Plans Gone Awry
"Hmm."
Yujin nodded as he looked over the two blood-soaked slaves.
They're useful after all.
Lee Sia, the Sword Empress, went without saying. There was a reason he had ranked her as a zero-tier recruitment priority. Her swordplay was so refined it was hard to believe she possessed nothing more than a passive skill like Basic Swordsmanship [D]. Her movements themselves were still clumsy as hell, but watching her sever a Red Goblin's neck in a single stroke told him everything he needed to know.
If I raise her right from here, she'll more than pull her weight.
The sixty-fourth floor. He intended to forge her into something incomparable to the woman who had held off a demonic dragon alone there before burning herself out. Yujin had both the ability and the knowledge to make that happen.
And then…
His gaze shifted. The boy still gasping for breath, exhaustion written all over him—Park Ji-hoo. Even this early, his fighting ability alone was outstanding enough to already earn him the name Fighting Demon.
Skills? None. Traits? None either. All he had were those massive metal gauntlets and pure grit.
This kid's not bad either.
Unlike Yujin or Lee Sia, luck hadn't been on his side; he had gained no particular rewards even after leveling up. Yet he had never stopped pounding Red Goblins to death. He tired easily, still far from fully grown, but every single punch carried weight that was anything but ordinary.
Like watching some wild animal cub.
Both Lee Sia and Park Ji-hoo fought their enemies on pure instinct. But the two of them were fundamentally different. Where Lee Sia drew on the instincts of a swordsman, Park Ji-hoo was closer to a beast. A beast that, the instant it spotted an opening, tore into its prey without mercy. His movements were raw, crude, unrefined…
And all the more lethal for it.
Yujin liked what he saw. Finding even one candidate from his shortlist was already a good mood; discovering that this one was far more valuable than expected left him with no reason to be displeased.
Well. Still a long way to go.
Of course, what they had now was power that would only work on the first floor. No—even that wasn't perfect. If Yujin hadn't stepped in, the Red Goblins would have killed them for certain.
How long is it going to take to raise these two…
Expectation rose in him even as a sense of distance yawned open. To raise these brats until they could climb to the top of the Tower and seize the end of the world by the ankle…
"Ugh. My back is really gonna break."
Growing himself while raising those two as well meant he would have to move far more frantically than he had in the first round.
"What level are you at?"
He directed the question at Park Ji-hoo.
"L-Level ten, Hyeong."
"Hmm. And you?"
"Same for me."
Level ten. Compared to other players, the gap was night and day. Ninety-nine percent would still be stuck at level one; only a handful of the talented would have just reached level two. Pure numbers put them five times higher already, and their actual combat ability was higher still.
By that measure the pace was by no means slow—but it was not enough to satisfy Yujin.
I herded Red Goblin waves at them three times and they're still only level ten?
Splitting the experience had kept Yujin's own level from climbing much either. A single level-up left him just barely at fourteen.
This isn't enough.
Alone it might have been different, but growing alongside these two deadweights called for drastic measures.
What gave the most experience on the first floor again?
For a single target it was obviously the Earth Dragon—the boss monster that served as the first floor's gatekeeper. But its respawn time was a full day. High experience, yes, but efficiency left much to be desired.
Red Goblins aren't numerous enough for three people to share, and Sulfur Deer give far too little experience.
He turned the problem over. He ran through every monster that lived on the first floor, yet nothing better than the Red Goblin waves presented itself.
Is this the limit here?
Objectively the pace was not slow… but it was not a pace that satisfied Yujin.
"Tsk. No choice, then."
If the first floor offered no answer, only one path remained.
"Tomorrow we go up."
"…Up?"
Lee Sia, not grasping his meaning, lifted her head and looked at the sky.
"I mean we go to the second floor."
"Ah."
Lee Sia and Park Ji-hoo's eyes went wide. The second floor? Was that even possible?
"We haven't even been here a full day yet."
"I-I heard you have to kill the boss to go up a floor…"
Both of them answered carefully, watching Yujin's expression. They had spent the entire day being worked to the bone at his side, after all. If it had been nothing more than torment, they never would have followed him so obediently. Park Ji-hoo, of course, and Lee Sia the same. They would have risked their lives resisting him. Given their personalities, there was no chance they would have simply taken it. Differences in strength could come later—at the very least they would have pushed back against him. The only reason they hadn't was this:
Because it helps us grow.
