The First Real Battle
[ You have entered the Tower. ]
This wasn't a tutorial; this was the real deal. Unlike the exterior, the interior was vast and deep, with no end in sight. To find the Tower's Core, I had no choice but to face the monsters and traps that stood in my way.
Kik- kik-kik!
Small stature, green skin, and bumpy protrusions covering their bodies. They looked just like the trolls from a game. They began to gather around me one by one, letting out unpleasant, cackling laughter.
Srrk-
To the trolls, I was an intruder or a looter. They were here to protect the Core, and I was here to find it. The weapon the trolls used was a wooden club. It looked crude, but it was embedded with jagged stone shards. If one of those hit me, it would be a serious injury at best.
“*Haa*, *huu*.”
I took a deep breath before the battle. What I lacked right now was, without a doubt, stamina. Even if I had a talent for swordsmanship, my body couldn't keep up. I had felt that painfully during the tutorial. I had reached the 10th floor in a short 30 minutes, but by the final stage, I had been on the verge of fainting. Moreover, this was the real thing. I had to push forward into the endless darkness. I didn't even have any potions. Stamina management. I repeated that to myself as I raised my sword.
Kireuk-!
The trolls rushed at me like a wave. Use the smallest movements possible, and strike precisely at their vitals. That was the key to this fight.
Puk-!
My sword pierced the green skin and struck the heart. That was only one. I realized immediately that this attack was a mistake. Aiming for the heart? In a one-versus-many situation, that was the worst possible judgment. Had I been too obsessed with minimizing my movements?
“*Keuh!*”
Correct your stance. Put your weight on your front foot and use your waist. What I needed to aim for wasn't the heart, but the neck.
Swaaaak-!
My gaze followed the trajectory of the blade. The trolls' bodies and heads were separated. With a single strike, at least three or four trolls were dead. And again. Swaak-! The sensation of cutting something had become completely natural to me now.
Kekeke-!
I could see fear on the trolls' faces. Flustered, they began to step back, not knowing what to do. Now is the time. It was the perfect moment to wipe out the cornered trolls.
Buuuung-!
My sword tore through the air. And then I saw it—the faint Sword Qi surrounding my blade.
Chwaaaak-!
The Sword Qi shredded the trolls' bodies to pieces. Perhaps because they were clumped together, blood sprayed out like a fountain.
“*Huu*, *huuk!*”
Chamgyeok. It was my most destructive technique, but because the movement was so large, it drained my stamina. I had used it without thinking in the tutorial, but in a real fight, it was a great way to end up exhausted.
The deeper I went into the Tower, the more I realized that these creatures had intelligence. Seeing how they had decorated the Tower like civilized beings was, frankly, impressive.
Click-
The trolls had set traps all over the Tower. Very basic traps. Most of them involved arrows or dropping large boulders.
Tadadadak-
The moment they were triggered, I rolled in the direction the footprints led. I couldn't identify the traps, but I could avoid them. I reacted as quickly as possible, running toward the footprints. If I couldn't run, I rolled. At least where the footprints were, it was safe from traps.
Kik- kik-kik- kik-!
After running for a while, I began to hear the trolls' vile laughter. It was as if they had all gone insane; they were standing still, openly mocking me.
“Are you guys crazy?”
A dry laugh escaped my lips. The guys who had been running away with their tails between their legs had stopped? Did they have something to rely on?
Kung- kugung- kung-
The vibration was enough to make it seem like the Tower might collapse at any moment. And then, a massive monster appeared from beyond the darkness.
“Ha, seriously...”
It was huge. It was so big it left me speechless. It was like a five-story villa was moving.
“So that’s why you were acting cocky.”
Well, if I had a backer like that, I would have acted the same way.
Kikikik-
The creature looked at me like I was a bug and twitched its lips. Seeing a monster-like thing making a cheeky expression was strangely unpleasant.
“So you’re the boss.”
I had a long way to go. I needed to clear these towers as quickly as possible and get out of here, so I couldn't afford to be held up by guys like this.
“Try and take this.”
Trading blows with a mountain-sized beast was foolish. One hit. I would end it with one powerful strike. It was also a good opportunity to test just how far my Chamgyeok could reach.
Just as I thought that and prepared my stance:
Challenge Occurred
📍 Objective: Use your talent to defeat the Troll King.
🎁 Reward: 50,000 Talent Points
⏳ Time Limit: 15 seconds
A notification window I’d never seen before. It was a golden opportunity to earn 50,000 of the Talent Points I wanted so badly. The problem was, I had already spent 5 seconds just reading the quest details.
Time Limit: 10 seconds.
My original plan hadn't changed much. I poured all my focus into my sword, and a pale energy began to shimmer. I swung the sword immediately.
“Ugh!!!”
A pain like my arm was being torn off surged through me. It felt like a crushing pressure pressing down on my arm from above and below. But I couldn't stop.
Chwaaaak-!
I swung the sword, and the pale energy that had been wrapping around it flew forward. It was the largest Chamgyeok I had ever used.
Swaak-
The Chamgyeok passed through the Troll King's body diagonally. Unlike before, it didn't spray blood like a fountain. Instead—
Seuuueuk-
The Troll King's upper body slowly slid off and began to separate from its lower body. The area where the Chamgyeok had passed was cut cleanly, as if it had been precision-butchered.
Kuung-
The Troll King closed its eyes while maintaining its mocking expression. And on the faces of the trolls behind it, dark clouds gathered.
Challenge Successful!
