The Spoiled Heir's Spectacle
A serpent's tongue lay coiled tightly like a leather bullwhip. Beside it rested the flared, shed hood of a cobra's head, followed by curved fangs larger than an adult man's open palm. It took no great leap of intuition to realize that the drops left behind by the slain Master of the 66th Floor were anything but ordinary. In fact, the fangs were already hissing and belching plumes of caustic white smoke the second they made contact with the ancient stone floor.
Moving swiftly, Mu-saeng pulled a pair of hazard-grade gloves from his pack, slipped them on, and inspected the items.
◈ The tongue of Sraken, Master of All Snakes.
◈ No serpent can defy its resonant tremors.
◈ The shed outer skin of Sraken. Imbued with the concentrated vitality of the Snake Lord.
◈ Permanently enhances poison resistance. Induces instantaneous full-spectrum detoxification upon consumption.
◈ Sraken, Master of Snakes, secretes venom directly from his fangs rather than venom glands.
◈ Exercise extreme caution; mere skin contact may result in instant poisoning. Toxicity symptoms vary by dosage.
Every single one is S-rank... Tch.
His C-rank hazmat gloves, more than capable of filtering out any standard 15th-floor toxin, began melting away within five seconds against the corrosive potency of S-rank venom.
"Are you seriously digging through scrap left behind by mere 66th-floor data?" Wahsh grumbled.
Mu-saeng didn't even bother answering. Mere 66th-floor data? Geumseong, the undisputed number one guild in South Korea, had only recently succeeded in clearing Floor 66 and was currently staging attempts at Floor 67. And right here in his hands were artifacts directly dropped by the boss of that very same stage. Just what kind of astronomical fortune were these worth?
More importantly, this little duck... the moment he saw that snakehead, he identified it as the 66th floor without a second thought.
Across the globe, countless dungeons remained unclassified. The highest milestone mankind had ever conquered in the Tower stood at the 71st floor. Put differently, there were still dozens of dungeons scattered across Earth that held the potential to connect to floors far beyond that threshold. Conquering them wasn't even necessary. Just knowing which floor they belong to would be enough. Before elite raid teams risked their lives on a new Tower floor, they scoured dungeons for preparatory intel. If he could simply pinpoint the exact floor a dungeon mirrored, the information alone would command billions of won.
"Hey, you're a lot more useful than I—... Huh?"
Mu-saeng's excitement at having struck gold was abruptly cut short. Wahsh was flickering with static far more violently than before, his yellow rubber form dissolving into faint digital noise around the edges.
"Hey... what's wrong with you?"
"What?" Wahsh scowled, clearly irritated that Mu-saeng was showing concern.
At the same moment, a translucent system prompt materialized before Mu-saeng's eyes.
[Executing Disk Defragmentation] [1%]...
"Don't you dare look at me with those pitiful eyes. I'd rather rot into dust than take charity from a primitive monkey like you. Once the time is right, my administrative authority will return."
Their agreement to operate in good faith and mutual diligence was strictly confined to the terms of their contract. That didn't mean they were suddenly going to become warm, sentimental companions overnight.
"Well, if you say so... fine by me."
Throughout thirteen years as a dungeon sherpa, Mu-saeng had catered to every conceivable breed of client. No matter how rotten, abusive, or erratic they were, he had always fulfilled his duties without fail. And here was a genuine Tower Administrator whose reality-bending authority he had witnessed firsthand. Born from an Awakened ability he had long written off as a useless curse, this grumpy little duck of a partner was practically endearing.
That reminds me... what about 〈Transmit(O)〉? Is this really where it ends? It had sat dormant as an inactive (X) for over a decade, flipped to an active (O) upon completion, and then nothing. Was that the whole story?
Ruuuuumble—!
A heavy tremor rippled through the foundations, and the stone temple groaned under buckling weight. Mu-saeng didn't lose his head for a single second.
"The whole place is coming down. Time to move."
He packed the S-rank artifacts securely into his dimensional-lined pouch. Having already torn every escape scroll in his inventory, the only path left was to sprint out on his own two feet before thousands of tons of ancient masonry crushed him alive. Mu-saeng broke into a dead run.
It took several grueling hours to finally break free of the dungeon. The stone temple had collapsed completely into the subterranean sands, drastically shifting the surrounding dunes. The instant he stepped through the shimmering dimensional gate back into the terrestrial air, Mu-saeng let out a deep, ragged breath.
"Phew... Made it out alive."
"So this is CX-... no, Earth? Filthy. Absolutely revolting." Wahsh scoffed with an arrogant tilt of his beak, though his black-rimmed eyes darted left and right with unmasked curiosity, absorbing every inch of the modern landscape.
