The suicide note contained two pieces of paper, and both contained only a few very concise lines.
The first paper explained Jo Euishin’s physical condition, and it had the contact number of the funeral place he had contacted in advance.
‘What the hell does this mean…?’
Cheon Sungheon didn’t accept the situation.
He doesn’t suspect that the suicide note was fake.
He could recognize Jo Euishin’s uniquely neat handwriting, and he knew that his hyung wasn’t someone who would lie about his life.
Even so, Cheon Sungheon couldn’t comprehend the situation well.
There was a suicide note, but Jo Euishin suddenly disappeared?
‘Where did Euishin hyung go? But why did he call a funeral place instead of a hospital if his condition has worsened?’
His hand trembled as he held the suicide note.
He did his best to stop the trembling as he tried to check the contents of the next paper.
[To Sungheon]
The second paper had Cheon Sungheon’s name and a small envelope attached.
The small envelope was full of cash, perhaps leftovers from the payment for funeral expenses.
Cheon Sungheon felt his stomach drop.
‘He prepared this much… But he didn’t even say anything to me?’
Cheon Sungheon read the suicide note with widened eyes.
The first line had a brief greeting and a word of apology as if Jo Euishin predicted what he would feel.
‘Why is Euishin hyung apologizing to me? I haven’t even… I haven’t even apologized to him…!’
Every kid who dreamed of becoming a professional chess player was inspired by Jo Euishin.
Cheon Sungheon was one of those kids too.
When he lived in the orphanage, no one understood how happy it made him whenever he read articles about Jo Euishin winning big tournaments.
Jo Euishin was the idol, the star that Cheon Sungheon respected the most.
The same was true even after Jo Euishin retired from chess.
Jo Euishin went through a difficult phase in his life because of Cheon Sungheon, but instead, it was Jo Euishin who apologized to him instead of the other way around.
The blood, the number of the funeral place, and all the costs for the funeral that were prepared in advance all bothered Cheon Sungheon, but the words of apology from his hyung were what made him suffer the most.
‘If he weren’t involved with me, he wouldn’t have ended up in a gosiwon, and he wouldn’t have had problems with getting a job. He could’ve been examined and treated earlier, and he wouldn’t have to leave a suicide note like this…’
A long series of what-ifs swallowed Cheon Sungheon.
He couldn’t bear to read the next line.
He wrapped up the envelope containing the suicide note.
‘I should find Euishin hyung first. We need to talk in person!’
Cheon Sungheon tried to stay calm as he looked around the small room.
Some other residents came out to the hallway and looked around because Cheon Sungheon noisily opened the door to Jo Euishin’s room earlier.
Cheon Sungheon closed the door and tried to think rationally.
‘Where could Euishin hyung have gone to?’
The gosiwon room had no windows.
There wasn’t any place to hide in the small room, and there was no way that there was a secret passage in it.
The only entrance and exit to the room was the door.
‘I heard Euishin hyung coughing. I’m sure he was in here just a few seconds ago.’
Cheon Sungheon closed his eyes tightly.
When he opened them again, he looked at the bedsheets covered with blood.
He tried his best to think calmly.
‘Should I call the police? No, that’s no use.’
He thought about reporting a disappearance to the police, but he immediately gave up the thought.
The police wouldn’t put a lot of manpower into finding a terminally ill patient who disappeared after leaving a suicide note.
More than anything, Cheon Sungheon might be suspected of the disappearance and he’d be detained for nothing.
That would be a complete waste of time instead of finding Jo Euishin on his own.
‘Something that I don’t understand is happening here. I need to think outside the box before I lose time.’
Cheon Sungheon’s instincts tell him that something was unusual about this whole situation.
Assuming that Jo Euishin’s disappearance was something that occurred beyond the realm of common sense, Cheon Sungheon tried to establish an action plan.
‘I need to get a clear picture first.’
He checked the CCTVs in the hallway and the entrance and confirmed that Jo Euishin never came out of his room.
The last place that Jo Euishin went was his room.
That means he was definitely inside his room.
‘What was Euishin hyung doing before he disappeared?’
Cheon Sungheon briefly summarized in his head what Jo Euishin was up to before disappearing.
Isolation.
Coughing.
Game.
Cheon Sungheon focused on the third keyword, “game”.
‘Euishin hyung was playing PMH. There’s even a file here that summarizes attacks and strategies. Considering Euishin hyung’s personality, he would’ve kept all these organized after playing the game.’
Cheon Sungheon checked Jo Euishin’s phone.
When he wiped off the blood from the screen, he saw the PMH game open.
On the screen, an image of an open gift box was shown against the background of the game’s main screen, and a line of system information messages was displayed.
[Reward for completing final chapter received.]
There’s usually a notice about what items are obtained after opening gift boxes like this, but there was only a notice that the acquisition was completed.
It’s still unclear why and how Jo Euishin disappeared, but this piece of information cleared something up.
‘Euishin hyung cleared the final chapter and got a reward right before he disappeared. This is probably the last thing he did.’
There weren’t any more clues beyond that.
