The area around the department store event hall was crowded and noisy, which was fortunate.
In response to Lee Nayeon’s bold statement, the man in the suit merely blinked, as if he had misheard.
He quickly continued with what he had to say.
“I’m sorry to bother you while you’re busy.”
As he reached into his inner pocket, seemingly to pull something out, Lee Nayeon’s eyes narrowed sharply.
She seemed to mistake it for him reaching for a weapon.
However, Choi Junseok stepped forward calmly, signaling her to stay composed.
“What’s the matter?”
If he hadn’t, who knows where her small, tightly clenched fist, slowly curling up, might have landed.
The man promptly pulled out a business card and bowed.
“Greetings. I’m Kim Jinho from the Super Sonic marketing team.”
The business card indeed read “Kim Jinho, Super Sonic Marketing Team.”
“To get to the point, we’d like to scout the lady beside you as the next model for Super Sonic, which is why we’ve rudely stopped you like this.”
“A model…?”
Kim Jinho, Lee Jiyu’s manager, scrutinized Choi Junseok, who was carrying the conversation on behalf of the woman, almost like a spokesperson.
Is he her boyfriend?
They weren’t holding hands or clinging to each other, so they didn’t seem like a couple, but the man was handsome, which led to the assumption.
“Please do contact us. Oh, by the way… were you perhaps on your way to purchase our products?”
That was indeed the case, but Choi Junseok didn’t want to admit it.
He was about to respond, but Kim Jinho, not waiting for an answer, continued.
“Please, come this way. It’s fine, don’t hesitate. We’ll provide you with some sponsored items.”
“What? Sponsored items out of nowhere?”
“Just think of it as a friendly gesture to make a good impression. Our CEO, who is also our main model, Lee Jiyu, will be quite busy for a while, so we’ve been eagerly looking for a replacement model.”
There was some truth to that statement.
Choi Junseok clearly sensed it.
This man was sent by Lee Jiyu to keep an eye on them.
Whether it was the intuition of someone who had risen to the rank of a top player or something else, it didn’t matter.
What was certain was that Lee Jiyu was still searching for the Quadratic Function.
However, Choi Junseok, as an ordinary citizen of the Republic of Korea, thought to himself: Free stuff?
If there are no strings attached…
Well, I’ve got to take what’s offered.
And so, the two of them left the department store with their hands full of shopping bags.
Even though it was a sale event, the total value of the items in their hands easily exceeded 900,000 won.
They had initially offered only women’s clothing, but Choi Junseok’s pointed throat-clearing ensured they included men’s clothing as well.
A full set from head to toe, plus some spare clothes.
Even if I planned to splurge with government funds…
Choi Junseok still had a sense of business ethics and fairness.
After all, he had already spent 18.3 million won on a sofa and a giant TV.
Sure, he now had a card that let him spend freely like a black card.
But it was clear he needed to find more ways to earn money.
I should start looking for safer ways to loot items.
Satisfied with the free shopping spree, they were about to take a taxi home when Lee Nayeon spoke to him telepathically, alerting him to a pursuer.
Someone’s tailing us. It looks like a summoned being sent by that woman, Lee Jiyu, from the event hall.
Not a summoned being, but a subordinate employee.
Either way, their intentions are clear.
For now, act natural and don’t show any hostility.
Yes.
Making suspicious detours would only make them look more dubious.
So, Choi Junseok got into the taxi, trying his best to act calm.
At least they don’t fully know my identity.
It was possible they hadn’t discovered that Lee Nayeon was a summoned being either.
He wasn’t sure since he wasn’t F-rank, but they might just be following a vague sense of something off.
Or maybe it was just a pervert using street casting as an excuse.
The latter would be preferable, but the former seemed overwhelmingly more likely.
After all, they had tried so hard to get Lee Nayeon to meet Lee Jiyu under the pretense of offering sponsored items.
It might have looked like genuine street casting to an outsider, but Choi Junseok had seen through the ulterior motive.
They’ve definitely noticed something.
Upon arriving home, Choi Junseok locked the door, his heart pounding.
It felt like he’d experienced a lifetime’s worth of being followed lately.
First in America, now in Korea.
And after Korea, an S-rank player from one of the top five guilds.
At that moment, Lee Nayeon looked at Choi Junseok, signaling him to summon her sword.
Her lips moved silently as she spoke.
Someone’s coming up the stairs from outside.
How they managed to bypass the building’s entrance code was a mystery, but it was astonishing.
