Charcter list for Level One Player. Spoilers may be unmarked.
Main Character
Choi Hyungsung
I have got to upgrade my shop rank to buy that elixir my father needs to recover from [Mana Reflux Syndrome]. In the meantime, let's go hunt some monsters.
27-year-old Choi Hyungsung is desperate to become a Player so his family doesn't have to struggle so hard to raise the money for his ailing father's medical treatment. His wish is answered when he comes home from his construction work day-job to get the message [You Have Awakened]. He checks his status to see that his stats are abysmal and he has no offensive, defensive, or supporting skills, but he does have the [Unique] [Buy] and [Sell] skills, and checks the interdimensional market, that allows him to grow stronger, fast, at a price. While hunting monsters, he also learns, to his horror, that he can't level up. But this turns out to be a blessing in disguise...- Accidental Discovery: He gets the [Rare] Vampire Blade dagger as a result of killing over 100 vampire bat monsters at once using a skill, realizing that the grade of a loot drop can be artificially inflated by hunting a large group of monsters together. He tries this several other times to learn that there are other hidden mechanics at play.
- Cast from Lifespan: After going on a shopping spree soon after getting his unique skill, he goes to the Player's Association to register and is turned away. Confused, he looks at a mirror to realize that the points he spent were taken from his remaining life-span, resulting in Rapid Aging. He then goes and sells off random items he owns to try and recover. Fortunately, the sheer novelty of what he's selling results in otherworldly beings buying them.
- Cursed with Awesome: Because his unique skill rewards him with points rather than experience for killing monsters, he can't get past level 1. However, because he can't level up, he winds up receiving unique titles and boosts that normal players can't get, such as [Fox Massacrer] and [First to get a Heroic Title]. He can also point and laugh at the [Rule of 20]note because he gets better loot drops, thanks to being a much lower level than the monsters he fights, while normal players are forced to find monsters on their own level, since they become penalized when hunting monsters with lower levels and monsters with higher levels are too strong.
- Good Thing You Can Heal: Thanks to the passive [Regeneration] skill he got from defeating the Three-Headed Panther, he can recover from any injury. As such, when he's swallowed by the Blue Drake, he regenerates faster than the beast's stomach acid can digest him, much faster. He kills the beast, from the inside by hacking through the beast's flesh and then piercing its heart with his broken dagger, which proceeds to evolve as well...
- Guide Dang It!: His [Unique] skill didn't come with instructions, so he has no choice but to learn the mechanics by trial and error.
- Guile Hero: He is dangerously cunning and clever. When the Seowoo Guild comes at him with recruitment contracts, he takes the contracts to a lawyer before he signs the dotted line. This allows him to learn of the hidden traps the guild had planned for him.
- Healing Hands: He learns a healing skill early on. While he never actually loses this skill, he chooses to lower its effectiveness in exchange for higher DPS as a result of a class up quest.
- Heart Drive: As a result of defeating the Three-Headed Panther and absorbing the loot drop skill book, he not only gains a powerful Healing Factor, he becomes immortal as long as his head is not entirely destroyed. This skill later evolves to making him immortal if his head and heart aren't destroyed simultaneously.
- Life Drinker: Thanks to his dagger, the Vampire Blade, he gains health in direct proportion to the damage he delivers with said dagger.
- Losing Your Head: Shortly after Hyungsung joins the Player's Association, the butt-hurt former Vice leader of the Seowoo guild comes at him in a dungeon. The guy not only utterly stomps him, tortures him, and gloats, but then casually beheads him for laughs. Hyungsung responds by having his body punch a hole through the guy's chest and then pick up his own head, putting it back on, to the lout's utter confusion.
- Necessary Drawback: His [Buy] and [Sell] skills allow him to sell goods to an interdimensional market, but he has no way to contact the buyers or sellers directly, and the interface is Lawful Stupid, doing nothing at all to screen complaints against his merchandise. So, he repeatedly gets hit with suspensions due to his goods being marked as "defective" thanks to the otherworlders gaming the system.
- Relative Button: Going after his family is guaranteed to make him murderous.
- Springtime for Hitler: At the beginning of the story, he's trying to earn enough money to heal his father while remaining Beneath Notice from the big guilds, knowing that they would either exploit or kill him if they learned of his unusual status. Since he keeps going off on his own, one of Seowoo Guild's employees follows him out of curiosity and sees him take down monsters that should be out of a newbie's range, prompting first attempts to recruit him and then attempts to murder him when he rejects the former. In the end, he ends up getting recruited into the Player's Association by Shin Yoon-Ah, but at least she's a Benevolent Boss/Reasonable Authority Figure willing to help him with what he needs.
- Swallowed Whole: When he's fighting the [Blue Drake], the creature blocks all his escape routes, rips off his legs and swallows the rest of him in one bite, without chewing.
- Tragic Dropout: He dropped out of college as a result of his father falling into a coma, since the medical treatment for his condition is insanely expensive, due to requiring the monster stone of a rare and powerful monster.
- Unscrupulous Hero: He is usually decent and law-abiding, but he won't hesitate to bend or outright break the law when he can get away with it if it benefits himself or serves the greater good.
