Chapter 1: Hidden Ending Perk
[Hidden Ending Perk!]
[The hidden class, <Mage Gazing into the Abyss> has been unlocked.]
A dry message appeared on the monitor.
"Ugh..."
I did it!
"A hidden class! You did it, Kim Shin-hwa!"
[Cthulhu World].
This is the game I've dedicated over 1,000 hours to recently.
[Cthulhu World] is a game set in modern Korea, incorporating elements of the Cthulhu mythos like the "Mountains of Madness" "Dagons" and "Nyarlathotep".
Therefore, everything in this game existed in a way that was more grim and horrifying than reality.
The civilizations built by humanity were nothing more than sand castles, prone to collapse at any moment in the face of cosmic evil.
Humanity's feeble minds and frail bodies became prey for surreal otherworldly beings.
Knowledge and wisdom turned into curses that spurred destruction.
Corrupted religions praised blasphemous wisdom. ,
Blind science studied forbidden knowledge.
The only weapon bestowed upon humanity was a veil called "ignorance".
Even that was pitifully thin and frail to hold back beings that were indescribably enormous.
What is it like? Does it look fun?
Regardless of what others think, I find it to be fun.
Its unique settings and ambiance perfectly targeted my love for horror.
But the intrigue didn't stop there.
True to its cosmic horror theme, the game was really, truly, genuinely very difficult.
The extreme difficulty, the horrifying traps, the powerful boss monsters that made you wonder if they were actually impossible to defeat, and the named NPCs hunting down players.
Of course, to a hardcore player like me, who had conquered all sorts of games, this was merely a stimulating challenge.
This time too, I had managed to clear an incredibly tough hidden ending and, as a reward, obtained a hidden class.
But still...
There's no one to brag about it to... It's really sad...
Out of curiosity, I checked the community, but all the posts from the last year were mine.
The view counts were all the same: 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1...
In the past, there was at least some exchange of information, but lately, the community has become completely inactive.
Yes, that was the case.
This game was a flop.
It was so blatantly a failure that it couldn't fool anyone.
The extreme settings, dark atmosphere, and hellish difficulty level...
Although these elements are divisive, they were not the cause of the game's downfall.
The reason this game failed was due to its excessive bugs.
Getting stuck between structures or walking through walls was just the tip of the iceberg.
When the game suddenly crashes or a well-developed character disappears, who would want to play it?
Then there were the half-baked, unfinished elements that were glaringly obvious.
A prime example was the [Lacrex Codex], one of the items that must be obtained in every playthrough.
In the Cthulhu mythos, such tomes usually contain surreal wisdom or madness.
If it didn't have a special function, at the very least, it should have been connected to some event.
But the [Lacrex Codex], despite its grandiose special effects, had no content written in it. There were no connected events either.
I wondered if Lacrex was a place or a person's name, but such a word didn't exist anywhere in the [Cthulhu World].
What could it be then?
Either it was left unfinished, or the developers forgot about it halfway through!
Given these circumstances, the game was inevitably abandoned by its players.
I might be the only person who played it this far.
No, I am definitely the only one!
If there were actually other players, there would have been at least one post posted in the community.
Did everyone just not like Cthulhu or cosmic horror?
How could you hope to save the world from such mythological beings with such weak spirit!
Anyway, if one could adapt to the initial discomfort and absurd difficulty, it was somewhat fun.
Unfortunately, I quickly adapted to the numerous bugs.
Even though it was terrible, if you just thought, 'Ah, it's just a hidden piece, right?' and got by, eventually you could even master the exploitation of bugs.
In fact, there were quite a few ridiculous bugs that actually helped with progress.
I shouldn't have gotten used to such a game...
Ah, forget it, forget it.
Why is being recognized by others so important? Protecting the world from the dreadful Cthulhu is what matters!
Speaking of which...
"This time, it's about unlocking a new character."
Cthulhu World has a multi-ending system with over hundreds of endings.
The joy of experiencing new developments and stories with each route is one thing, but with each new ending viewed, small rewards were provided or hidden elements were unlocked.
If it's a flop, at least make it interesting...
Thanks to these varied rewards and hidden elements, I never got tired of clinging to this game for so long.
"Since I've received it, shall I play with this one this time? I was thinking of trying a mage next, and if it's a hidden class, it must have good options, right?"
Depending on what character you create, you could have a completely different experience in the game.
The character I had been playing just recently was a martial artist with the ability to transform into a beast.
A tough body that can withstand being shot by a gun when buffed!
He possessed immense strength, enough to hurl boulders!
Though he had no magical abilities at all, the storyline of overcoming all obstacles with sheer strength and brute force was incredibly fun.
This time, I decided to create a character that was the exact opposite extreme.
A mage with the very attractive "Hidden" title.
I clicked on [New Game] on the title screen and opened the character creation window.
