Chapter 3–9. What Changes and What Doesn't (1)
The Fire Pterosaur turned out to be a disappointingly easy kill.
Then again, any flying lizard whose defenses crumbled the instant Siara's fist connected was doomed to become a smear of blood sooner or later.
"Hohoho! How was that?"
"You land your hits well, even though your reach has gotten so much shorter."
"What? What did you just say?"
He'd spoken in Korean that time, not the common tongue.
There really was nothing like your mother tongue for moments like this.
"I said that was cool."
"That was a bit long for 'cool.'"
"I said it was really cool."
"Hmm…."
Timothy, who'd been watching the exchange, stifled a small snicker.
Right — the kid understood Korean well enough.
Shh—
Lee Jun shot him a signal, careful to keep it out of Siara's line of sight.
Timothy nodded, fighting down his laughter.
In any case, the hunt for the variant Fire Pterosaur wrapped up remarkably fast.
The climb back up had honestly been more exhausting than the fight itself. Solo, this place had been hellish; add a handful of S-Class hunters, and suddenly it was a walk in the park.
No wonder people paid fortunes to scout high-rank hunters.
"Well then, shall we go find the door?"
Locating a randomly spawned door was, in the current situation, laughably simple.
The volcanic peak they stood on was the highest point in the entire region. Thanks to the eruption, there was nothing obstructing their view but ash and smoke.
And just as predicted, the door to the fourth floor turned up in no time.
"There we go — not even that far away."
Roughly 250 meters to the northwest. Dodging the lava flows to get there would be a mild nuisance, but it wouldn't take long.
"So what's the theme on the fourth floor?"
"Never been there, so I don't know."
"Hmm, so there are things even Jun doesn't know."
Why did she look so delighted about that?
Not that it mattered — he was, in fact, very well acquainted with the place.
The fourth floor was a cliffside expanse, a stretch of sheer rock face running on and on. The objective was to hunt down the Polygots leaping between the vertical crags.
The Polygots weren't particularly aggressive, so no one was in any real danger from them. The problem, conversely, was the time it ate up — the things never fought back; they only ever fled.
Worse, if even a single Polygot fell off the bottom of the cliff, the run was a failure. There was no ground beneath it. Anything that dropped past that edge simply kept falling, forever. Back in a previous cycle, when the Association's Technical Bureau director had tossed a transmitter over the edge, it had done nothing but plummet for days on end. At that point, you had to call it infinite.
So if a Polygot tumbled off the rock face… the condition of clearing every monster on the floor could never be met.
Having to wait out the entire respawn timer because of one lousy creature. What a nuisance.
Which raised the question — what happened if a person fell off those cliffs?
The answer was 'unknown.' No one had ever come back after falling.
It was safe to say the danger of dying grew substantially from the fourth floor onward.
That said, the floor had its perks. With no risk of monster ambushes, you could rest up on the clifftop for as long as you liked. It was the first true rest stop the Ant Nest had to offer.
The Polygots are pretty cute, too.
So cute, in fact, that Sisela had grown attached to them, and calming her down had taken considerable effort. A memory worth keeping, he supposed.
In any case, they had no intention of clearing the place today — grab the reward and head out. He couldn't explain it to them anyway, even if he wanted to.
"Alright, alright — let's hurry to the next floor already."
"Are you changing the subject?"
Siara was so pleased with herself she'd started hopping up and down. Lee Jun scooped her up, and the party quickened their pace.
The door to the fourth floor stood amid the churning lava, just visible through the heat haze.
"That's a dicey spot for it."
"Looks like we'll have to jump for it."
The gap was a little over two meters. Not far, exactly — but caution was still warranted.
Lee Jun stopped Jeanne, who had volunteered to go first, and passed through the door himself.
Whoosh—
The moment he crossed the threshold, an entirely different world opened up before him. Sparse grass tufted the open ground. Directly ahead stood a pedestal bearing the floor's reward, and behind it, a sheer cliff face plunged away into nothing.
Good — nothing's changed here.
Which meant the real question was the reward itself.
Would it be different this time, too?
Just then, a sound like escaping air came from behind him.
Fwaah—
Jeanne had crossed the threshold with both dolls cradled in her arms.
"It's completely different from the last floor."
"Right? It's nice and cool up here."
Jeanne nodded at that and began glancing around, taking in her surroundings.
"This place… feels strangely familiar."
"You think so too?"