Seowoo Guild
Lee Soohee
Oh. What a big fish! I got to get him for our guild!
An employee of Seowoo Guild, she enters the story when she encounters Choi Hyungsung in the Horned Rabbit dungeon while she's looking for the dungeon boss as part of her class-up quest. When she sees that he's a newbie that is still one-shotting monsters above his level, she decides to attempts to recruit him for her guild, but he refuses to show her his stats. Her unwillingness to leave him alone ends up dragging Hyungsung into her guild's internal conflicts - with rather disastrous results.- Cleavage Window: Her official hunter armor is a very form-fitting plate that covers her chest and torso, her arms and legs have chain-mail greaves and leggings, but her cleavage is completely unprotected.
- Contrived Coincidence: While the first time she meets him is truly coincidental, every other encounter is this In-Universe as she tracks him illegally by checking where and when he's selling loot drops and then hounding him outside dungeons.
- Proper Tights with a Skirt: Her legs are protected by chain leggings and her armor has a pencil-skirt.
- Stalker without a Crush: She keeps dogging Hyungsung in order to recruit him for Seowoo Guild, under orders of her boss.
- Unwitting Instigator of Doom: Trying to recruit Hyungsung ends up dragging the latter into Seowoo Guild's internal conflict between Mah Jihun and Jung Sunwoo, with horrible results for the guild.
- You Have Failed Me: Mah Jihun yells at her every time she fails to recruit Hyungsung.
Mah Jihun
What's this bastard's identity?!
Seowoo Guild's President. As one side of the guild's internal conflict, he seeks to recruit Choi Hyungsung under the belief he might be the leverage he needs to get rid of his hated Vice President.- Death Glare: Further boosted by some kind of magical ability, he almost literally stares holes in Lee Soohee when he asks if she's shared the info she has on Choi with "other guilds" and that includes his own VP.
- Enemy Civil War: The biggest reason Choi Hyungsung is able to give this guild the finger and get away with it is that he and his VP loathe each other and are constantly scheming to sabotage each other's work.
- Mean Boss: He frequently yells at employees when he's less than pleased with them.
- Opportunistic Bastard: Shin Yoon-Ah was pleasantly surprised that the prosecutor's office, normally very friendly with Seowoo Guild, would be very cooperative with filing criminal charges against guild-members on behalf of Choi Hyungsung. Turns out he ordered the prosecutor's office to be as cooperative as possible in order to clean out the faction working under then VP Jung Sunwoo.
- Strange Minds Think Alike: He and the VP send nearly identical contracts to Choi Hyungsung independent of each other, with the same pitfalls.
Go Jinsung
It seems I offended you, I must sincerely apologize for that.
Seowoo Guild's so-called "top negotiator and recruiter". Choi Hyungsung immediately pins him as a borderline conman because of his constant fast-talking and his very frequent and insincere apologies.- Acting Unnatural: Hyungsung notes he's extremely untrustworthy due to his fast-talking and his too-good-to-be-true job offers.
- Apologizes a Lot: Which only comes off as part of his attempt to fool his targets. He will usually say something offensive to get Hyungsung's attention (such as suggesting to speak at the latter's home) and then "apologizes" in order to keep the dialog going. For his part, Hyungsung is wise to his attempts.
- Digging Yourself Deeper: No matter what he tries, he only drives Hyungsung away with his attitude.
- Logical Fallacies: He excuses his own faux-pas against Choi Hyungsung by accusing the other guilds of doing the same, and worse. Hyungsung is not fooled.
- Schmuck Bait: He offers Hyungsung a contract which would deliver a 50 billion won sign-on bonus (half of what Hyungsung wanted) upon signing. However, when Hyungsung brings the contract to a lawyer, he's able to point out the contract's pitfalls - the worst being that Hyungsung would be forced to pay back five times the sign-on bonus if his stats are found wanting.
- They Just Dont Get It: No matter how many times he's told "no", has his number blocked, or is flat-out told to take a hike, he just refuses to believe Hyungsung doesn't want to sign up.
Jung Sunwoo
I had considered going after your family as well, show you what it's like to lose everything, but you were prepared. Sure. I could have gone through the bodyguards you had like a laxative and killed them anyway, but it would hamper my attempts to flee the country. You really should have just obediently joined the Seowoo guild under me and lick my boots like the dog you are.
Seowoo Guild's Vice President. When he learns from a subordinate that President Ma Jihun is trying to recruit Hyungsung, he attempts to one-up Jihun by recruiting Hyungsung himself. When this triggers a series of events that leads with him being on the run from the police, he attempts to take it out on Hyungsung before fleeing the country.- Did Not See That Coming: People usually die when you chop off their heads. He chops off Hyungsung's head for laughs, only to stare down at his own chest in horror when the guy's headless body punches a hole through it from behind, and as he lays on the ground bleeding out, Hyungsung picks up his head and puts it back on."What kind of bullshit is this?!"
