Chapter 108: 24th Floor: Dance with Pigs
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 108: 24th Floor: Dance with Pigs
I wasn’t too worried about the 23rd-floor trial.
Unlike the 22nd floor, where you never knew what to expect, this was a trial that only required combat.
Some floors were unpredictable, but for others, the type of trial was more or less set in stone.
There were floors like the 17th-floor defense game, where everyone was given the same trial and the reward grade depended on how they solved it. Then there were floors like the 22nd, which presented a completely different era and setting.
The 23rd floor was always the same in its structure, with only slight variations in difficulty.
The objective of the 23rd floor was to rescue hostages captured in a bandit den.
That part never changed.
The official strategy for this trial was to have a party member who looked like a bandit disguise themselves, infiltrate the mountain fortress, and figure out its layout and scale.
After that, the normal method was to create a diversion by calling for reinforcements or setting a fire from the outside, allowing a rogue-class character to sneak in and rescue the hostages.
Since the trial’s difficulty was determined by the Bandit Leader’s stats, caution was paramount.
There was once a case where a team underestimated the fortress, assuming it would be an easy clear, only to run into a former Swordmaster-turned-Bandit Leader. A blood-soaked, limb-severing party ensued, broadcast live for all to see. Because of that, the golden rule of the 23rd floor was, ‘For the love of God, don’t even think about fighting them head-on!’
But that rule didn’t apply to me.
“Let’s goooo!!!”
I simply charged straight into the bandits’ mountain fortress.
CRASH!!!
The front of the fortress crumbled pathetically under my body slam, and run-of-the-mill bandits charged at me, not even realizing the difference in our levels.
Stab!
A bandit who entered my spear’s range had his throat pierced.
More bandits rushed forward, still oblivious to the gap in our abilities.
Stab-stab-stab-stab-stab!!
Every bandit who came within my spear’s reach had their throat pierced.
Thrusts so fast they couldn’t even be perceived.
This was the power of having achieved a partial awakening in the first of the three stages of the Straight Heart One Spear!
‘Hmm… the name is a bit too long. Let’s just call it the Straight Spear.’
It was an advanced technique I didn’t even need to use on bandits, but wasn’t the whole point of this trial to get some practical experience with the Straight Spear?
In the end, I punched a hole through all their necks with a single thrusting technique.
“Who the hell are you, bitch!!!”
The Bandit Leader was a fairly strong guy, but by my standards, he was no different from the ordinary bandits lying on the ground. He, too, couldn’t even react to my thrust before his neck was pierced.
Stab!
“Gack!”
It reminded me of myself whenever I was on the receiving end of Irene’s attacks.
[You have cleared the trial. Your grade will be increased as a solo play reward.]
Normally, I would have had to ensure the hostages were returned safely, but the trial ended the moment I killed all the bandits.
[You will receive an A-rank reward. Please select your reward.]
“Eh… I guess this trial doesn’t have a true ending reward.”
The solo play bonus bumped my reward up to A-rank. It must have originally been a B-rank trial.
Instead of useless equipment or skills, I chose two <Skill Growth Tickets>.
“Ah, I should have saved the Skill Growth Ticket I got last week!! I could have leveled up Haste!!!”
- Tsk tsk.
- She’s just gonna use it on Strength, right?
- This is why retail investors always lose money.
- What does this have to do with investing lol.
This time, I would cherish them and not use them recklessly.
After quickly finishing the somewhat disappointing trial, I returned to the waiting room.
“Ah, what is this lingering dissatisfaction?”
- This is the normal difficulty.
- FYI) 70% of trials are usually B-rank.
- Fuck, this is what the difficulty is supposed to be like.
- Why does it look so easy? LMAO.
- It’s because she’s always getting her pussy wrecked, but this bitch is a total fucking munchkin.
- FR, her pure stat total is probably higher than a 50th-floor Awakened.
- Once again. Lee Do-hee. Is amazing.
- Sooo easy~
After fighting so many powerful enemies, tackling a low-power trial like this felt strange.
