The Fourth Climber

"P-Please, spare me, please—!"

"Kirit? Kit-kit-kit!"

The woman fell back onto her buttocks, scrambling away in terror as she pleaded, but mercy was not in a goblin's vocabulary. The creature contorted its grotesque face, sneering at her pathetic display, but that arrogance lasted only a fraction of a second.

"Kirik?"

By the time the goblin sensed something amiss, an unseen edge had already grazed across its back. A sudden, fiery stinging sensation flared across its flesh.

"Kit?! Kiiik? Ki... iit..."

Something had attacked it. Enraged, the creature tried to spin around and swing its crude wooden club, but its limbs refused to obey. Complete bodily paralysis set in first, followed swiftly by a black veil descending over its vision. Then, silence.

"The sixty-sixth floor really doesn't mess around," Mu-saeng muttered, eyeing the carcass. "Just how many seconds was that?"

Sraken's Poison Fang was absurdly overpowered for tutorial-tier fodder like first-floor goblins. He didn't even need to thrust deep into vital organs; merely grazing the skin was enough for the toxin to seep into the bloodstream. From exposure to total cardiac arrest, it took barely three seconds.

Wahsh chuckled at Mu-saeng's awe.

[Hah! If this impresses you, you'd faint dead away if you ever met the freak on the seventieth floor.]

"What's on the seventieth floor?" Mu-saeng asked immediately.

Wahsh, who had been preening with self-importance, suddenly shifted his beady eyes behind his horn-rimmed glasses.

[The seventieth floor was... a liquid guy... wasn't it?]

"Hmm?"

[L-Like I'd tell you now! Cluttering that dim-witted brain of yours with useless information will only confuse you! Focus on what's right in front of your face!]

Wahsh squawked defensively, puffing out his yellow rubber chest. Mu-saeng had no intention of teasing the duck, ridiculous as his outburst was. He had already witnessed the former Administrator's terrifying capabilities firsthand.

An Administrator is an Administrator after all. To think there were hidden clear conditions...

Rumors had long circulated among Awakened that certain floors possessed alternative clear methods outside the standard objectives assigned by the Tower. Yet no one had ever publicly revealed how to trigger them. Proprietary intelligence was power, and high-ranking guilds guarded their secrets with their lives.

Mu-saeng had suspected as much, but he had never imagined such conditions existed even in the tutorial tier. Throughout his thirteen years as a dungeon sherpa, he had guided countless fresh Awakened taking their very first steps, Shepherding novices too terrified of the Tower into Dungeon 1 just to build their courage. He knew this terrain like the back of his hand.

Goblin respawns hover around two hundred and sixty. Usually cited as two hundred and sixty-five.

He also knew the respawns were finite. Ambitious high-floor climbers had once slaughtered every monster on the floor to test the limits, documenting their findings in guides. But Wahsh's intel proved that even those comprehensive guild records were fundamentally flawed.

No wonder no one ever met the hidden condition. Especially on the first floor...

The standard way to pass was simple: evade, hide, and sprint for the exit. Combat wasn't even strictly necessary. In the panic of their first real-world trial, how could any terrified rookie be expected to track down and execute six specific goblins concealed at the outermost edges of the sector?

Once a floor was cleared, the Tower barred re-entry forever. The information alone was priceless, but what truly blew Mu-saeng away was how Wahsh had illuminated the hidden targets' exact coordinates directly into his vision.

And he claims he can't use 'Admin Authority' inside the Tower. Give me a break.

Even this bare-minimum support was more than enough for Mu-saeng.

"Hup!"

Mu-saeng sprinted across the terrain, carving through scattered goblin packs with surgical precision. Watching the human weave through the battlefield, Wahsh found himself quietly impressed.

Hmph. All I did was point out the six hidden runts...

Wahsh hadn't dared conjure a full interface map. He knew all too well what would happen if he wielded genuine Administrator Authority under the Tower's watchful surveillance, so he had leaked only the bare minimum telemetry. Yet Mu-saeng made it look like a masterclass.

He knows how to fight... and he understands the exact properties of the weapon in his hand.

It was the absolute pinnacle of efficiency. In mid-stride, Mu-saeng dragged his thumb lightly across Sraken's Poison Fang, coating a jagged pebble scooped from the dirt before hurling it with a flick of his wrist. He didn't need devastating throwing force; the moment the venom-slicked rock grazed a goblin's hide, neurotoxins locked the creature's muscles within four seconds, rotting its organs within twenty.