Mu-saeng smirked at the duck's antics and immediately pulled his smartphone from his coat. Slaying the 66th-floor boss? Securing three pristine S-rank artifacts? Having a former cosmic overseer transmitted into his soul through an ability once deemed trash? None of that mattered right now. Surging above all of it was the sheer, intoxicating rush of having survived. And the only thing consuming his mind was reaching out to the one person he could share that relief with.
"Hey, Hyung! I was just about to call you, how did you—"
—Mu... Mu-saeng? Is that really you, Mu-saeng?! Mu-saeng, you bastard!
It was Park Hyun-gu, CEO of Omkim Inc. His voice was trembling violently as he shouted Mu-saeng's name over and over across the line.
Realizing the sheer panic on the other end, Mu-saeng chuckled dryly. "Man, don't even get me started. That spoiled One Way grandson pulled some crazy—"
—You crazy bastard! They told me you were dead in that dungeon! God dammit... I knew it! I knew a tough son of a bitch like you wouldn't just keel over and die, but holy hell, you took ten years off my life!
Even though Mu-saeng was the one who had crawled through the jaws of death, it sounded as if Hyun-gu were the one who had just clawed his way out of a grave.
Mu-saeng laughed softly. "Geez, you worry too much. Did you honestly think I'd go down that easily? Anyway, I'm going to wring every single cent of compensation out of that brat's hide. Listen to what that little shit did—"
He was about to lay out a calculated plan on how to legally dismantle Lee Eunwoo and wring restitution from Korea One Way Group, a prominent mid-tier domestic guild. He wanted to hash out the settlement figures and legal strategies with Hyun-gu right then and there, but...
—Compensation?! You idiot! They're the ones ripping our heads off right now!
"What? What are you talking about?"
Assuming Lee Eunwoo would sit quietly and await legal fallout proved how little Mu-saeng had understood the sheer depths of the boy's depravity. Mu-saeng file for damages? Hyun-gu shouted into the receiver.
—That little bastard called an emergency press conference just now! He's crying on camera, claiming our sherpa gave false directions and nearly got him slaughtered! He's suing our company for billions in damages, and the whole damn circus is broadcasting live right this second!
"...Live broadcast? I'll watch it myself. Hang up."
—Yeah, go look at it right now! Ugh, my liver feels like it dried up and fell out. I swear I'm having a stroke, seriously—
Click. Mu-saeng cut the call and tapped open his web browser. He didn't even need to search. From the banner headlines of every major portal to the front page of the world's largest video streaming platform, the digital sphere was smothered in coverage of Lee Eunwoo's emergency press conference.
"Is it true that you encountered the Master of Snakes inside Dungeon 15?" a reporter shouted.
"If you are referring to the Master of Snakes... isn't that a monster rumored to be a boss past the 60th floor?" another chimed in.
"That is precisely why I am so utterly devastated!"
On screen, Lee Eunwoo dabbed at crocodile tears as he wailed into the microphones. "Floor 15 and Dungeon 15 are hardly uncharted territories! Yet a licensed professional sherpa—a man who should have meticulously reviewed every piece of exploration data—deliberately led us into an unverified death trap! How could any professional behave with such gross negligence?!"
Mu-saeng's mouth tightened into a rigid, icy line.
"I see... Dungeon entanglements are indeed extraordinarily rare," a senior journalist mused over the audio feed. "And what little historical data exists never described a spatial distortion manifesting quite like this. For the mana pressure of an entirely different floor to erupt from within an interior structure—"
"Are you suggesting I am fabricating this?!" Lee Eunwoo shrieked, dramatically presenting a suit of battered armor to the flashing cameras. "Look at these gouges! Do you believe injuries of this scale could ever occur in Dungeon 15?! Do you think common desert beasts could rupture S-rank armor like this?!"
The chestplate was mangled and torn with deep, claw-like gashes—physical evidence that seemed impossible unless one had faced the horrifying aura of the Master of Snakes.
"N-No, that wasn't what I meant," the reporter stammered. "However, an entanglement in Dungeon 15 should at most connect to Dungeon 14 or 16... Ah, w-wait! The residual mana analysis results just came in! S-Sixty-sixth floor! Cross-referencing against mana fingerprint databases secured from the United States confirms it matches the mana signature of Floor 66—!"
"Holy shit, this is massive! A passage in Dungeon 15 that links directly to Dungeon 66?!"
"Q-Quick, call headquarters! Priority One emergency line, move!"
Lee Eunwoo was spoiled, but he wasn't completely brainless. Having personally choked under that monstrous mana pressure, he had taken the lingering energy clinging to his gear and spun it into the ultimate fabricated performance. Reporters, camera crews, and scout agents quietly dispatched by top-tier guilds began scrambling in pandemonium.