Cheon Sungheon felt his heart become heavier as he thought of the PMH game.
Player Master High School, the Nation’s Failed Game that marked a milestone in Korea’s mobile game history.
‘Come to think of it, there are more than one or two things strange about this failed game.’
Player Master High School recorded the highest development and marketing costs in the history of the game industry.
Even Cheon Sungheon, someone who had no interest in games at all, knew about PMH from its s.
Both on the internet and in the streets, s for PMH were plentiful.
It seemed as if the game was begging everyone to play it at least once.
However, the PMH game crumbled and failed.
Nevertheless, its operation continued.
‘PMH was featured in a documentary program before. A famous streamer said he would reveal the secrets of PMH, and so people tried to contact the game company that launched it. Nothing came out of that though.’
Many television programs and internet streamers tried to analyze all the ways that PMH has failed.
Some of the things featured were PMH’s basic development costs, marketing costs, server maintenance costs, and development costs for new content.
People analyzed these things in depth through various data and their own methods, and they always reach the same conclusion.
PMH hasn’t recovered even 10% of what was invested in it, and the deficit grows exponentially as it continued to operate.
Users who still play PMH are crazy, but the developers and the game’s company are even crazier.
Cheon Sungheon was slightly offended since the conclusion implies that Jo Eushin was crazy, but he doesn’t see anything wrong with its logic.
‘All kinds of dark rumors are still circulating.’
It didn’t make much sense, but some people made countless conspiracy theories to explain why PMH continues to operate.
There were a few that stood out, which are as follows;
‘PMH is an online game created by gangsters for money laundering.’
‘PMH has a huge psychological testing site built for illegal psychological experiments.’
‘PMH is a government project to stimulate the minds of young unemployed people addicted to games to make them return to reality.’
‘PMH is a ghost created to destroy its users’ minds.’
However, none of those theories had any evidence backing them.
As more and more people questioned how the Nation’s Failed Game generates profits, the National Tax Service eventually conducted a tax investigation.
However, the result of the investigation only concluded that PMH was simply a badly ruined game.
‘Oh?’
Cheon Sungheon opened the PMH game on his phone and updated it.
It’s been a while since he touched the game.
A notice was displayed as soon as he opened the application.
[Player Master High School; Notice of Server Shutdown]
No matter how many users cursed the game, and no matter how much money it lost, PMH never did anything about it.
They didn’t improve their servers, but they also never shut them down.
It was quite strange that they would try to shut down the server immediately after the final chapter update.
Cheon Sungheon immediately formed a guess.
‘PMH hasn’t shut down its servers so far. But now that they’re going to, maybe that means they achieved some goal that they had?’
Perhaps uploading the final chapter was simply the game’s final purpose.
However, PMH’s enthusiastic player, Jo Euishin, suddenly disappeared after playing the last chapter.
He doesn’t have evidence yet, but Cheon Sungheon’s gut instincts tell him that the two are related.
‘I need to clear the final chapter like Euishin hyung did before the server closes!’
His only clue on Jo Euishin’s disappearance was PMH, but the game’s server would be closed soon.
Cheon Sungheon immediately began to play the game.
‘I played this a few times before. Where have I left off again? It was after a butterfly-motif character died at the hands of the Black Screen, right…?’
Cheon Sungheon followed Jo Euishin’s footsteps and hurriedly played the game.
He used the files and guides left by Jo Euishin.
He also checked the blog where Jo Euishin left his game records.
‘I’ll borrow this for a bit, Euishin hyung.’
Cheon Sungheon has since been locked in Jo Euishin’s room playing PMH.
Thanks to Jo Euishin’s guides, Cheon Sungheon quickly reached the end.
Whenever he felt like giving up the disastrous story, he read a line of the suicide note left by Jo Euishin.
With just about an hour left before the server shutdown, Cheon Sungheon successfully cleared the final chapter of PMH.
‘…It’s really a bad and hopeless ending after all. Euishin hyung wasn’t feeling well when he played this, maybe this just worsened his condition.’
After the ending, a notification arrived.
[You can earn a reward for clearing the final chapter. Please check your gift box.]
Cheon Sungheon hurriedly opened the gift box.
‘I’m sure the reward is a clue to where Euishin hyung is!’
The screen stopped, and Cheon Sungheon heard a strange voice in his head.
<Connection to transcendent universe complete. Reviewing compatibility of the player.>
<Review completed. Player ‘Cheon Sungheon’ selected as a candidate for two-dimensional future transform object.>
Cheon Sungheon thought that he was hallucinating, but he listened and focused, thinking that this was also a clue that would help him find Jo Euishin.
<Information modification, dimension synchronization, and transporting of two-dimensional future transform object ‘Cheon Sungheon’ in progress.>
Dimension synchronization?
Transporting?
They were quite incomprehensible words to be a mere hallucination, but the word “transporting” perhaps had something to do with Jo Euishin’s disappearance.
<Information successfully modified, however, a serious error was found during the dimension synchronization process.>
<Dimension synchronization and transportation are interrupted for the protection of the two-dimensional future transform object candidate.>
