Senior!
After bringing down every last golem, I searched the surrounding buildings for people still trapped and unable to move, pulled out the victims I hadn't managed to reach, and hurried them all to safety. Once they were clear, I finished the emergency treatment with the Wondrous Healing Art Seonghwa had taught me.
Then I stood among the collapsed rubble and waited for the administrators who would be racing over to take charge of the scene.
How long until they get here…
A mana surge that powerful meant the Association managers would be hurrying this way as well. But as I stood there waiting, the state of the surroundings started to bother me.
"This place is a total mess, isn't it?"
The golems had far outperformed anything I'd expected. With no time to properly rein in my strength, I'd simply steamrolled them—and the area around me had been reduced to utter devastation.
Maybe I should tidy up a little?
Operating on the principle that a little extra work from me would make everyone else's job easier, I began gathering the golems scattered messily across the street and stacking them neatly in one place.
That was when—
Beep-beep-beep—
The phone in my pocket suddenly started ringing.
Section Chief?
"Hello?"
"Hyeondo-nim, this is Section Chief Lee Gicheol."
What?
No one had even arrived yet.
How did the Section Chief know to call me?
He began explaining the sudden call.
"So you're saying… someone livestreamed me taking down the mithril golems?"
"Yes, that's correct."
Wow…
It wasn't as if they had two or three lives to spare, and yet someone had still managed to film me in the middle of that chaos. Thanks to that, he said, millions of people—not only domestically but overseas as well—had watched my performance through the live stream.
The Association had recognized the severity of the situation and committed resources for an immediate response. However, traffic around the Gate Break site had been paralyzed by evacuating civilians, and with ground control measures layered on top of that, there had been unavoidable delays while establishing a helicopter approach path.
"Then when can I expect support?"
I'd already been standing here for more than ten minutes. If I didn't get back soon, my parents would start to worry.
Picking up on my not-quite-request, the Section Chief said that a field command officer would arrive shortly at the least, and that the reward settlement and byproduct processing would be handled swiftly under Association authority.
Reward money, huh…
This was the first time I had watched people die in real time. I wasn't exactly overflowing with civic virtue, but a strange weight had settled on me all the same.
This feels… uncomfortable.
If I was going to feel uncomfortable about it, better to just donate the whole thing. I'd grown mentally sturdy enough not to get worked up over money anymore, so I spoke to the Section Chief.
"Could you just process the full amount as a donation for a good cause, like last time?"
But the Section Chief voiced his opposition.
"That won't do. Hyeondo-nim, this time I will stop you even if I have to use Association authority."
"Excuse me?"
"If you keep insisting on donating everything, distorted public opinion will form asking why other Climbers don't donate. Ultimately, the national sentiment and perception toward Climbers as a whole could turn hostile."
He had a point. Public opinion toward the awakened could generate unexpected waves depending on how it was managed. As the Section Chief responsible for the Climber Association, he had no choice but to stay mindful of that kind of sentiment.
"On top of that, you need to establish your proper worth as a Climber so that the renown you've built doesn't fade."
"My worth…"
"Yes. Moreover, the mithril you'll receive this time is an extremely precious resource whose value is hard to casually assess. So please, do not refuse this settlement. Accept it."
When he put it like that, I didn't have much choice.
"In that case, I'll take the mithril for now."
It was a byproduct from the ones I'd dealt with anyway. However, I asked that at least the reward money be used—anonymously if necessary—for the people who had died.
"Are you truly all right with remaining anonymous?"
"Yes. I didn't rush in for the money in the first place."
I'd only stepped up because I was worried my younger brother in the military might be in danger. I didn't think I'd done anything particularly praiseworthy.
The Section Chief murmured a low word of thanks, said he had already briefed the field commander who would arrive shortly so that only identity verification would be needed, and the call ended.
Once I'd shaken off the weight on my heart, just as I was putting the phone back in my pocket, something I should have told the Section Chief suddenly came to mind.
"Ah! I should have asked him to call me Doyeon from now on."
Well, with the sudden Gate Break, the Association side was bound to be scrambling too. I'd have to pass it along next time, once the name-change application at the court was complete—along with a check-in.
"Too bad. I'll have to tell him next time."
I sat on the pile I'd stacked off to one side and waited. Before long, I sensed a presence approaching from afar.
"Rookie!!!"
"…?"
Who's calling me rookie?
I turned my gaze toward the voice. The face was somehow familiar—blue-tinted hair, cool sharp eyes, and clean, striking features.
That's Kim Haeyeon.
A celebrity whose face had been plastered on the sign of the gym I used to go to, and one of the top three strongest Climbers currently active in Korea—Kim Haeyeon was hurrying toward me. As she drew near, she casually struck up conversation without any preamble.
"I never thought I'd meet you in person like this."
"…Do you know me?"
Her friendly tone was so completely different from the image I'd seen in the media that for a moment I thought she was someone else.
"Oh, have I never mentioned it before?"
"?"
"It's me—ahem… Ice Princess."
She whispered the nickname as if it embarrassed her a little.
Good heavens.
