The Chicken Legend's Game Becomes Reality - Chapter 34

—————
This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
—————

Chapter 34
* * *
The woman Baek Hee-an was infatuated with despised him intensely.
‘Damn, that’s interesting. Getting rejected with a face like that?’
In Hwang Beom-young’s mind, the dynamic between the two played out something like that.
It was intriguing that there existed a woman who disliked Baek Hee-an, but the fact that she actually hated him sparked considerable interest.
You could tell just by looking at her eyes.
Fierce rejection.
Even a subtle heat of anger emanating beneath the surface.
‘But Baek Hee-an isn’t just casually interested in that woman.’
That’s what piqued Beom-young’s curiosity.
It was surprising enough that the woman Baek Hee-an was chasing around was a bespectacled acne-ridden pig, but the fact that she hated him triggered considerable delight.
‘A rare situation like this demands front-row observation while munching popcorn.’
Beom-young’s stomach tingled with anticipation.
Imagining how that unlucky bastard Baek Hee-an would be treated by that ugly woman (pure fantasy), how he’d be rejected and trampled (pure fantasy)—it was so entertaining he thought he’d lose his mind.
‘Her name was Joo Hyun-soo, right.’
After being fleeced of 100 million won by that woman and wallowing in suspicion and defeat, Hwang Beom-young’s heart flipped like a palm turning over.
‘I need to get close to her.’
Hwang Beom-young harbored an intense competitive spirit toward Baek Hee-an.
He hated losing so much that he paid close attention to Baek Hee-an, readily picked fights whenever they met, and clashed with him over every little thing.
Baek Hee-an’s one-on-one game ranking was first place.
Hwang Beom-young was fourth.
However, not all hunters in the world played God Opal, so in reality, there existed a significant power gap between Hwang Beom-young and Baek Hee-an’s actual hunter abilities.
While Baek Hee-an was also ranked first in reality, Hwang Beom-young’s hunter ranking was relatively lower compared to his game ranking.
Of course, the Hunter Community regarded Hwang Beom-young’s abilities very highly, and considering his young age, they believed he possessed tremendous potential.
But he couldn’t be satisfied with that.
Hwang Beom-young despised the very fact that someone existed above him, whether in the game or in reality.
Right now, as quickly as possible, he wanted to defeat Baek Hee-an and surpass him.
Since that was realistically impossible, he was frustrated—until a woman appeared who could trample Baek Hee-an in his place.
“Chicken Seat can’t do battle royale, huh.”
At the sudden remark, Hwang Beom-young, who was leaving school in a foreign luxury car, glanced to the side.
“Who?”
“Chicken Bulssdagu. Ranking 12th. That user who beat Dark Choco recently.”
“Lee Do-jin, you idiot. You lost to that?”
The man in the passenger seat, scrolling through his phone, laughed.
He was the same man who had tried to knock out Joo Hyun-soo at the abandoned building not long ago, only to be knocked out by her reflection skill instead.
He was watching a YouTube video.
“Don’t be careless. Among first-page ranking users, you win with good luck and lose with bad luck. Except for Baek Hee-an, who’s always ranked first.”
Hwang Beom-young’s eyes narrowed with displeasure.
“This person is now a person of interest in the Hunter Community. Their ranking ascension speed is unprecedented.”
“My only true rival is Baek Hee-an.”
“Baek Hee-an didn’t climb up this fast either. He started from the bottom and climbed up very methodically, step by step.”
The world regarded Baek Hee-an, the world’s top-ranked hunter, as a once-in-a-generation prodigy, but in truth, he had risen through the ranks in an unexpectedly gradual manner.
Despite having an S-rank skill at the time of his awakening, he was remarkably poor at combat.
Moreover, the fact that Baek Hee-an originally suffered from severe Gate trauma was knowledge that had quietly spread among hunters.
“Because of Baek Hee-an, almost every hunter now does professional training—they call it God Opal.”
Baek Hee-an had profoundly awakened hunters worldwide to the importance of effort.
By brilliantly proving that real-world combat prowess could be improved through Virtual Reality games, he had sparked an enormous God Opal boom throughout the hunter community.
“The guild sent over a combat analysis of Chicken Seat, so take a look at it.”
“Ha. The Hunter Guild is analyzing game character builds now. Seems like there’s nothing going on domestically these days, so everyone’s just lounging around.”
“Tell me about it. All the major Gates must have gone to the United States. Though the States have been pretty quiet lately too.”
Hwang Beom-young skimmed through the combat analysis file of Chicken Seat that his closest aide had handed him, and his mind drifted to that woman.
‘She fights damn well.’
Her skill was so impressive that it was hard to believe she wasn’t a hunter.
If she truly wasn’t a hunter, then she must have received proper training somewhere—whether in combat or athletics—from someone who knew what they were doing.
‘Could that woman be doing God Opal too?’
Hwang Beom-young had excellent instincts, but as he read through Chicken Bulssdagu’s combat analysis, he didn’t realize why Joo Hyun-soo suddenly came to mind.
* * *
Along with combat training in the Virtual Reality game God Opal, I began serious physical conditioning in reality as well.
A gym located on the route from the Convenience Store to my home.
Thump! Thump! Thump!
Running slowly on the treadmill with my unsteady legs, making considerable noise, the gym trainers kept watching me with deeply concerned expressions.
More precisely, they were watching the treadmill.
They seemed worried that the treadmill might break under my body weight.
‘Surely it’s not that bad?’
