Most players who enjoyed the game loved creating their virtual reality avatars to be cool and beautiful.
Before connecting to the game via the Connector, players could create their characters on Real’s website.
Typically, it took at least an hour or two to craft a handsome or beautiful appearance to their liking.
This was because the face and body could be finely adjusted, and there were countless options for skin tone, eye color, hair color, and hairstyles.
But Irim skipped this entire process with a single press of the “Random” button.
The result was a strikingly handsome avatar.
Slightly over 180 cm tall, with sculpted muscles and a sturdy physique. Pale skin. Perfectly chiseled features and a sharp jawline.
Mystical silver-blue hair and brown eyes.
Despite the unusual hair and eye color combination, he exuded an overall Eastern charm.
For a randomly generated appearance, it was remarkably attractive.
It was far better than the painstakingly customized avatars of others.
Luck had been on his side.
So, seeing such a handsome man frying eggs for over two hours was quite a rare sight.
“Rice-nim! Three fried eggs, please! Sunny-side-up.”
“I’d like one fully cooked, please.”
Users began gathering around Irim.
Sizzle!
Fried eggs cooked merrily on the stone slab.
Irim sold the finished eggs to the users immediately.
It was a full-fledged food stall, just without a storefront.
No one else in the newbie zone had done anything like this.
After disconnecting from Real, Irim’s face was radiant.
In a life that had been shrouded in darkness, he finally felt a glimmer of light.
Sniff sniff.
He tried to catch a scent in reality, but it was a futile hope.
In the past, this would have filled him with bitter self-mockery, but now it stung less.
He had another world now.
That said, I need to earn some money.
Until now, he had thought it wouldn’t matter if he just lived and died like this.
But now that he had a reason to live again, he needed money.
What was he best at?
The answer came without much thought.
10 p.m.
Irim stood in front of a diner called “Narae Snacks.”
While browsing a job site, he saw they were hiring a kitchen assistant.
The location was about a ten-minute taxi ride from his house.
The job required working five days a week, from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m., six hours a day, for 60,000 won per day.
That came to about 1.3 million won a month.
To earn more, he could have looked elsewhere.
But Irim needed time to play Real.
Since he already owned his house and wasn’t the type to waste money, he didn’t need to earn a fortune.
His frugal nature had allowed him to survive the past year without working while still paying for medical bills.
The biggest expense had been alcohol.
Ding.
As Irim opened the diner’s door, the owner, Oh Chunsik, who was looking at his smartphone at a table, looked up.
“Are you…?”
“I’m here for the kitchen assistant position.”
“Oh, sit down.”
As Irim sat across from him, Oh Chunsik gave him a quick once-over and asked, “Irim-ssi? Last name I, first name Rim?”
“Yes.”
“That’s a unique name. How old are you?”
“Twenty-eight.”
“Got any kitchen experience?”
The kitchen was something Irim had been intimately familiar with.
Though it had been a while since he’d set foot in one.
“Yes.”
“Alright. Our diner gets a lot of delivery orders, but even more dine-in customers. You need to be quick. You know the kitchen assistant doesn’t just wash dishes, right? You’ll need to prep ingredients when the head chef asks and sometimes help finish dishes.”
“I understand.”
Since he had lost his sense of taste and smell, cooking directly would be difficult, but he could handle that much.
Oh Chunsik gave Irim, who responded with a smile, another look up and down.
Doesn’t seem like the type to slack off… Should I just hire him?
The previous kitchen assistant had quit abruptly after a big fight with the head chef, Kim Daewon, leaving them desperate for help.
Ugh, that Daewon needs to cool his temper. How many people have quit already?
Clicking his tongue internally, Oh Chunsik added, “You know how fiery kitchen folks can be, right? You can’t just quit after a few days because you can’t handle it.”
“I understand.”
“Then start tomorrow.”
“Don’t you want to see my resume?”
“For a kitchen assistant? Just leave it there.”
“Okay.”
Irim placed the resume he had prepared on the table and bowed.
“Thank you. I’ll be here on time tomorrow.”
“Yeah, don’t be late.”
After Irim left, Oh Chunsik glanced at the resume and snorted.
“Looks like he entered every small-town cooking competition out there. Like that’s any use.”
If Oh Chunsik had known even a little about national cooking competitions, he never would have said that.
Sizzle.
Sizzzle.
In the newbie zone of Real, the Starting Grassland, the number of users frying eggs on stone slabs suddenly surged after Irim logged off.
With no place to buy fried eggs, they started cooking for themselves.
But…
“Why does it only give 7 satiety?”
“A fried egg that makes you vomit? Am I that bad at cooking?”
Not everyone could make a delicious fried egg.
After the interview, Irim returned home and logged back into Real.
Watching the newbies slaughter Unicorn Chickens, he had an idea.
Many newbies killed the chickens and left about half the carcasses behind.
Irim collected as many Unicorn Chicken corpses as he could and stored them in his inventory.
While frantically gathering carcasses, he noticed a cluster of very familiar plants.
Could it be?
Irim quickened his pace.
Reaching the plants, he pressed a leaf with his hand.
A refreshing scent burst forth.
“Rosemary.”
