Chapter 169
Chapter 169
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 169
Chapter Title: The Rift Core
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“That’s...”
The ominous black sphere sitting in the living room.
Penny turned to me with a startled expression.
“How did you bring that here?”
“I got it as a gift.”
“What? No, how?”
Penny seemed to know what this object was.
She gazed at the orb with a complicated expression and said,
“That’s the rift core.”
[??? → Rift Core]
A core that can be found in specific areas outside.
It serves as the essence and heart of the rift.
It can be destroyed!
“Oh...”
I read through the plausible description.
So this little thing was the essence of the rift.
“No, wait a minute...”
Even now, the gallery surgeons were erasing rifts in various ways.
But if this was the rift’s essence...
What were all the ones we’d wiped out so far?
That was when Penny slowly opened her mouth.
“I don’t know how you got it, but... this can’t be destroyed.”
“Huh?”
“Even back when I was outside, I never saw one of these break.”
The problem was that it couldn’t be destroyed.
Penny had seen this a few times before she lost her power.
But no matter what method they tried, that small, ominous bead never shattered.
“What happens if you break it?”
“The rift made from that core will close.”
The problem was that it couldn’t be destroyed.
My thoughts were a bit different.
“I think it can be destroyed.”
“...Really?”
The system doesn’t lie.
It would have just said it didn’t know if it didn’t.
I approached the orb.
[No physical threats detected.]
[Can be easily destroyed!]
“Hmm...”
Had the system ever welcomed something this much?
But at least it had never led to anything that threatened my life.
The moment I reached out to grab the orb, Penny urgently grabbed my collar.
“What are you doing? Don’t!”
She hadn’t expected me to grab it, judging by her wide eyes.
“Malphite, can’t you hear that voice? That creepy voice?”
Penny glared at the small orb and said.
I looked at the orb too, but felt nothing.
“Can’t hear it?”
“Th-then what about a headache or stabbing pain through your body?”
“Nope.”
I couldn’t sense anything cursed about it. It’d look perfect as a decoration in a tarot shop, though.
Penny stared up at me blankly, then suddenly clung to me.
She glared at the orb and said in a resolute tone,
“If anything happens, I’ll protect you.”
-Hummm
The famous sword, which had been acting as a fan, flew over and hovered by my side.
Amid all the fervent attention and worry, I picked up the rift core from the floor.
“!”
And in that instant, my eyes widened.
“Malphite!”
Facing the startled Penny, I said,
“I don’t feel a thing.”
“...?”
“It’s just a bead.”
It felt like one of those glass marbles they sold in bulk at the stationery store back in elementary school.
I was toying with it, surprised by the underwhelming reaction.
-Crack
“Huh?”
A crack appeared on the core in an instant.
I tilted my head, thinking it was an illusion, but then a dark light burst from the rift.
-Crash!
It shattered completely.
-Crumple
At the same time, the rift Viscount had come from crumpled up like a piece of paper.
[Rift successfully removed!]
[Acquired 10,000p!]
A massive amount of points dropped into my hands at once.
*
A passageway filled entirely with stairs.
It was extremely cramped.
So cramped and unpleasant that I didn’t want to move an inch.
Viscount took a breath and muttered,
“So this is outside.”
The culprit behind the Great War, the hell that endlessly spewed beasts.
He’d expected a landscape of blood, flesh, and screams, but reality was completely different.
Stairs, and more stairs.
Even looking down, all he could see was a long passage of stairs.
“It’s like a tower...”
Occasional growls from beasts echoed up the walls.
Douglas Viscount gripped his sword and descended the stairs.
What he saw was 8F.
“What’s this?”
Markings made of pictures of people running, numbers, and incomprehensible letters.
He slowly opened the door.
A vast space unfolded before him.
“...What is this place?”
Shelves of all kinds and what looked like building debris.
Panels with unintelligible writing and faded carpets stretched out long.
There were so many rooms that every time he entered one, another vast space appeared.
“...What the hell is this place used for?”
Countless chairs all faced one direction.
At the end, a huge cloth hung from the wall, covering one side.
It was just like a theater.
The entire 8F was full of such things.
No gains.
“Heading down to the lower floor.”
And so he went even further down.
He had no intention of returning alive anyway.
He planned to avenge his wife and daughter and then die.
-Clank
Descending the stairs, he reached 7F.
