There was a reason behind every notification in Ares.
That your affinity had risen or fallen.
That you had completed a quest or failed one.
That you had gained something or lost something.
Many people did not know even that simple rule.
Because users merely thought they heard “notifications” because they were playing a game.
But a small few—
high-rankers, or those quick on the uptake—knew.
Because every notification had a reason, sometimes it became an “implication” of something.
And Hyunsoo, too, had noticed that.
At first, when Hyunsoo named himself Hyun King, the world had thought only of “Brand Hyun,” and reacted with disappointment and disbelief.
But Hyunsoo had thought about it more carefully than anyone.
Strictly speaking, he really was terrible at naming things.
Lucky Lump.
Kkoko.
Golemmy.
Pretty.
KyooKyoo.
They all proved it.
But this time, he had gotten a “hint.”
Why did the notification phrase it to me like that from the very beginning?
[You do not possess unrivaled strength like the Overlord.]
At first, he had thought it was simply pointing out his shortcomings.
But—
The more it went on, the more I felt that wasn’t it.
Why had it said all that, only to end by telling him to choose his “epithet”?
Because Hyunsoo was the first king?
Or because, in the second Ares, he had become a king much faster than expected?
Those are both right. But there has to be another meaning too.
He had guessed the implication was something like this:
Overlord.
The king who does not lose.
Tyrant.
The mad king.
Saint King.
The king who leads all.
Each of them possessed power and achievements worthy of those epithets.
From the notification and the names of those kings, Hyunsoo had predicted it.
It’ll grant power that matches the epithet.
Probably 99.5% of users would never have guessed it.
But Hyunsoo, who had been subjected to repeated cramming from Kabel along the lines of “Every notification has a reason,” had seen through it exactly.
So he named himself:
Hyun, meaning virtuous.
King, meaning ruler.
Hyun King.
A king broad of heart and rich in virtue.
It can’t overlap. It has to be a name only I can have.
Even in that brief instant, Hyunsoo had been thinking exactly that, and he became the owner of the name Hyun King.
Because he was certain he would gain power befitting it.
As Hyunsoo stepped into the audience chamber, his heart pounded.
Because buried beneath the cheering of the citizens, he had heard notifications pouring down on him.
What kind of power is it?
He was the one who had chosen the name, but the only hint he had received was that the trait granted would suit that name.
Naturally, he had no way of knowing what exact power it would be.
He pulled up the notification scroll and checked it again.
[All rewards become one grade higher.]
[The title First King is changed to Hyun King.]
[The title First King was originally SS grade.]
[Hyun King is more special.]
[The title Hyun King is SSS grade.]
[You gain 20 in all stats.]
[You gain 5,000 Fame.]
[You gain 1,000 Charisma.]
Sweet.
This is sweet enough to be nearly lethal...
He had been running toward kingship for a very long time.
And the reward waiting at the end was so sweet it nearly numbed his tongue.
Five thousand Fame? There are countless ordinary users who don’t even have one thousand. And twenty in all stats?
Twenty in all stats.
Just a little below the level of forging a Mythic artifact.
He could not even begin to estimate how much stronger he had just become.
And on top of that, 1,000 Charisma.
Normally, he had gained it in increments of one, five, ten.
But the moment he became king, he gained a full thousand Charisma.
And that, too, would be converted through Hyunsoo’s stat, Overwhelm.
Overwhelm would now control more enemies.
And through the effect of that Overwhelm, even more people would now be unable to ignore his words, and would feel a force that made refusal difficult.
As king, he would be able to show his true worth.
The difference between SS grade and SSS grade is heaven and earth.
If SS grade was Transcendent, then SSS grade was god grade.
In fact, the SSS-grade title he had once obtained, Blacksmith God, had been absurdly overpowered.
(Hyun King)
Unique Title
Grade: SSS
Special Abilities:
·This is a unique power granted only to a king who is broad of heart, kind, and rich in virtue.
·When you display the qualities of a broad-hearted and virtuous king, you gain Unlock Percentage.
·It may be used when Unlock Percentage reaches 100%.
·You may set a trait you wish to take root in the target, and after setting it, it will be applied at random to certain people around you.
·However, if there is no one around you suited to the trait you have set, the use count will be deleted and the activation will fail, so please choose carefully.
·The first activation is special. You may designate a target for use.
·It may activate only on one whose affinity with you is very high.
·It is affected by Potential.
·Current available uses 1/1
“Hmm...”
