The Strongest Newbie
“S-Seong Yujin, Player?”
Didascalia stammered as he called Yujin’s name, his face a mask of pure confusion. Even so, the bastard still had no idea what had just happened to him. Something had changed—he could feel that much—but he couldn’t begin to grasp what, or how.
Of course he couldn’t. The Yujin standing before him now was a being of an entirely different dimension from the man of only moments ago. Didascalia might have been one of the thirteen bastards who managed the Tower, but he lacked the ability to read the power of someone who had cleared it alone.
“I thought long and hard before I decided on this.”
Yujin ignored the call completely and spoke in a low voice.
“Honestly, there were so many places I could burn this that I couldn’t even count them all.”
“…What on earth are you talking about, Player Seong Yujin?”
Naturally the bastard couldn’t understand a word of it. He didn’t even seem to know anything about the skill Yujin had just used—Flashback [S].
“Come on, you know how it is. There are going to be walls. Times you hit a dead end or get shoved into a corner. Use it then and it becomes the perfect key to smash straight through. So of course I had to think it over.”
The Tower was full of so-called hell floors. Even Yujin, in his first life, had poured absurd amounts of time and effort into clearing them, and he’d brushed death more times than he could count along the way. Dropping Flashback [S] into one of those moments would have been like hitting a cheat key.
“But then another thought hit me.”
Yujin’s gaze finally locked onto Didascalia’s eyes.
“What does the Akasha System love more than anything?”
An out-of-nowhere question. Still, as manager of the Tutorial Floor, the bastard was obligated to answer a player’s question.
“W-Well… achievements?”
The way Yujin asked—as if he already knew the Akasha System inside and out—only made Didascalia’s eyes spin harder with confusion.
“That’s right. Achievements. That’s the important part.”
The Akasha System handed out excellent rewards for nearly every act that could be judged an achievement. First. Strongest. Highest. Fastest. And most important of all—
“When you pull off the impossible.”
A Level 1 player freshly summoned into the Tower killing a Floor 90 boss that had appeared in the Tutorial? That was every bit as impossible as clearing the entire hundred floors alone. The thing had been called here to slaughter newbies, not to be hunted.
“So what if—just hypothetically—I wring that black lizard bastard’s neck right here? What do you think happens then?”
And what kind of reward would the Akasha System drop on the player who actually pulled off an absurdity like that? Even compared to the clear rewards Yujin had received for killing the End and finishing the Tower in his first life, it probably wouldn’t fall short. It was a pure gamble, sure—but the kind worth emptying every last coin from your pockets for.
That was why he had used Flashback [S]. In the first life or the second, no player and no manager had ever even imagined it: the one and only unprecedented achievement of its kind.
“W-What the hell are you?!”
Only then did Didascalia realize what Yujin intended. Panic flooded his voice.
“What, the Akasha System hasn’t told you yet?”
The corner of Yujin’s mouth curled upward as he looked at the bastard. Then he spoke like a declaration.
“I already asked it to pass along a message for me—that I’m your End now.”
KWA-DUDUDUDUK—!
He drove his foot into the ground hard enough to shatter solid stone, and his body rocketed into the air like a launched missile. In the blink of an eye he stopped dead in front of the enormous head of Black Darkness.
“Hey. Long time no see.”
A grin split his face. About three years, was it?
“Nice to catch up. Let’s never do it again. Not that you’ll get the chance—you’re dying today.”
JEO-EO-EO-EO-EO-EOK—!
Black Darkness’s jaws yawned open, ready to swallow the chattering insect whole.
“Eyes down, you piece of shit. Who the fuck do you think you’re looking at?”
Compared to the monster’s bulk Yujin was no bigger than an ant, yet he punched as he cursed.
KWAAAAAAAAAAAAANG—!
The sound was like a temple bell the size of a house being struck. Impossibly, Black Darkness took a fist that wasn’t even a hundredth of its mass and had its entire snout twisted sideways. The sight was so unreal, so utterly nonsensical, that every onlooker—player and manager alike—simply hung their mouths open.
“Man, that felt good.”
Yujin climbed onto the reeling head with a satisfied smile. Even through the pain, Black Darkness thrashed wildly, instinct screaming danger, trying to shake him off. An ordinary player would have been fighting just to stay airborne. Yujin stood rooted on the crown of its skull as if his soles were glued there, not a single hair out of place.
“Shame I don’t have a sword. Real bad luck for you, huh?”
With a blade he could have taken the head clean off. Right now he didn’t even have a kitchen knife. So he would simply beat the thing to death.
“About seven minutes left of the ten that bastard gave us, right? Stay alive till then and I won’t finish you. Go on—try.”
The highest-ranked skill he had mastered in his first life—the same one that had eventually torn the End itself to shreds—
Dragon Hunt [A]
A skill meant to be unleashed through a sword returned to the world through Yujin’s fists instead.
KWANG-KWANG-KWANG-KWANG-KWANG-KWANG-KWANG-KWANG-KWANG—!