While the rest of the pack panicked at their comrade's sudden collapse, Mu-saeng dove into their midst, piercing vitals with the fang to eliminate five more within fifteen seconds. In the exact same breath, he scooped up the thrown stone and hurled it into the next cluster ahead.

I thought he'd run out of time.

Wahsh had expected a messy brawl—running up to stab every green runt individually, triggering defensive formations, encirclement, or outright retreats that would inevitably drag the battle past the one-hour limit. But Mu-saeng operated on an entirely different level.

He suppresses them before they can even enter a combat stance. He wipes out isolated groups virtually simultaneously so no alarm can spread. How can someone who only ever reached the third floor fight like this?

Mu-saeng moved like flowing water, every shift in footing seamlessly rolling into the next strike. He had mapped out ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠the entire engagement in his mind before taking his first step.

Just how many times did he walk through those 'dungeons'...? How obsessively did he study them?

A top-tier artifact in hand was one thing, and the tutorial floor was weak fodder, but the sheer economy of his movement was breathtaking. If Wahsh weren't an ancient entity of cosmic ego, he might have openly gasped.

Yet for Mu-saeng, this was second nature. He had lived as a crippled Awakened lacking combat talents, but for thirteen long years, he had traversed dungeons across dozens of floors. His eyes had analyzed the fighting styles, tactical blunders, and lethal techniques of thousands of elite climbers. He was the ace sherpa—the man who devised flawless operational paths to carry entitled clients through lethal territory and back alive.

Squelch!

"Kiiii..."

As the final hidden goblin gurgled its last breath, Wahsh registered the timer.

"A clean forty-minute clear!" Mu-saeng exhaled, shaking the grime from his fingers.

[...Let's keep the numbers accurate, primitive. It was forty-one minutes and twenty-five seconds! Slow! Far too slow!]

Mu-saeng merely smirked at the grumbling duck. Whatever Wahsh barked went in one ear and out the other, drowned out by the brilliant sapphire light cascading before his eyes.

Thirteen years of humiliation under the label of an unawakened cripple burdened with 〈Transmit(X)〉. Thirteen years of standing in the shadows, watching others bask in glory and rapid ascension. Finally, the wheel had turned.

All stats increased by three? And twenty percent bonus damage against small monsters?!

A standard solo clear on the first floor granted a modest five unallocated stat points. Yet the hidden clear awarded three points to every single one of his six core attributes—eighteen points in total—on top of an innate passive damage amplifier. And this was only the beginning.

"You know the condition for the second floor too, right, Wahsh?"

[Hah! Primitives... so plagued by anxiety they must double-check the blatantly obvious.]

Mu-saeng was about to queue the next ascent when a follow-up prompt caught his eye.

"...Wait a second."

[Now what?]

"Three people cleared this before me?" Mu-saeng murmured.

[...The stubbornness of primitives knows no bounds.]

Wahsh paused, shaking his rubbery head. The habitual mockery had faded from his voice, replaced by an unsettling, solemn gravity.

Three climbers had managed to deduce this preposterous objective without an Administrator whispering in their ear.

"...And here I thought I knew everything there was to know about the Tower and its dungeons," Mu-saeng mused softly.

[Kkwak?]

Mu-saeng fought to keep his expression flat at the squeak of the rubber duck, but the corners of his lips twitched upward. His fingertips trembled with raw adrenaline. The burning hope of rescuing Ye-rin was always there, driving him forward, but right now, what set his pulse racing was a far more primal sensation.

He was becoming strong. He could feel it in his marrow.

A brand-new world, vast and uncharted, had thrown open its gates before the veteran sherpa.

"Challenge Floor Two!"

The vast expanse unfolded beneath a pale sky, stripped of dense forests or towering ruins. The rolling grasslands provided a refreshing line of sight, but Mu-saeng didn't spend a single second admiring the scenery. Lingering out in the open here was an invitation to a swift burial. He dropped low instantly, crawling into the brush to mask his silhouette.

"Last time I was here, our eight-man party had to slaughter two hundred of them," Mu-saeng murmured, scanning the mounds. "Solo scaling really does shave down the body count."

In party play, the Tower scaled monster density and reward thresholds exponentially based on head count.

[And how many did you personally put down back then?] Wahsh chimed in.

"Uh... four?"