You have defeated the Troll King within the time limit.
Reward: 50,000 Talent Points acquired.
It was a close call. Perhaps because I had poured all my strength into that short 10-second window, I couldn't feel anything in my arm. This was a crisis. I had to finish off the remaining trolls, but my arm was completely numb. I just hoped they wouldn't notice.
I scanned the area quickly. There were about 10 trolls left. If I could just get the feeling back in my arm, I could take them down without issue. Just as I was thinking about whether I should run away for a moment—
Flash-
Something glowed from the Troll King's severed upper body. A white gem the size of a marble. Thud- crack- The gem that had fallen out of the Troll King's body lost its light the moment it hit the floor and shattered into pieces.
And then—
Keuk- keuk-keuk-!
The trolls began to collapse one by one, clutching their throats. “W-what? Why are you guys acting so scary?”
It was a mass suicide scene. It was as if the trolls were connected to the Core; as soon as the Core lost its power, they started to fall one by one. That wasn't all. Crack- crack- An ominous sound. I had heard that sound somewhere before. My instincts screamed at me. I had to run.
“It’s the Core.”
The power that supported the Tower—the Core. The gem that had rolled out of the Troll King's body was definitely the Core.
To clear the Tower, you must destroy the Core.
That was the explanation I had heard from Ariel. She hadn't told me what would happen if the Core was destroyed. “You should have told me that sooner!”
They said the Tower was full of loot, but I didn't have the luxury of looking for such things while the Tower was collapsing. If I got buried, there wouldn't even be a corpse left. I didn't look back and ran toward the Tower's entrance.
Kung- kung- kung-
The Tower began to collapse in sequence, like dominoes. There was no point in relying on my talent for evasion. I just ran, without hesitation, along the path I had come.
“*Haa*, *haak*. I almost died.”
When I stumbled out of the Tower, exhausted, Ariel was looking down at me with cold eyes. I looked up at her with resentful eyes, but—
“Congratulations.”
“Oh... yeah.”
Her firm tone made the words that had been stuck in my throat sink back down.
“Let’s move to the next Tower.”
***
- Clearing the Towers surrounding the village (5/15)
It wasn't a bad result for the first day. Two more days. Once I cleared all the towers surrounding the village like a barrier, the path to the small city below the village would open. According to the village chief, there was an academy for Awakeners in that city.
“The academy is an institution created to help participants adapt to this other world.”
In short, it was a school for participants gathered from different worlds. Of course, it wasn't just participants who enrolled. The residents of this world also cleared towers to earn money or for various other reasons. Therefore, whether you were a participant or a resident, the academy was one of the essential courses.
“I recommend that you enroll in the academy, Choi Suhyun.”
“Even though I only have one year?”
“I judge that it is worth it.”
Well, I couldn't even read the books I’d brought from the Tower right now. The loot from the Tower consisted only of worn-out equipment and a few books. The problem was, the contents of the books were full of a language I was seeing for the first time.
“So that’s why they said humans were the weakest.”
“That’s a book I haven't seen in a long time.”
“What’s it about?”
“It’s Elvish. It’s about basic magic... and mana application. It was one of the required texts.”
Ariel seemed lost in nostalgia for a moment, but to my eyes, it was just a book written in a language that looked like pictures.
“Wait, basic magic?”
The magic section of the Talent Shop came to mind. The characters I was seeing for the first time looked similar to the language in the book.
“Ariel, this book. Can you teach me?”
I was desperate. In a year, the other participants would be trying to kill me; I needed to learn at least a little magic, not to mention my other talents.
“Unfortunately, that is impossible.”
“It was an unreasonable request, wasn't it?”
Ariel’s firm refusal. Well, she couldn't directly influence the game, so it was understandable.
“I can, however, teach you Elvish.”
“Really?”
Ariel closed the book, picked up a small stone, and began to write Elvish on the floor. I was surprised by her unexpectedly proactive attitude, but only for a moment.
“Wait a second.”
Before I started studying in earnest, I needed to prepare.
From the tutorial to the challenge that occurred in the Tower. I had scraped and saved every point I could for a moment like this.
“*Gulp*.”
Maybe because it had high versatility, it required much higher points than I had expected, unlike my talents for swordsmanship and evasion. I was a blockhead anyway. I had no other choice.
“I-I’ll buy it...”
Talent purchased.
“Then, let’s begin.”
Ariel explained the Elvish she had written down one by one. Starting with basic characters, then words, and finally pronunciation. She was as kind as if she were teaching a baby that had just started to speak.
“It’s not as difficult as I thought.”
Was it because I had purchased the talent? I absorbed the Elvish like a sponge. To be precise, Ariel’s explanations were embedded in my brain and played back repeatedly until I understood them.
“...”
Perhaps she was suspicious because I was just nodding without saying anything, but Ariel looked at me with a dubious expression.
“Why are you looking at me like that?”
“It’s nothing, it’s just that your learning speed seems quite fast...”
No, that was a lie. It was a look of suspicion.
“Are you learning too fast for a human?”
I said it as a joke.
“I apologize.”
However, Ariel’s pale skin began to flush red. Ariel was an Elf, after all. She, too, seemed to have been looking down on me deep down. I already knew that high-and-mighty Elves especially looked down on humans, so it didn't hurt much. It was just fascinating to see her ears, which poked out from her long hair, turning red.
“I’m joking. Keep going.”
I had a huge urge to tease her more after seeing Ariel flustered for the first time, but I had to hold back. At least until I learned all of Elvish.