- Misplaced Retribution: His life fell apart because Mah Jihun hung him out to dry, taking advantage of the legal complaints of one Shin Yoon-Ah. He shifts all the blame for it to Hyungsung who he thinks would be easy prey, and were it not for Hyungsung earlier getting the [Book of Immortality] skill from the Three-Headed Panther some time earlier, and evolving it, he would have been right.
- Eyes Always Shut: His eyes are shut when he's acting smug, but when he's surprised or angry, they open.
- No Body Left Behind: After he's dead, Hyungsung burns his body to ash with fire magic and dismantles the equipment he was using to hide his identity, so he's never found and Hyungsung can't be connected to his death.
- Revenge by Proxy: Discussed. When he's got Hyungsung cornered in a dungeon, he taunts his victim by stating he could have gone after the guy's family for laughs, but chose not to because it would be inconvenient.
- Revenge Myopia: After being booted from Seowoo Guild and being forced on the run as the police have proof of him committing several felonies, he attempts to kill Hyungsung, whose only "crime" was rejecting his recruitment attempts and bringing attention to his actions.
- Schmuck Bait: Much like Go Jinsung, he attempts to entice Hyungsung with a contract that looks good only in surface - a lawyer quickly finds multiple traps that could nullify the contract at the discretion of the guild's top management, which could be dangerous if they chose to act with malice. The deal-breaker is a clause that, should the contractee be considered at fault if the contract was nullified, the fee would be ten times the sign-on bonus.
- Smug Super: He's a very powerful player at a level well over 300, and knows it, acting as if he were untouchable. Then he met Hyungsung.
- Soft-Spoken Sadist: As he's just stabbing and slashing at Hyungsung, taking his sweet time to draw out the suffering, as well as doing a lot of Evil Gloating, he does it all in an eerily matter-of-fact tone that's quite unnerving.
- Tantrum Throwing: After Hyungsung has gone completely off the grid for a few months, with his underlings utterly unable to find, never mind corral him, he grabs a shot of whiskey on the rocks and throws the glass at his office's door as his top underling is walking out.
Seo Daeong
This disrespectful little...
Jung Sunwoo's lackey. He's the one that brought Hyungsung to Sunwoo's attention, dragging the former into Seowoo Guild's conflict.- Despair Gambit: After getting blown off for disturbing the Choi family and getting a voice recording of himself sent to Go Jinsung (and vice-versa) because both refuse to accept he doesn't want to join Seowoo, he hires a guild that is notorious for ambushing Players in dungeons so they will go after Hyungsung until he comes crawling for protection to Seowoo. Bad move.
- Moral Myopia: He constantly hounds Choi Hyungsung, to the point that he goes to his house completely uninvited and unannounced, and sends several blatantly unfair contracts - yet Hyungsung is the "disrespectful little brat" for rejecting said contracts, cutting off all calls and telling him and others like him to take a hike.
- Unwitting Instigator of Doom: Repeatedly.
- His attempts to poach Hyungsung for the Vice President's faction gets leaked to the President (and viceversa), leading to the arrests or losses of most of his own faction.
- Most of the other faction members get killed off when he sends assassins after Hyungsung, as, by this time, the Player's Association's chief Shin Yoon-Ah has become interested in Hyungsung as well and becomes a witness to the murder attempts.
Player Association
Oh Chansoo
A monster, a real monster!
A safety officer in the red-furred wolf dungeon that has the misfortune of being the first to meet the Three-Headed Panther. He and his partner die to the beast.- An Arm and a Leg: He loses his spear-arm to the Three-Headed Panther when he tries to fight back.
- Off with His Head!: The Three-Headed Panther ripped his head off as he tried to run away.
- Red Shirt: His only purpose in the story was to die to the Three-Headed Panther. He and his partner don't even get a funeral service, despite their ID's being collected by Yoon Shin-Ah when she and some much higher leveled Players come to investigate.
- We Hardly Knew Ye: Introduced just to die within a panel or two.
- The Worf Effect: He's shown as a level 71 player and dies to the Three-Headed Panther like a total amateur.
Captain Shin Yoon-Ah
Lee Hang-gu! Are you saying you'll bill me with "Non-compliance" and "Breach of Contract" fees the moment I die in battle?!
The second of the Player Association members introduced to the audience and the first Choi Hyungsung meets. She's in charge of the "Kill Squadron", a rapid response team of Player Hunters designed to respond to emergency situations. She successfully recruits Hyungsung to the organization with a variation of an internship contract and respects his desire to keep his status window secret.- Brainy Brunette: She spots milk-chocolate colored hair and is a very intelligent woman.
- Cleavage Window: At first. Her first armor has detached sleeves, torso guard, pencil-skirt, and chain leggings, with her cleavage exposed, but later armors are neck to toe banded mail.
- Enlightened Self-Interest: She is the loudest objector to the mistreatment the Choi family suffered under Lee Hang-gu because she realized that it's very likely she'd be next on the chopping block the instant her usefulness comes to an end.
- For Want Of A Nail: After she's signed on Choi Hyungsung with a make-shift internship contract, she realizes that she could have avoided being trapped in the Player's Association in a contract bordering on slavery if she had been a bit more cynical instead of taking the promises she was provided at face value.