After reading it, Hyunsoo was disappointed.
In other words, this Hyun King thing—
was a power that accumulated through Hyunsoo’s own virtue and generosity, then opened a trait for someone else.
To be honest, this was the kind of thing Hyunsoo had expected:
That when I act with virtue and generosity, my own stats would rise, or I’d gain Charisma, or my skill levels would go up—something that makes me stronger.
How perfect and magnificent would that have been?
That would have been the kind of power that could instantly raise Hyunsoo into the ranks of the unmatched and supreme.
But instead of himself, it was for “someone else”?
Then Hyunsoo realized something.
Wait a second.
A chill ran across his body.
The kind of title I had in mind didn’t make sense to begin with.
There was a clear limit to how much a user could grow stronger.
If NPCs went insane with growth, that was one thing.
But if a user’s growth got too far ahead, it would break the balance and eventually bring restrictions.
But if you looked closely, this was what it said:
It may activate only on one whose affinity with you is very high.
The meaning of that.
“...Those who submit to me and are loyal to me? Or those who love me?”
Hyunsoo realized that his own growth would hit a ceiling, but the people around him would not.
One individual growing stronger would eventually hit a limit.
But a great number of people, each becoming stronger in their own way and walking better paths one by one—that could become something far more extraordinary.
Because...
They’ll become my sword and shield!
At the moment, he had been given a special benefit.
I can use it on someone once right now. And if it’s affected by Potential, that means the greater the target’s innate potential, the greater the power they can gain from it.
Just as Grant Me Your Protection had been an absurdly overpowered title that let Hyunsoo receive greater protection depending on how strong the target was and how high their potential was—
Well, a Normal-rank soldier suddenly unlocking a trait and becoming a Legendary swordsman probably isn’t possible... is it? Or can it happen?
The full extent of the power of this title had not been completely revealed yet, so he could not jump to conclusions.
He could not decide anything carelessly.
I need to think this through carefully before deciding who to use this privilege on.
With that thought settled, Hyunsoo rose to his feet.
There was no point agonizing over whom to use Hyun King on right now. It would be better to rest first and think later.
Just then—
[Nell: First King~]
A whisper came from Nell.
*****
Nell.
Kim Hyein could not hide her shock at Hyunsoo’s impact.
She hurried to Gyeongju and calmed people down.
On TV, on the radio, on giant electronic billboards—
everywhere, the name of Hyunsoo, whom she served, was appearing.
And Nell could physically feel just how enormous the impact of the nation of Hyun’s founding was.
The kind of people trying to recruit me is insane.
The level of the offers coming in from behind the scenes was beyond common sense.
Of course—
[You # Nоvеlight # have blocked them.]
She, too, was a professional blocker. Her heart was full only of the desire to help Hyunsoo, now that he had become king, bloom even further and make an even greater leap.
“Heh.”
Nell let out a small laugh.
Because she figured that if it was the Hyunsoo she knew, he probably still had no idea about any of this.
So when she contacted him, this was the reply she got:
[Hyunsoo: Who is this?]
[Nell: ......Wow]
Nell smiled faintly at Hyunsoo’s joke.
[Nell: You were probably checking whether the name Hyun King had become a title, right?]
[Hyunsoo: Did you install CCTV?]
[Nell: I figured it would be, since they said you were assigning an epithet. You should let people know now that Brand Hyun has officially launched. I think it would be best to change Hyun’s Forge in the auction house to Brand Hyun. And make sure to check your messages.]
[Hyunsoo: Oh, right. About the effect of Hyun King...]
Nell was impressed.
That’s the kind of power it is?
[Nell: I’ll think about it carefully.]
[Hyunsoo: Got it. Then I’ll change it to Brand Hyun right away.]
And there was a clear reason Nell had whispered him in the first place.
If I’m getting this many offers, then how many is Hyunsoo getting?
He would probably understand as soon as he checked his messages.
That today, his world had changed.
Nell found herself curious about the proposals Hyunsoo had received—and the price the world was putting on him as an advertising model.
*****
After logging out, Hyunsoo sat down in front of his computer.
I can’t believe I forgot about the auction house.
He entered the auction house and first changed Hyun’s Forge to Brand Hyun.
[You have changed Hyun’s Forge to Brand Hyun.]
Then he checked the subscriber count and was stunned.
This is insane...!
Ares now had 1.4 billion players.
New users kept flowing in steadily, and now it was truly becoming a world of its own.
At that moment, Brand Hyun’s subscriber count was far beyond 10% of that 1.4 billion population.