The terrain was reminiscent of… the Dragon Gorge on the Prilya Continent. Given that every gate was a fragment of a different dimension, the resemblance might well be more than coincidence. Judging by the resident Polygots, though, it was probably from an era before the dragons had nested there.
Whatever era the original belonged to, the sight stirred up old memories. The Dragon Gorge had been cleared by these triplets, Pablo, and Lee Jun.
"That run was quite a novel experience."
"The party composition was new to me too. First time I'd ever moved with that many people in a simulation gate."
Come to think of it, it had been a genuinely fun campaign.
Aside from the part where he'd nearly been chewed to a pulp by a dragon.
He was on the verge of sinking into the nostalgia when Siara broke in on them.
"Aren't you going to check the reward? I want to see it — hurry up."
"What a mood-killer."
"Wh-what? It's just that now's not the time for pointless daydreaming!"
Fair enough. He agreed. Better to examine the reward sitting right in front of them than dwell on a time they could never return to.
"Let's see what we've got, then."
Thud… thud…
Lee Jun walked toward the pedestal. The three of them trailed behind him as though it were the most natural thing in the world.
This was what it must have felt like to be Kyle. That one had always been the one out front.
"Let's see…."
Two items rested on the pedestal.
First, as expected — an iron tablet. A woman's face was engraved in intaglio, one hand raised to cradle a round sphere. That sphere was the sun. Beneath it, the Roman numeral XIX was clearly visible.
Number 19 after all, then.
Arcana No. 19 — The Sun. Timothy's seal, exactly as he'd predicted.
"This is…?"
Timothy murmured the words from where Jeanne carried him. Even he couldn't make sense of it. No — it wasn't just Timothy. Every single person here was at a loss.
Lee Jun included.
"Hyung? Why is this here…?"
"Hard to say."
As he spoke, Lee Jun drew the other two iron tablets from his Pocket and held them up.
Kyle's, and Pablo's. The numerals carved into them — XXI and XX — caught the light.
None of the other three said a word.
They couldn't. It would take a while for the meaning of this to sink in. The reward was simply that far out of left field.
"Don't tell me… those two's seals were the rewards for the first and second floors?"
"Yep. And the third floor's is yours."
"So if we clear this place, Siara's seal comes out…?"
"Me? My seal?"
Siara, too, seemed utterly bewildered; she could only stare at the tablet. It was unmistakably identical to the one belonging to her older brother in her memory — down to the smallest detail. The triplets had designed their seals together, so there was no mistaking it, no matter how hard one tried.
Timothy climbed down from Jeanne's arms and examined the pedestal. He studied the seal for a moment, then turned his gaze to the object lying beside it.
Something placed there alongside his seal — namely:
"A watch?"
A pocket watch. Extremely battered, on the verge of falling apart.
"Hmm. If it's sitting with my seal, it must be connected to me somehow."
"Anything come to mind?"
"Honestly, I'm a bit at a loss myself. Why my seal is even here is a mystery to begin with…."
Timothy touched the tablet gingerly. One thing was certain: the size, the material, the texture, the intaglio pattern — even the spot where the carver's hand had slipped mid-engraving. It was, without question, his.
Ziiiip—
Timothy unzipped the seam along his own side.
…Hang on, are you allowed to just open that?
But where Lee Jun flinched, Timothy remained perfectly calm, drawing something out from within. A tablet of iron — the seal he carried with him at all times.
"I'm certain. My seal — or rather… this is the same object as the one I have left."
Only one of Timothy's seals remained in existence. The three spares he'd made had all been destroyed or lost in gates, which was why he'd ended up carrying the original.
"Fascinating. It's aged a little, but… it's unmistakably the same one."
"Is that even possible?"
"…I couldn't say. But Siara — I'm certain these two are the same object."
Timothy nodded, yet couldn't tear his eyes from the tablet. He had every right to be bewildered. His own seal surfacing as a dungeon reward was strange enough — but one identical to the very thing in his possession?
"What do you suppose it is? Could it be my seal from a slightly further future?"
"……."
"Haha, no, that's absurd. We already concluded time travel is impossible, after all."
Well. Regression existed. Who was to say.
"In any case, this should…."
"You keep it, Hyung."
"What?"
"The other two are already with you, aren't they? So keep this one safe as well."
There was something complicated in his expression as he said it.
Lee Jun could hardly blame him. These iron tablets carried a meaning, too — that of relics left behind.
"…All right."
"Haha, I'll feel better knowing it's with you, Hyung. Don't you dare lose it, now."
"……."
