Jin-woo logged into ERO at 8:30 AM. He was standing in Havencrest City near the marketplace. His character was level 28 now. A notification appeared.
New Content Unlocked: Ruins of the Fallen
Level Requirement: 25-35
Location: Eastern Desert
Difficulty: Intermediate
Recommended Party Size: 5 players
Jin-woo opened the dungeon information panel. The description said the Ruins of the Fallen was an ancient temple buried in the desert. It contained rare loot and valuable materials. The final boss dropped equipment that sold for 50-100 gold on the auction house.
Jin-woo checked the forums quickly. Multiple posts talked about the Ruins. The average clear time was two to three hours. The dungeon required good coordination. Bad groups wiped frequently.
But the rewards were worth it. A successful run could earn 15-20 gold per player from loot splits. That was better money per hour than most Shadow Merchant jobs.
Jin-woo closed his laptop and opened his map. The Ruins of the Fallen was marked in the eastern desert, about one hour travel from Havencrest on foot.
Jin-woo left the city through the east gate. He walked across grasslands for twenty minutes, then entered the desert. The sand was golden and red. The sun was bright. Heat waves distorted the air in the distance.
After one hour of walking, Jin-woo saw a structure ahead. A stone temple half-buried in sand. The entrance was a large archway covered in ancient carvings. The stone was crumbling and weathered.
Twenty or more players were standing near the entrance. Some were forming groups. Others were waiting to be invited. Zone chat was active with group recruitment messages.
PlayerX: "LFG Ruins, level 29 mage, know mechanics"
TankGuy: "LF healer for Ruins, full clear"
SwordMaster: "LF3M for Ruins, need tank + healer + DPS"
Jin-woo typed in zone chat.
Jin: "Level 28 Berserker LFG Ruins"
A party invite appeared after thirty seconds. Jin-woo accepted it. The party leader's name was "TankBoss." He was a level 30 warrior.
TankBoss sent a message in party chat.
TankBoss: "Need 1 more DPS, then we go"
Jin-woo checked the party roster. Four members so far:
TankBoss: Level 30 Warrior (Tank) Jin: Level 28 Berserker (DPS) IceWitch: Level 29 Mage (DPS) HolyHands: Level 27 Priest (Healer)
A fifth player joined the party. The name was "ShadowStep." Level 31 Rogue. The party was full.
TankBoss spoke in party chat again.
TankBoss: "Standard run. Need on gear upgrades. Greed on sell items. Everyone good?"
IceWitch: "Good"
HolyHands: "Ready"
ShadowStep: "Let's go"
Jin: "Good"
The party walked to the dungeon entrance. TankBoss approached the archway first. A notification appeared for all party members.
Enter Ruins of the Fallen?
All five players accepted. The screen faded to black for two seconds. When the screen cleared, Jin-woo was inside the dungeon.
The interior was a stone corridor. Sand covered the floor. The walls had ancient carvings and faded paintings. Torches hung on the walls, providing dim orange light. The air was cool and dusty.
TankBoss led the party forward. The corridor was twenty meters long. At the end was a large chamber.
Jin-woo entered the chamber. It was a circular room with high ceilings. Six skeleton warriors stood in the center of the room. They were motionless, waiting.
Jin-woo used Inspect.
Skeleton Warrior
Level 28
HP: 1,200/1,200
The six skeletons wore rusted armor. They carried swords and shields. Their bones were yellowed and cracked. Red light glowed in their eye sockets.
TankBoss checked that everyone was ready. "Pull in 3... 2... 1..."
TankBoss charged into the room. He used a skill called "Battle Shout." A red aura surrounded him. All six skeletons turned toward him immediately. Their aggro locked onto TankBoss.
TankBoss used "Taunt." Golden light flashed from his body. The skeletons all attacked him at once.
Six swords swung at TankBoss. His shield blocked four of them. Two swords hit his armor. 32 damage. 28 damage. His health dropped from 920 to 860. HolyHands immediately cast a heal. TankBoss's health restored to 920.