At least there wasn’t anyone else in this gym as overweight as me.
I paid no attention to their stares and focused on my dramatically improved physical condition from the strength enhancement.
Sweat poured down like rain, but I felt no particular pain.
After enhancing my strength to level 2, my muscles began to firmly support the excess fat.
Even the awkward movement in my injured leg since the accident became something I could consciously control to some degree.
Of course, neither my legs nor my body were anywhere near normal yet.
My damaged leg still responded slightly slower than it should, and my joints couldn’t withstand the enormous weight and impact.
After running for a while, my joints began to strain under the burden of my excess weight.
“Huff, huff.”
Before my body could suffer real damage, I stepped off the treadmill and wiped away the sweat.
Running hard while wrapped in an extremely thick layer of fat had been absolutely brutal in terms of heat.
‘God, I wish this fat would just disappear.’
My strength-enhanced body was definitely worth the effort compared to before.
Which is precisely why I found myself anticipating how much more comfortable my body would feel if I could shed this fat as well.
Since I’d already enhanced my strength to level 2 with items, I held onto a faint hope that if I just exercised diligently, the fat would melt away quickly.
However, I couldn’t know if the strength created through items was ordinary muscle.
Even though I’d enhanced my strength, my body weight hadn’t changed at all, and when I touched my body, the volume of my muscles hadn’t increased in the slightest.
Most decisively, the skeletal muscle mass measured by InBody was completely normal.
‘So it’s an item that doesn’t build muscle but causes some kind of magical transformation within the muscle itself. If I had coins, I’d want to drop about 10 kilograms right away. If I lose weight through items, I don’t think yo-yo effect would even come.’
My original eating habits were to eat late-night snacks after dinner, play games until dawn, sleep, and then go to the Convenience Store when I woke up.
Just by enhancing my strength and cutting out late-night snacks, I started losing weight.
In just a few days, I’d lost over 3 kilograms.
Instead, because I was starving to death while staying up all night, my gaming performance showed a noticeable decline.
No matter how immersive the Virtual Reality game was, the mental focus I applied to the game came from my real body in reality.
‘I need to build stamina. I should definitely eat before the preliminaries.’
I felt certain that if my body became healthier, my gaming performance would improve as well.
After steadying my ragged breathing from running and resting for a while, I got up and began serious strength training.
Whoosh, whoosh, whoosh.
Unlike running, which still made breathing difficult even as my body moved, strength training was incredibly easy.
Only after increasing the weight of the dumbbells several times did it become challenging.
As the enormous weights rose and fell smoothly with the movements of my arms and legs, several people at the Gym glanced at me.
‘If Strength Level 2 is like this, I wonder what Strength Level 3 would be like.’
I needed coins.
But if coins came in this time, I had to save them as much as possible.
After experiencing the situation with Hwang Beom-young this time, I realized that coins could be needed urgently at any moment in any way.
It was right to save them as much as possible and only use them in unavoidable situations.
So I decided to train hard from now on, starve myself hard, save money, and lose weight.
‘I want to fix my leg quickly.’
I glanced down at my leg, which was becoming more defined with thigh muscle.
It was strange how relatively smoothly it moved with the strength enhancement, but I still regretted that it wasn’t completely healthy.
People still looked at me with displeasure when I limped.
“….”
I glanced around briefly.
Even now, there were looks of people wondering what a cripple was doing here without rehabilitation therapy, glancing at me with displeasure.
To accumulate coins and fix my leg, I first had to participate in the tournament.
According to Kkolkkalpi, this preliminary round had quite a number of Constellations just from the Players alone, so I’d have to do my best.
A thought suddenly occurred to me.
‘How can I squeeze coins out of the Constellations effectively?’
I still didn’t fully understand what Constellations were, but I had Constellation samples like Kkolkkalpi, Green Star, and Red Star.
They had emotions, obsessions, and preferences.
Not much different from humans, really.
If Constellations really weren’t AI, then even if I won the same way in the game, there had to be a way to make them pour out more coins.
A way to draw better reactions from the Constellations, more coins.
‘But still, I need to be able to see the Constellations’ reactions to even try anything. They should at least show me a Constellation comment section.’
They came to watch battles.
Wouldn’t the Constellations’ particular points of excitement roughly align with what the viewers watching the broadcast in real-time were feeling?
‘For now, I just need to win as much as possible in each match.’
With these thoughts swirling through my mind, I finished my workout and headed into the changing room.
Just as I changed clothes and threw on my coat, eager to get home and shower, my phone rang in my pocket.
The caller was my Landlady.
The moment I answered, a shrill, irritable voice pierced through.
[“When exactly are you coming?! Today’s the day the new tenant moves in, and if you don’t get your stuff out, what am I supposed to do?!”]
“…What?”
I’m the tenant.
[“Get here now!”]
“Wait, what do you suddenly mean by—”
Click.
The call cut off.

—————
This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
—————