Somewhere, something felt off about all of this.
At this rate, I'm actually going to end up collecting the whole set. I'm turning into a walking memorial shrine.
And to be fair — it was true. Including Lee Jun himself, every last one of them had died in the end.
…Ah, right, one of them is still alive.
But knowing that one's personality… she'd have been dead soon enough anyway. She wasn't the type to endure being the last one left.
"Whew…."
With a sigh, Lee Jun tucked all three seals into his Pocket. Fine — they'd asked him to hold onto them, after all. He'd keep them safe.
Okay. One item left: the pocket watch. What on earth was this thing?
"Nothing jogging your memory?"
"Mm… no artifact description is popping up, so it seems to be an ordinary watch."
"Really? I can't tell — I've got nothing to compare it against."
Yeah, and I'd like a status window too, you damn god-thing or whatever you are.
All the while, Timothy turned the watch over in his hands, examining it thoroughly. But nothing out of the ordinary turned up. He flipped open the cover — nothing. Just hands frozen in place. Nothing but a broken watch.
"Confirmed. I can't find anything special about it."
"What time does it show?"
"Eleven thirty. Doesn't seem to mean anything, though."
He couldn't figure it out. Judging by the pattern so far, it had to be something connected to Timothy — but if the man himself didn't know, Lee Jun had no way of finding out either.
An item he acquires in the future, then — later than now.
In that case, holding onto it himself would be pointless.
"You keep that one."
"Hm?"
"Everything that's shown up alongside a seal so far has belonged to the seal's owner. So that watch must be tied to you somehow too."
"I genuinely don't remember anything like it…."
"The odds are high that it's connected to you or yours one way or another. Nobody knows what it is yet, so it's safest in your hands. If we figure it out later, we'll tell you."
"…Mm. All right."
He fiddled with the watch a little longer, then showed it to the other two, just in case they knew something he didn't.
Jeanne and Siara each took a turn with it, poking around here and there.
"What is this thing? There's no second hand? The hour and minute hands won't even move… what kind of watch is this?"
"I don't believe it's meant for telling time."
"Hmmm… strange. I don't recognize it, that's for sure."
"Neither do I."
"Is this thing actually gold, though?"
"Unni, you're not thinking of selling it, are you?"
"Oh, come on, we're rich. Who'd sell this? It doesn't even look expensive."
So you'd sell it if it looked expensive?
"One piece of advice: if a talking, walking doll brings it in, I'm not buying."
"I said I'm not selling it! What do you take me for?"
"Let's see… a walking rabbit plushie."
Pak—
"Knock it off."
Siara had driven a fist into Lee Jun's shin. Since she wasn't using her ability, it hit with all the force of any ordinary plush toy's cotton punch.
Normally that was all it amounted to — and yet with a single innate ability, she could shatter boulders.
Ha. If only I had an innate ability of my own…
{Aren't I basically your innate ability?}
What kind of innate ability talked back at its own user?
{…Then what about Styx?}
That one's output's too weak.
{You are a difficult person, you know that?}
Hard not to be, with something to measure against. Lee Jun found himself thinking of Pablo's gravity manipulation. Measured against that, the Shard of Styx he'd settled into his body was… frankly lacking.
Well — it was a growth-type relic. Give it time and it would probably become worth something.
"Whew… right. What's the point of agonizing over it now?"
Today's haul was more than enough. The real purpose of clearing the third floor had been to share the nature of these rewards with the three of them. Put their heads together, and a clue would surface.
So this much was enough for today.
"Let's head back."
"Already?"
"There are people waiting for us outside."
And clearing the fourth floor with their current numbers would be far too difficult — a poor matchup, you could say. The Ant Nest wasn't going anywhere. No sense getting greedy.
"Hmmm… and here I thought I'd finally get to stretch my muscles today. What a shame."
"Don't posturize, Siara. You were complaining how hard the climb was."
"B-brother! When did I ever!"
On the way back, Lee Jun walked along watching Siara and Timothy bicker.
It really was more fun this way than clearing things alone.
He watched the two dolls scamper ahead, then turned to Jeanne.
"What did you think of today's run?"
"My thoughts, sir?"
"That's what I asked."
She paused, gathering her thoughts, and Lee Jun waited patiently until she found her words again.
After a while, once her mind was settled, she spoke her impression in a low voice.
"This kind of joy… I think it's been a long time since I've felt it."
"I see."
There were two kinds of things in this world: the things that changed, and the things that never did.
Lee Jun… was fond of them both.