- Good Is Not Soft: She is normally a very sweet and sensitive woman, but she won't hesitate to torture the living daylights out of criminals who try to extort, ambush, or murder Players in dungeons, where it's difficult to gather evidence of their misdeeds.
- Knight in Sour Armor: She is still a woman who treasures the lives of her fellow Players and civilians, trying to help the helpless and protect the innocent, but she's bogged down with the bureaucracy of the Players Association and she's had to suffer the death of her close friends and allies, powerless to help.
- Proper Tights with a Skirt: Her first armor has a pencil skirt and chain leggings.
- Reasonable Authority Figure: She does everything in her power to keep Choi Hyungsung happy because she realizes just how valuable a Player he is.
- Right for the Wrong Reasons: She decides to search for Choi Hyungsung after failing to find the Three-Headed Panther, because he's alone and it might be dangerous for him if the beast somehow managed to slip past her group. Turns out she was right to be suspicious as he had sent her group on a merry wild-goose chase to hide the fact that he defeated the beast which was over 100 levels higher than himself.
- Servile Snarker: She's grown wise over the years that a life-time contract for whatever sign-on bonus she got wasn't as great an idea as it seemed at the time. As such, she loves to snark at her boss, the President of the Player's Association, who got her into the Association with a life-time contract and then slaved her away for pathetic wages, and would have kept paying her in peanuts if she didn't object, all the way to the present. Yet the guy won't release her from her contract and loves to belly-ache about how acerbic she is.
- Ship Tease: Her professional and personal chemistry with Choi Hyungsung is so good, many people think the two are dating.
- It's especially prominent in chapter 47, when she's greeting Choi Hyungsung after learning he not only survived his encounter with the Blue Drake, but successfully killed it. She hugs him like a lover greeting her husband coming back from war, blushes like crazy when she realizes he's naked under the tarp he salvaged from a storefront to protect his dignity, gets possessive when her old team that was with her way back on the hunt for the Three-Headed Panther starts ribbing her about him, and then drags him off like a girlfriend who is worried that another girl's got her eye on her man when one of the female members of the team starts flirting with him.
- Spell My Name With An S: Her name starts out as Shin Yun-Ah but is later translated as Shin Yoon-Ah.
- Spotting the Thread: She realizes Choi Hyungsung is the one who defeated the Three-Headed Panther while investigating the battle scene with a proper [Tracker] who relays that the beast was beaten in a one-on-one fight.
- When She Smiles: She's either very stoic (as seen in the page image) or putting forward fake "business" smiles that are somewhat creepy. When she smiles with genuine joy, she is so adorable Choi Hyunsung can't help but blush.
Kim Dongsu
A single player managed to solo the Three-Headed Panther, but I can only track monsters, not Players.
A monster tracking specialist Shin Yoon-Ah brought in to try and find the Three-Headed Panther, for the sake of public safety and so the Red Maned Wolf dungeon can be reopened. He tracks the beast's final moments and proclaims that it was killed in single combat. Shin Yoon-Ah immediately pings Choi Hyunsung as the culprit, since she met him alone, when her team was tasked with the initial emergency.- One-Shot Character: He appears in chapter 20 and the first half of chapter 21 then is never seen again.
- Sensor Character: Because of his super-powers, he can use dungeon mana to recreate the actions of a monster he's tracking, though the effect fades over time.
The President
Oh which god did I offend to get stuck with this woman?
Shin Yoon-Ah's boss and the president of the Player's Association. With some unstated sign-on bonus, he managed to get her into a life-time contract, that she's grown rather tired of. Although he loves to belly-ache about her, he utterly refuses to release her from her contract.- Ask a Stupid Question...: When Shin Yoon-ah suggested he was planning on having Hyungsung given a crappy salary in return for a hefty sign-on bonus and a life-time contract, he goes "I didn't do that to you did I?" Her response is "yes, you did, and you would have continued doing it if I hadn't objected."
- Good Is Not Nice: He seems morally upright and concerned about Korea's well-being, but he's not a pleasant man to work for.
- No Name Given: His name is never revealed. His office placard even says "President of the Player Association" with no name on it.
- One-Shot Character: He's only on-screen once in chapter 35 and is never seen again. Rather odd for the President of the guild...
- Orcus on His Throne: One wonders what he does as President since he's only seen once in his office and did nothing in regards to Lee Hang-gu's antics. Shin Yoon-ah had to call the Minister to task instead.
- Scars Are Forever: Even in a world with all sorts of healing magic, he's got a scar on his face, crossing over (but not through) his left eye vertically.
Seo Tae-chul
Sorry, this brat has no manners.
Hyungsung's trainer when he goes in to start working for the Player's Association as part of the emergency response team. He's pleasant enough, but his co-trainer, Soo-young is rather unpleasant, thinking he's a teenage brat, until she learns he's actually two years older then gets really polite all of a sudden.- Consummate Professional: Even when Soo-young is being extremely rude by Korean standards, he doesn't let it faze him and continues going over Choi Hyungsung's duties as part of the emergency response squad, and getting the new hire oriented.
- One-Shot Character: He shows up in chapter 37 and is never seen again.
Lee Soo-Young
Well. He looks younger than me, so I'm being familiar.
