The Digging Bonanza at the 0th Floor Lobby Explodes! (4)
It was shocking.
Was that the smell of garlic and lobster?
I was so hungry that I thought it was just my stomach playing tricks, but I didn’t know if this was really the best thing on earth. I didn’t care. I dove in and started devouring the centipede legs with wild abandon.
Centipedes have tons of legs. Fifteen pairs, thirty in total, is the minimum, but there are bigger ones too.
The important part was that I could stuff myself with this delicacy all I wanted.
Slurp-
Smack-smack-smack-smack-
“Haaaa! It’s so good!”
Eventually I squatted in that hole and, with Beodori by my side, sucked down twenty-two centipede legs in a row until I was finally full. It was the most satisfying meal of my life, and there was no competition for the title.
I even took my time smoking one cigarette, then poked the shivering live centipede with my toe.
“Hey, let’s get back to work.”
Kkriuk~ Kkriuk~
The slave centipede looked at me in fear, trembling all over, then started squeezing out venom again.
* * *
Hours later I finally reached the section where the spiderwebs began. I had successfully climbed two hundred and sixty-seven meters.
Of course there were detours and slides and I had to climb back up a few times. But once I secured a spot, falling was no big deal because I could use the ascender to pull myself up quickly.
Looking at my hunter watch, though, I realized one problem.
If I kept going at this pace, I would reach the 0th floor lobby around eleven in the morning…
That was definitely a serious issue.
Even if no one was around on the 0th floor, at that low time of day there would at least be ten to twenty people coming and going.
That made dealing with the guy who cut my rope and killed him even more inconvenient. And more importantly, if other hunters found out about this space below the 0th floor, it would be a disaster.
I had to handle everything alone.
Yeah. Alone.
So I needed to kill time and climb up to the 0th floor lobby at dawn.
Luckily, the securing points I had installed along the way meant the climb wasn’t as exhausting as I expected.
What should I do to pass the time?
Well, I could level up.
I set a plan in my head while climbing: I would conquer every single branch I had seen on the way up.
There were so many branches that I couldn’t finish all of them in one day, but I could clear as many as possible before dawn.
I had plenty of food since I could roast the centipede corpses.
Of course there were two risks. First, I didn’t know how long the flashlight batteries would last.
But I had prepared by swapping between two flashlights. If one ran out, the other could still carry me for a while.
The second risk was the queen centipede.
But I had plenty of cigarette liquid and cigarettes. It was a gamble worth taking.
I decided to start from the top and clear the first branch point. I secured the entrance firmly, then used the descender to slowly drill through the spiderwebs.
The slope here wasn’t steep, so I was worried the Earth Digging skill wouldn’t apply, but it worked perfectly.
===
*System Notification*
[I dug 1 meter down.]
*Earth Digging Luck* gave me a random luck item.
I acquired a *Mana Battery*!
===
Haha! No more battery worries now!
The real jackpot came next.
*Rune Stone [Self-Development Digging]* granted me ability points.
I gained 0.025 ability points.
Heh heh.
After slaughtering centipedes up to level 5, it seems I get 0.025 points per meter.
Forty meters would give me one full point. This is…
An absolute jackpot! Hahaha!
I happily hacked through the spiderwebs with my machete and descended. I had securely secured every spot, so climbing back up would be a breeze with the ascender.
In the new centipede cave I arrived at, I switched back to *Stacking and Hammering* mode.
*Stacking and Hammering*!
Kwa-kwa-kwa-kwa-kwa-kwa-
Crack-
Swoosh-
* * *
At 1 a.m. that night, I finally placed my hand at the end of the tunnel.
I had successfully climbed three hundred meters of slippery rock wall.
I immediately removed the rope and sat at the bottom of the pit, basking in pure joy.
Climbers always say that after reaching their goal on a rock wall, the satisfaction is like sleeping in the world’s most luxurious bed.
A pointless internet meme popped into my head.
This feeling… is the best.
I had only been up for about a day, but I felt like I had become a slightly different being.
Level 7 for starters.
I had visited dozens of branches, slaughtered centipedes, and the whole process had applied Earth Digging, so I had leveled up by two full levels.
Even at level 2, it wasn’t just the eight ability points from leveling up.
Thanks to the incredible skill *Self-Development Digging*.
The total meters I had dug while hacking branches that day was 412 meters.
Of that, 98 meters at level 5.
282 meters at level 6.
And 32 meters at level 7.
Calculation:
98 × 0.025 = 2.45
282 × 0.030 = 8.46
32 × 0.035 = 1.12
Total additional 12 ability points.
More than the eight from leveling up.
Insane!
So I had level 7 stats that matched level 10-11 in strength and stamina.
===
Strength became 30.
Stamina became 30.
===
Then a completely unexpected message popped up.
===
*Cave Centipede* has awakened empathy.
*Cave Centipede* wants to submit to you out of fear.
Do you want to register *Cave Centipede* as your *Pet*?
Yes No
===
Ooh! Jackpot!
I immediately clicked Yes.
