Chapter 102
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Translator: 8uhl
Chapter: 102
Chapter Title: World Point (3)
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A yellow sports car sped down the highway.
Cho-ah weaved through the lanes as if playing a racing game.
She seemed to have no intention of slowing down.
“Please! Slow down! Just slow down!”
“Si-woo told me to get you here fast.”
“That doesn’t mean you have to speed. I’d rather drive. Let’s switch at the next rest stop.”
Cho-ah lowered her red sunglasses with one hand and frowned.
“Rookie driver.”
“Who are you calling a rookie driver!”
The moment I yelled, the speedometer shot past 200 km/h.
My hair whipped around, and my head was spinning.
I glanced at a speed camera and said.
“If you keep driving like this, you’ll rack up a lot of fines. What are you going to do about them?”
“Si-woo will pay for them, so it's fine.”
Hearing her say that, I realized Park Si-woo was an accomplice in this.
Giving up on trying to stop her, I leaned back against the passenger seat.
Cho-ah, having adjusted her sunglasses, pointed to the back seat.
“There’s an elixir in the bag.”
The moment I left the Tower, I was greeted by a flood of missed calls, one of which was from Cho-ah.
When she said she’d pick me up, I asked if she could bring an elixir.
It was a last-minute request, but I hadn’t actually expected her to bring one.
I opened the bag and found the elixir.
“Don’t drink too much.”
“Yeah, yeah.”
I opened the cap and chugged the elixir like water.
“Ugh, this is disgusting.”
It seemed that none of the potions, from the ones in the Tower to this elixir, tasted any good.
Normally, I would have recovered some stamina between floors before leaving the Tower, but this time, I was truly out of time.
— Hey, about the 11th floor…
— Sorry. I’m a bit busy.
— Huh?
— The culprit is Liz. Figure out the rest yourself. I have nothing else to say about this floor. I’m out!
— W-wait… Hey! Who the hell is Liz?! You son of a…
Before I rushed out of the Tower, I had the distinct impression I’d heard a curse I wasn’t supposed to.
Still, really?
You shouldn’t talk to your god like that!
‘My personality is… starting to resemble his.’
No, that wasn’t it.
The Transcendent Yoo Ji-han was still Yoo Ji-han.
It was more accurate to say I was rediscovering my original personality.
‘What do you want me to do when I really have nothing to say?’
The way I had cleared the 11th floor wasn’t the standard method.
Normally, it should have ended after killing Liz.
‘He’ll figure it out.’
The important thing was that I gave him a spoiler, wasn’t it?
The rest was up to Yoo Ji-han.
It felt more and more like I was just neglecting him, but that was probably just my imagination.
Sorry.
I’ll take good care of you after the raid is over!
“By the way, what’s the raid boss?”
At my question, Cho-ah let out an audible sigh.
I couldn’t see her eyes behind her sunglasses, but she was clearly scowling.
I had asked a few times before, but Park Si-woo had only said he would tell me when the time was right.
To be fair, it was partly my fault for not leaving the Tower until today.
I really had no idea I would be stuck in there for so long.
“It’s a Yeongno.”
“A Yeongno?”
“Yes. A creature that failed to become a dragon.”
A Yeongno, huh.
I had never seen one before, so I had no idea what to expect.
We were currently heading to Yukbaeksan Mountain in Samcheok, Gangwon Province.
It was an unspoken rule that boss raids were conducted in sparsely populated areas.
Just imagine dropping a monster in the middle of Seoul to start a boss raid. It was obvious what would happen.
‘Well, not that it’s possible anyway.’
I didn’t know who made the rules, but the entity known as the Administrator was quite meticulous.
There were several conditions for summoning a boss, such as the number of people within a certain radius having to be below a specific threshold.
“The reason for the raid is for Contribution Points, right?”
The accumulated Contribution Points for this boss raid were close to ten million.
“Not entirely.”
“What do you mean?”
“The item.”
An item dropped from a boss was highly likely to be useful.
“The Yeongno is special.”
“Special?”
“The Dragon Orb it possesses grants wishes.”
“Wishes?”
Cho-ah nodded, but my reaction wasn't exactly enthusiastic.
“So you’re saying it grants the wishes of whoever holds the Dragon Orb?”
“That’s what the legends say.”
Despite the incredible speed at which we were traveling, Cho-ah’s voice was perfectly calm.
An item that grants wishes…
“You don’t actually believe something so ridiculous, do you?”
“Why not?”
“There’s no such thing as an item that grants wishes.”
“But there could be.”
“No. There isn’t.”
I couldn’t yield on this point, no matter what.
A wish is an incredibly abstract concept, and what people desire varies from person to person.
It might be possible to grant a purely physical wish, but anything beyond that was a completely different story.
“‘Monsters don’t exist in this world.’”
“Huh?”
“A hundred years ago, that’s what everyone said. But what about now? We have Awakened Ones, monsters, and gods.”
Her logic was that if gods existed, it wouldn’t be strange for an item that grants wishes to exist as well.
It wasn’t an entirely flawed argument, and there was more to this world that I didn’t know than what I did.
