WeTried Translations
Translator/Editor: Satori
Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried
◈ Healers Are Not Tools ◈
Chapter 2: Lost of Fantasy Really Is an Inconvenient Game
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I calmed my pounding heart a little.
If I thought about it logically, maybe the former pro gamer was just hyping the game up way too much, or maybe people were mindlessly praising it because it was a new release being advertised.
So I decided to check an online forum, where I could see this world's true colors.
《Lost of Fantasy Forum》
[Peaked at Silver, mid main. Recommend me a class]
[Honestly, just play warrior or mage if you can't decide]
[Nobody's enough of a sucker to play priest unless they're an e-girl, right???]
[Which server should I pick? And what's a faction?]
Just skimming the titles gave me a pretty good idea.
Questions about servers were one thing, but some people didn't even know what factions were.
Well, then. How about a little advice from someone who'd played Lost of Fantasy for over ten years...?
[YouTube keeps hyping this up, so I'm gonna try it. What the hell is a faction?]
What even is a faction?
Allied Coalition
Demon King's Army
Which one am I supposed to pick?
「Just pick whichever looks prettier」
「Server's Venus, faction's Allied Coalition. You don't know that?」
Pretty much what I'd expected.
Nobody was giving any proper advice about factions.
This was a pretty important part of the game.
You could even call it the whole point of Lost of Fantasy.
「If you're new to RVR, pick a faction based on the situation on your server for an easier time. If you're gonna grind reputation, go Allied Coalition for the humans. If you want better performance, go Demon King's Army for the demons. Yep」
『▶ Is this for real? Then I'm picking Demon King's Army?』
『▶▶ ??? What the fuck is this bullshit? And what's RVR? lol』
『▶▶▶ There they go again. Demon King's Army spies baiting newbies with weird terms. Unless you've got a gray-skin fetish, just pick Allied Coalition, I told you』
So they didn't know what RVR was, either? Faction versus faction?
But how could they not know that?
Even outside Lost of Fantasy, South Korea had games where vampires fought hunters!
Anyway, the more I looked through the forum, the more legendary the nonsense became.
[So which class performs best? I heard rogue was the best?]
[Can I just let my dick pick my race? Their performance is pretty much the same, right?]
[Paladin < upvote if you can smell the trash just looking at it lmao]
From where I stood, they were posting an endless stream of things that deserved a shout of, “You don't even play this game!”
And people in this world were sharing all this wrong information as if it were common knowledge.
Seeing them claim that even racial traits didn't matter, I figured it might be faster to become a missionary and teach them everything myself.
“Well, anyway...”
I'd finished eating and cleaned everything up, so I happily launched the copy of Lost of Fantasy already installed on the computer.
The familiar soundtrack I'd heard for over ten years played, and the login screen welcomed me. It looked a little more polished, but otherwise, it wasn't much different.
...My heart was racing for no good reason. This really was a great song.
I'd quit this game after swearing I'd never, ever play it again, but in the end, I was still a man who loved Lost of Fantasy.
Well, a woman now.
《Please select a server》
[Venus Server: Very Crowded]
[Murmur Server: Very Crowded]
[Hedone Server: Very Crowded]
[Nikea Server: Very Crowded]
[Sitri Server: Very Crowded]
Wow...
Now, this was a sight that brought back memories.
In my old world, Lost of Fantasy was a game only the same old players kept playing.
The servers had been merged over and over until all but one were practically meaningless. Seeing every server marked Very Crowded really was a sight from the past.
Anyway, I had to pick either Venus or Murmur.
If I chose Venus, I'd play the Allied Coalition.
If I chose Murmur, I'd play the Demon King's Army.
“...A real man picks the Demon King's Army. Gotta go demon.”
Before creating my character, I searched the forum one last time.
Maybe things had been different ages ago, but these days, livestreaming existed.
One or two searches were enough to find out what sorts of people were gathering on each server.
[So Venus is where all the streamer fanboys are going, right?]
[Server: Venus! Race: Allied Coalition! Forum guild: Red Salt!!!!]
[What the fuck, are the other servers some kind of scam? Does nobody play anywhere except Venus and Murmur?]
[★ Mention streams and your post gets deleted immediately. “So-and-so says they're playing on this server” < None of that XXX]
It didn't look like all the streamers were choosing one server and piling into it together.
Still, most of them seemed to be picking either Venus or Murmur.
Putting that together with my memories and experience...
“I'll go with Murmur...”
Server: Murmur.
Faction: Demon King's Army.
Race: demon.
Class: paladin.
