003
-Wooooooooooooong!
The staff gave off a piercing resonant hum.
Boom—light exploded outward, and the dark underground chamber was suddenly flooded with brightness.
I could only stand there, stunned.
W-what the hell? What the hell is happening?!
The old, shabby staff in my hand.
I’d only grabbed it by chance.
So what was this bizarre change all about?
I had no idea how the situation was unfolding.
And then, all at once—
Ah.
I felt something strange.
The staff and I are connected.
Yeah. Connected.
That was the only way I could describe the sensation.
Something inside me—some fragment of what might as well have been called my soul—was seeping into the staff, and I could feel the staff and I merging into one.
Right after that, certainty welled up inside me.
Blue Dots.
Those special particles no one else could see, the ones only I had been able to perceive since childhood.
Those drifting little clusters of light with their beautiful, dreamlike presence.
The things I could only ever look at.
I can control them now.
I could move the Blue Dots however I wanted.
Almost as if I’d been possessed, I gripped the staff even tighter.
-Wooooooong!
Light burst out again, and the harsh hum shook the underground chamber.
The Blue Dots gathered at the tip of the staff and began to condense.
Then, just then—
-Kyaaaaek!
A goblin shriek rang in my ears.
I turned my head and looked past the barrier.
-Keek! Keh...!
-Kruk... kruk...
The goblins who’d been laughing and mocking me just moments ago had completely changed their tune.
The goblin warrior was edging backward, his face twisted with fear.
The goblin shaman was trembling all over, staring at the staff in my hand with naked shock.
Like prey facing a predator, they were clearly afraid of me.
But what was even stranger was this.
Huh? Have those bastards always looked that pathetic?
The goblin warrior.
And the goblin shaman.
For some reason, they suddenly felt like nothing special at all.
That was weird.
Just a second ago, I’d been so terrified I couldn’t even bear to look at them.
Now they were as ridiculous as bugs crawling along the roadside.
A snort of laughter escaped me.
Am I losing my mind? Those monsters are funny now?
It was obvious that something unusual had happened.
The goblins sensed it too, and so did I, which was why a scene like this was unfolding.
But there was a problem.
I don’t know how to use this staff.
The staff in my hand was definitely no ordinary object.
But I had no idea how to use it.
What the hell was I supposed to do with this thing?
I shot a glance sideways and checked the remaining time.
Time until safe zone release: 01:12
There was only one minute left.
Soon the safe zone would be released, and the real fighting would begin.
Before that happened, I had to figure out how to use this staff, but...
How the hell do I use it?
All I knew was that with this staff, I could move the Blue Dots at will.
I had no clue how I was supposed to use that to crush those bastards.
I wasn’t even asking for a friendly how-to lesson.
At the very least, it’d be nice if I had something to use as a reference...
...Wait a second.
I turned my gaze back to the goblins.
The goblin shaman was staring this way with a stiff expression.
-Whoosh!
A fireball still hovered above the goblin shaman’s staff.
The spell he’d prepared the moment he saw me was still active.
And as I stared at that fireball—
I could see it.
The arrangement of Blue Dots the goblin shaman had made.
The fireball created by the goblin shaman.
And the pattern of Blue Dots behind it came into my view crystal clear.
I made a guess.
If I draw the same thing, can I use the spell too? That looks like it’s made of Blue Dots as well.
First, I’d try it.
I quickly began tracing the arrangement of Blue Dots visible behind the fireball.
It wasn’t that hard to copy.
One circle, one rhombus inside it, then another circle...
A simple structure of lines and circles repeating over and over.
The Blue Dots gathered on the staff began arranging themselves exactly where I wanted them.
It was easier than I’d expected.
If I had to compare it to something, it felt like clicking dots one by one in a computer drawing program.
And so I copied the Blue Dot pattern behind the fireball exactly as I saw it, and—
-Whoosh!
A fireball appeared above my staff.
I’d successfully replicated the goblin shaman’s fireball spell perfectly.
That was insane.
Was this what a spell was?
I lifted my head and looked at the goblin shaman again.
-...Kerrruk?! Kerk! Kerrrrrrruk!!!
Maybe he’d realized I’d copied his spell.
By now he’d dropped the stiff expression and was screaming something at the top of his lungs.
But it still wasn’t enough.
Something about it feels clumsy.
Copying the goblin’s spell had definitely been interesting and fascinating.
At the same time, though, I was a little dissatisfied.
I felt like I could do better. Did I really need to use it exactly like this?
I made small adjustments to the completed formation.
Shrink the gaps between the particles. Make it denser and more precise. Increase the overall size.
As I tuned the pattern, the fireball floating above my staff changed completely.
-Fwoooooosh!
It grew larger, and the power it contained became far more intense.
While the goblin’s fireball was only about the size of a fist, the one I’d made had grown to the size of a human head.
-Kerk...?!
The goblin shaman let out a shriek of disbelief.
He seemed stunned that I was wielding a spell even stronger than his.
Honestly, I hadn’t thought this would actually work either.
I’d just tried it because it seemed like it might, and it had really succeeded.
But that wasn’t the end of it.
I think I can make multiple ones at once. Let’s try.
I poured more of the Blue particles gathered on the staff into the pattern.
Then I drew several formations at the same time.
That was easy too.
-Fwoosh! Fwoosh! Fwoosh! Fwoosh!...
Four additional fireballs formed and began circling above my staff.
Five fireballs in total.
-Kerk...
-...
The goblins’ faces drained black at the sight of the five fireballs.
They looked past despair now—closer to complete resignation.
I checked the remaining time.
HP: [x] / [max]
“Phew... Looks like I’ve figured out how to use the staff.”
I let out a relieved breath.
I’d nearly shit myself because I didn’t know how to use it.
