Chapter 26
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Translator: Ryuma
Chapter: 26
Chapter Title: Entering the 2nd Floor
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A quaint book engraved with a white tree. Opening the pages of the Spirit Summoning Scroll revealed ten skill coins inside.
Gonghyeok picked out five of them and swallowed them all at once.
[Intracorporeal Sephirot Formation (─)]
[Forms the Tree of Spirituality, the Sephirot, within the user's body. As the Sephirot's hierarchy ascends, related skill ranks increase.]
A golden halo appeared above Gonghyeok's head, and his entire body trembled.
[The Tree of Spirituality takes root within Master.]
[Sephirot 1st Hierarchy: Malkuth (MALKHUT) formed.]
[The gateway to the Garden of Eden, Malkuth, resonates with Master's spirituality.]
[The place where Adam Kadmon, the Perfect Man who completed the 10th hierarchy of Sephirot, first set foot.]
[Malkuth's archangel, Sandalphon, and his legion of angels have recognized your existence. Once your hierarchy is complete, you can borrow their power.]
[Acquired Spirituality Harvest (F).]
[Harvests spirituality from souls and matter. Harvested spirituality is stored in the body's Sephirot.]
[Acquired Purification (C).]
[Purifies souls and drives out impurities. Refines turbid spirituality into pure form.]
[Acquired Spirit Summoning (D).]
[Summons spirits and angels using the body's Sephirot or sacred relics as mediums.]
[Acquired Spirit Possession (A).]
[Contracted spirits or angels lend their aid. They possess your body or mainly your weapon to amplify power.]
[Acquired 3 or more skills from the Spirit Summoning Scroll. Occupation forcibly fixed to 'Spirit Summoner.']
"Acquired another bunch of useless skills."
They were definitely good skills. If mastered perfectly.
The problem was that to use Spirit Possession, you had to summon a spirit first. To summon a spirit, you needed a unique or rare-grade sacred relic. Completing them properly required luck as well, and they were skills that were picky about their users.
The somewhat usable ones were Sephirot and Purification, at least.
Even at stage 1, Sephirot granted superhuman power. In the case of stage 1 Malkuth, not only could you borrow the authority of one of the archangels, Sandalphon, but if you prepared a medium in advance, you could summon his angel legion to create an army of angels.
Purification dealt near-instant death damage to undead and specter-type monsters. In other words, these two skills were...
The angels' trump card, made to kill necromancers and devil contractors.
Of course, the angels were a bit dim-witted, so it was a flaw that it took a long time to complete them.
'I won't get to kill many on the 2nd floor, so I'll just kill some roughly and hunt for sacred relics. Gotta complete it by the 3rd floor. And grab another combat job there.'
While pondering the job to acquire on the 3rd floor, Yeonsi's worried voice came through.
"Oppa, the mission's done, and it says we head to the 2nd floor in 8 hours. What happens after that?"
"What happens is... we go our separate ways."
"Huh?"
"Supporters get dropped into a battlefield on the 2nd floor and assigned to assist one side or the other. Combat-type avatars like me form teams and fight 10 vs. 10."
"...I'll survive somehow."
"Yeah, yeah. You will, no problem."
Yeonsi planned to sweep up most of the achievements on the 2nd floor. With her mass-producing recovery items and nullifying all sorts of curses, no supporter could stand against her.
"Yeonsi, let's hit the comic shop one last time."
Sephirot stores the spirituality of souls.
In other words, it meant you could cram it in by quantity, like building up internal energy.
= = =
"Purchase 500 shards of spirituality."
[Consumed 100,000 purple coins to purchase 500 shards of spirituality.]
"Purification."
[10 shards of spirituality transmute into 'Pure Shards of Spirituality.']
"Purification, purification, purification, purification."
[10 shards of spirituality....]
[Sephirot 1st Hierarchy Malkuth fills with spirituality.]
[Current Malkuth completion: 97%.]
The 30,000 coins from clearing all 1st floor dungeons, about 50,000 from special achievements, and 30,000 from hunting monsters and hunters.
Total of 100,000 purple coins splurged at the 1st floor comic shop 'Pezelon's Cradle.' Bought spirituality to the brim with cash and forcibly raised the completion of 1st hierarchy Malkuth.
To complete Malkuth now, he needed a sacred relic like a unicorn horn or a fragment of the Ten Commandments, or a holy soul.
The closest thing to a holy soul was...
