Your Commander-in-Chief – Chapter 333

When you get engrossed in something, time really flies by.

Sohee had banned me from strength training, but I could still work on my stamina, so I spent the last week running around the neighborhood all day.

Of course, one week of exercising didn’t bring about any major changes.

The most I could say was that I could hold my own a little longer against Sohee.

“Ready?”

“Yep.”

“It’s cold today. Dress warmly.”

“I’m fine!”

I replied to Sohee and jumped right into the car.

The time was 7:10 PM.

With the raid appointment approaching, we needed to head to the playground soon.

As expected, my designated seat was naturally Sohee’s lap.

I plopped down and began setting the destination on the navigation system.

Once I set the destination, I pulled out my phone and started looking for raid videos from other parties.

Not from Deron, but augmented reality raids using D.R.

The difficulty of the raids on the test server wasn’t too high.

Given the character specs, it was a level that could be cleared comfortably.

But that was only within the world of Deron.

There’s a problem that all the testers on the test server mention.

That is mobility.

Unlike the virtual Deron, since we had real bodies, all the testers had to move slowly.

Stamina issues came secondary.

With such a problem, could we easily clear raids designed based on the speed of game characters?

Absolutely not.

A week isn’t short. Many raids were formed and dissolved repeatedly during that time.

While there were various complex reasons behind the dissolution of raid parties, the biggest issue was, of course, mobility.

With slow bodies, avoiding patterns led to numerous party wipes.

Yet, while countless raid parties were tasting the bitterness of defeat, a party that cleared the raid appeared.

The party was named SSOP, formed by users from the French server.

Their biggest characteristic was that all members participating in the raid wore inline skates.

Yep. They used inline skates to compensate for the lack of mobility.

Of course, just wearing inline skates didn’t guarantee a clear.

The SSOP team consistently uploaded videos of their attempts at the raid while wearing inline skates over the past week.

The first attempt ended in a wipe, showing results even worse than moving in sneakers.

But they didn’t give up.

It was because of the party leader’s stubbornness.

“Hmmm…”

The SSOP team’s attempts were revolutionary.

Naturally, after that video was uploaded, many other raid parties started following their lead, and some even attempted to take on raid bosses while riding bikes.

Tester users cleared the raid.

In a normal situation, it would have received cheers from players of Deron, but the party that cleared it that way began to face ridicule and contempt.

It was obvious. Watching that video couldn’t help but make you laugh.

The holograms presented by D.R are fundamentally limited to in-game data.

In other words, external elements like bikes or inline skates weren’t represented.

When looking at the video of players attempting the raid on bikes, most party members looked like they were perched on something transparent, floating around the raid boss.

What could be funnier than that?

They were just trying to clear the raid, yet they became a target of mockery online for riding invisible bikes.

It was truly unfortunate.

“Ugh…”

I let out a sigh, shaking off the negative emotions.

I am the party leader. If I show a droopy look, how do you think the party members beneath me will feel?

Even when the situation isn’t good, the party leader should always maintain their usual demeanor.

“Hayun, we’ve arrived.”

“Oh, okay.”

Have we already arrived?

I pulled my gaze away from my phone screen and looked outside.

Following the bright neon signs shining against the dark night sky.

“Here we are…!”

With a tense expression, I got out of the car and started manipulating D.R.

The time was now 7:30 PM.

It was about time to invite the party members and settle in a suitable spot.

Inside the school playground.

The empty playground, devoid of lights, began to scatter bright light and form the raid terrain the moment Sohee and I stepped in.

“Hey, Sohee.”

“Yeah?”

“What do you think about this?”

“This, what do you mean?”

“About Deron. This D.R.”

“Oh…”

As I began inviting the party members, I asked Sohee for her opinion.

Well, since I’m kind of out of it when it comes to Deron, it’s hard for me to make an objective judgment about how the game is.

That’s why I’m asking Sohee.

Even though Sohee plays Deron, she doesn’t particularly enjoy the game.

She just occasionally plays because her beloved is fond of it, that’s all.

Sohee, who was deep in thought at my question, finally spoke up.

“Do you want my gamer opinion? Or my personal opinion?”

“I want to hear both,” I replied.