‘Is this what it feels like to be so bored you could die?’
The Demon King Liliana, myself, the Sword Saint and his elite soldiers, and even a top-tier idol(?).
My recent opponents had been so strong that I’d started to misjudge the original difficulty of the trials.
Of course, that was that, but my body was still itching for a fight.
Something inside me was left unfulfilled!
“This is too frustrating. I’m going up one more floor!”
A blood-boiling, life-or-death battle.
A desperate struggle for survival.
The thrill of narrowly escaping death and landing a stunning comeback victory!
Dopamine Battle Sex Addict, Lee Do-hee.
Deploying!
- What.
- Sure, go ahead.
- Have fun lol.
- She’s living in a different world.
- Enjoy the fuck.
- A bloody, gore-filled battle is fun, I’ll give her that.
- Lee Do-hee, the queen of sudden impulses.
- Hey, I’m the one who provided the 4th elixir!
- At your level, everything is a slaughterfest except for S-rank true endings…
Swoosh!
‘Wasn’t the next trial supposed to take a while…?’
With that hazy memory in mind, I felt my body dissipate as the 24th-floor trial began.
*
Meanwhile, at that very moment.
A group of people was gathered around a dark, gloomy round table…
There were exactly six of them.
The leaders of the six great guilds.
“So, why are we meeting in a dump like this?”
Baek Ha-ye, the head of White Night Society, Korea’s top cleric guild.
She was fiddling with her phone, leaving a self-praising comment on an article about herself that read, ‘Baek Ha-ye is truly Korea’s number one beauty!!’
“Shut up, that’s not the problem right now. That Sword Saint bastard… To think he’d actually be revived. We should have finished him off back then!!”
The guild master of the Ohsung Guild, a man in golden armor, slammed his fists on the round table in fury.
His anger management issues had been going on for nearly a decade, so everyone else reflexively pulled their hands away from the table.
The table itself was made with incredible durability, so it wouldn’t break.
“Hoo… Let’s take this one step at a time. How are things progressing with that Lee Do-hee bitch? Black Veil?”
The one leading them, Baek Do-hyeon, the guild master of the Golden Dawn Society, asked the master of the Black Veil Guild.
“…Soon.”
“Didn’t you say that a while ago?”
“She’s trickier than expected. Once she enters a trial, she often doesn’t come out for weeks. And now that she’s broadcasting 24/7, a quiet abduction is impossible.”
In truth, their assassination squad had been on standby to kidnap and rape Lee Do-hee right after the 21st floor ended. But then, after a near-death experience, she had immediately challenged the 22nd floor to fully recover.
Still, they had endured and waited for a month.
They waited for her to turn off her stream, but as if she had sensed their plan, she started broadcasting 24/7.
Of course, they could ignore that and proceed with the abduction, and they would likely succeed, but the problem was the risk of their identities being exposed.
Even if they weren’t identified, the public would surely suspect one of the great guilds was behind it and rise up. Risking the fate of a great guild just to abduct Lee Do-hee wasn’t worth it.
“But you do have a way, right?”
“Of course. We’ve decided to hire some criminals who fled from China. They’re on the run from the Chinese government anyway. They were actually happy about it, saying it’s a chance to screw over their government. We will be framed as the guild of justice that tried to protect Lee Do-hee.”
They would intentionally open a path for the Chinese criminals to abduct Lee Do-hee, a walking treasure trove of elixirs, and then expose their identities.
After that, all they had to do was pretend to fight them.
The foolish public would believe that the great guilds, being fellow Koreans, had tried to protect Lee Do-hee.
With some pre-planned media manipulation to stir up hatred against the Chinese and the Joseon-jok, the game would be over. It was a meticulous plan that even exploited the public’s nationalistic sentiments.
Whether Lee Do-hee was murdered by the Chinese or became a limbless onahole for the rest of her life was no longer their concern. All that mattered was subtly showing the other Awakeners what happens when you mess with them.