Her were-leopard form.
Hyungsung's handler and the only one available to deal with new level 100 and under members. She starts out extremely rude to Hyungsung, to the point that he wondered if he had somehow earned her ire, until she learns he's actually two-years her elder and suddenly gets really polite.- Break the Haughty: She starts out extremely arrogant towards Hyungsung, becomes "polite" when she learns he's actually her elder, and then has her pride broken completely when he has to save her life, as the training mission she takes him on turns out to be way more dangerous than the intel she was provided.
- Curtains Match the Windows: Her hair and eyes are similar shades of grey.
- Leotard of Power: Her armor is actually a very conservative neck to toe spandex-like outfit that allows for maximum agility and flexibility.
- Our Werebeasts Are Different: Her special ability allows for Voluntary Shapeshifting into a were leopard.
- Professional Butt-Kisser: Of a sort. She is very rude, speaking "familiarly" with people who are younger than herself, but when she's speaking with an elder, even if it's as short as two years, she bends over backwards to be polite.
- Sour Outside, Sad Inside: Her early abrasiveness makes a lot more sense when her backstory is revealed. She has repeatedly been assigned to babysit the reckless sons of rich idiots who would put her team in danger and then shift the blame on said team when things go badly. She becomes apologetic and much nicer to Choi Hyungsung when she learns he was put on her team by merit, not politics.
- Super-Senses: Her sense of smell is stronger than a bloodhound's.
Lee Hang-gu
Who do you think I am that you can speak so insolently?! ... Just because you luckily awakened after doing nothing but eating and shitting your entire life, you dare insult me? A punk like you who's less than a bug thinks he can—-
The Minister of Dimensional Affairs and a former congressman. He gets the "brilliant" idea to file a bunch of ridiculous claims against Choi Hyungsung's estate the instant he receives word that Choi died in battle, and refuses to back-off despite repeated warnings and protests. He honestly believes he's done nothing wrong and is just trying to enforce the rules, right up until Choi Hyungsung confronts him directly, asking for nothing more than a simple apology for going after him and his family unjustly, at which point he reveals that he sees Players like Choi Hyungsung as being lower than bugs and thinks himself vastly superior to them just because he's a Minister and a former Congressman.- Believing Their Own Lies: He tells himself, his unseen cronies, and his yes-men that he's done nothing wrong by filing ridiculous claims for damages against Choi Hyungsung the moment he received word that the 27-year-old man fell in battle and is only trying to comply with the law. When he's told that the claims are utterly ridiculous, he flies into a tantrum like a spoiled 3-year-old.
- Blinded by Rage: Implied. On his way out of Lee Hang-gu's office, Hyungsung looks at his skill [Rage] which can drive people or monsters into a suicidal frenzy, not caring about their own safety in exchange for strength.
- Bring Me My Brown Pants: When Choi retorts to his insults, profanity, and temper tantrum by calmly asking "Should I just kill you?", he's shown having a trail of urine going down his pants' leg onto the carpet of his office.
- Corrupt Politician: Using his [Psychometry] skill, Hyungsung learns this guy is just the face of a cabal of corrupt politicians who twist the law into pretzels to "legally" steal from Players out of a bloated sense of entitlement and envy.
- Did Not Think This Through: Which Hyungsung calls him out on. After interrupting his rant with a credible death-threat, that manages to finally flip his brain to "on", Hyungsung touches his forehead with the statement that it's not just there for decoration and he should really be thinking very carefully if what he's going to say is worth saying aloud. Then goes on to reveal he recorded the conversation and the Minister's profanity laden insults are actionable in civil court, before proclaiming his intent to sue. Lee Hang-gu can only scream in impotent rage as Hyungsung is walking out the door.
- Faux Affably Evil: He tries to pass himself off as a kindly grandfather just trying to do his job, but the instant he's challenged, he flies into rages and tantrums.
- Just Following Orders: He constantly tries to defend his Stupid Evil actions by claiming that he's just trying to comply with the law. When he's called out on how ridiculous this stance is, he flies into tantrums.
- Lawful Stupid: Even if the claims are legal, they have no merit under even the tiniest of scrutiny.
- "Loss of rented equipment": Destroyed in the line of duty and beyond Choi's control. Possibly legit, but callous.
- "Breach of contract": Choi died in complying with the terms of the contract. You don't file "breach of contract" charges against a corpse who died trying to keep his end.
- Penalties for "Non-compliance": Choi literally died following orders, how is that "non-compliant?"
- "Illegal gifts": Not only were Choi's earnings legally his, he gave them to his family for living expenses, and the house they are living in was bought before joining the Player's Association. So, billing the Choi family to try and get them back and trying to boot them out of their home can't possibly be justified.
- Logical Fallacies: He and his staff rebuffed all the complaints and protests of the Choi family by just repeating "there's no legal problem" and "petition to renounce inheritance" over and over again, never bothering to check the actual merit of the claims against the Choi estate that they're pursuing, with the intent of making the Chois just give up and go away. When Choi Hyungsung is in his office and tells him, to his face, that the initial claims are completely senseless, he flies into a profanity and insult laden rant.