A sword appeared at her waist.
A chilling silence followed.
As Lee Nayeon’s thumb moved toward the sword’s hilt, her eyes grew icy.
She gestured toward the door with her eyes, mouthing silently.
They’re right in front of the door…!
Suddenly, her expression turned to shock.
“Arghhh!”
A man’s scream came from outside the door, followed by the sound of something freezing solid.
Crackle!
At the sound of menacing ice, Choi Junseok peered through the peephole.
A man, frozen solid like the baby dinosaur Dooly, appeared.
Then came the sound of Song Hana’s footsteps rushing up from the floor below.
Choi Junseok opened the door in a panic.
Song Hana looked down with a proud expression.
“Got him! This guy! Heh! Pretty effective, right?”
“H-Hana, is this guy dead?”
“Nah, he won’t die from this! It’s fine! It’s just a seal.”
“Hana, do you happen to have something like a protective charm? Something that creates a barrier?”
“I do! A protective charm! It’s super effective! Want one?”
As she confidently handed Choi Junseok a protective charm, he glanced at the frozen Manager Kim Jinho.
The man was frozen solid, eyes wide open in shock. It wouldn’t have been surprising if he had died instantly.
Not stopping there, Lee Nayeon, with her hand on her sword, asked.
“Should I cut him?”
Amid the dizzying situation, the most sensible option for Choi Junseok was, of course, the Player Management Office.
But before he could even call Team Leader Kang, a text arrived.
Team Leader Kang was already on his way to Choi Junseok’s place.
***
“Nice to meet you, Song Hana. I’m Kang Jinsu, Team Leader at the Player Management Office. Just call me Team Leader Kang.”
“Hi!”
Team Leader Kang, casually introducing himself with a frozen block of ice (containing a person) in the room, was no ordinary person.
They say there’s no such thing as a normal person in the player world, but…
Even Team Leader Kang, whom Choi Junseok had thought of as a fellow ordinary person, nodded calmly at the sight of a frozen human, leaving Choi Junseok with a strange sense of betrayal.
“I’d heard about Song Hana’s skills, but they’re truly impressive.”
“Right? Hehe, thanks!”
She glanced at Choi Junseok as if to say, Did you hear that praise?
“What, you two aren’t acquainted? Wait, hold on. Team Leader Kang, do you have surveillance cameras set up around my place?”
“No, that’s not it. My visit today has nothing to do with this frozen guy.”
Choi Junseok gave him a curious look, as if to ask what it was about.
“Let’s deal with this first. Is it true that Super Sonic’s Bunny came looking for you?”
“It seems that way. I don’t know how they knew, but they spotted me the moment we crossed paths at the event hall… Could my face—”
He shook his head firmly.
“No way it’s known. Even the Director doesn’t know your face, and he only refers to you as Quadratic Function, not by your real name.”
“So you’re saying there’s no way the information leaked internally.”
“If anything, maybe she memorized the profiles of every F-rank player out of spite and identified you, an F-rank she’s never seen, through appraisal…”
“That’s impossible. I gave him a charm that disguises his status window.”
Song Hana, hands on her hips, puffed out her chest proudly.
“Can you manipulate this guy’s memories too?”
“Yep! How do you want them altered?”
“Erase about two or three hours of his recent memories.”
As it turned out, Song Hana was like a versatile Doraemon.
That’s possible?
In any case, things were moving swiftly thanks to Song Hana’s all-purpose charms.
She altered his memories to make him think he failed to follow them after they left the department store.
Song Hana diligently drew a charm and stuck it onto the ice block.
Cracks began forming in the ice.
Shatter! Tiny ice crystals sparkled as they scattered.
The moment Lee Jiyu’s startled manager tried to shout something—
Slap!
Song Hana leaped forward and boldly stuck the charm on his forehead.
His eyes instantly glazed over, and with a dazed expression, he walked out the front door.
It was a chilling sight, but Song Hana just giggled while Lee Nayeon patted her head.
“It worked, right?!”
Choi Junseok quietly gave her a thumbs-up.
Team Leader Kang, however, looked somewhat reluctant.
“This doesn’t exactly solve the problem, but it’s a temporary fix. We’ll do our best to cover the rest. You should look into moving somewhere else in the next few days. By the way… the real reason I came today isn’t about this.”
“What is it?”
Choi Junseok tensed up as Team Leader Kang’s tone grew serious.