Jin-woo and ShadowStep moved to the sides. They attacked the skeletons from left and right while TankBoss held aggro from the front.
Jin-woo targeted the closest skeleton. He used Frenzied Slash. Three rapid strikes hit the skeleton. 156 damage. 159 damage. 153 damage. The skeleton's health dropped from 1,200 to 732.
ShadowStep attacked a different skeleton from behind. His dual daggers stabbed twice. 187 damage. 193 damage. The skeleton's health dropped to 820.
IceWitch stood in the back of the room. She raised her staff and cast a spell. "Ice Spear!"
Three large spears made of ice materialized in the air. They flew toward the skeletons. Each spear hit a different skeleton.
First spear: 312 damage.
Second spear: 298 damage.
Third spear: 305 damage.
Three skeletons now had reduced health. The damage was spread across the group.
Jin-woo continued attacking his target. He used Power Strike. The charged attack hit the skeleton for 367 damage. The skeleton's health dropped to 365.
The skeletons fought back. All six were still attacking TankBoss. His health dropped to 720. HolyHands cast another heal. 150 HP restored. TankBoss's health went back to 870.
Jin-woo used Whirlwind Strike. The spinning attack hit two skeletons near him. Each took 398 damage. Jin-woo's target skeleton died. The second skeleton's health dropped to 422.
ShadowStep used a skill called "Backstab." His daggers glowed red. He stabbed his target skeleton from behind. Critical hit. 489 damage. The skeleton's health dropped to 331.
IceWitch cast "Frost Bolt" three times in rapid succession. Each bolt hit a different skeleton. 186 damage. 191 damage. 184 damage.
The fight continued for thirty more seconds. Jin-woo killed one more skeleton with Frenzied Slash. ShadowStep killed two with backstabs and normal attacks. IceWitch's spells finished off the remaining skeletons.
All six skeletons died. Their bones collapsed to the ground. The red light in their eyes faded.
Combat ended. Total fight time: 45 seconds.
Loot appeared on the ground where the skeletons had fallen. TankBoss checked the loot.
Loot: Bones x12 (vendor trash, 10 copper each), Rusty Sword (vendor item, 20 silver)
TankBoss set the rusty sword to "Greed." All five party members rolled. ShadowStep won with a roll of 87. The rusty sword went into his inventory. The bones were distributed automatically, two or three per person.
"Clean pull," TankBoss said in party chat. "Let's keep moving."
The party continued deeper into the dungeon. They entered another corridor. This one had traps. Pressure plates on the floor triggered arrow traps in the walls.
TankBoss moved carefully. He avoided the pressure plates. The party followed his exact path. They reached the next room without triggering any traps.
The second room had eight Skeleton Warriors. The fight was similar to the first. TankBoss pulled all eight. Jin-woo and ShadowStep attacked from the sides. IceWitch cast area spells. HolyHands kept TankBoss healed.
The eight skeletons died in one minute and ten seconds. Loot: more bones, rusty armor pieces worth 15-25 silver each.
The party moved to the third room. This room had a different enemy type. Four Skeleton Archers stood on raised platforms. They had bows and shot arrows from range.
TankBoss could not pull all four at once because they were spread out. The party had to fight them one at a time.
Jin-woo could not reach the archers easily. They were on platforms three meters high. He used throwing axes from his inventory to damage them from range while ShadowStep climbed up to fight them in melee.
Each skeleton archer had 1,000 HP and died in about thirty seconds. The four archers took two minutes total to clear.
Loot: arrows (ammunition for rangers, worth 5 copper each), cracked bows (vendor trash, 15 silver each).
The party cleared eight more mob packs over the next forty minutes. The packs varied in size and enemy type. Some had skeletons. Some had mummies wrapped in ancient cloth. Some had sand elementals made of swirling sand and stone.
Jin-woo fought mechanically. Frenzied Slash on cooldown. Power Strike when it refreshed. Whirlwind Strike for area damage. Blood Rage when the pack was large and dangerous.
