I Start with 13 Hidden Traits Chapter-245

Ch-245. **A Man Named Park Hyun-myung**

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“…What a f***ing trash game.”

A dark, dim room.

A man—Park Hyun-myung—let out a sigh, brows deeply furrowed.

The words “Game Over” reflected on his monitor were so familiar by now that they barely moved him anymore.

“Andrew, you bastard.”

The problem was Priest Andrew.

A priest at the charity shelter in the Valan Kingdom’s “Garden of the knight City,” known for giving many quests that raised honor.

A *mandatory* NPC for players who wanted to grind honor levels.

Most quests were simple, repetitive labor, but once the number of completed quests passed 300, the content began to change little by little.

“How high does this difficulty go…?”

The content changed, the difficulty spiked, yet the rewards remained the same.

So he gained notoriety as an NPC people fled from the moment they met the required honor value.

Some players believed there had to be a hidden quest and tried pushing further—but after suffering endlessly scaling difficulty and pathetic rewards, they all gave up.

> —Total waste of time and money. Just some NPC who likes screwing with players. There are a few like that in Pangaenia, right?

In a game where death meant character deletion, no one could afford to waste time.

And so, no one challenged Andrew anymore.

Except for one.

Park Hyun-myung.

“Ah, damn it. This *has* to be a chain quest.”

He scratched his head viciously.

There was a simple reason he couldn’t give up on Priest Andrew:

He knew something no one else did.

“The guy has a daughter. A hidden one. He wants to save her. So why the hell won’t he ask for help?”

Andasar, who became an Eldritch.

Andrew’s hidden daughter—whose location he had discovered by chance.

She was sealed in corrupted land, and to break that seal and purify her, Andrew’s cooperation was required.

Yet even after completing several hundred quests, Andrew didn’t mention her once.

Park tried every strange method, thinking there might be a hidden condition.

Nothing worked.

“The damned *Cursed Eldritch Black Grimoire*… Without that I can’t craft Unique-tier gear.”

A material obtainable only by purifying Andasar.

He was certain Andrew held the key.

But Andrew refused to open up.

It was possible something was missing—maybe content that hadn’t been updated.

Maybe Andrew didn’t have the key at all.

“…What if the reason he gives all these honor quests is because he doesn’t think *he* is honorable… and he’s waiting for someone who truly is?”

But Park saw things differently.

A priest with a daughter who became a lich.

A man who should have been stripped of his position, yet still worked at the shelter caring for people.

More earnest, more sincere than anyone.

Never hesitating to extend a helping hand to those in need.

He saved others—but could not save himself.

He believed himself dishonorable.

Could there be a sadder man?

…Truly pitiful.

*“I’ll save him.”*

He wanted to free Andrew.

To liberate him from his self-condemnation.

Others might laugh, asking why he cared so much for an NPC.

But at some point, to Park, Pangaenia became more than a game.

He wanted to save the game itself.

In the real world he was a normal nobody, but here in Pangaenia, Park Hyun-myung was a Knight-King—

A man who valued honor, defeated evil, and saved people.

“If a thousand tries aren’t enough, I’ll try ten thousand. If ten thousand aren’t enough… well, I’ll think about it then.”

Finally realizing hints wouldn’t work, he resorted to brute force.

After logging in as Wilhelm and completing around three thousand quests, the exhausted Andrew finally confessed his deeply buried secret.

—

—

 

Memories brushed past her.

Beside Isabella, countless memories of “Park Hyun-myung” flowed by.

Unnumbered deaths, salvations, stories.

The Park Hyun-myung she saw—

Was a man who didn’t know how to give up.

His persistence bordered on madness.

One of the most striking examples was Priest Andrew’s story.

For years, no one could open the man’s heart.

But Park eventually did.

Overcoming endless trials and countless near-deaths—he reached him.

Could she have done the same?

*No.*

…She could not.

No one could.

Without Park Hyun-myung, it would have been impossible.

Without him, Andrew would have died hating himself.

*“This is only the tip of the iceberg.”*

More memories surfaced.

She pulled another to the forefront.

*Isaac.*

The story of “Isaac the Brain-Dead Swindler.”

A villain who committed countless crimes and murders.

—

—

 

“What the hell is this place? Why is the starting point such crap?”

Park immediately began complaining.

He had only generated a character and chosen “random starting point”—yet he spawned in a completely unexpected location.

“Unnamed Slave Mine? Why is this place so big?”

He turned his map around and frowned.

Numerous half-naked NPCs were mining with pickaxes.

But the slave overseers were fully armed regular soldiers.

“Escaping won’t be easy…”

Main Quest 1: Survival.

The main quest never changed.

Every character was assigned “survival” the moment they spawned, almost always in horrific circumstances.

Which is why the actual survival rate was said to be under 50%.

A game that forced death on you from the very beginning.

But Park was a veteran of survival.

