The Man Who Walked Out of the Ancient Ruins

Yujun, the man who had just walked out of the Ancient Ruins, broke into a bright smile.

This defense is no joke.

The first attack had come out of nowhere and startled him, but he was wearing a full set of level 150 armor. To Yujun, the blows of ninth-floor players did not even qualify as attacks.

The defense test is finished. Time to test a level 250 Legendary weapon.

The masked players had charged him first, fully resolved to kill him. That left him no reason to stand still. Yujun hardened his resolve, kicked off the ground, and as he ran he summoned Paranet again—the one he had dismissed only moments before.

"Nn... nngh? Ah!"

Yanked into the world without warning, Paranet was bewildered for only a heartbeat. He grasped the situation at once and broke into a run at Yujun's side.

The masked players flailed.

"Hold them! Protect the mages!"

"Yes!"

Mages were a vital class, covering offense, defense, and support all at once. Yujun knew it and drove straight for them, but the masked players caught on and closed ranks around their casters.

Well. Doesn't matter.

I'll take them from the front, one by one.

Three players came charging with longswords. One of them seemed about to trigger a skill; mana gathered along his blade. They thrust as one, and Yujun thrust back.

Shhk!

There was no clang of metal on metal—only the shearing note of something cut clean through. Every sword that met Yujun's blade split in half.

"Insane!"

"...It only touched them?"

"F-fall back!"

Warriors who had lost their weapons met an obvious end. Yujun's stats already far outstripped theirs, and he took their lives in a single instant.

This feels foul.

You'd think I'd be used to it by now.

Three lives had vanished on the back of one motion of his. He could not feel nothing about it. It was only the Equanimity trait that kept the feeling from going any further.

Showing mercy would mean nothing.

His face set, Yujun charged forward again. Two players with bows closed in, and at the same moment an ice-attribute spell came flying. Fire magic had failed, so they had ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠switched elements. It was useless. Fire had failed against him for one reason alone: his defense. Defense that far outclassed theirs shrugged off every magical attack, and Yujun met the sharp icicles head-on, armor first.

"M-monster! How did you just— magic..."

"Stop him somehow! If he reaches the mages, it's truly over!"

The chest of the player who had closed on Yujun blew open. A man nearby stumbled backward.

"W-we can't stop him!"

"Then throw your bodies in the way if you have to!"

Four players were already dead. Only six remained, and unease washed over the faces of the masked men still facing him. He did not stop.

Shhk! Thunk!

He moved without pause, driving them to the brink, and before long every player capable of close combat had died on his sword. What remained was one man with nothing but archer skills, and three mages.

"How... how is this even possible?"

"That gear... he must have taken items of Legendary rank or higher out of the Ancient Ruins. Nothing else explains it."

Against an enemy their attacks could not touch at all, they had no way to survive.

"Why did you attack me?"

"..."

"..."

The masked players clamped their mouths shut as one. Yujun pressed the few who still lived, asking again and again who they were, and got nothing for it. He let out a sigh and swung.

Shhk!

The fight was over.

A penalty? Right. From level 100, karma starts to stack.

To discourage indiscriminate player killing, slaying a player incurred a penalty: every stat reduced by a set percentage, the reduction growing steeper the more players one killed. He had thought the rule applied only inside the game. Seeing it now, it seemed to hold in reality just the same. Fortunately, the power of the Primordial Player spared him the PK penalty.

They said that because I'm the Primordial Player, I take no penalty at all. Does that hold even when it isn't self-defense?

If he could strike another player first and suffer nothing for it, the privilege was absurd.

Were they following me, then?

The masked players had come for him as if they had been waiting.

Well. Obvious at a glance that I was the target.

Yujun swept the items they had left into his inventory.

Nearby, Jin Changho and Park Seoksan had watched the whole fight. For a long moment they stood as if their souls had left them, unable to move.

"Th-that can't..."

"..."

Their eyes met.

"We don't even know who he is, so... I can't tell if that was skill or the items."

"He's got skill too. You think good gear alone lets one man take ten? You saw how he moved."

"Fair... he looked plenty used to his own ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠body. And he didn't hesitate at all when he killed them."

Jin Changho's brow tightened.

"That was dangerous. Lucky there were people who moved faster than we did."

"Now that you say it... whoa. We really almost died. If we'd been the ones to attack first, we'd be the corpses, wouldn't we?"

"Right."

"So? What are you going to do?"

Park Seoksan asked it with an uneasy face. Jin Changho had refused to bend, right to the end, determined to dig the secret out of the ruins. They had come all the way to the verge of that prize, and Park Seoksan could not imagine him giving it up easily.

"We pull out."

"...What?"

Park Seoksan's eyes went round. It was not an answer that belonged in Jin Changho's mouth. The usual man would have tried anything to learn what the ruins held.