And not long after the second Ares opened, the auction houses had been integrated.
Originally, the auction house had been divided up—one for blacksmiths, one for jewelers, one for explorers, another for merchants’ goods, and so on.
But once the auction house was integrated, the rankings changed.
The merchants’ rankings in particular had been dazzling.
Merchants sold a wide range of goods, and Hyunsoo had always thought that Yard—the world’s number-one-ranked merchant—must have an absolutely absurd number of subscribers.
That was all it had been, though.
Something he had merely thought.
-Yard Shop subscriber count: 111,001,013.
Yard, the number-one merchant, was the first user to break 100 million subscribers.
And there was a reason for that.
Artifacts are expensive.
It was only natural.
On the other hand, Yard was a master merchant, and their entire guild sold goods worldwide through Yard Shop, so it was only natural that the ranking would be high.
And now Hyunsoo stood in a league of his own even above Yard.
Then Hyunsoo became aware of something.
...Huh?
He had been so absorbed in the game, and so distracted by Hyun King, that he had not realized the entire world had exploded over this.
And he finally understood why Hyein had gone out of her way to contact him, and why she had told him to check his messages.
Didn’t they say master merchant Yard was once offered tens of billions of won for a single ad?
It had been an enormous sum.
Before clicking on his messages, he thought back.
How much was the first offer I ever got for my market value?
Two hundred million won.
Even that amount had been shocking at the time.
Of course, it had been a contract fee for an entire year, which was why it could be that large.
And the ad Yard had been offered had also only been a single one.
How much would I get? Tens of billions?
With nervous hands, Hyunsoo opened his message box.
[There are too many messages.]
He had expected that, so it did not matter much.
Hyunsoo first opened the message that happened to be at the top.
[Hello, First King Hyunsoo. This is Team Lead Lee Mijin. Up to 300 million won in loans exclusively for the First King...]
“You’ve got to be kidding me...”
Right from the start it was spam, and ridiculous spam at that. He moved on to the next one.
[Hello, this is Han Seongjin, advertising team lead at Jeil Media. Regarding a contract... The contract fee can go up to 5 billion won...]
Five billion?
Hyunsoo was impressed.
That’s definitely not a small amount.
As he checked them one by one, there were all kinds of offers—500 million, 1 billion, 1.5 billion, and more.
And there were more than a thousand messages that had come in just today.
So Hyunsoo used the power of summaries and entered a request to sort out only the places offering the highest contract fees.
Then—
What?
Hyunsoo stared.
The names listed there were global corporations.
Aiple, the American company that made apple phones.
Xiaoning from China.
Toyoda from Japan.
Messages had come from the world’s top companies.
Among them, when Hyunsoo opened Aiple’s message, he could not hold back his shock.
[Hello, this is John Wook, division head of Aiple. I’m contacting you because we would like to meet and speak directly with you, Hyunsoo, the first king of Ares. To speak frankly, we would like to begin with a contract fee of 12 billion won. If you call us, we will send our entire advertising team to Korea for your convenience, in keeping with the treatment due to the First King.]
O-One point two... 12 billion?
Then the next one.
[Xiaoning Vice Chairman Wang Chun. We are contacting you because we would like to invite the First King to serve as our advertising model. Omitted... If you contact us at any time, we will come running to Korea.]
Then Toyoda.
[...We intend to come see you carrying a blank check, and we will provide every convenience. We sincerely congratulate you on becoming the First King, and if you wish, we can transfer your father to the best hospital in Japan... 15 billion won...]
“......”
But what stunned Hyunsoo was not the amount.
Dozens of the world’s most powerful corporations.
And every one of them said things like “the First King,” “we would like to serve Hyunsoo,” “we will do our utmost to provide every convenience.”
Every one of them treated Hyunsoo with the utmost courtesy, respect, and even reverence. And every single person who had contacted him was someone renowned throughout the world.
With his head bowed, tears slipped from Hyunsoo’s eyes before he even realized it.
Head still lowered, he spoke.
“...Dad.”
His father had once said he was sorry that the only thing he had ever been able to teach him was blacksmithing.
“I made it this far with what you taught me.”
Hyunsoo’s world had changed, and now everyone came to him carrying bundles of money, showing him every courtesy.
A memory of his father and himself rose up in him.
His father, still young then, holding a hammer.
And himself beside him, learning to forge, laughing as he said, Dad, this is how you do it, right!?
That child—
had become a king.