Characters he played had a 99% survival rate in Main Quest 1.

Crack—crack!

He stretched his fingers and neck.

Then dove into the quest.

Using a sharpened stone, he ambushed a soldier.

Then he dug his way through the mine along the shortest route he had identified.

He nearly died three times—but survived through absurd control skills.

He put on a soldier’s uniform and escaped the mine.

“So it was a hidden ‘Mining City.’ No wonder I didn’t recognize it.”

Only after escaping did he understand.

Pangenia had several hidden cities.

This “Mining City” was one—kidnapping people, forcing them into slave labor.

“…Wow, this place is insane.”

The more he learned, the more fascinated he became.

A nest of corruption.

Priests of the corrupt goddess, nobles from several nations—

All involved.

In exchange for looking the other way, they shared the treasures mined here.

Such places existed, but this was the worst he had seen.

“Interesting.”

Perfect.

This character was meant for “evil deeds” anyway.

If the Operator was truly watching the game, they would have to intervene if an entire city collapsed.

Especially a city of this size—surely a notice would appear.

And so, it began.

His plan to collapse the mine and erase this entire evil city.

One by one, he hunted down involved parties.

Extorted, destroyed, killed—and eventually buried the city underground.

The slaves were freed.

But the powerful people connected to the mine were now hunting “Isaac” with bloodshot eyes.

He had too many enemies.

Without a top-tier disguise potion, death was guaranteed.

“…This really is a trash game.”

And yet, no notice appeared.

Shaking his head, he logged out from a safe zone.

He never logged back into Isaac again.

Not until the day they met again in the monster city of Cramdel.

—

—

 

Truly, it was strange.

The memories of Park controlling Isaac.

During his “possession sickness,” Isaac lost his memories.

Once he regained sanity, he found himself a fugitive being hunted all the way to Cramdel.

*If he hadn’t had possession sickness…*

He would have died.

In that hellish mine.

Not only him—

That hellish mine would still be operating even now.

*Isaac wasn’t the only one.*

…There were others.

Everyone who suffered possession sickness—

Everyone Park controlled—

They were all in the worst possible situation.

Hopeless. Certain death.

Situations requiring true “survival.”

But wasn’t possession sickness supposed to be random?

Or did it target certain conditions?

For example—

People standing on the brink of death.

But for such perfect timing to happen repeatedly was strange.

*People who already knew they were going to die.*

Those aware of their impending death.

Those trapped in impossible situations.

Those were the ones who fell into possession sickness.

*Then… I also…*

If so, she too must have been on the brink of despair.

But Isabella’s expression hardened.

*“I can’t remember.”*

The memory of her own possession sickness was erased.

The Dersian Family.

She had possession sickness there, then wandered to the desert city Faisalmer.

But she was the daughter of a major imperial family.

How could she have been on the brink of death?

It made no sense.

“A…”

Suddenly, a headache struck.

A piercing pain like a drill.

And soon, another memory surfaced.

A memory that belonged to her—not from Park.

A memory of Isabella von Dersian.

—

—

A suffocating place.

The Dersian Estate.

Since she first gained awareness as a child—that was how she felt.

“Mary. When will I die?”

One day, Isabella asked her maid Mary.

Mary, adjusting Isabella’s sleeves, froze in shock.

“My lady… what are you saying? Why would you die?”

“I know everything. I’m the ninth clone.”

“…No, you’re not. Absolutely not. You won’t die, my lady.”

“No. Before this year ends, I’ll be disposed of. Or I’ll be sold to ‘Faisalmer’ like the others.”

“…”

“So Mary knew too?”

“My lady…!”

Mary’s eyes trembled violently.

This was knowledge no one—*especially* Isabella—should have discovered.

Knowing meant disposal.

“My sisters are in Faisalmer, right? Sold to the Desert Queen. Because my sisters and I might awaken Jormungandr, however slim the chance…”

“Hush! Please, not another word. I’ll pretend I heard nothing.”

Mary fled the room in panic.

Isabella never saw her again.

She didn’t care.

Everyone in the house knew.

She was a clone.

She had been deemed useless and would be disposed of—or abandoned in the desert city.

She stared out her empty window toward the birds flying outside.

“When will I die?”

She just wanted to know.

If she had to die anyway—she wanted to know when.

Then—

A bluebird flying by turned and perched on her windowsill.

It was odd, but Isabella was not impressed.

“Do you know?”

“Do you want to live?”

“…Huh?”

For a moment, she thought she misheard.

A bird—speaking?

But she didn’t mishear.

The bird chirped again:

“If you could forget everything, lose everything, but gain a chance to fulfill one wish—would you take it?”

“What are you…? How is a bird talking?”

“I am the Operator of this world. You will not remember meeting me once this moment passes. So choose. Will you accept your death as is, or will you leap into the flames like a moth for the sake of your wish?”

 

 

 

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