Slowly opening the door, what he saw was...
“...People?”
No, wooden puppets in human shapes.
Each one frozen in some pose, draped in rags.
It was bizarre.
Nothing could be more bizarre than this.
Viscount had no desire to understand it.
“Where are the beasts?”
What use was understanding hell?
Fortunately for Viscount, there were beasts on 7F.
“Kieek!”
Ghoul-like grotesque beasts.
They were miscellaneous beasts, so not too difficult.
After clearing the beasts left on the floor, Viscount descended to the lower level via the stairs again.
6F, 5F, 4F...
“What in the world is this place for?”
One floor was filled with smiling pictures.
Another was packed solely with shoes, bizarrely enough.
The beasts poured out more and more as he headed lower.
-Slash!
“Ugh...”
Around the 3rd floor down, massive beasts began to appear.
“I wish I could show this to Lord Judak...”
But Viscount’s wish was impossible.
[This location is outside the service area.]
The gallery wouldn’t turn on at all.
And so he reached 1F.
“Kieek!”
“Grrr!!”
Even more beasts than before welcomed Viscount.
1F, so was this the last?
But as expected.
“Stairs... again.”
There were stairs leading down once more.
B1F, B2F...
From then on, he could feel his body starting to break down.
Something was wrong inside his armor.
His vision gradually turned red.
Wounds kept accumulating from the battles.
Yet he pressed on without stopping, and the place he arrived at was...
“This must be the final floor.”
B4F.
After that sign, the stairs no longer continued downward.
It was the moment Viscount opened the glass door.
A massive open space like a plaza appeared.
Iron masses on wheels of unknown purpose, parked at regular intervals.
Viscount spotted it at the end.
“That’s...”
A single black, ominous orb floating in the air.
A strange object that the beasts were particularly protecting and circling.
Just looking at it felt ominous, sending chills down his entire body.
“Grraa!”
Above all, a variant beast stood before the orb, glaring at Viscount.
[Deliver this object to Judak.]
The system blared notifications as if it had been waiting for this moment.
“Take that to Judak, huh?”
Viscount couldn’t comprehend this space or the system’s alert.
But he understood what Judak had done for him all this time.
“Must be something pretty important.”
He’d already sliced through beasts equivalent to a full wave without rest.
Now facing a variant beast, but he wasn’t particularly scared.
What would Don Quixote do in this situation?
“I’ll give it a shot.”
He readjusted his steel sword with both hands and charged forward.
And when Viscount came to again...
- Judak*) Hey man, you awake?
“...Lord Judak?”
He could see Judak’s text floating before his eyes.
*
- Oh, he’s opening his eyes
- Whoa, how’d you survive?
- This jobless NEET Alex(39) prayed hard and it paid off ㅇㅇ;
ㄴ No fuck how are you still alive
ㄴ This guy’s a bigger internal enemy than the beasts
ㄴ (Elfkyaaaaak! Corn)
The viscount, who had collapsed as if dead, woke up.
The effect was like pouring potion on water.
“Where...?”
Viscount bolted upright, looked around, then checked his own body.
Naturally, he was perfectly fine, without a single wound.
“The illness... No, why doesn’t my body hurt?”
On top of that, the orange bottle he’d had was gone.
“Potions aren’t fully developed yet.”
They could heal external wounds, but not internal illnesses.
The reason it was cured was simple.
Viscount had fought nearly to death.
The areas infected with the disease had been outright wounded and healed in the process, wiping out the illness.
He’d literally physically beaten the disease.
“Lord Judak!”
Viscount looked around, checked the gallery, and urgently called for me.
“That black orb...”
- Judak*) Yeah, thanks to you it’s all sorted
“Ahh...”
Destroying the core had made that rift disappear.
Watching the relieved viscount, I waited a moment before asking,
- Judak*) So what happened inside?
I got a detailed description of the outside scenery from Viscount.
Endless stairs.
Each floor marked with nF.
Some floors like theaters, others lined with wooden puppets in human shapes.
“It was a hell I couldn’t understand, and didn’t want to.”
Viscount hardened his expression recalling it.
He said it felt like being trapped inside a massive building.
After organizing his descriptions one by one, I reached my own conclusion.
“That’s totally a department store.”
Movie theater, men’s and women’s clothing floors, countless shoe stores, and underground parking.
The place Viscount had fallen into was a ruined department store.