“A Magic Tower has risen in North Korea. It’s the first time in history.”
“A Magic Tower in North Korea?”
“Yes. It’s located south of Kaesong. If South Korean players go to the northernmost part of Paju, they’ll be within range to enter the North Korean Magic Tower.”
The Magic Tower teleports players to the nearest tower based on their location, though there’s a distance limit.
“Are you asking me to go there and snatch the hidden reward on the first floor?”
He already knew. In his past life, a Magic Tower had indeed appeared in North Korea.
Back then, Choi Junseok hadn’t paid much attention to it.
To be precise, he didn’t have the time.
As an F-rank Porter, he was busy completing government-run player training programs.
“As expected of you, Junseok. You catch on quickly.”
Every Magic Tower’s first floor measures the fastest solo clear time and grants a hidden reward.
It’s a universal trait across all Magic Towers worldwide.
Team Leader Kang bowed again, politely reiterating his request.
“On behalf of the Ministry of Defense and the government, I humbly ask for your help! The first floor of every Magic Tower has a hidden reward. That means… it’s your time to shine. Please prevent North Korean players from claiming the first floor’s hidden reward. I’m counting on you!”
It was a request, sure, but the opponent was North Korea. Was this okay?
Wouldn’t it start a war?
“Is that really okay?”
“If possible, it’d be great if you could smash the Magic Tower to pieces, but that’s impossible, right?”
Smash the Magic Tower to pieces?
It might actually be possible, but for now, Choi Junseok stayed silent.
“We’ve prepared a vehicle to take you to Paju. If you leave now, you’ll arrive around midnight when the tower entry ticket resets, right? So… let’s head out right away, before the North Korean players get there. We’ve got the first floor’s structure mapped out. As for the clear conditions—”
Messing with North Korea?
He couldn’t let this slide.
At the same moment, just over an hour after the Magic Tower appeared, North Korea sent an official warning to the South.
It was a statement from the First Vice-Chairman of the Central Committee of the Workers’ Party of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, officially transmitted to South Korea. Summarized in one line, it read:
“If you dare poke your nose into our Magic Tower with your shameless faces, be prepared to see blood!”
It was clear they knew South Korean players could access it from Paju.
And within about 30 minutes of that warning, an anonymous player sent South Korea’s official response.
“Summon!”
BOOM!
[Congratulations!]
[You have cleared the 1st floor.]
[Congratulations!]
[Hidden Reward Condition: Achieved the fastest solo clear.]
[Clear Time: 0 seconds.]
[Rewards will be granted.]
[Would you like to register anonymously in the Hall of Fame? (Y/N)]
[Registered anonymously.]
[Hidden Reward and Clear Rewards will be granted.]
This meant North Korea could no longer claim the first floor’s hidden reward.
The reason a 0-second clear was possible?
Thanks to the “protective charm” Song Hana, the S-rank home security guard, had given Choi Junseok.
At the same time, this event marked the beginning of the legend of the Quadratic Function among South Korea’s Player Management Office and players.
The reason was simple.
If the anonymous player who smashed through the first floor in North Korea was indeed Quadratic Function, what happened the next morning wouldn’t make sense.
Because Quadratic Function cleared the 8th floor of the Suseo Magic Tower in record time, according to his schedule.
Suseo Magic Tower Hall of Fame List:
[8th Floor: Best Record ‘5 seconds’ – Anonymous, 0 others (F-rank)]
If Quadratic Function was responsible for the chaos at the Kaesong Magic Tower, it would’ve been impossible for him to clear the 8th floor of the Suseo Magic Tower in 5 seconds.
It wasn’t a matter of time but the absolute system restriction: one tower entry per 24 hours.
Every player is bound by this unyielding rule.
And yet, the top clear rank on the first floor of the Kaesong Magic Tower’s Hall of Fame was also listed as F-rank.
So, North Korea’s reaction, upon hearing this information through their spies, was unanimous.
At first, they thought South Korea had sent Quadratic Function to wreak havoc, but it didn’t seem that way.
Could it be… us?
Do we have our own Quadratic Function?!
The happiness circuits in North Korea began to overload.
Chairman Kim Jongun leapt to his feet, his heavy frame shaking, and issued a grand order to “find and reward the glorious warrior of the people,” as North Korean broadcasts loudly proclaimed.
Both North and South Korea began swallowing hard, trying to make sense of the situation.
This was the emergence of the so-called Quadratic Function.