“Excellent!! As expected, you’re reliable!! Hahahaha!!! That rotten whore will finally…”
“Wait, we’re handing her over to the Chinese? We’re not using her ourselves?”
Just then, a burly man who had seemed uninterested in the meeting, the guild master of the Steel Alliance, chimed in.
“To be precise, they’re fugitives from China.”
“Right, there’s too much attention on us to handle it ourselves, isn’t there? We can’t afford to be on bad terms with the World Awakener Association right now.”
“No, then just delay it a bit. Let me have a taste of that bitch, too.”
“What?”
“Men, I swear…”
“Heeh…? You pervert!”
Despite the women’s scorn, the Steel Alliance guild master spoke firmly.
“I’ll borrow the identity of one of my guild member’s family to infiltrate her guild. We’ve waited this long anyway, let’s just wait until the public’s interest dies down a bit more.”
Among the Awakeners who climbed the Tower, there were some men who held a certain misconception.
The misconception that the bigger the dick, the better.
If you had a lot of sex inside the Tower like Lee Do-hee, you would sometimes get rewards that increased your penis size. Many guys who grew up on weird porn and webtoons would make the mistake of maxing out their size.
Naturally, this made it impossible for them to enjoy sex with ordinary women.
The moment they tried to insert it, the women would scream in pain. Unless you had a very specific fetish, it was difficult to keep fucking a woman who was sobbing in genuine agony.
But if you only put in less than half, it just didn’t feel like you were having sex at all.
That’s why there were a surprising number of men like Dotamuk who were desperately waiting for a woman like Lee Do-hee, someone who could handle their massive dicks.
Unsurprisingly, the Steel Alliance guild master was also the owner of a super-sized one.
“You’re going to hog her all to yourself? How cheap.”
“You think you’re the only one who can forge an identity?”
The Steel Alliance guild master found himself the target of the other men’s furious glares.
“…Who said you can’t? Just do it yourselves!”
“I see.”
“Hmm… An all-stats bonus of 16 is certainly not a small number.”
“I’m more curious about how that bitch’s pussy tastes. Fuck, just how good is it?”
“By the way, I heard she’s using a lie detector for her interviews. How are we supposed to get past that?”
“There are deception items that can even fool the status window.”
“Ooh, could you lend me one of those?”
Baek Do-hyeon and the women just shook their heads as they watched the trio of men, who were more interested in fucking Lee Do-hee than eliminating her.
“Hoo… Enough. There’s something more important right now.”
After all, Lee Do-hee wasn’t the only person the great guilds were targeting.
They were sharpening their blades of vengeance for every politician, entrepreneur, and civic group leader who had turned their backs on them during the last protest.
And this meeting wasn’t convened for Lee Do-hee or any of those small fry.
The most urgent matter at hand was…
“The Sword Saint. He’s apparently heading to the 79th floor. What are we going to do now?”
The Sword Saint of Korea.
A former leader of the seven great guilds, who fell from grace after losing his sight and being betrayed by the others.
Having attained enlightenment, he was now climbing the Tower at a furious pace with his direct disciples.
His record, which had been stuck at the 72nd floor, had secretly reached the 78th while they had let their guard down. Now, believing he was ready, the Sword Saint had announced his return before challenging the 79th floor.
No one knew when he had regained his skills.
“Hoo… Is there anything we can do?”
“No. The Sword Saint and his thirteen direct disciples have all been confirmed to be living inside the Tower. They never come out.”
“Then what’s the plan?”
A long silence fell over the meeting room.
‘Just where did things go so wrong?’
Baek Do-hyeon, his usual madness gone, pondered with a serious expression.
A moment later, a conclusion was reached.
“We have no choice. We’ll climb it first.”
“……”
“Oh…”
The 79th floor was a repeatable clear floor, so its difficulty wasn’t that high.
What mattered was the 80th floor beyond it. The only reason they hadn’t climbed the 79th floor yet was to buy time to prepare for that.
