The Tower - Escort (2)
Lee Suyoung and I gathered the mana stones and the ears we could exchange for contribution points back on the 10th floor.
Unlike the 10th floor, none of these creatures carried hand axes. Most wielded crude stone axes or wooden clubs instead. Come to think of it, how had the goblins on the 10th floor gotten their hands on iron hand axes? Was there someone crafting them and deliberately releasing the creatures?
“Doesn’t it seem strange?”
Oh, so Lee Suyoung had the same question.
“Jiwoo oppa, how does your inventory hold all of that?”
Ah, that’s what she meant. I shrugged.
“I have a special item that helps. My inventory isn’t anything special on its own.”
If the Tower’s 1st floor could count as an item, then it was an item.
“Oh~! Really?”
The Tower contained all sorts of strange things, so Lee Suyoung accepted the explanation easily enough.
After resting and waiting for the cockroach-extermination smoke to fully dissipate, we decided to check the goblin den just to be safe.
Inside we found a bizarre altar made of bones and an elderly goblin clutching a shabby staff that pulsed with magic power. Too old and weak to flee, it had collapsed, foaming at the mouth.
“Did it use some kind of sorcery to multiply the goblin numbers? Is this a goblin shaman?”
The unpleasant magical energy it radiated suggested that a direct fight would have been quite difficult. As expected, using your head was essential.
“Should we destroy this altar as well?”
“That would be best.”
We finished off the still-breathing elderly goblin and sliced open its chest to harvest the mana stone. Inside lay a murky green Ability Stone.
“...Are Ability Stones this common?”
It was strange. Every community post I had seen questioned whether Ability Stones even existed. A few rare claims of obtaining one appeared, but without photo uploads, their credibility was nonexistent.
“Another Ability Stone? Wow, oppa, you really are lucky. I had never even seen one before meeting you.”
“We’ll look into this later and distribute the points then.”
“No, honestly I feel too embarrassed to take any share this time. I did contribute against the wolf pack, but you basically soloed the entire 13th floor. If you want a relationship to last, it’s best to be strict about these things.”
It made sense. After all, I had been the one to build the barricades and deploy the cockroach smoke.
“Hmm, then I’ll just take this one.”
“Okay. We’ll split the rest evenly. Oh, and I don’t want that creepy-looking staff.”
Since neither of us was greedy, the division went quickly. To be precise, because my inventory couldn’t hold everything, I would store the excess on the 1st floor and divide it properly once we returned to the 10th floor.
With our exploration complete, we immediately ascended to the 14th floor.
When we reached the 14th floor, two other climbers were already there.
Merchant, Please Fulfill Lorolen's Request
The quest to proceed to the next floor also appeared above the window.
The other two were a Western man who appeared to be in his mid-thirties and a Southeast Asian woman who looked to be in her early twenties. They glanced at each other.
While they seemed flustered at suddenly encountering strangers, the merchant Lorolen brightened the moment he saw us.
“A-are you really climbers?! Thank goodness!”
At Lorolen’s exclamation, the Western climber spoke.
“The Tower is telling us to accept your request. What exactly would you ask of us? Just so you know, if it’s unreasonable we will simply decline, so choose your words carefully.”
The words were in English, but thanks to the common ability Translation I understood them without difficulty. The Western climber spoke with a distinctly aristocratic British accent.
“Ah, my name is Lorolen. I operate a small trading company.”
After introducing himself, Lorolen cautiously explained his request. The story was long, but the summary was simple: the mercenary group originally hired to escort him had collapsed from mass food poisoning. He wanted us to safely escort both him and his cargo wagon to the nearby city of York.
He needed to arrive by the next day at the latest. Unfortunately, a flock of harpies had settled on the only road to York, making passage impossible. The distance was merely eight hours, yet failure to arrive on time would mean a crippling penalty fee and bankruptcy.
“If you would please escort me, I will pay the same fee I promised the mercenaries.”
“Payment, you say. How much per person?”
“Five thousand credits per person.”
Oh, side income. Five thousand credits for eight hours of work was decent.
At Lorolen’s offer the Southeast Asian woman climber spoke.
“Six thousand.”
“Pardon?”
“Seven thousand, eight thousand, nine thousand, ten thousand, eleven thousand… Eleven thousand credits per person.”
Lorolen looked flustered by the Southeast Asian climber’s words, but he flinched under her cold gaze and quickly nodded.
“Y-yes, eleven thousand! I’ll pay it!”
The Southeast Asian climber nodded.
“I’ll accept this request.”
“I’ll accept it as well.”
When the Western climber agreed too, Lee Suyoung and I accepted.
“Th-then I’ll prepare right away. Please wait here!”
As Lorolen hurried off, the Western-looking climber spoke.
“From what I’ve seen on the community, climbers sometimes team up to complete quests. Is this one of those situations?”
We hadn’t even introduced ourselves yet. I nodded.
“Seems like it. My name is Han Jiwoo. I’m from Korea. My ability is swordsmanship.”
Both the Westerner and the Southeast Asian looked at me in surprise.
“Names and origins don’t matter, but isn’t it dangerous to reveal your ability so casually?”
I shook my head at the Westerner’s question.