“From a gamer’s perspective, this game can never succeed. Unless it’s produced as something other than the Deron IP, that is…”

“I see…”

It seems Sohee thinks similarly to others.

Meanwhile, I still thought it was quite fun.

Just think about it; this game is taking care of our health in reality.

How great is it that you can become healthy just by gaming?

Of course, that’s just my personal opinion.

I shared this thought lightly in the Deron gallery, but I received negative reactions and was treated as a troll.

It seems most tester users and other Deron players share similar thoughts to Sohee.

On the contrary, FPS genre players seem to covet the features that D.R offers.

“So what about your personal opinion?”

“Um… I wish this technology was used for something other than gaming, I guess? That’s about it.”

“Not telling me precisely?”

“There are just so many things that come to mind… And the raid start time is approaching, right?”

“True…”

I nodded and looked at the party members who were starting to arrive one by one.

Familiar faces from a week ago.

But the party members looked a little off.

Some seemed to be floating in the air, sitting as if perched on something transparent, while others stood slightly above ground.

“Looks like everyone wants to clear the raid, huh?”

“Ah…”

Seeing the party members’ appearances, I wiped my dry face.

Although I didn’t say much as the party leader, it seemed like they had each prepared something in their own way to achieve the raid clear.

[Long time no see. Blood Demon King!]

Swoosh—

A small girl, a paladin, approached gliding through the air.

Jupiter flapped her angel wings as she came toward me.

She now looked about an inch taller than when I last saw her.

Sure enough, when I glanced down, I noticed her feet were hovering just above the air.

What the heck is she riding?

“What are you riding?”

[W-What do you mean? I’m not riding anything!]

“You’re floating.”

[My feet…?]

Jupiter looked down at her legs in confusion.

But how could she make sense of it?

In her view, her feet must be naturally touching the ground.

[Hmm… Doesn’t seem like there’s a problem, though…]

I mumbled under my breath and turned my attention to the other party members, leaving puzzled Jupiter behind.

About ten others seemed to have their feet slightly off the ground, like Jupiter.

There were also five who looked like they were on bikes or bicycles.

Among them were some I recognized well.

[Blood Demon King!]

Coming toward me gracefully, riding something transparent, was the Snow Mage.

Since her legs weren’t moving, it looked like she was on a bike.

If it were a bicycle, her legs would be moving up and down as she pedaled.

Although I didn’t hear the distinct sound of a bike, the Snow Mage stopped and touched the ground with one leg.

“You’re riding a bike…?”

[Yes!]

“Wow…”

[W-What? Is it not okay?]

“No, that’s not what I meant…”

I shook my head. I didn’t intend to say anything negative about what the party members prepared themselves.

I just wanted to let them know how they looked from the outside.

Honestly, it was a bit funny.

[Ah, would you like a ride?]

“Ah, no…”

I quickly declined the Snow Mage’s offer.

The glance from Sohee next to me sparkled dangerously.

“It seems like you like bikes, Snow.”

[Ah! Helena…! Yes, I do love bikes!]

“Just be careful… I’ve heard that bike accidents happen more often than car crashes…”

[Oh no…!]

I left those two to their conversation and approached the other party members.

I was a bit worried that one or two might suddenly drop out of the raid, but thankfully everyone had shown up.

The time was 7:55 PM.

We needed to wrap up preparations to start the raid soon.

“Everyone, listen up!”

The party members, who had been chatting away, began to focus.

As the chatter quieted, I called out to a few of the members who looked slightly different from the ordinary party members.

“… The following 15, can you let me know what you are riding? I’m not really going to problematize it.”

The 15 party members called out started telling me what they were riding.

Inline skates.

Skateboards.

Bikes, scooters, you name it.

Truly a variety of rides, surprising both the party members and me.

“Uh… well, that’s fine. Shall we get started?”

[Yes!]

The enthusiastic response came, of course, from the Snow Mage.

Seeing her on the bike pulling on the handlebars excitedly showed just how thrilled she was.

I watched her with concern.

“Alright… here we go. Main tank, move in!”

[Hiyah!]

The moment my order finished, Jupiter shot forward at an incredible speed.

Though it looked really odd that her legs weren’t moving, the speed was fast enough to remind one of Deron’s Jupiter.