KYB Ch 4

Ye Woo-won stared blankly at the chat, then blinked when he realized that the people around him were talking about the Dragon Knight.

‘There are always a few who find Dragon Knights fascinating.’

Ye Woo-won knew well enough. There were so few Dragon Knights that seeing one was rare, and their appearance stood out among other classes — unusually large physiques and skin that constantly shifted in color due to dragon scales, making them feel even more alien.

Still, it had never been to the point where a crowd would gather.

‘Well, I didn’t go into towns that often, too.’

He had only ever played with Kim Hee-yeon’s friends until now, so he had hardly ever walked around alone. Maybe that was why he simply hadn’t noticed before.

As Ye Woo-won scrolled through the chat window, he blinked slowly.

‘Was it really that difficult? I think it’s a fun class.’

What that user Mandumangdu said wasn’t wrong — it was a difficult class. But Ye Woo-won still liked being a Dragon Knight. He found it fun to save teammates from near death, and fun to see himself having a large impact on the entire party.

‘Sure, I picked this class originally to back up Kim Hee-yeon, but I grew attached to it.’

The reason was Kim Hee-yeon. He had always played DPS roles in every game, but since his now ex-girlfriend, Kim Hee-yeon, insisted on playing DPS, Ye Woo-won chose the tank role to watch her back.

Of course, he could have chosen to be a Healer, but healing simply didn’t interest him.

And once he started leveling it, he found it genuinely fun — fun enough to spend real money to raise it all the way to max level.

So when Ye Woo-won said it was purely enjoyable, he meant it.

He didn’t expect the chat to explode with question marks.

‘Why is the class’s reputation like this? Did something happen?’

Seeing the way people treated the Dragon Knight like trash, he had no choice but to check for himself.

Ye Woo-won minimized the game window and entered the Class Board.

And the moment he opened it, his mouth fell open— the most recent post was from ten days ago, and most of the titles were about people quitting.

Dragon Knight comrades, I’m sorry. I’m quitting

Ye Woo-won clicked on the latest post without hesitation.

(Free Board) (Category: Dragon Knight)

‘Looks like the update broke things again.’

Dragon Knight players just wanted what the word “Knight” implied — better mobility and stronger offense like other classes. But even now, they still had no movement skills and too many responsibilities, so the few remaining players had all but left.

“Hm…”

Ye Woo-won leaned back slightly, as if thinking

His motivation suddenly faded a little. Even with a quick search of the term “Dragon Knight,” most of the posts he found were about it being the number-one class to avoid in parties—it seemed its reputation had sunk straight through the floor.

On top of that, with a reputation like this, there was a high chance people wouldn’t even let him join their raids.

‘Still… making a new account and starting over sounded like such a hassle. If it came to that, I’d rather just quit playing. I’ll try applying to a party once. If no one takes me, I’ll just log off.’

With that, Ye Woo-won switched the chat tab to [Party Recruitment].

Ye Woo-won scrolled down the list. Most of the party recruitments were for taking down Apostle Wilt Rose, the boss monster from the previous season. It seemed that parties for the newly released Apostle, Maestro, were rare—probably because that raid was overwhelmingly high-level content.

‘Wilt Rose… that Apostle with the rotten rose for a head.’

Not an easy boss. The raid demanded perfect coordination for synergy mechanics, and even a small mistake could cause a total wipe. It wasn’t something new players could handle easily.

‘Maybe Wilt Rose would be good for warming up.’

Just as he thought that, a flood of messages suddenly filled the Party Recruitment chat, and Ye Woo-won widened his eyes.

Amid the recruitment messages, one user was shouting.

Normally, talking in the Party Recruitment channel was bad manners — but sometimes people did fight there.

‘MysticComeServeMe?’

They were tagging another player angrily. Judging from the name, the player was clearly a Mystic.

The Mystic — the emperor among all Healers in this game.

Their character design was beautiful, their performance unmatched. They could heal, deal damage, and even boost allies’ defense, making them the top-tier healer class in existence.

Naturally, there were a lot of Mystics —

‘But still never enough.’

In every game, Healers were always scarce because every six-man party needed at least one or two.

The problem, however, was the Mystics’ attitude.

The Mystics had such unity that they even created a Mystic Association.

It wasn’t necessarily a bad thing— within it, members shared plenty of information and received special benefits. So on the surface, it just looked like they were an unusually close-knit class—but in reality, it was closer to a dictatorship.

Mystics wouldn’t join any guild outside the Association — or more precisely, they weren’t allowed to without the permission of the Association’s leader.

And if a Mystic defied that rule?

‘They’d be blocked from crafting their equipment.’

That was as good as the end of their in-game life.

TL’s Note:
In case you missed my edit on previous chapter, I’ll repeat my note yesterday. You’ll see the in-game chat use a dizzying number of emojis. A lot are crying emojis ㅠㅠ (which I turned into 😭, or sweating emoji (;), or ㅗ (to symbolize fu), or ㄷㄷ (which is a tremble or shocked emoji). I tried to translate them to English.