“I didn’t reveal anything specific. Simply saying my ability is swordsmanship doesn’t give you anything useful. Since we’ll be completing the quest together and fighting side by side, it’s information you would learn naturally anyway.”
The Southeast Asian nodded.
“That’s true. Knowing each other’s general abilities is necessary. I’m Le Thi Hoa from Vietnam. My ability is necromancy. I can bind spirits to totems and make them fight. With some application, I can read soul fluctuations to distinguish truth from lies, just like I did with the merchant’s lie earlier.”
The Vietnamese climber, Le Thi Hoa, took two small totems from her inventory and demonstrated. The totems floated in the air and orbited around her.
“Oh, so the merchant Lorolen tried to undercut our price. Thanks to the lady, we’ll receive a fair amount.”
The Western climber gave a light bow and introduced himself.
“My origin is England. My name is William Edvans. My ability is Magic Arrow.”
The English climber William summoned a magic arrow into the air.
“I also practice fencing for close combat. It’s a bit like American gun kata, I suppose? Or since it’s arrows instead of guns, perhaps arrow-kata?”
William took a slender rapier from his inventory and fastened it at his waist.
Next, Lee Suyoung introduced herself.
“I’m from Korea like Jiwoo oppa. I’m Lee Suyoung, his party member. My ability is Slime Summoning. My slime can use Suoktan. As a secondary weapon, I use a bow.”
After reaching the 14th floor, the strengthened Lee Suyoung and her slime could now fire Suoktan on a short cooldown.
“A bow! Korea is famous for archery, now that I think about it.”
When William showed interest, Lee Suyoung smiled and answered.
“I learned archery when I was young too.”
The two sociable people chatted energetically while Le Thi Hoa and I mostly listened quietly or offered occasional nods.
By the time introductions finished, Lorolen returned pulling a cargo wagon. Two mules drew the wagon, so its speed was not particularly fast.
“I’m back. Shall we depart immediately?”
At Lorolen’s words, William said, “The road is rather long. Would the two ladies like to ride in the wagon?”
“Huh? But…”
I cut off Lee Suyoung.
“It’s better if you ride. If we get tired walking, we can switch then.”
We had eight hours ahead of us. There was no need for everyone to suffer. It would be ideal if we could all ride, but the only sitting space was the coachman’s seat, so four people could not fit.
Lee Suyoung nodded and climbed aboard. Le Thi Hoa also accepted without protest, giving a small bow before boarding.
William seemed pleased that I had yielded the seat. He patted my shoulder and winked, apparently thinking my offer to switch later was merely to ease their guilt.
No, I had meant it literally. If it got hard, they could make way so I could sit. I simply preferred taking the first watch if someone had to stand guard—a man who truly believed men and women were equal.
That was me.
There was no distinction of male and female in the Tower. Anyone who could handle mana was a superhuman.
“Phew, it’s hot. This floor seems to be set in summer.”
William wiped sweat with a handkerchief. Even Le Thi Hoa, who came from a hot country, was sweating slightly in this weather.
While escorting the wagon, we shared stories of the floors we had passed. William had joined residents on the 11th floor to subjugate a goblin village of roughly thirty, caught monster fish by fishing on the 12th floor, and faced about twenty bipedal hyena-like monsters called gnolls on the 13th floor.
Le Thi Hoa did not go into detail, but it seemed she had experienced similar difficulty levels.
What was going on? Was only our difficulty abnormal?
No matter how I listened, the quests Lee Suyoung and I had faced seemed far higher in difficulty. A wolf pack led by a monster wolf, a flock of eagle-sized flying birds, an abnormally proliferating goblin den—the numbers were on completely different scales.
Lee Suyoung seemed to share my thoughts as she glanced at me.
Could being in a party have assigned us harder quests? Or had we simply been unlucky?
“What kind of floors did you two—” William paused. “It seems enemies are approaching.”
Besides Magic Arrow, William apparently possessed another ability that detected approaching foes. When I expanded my senses at his words, I detected a group that appeared to be goblins cautiously drawing nearer from a fair distance.
When I nodded, Lee Suyoung summoned her slime and jumped down from the wagon. As everyone prepared for battle, Le Thi Hoa took out her totems and bound spirits into them.
William fired a magic arrow toward the goblins hiding in the bushes, seizing the first strike, then drew his sword.
“Three there, four over there.”
I pointed out the goblin positions for Lee Suyoung, who could not spot them easily. Their green skin blended too well with the bushes.
I had heard green was a color difficult to produce naturally, yet somehow their skin had become that exact shade.
Lee Suyoung stared carefully in the direction I indicated. Once she spotted them she used her slime Mulpung-i to launch Suoktan.
“It seems Han Jiwoo possesses detection abilities as well. Miss Le Thi Hoa, five goblins are over there.”
At William’s words, Le Thi Hoa sent one totem flying. I had wondered how a mere piece of wood could fight even when possessed, but after it rammed a goblin it simply fell to the ground.
The goblin then began writhing strangely before suddenly swinging its stone axe into another goblin’s head.
The sight sent chills down my spine. I realized the totem was merely a vessel to deliver the spirit to its target.
(To be continued in the next chapter)