The Regressor Wanders (1)
The Regressor Wanders (1)
The reward for Floor 13 was the Experience Elixir and a trait called Quick Reflexes.
- Quick Reflexes [C]
- You won't have to worry about tripping over your own feet. Your reflexes improve in proportion to your stats.
Floor 13 was set in the wilderness, so the skill was likely meant for a gunslinger of the wilds. After a quick test with Choi Ji-won, I could definitely feel my reflexes had quickened. More precisely... my responses to attacks had sped up. It felt like my thoughts grew denser in extreme situations.
"Ji-won, did you get this trait too?"
"Yeah. Seemed like everyone got it, not just us."
"Hmm..."
The truth was, both Choi Ji-won and I had always fought by predicting our opponents' actions to some degree. Since our reflexes lagged slightly behind our physical abilities, it's more accurate to say we fought by reading the opponent's posture and gaze, predicting where and when attacks would land, and moving in advance. Battles were decided in a split second because both sides' predictions clashed.
The reason I'd been able to suppress top-tier players on Floor 11 wasn't just regression. This background factor was also at play.
But if reflexes get faster, the strategic game becomes far more complicated. An opponent might react just before my attack lands, and conversely, I could respond to a surprise attack and deal damage in return. From my standpoint, where taking damage triggers regression... this is likely a disadvantage.
"But I think the real beneficiaries of this trait are the mid- to low-rank players."
Choi Ji-won said, patting the Boongboong-yi draped over her shoulder.
"Think of it as the skill floor being raised. With a decent stat baseline, you can fight on physical ability alone even without any technique."
"That's true."
"The gap between players who cleared Floor 13 and those who didn't will probably widen... and the gap with ordinary people will grow even larger."
If battles up to now had been sword against sword, this felt like everyone had been handed a shield. If one day that shield grew larger and thicker... guns might stop working on players altogether.
"Let's put that aside for now..."
This wasn't something I could control. No matter how many regressions I had, I couldn't stop every player from climbing the Tower and growing stronger. That was beyond my power.
"From what I can tell, there's something on Floor 13 we still haven't discovered."
What mattered now was Floor 13 itself. Floor 13 wasn't like Floor 11, where everyone shared one world. It was like Floor 4, where a new world was created for each group that entered. And I believed there were still hidden secrets on Floor 13.
"But... the Association said there was no hidden route or anything like that."
"You shouldn't blindly trust the Association's statistics. We've talked about this before."
"Hmm... Actually, the Association did say there have been cases where players were reluctant to share information. You might be right."
Of course, the "hidden route" I'm talking about might not exist. But I'm certain there are still undiscovered secrets. Because Floor 13's structure is different from other floors.
Floors 11 and 12 were designed so that if one person acted out of greed, the damage was passed on to others. To put it a bit strongly, it wouldn't be an exaggeration to call them floors that encouraged betrayal.
But Floor 13? Floor 13 had no such mechanism. If you thought about it in a limited way, the carriage protection failure itself could be that mechanism. But wasn't that too simplistic? Escort missions were never that simple. By nature, they hid traps and twists.
Magical beasts charging in with blood-red eyes. The mustached man who appeared once and never again. The nun who suddenly emerged from within the village, and the transparent barrier concealing the village. There were still secrets left to uncover.
"If we can't get information in the real world, it can't be helped."
We'd just have to find out firsthand.
[You have taken damage.]
[Regressing to the moment you first entered Floor 13.]
***
If I had to pick the most suspicious thing on Floor 13, it would be this "carriage." The horses pulled it without eating or drinking, and inside, it was packed with suspicious wooden boxes.
My guess was that opening one of those boxes in the carriage would trigger a chain of events. Something like, once you opened a box, something besides magical beasts would attack.
"So... you're going to open what's inside the carriage?"
"That's right."
"Hmm..."
Honestly, the cleanest method would be to throw someone else in as bait. Someone was bound to give in to curiosity and rummage through the carriage anyway. If I just let it happen, I could gather useful information.
But knowing something would happen and just standing by bothered my conscience. I'd open it myself first. If things went badly, I could always have someone else do it instead.
"I can just regress. Right?"
"...Fine."
After I'd barely convinced Choi Ji-won.
"The carriage must never, ever be damaged! You must guard it with your utmost dedication."
