Prologue

The ending screen flashed open.

Congratulations!

You have successfully completed a [Conquest Victory]!

Your name as a conqueror will go down in the annals of history to be extolled for millennia.

“I... finally beat it.”

My throat constricted as a rush of indescribable emotions surged within me. Memories of my long journey flashed before my eyes like fragments of a fleeting dream.

“Ugh...”

A bead of hot tears raced down my cheek. To any bystander, my reaction might seem excessive, but it all felt surreal to me.

Territory Wars was a game in which a player could choose a character from a pool of over one hundred lords, build and manage their faction, and compete against other lords to determine the ultimate winner. Among the list of lords, Otto de Scuderia posed the greatest challenge for players.

[Otto de Scuderia]

Difficulty: ★★★★★★★★★★★★★ (Near impossible to clear)

Even the game studio responsible for developing Territory Wars openly acknowledged that Otto was an exasperating character of unreasonable difficulty. His stats were the worst of the worst, his only affiliations were with the dregs of society, and the conditions of his territory could only be described as hellish. Such was the reason why no one had managed to clear the game using Otto in the five years since Territory Wars’ release.

- This character’s got to be some kind of dev joke. Wtf lul.

- I’d totally recommend this POS to someone I wanna punch in the face. Will prolly pop a blood vessel or two and make ‘em kick the bucket lollll.

- Yeah this character is straight-up ass.

- I farmed and raised Otto for a good year and didn’t clear jack sh*t in the end -_-;; The devs made him just to piss us all off.

- R. I. P. Issa dead character bruh...

And just like that, the player base turned their backs on Otto. A few tryhards and hardcore enthusiasts attempted to clear the game with him, but most of them quickly gave up their pursuit. With numerous superior lords at their disposal, subjecting oneself to the stress of playing Otto seemed nonsensical.

However, I was different from them.

I’ll beat the game with Otto, no matter what it takes.

Consumed by an inexplicable drive, I began to analyze the character like a madman. I had to face countless trials and errors in my new pursuit. I couldn’t even begin to count how many times I died or restarted the game.

Finally, after three years of spending every second of my free time on this cause, I drafted a build optimized just for Otto. And today was the day—the day I successfully completed the game with him. The title of being the first to clear the game with Otto also fell to me.

As you can see, I had good reasons to be dramatic.

[Notification: Would you like to register your feat on the server?]

[Choose: Yes / No]

My hands shook nervously as I pressed the [Yes] button.

[Notification: Connecting to the server...]

[Notification: Your feat has been successfully registered on the server!]

[Notification: Congratulations!]

[Notification: You have earned a place in the Hall of Fame!]

The game’s official homepage suddenly appeared on the screen, and I watched as Otto’s grayed-out portrait began to fill with colors, signaling my completion.

Under his sparkling portrait, a digital plaque with my name emerged from the pixels.

Otto de Scuderia

1. OttoEquation [South Korea]

2. -

3. -

The Hall of Fame listed the top three gamers who had cleared the game with the highest scores for each character. For other lords, the rankings changed frequently since popular lords had a massive pool of gamers who had cleared the game with them. However, such was not the case for mine. Even if I revealed my super-optimized build to the public, it was almost a guarantee that no one would even dare try to rob me of my spot.

I felt a sense of relief knowing that my name would remain in the Hall of Fame forever. Well, as long as the game remained in operation, that is.

I bet everyone’s scratching their heads right now. They have no idea that Otto is the most broken, overpowered character to have ever existed! Ha ha ha.

As I quietly savored my victorious moment, I heard a ding.

[Notification: Hardcore mode has been enabled!]

[Notification: To start the game in hardcore mode, click the skull icon on the menu screen and hit Start!]

What’s this? I didn’t know this game had a hardcore mode. Surely this is a bug… I had never heard of Territory Wars featuring a hardcore mode. The game operated solely in single-player campaign mode and did not offer multiplayer mode.

Territory Wars also had a save feature so players could take breaks or pause, but the saved files were automatically deleted when the character died. In other words, the game was hard enough that it didn’t need a hardcore mode.

Click!

I absentmindedly clicked the skull icon in the middle of the game’s starting screen.

Fwoosh!

In the blink of an eye, flames burst forth from the edges of the screen, casting a grim red hue, indicating that the hardcore mode had been activated.

Click!

Again, without much thought, I hit the [Start] button.

[Notification: Hardcore mode has begun!]

[Notification: The game will now begin!]

[Notification: 3!]

[Notification: 2!]

[Notification: 1!]

A familiar heading appeared before my eyes.

Chapter One

“I don’t believe this... It must be a dream...” I gripped my hair tightly, refusing to accept the reality before me.