Just then, the Steel Alliance guild master cautiously raised his hand.
“Then the plan to rape Lee Do-hee is…”
“Is that what matters right now? You’re already fucking around inside the Tower anyway, aren’t you? We can’t delay our plans for one woman. The moment the Sword Saint clears it first, we could be finished.”
“Oppa, get a grip. That bitch is an enemy we need to eliminate.”
“Haa… Why are you so obsessed with a whore like that? Don’t tell me you’ve fallen for her?”
Baek Do-hyeon and Baek Ha-ye.
With the Red Magic Tower Guild Master joining the combined assault, the Steel Alliance guild master fell silent, looking somewhat dejected.
The plan to deal with Lee Do-hee would proceed as originally intended, using the Chinese.
And so, the meeting ended. As everyone was leaving, the three men who had plotted to rape Lee Do-hee wore expressions of dissatisfaction.
*
As consciousness returned, Lee Do-hee slowly opened her eyes.
A mountain so high that clouds drifted past its peak.
The first thing she saw was a crudely made, shabby altar nearby.
“Ooh…!! Our savior!!!!”
“Our savior has descended!!”
“Finally!!”
“Huh…?”
As soon as I was summoned, countless fanatics prostrated themselves at the foot of the altar.
And they weren’t human…
“Pigs?”
They were large pigs.
‘What the…?’
[You are the savior of the Mechakucha Kingdom, founded by the Peokteu tribe. Help them overcome their crisis!]
“What kind of… kingdom?”
I didn’t ask why they chose such a ridiculous name. The pink pigs, all dressed up in clothes, were staring at me with sparkling eyes.
The keyword for the 24th floor was ‘Race War.’
‘This floor was always like this… but I’ve never seen pigs before.’
In my past life, I led an army of orcs on this floor and fought against lizardmen.
Humans didn’t exist on this planet. That’s why they treated us humans as saviors, avatars of the gods, or divine agents who had descended to the mortal realm through some unknown means.
Challengers of the 24th floor would become the savior of one of the tribes living on this planet, lead them, and drive out a rival race.
Usually, you were summoned to a tribe engaged in a fierce racial war, so the trial ended once you resolved it.
Regardless of my tilted head and confused expression, the pigs began to dance with joy at the fact that their savior had finally been summoned.
They were, of course, a bit different from ordinary pigs.
For one, they could walk on two legs, wield weapons, and were intelligent. They wore different clothes according to their status and even knew how to play musical instruments.
Tiri-ring~ Tiring~~
To the cheerful sound of a lute, the pigs joyfully shook their bodies and danced.
“Hooray!!!”
“We’re saved now~~!”
“Let the music play~~”
“……”
‘Why are they dancing so excitedly…?’
They were waving the trotters attached to their short limbs with such gusto that it made me feel awkward just standing there.
Just then, someone came running up the altar, breathing heavily.
“Huh?”
“What is it? You’re… one of the guard captain’s men?”
Seeing the look on his face, everyone seemed to realize something serious had happened, and they all stopped dancing and playing their instruments.
The altar fell silent.
His urgent voice echoed.
“Oink!! We’re in trouble! A large-scale raid! The Kalif tribe is leading a massive army… Gack!!”
‘What…?’
A sharp stinger, like that of a hornet, burst through the reporting soldier’s stomach.
“Guhhhh….”
The soldier tried to resist until the very end, but pincer-like blades emerged from the sides of his neck and snip!—they sliced his head clean off.
Fwoosh…
Blood spurted into the air as the pig’s head went flying.
Splat.
The moment the severed head landed at my feet, the pigs who had been dancing and celebrating began to scatter in all directions in a panic.
“H-Help me!!”
“I am the king. Protect me… Oink!”
“Oooooink!!!”
‘What is happening…?’
I looked up to identify the attacker.
It was a giant hornet, about two meters tall.
BZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ!!!
Starting with that one, giant hornets began to appear one by one near the altar, until hundreds of them filled the sky.