difficulties in entering the Black Market at this point in time.

One had to solve a rather annoying quest to barely get their hands on the entry permit.

On top of that, even if you went to the Black Market, there was almost nothing you could buy.

Most of the items in the Black Market were more expensive than the market price, and it was difficult to gather enough money to buy them at that point in time.

Of course, you could secure enough money to go to the Black Market by catching just one Mugan escapee.

That was just a theoretical story, though.

Because at the beginning of the game, the character is not strong enough to catch an escapee.

So, one had to catch various petty criminals, save up small amounts of money, and level up.

The current specs, having caught two escapees from the very beginning of the game, were on a completely different level.

“Okay, for now, the annoying things are over. Time for a shower.”

Riman went into the bathroom and took off his clothes.

A gaunt, emaciated body was reflected in the mirror.

But what was more noticeable than the thin body were the tattoos.

Tattoos that still looked unfamiliar, covering his entire body.

They were tattooed everywhere except for his face, neck, hands, and feet.

Riman looked closely at the tattoos through the mirror.

The more he looked, the more bizarre they seemed.

It was because he couldn't figure out for what purpose they were tattooed.

What was tattooed on his body was not a picture.

Only letters, symbols, and unidentifiable geometric patterns.

At a rough glance, there were millions of characters, and they were a mix of the alphabet, Greek letters, Chinese characters, numbers, and even runes.

Although he could read the individual characters, it was impossible to interpret the entire content.

However, he could make a guess.

“Magic… it seems related.”

Of course, in the world of , there were no cases of using tattoos for magical purposes.

But magic circles existed.

And the letters and patterns tattooed on this body had some things in common with the components of a magic circle.

Of course, even so, it was still impossible to interpret.

‘Could it be related to how this body can use magic of various systems?’

There was no way a man who was the final boss of this game would have tattooed hundreds of thousands of texts on his body for no reason.

So, he thought it must be related to the power this body possessed.

Well, in any case, he would find out about these tattoos gradually.

‘For now, let’s take a shower.’

Swoooosh-

The warm water flowed down his skin, relaxing his tense body.

He thought he should just rest today without doing anything, and Riman began to lather the soap.

* * *

The next day, in the afternoon.

Riman went down to the parking lot with a bag slung over one shoulder.

A bag containing a bundle of 40 million Credits in cash.

And he started the motorcycle.

It was to stop by the Noksan Junkyard before heading to the Black Market.

Vroooom-

Riman drove on the road at a leisurely, moderate speed.

There was no need to rush.

As he drove, he took in the scenery of Seoul in the year 2200.

Endlessly tall buildings, occasional flying vehicles cutting across the sky, thicker smog, and dirtier roads.

However, it seemed that Riman's leisurely appearance looked like a tasty prey to someone.

To the duo of motorcycle snatchers who were now speeding from the opposite lane.

Vroooooom!

They came rushing, targeting the bag on Riman's shoulder.

They had an amazing sense for the smell of money.

Anyway, they intended to snatch the bag strap and flee quickly—

[Discharge]

Bzzzzzzzzzt!

“Geup…!”

“Keok…!!”

A black lightning bolt erupted from Riman's body and fried them on the spot.

From the beginning, Riman had noticed that they were targeting this bag.

Just as the snatchers and their motorcycle tumbled onto the road.

CRUNCH!

A van coming from behind ran the snatchers over.

“Oops.”

Seeing this scene in his side mirror, Riman let out an exclamation without realizing it.

He hadn't expected it to go that far.

Meanwhile, the driver of the van that had run over the snatchers quickly stopped the car and got out.

He looked at the blood splattered on the car body and the scratched bumper and muttered.

“Agh, in broad daylight, shi…”

After muttering so, he got back into the van and left the scene.

Leaving the scattered bodies as they were.

And so, the Seoul of the year 2200 went on, as if nothing had happened.