Of course, someone of Kim Haeyeon's caliber would be more than adequate as a top-tier Hard Mode Climber. But to think that the same Kim Haeyeon—known domestically as the Empress for her cold appearance and intellectual air—was the busybody of the Hard Mode community…
"You're saying Kim Haeyeon is that Ice Princess unnie?"
"Tsk…! I told you to call me unnie, didn't I?"
That seemed about right…
With an awkward expression, I sorted out the form of address and continued.
"Um… Senior, how did you end up here?"
"Huh? Didn't you hear? I volunteered to come as the field command officer."
"You're in charge of this site, Senior?"
"Yep. I moved a few months ago, so Uijeongbu is my residence now."
Which meant the surrounding area also fell under her jurisdiction.
"More importantly—you were incredible, rookie."
She said she'd been watching the live stream on the way over and had been amazed by my performance.
"Haha—it wasn't that big a deal."
"Aww, you don't believe me. I'm serious. Mithril golems have the absolute worst matchup against me. They're the reason I got stuck on the forty-first floor."
"The forty-first floor?"
"Yeah. While preparing to climb the fifth floor, I went up to the forty-first on Normal Mode."
The forty-first floor was close to the Tower's front line.
Don't tell me monsters from the forties—not even the mid-thirties—caused a Gate Break…
Worried, I asked her.
"Is this really okay…?"
Gate Breaks had been happening far too often lately. And not even low floors—the highest ones.
"Well, with progress on the upper floors delayed, it can't be helped…"
Some people already suspected a correlation between Gate Breaks and progress in conquering the Tower. In that situation, the confident tone of a senior who walked the highest floors only strengthened those suspicions.
"It's been over six months now that no one has cleared the highest floor, right?"
"Yeah, about that long since we got stuck on the forty-fourth."
It had been over ten years since the Tower appeared. Even so, they still hadn't reached even half of the estimated total floors. Because the difficulty had become so extreme, people guessed the summit was the fiftieth floor.
But according to Seonghwa, the fiftieth floor isn't the end…
As a baseline, one floor of Hard Mode averaged about ten floors of Normal Mode difficulty. So from what Seonghwa had said about clearing the sixth floor, I already knew the Tower had more than sixty floors.
"That's why seeing you makes me hopeful."
"…?"
"You're still only on Hard Mode floor two, right?"
Watching me—who was only on the second floor—trample monsters from the forty-first, she said that as a senior she was almost embarrassed to admit how much hopeful possibility she read in me for the future.
"Of course, I'm not just sitting around either."
She said she was currently training a new technique and practicing with Senior Sword Empress.
Now that sounds reliable.
But the part about training with Senior Sword Empress piqued my curiosity.
"Come to think of it, who is Senior Sword Empress?"
"Whoa, you really don't know anyone, do you?"
Well, nobody told me…! Honestly, in that anonymous-board atmosphere, I hadn't had much grounds to suddenly ask who someone was.
"Does the name Lee Juyeon ring a bell?"
"Lee Juyeon…!"
The high-ranking Climber who protected Jeju Island—Lee Juyeon?
"You don't mean the Guardian Deity Lee Juyeon?!"
"Yep. Sword Empress is that Lee Juyeon."
"No way…"
Then that means Senior Sword Empress is a woman.
To think the person who wrote in that crusty old wuxia style was the Guardian Deity of Jeju Island, famed for her beauty.
"I never imagined Senior Sword Empress was a woman…"
"Haha, I thought the same thing when I first met her."
Still reeling, I grumbled that this was ridiculous.
"At this rate you'll tell me Zippy is a woman too."
"Uh…"
What… was that reaction?
"She is a woman, actually."
"What?"
That woman-hater is a woman?
Seeing my complicated expression, my senior began to explain.
"Well, she's a bit complicated… Because of her Trait, she tends to prefer women, and she has a pretty boyish side to begin with."
I couldn't believe it…
"Don't tell me Senior Saint Father is a woman too?"
"Nah, Uncle Lee Seongwook is definitely a guy."
Thankfully, Senior Saint Father was male, and he had the rare class of High Priest—uncommon even worldwide. She went on to say that the Hard Mode community these days had so much communication among the women that the male Climbers only checked in occasionally and had largely vanished from conversations.
"So that's how it was…"
It was the most surprising thing I'd learned since becoming an Awakened.
"But most of the famous Climbers you know probably have one foot in Hard Mode."
Whether they'd given up Hard Mode or were still on it, high-ranking Climbers each had their own reasons—and the majority of Climbers who'd made a name for themselves had typically been part of Hard Mode.
While I was still reeling from all the new information, my senior suddenly offered congratulations.
"Ah! That reminds me—congratulations."
"Huh? For what?"
"Oh, right! You don't know yet? Rookie, your channel subscriber count exploded like crazy!"
She said she'd checked how much my subscriber count had grown while watching my performance on the way over.
Just how many people…?
Seeing how worked up she was, I quickly turned on my smartphone and checked my channel. And when I saw the subscriber count, I couldn't help but cry out in shock.