****
[Mage Gazing into the Abyss]
A mad mage researching the forbidden abyss of humanity.
The abyss is a living monster in itself.
He could wield evil magic capable of destroying even his own sanity.
But his soul, filled with madness and chaos, would be the perfect feast for the beings of the abyss.
Exclusive traits: [Shattered Mind], [Madness of the Abyss], [Feast Offering], [Supreme Stat Adjustment], [Abyss Magic], [Madman's Luck], [Magic Devourer], [Spell Mastery], [Spell Enhancement: Deadly Poison]...
[Shattered Mind]: Randomly receives 2 mental illnesses. If, for any reason, this mental illness appears, you will randomly receive a new mental illness. The delirium effects caused by this acquired mental illness cannot be prevented.
/ You have gained a terrible mental illness that will never be erased, as a price for looking into the abyss.
[Madness of the Abyss]: Does not lose sanity due to encounters with monsters or mythological beings, magic use, or reading mythological texts. Gains supreme resistance to delirium and fear effects.
However, fear and delirium effects caused by [Shattered Mind] cannot be prevented.
/ Your mind will never collapse. Because it's already insane...
[Feast Offering]: Increased probability of encountering beings from the abyss...
****
Would skimming through the other special abilities suffice for now?
The most important trait is the [Stat Adjustment] trait which is often attached to hidden characters.
[Supreme Stat Adjustment: You can adjust stats without limits during character creation.]
"Huh? No limits? Really? Seriously?"
Characters with the [Stat Adjustment] trait can modify their initially given stats at creation as they desire.
However, it's not a free-for-all adjustment. There are penalties and restrictions.
First, the penalty.
To increase one stat, another must be decreased.
For instance, lowering the less important intelligence to increase strength when creating a warrior character.
Then, the restrictions.
This is important: each character has a maximum and minimum stat threshold.
You can't have abilities over 20 or under 8...
But you say now there's no limits...?
Let's first look at the basic stats.
****
Strength: 8
Health: 10
Agility: 11
Intelligence: 18
Mental Strength: 14
Charm: 16
Remaining Stats: 0
****
The basic stats and traits were set for a typical glass cannon mage.
Although these characters have weak bodies, they can wield powerful magic unmatched by others.
As I mentioned earlier, normally you can't reduce a specific stat below 8. But this character had no such restrictions...
****
Strength: 5
Health: 5
Agility: 7
Intelligence: 16
Mental Strength: 14
Charm: 16
Remaining Stats: 14
****
"Alright, is this the maximum I can subtract?"
I had secured 14 points in the remaining stats.
I could use this number to increase any stats I wanted.
There was only one stat I intended to boost.
That was intelligence.
Intelligence is the core of a mage and the most crucial stat directly linked to magical ability.
An intelligence of 18 points is considered genius.
20 points is transcendent.
The martial artist I played just before was a character with 20 points in strength, that is, transcendent strength.
20 in strength meant the ability to hurl boulders and bend steel bars with ease.
And the mage I created this time was...
****
Strength: 5
Health: 5
Agility: 8
Intelligence: 29
Mental Strength: 14
Charm: 16
Remaining Stats: 0
****
The intelligence score of 29 was tagged with the following descriptor:
[Intelligence 29: Surreal]
Just as I was about to click the "OK" button to complete the stat adjustment, a bitter sound escaped from between my lips.
Surreal intelligence.
It sounded good.
Really good.
Hmm.
Yet, there was something about the number 29 that felt imperfect.
29.
It's an impressively high number, but didn't it seem lacking?
It felt like drawing a perfect circle but faltering at the very last moment.
Since I already made it this way, I found myself eager to reach 30 rather than settling for the seemingly incomplete 29 in intelligence.
An intelligence of 30 was a truly absurd number, something I had never even imagined while playing [Cthulhu World].
But there were no other stats I could reduce further.
It might seem like the other stats were chosen haphazardly, but each had its own reason.
Charm didn't just mean a handsome appearance.
It was the minimum number required to negotiate with mythical beings and win the favor of surreal entities.
Of course, a transcendent charm score would be better, but I could enhance it by about 2 points with items acquired along the way.
So, [Charm 16: handsome].
This can't be reduced.
The 8 points in agility were also the minimum number considering the increase I would get from future items and buffs.
Dropping below 8 might lead to my death before I could acquire other items.
The same went for soul and health...
The tooltip displaying [Strength 5: Feeble] caught my eye.
"A mage doesn't really need strength, right?"
In the end, I clicked the minus button next to strength one more time.
I offer myself to you, Lord Cthulhu, Lord Yog-Sothoth! Grant me more intelligence!
****
Strength: 4
Health: 5
Agility: 8
Intelligence: 30
Mental Strength: 14
Charm: 16
****
As I set my strength to 4, its descriptor changed as well.