- Mass "Oh, Crap!": When Choi Hyungsung makes him realize that he's Bullying a Dragon with his profanity and insult laced rants by calmly asking "Should I just kill you?", he and his two henchmen start sweating bullets in sheer terror as Choi would have no problems killing all of them, even if he might face legal problems later.
- Oh, Crap!: When Shin Yoon-Ah angrily protest that she'd quit the association, even if it means eating the "breach of contract" penalty, and would go to his superiors in the government if he doesn't reverse his rulings against the Choi family, he momentarily drops his smug demeanor and hangs up, before he provokes her any further. Either he reverses his ridiculous rulings or authorizes Shin Yoon-Ah to because she's able to reverse the situation later.
- Reality Is Unrealistic: Yes, politicians this entitled and arrogant have always existed, still exist, and will always exist, regardless if they're elected, selected, appointed, or born into it. This is the primary reason revolutions take place.
- Screw Politeness, I'm a Senior!: Korea, like most Asiatic countries, takes the phrase "respect your elders" as Serious Business, but he takes it to an extreme. He considers anyone telling him anything other than "yes, sir. You are correct, sir" as an unabashed insult. When he first learns that Choi Hyungsung demanded an apology from him, personally, for putting his family in jeopardy by attempting to force them to give up their inheritance, billing them with insane and ridiculous fees, and trying to evict them from the house they were living in, he starts pounding on his office furniture, calling Choi a "cheeky brat" to his underlings, and conspiring to try and find a way to punish Choi Hyungsung for the perceived "disrespect" and gets all dismissive when he meets Hyungsung in person, stating "you look to be around the same age as my grandson, why are young kids these days always—-" before being cut off and Hyunsung asking for the apology he was promised.
- Screw the Rules, I Make Them!: He thinks that just because he's a Minister and a former congressman, he can do whatever he wants and the law will always back him up.
- Smug Snake: As a result of being surrounded by yes-men and cronies who reinforce his delusion that he's never wrong, he spends the vast majority of his appearances prancing around like he's untouchable and fancying himself vastly superior to all his subordinates, including Players, who have to risk their lives for their paycheck and have super-powers. In reality, he's a Darwin Awards "At-risk survivor" as he's too stupid to ever realize that pissing off people with super-powers is clearly not in line with his continued ability to live safely.
- Stupid Evil: Which Choi Hyunsgung calls him out on - he might have been appointed to the position of Minister, but the position of congressman is by election, so he should understand optics and public relations. So, what the hell made him believe that going after the assets and family of a hero after hearing of said hero's death in battle would work at all?
- The Unapologetic: When Hyungsung comes to his office, as ordered, and asks for a simple apology for going after him and his family unjustly, he refuses to apologize, since he believes he did nothing wrong, instead just flying into a profanity laced rant for being called out on his Stupid Evil ways.
- Unwitting Instigator of Doom: By ordering Hyunsung into his office for his apology, that he never delivered, and making the 27-year-old wait in the lobby, just to flex, he allowed Hyungsung to use his [Psychometry] skill to grab holographic evidence of not only his corruption, but a hot den of corruption and collusion with several high-ranking player guilds and government officials. This blows the corruption scandal wide open in the press, and the players go on strike. After all, they don't want to fall in battle, trying to protect their country, just to have their families suffer unjustly under arrogant and entitled politicians who are going to summarily fine them like crazy and throw them out in the street.
- What Were You Thinking?: He's repeatedly asked why he thought going after a war-hero who fell in battle was a good idea. He defends himself by going Just Following Orders and acts as if he's being forced into it by a higher power, when it's really all just a matter of a bloated sense of entitlement, envy, and a completely unjustified superiority complex.
Otherworlders
White Moon
This "smartphone" is such a wonderful product! Too bad I can't understand most of what it's telling me!
One of the first buyers of Hyungsung's goods. She's fascinated by an antique cell-phone and takes selfies with it for 6 hours before the battery dies.- Guide Dang It!: Since she's from a world without electricity or electronics, she can't understand how a cell-phone works. Her complaint about it failing to work after 6 hours of use is one of the few valid complaints to Hyungsung's merchandise. Fortunately, after providing chargers fed by monster stones, the complaint was cleared up.
- Mundane Object Amazement: Thanks to the sheer novelty of electronic devices on her homeworld, she's fascinated by a shock-resistant watch and an antique cell-phone.
Bakarut
(Gasp!) NEW PRODUCTS! Got to buy them all!
Bored out of her mind just seeing the same products sold day in and day out, she is ecstatic to see the new stuff Hyungsung is putting on the market. Impatient and irascible, she tries, and fails, to buy them all. Her most common "complaint" is "sell more stuff!"- The Ageless: She appears to have infinite points to spend and never gets older during any of her appearances.
- Gotta Catch 'Em All: The instant she sees new products on the market, she tries to buy them all, but a few wind up being bought by others. White Moon buys a smart-phone, batteries, and a wristwatch, and Gaspit buys some batteries too.
- Hair-Trigger Temper: She's disturbingly easy to anger.