“Still, there’s no such thing as an item that grants wishes without a price.”
“How can you be so sure?”
“Let’s say there is an item that grants wishes. Then it shouldn’t be called something like a ‘Dragon Orb’; it should be called ‘Omnipotence.’ Even the gods you know aren’t omnipotent, so how could a mere item perform such an all-powerful feat?”
“Isn’t that blasphemy?”
“It’s fine if I’m the one being blasphemous.”
“Even if your god is listening?”
“My god would probably think the same thing.”
Seeing me smile so casually, Cho-ah stepped on the accelerator.
It was a clear sign that she was angry, but I refused to retract my statement.
Because it was…
the absolute truth.
There are some things in this world that you have to accept, whether you want to or not.
Awakened Ones—those granted abilities surpassing ordinary humans—desire even greater power.
The price of that power is ‘Transcendence.’
In exchange for becoming a Transcendent, one is bound by a Taboo. The same applied to gods.
‘Is that really all there is to it?’
I could guarantee that the price for becoming a Transcendent wasn’t just the Taboo.
If what Cho-ah said was true, it meant the Yeongno’s Dragon Orb was a divine artifact that surpassed even that.
‘No such thing exists.’
What doesn’t exist, doesn’t exist.
Separate from the debate over wish-granting items, I decided it was probably best to calm Cho-ah down.
If she sped up any more, we might actually get into an accident.
“If the Dragon Orb is real, what wish would you make, Cho-ah?”
“You just said there’s no such thing.”
“There isn’t. But the fact that the Dragon Orb can’t grant wishes and the wish you’d want to make to it are two separate things, aren’t they?”
“I don’t have a wish to make to an item that can’t grant it.”
“Haha.”
It seemed she was seriously sulking.
Unable to think of anything else to say to appease her, I scratched my cheek and fell silent.
The car, which had been moving at a formidable speed, began to slow down.
Before long, a rest stop came into view.
“Weren’t we in a hurry?”
“Gas.”
Cho-ah pulled a card from her pocket.
“Lunch.”
“Is there anything you want to eat?”
“Banana milk and some bread.”
While Cho-ah filled up the tank, I went to the convenience store at the rest stop and bought banana milk, bread, and a few things for myself.
Looking down at Cho-ah sitting in the driver’s seat, I said.
“Isn’t driving tiring?”
“Saying that won’t make me switch, so just get in.”
Cho-ah snatched the banana milk from my hand and started the engine.
“Want some bread?”
“I’ll eat it if you open it for me.”
“Yes, yes. Of course.”
I tore open the top of the bread package I’d bought and held it out to her.
Putting down the banana milk, Cho-ah took a bite of the cream-filled bread and began to chew.
I took a sip of the chocolate milk I had bought for myself.
After finishing the entire piece of bread, Cho-ah passed the empty wrapper to me.
“Han-gyeol, why did you drink the elixir?”
“I had some personal business…”
Cho-ah, no longer wearing her sunglasses, pouted.
I realized I hadn’t understood her question correctly.
She wasn’t asking why I, who hadn’t even entered a dungeon, needed an elixir. She was asking about the act of drinking it itself.
Why drink an elixir?
“Obviously…”
The words that came out so casually got caught in my throat.
An elixir is a healing potion.
The reason to drink a healing potion is, of course, to heal injuries.
So why do injuries need to be healed?
Because if left alone, they could become serious, or even lead to death?
It didn’t need to be that dramatic.
Because it hurts.
That’s why people go to hospitals, and why Hunters seek out healers and potions.
So what happens if you can’t feel pain?
Seeing my speechless expression, Cho-ah finished the rest of her banana milk and smiled bitterly.
“You asked what my wish was earlier, right?”
“I did.”
“That’s my wish.”
Some might look at Cho-ah’s body and feel envious.
But being unable to feel pain was another form of hell, one that ordinary people could hardly imagine.
Cho-ah’s life was one that an average person could never comprehend, not even in the slightest.
“Still, there’s no such thing as an item that grants wishes.”
Such an item should not exist.
That fact remained unchanged.
“Isn’t this the part where you’re supposed to offer some empty flattery?”
“This is my version of flattery. It’s better to face reality early on than to cling to some impossible hope. But…”
“But?”
“I think your condition could be fixed without needing such an extravagant item.”
“Do you really think so?”
“Of course. An item that grants wishes might not exist, but there are plenty of other mysterious items out there.”
Perhaps one of those items could be the one to restore Cho-ah’s body to its original state.
Cho-ah’s foot slowly pressed down on the accelerator.
Very gently, the car began to pick up speed.
It seemed her anger had subsided.
* * *
Midway up Yukbaeksan Mountain in Samcheok, Gangwon Province.
Over twenty years ago, an A-rank dungeon break had devastated the mountain. Since then, it had been off-limits to the public, except for dungeon raids.
In this way, Yukbaeksan and a few other mountains often became the stage for raids.
Today, more Hunters than usual were gathered here.
Standing among the variously dressed Hunters, Park Si-woo saw Cho-ah and me and let out a sigh.
“You’re one minute late.”
Come on.
Cut me some slack for just one minute!