Hundreds of blows every second. Like a meteor shower, his fists hammered endlessly into the crown of Black Darkness’s head. Each strike carried catastrophic force; scales tore like paper and the skull shattered like glass. After an unknowable stretch of time Yujin kicked off the collapsing head and leapt free.
KUUUUUUUUNG—!
The massive body crashed down and dust billowed from the pulverized earth.
“Hahk—ptoo! Seven minutes my ass. Didn’t even last one.”
Covered head to toe in the blood that had sprayed from Black Darkness’s skull, Yujin stepped through empty air and stopped in front of Didascalia, spitting.
“Hey. Looks like we’ve still got a long way to go before your timer runs out. Got anything else to summon, do it quick. Don’t waste my time.”
Didascalia flinched as if he had seen a demon and scrambled backward.
“You…”
Something was wrong. Seong Yujin was no ordinary player. As a manager he had to take proper measures right now—
“What? Planning to handle it yourself this time?”
Yujin’s pupils bored straight into the depths of Didascalia’s soul. Madness? Rage? Ecstasy? Didascalia couldn’t tell. Whatever lived in those eyes was a chaotic vortex even a being who had lived uncountable years could not read.
“Fine by me. But you sure? Think you can beat me?”
In Akasha System terms a manager sat around Level 300—an unreachable realm for anyone except Yujin in the first life. Managers were that strong. But the level Yujin had reached when the world ended was 350, and the levels he had gained as a reward for killing the End were so many he had never even counted them. Didascalia? Honestly, Yujin was certain it wouldn’t take five full minutes to kill the bastard.
“…Of course not, Player Seong Yujin. Managers prefer not to quarrel with players unless absolutely necessary.”
Sensing that truth on some instinctive level, the bastard waved both hands with a greasy little laugh.
“Still, I am a little curious. What exactly you are. How you came by that kind of power. And why the Akasha System is hiding your information.”
He was going to keep talking to the end. Apparently he had sensed, on pure instinct, that Yujin wouldn’t kill him just yet.
Tch.
Yujin clicked his tongue inwardly. He wanted the bastard dead. Every last manager of the Tower was a rabid, psychopathic piece of shit. How many players had died because of their sick games? Killing this one alone would save thousands, tens of thousands of lives.
But—
Shame I can’t do it right now.
Killing Didascalia would be easier than flipping a hand. And then? Another manager would come to punish the crime of murdering one of their own. Once Flashback [S] ran out, Yujin would never be able to face that one. Instant dead ending.
“Why do you need to know? If you’re that curious, go ask the Akasha System yourself.”
He was certain it would never answer. If it had planned to hand over the information, it never would have hidden Yujin’s existence from the managers in the first place. Instead the System had gone so far as to blind the managers’ eyes just to keep his data sealed. Almost as if it were doing him a favor. He still had no idea why.
“I’ll look into that on my own, Player Seong Yujin.”
Didascalia still hadn’t fully recovered from the shock and confusion, but he forced himself to answer with composure. Apparently he didn’t want the other players seeing his dignity get shredded any further. To Yujin the whole act was just pathetic.
“Yeah. You do that.”
Yujin deliberately flicked his hands, spraying Black Darkness’s blood across the bastard.
“What do you think you’re doing?!”
Didascalia recoiled with a look of pure disgust.
“What, you gonna do something about it? Got a problem, come take a swing.”
Yujin snorted a laugh and turned away.
“Chickenshit. Anyway, I’ve still got work to finish.”
He ignored whatever else Didascalia tried to say and simply dropped downward.
SWAAAAAAAAASH—
His destination was the head of Black Darkness, which was still stubbornly clinging to life even as brains leaked out of it.
KWA-DEUK—!
The instant his foot came down on the neck, the sound of a spine snapping rang out. A Floor 90 boss, yet in front of Yujin it was nothing more than thin ice—ready to shatter with the lightest pressure.
“Used to be such a pain in the ass.”
He had probably spent a good two weeks fighting for his life against this thing. Even then he’d only survived by managing to take its head a heartbeat before it took his. The memory tightened Yujin’s expression.
“Don’t feel too wronged. Even if it wasn’t here, you were always going to die.”
On Floor 90. By Yujin’s own hand.
WOOOOOOONG—
Dragon Hunt [A] flared again. Magic that was the natural enemy of the dragon race coiled around his hand and began to spin like a whirlwind.
“Just think of it as dying a little early.”
Even while gasping for breath, Black Darkness still poured out savage killing intent. Yujin’s hand drove straight down into its head. The already-torn scales and shattered skull had no way of stopping it.
PEOK—!
Like slicing soft tofu, Yujin’s hand turned the brain into pulp.
At the same moment—
You have won the battle against the Catastrophe-class Boss, Black Darkness.
◈ A body that houses divine power
“…Yeah! Fuck. This is exactly it.”
The gamble had paid off.
And with a jackpot, no less.