Gonghyeok glanced sideways at Ha Yeonsi.
'Killing Yeonsi and purifying her would be the surest way.'
"Wow, oppa! A new flower type appeared. Flesh Mending Flower—this seems like a skill that replenishes mana?"
"Yeah, that'll be handy. There's a comic shop around the 6th floor, so buy the itemization skill there."
But Yeonsi still had plenty of uses left. If he killed her, even Soma Sangai wouldn't accept it.
'At latest, I can complete it by the 3rd floor, so no need to rush.'
It was almost time to leave. He pulled the hellhound mask and hood back down.
Using the comic shop's portal, the two returned to the village.
Twenty hunters, including Soma, were already gathered in the village. Everyone was looking up at the sky.
A massive vortex formed in the red sky. At the center of the fiercely swirling vortex stood a gigantic brass door.
- All 1st floor survivors now ascend to the 2nd floor.
- Personnel from 30 zones merge and are redistributed into 2 zones.
Red magic circles glowed beneath everyone's feet, and before they could exchange a word, they were enveloped in red light and vanished.
= = =
"I am the devil Mastema. You 1,000 in total must fight here on the 2nd floor."
Beneath their feet lay square grid-patterned stone tiles. No matter where you looked, there was nothing but endless gray stone flooring.
Before them, a devil in a suit, looking utterly unmotivated, continued in a businesslike tone.
"This round is 10:10. Ten people form a team and compete against another ten."
Rumble.
Stone dolls rose from the stone floor.
Ten red stone dolls and ten blue ones.
One from each side stepped forward.
"And like this, one from each team is selected to fight."
The two stone dolls swung stone fists at each other, smashing away. After a fierce close-quarters brawl with stone dust flying, the winner was the red stone doll.
[Red stone doll vanguard wins. Buff: All stats +5%.]
[Buff applies only on 2nd floor, stacks up to 10 times max.]
"Like this, the winning stone doll can keep fighting. Even if it wins, it can withdraw due to injuries, or it can smash all the way to the 10th enemy captain."
The red stone doll, on a three-win streak, had its head shattered by the fourth blue one.
"See? Simple. They fight one-on-one until one side's all that's left standing. Winners advance to the 3rd floor a day later."
"Well then, overtime work.... No motivation. The rest will be handled by the angel Azazel..."
"Hello! Azazel-nim is bedridden with a headache, so I'm Nariel, dispatched in her place!"
An angel with orange hair tied in twin tails appeared and shouted energetically.
"On this floor, even if hunters die, you only get a measly 5% coins! Let me say it again. A measly! 5%! "
"5% is kinda iffy..."
Someone muttered, and Nariel pinpointed the spot and yelled.
"Yes! Iffy, right? Right?"
'She's trying hard.'
It was Gonghyeok's first time seeing Nariel on the 2nd floor. But the reason she emphasized the percentage was simple.
Kill someone, and you barely get any coins, so don't kill each other.
"Losing teams get a losers' bracket revival match! No need to get down if you lose! Plus, there's a surrender signal—just slap the ground three times with your palm and shout 'Surrender!' Super easy, right?"
Murmurs grew louder around them. The consensus was that it wasn't as harsh as the 1st floor rules.
"Now, time to form teams! You have 3 hours, so pick your teams! Oh, but try to balance strong and weak.... We'll give prizes too!"
[Nariel promises prizes.]
[Do not kill possible opponents.]
[Do not team up strong with strong.]
[Fight less, talk more! Love & Peace! (Love and Peace!)]
"Oh, right."
Snap!
Mastema, who had been lounging on a hammock net in midair, snapped his fingers.
Shadows rippled once beneath the 1,000 hunters.
Then, like paint dropped on them, the shadows began spreading red.
"Please check the color of the shadow under your feet. And me.... Eh, nothing much. Just fight sloppily and die sloppily."
[Shadow color changes based on murders committed on 1st floor.]
[Kill a lot again, and the devils will award prizes.]
The devil, who announced without even looking, flopped back onto the hammock. A book was in his hand.
Murmurs rose as they checked each other's shadows. Some innocent-looking faces had faint red shadows, while a burly face surprisingly cast a calm black one.
"Gasp! Who spilled blood here?"
"Shut up, you idiot."
People backed away from certain shadows.
'No wonder, fuck. Wearing such a scary-ass mask.'
The shadow of a mass murderer glowing a vivid crimson.
Ju Gonghyeok, who had killed 30 in a single day.