- Horned Humanoid: She has giant horns on the side of her head to signify she's some kind of demon archetype.
- It Amused Me: She adores the game consoles, arcade games, and electronic gaming devices Hyungsung offers because she just wants to be entertained, and it's all a novel experience.
- Obviously Evil: She's got a throne decorated with skulls, looks demonic, lives in a castle that looks like it's right in the middle of the nether realms, breathes fire, and tends to hurl out threats of violence when she loses her temper, which is fairly easy.
- Winged Humanoid: She has large bat-like wings.
Crow
After I force your business into shutting down a few times, you will have no choice but to bow your head and do as I say. BWAHAHAHA!
A tribal warlord from a backwater world. He exploits the "complaint" system to force sellers into selling on his terms and then makes himself a middleman. He tries this on Hyungsung only to realize, too late, just how bad it is to try and corner a market with a very, very fast production and turn around rate.- Flaw Exploitation: He abuses the complaint system to force sellers to meet his demands and then acts like a middle-man profiting by buying popular products and reselling them.
- Know When to Fold 'Em: When he gets into an economic war with Hyungsung and sees that the guy has virtually no limit in supplying new stuff, he cuts his losses before it becomes life-threatening.
- Laser-Guided Karma: He tries to buy out and lock down Hyungsung's market, only to learn that Hyungsung can supply much, much faster than he can buy. And then Hyungsung comes out with a better product, leaving him stuck with, for example, a large number of packs of batteries that he can't either use nor sell because they have been made obsolete already.
- Take Over the World: He used his unique [Buy] and [Sell] ability to grow strong enough to outright conquer his homeworld and become its ruler in off-screen backstory.
Others
The Choi Family
(Sniff) It's been so difficult.
Hyungsung's mother and sister. Along with Hyungsung himself, they worked themselves to the bone trying to afford the treatment for the father's illness. Hyungsung [Awakening] changed all that for the better.- Mundane Luxury: They've had to live with poverty for so long, an 1100 sq ft house, just barely big enough for private bedrooms, is considered a mansion by them.
- Only Known by Their Nickname: Hyungsung's mother goes by "Mom" and his elder sister by "Noona." Their names are never mentioned.
- Perpetual Poverty: Due to the patriarch's illness putting him into a coma, with the only viable treatment being extremely rare and expensive, they all worked themselves to the bone, the sister cashed in her intended dowry, the brother had to drop out of college, and the mother had to take up two full-time jobs back-to-back. Fortunately, Hyungsung awakening as a Player and striking it rich with his "found" skill-book put an end to all that, allowing them to live comfortably in a house big enough for separate bedrooms. Signing on with the Player's Association allowed him to give them enough living expenses for ten years, provided that's not a translation error.
Choi Hyunsu
The protagonist's father.
- Delicate and Sickly: Thanks to suffering from [Mana Reflux Syndrome], he's been in a coma for at least 3 years.
- Find the Cure!: Hyungsung isn't selling goods and collecting points just for buying skill books and stat potions, he's looking to increase his store rank so he can get his hands on [Elixir] which has a chance of curing his father's disease.
Jang Woo-hyun
Tch. This noob blocked my skill? This bastard. Guess just one leg won't be enough, have to take an extra arm too!
The leader of an infamous guild known for attacking players in dungeons. After being hired to attack Hyungsung, he attempts to cripple him - only for Shin Yoon-Ah to catch him in the act. It doesn't end well for him.- Blatant Lies: He leads his gang in an attempt to mug Hyungsung, demanding compensation in the form of all his equipment, for "trespassing" in "their" hunting grounds. Then, when Shin Yoon-Ah shows up, he attempts to claim Hyungsung was the aggressor, not knowing that Yoon-Ah has seen him in action.
- Close Call Hair Cut: Close call hair burn. He had shoulder-length hair until he attacked Hyungsung and the guy retaliated with a fire-ball to the face.
- Hoist by His Own Petard: He takes advantage of the dungeons being places where getting evidence is hard to mug, cripple, and murder other players. When Shin Yoon-Ah catches him in the act, she reminds him of this before asking Hyungsung to step out of sight and hearing and then subjecting him to some rather intense Enhanced Interrogation Techniques.
- Long-Haired Pretty Boy: He had flowing shoulder-length hair until he ate a fireball from Hyungsung, and now it's cropped rather short and messy.
- Moral Myopia: Mugging people, even killing them, is nothing more than a harmless game. If the intended victim fights back competently, they're a bastard that has to be permanently disfigured and maybe even killed.
- Playing the Victim Card: He and his gang set up an ambush and try to rob, cripple, and if things turned bad, kill Hyungsung, but when Shin Yoon-Ah arrives on the scene, he tries to paint himself and his gang as the wounded party, and objects, loudly, when Shin Yoon-Ah, who was watching from the start, calls him out on his lies, interrogates, and arrests him.
- Straw Hypocrite: He and his gang mug and murder people in dungeons, because getting evidence to the police is rather difficult, seeing as electronic devices don't work in dungeons. When Shin Yoon-Ah takes him aside for some "enhanced interrogation," he tries to protest that the police won't let her get away with it, at which point she reminds him of his own policy of going after people in dungeons because there's no evidence, and declares that their intended victim is extremely unlikely to testify on their behalf, but just in case, she has Hyungsung step out of sight and hearing so he can't testify about what she did.
