World of Masks

Chapter 2

Translator: Seven

Editor: Ana_Banana

“What’s your name?”

“Kim Jin-suk.”

Jin-suk replied calmly as he watched the detective in front of him beating on their keyboard.

“Identification number.” (TL: Or Resident Registration Number or Social Security Number)

“xxxxxx-xxxxxxx.”

“Where do you live?”

“Xx-x, xx, Sinchon-dong, Seodaemun District.”

The detective who was entering the information paused as they saw what popped up on their monitor.

“This isn’t your first time coming to the police station.”

“That’s right.”

Jin-suk scratched the back of his head awkwardly as he said that. The important thing was that such an expression and behaviour was normally what a hero would do. The detective in front of him wouldn’t be able to imagine what he was thinking or why he was doing such heroic actions.

There was nothing for him to be embarrassed about.

Moreover, no one would be able to imagine how much practice he’d put into making that expression as natural as possible.

It was icing on the cake for him to be a citizen who was pure and innocent who also had a just mind.

As Jin-suk expected, the detective’s attitude visibly softened as he saw this.

“You save two victims of robbery and three victims of sexual assault so far. You also received a Courageous Citizen Award?”

“I don’t know if I’m lucky or not, but I get involved in such things pretty often. Maybe it’s because I don’t like the loud noises cars make so I often walk in alleys.”

He couldn’t say he was looking for someone to legally break. It was no exaggeration to say that the detective in front of him would never be able to understand that interesting hobby of his.

Jin-suk wasn’t foolish enough to say what he wasn’t supposed to say, especially things that should never be said in front of law enforcement.

“It must not have been easy to deal with guys like that…did you learn some kind of martial art?”

“I did learn a bit of boxing. I didn’t learn it under the assumption that I was gonna use it, but now it seems I’ve only been using it for things like this.”

It was a total lie.

Kim Jin-suk had learned boxing for the sole purpose of defeating people. In order to properly enjoy the ecstasy that came with hitting someone with the perfect punch.

It was purely for the purpose of delivering unilateral violence upon his prey. But of course, he couldn’t say that either.

“First of all, we’ll make sure those gangsters pay for what they did. Those bastards will get some nice Kongbap1 in their comfy prison cells. There’s already CCTV footage of the three of them dragging the woman away. It’ll be fine Jin-suk, you won’t be held responsible for your self-defense. No, actually since you’re injured, if you go through the civil procedures, you should be able to claim compensation from them.”

It was clear from the way the detective spoke about the three gangsters under investigation that he held a great dislike for them or people like them.

“I couldn’t. I think it’s cheaper than saving that woman. That’s like a medal of honor. I just don’t want to see those guys again.”

He was already satisfied with beating the three of them. Anyway he felt that the price of his arm was worth the ecstasy he got from them so it wasn’t necessary to go to civil affairs. However the detective kept trying to persuade Jin-suk as he could not tell what he was thinking.

Maybe it was because they wanted to give those gangsters as much trouble as he possibly could.

But when he saw Kim Jin-suk continuously shaking his head, he decided to stop talking about civil affairs.

“Anyway, is that woman okay?”

“Oh! The lady. She is in the hospital right now because we still want to ensure that her mental health is okay. Fortunately there were no injuries other than some light bruising but she was quite shocked by the incident.” (TL: ‘The lady’ in this case was said politely…there is just no way to politely say it in english.)

He was being quite thorough. Since he was pretending to be a good guy and a hero, he had to ask about the victim of the attack.

This was because he himself had been treated in the hospital’s emergency room and thus couldn’t know what had happened to the female victim.

‘She was one hell of a woman.’ (TL: Stinky MC -_-)

Jin-suk, who could feel his heart burning, could only shake his head to shake out the thoughts.

“Is this the end of my interview?”

“Yes. Thank you for your cooperation.”

Jin-suk raised his body and extended his hand over the desk, reaching out to the detective. This was what he called perfect post processing.

It had been a satisfying hunt, from start to finish.

At this time, a group of people ran past him in the police station.

The guns that he could see under their clothes made him think they were also detectives.

“Are you guys really busy?”

Looking at the detectives who ran past the glass doors and quickly entered their patrol cars, Kim Jin-suk turned back to the police officer who had been interviewing him.

The detective, who had a cigarette in his lips and was searching his pockets for a lighter, shrugged.

“That’s how this job is. And these days there have been a lot of deaths in that World of Masks game.”

The detective turned on the lighter, lit his cigarette and walked to the outside of the police station, seeming as though he was grieving.

He was weakly muttering, “Oh, it’s like I saw a high ranking detective behind me, screaming and pointing at the ‘no smoking sign’,” while taking a puff from his cigarette.

Jin-suk also walked out of the police station.

After the glass doors opened, he saw the detective, who seemed to have been lost in the smoke from his cigarette. Taking out a cigarette, he went to stand beside the detective.

“You said it was the World of Masks? The one that was prohibited because of the side effects…”

“That’s right. That’s the main cause of stress for the police station right now. Why would you want to die in a game that’s been prohibited by the law…”

“Is extreme realism really so good anyway?”

The detective kept grumbling by his side, and Kim Jin-suk, who heard this, lit his cigarette and took a long drag, filling his lungs. (TL: basically he took a long suck on his cigarette)

As he spat out the smoke, he looked up at the sky.

The World of Masks.

It wasn’t a gambling game, it was a virtual reality game that had been banned worldwide, yet people continued to play it. He had only heard rumors and never experienced it for himself, but he was told that it was a game that pursued extreme realism.

However the realism of it was so overwhelmingly high that it was banned.

‘The doctor said I shouldn’t smoke.’

Jin-suk scratched his head with his bandaged hand, then quickly puffed on the cigarette until it was finished before discarding the butt in a trash can beside him along with the other cigarettes he had.

He then said goodbye to the police officer who was staring at the discarded cigarettes with an unfortunate expression on his face, before leaving the compound of the police station.