It was rosemary, a type of herb.
A fantastic herb for cooking meat, eliminating gaminess and enhancing flavor.
Thrilled by the unexpected find, Irim harvested the rosemary.
“Let’s get started.”
The Starting Grassland had a large lake.
Irim moved to a spot near it.
Sitting on the ground with a flat, wide stone in front of him, Irim took out a Unicorn Chicken carcass and his dagger.
He began butchering the chicken swiftly.
Though the dagger wasn’t a kitchen knife and felt unfamiliar, his skill compensated for it.
In the blink of an eye, he separated the bones and meat of a single chicken.
How long had it been since he’d done this?
Irim’s face was filled with joy.
He washed the bloody meat in the lake, cut it into bite-sized pieces, and rubbed it with the rosemary.
Then, using the long horn from the butchered chicken, he skewered the meat to make kebabs.
“Let’s grill them.”
He gathered branches, lit them with his torch, and rotated the skewers over the fire.
The aroma of cooking meat was divine.
The scent was so enticing that newbies forgot about hunting and gathered around.
Sizzle sizzle.
Finally, a chicken skewer was complete.
[Delicious Chicken Skewer]
– Satiety +15 upon consumption
The onlookers’ gazes focused on the steaming skewer.
Irim took a bite of the skewer, as if to show off.
Nom.
As he chewed the perfectly cooked meat, rich juices burst forth.
“Mmm.”
How long had it been since he’d tasted meat juices?
Overwhelmed by the flood of flavor, Irim let out an involuntary moan.
Following the rush of juices, the smoky aroma spread, sending him into ecstasy.
The rosemary had perfectly masked the gaminess of the chicken.
Irim devoured the entire skewer on the spot.
“Haa, delicious.”
It was heartfelt admiration.
The watching users swallowed hard. One of them spoke up.
“Rice-nim, could you make me a chicken skewer too?”
It was Sinking, who had previously bought fried eggs.
“1,500 won each, how about it?”
The satiety gain was the same as his fried eggs.
But the price was three times higher.
Skewers required more effort and tasted better.
“I’ll buy.”
Sinking replied immediately.
“I’ll make it right away, customer.”
Irim butchered more chicken, skewered the meat on a horn, and grilled it.
He handed the perfectly cooked skewer to Sinking.
And received 1,500 won.
Sinking blew on the hot skewer to cool it, took a bite, and chewed.
“Wow.”
Nothing but awe came out.
“This is amazing.”
Sinking gave a thumbs-up.
Other users rushed forward, eager to buy skewers.
“Yes, I’ll make them right away.”
Irim smiled brightly and began butchering chickens diligently.
“Your order of five chicken skewers is ready.”
“Yep, that’s 7,500 won.”
In just three hours, Irim had sold 99 chicken skewers.
He was having so much fun selling food in the game that he lost track of time.
The money from selling skewers alone amounted to 148,500 won.
Combined with yesterday’s fried egg sales, he had over 200,000 won.
“Phew, let’s take a break.”
Irim told the users still coming to buy skewers that he’d take a one-hour break.
Selling food in a game and even taking a break?
He found it amusing himself.
Growl.
He was hungry.
After three hours of making skewers for others, his satiety had dropped significantly.
Irim skewered some thigh meat he’d butchered to make a skewer for himself.
But then—
[Achievement Unlocked!]
Achievement Acquired: The Piercer
Condition: Be the first to pierce monster carcasses 1,000 times
Reward: Death Point Vision F
Irim’s eyes widened as he read the achievement details.
A skill.
It was his first skill in the game.
Irim examined Death Point Vision closely.
[Death Point Vision F, Passive]
Grants the ability to see the death points of 1-star monsters. Piercing a death point accurately allows you to kill the monster in one strike.
Higher ranks enable seeing death points of higher-grade monsters.
It was a passive skill.
Moreover, the condition included the word “first.”
This meant no other player after Irim could earn this skill, no matter how many times they pierced monster carcasses.
After reading the description, Irim observed the Unicorn Chickens around him.
Astonishingly, red dots marked their death points.
Let’s try it.
Irim looked at the dagger in his hand, then shifted his gaze around.
The ground was littered with discarded Unicorn Chicken horns from eaten skewers.
To hit a death point, a long, sharp horn would be better than a dagger.
Irim put the dagger back in his inventory and picked up a horn.
He focused on the death point of a nearby Unicorn Chicken.
The death point was on its back.
Gulp.
This was his first time hunting a monster in Real.
With subtle tension, he gripped the horn tightly.
Approaching the chicken slowly, Irim stabbed the horn directly into the death point.
Puk!
“Kkok!”
It went in perfectly.
The Unicorn Chicken let out a pitiful cry, trembled, and died instantly.
Incredible.
He had never seen a newbie kill a Unicorn Chicken in one hit.
Yet he had done it.
A thrill ran through his body.
Irim stored the freshly killed chicken’s carcass in his inventory and approached another, stabbing its death point.
Puk!
“Kkook!”
Another one-hit kill.
He found hunting monsters with Death Point Vision fun.
Irim began stabbing every Unicorn Chicken in sight, taking them down in a single blow.