The hunt they had done with Shield Guy, Spear Guy, and the Healer was child's play compared to the hunts conducted under Yujin's oppression. There had been no room left to celebrate a level-up or wonder whether they should try for one more kill. Packs of Red Goblins thick with killing intent and madness. Kill one and two charged in; kill two and four charged in. Hundreds of them, each individually stronger than themselves. A fight they would certainly have died in if Yujin hadn't intervened. It had been less a hunt than a desperate struggle to survive.
That was why, even as their bodies and minds frayed, they still listened when Yujin spoke.
"Ah, don't worry about that. I already cleared the path."
"…What?"
Lee Sia asked as if she couldn't believe what she was hearing.
"I killed the Earth Dragon. The road to the second floor is already open. Of course, no one else can go up yet."
Good lord. Players had been summoned to the Tower and arrived on the first floor barely a day ago—and Yujin had already beaten the boss monster called the Earth Dragon?
Is that even possible?
Just what kind of person was he… It was impossible to believe he was living on the same clock as the rest of them.
"Anyway, if we go up we should be able to raise our levels a bit faster than here, so that's the plan."
It was not a request for opinions. It was a one-sided notice. And so Lee Sia and Park Ji-hoo had no choice but to follow Yujin up to the second floor.
"Tch."
After roughly securing lodging and scrubbing the blood from his body, Yujin dried himself with a towel and clicked his tongue.
"The plan's gotten a little twisted."
Originally he had meant to stay in Terra until he hit level thirty. The second floor was nowhere near as player-friendly as this place. Lodgings like these didn't exist, and neither did NPCs of any kind. Monster quality was higher, so levels would climb faster, but it would never be as comfortable as here.
"Just pure wilderness, basically."
For the slaves to survive in a place like that, a few preparations were required. Food, tents, gear, clothes—the whole set of survival items. The problem was…
"It takes money."
The Tower's currency was, of course, Coins. But their value was far too high. You couldn't exactly hand over a Coin for a single slice of bread. It wasn't as if you could get 0.999 Coins back in change. So everyday necessities that weren't items used a different currency: gold and silver. Not official Tower currency, but a monetary unit the NPCs themselves had created—indispensable for ordinary NPCs who never went hunting and still needed to live inside the Tower.
"I'll have to sell every scrap of junk."
Clearing Red Goblin waves all day had netted him a fair pile of trash loot. Material items, two useless skills, and even one E-grade item. Converting all of it to gold would bring in a solid sum.
"Buy what we need with that, and…"
His thoughts turned to the deadweights.
Come to think of it, there are a few things on the first floor that would be useful for them.
To Yujin they weren't worth a single silver piece. But for Lee Sia and Park Ji-hoo it was different. Nothing world-shaking, yet several items that could make a real difference for early survival.
"I should grab those before we go up."
Coming back down wasn't impossible, but he didn't have so much free time that he wanted to make the trip twice.
"Haaah."
With a sigh he rose from his seat. Did those two even know? That he was running around sleepless for their sake?
"I'll have to work them even harder."
The more he thought about it, the more infuriating it was. All they had done was kill a few monsters, and the second they hit their rooms they washed up and passed out. Starting tomorrow he would drive them until they couldn't even think about washing.
He made that resolution as he stepped out the door.
"Kku-a-a-ang—!"
"You think so too, huh?"
Listening to Chunbae's cry, Yujin nodded and lifted a hand to stroke the little creature's head. If even this bizarre thing agreed, maybe he could push the line a little further. Lee Sia and Park Ji-hoo, of course, had already collapsed into sleep as if they had been knocked unconscious—utterly unaware that a decision of grave importance for their futures had just been made.
"Let's see."
Leaving the inn, Yujin scanned his surroundings. The first thing he had to do was leave Terra. To obtain what he intended to give Lee Sia and Park Ji-hoo, he had no other choice.
"Tsk. Never expected to run into two of them on the first floor."
Thanks to that, everything had gotten thoroughly tangled. Still, meeting them here was better than failing to recruit them at all. The earlier he started raising them, the higher and sturdier he could make them grow—and that meant a greater chance of conquering the Tower. There was no reason to refuse. That didn't mean it wasn't a pain, of course.
"Fine. Let's go. No point sitting around."
Grumbling, he turned toward the south gate. If he wanted to get what he needed, sell the junk for cash, and buy everything required for the second floor before this night was over, he had to move fast.
"Summon."
With the quiet murmur, a horse appeared before Yujin. Mounts could be summoned and dismissed like this. Fortunate, really. If that function hadn't existed…
Yujin looked back and forth between the horse and Chunbae with a complicated expression.
"Just imagining it is horrifying."
He shuddered, then climbed into the saddle and set off beneath the night sky dyed black.