Fortunately, thanks to copying the goblin shaman’s spell, I’d somehow managed to make it usable.
Come to think of it, that goblin shaman kind of saved me, didn’t he?
I stared at the goblin shaman with a dazed expression.
When the goblin shaman had first appeared, I’d thought I was absolutely doomed here.
In the end, though, he’d helped me learn how to use the staff, and because of that, I’d found a way to survive.
If this had been an ordinary Hard Difficulty run without a shaman, I probably wouldn’t even have had the luxury of hope.
As always, life really was full of twists and turns.
Anyway, now I was ready to fight.
I raised the staff in my grip and aimed it at the goblins beyond the barrier.
-Kerk-!
-Kerrrrrk!
Maybe they were weighed down by the five fireballs I’d created.
The bastards turned and started to run.
...Did the tutorial monsters run away too? I didn’t think I’d ever heard of that.
HP: [x] / [max]
-Kerrrrrruk! Kerk!
-Kyaaaak!
The goblin warrior and the shaman fled rapidly into the darkness and vanished.
I couldn’t see them anymore.
But for some reason—
I knew exactly where they were in that darkness.
Maybe it was some kind of sixth sense.
Not through sight or hearing, but through the mind’s eye, or maybe a feeling in the soul, I could take in the entire space.
Their shapes were laid bare inside the dark.
HP: [x] / [max]
The translucent barrier faded away.
The pile of weapons at my feet vanished in an instant too.
And I thrust out the staff.
If I just mess with part of the pattern like this, it should fire.
I relied on my rough intuition and tried to launch the prepared spell.
Thankfully, my instincts weren’t wrong.
-Sshreeeek!
The moment I touched part of the array, one of the fireballs shot forward as if it had been waiting for me to do exactly that.
A red streak slicing through the thick darkness.
The back of the goblin shaman’s head was faintly visible.
The fireball I sent slammed into the back of his skull.
-KWAOOOOOM—!
An explosion erupted.
The firepower felt several times stronger than any grenade I’d ever thrown in the army.
A mist of blood sprayed outward.
Brains and chunks of flesh scattered in all directions.
-Splat!
-Thwack!
-Spatter.
Bits of goblin remained flew all the way to my feet and rolled across the ground.
The metallic stench of blood brushed past my nose.
...I think I’m going to puke.
It was a brutally grisly sight.
Even if they were monsters, once they’d been caught in the explosion and reduced to countless scraps of meat, it was hard not to feel sick.
Still, I didn’t pity them.
If I hadn’t gotten the staff in my hands, I’d have been the one dying like that, not them.
I swallowed down the rising gag reflex with effort and calmly found my next target.
-Kruk! Kruk...!
The goblin warrior, who’d been fleeing at full speed, suddenly froze in place.
Maybe he’d realized running was pointless after all.
The creature paused there to catch its breath, then drew its greatsword and charged straight at me.
It had chosen one last struggle over fleeing.
I aimed the staff.
Fire.
I launched a second fireball.
Sshreeeek!
A red streak ripped through the air.
Maybe sensing death, the goblin’s face twisted horribly as he clenched his teeth.
The fireball struck him square in the chest.
-KWAOOOOOOM—!
The second explosion.
Because the distance had been short, a wave of hot air even reached me here.
Once again, blood mist scattered and chunks of flesh flew.
Smack. Thud. Spatter.
Blood and meat soaked me.
It was disgusting.
Droplets of blood pattered down.
Through the wet mess, a clear notification struck my ears.
Congratulations.
You have survived the trial and proven your qualifications.
You have been recorded as an official climber of the Tower.
Baek Jiho (Republic of Korea : 1st Floor)
You have defeated Goblin Warrior (10).
You have defeated Goblin Shaman (100).
Points are being calculated.
Returning.
A brilliant mass of light wrapped around me.
* * *
When I opened my eyes again, I was in a familiar place.
My room in a semi-basement rental apartment.
The springy bed, the musty bedding, the old computer and desk, the squeaking wardrobe.
My home, steeped in the stench of poverty.
“...Was it a dream?”
It was such a familiar, affectionate scene that for a moment I thought I’d dreamed everything.
Being chosen as a climber and dragged into the tutorial, meeting the goblin warrior and shaman, and somehow bringing down those monsters with whatever it was I’d used—magic, maybe—had it all been a dream?
But it was definitely not a dream.
Because—
The smell of blood.
The staff in my right hand.
The blood that had soaked my entire body.
They were brutally reminding me that this was reality, not some dream.
Thud.
My legs gave out, and I collapsed where I stood.
“Fuck...”
It was a curse loaded with all kinds of feelings.
Relief that I’d made it out alive.
Psychological shock.
The nauseating stench and feel of blood.
The surreal fact that I’d experienced a difficulty no one else had ever even dreamed of.
And even doubt about my own ability.
“...I should wash up first.”
I wanted to collapse and sleep right this second, but I wasn’t about to dirty my bed with blood.
I staggered to my feet and went to the bathroom to shower.
-Shaaahhh.
I washed the blood off my body and checked myself in the mirror, scanning every part of me to see if I’d been injured anywhere.
Thankfully, I hadn’t.
Well, it wasn’t like I’d been hurt if I’d been blasting fireballs from far away, anyway.
“Blegh! Ugh!”
In the middle of showering, I even grabbed the toilet and threw up.
Seeing the blood wash down the drain brought the goblin explosion back to mind, and there was no way I could hold the nausea in.
I think I was going to end up with trauma.
Anyway, after all that washing, puking, and general chaos, I finally lay down on the bed.
“Ah. Right. I should tell Noona I cleared the tutorial.”
I sent her a quick text.
After leaving my “I’m alive” message, I slowly closed my eyes.
I didn’t even last ten seconds before I passed out cold.
It was the day I became a Hunter.
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