[Strength 4: Frail]
But that was okay.
Look at this intelligence!
Intelligence 30!
It's 30!
Look everyone! I've created a character with an intelligence of 30!
...Ah, damn it. The community is still empty.
Meanwhile, a never-before-seen sentence was displayed in the tooltip window showing a detailed explanation of intelligence.
[Intelligence 30: Mythical. You have knowledge beyond human reach and a wisdom that borders on madness.]
Huh? What's this? I've never seen a message like this before. Could it be? A hidden trigger?
The thought that I might have activated another hidden trigger made my heart race with excitement.
"Yeah, this level of madness is required to be considered a truly insane mage."
In fact, it's generally better for survival to create a character with a well-balanced set of stats rather than one with such a lopsided distribution.
But this time, it's all about the extreme madness concept!
If it doesn't work out, I can just delete it and start over...
Next were the traits.
As a [Mage Gazing into the Abyss], I had more traits than other characters, but like my stats, I could add other traits by choosing detrimental penalty traits.
Having already sacrificed my strength, extreme penalty traits were added.
[Weakened Stamina]
[Weakened Strength]
[Weakened Health]
[Weakened Close Combat]
[Increased Damage]
[Weakness: Disease]
[Inability to Use: Heavy Weapons]
[Increased Injury Probability]
[Weakness: Poison]
Hmm... Should I add [Decreased Stamina]? But can I handle not being able to walk for long?
Is it okay to add [Reduced Healing]?
And then...
And also...
In exchange for shouldering such penalties, I was able to incorporate a plethora of useful traits necessary for magic.
Now, what were some good traits for a mage...
It had been a while since I created a mage character...
Wow! The [Spell Mastery] came free for the [Mage Gazing into the Abyss].
It was an excellent class.
Unlocking [Spell Mastery] requires a very large cost.
The prerequisite conditions were incredibly complex.
This trait allowed the use of basic spells from the available hierarchy without any separate learning process. Without it, many who created mages couldn't cast spells simply because they didn't know them.
The fact that this top-tier trait was provided for free made the [Mage Gazing into the Abyss] an exceptionally good character.
Then, I added [Secret Lore Understanding] and [Spell Enhancement: Maximization].
[Spell Enhancement: Power Boost]
[Spell Enhancement: Range Extension]
[Quick Casting]
[Double Chanting]
[Cast Skipping]
[Catalyst Compensation]
[Spell Stealing]
...And although these were not a mage specialty, the always useful [Precise Aiming] and [Vigilance].
Huh, do I have traits left over?
Then let's upgrade [Vigilance] to [Enhanced Vigilance],
And then...
And again...
As a result of adding a whopping 11 penalty traits, I added an equal number of useful traits.
Ultimately, I created the most powerful mage ever, steeped in the Cthulhu mythos' dark shadows, surpassing all the characters I had made before.
Of course, this came at the cost of virtually sacrificing my own body and life.
But this, in its own way, fitted the concept and pleased me.
"Okay, that's the setup done. Magic power! That's all I'm counting on!"
The moment I clicked the [Game Start] button, the mouse cursor vanished, and the monitor screen went dark.
The computer showed no response.
"Damn, another bug...!"
The dark screen of the monitor began to flicker strangely.
A character-specific opening video?
That seemed unlikely.
The liquid crystals of the monitor itself started to flow strangely.
The center of the monitor split apart horizontally with a loud crack. It opened like the jaws of a beast, no longer resembling any object from the reality I knew.
It was a dreadful darkness, seething like a dark swamp. It was a horrible filth, filled with disgusting sewage. It was rotting chaos, a grotesquely distorted remnant of a broken reality, and fragments of a nightmare that should never be remembered.
And it was a pit of ravenous abyss.
From that hideous pit, ominous black slime began to pour out, writhing like a living fragment of a monstrous creature.
I couldn't move my body. My tongue and lips were motionless.
I had a mouth, but I couldn't scream. I had arms and legs, but I couldn't move. A terrible malice was approaching me...
But I couldn't escape.
The cold, horrific slime started to envelop me, moving in ways inexplicable and bizarre in human terms.
I couldn't escape.
I wanted to scream.
I wanted to scream!
I couldn't scream!
I wanted to scream so badly!
In just a fleeting moment,
I...
Like I said, I...!
The freedom to close my eyes or turn my gaze away had been stripped from me.
I had no choice but to watch that terrible monster eroding my flesh. I couldn't breathe. My consciousness was fading. Death was approaching. No, in this bizarre abyss, even death itself seemed destined to die.
At the edge of my fading consciousness, I heard a voice.
A bizarre voice that seemed to pour out not from one mouth but from hundreds or thousands of maws at once.
The voice struck not my ears but my brain.
No, it felt like it was imbued with such force that it directly struck my soul.
"The feast offering... is now prepared."