Just like before, after listening to the mustached man's explanation, the carriage began to move. Everything up to this point had proceeded exactly as it had before. If I was going to act, now was the chance, while everyone stood there dumbfounded.
"H-hey!"
"What are you doing?"
Slash!
Without hesitation, I drew my sword and sliced the cloth covering the lead carriage clean in half. As the scraps of cloth fell limply, countless wooden boxes were revealed.
Crack!
The moment I smashed one with my fist, streams of pitch-black smoke poured from inside the box, staining the surroundings black.
"...!"
I instinctively held my breath and retreated a wide distance. But my skin had been briefly exposed to the smoke. What was this smoke? Should I regress?
"Cough, cough... what is this?"
"Are you insane?"
"..."
But even after waiting quietly, there was no sign of regression. My body was fine. I didn't feel anything unusual. What had changed? There had to be a reason the black smoke had burst out.
"Hey. I asked if you're insane. You want to die?"
"Uh... I'm sorry. I was sure I heard a sound from inside the box. I must have misheard."
"Sorry fixes everything? We all almost got completely screwed just now."
"He says he's sorry. How about letting it go?"
"Then what are the police for, what are laws for... Choi Ji-won?"
"I'll work harder. Let's move past this for now. The horses are still moving."
"...Alright."
Thanks to Choi Ji-won covering for me, I avoided immediate punishment, but my mind was still completely confused. Black smoke had come out, and that was it? There had to be some kind of change.
"...What's with that bastard?"
"Dunno. Probably a Choi Ji-won thing."
Enduring the glares of the other players, I desperately searched for any sign of change. After circling around the carriage for a while, I finally spotted one.
"The horse... looks a bit different."
The carriage whose box I had smashed. The eyes of the horse pulling that carriage had turned red. Come to think of it, its breathing was a bit ragged, and it kept baring its teeth and snorting.
It had transformed into something resembling the "magical beasts" that had been attacking the carriage. Since all the other horses were fine, there was clearly a causal link to me breaking the box.
"...If a certain number of boxes break, do the horses turn into magical beasts?"
This would make sense. We didn't know the way to our destination, the "village," and were moving entirely in the direction the horses led us. But if all the horses pulling the carriages turned into magical beasts? Game over. With no way to clear the floor, the most likely future was dying of thirst in the wilderness.
"..."
But something still felt off. I couldn't see the pattern from Floors 11 and 12, where "one person's greed or incompetence inflicted damage on everyone else."
"Should we deliberately turn a horse into a magical beast, then follow where it goes? No, that doesn't seem right..."
"Let's wait and see for now. Something will change."
"...Got it."
Following Choi Ji-won's advice, I continued observing without taking any action. A day passed like that, and finally, something unusual occurred.
"My body... what's wrong with me?"
One of the players complained of a noticeable decline in his physical ability.
"No, seriously, I was fine until yesterday. Then suddenly... I guess you'd call it dizziness, or like my body has no strength. It's really weird..."
When Choi Ji-won and I had cleared Floor 13, this man had been perfectly fine right up to the end. But now his body was suddenly in poor condition? There was only one reason.
"If even one box is broken... a debuff gets applied to one of the players..."
This satisfied the pattern I'd mentioned earlier: "one person's mistake or greed being passed on to others." If a player unable to contain their curiosity opened a box at night, the horse pulling the carriage would mutate, and another player's body would deteriorate as a result. It wasn't a system that rewarded selfish players, but the point—that everyone suffered because of one person's actions—was the same.
"Jun-ho. Isn't this settled, then?"
"..."
"We just got lucky and were skilled enough to perfectly clear Floor 13 on our first try. Since the carriage took no damage at all, there was no debuff, which is why it felt especially easy."
Our first attempt... had been a perfect success? It made sense. Even my rational mind was nodding along, agreeing this was the answer.
But something... a vague, uneasy feeling still lingered in my chest. Ah, I knew why.
"There's still something I haven't confirmed."
"...?"
"I haven't confirmed the true mastermind."
The one who had insisted on escorting these dangerous boxes. There was that nun who hid herself behind a transparent protective barrier and acted suspiciously.
If something was hidden, it would be hidden there.
"I need to get into the village."
The village... I had to check the village.