"Everyone, do not forget!" Lee Eunwoo shouted over the roar of the crowd, his face flushed with triumph as he puffed out his chest. "The path leading to Dungeon 66! What transpired within those walls! How I escaped with my life! And the secret to conquering the boss of Dungeon 66, an entity identical to the Floor 66 boss—I, Lee Eunwoo of Korea One Way Group, hold that knowledge!"
Amidst the frenzy, Lee Eunwoo basked in the adulation. For a mid-sized syndicate like One Way aiming to elevate itself into a top-tier guild, generating explosive public recognition while establishing their sole heir as an indispensable hero was a masterstroke of PR.
"Heh..."
It was also the single most effective way to ignite a volcanic fury inside Mu-saeng—a man who had spent his entire life quietly putting his head down and doing his job.
Mu-saeng's gaze drilled into the screen. "I may have eaten dirt, choked down bitter pills, and spent years smiling through gritted teeth just to cater to entitled clients..."
He crushed the gas pedal to the floor.
"...but that doesn't mean I'm a brain-dead pushover who'll let a little parasite step on my throat."
His car roared into the traffic, tires screaming as flame danced in his eyes.
Lee Eunwoo's live circus wasn't only being watched by Mu-saeng. As dusk settled over Seoul, office workers lingering past closing hours gathered in clusters around monitors, captivated by the bizarre drama unfolding across the news feeds. This was equally true within the Euljiro headquarters of Geumseong, the undisputed summit of the domestic Awakened world.
"Could that claim actually be true, Vice Head?" an assistant wearing slim horn-rimmed glasses asked. "His declarations about connecting to Dungeon 66 and knowing how to conquer the boss..."
"Lee Eunwoo of One Way Group. Eighteen years old. He claims to have climbed the Tower entirely solo, but his official public record caps out at the 14th floor. Even the private security escorts he took along barely hover in their thirties."
The woman sitting with her legs crossed in the high-backed executive leather chair spoke with frigid precision. She looked mid-to-late twenties at most, yet within Geumseong's brutal meritocracy, she held the number two position in the entire Raid Division: Vice Head Geum Soo-ah.
"Yes. According to their official statement—"
"Then there is zero chance he made it out alive on his own merits. Absolutely none," Geum Soo-ah cut in, her jaw tightening. "You know it as well as I do, don't you? Even we... had to offer a living sacrifice. There is no reality in which those pampered fools deciphered a raid strategy."
She ground her teeth, a bitter shadow crossing her eyes. It remained an indelible humiliation. In the end, they had failed to truly conquer Sraken. Their most devastating high-tier attacks hadn't even scratched its scales. They knew the shared vulnerability of serpent-type monsters was the inside of the mouth—the soft tissue beneath the jaw. But targeting it had proved impossible. That whip-like tongue lashed with sound-breaking speed, and the ambient venom withered flesh on contact. Within that spatial anomaly that twisted infinitely, the casualties from toxic necrosis had only multiplied. A cursed domain where advance and retreat were equally barred unless a living sacrifice was fed to the serpent: the 66th floor. She would never forget the agonizing decision they were forced to make that day.
"Then..."
"However, the system broadcast text those fools cited was authentic. It matched what our expedition witnessed, character for character. It is almost certain that Dungeon 15 suffered an entanglement with Dungeon 66."
Which meant bottom-feeders like One Way Group could never possess a legitimate strategy. Yet the physical entanglement itself was undeniable. In that case, Geum Soo-ah's duty was clear. Geumseong prioritized strength, pursuing rational, efficient, and merciless conquest.
"We couldn't kill it inside the Tower... so we will slaughter it out here. If only to honor the comrade we were forced to leave behind."
They never forgot those who shed blood for the guild. They never discarded their fallen. That was the foundational creed of Geumseong, instilled by its founder and her father, Chairman Geum Byeong-cheol.
"Secretary Choi. Issue an immediate muster order to all available strike teams in the Raid Division. I will go directly to the Director to report—... Hm?"
Rising from her desk, Geum Soo-ah paused mid-stride. A sudden commotion was breaking out on the wall-mounted screen broadcasting the press conference.
"Who the hell are you?!"
"S-Stop him! Grab him! Don't let him near the stage!"
Frantic shouts erupted through the auditorium audio feed, pulling the heads of every reporter in the hall. The broadcast cameras instinctively panned their lenses toward the rear entrance. Geum Soo-ah's eyes narrowed on the figure pushing through the security cordon. It was a lone man, his jacket battered with dust, walking straight into the glare of the studio lights.
"Who is that? What's happening?"
"He appears to be the dungeon sherpa in question, Vice Head. The one known on the forums as the Ace Sherpa..."
"Ah. Park Mu-shik, was it?"
"No. Kim Mu-saeng."
On the live monitor, Mu-saeng was charging across the stage straight for Lee Eunwoo's throat.