- Villains Want Mercy: When it becomes clear that Shin Yoon-Ah is going to beat the tar out of him, for information and a bit of vigilante justice, he begs to be spared.
Mercenaries:
Lucia
In her home world.
The first mercenary Hyungsung hires through the [Buy] and {Sell] system. When her world became the target of dimensional breaches, she fought on the front lines, until 40 years later, legendary monsters too numerous to fight swarmed and consumed it, leaving her the Sole Survivor, because she fled and became trapped in the Void Between the Worlds. She turned to selling her services as a mercenary for points and to try and escape. She repeatedly askes Hyungsung for permission to live on Earth, full-time, which would cost a minimum of 24 million points a day.- I Was Quite the Looker: As can be seen in her flashbacks, she was very beautiful, but after being trapped in the void dimension for an extended period of time and losing points just by existing, she's become an old crone.
- Knight in Sour Armor: After trying and failing to save her homeworld, fleeing into a dimensional pocket to escape her own destruction, and being abused by unscrupulous employers in the mercenary system, she's become quite jaded, but she's still a good and kind woman. She and Hyunsung get along swimmingly as a result.
- Mentor Archetype: In addition to getting her help hunting monsters and learning the ins and outs of the mercenary system, Choi Hyngsung takes advantage of the time she's with him to learn the way of the sword, since she demonstrated that simply having a passive [Sword] skill is insufficient to deal with humanoid monsters who have actual experience with swords rather than a magical skill that instinctively guides his sword strikes.
- Sole Survivor: Of her homeworld, she's the only known survivor. The rest are likely dead to monster invasion.
- Too Desperate to Be Picky: Trapped between worlds, with no other options, she sells herself out as a mercenary, and when she was first hired out, she agreed to turn over 24 mil per day of her own points to her employer to stay in his world, full-time, which seems fair at first glance as that's the minimum maintenance fee. Unfortunately, with the system taking a 20% commission from her and the guy's own greed, she had to terminate the contract, pinging her own rep as a result.
Japan:
Takahashi
How did he know I was coming?!
An assassin who, later confirmed to be working for Japan, tries to kill Hyunsung while the latter was investigating a dungeons in North Korea, at the behest of the Player Association. He does not survive the attempt.- Casting a Shadow: What makes him particularly dangerous as an assassin is that he can use shadows to more or less teleport around.
- Know When to Fold 'Em: The instant his backstab failed, he put all his focus on escaping and considered the mission to eliminate Hyunsung a bust. Unfortunately for him, Hyunsung has already had people, namely Sungwoo, try to kill him, and learned to never let an enemy escape if he can help it.
- Screw This, I'm Outta Here: He tries to flee the instant backstabbing Hyunsung failed. This only made Hyunsung determined to hunt him down and eliminate him, to ensure he doesn't try again.
Kaneko
Another Japanese operative sent with Takashi. She immediately pegs that something went wrong when she sees Choi Hyunsung come out of the dungeon, but not Takashi. She backtracks the two's actions in the dungeon to learn Takashi is dead.
- Dishing Out Dirt: Her skill [Memories of the Earth] skill allows her to create mud puppets to reenact a recent battle scene inside a dungeon, but while she can see what happened via the rough mud puppets, there is no sound.
- Scarily Competent Tracker: Her [Hunter's Eyes] skill allows her to track her intended target(s) through a dungeon.
- Spanner in the Works: She's the reason Japan knows that Takashi is dead and Hyungsung is responsible, rendering his efforts at hiding the body moot.
Tanaka
The Japanese Minister of Dimensional Gate Management. When word gets back to him that Choi Hyunsung killed Takahashi, after the latter tried to kill the former, he sends all 5 of the remaining Japanese operatives in the Korean area after Hyunsung with the imperative, recruit Hyungsung at all costs, if he can't be recruited, eliminate him.
- Join or Die: He has sent 5 Black Ops operatives at Hyunsung with orders to get him to work for Japan, or be killed.
- Real Politik: He wants to steal away Hyunsung from Korea because the guy apparently has a unique skill and he'd rather have Japan control said skill user rather than Korea.
- Smug Snake: While he is right that Hyunsung has good reason to not trust the South Korean government, that's no guarantee that Hyungsung will happily abandon and betray his country just on the say so of 5 black ops operatives.
Sasaki
One of the 5 black ops agents sent to try and capture, or kill, Choi Hyunsung for Japan.
- Aggressive Negotiations: Of the Join or Die variety. He tells Choi "it's better for you to come quietly and not offer futile resistance" and when Choi asks why goes "I don't have to tell you that. Decide. Will you resist or give up?"
- Evil Redhead: He sports dark-pink hair and takes pleasure in trying to kill Choi Hyunsung because the guy doesn't want to let himself get kidnapped.
- Off with His Head!: At the end of chapter 66, he's seen with his head sent flying, separated from his body when Choi's passive "Survival Instinct" skill triggered.