Because the system distributed stat spoils strictly according to combat contribution, Mu-saeng hadn't received a single stat point upon clearing Floor 2 with that raid party years ago.

[Pffft! Incompetent! Purely incompetent!]

"Give me a break. If it were one-on-one duels, I could have handled more, but..."

Mu-saeng scowled as Wahsh cackled. Individual kobolds weren't a serious threat to seasoned fighters; even a standard novice Awakened could manage a one-on-one duel against fifteen of them sequentially. But kobolds never fought fair.

"Sniff... sniff-sniff."

"Snort? Sniff... Yap! Bark!"

They operated as tight-knit tribal packs. More importantly, as canine humanoids, their sense of smell was terrifyingly acute. The second they caught the scent of human ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠sweat on the breeze, the entire colony would swarm the intruder like army ants. For climbers at the second-floor tier, that tidal wave was an absolute nightmare.

"Yap! Bark, bark!"

"Awooo! Bark, bark, bark!"

Sharp yaps echoed across the ridges. Dirt erupted from dozens of burrows burrowed into the hillsides, and hunched, snarling dog-headed creatures poured into the sunlight. Realizing his cover was blown, Mu-saeng abandoned his crouch and surged to his feet.

‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠

"That barking means the whole hill is awake. Damn it! Alright, Wahsh, what's the hidden clear condition this time?"

Since stealth was ruined, speed was all that mattered.

[Locate the boss. The Kobold King.]

"...Locate? Not kill? He's hiding inside one of those tunnels, isn't he?"

Mu-saeng already knew of the Kobold King's existence from his countless runs through Dungeon 2. What caught him off guard was the phrasing. Why find instead of slay?

[Kyahahahat! You act like you know everything, yet you ask such basic questions? Yes, he cowers deep within the burrows. He refuses to come out! You have to find him yourself!]

Wahsh mocked his hesitation, but as Mu-saeng glanced toward the crest of the hill, the grim reality clicked into place.

"Why would finding him be so... Ah. Inside the tunnels."

Over forty kobolds were currently tumbling down the slopes toward him, claws gnashing, primitive spears raised. And behind them sat the honeycomb of subterranean tunnels they had just vacated.

In other words, to clear this hidden objective...

"I have to scale that hill and search every single burrow... without killing fifteen kobolds."

There was no countdown timer, but the trap was obvious: the moment he slew his fifteenth pursuer, the standard clear condition would trigger, instantly locking the floor and ejecting him.

[Precisely. The millisecond a standard clear is registered, all hidden conditions and bonus requirements become permanently void, forfeit of rewards.]

The challenge was brutally simple: he had to outmaneuver forty frenzied monsters barreling straight at his throat, completely non-lethally, while methodically inspecting pitch-black underground warrens.

"Bark, bark, bark!"

"Grrrrr—yap!"

Mu-saeng broke into an explosive sprint. He offered a silent prayer of thanks that kobolds were bipedal creatures; had they possessed the raw four-legged sprint of true hunting hounds, he would have been mauled already.

"Wahsh! Can't you freeze them in place like you did with Sraken?!"

[Not a chance! Obviously! I cannot manifest my authority here. Scanning for the Kobold King's specific coordinates exceeds my current clearance within the Tower's network!]

"—Right, of course! Wouldn't expect anything less!"

Admin Authority was off the table. He would have to pull this off entirely on his own two feet.

"Haa... haa..."

Mu-saeng pushed his lungs to the brink, tearing across the uneven turf. Seeing him run for his life, Wahsh drifted alongside him, his yellow form bobbing effortlessly through the air.

[Perhaps you should settle for the bonus objective instead. Slay five more kobolds in the brief window between your fifteenth kill and the system's clear confirmation.]

The bonus objective was relatively well-known among veteran climbers. Rather than chasing an impossible hidden condition and risking losing both, grouping the pack together and bursting twenty down at once was the sensible route.

Panting through gritted teeth, Mu-saeng shot the duck a wild grin.

"Haa... yeah, obviously. Haa... I'm doing that one too."

['Too'? You intend to clear both the bonus condition and the hidden objective, Kim Mu-saeng?!]

Mu-saeng's smile deepened into a sharp, predatory line. He needed to grow faster. He had to conquer this monolith. He would become stronger than anyone who had ever set foot in these halls.

"You bet your rubber ass I am."

For Ye-rin—and for himself—he wasn't leaving a single scrap of power on the table.