From character customization to choosing my class, I went with my usual favorites without hesitating for even a second.
That was how firmly paladin had always held its place in my heart as an overpowered class.
* * *
Lost of Fantasy had been running for over twenty years in my world, but it was a new release in Jeong Hana's world. Its appearance and overall look were quite different from what I remembered.
The game's general feel and systems were similar to the days people called the “original” version, but the finer details felt modern.
How should I put it? It felt like someone had heavily modded the once-popular “Classic” version and made me play it.
Honestly, being able to pick paladin right away in the Demon King's Army was proof enough that this wasn't a pure original version.
- Holy shit lol, is that face for real?
- Damn, that face is terrifying
- Seriously, is that the best they could do with demon skin colors?
- Where do you learn skills in this game??? Where do you learn skills????
Anyway, unlike the people busily typing in chat because everything was new to them, I was familiar with it all.
The graphics had just been made sleek and shiny to suit the 2020s, and the characters' bodies had become a little more... hehehe...
...No, honestly, seeing this, I could understand why the game was so popular in Jeong Hana's world.
Back in my world, whenever I recommended Lost of Fantasy to new players, its clunky graphics usually earned me a reply like, “Not playing that ugly-ass Western trash, bye.”
The Lost of Fantasy before my eyes now was... how should I put it? A little more like a Korean game?
Anyway, it looked good.
“Pick up quests... level up... It's almost the same as the original version, so I can probably follow the same quest route...”
Lost of Fantasy wasn't a user-friendly game.
That was part of what drove players to explore its huge, open-world-like setting, but from a purely leveling perspective, it was pretty terrible.
Unlike other RPGs, it barely had anything you could call a main story. There were quests that sent you to the next area, but the catch was that you had to walk there.
This became more user-friendly with each expansion. Eventually, you didn't need to look up things like “optimized leveling route” or “recommended leveling route for beginners.”
But anyway! The problem was that you needed to know those routes right now! And I knew them!
“Guys! Guys! How do you learn skills in this game???”
I'd finished leveling here and cleared out every quest, so I was about to move on to the next area...
Then I spotted someone pitiful, shouting and even jumping up and down in place.
In any other game, you'd wonder what kind of idiot would ask that, but this was just how Lost of Fantasy worked.
《Ssangmun-dongFireShield》
The warrior with the slightly dizzying username was busy bouncing up and down and shouting.
But seriously, why had she made her character so pretty when her username sounded so folksy? The contrast was ridiculous.
- You can learn skills from your class trainer
- Where's the class trainer???
Oh, she didn't know? Well, obviously. That was why she was jumping around here.
- Follow me
I typed that into chat, then led her straight into a strange building that looked like a spaceship.
- This is the warrior class trainer. Pay this NPC to learn skills
- Whoa
Ssangmun-dongFireShield ran straight to the NPC.
- ???
- Wow! I really can learn skills here???
- Awesome lmao
Once a few expansions had come out, you didn't have to deal with this shit anymore...
Back in the old days, leveling up didn't automatically teach you skills.
Some skills even required you to complete quests or put points into talents, so a gap in knowledge could make an enormous difference.
- How'd you know about this, though?
Because I'd played this game for over ten years.
Probably couldn't tell her that.
- I saw it while passing by earlier
- How did I miss it lol
- Hey, thanks for telling me about this. Wanna add each other as friends?
Something about watching her jump up and down while asking to add me was funny.
- Nah
- Too much hassle
I appreciated the thought, but it was a hassle.
I didn't want other people making me miserable in Lost of Fantasy anymore.
I knew exactly how this game would develop, so I wanted to enjoy only the best parts and get out.
Right. Even when raids came out, I wanted to be the one people begged to join them, not tear my hair out managing the members of a raid group.
The raid leader who never came back.
The healers playing power games behind the scenes.
The main tank who suddenly announced that their back hurt today and they wanted a day off...
The mage screaming why the fuck did you take that, the rogue throwing a PMS fit about why that bastard wasn't getting loot restrictions, the gold farmer begging me not to break down plate armor and to give it to them instead, the asshole who threw a fit and absolutely refused to drink a potion when I told them to...
No. Absolutely not.
“I'm never doing that. Never again.”
Who knew what I'd get dragged into if I carelessly accepted a friend request here?
That was why I'd turned her down, but it was a meaningless choice.
Because Ssangmun-dongFireShield was a famous streamer with over four thousand viewers.
Footnotes:
The forum's “e-girl” insult uses the Korean gaming slang “Hyeji,” a derogatory stereotype of female gamers who play support roles and rely on others to carry them.
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