===
*Cave Centipede* has become your *Pet*.
Please name your *Cave Centipede*.
===
I thought for a moment, then named it *Tasty Drill*, short for *Matdeu*.
===
*Cave Centipede* has become *Matdeu*.
After being named, *Matdeu* felt fear.
*Matdeu* will submit more to you.
===
I was probably the first climber to use a drill as emergency rations.
Now I had finished resting and began preparing for the slaughter.
One rune stone per day is enough.
Two or three would count as today’s haul.
The three-meter-thick slab above was firmly closed as expected.
I stashed all my climbing gear into the storage inventory, then carefully hid the hole I had come through with dirt.
I debated whether to quietly push the slab up or stealthily climb over it.
Quietly leaving seemed far better. Mr. No mostly slept drunk.
Squeak-
I lifted the heavy slab a little and checked outside.
As expected, Mr. No was snoring away in perfect peace.
You little brat.
Why the hell did you want to kill me?
Well, thanks to you I got stronger, at least.
I scanned him with the hunter watch I had taken from Mr. Byeon last time.
The scan function doesn’t reveal rank, level, or traits. It only tells the highest floor visited.
So hunters roughly estimate an opponent’s power with this scan.
===
*The target’s highest visited floor is the 0th floor.*
===
So he was living here, feet up.
But he was still a hunter, a hunter.
I couldn’t let my guard down in a fight between hunters.
I maintained my stealth and quietly exited the hole, then silently closed the slab.
Looking around, the 0th floor was completely empty at this hour.
I approached Mr. No. One swing with a pickaxe or machete and he would die and return to ash without knowing why.
But I was too curious.
“Hey, sir? Sir! Wake up.”
“Huh?”
Mr. No opened his bleary eyes, saw me, and suddenly jumped up in shock.
“Eek! Y-you… how? A-are you alive?”
“Yes. I’m alive.”
Mr. No’s face changed from shock to a sly smile, then quickly returned to the pathetic drunk expression I knew.
“Heh heh. Whew, thank goodness. I was so worried… when the rope suddenly snapped.”
“Thank you for worrying. But why did you cut the rope?”
“Cut the rope? Me? Why would I cut it? What nonsense is that? The rope just broke by itself!”
“Senior, climbing gear is different from normal equipment. It doesn’t just snap. And look at this cut.”
I showed him the clean, sharp cut.
“That’s a human cut. Even if I did, what’s the excuse? You little brat!”
“T-that’s…”
Mr. No suddenly dropped to his knees and lowered his head, begging.
“P-please forgive me just once! I don’t want to die yet!”
“Fine. Tell me why you wanted to kill me. If you speak honestly, I won’t kill you with my own hands.”
“…Really?”
“Yes. I swear on everything I have, senior.”
Mr. No sighed and started confessing.
“Uhhuh… I’m a cursed man. Once you enter the tower, you’re stuck on the 0th floor forever. I only learned about it after entering.”
“Was that a reason to kill me?”
“To lift my curse I needed a sacrifice. But on the 0th floor there are no monsters, so I couldn’t level up. I… couldn’t resist the momentary temptation and cut the rope.”
“How many have you killed so far?”
“The one you did was my first. I was drunk and… it was a momentary lapse, uhhuh.”
He grabbed my leg and begged desperately.
“…If you were in my position, you would understand. When I imagine being in your shoes… uhhuh. You don’t hate me. I just miss my family too much. I told you everything honestly. Please spare me, please!”
I answered coldly.
“Whether it’s true or not, I won’t know until I check if a rune stone rises.”
“P-please! You said you would spare me if I spoke honestly!”
“I never lied. I only said I wouldn’t kill you with my own hands.”
“That’s…”
Then, hidden behind Mr. No, a centipede I had secretly released earlier crawled up his leg and back, wrapped around his neck, and stabbed its front legs deep into his body.
It was *Matdeu* from the 0th floor.
“Kriak!”
But Mr. No was still a hunter. Even in that moment he pulled a dagger from his pocket and stabbed at me.
I had expected the ambush, so I twisted sideways and caught the dagger hand. I twisted his wrist hard.
I wanted to make him drop the dagger.
Crunch-
“Aaaah!”
But something completely unexpected happened. His radius bone shattered, the bone piercing through his flesh and sticking out.
I had put in too much strength without realizing my strength was already at 30.
Clang-
Mr. No naturally dropped the dagger. Holding his broken arm, he fell to his knees again.
A moment later both of Mr. No’s arms hung limply like the corpse’s.
I looked straight into his eyes.
As the cave centipede’s venom spread, his eyes turned bloodshot, then slowly filled with sadness.
A moment later the cursed hunter crumbled into ash.
A pitiful death, except for the rags and empty soju bottle he was wearing.
But from the air side it was different.
As a hunter, a rune stone had risen.
Three of them!
He lied until the end.
Unexpected harvest anyway.
With anticipation I reached for the rune stone.
The one in the middle, the purple one.
Even though it was cursed, I could decide later whether to absorb it or not.