His mind wandered during the repetitive combat. He thought about his bank account. $3,213. Three months ago, he had negative $127. He had been eating rice and eggs from an electric kettle. He had been two weeks away from homelessness.
Now he was making $5,000 to $6,000 per week. His rent was paid. His sister was paid back. His credit card debt was decreasing every week.
Jin-woo thought about how he got here. The payday loan at 290% interest. The desperate decision to spend his last $450 on a used VR headset. The first day grinding wolves for $1 per hour. The slow progression. The delivery jobs. The mercenary work. The PvP fights. The deaths and setbacks.
It had been two months since he logged into ERO for the first time. Two months of playing twelve to sixteen hours per day. Two months of learning, grinding, fighting, dying, and trying again.
"I'm not safe yet," Jin-woo thought to himself. "The money is good now, but it could disappear. ERO could change their economy. Shadow Merchants could stop giving me jobs. I could get killed and lose hours of progress."
Jin-woo remembered Justice_Knight killing him in Deadwood Swamp. The 6-hour lockout. The lost experience and silver. One bad fight could cost him $100 or more in lost time and penalties.
"I need to keep leveling," Jin-woo thought. "Get stronger. Get better gear. Make myself more valuable to the Shadow Merchants. The higher I climb, the more I earn. The more I earn, the faster I get out of debt."
Jin-woo looked at his debt spreadsheet in his mind. $36,796 remaining. At $5,000 per week, that was eight more weeks to clear everything except student loans. Two months. That was manageable. He could see the finish line.
But student loans were $32,450. That was a different problem. Student loan debt did not go away easily. He would be paying that for years unless he made a massive lump sum payment.
"One problem at a time," Jin-woo told himself. "Clear the credit cards first. Clear the small debts. Then figure out the student loans."
A skeleton warrior swung its sword at Jin-woo. He blocked automatically without thinking. His body knew the movements now. Block. Counter. Strike. Dodge. The combat was muscle memory.
Jin-woo used Frenzied Slash. Three hits. The skeleton died. He looted it without looking. Bones. Vendor trash. He moved to the next enemy.
"This is my job now," Jin-woo thought. "I fight monsters in a video game and convert the loot to real money. It's ridiculous. It shouldn't work. But it does."
Jin-woo had tried for two years to get a job with his computer science degree. He had sent out 200 applications. He had gotten 12 interviews. Zero job offers. The market was oversaturated. Companies wanted three to five years of experience for entry-level positions. They wanted specific technologies he had not learned in school. They wanted proof he could code, but he needed a job to get that proof.
The traditional path had not worked. So Jin-woo had found a different path. A weird path. A path that most people would not understand or respect.
"I'm making more money playing a game than most people make in real jobs," Jin-woo thought. "And I'm working harder than I ever worked before. Twelve to sixteen hours per day. Seven days a week. No breaks. No vacations. Just grinding."
Another skeleton died. More loot. Jin-woo moved forward.
The party cleared the eighth mob pack. TankBoss called for a break. "Five-minute rest. Check your supplies. We're halfway to the boss."
Jin-woo checked his inventory. He had 6 health potions remaining out of 10. His armor durability was at 73%. His weapon durability was at 81%. Everything was fine.
Jin-woo sat on a stone bench in the dungeon corridor. The other party members were chatting in voice chat but Jin-woo had voice disabled. He preferred silence. He preferred to focus on the combat and his own thoughts.
HolyHands sent a message in party chat.
HolyHands: "Jin, you're doing good damage. You a main or alt?"
Jin-woo did not know how to answer. This was his only character. He had created it two months ago. But saying that would reveal he was new. Experienced players sometimes looked down on new players.
Jin: "Main"
HolyHands: "Cool. You play a lot?"
Jin: "Yes"
Jin-woo did not elaborate. He did not want to explain that he played ERO as a full-time job. That he was doing this to survive. That his entire life depended on making money in this game.
The five-minute break ended. TankBoss stood up. "Let's finish this. Boss is two more packs away."
The party moved forward.