"That man just now is outside every standard. There's nothing I can do..."

Jin Changho's voice had gone thin. Park Seoksan nodded, carefully.

"Yeah. Get greedy past your station and all you buy is a corpse's lot."

Whether the words stung his pride, the corner of Jin Changho's eye twitched.

Before challenging the tenth floor, Yujun stopped at the residential zone. Passing level 100 had changed which zone he belonged to: the district of level 100 and above, where other races began to appear.

Here, people past level 300 were a common sight. From this point it was more accurate to call the place another continent than a residential zone—a foothold the people of the Continent had built together with other races, into which, by the setting, players had appeared. The information he gathered confirmed that this was true in fact as well as in lore. Plenty of the Continent's own inhabitants were players too, because the Primordial Player had granted player abilities to the Continent's humans as well as ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠to anyone else. In any case, this was where other races and high-level players began to appear in earnest. Everything before it had been, in effect, nothing but a low-level zone. A tutorial.

I need to be careful from here.

A residential zone was not safe simply for being called one. Bandits could raid an inn and snuff a life out for nothing, or a monster assault could erase a village overnight. Yujun spent two days walking the city of Pantera, collecting what he could.

So the continent from War of the Gods really was moved into the Tower of Infinity as it stood.

He had expected as much, vaguely. Put together with what he had already learned in the zones below level 100, it was an easy prediction.

For now, I focus on clearing the Tower of Infinity.

Even if he wanted to return to Earth, there was no way back. All he could do was his best with the situation in front of him, and the best way for him to grow stronger was to raise his level. He already owned better items than anyone. The moment his level caught up, Yujun could become stronger whenever he pleased. So where was the best place to gain levels?

A hidden dungeon.

On the tenth floor there was a hidden dungeon whose location only Yujun knew. Someone might already have cleared it, but the odds were high that it still lay untouched.

First, the ninth-floor trial.

It was not a trial to take lightly, but Yujun was not particularly worried. His current specs stood vastly above players of the same level. They were not even comparable. His stats were high enough, relative to his level, to drop a jaw, and his items needed no mention at all.

Shame I barely have skills or traits.

Set beside his lavish items and titles, his skills and traits were badly few. He had only Equanimity. Cleaving Strike was a fine skill, but that alone could hardly swing a fight.

I can make my own use of it, but...

He wanted better skills.

Even so, I'll save the Long-Aged Elixir until I'm wearing luck items.

More.

He had to grow stronger, and faster. He was five years behind the other players. Even with an inventory that could close that gap, he could not settle into the present and let his guard down.

Step. Step.

The ninth floor's clearance trial, like the fifth's, was a boss raid. This time, unlike before, he meant to run it alone—something other players could not even imagine. A boss monster was a being on an entirely different order from ordinary monsters. Yujun was not greatly worried. In War of the Gods, items carried enormous weight, and having already faced the boss of the fifth floor, he expected to pass the ninth without much trouble. He set his hand on the stone statue at once and took the trial.

Wooong—. Woon—!

He warped. It was not a sealed chamber this time. Open country stretched away before him.

Shaaaa—!

The stage of the ninth-floor trial was a sheer cliff with a waterfall pouring down its face. On one side the falls crashed; on the other, the land opened so wide that no end of it could be seen. The boss to be raided here was none other than a false water dragon. It only looked the part. It was simpler to think of it as a giant snake that lived in water. It was decisively no match for a true dragon, but the thing was so enormous that killing it took players ages, a tenacious boss in a different sense from the troll of the fifth floor.

To clear this, you usually had to gather at least three extreme damage dealers with the fire attribute.

Ordinary firepower struggled to kill the snake, and toughness was not its only virtue. Its body was extremely agile, and now and then it sprayed venom from its mouth, dealing fatal wounds. More troublesome than the troll, and harder to kill. That was the ninth floor's false water dragon.

"Paranet."

"Yes?"

"Stand in front."

"...But of course. Such is my place."

Paranet was undead. Poison would only corrode bone; it would not take his life.

That was when it happened.

"Kyaaaok!"

The giant snake, having found Yujun, flicked its tongue. What it would do now that it had noticed him was obvious. Yujun moved first. He planted a foot on the skull of Paranet, who stood one pace ahead, and leapt high.

"Ack! My head!"

A bare skull was slick underfoot, but his Agility was high enough that he never lost his balance. In an instant he rose level with the snake's head, and as gravity dragged him back down he drove his sword into it.

Shhk—!

A single shearing note.

Whump! Splash!

The headless bulk of the false water dragon sank beneath the lake. That was the end ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠of it.

"..."

Paranet, who had been just about to throw himself into the fight, froze mid-motion.