At first, I wondered if my obsession with video games had driven me to madness. It was either that or I had dozed off and slipped into a dream without noticing. Neither of those seemed to be the case, though.

Hours passed as I wrestled with despair and frustration. Eventually, drained and defeated, I begrudgingly accepted that I had become the worst character in Territory Wars, Otto de Scuderia.

“Ha... Haha...” My eyes glazed over in disbelief as a weak chuckle escaped me.

How can a person become a character in a game? Such things only occurred in works of fiction. Yet, my reality was more fictional than fiction itself.

To think that hardcore mode meant something like this… I took in the ruefully familiar scenery around me and felt a pang of emptiness. Above me hung beams of wood and stone, creating the hollow and empty throne room. I was in Eiota, the land governed by Otto de Scuderia—a place I was sick to death with after three long years of playing as the notoriously difficult character.

I’m not sure what just happened, but a warning would’ve been—

At that moment...

Ding!

A notification box flashed before me.

[Notification: Account synchronized!]

[Notification: Starting the game!]

[Notification: WARNING!]

[Notification: Don’t forget! Failing to clear the game in hardcore mode will result in the deletion of your existence!]

Okay... Is this saying that I’m going to die for real? Will I get stuck in this game? I labored through hours of playing as Otto for three years... I don’t deserve to die! As unsettling thoughts swirled within me, a status window for me—well, for Otto de Scuderia, I suppose—popped up in my vision.

[Otto de Scuderia]

You are a young lord ruling over a meager fiefdom called Eiota, located in the rural, western corner of the continent. After a lifetime of wickedness and decadence since your days as the heir, you have lost the heart and love of your subjects, both high and common.

Age: 24

Race: Human

Faction: Territory of Eiota

Title: Lord of Eiota

I was more than familiar with Otto’s initial stats.

Level: -99

Unique Traits: Drunken Philandering

Class: None

My level is ninety-nine! Negative ninety-nine!

Otto was notorious for his weakness for alcohol, gambling, and women. So much so that his special skill was Drunken Philandering.

He doesn’t have a class... Well, I guess that’s that. It was nothing short of a pipe dream to expect a character to possess a class when their level began at negative ninety-nine.

Problem Solving 1 / Strength 3 / Political Acumen 9

Leadership 11 / Appeal 67 / Dignity 2

Notoriety 44 / Honor 0 / Virtue 3

Health 8 / Reputation 1 / Innate Ability 37

Luck 1

All my stats were equally trash. Having zero points in Honor and forty-four in Notoriety was one thing, but having a mere single point in Luck meant I’d likely end up on the losing side of everything. The only redeeming quality of this character, if one could even call it that, was Otto’s handsome features, which significantly bolstered his Appeal.

However, even his good looks had deteriorated due to his hedonistic lifestyle. To make matters worse, his character was cursed, much to the frustration of any players controlling him.

I wonder what heinous crime he committed to receive such a curse.

[Unlucky Scumbag]

Type: Curse

Duration: Unlimited

Effects:

- Starting Level: -99

- Unable to gain experience points

- Cannot level up

- Physical ability decreased by 60%

- Appetite increased by 50%

- Libido increased by 200%

- Need for sleep increased by 30%

- 1% chance of being hit by Random Misfortune when moving

- Immediate death upon the character’s twenty-fifth birthday

Every time I tried to do something, I’d feel sleepy. Every time I tried to do something, I’d become hungry. Every time I tried to do anything at all, my little buddy down there would get absolutely engor—

Ahem.

The “1% chance of being hit by Random Misfortune when moving” was one of the many things that infuriated the player base. Over the past three years of playing Otto, I’ve experienced all sorts of absurd deaths. It wouldn’t be an exaggeration to say that I had experienced nearly every possible scenario in which a human could die.

As if to prove that...

Wobble.

Thud!

As I wandered across the room, I lost my footing on the slippery floor and went crashing down.

“Jeez...!”

I cried out, struggling to rise to my feet. The searing pain made it clear that this wasn’t a mere dream. More importantly...

God, I almost died there… If I hadn’t twisted my body before hitting the ground to avoid falling on my head, things would have been much worse.

I trembled as a chill ran down my spine. I felt something warm trickling over my lips. I unmistakably fell onto my side, and now, blood was flowing profusely from my nose.

If there was ever a magnet for disaster, his name was Otto de Scuderia. I was relieved that I had been spared from crushing my skull to death, but I didn’t have the luxury to thank my rare moment of luck.

W-wait a second... If I remember correctly, most of the early deaths were caused by… The realization struck me suddenly.

“Damn!”

Almost instinctively, I flung myself across the cold, hard floor. With a resounding crash, a chandelier plummeted down right where I had been standing, sending a million glistening fragments flying all over the room.

In a span of a few minutes, I narrowly avoided death not once but twice.