First Defeat
First Defeat
On the way back after parting ways with Cha Seo-yun and Hong Chae-yeon.
Just before we separated, Cha Seo-yun had cautiously asked me something.
She said she couldn't even begin to estimate how much the treatment cost would be.
Her earnest and desperate expression had left me tongue-tied, like a mute who'd eaten honey.
Crafting items and healing ailing body parts might be my area of expertise, but calculating how much that was worth was completely out of my domain.
In the first place, there was no way a set market price existed for eye drops that permanently restored eyesight.
I'd dreamed of a sweet freeloader lifestyle ever since my Tower Gallery days, but when faced with genuinely complex market logic or money calculations, I always felt infinitely small.
That's when Hong Chae-yeon stepped in.
"That's something to discuss with me, Seo-yun-ah. I'll calculate it precisely and relay it to Si-woo."
Hearing Hong Chae-yeon's confident and self-assured voice, I let out a deep sigh of relief internally.
Indeed, when it came to this kind of business acumen and complicated calculations, Hong Chae-yeon was overwhelmingly superior.
Every time I see that kind of sharp, efficient handling of matters, I can't help but think how reassuring it is.
A silly fantasy suddenly flashed through my mind of how comfortable it would be to have Hong Chae-yeon by my side as my personal secretary.
From material procurement to annoying price negotiations and miscellaneous cleanup work, she'd handle everything perfectly on her own - wasn't that the ideal secretary?
But I soon let out a scoff and shook my head.
Imagining the guild leader of the top guild representing South Korea as my personal secretary.
Kim Si-woo, you've really come a long way.
Not too long ago, I was a guy who staked his life on convenience store hourly wages going up by a few hundred won and scraped by on expired boxed lunches tossed out for disposal.
And now here I am, handling money in units of 10 billion, even fantasizing about keeping a major guild leader as my secretary.
You really never know how a person's life will turn out.
I returned home and plopped down on the bed.
Anyway, I'd perfectly healed both of Cha Seo-yun's eyes.
It felt like my heart had become much lighter, as if I'd finally finished a long-overdue vacation homework assignment.
Now it was time to resume climbing the Tower.
The faces of the cheerful Tigris and the reliable Romanike, whom I'd met at the Beastman Village on the 21st floor, briefly surfaced in my mind.
I sprang up from my spot.
I quickly loosened up my body and stepped outside.
The dawn air was cold and crisp as always, but my steps were lighter than ever.
I passed through the streets thick with darkness and stood before the Tower's entrance.
The colossal Tower stood silent as ever, keeping its place without a word.
I took a deep breath and placed my hand on the entrance shimmering with blue light.
A familiar vibration spread from my fingertips through my entire body.
-Ding!
[Entering the 22nd Floor.]
Along with the crisp system notification, a heavy sense of buoyancy enveloped my body.
My vision flashed white, and a new world swallowed me whole.
The whiteness receded and my vision cleared.
The rich scent of grass tickled my nose, and a sudden dampness hit me.
It was unmistakably the landscape of that enormous forest and the Beastman Village I'd seen on the 21st floor.
"Oh! Human! Came again, nyang!"
Before I could even look around, a bright voice struck my ears.
When I turned my head, I saw Tigris in the distance, wagging her tail vigorously as she sprinted toward me.
Her eyes sparkling with delight as she launched herself at me, she looked exactly like a little child begging to play.
But just before she could jump into my arms, a large hand suddenly burst out from midair and grabbed Tigris by the scruff of her neck.
"Where do you think you're recklessly charging off to again!"
It was the giant tiger beastman, Romanike.
Dangling in the air, Tigris flailed her short limbs like a cat that had missed its prey.
"Ah let go, nyang! I'm going to play with the human, nyang!"
"I told you to show proper courtesy to guests!"
At Romanike's rebuke, Tigris ended up sullenly dropping her ears flat.
Lowered to the ground, she pouted her lips as if still unsatisfied and thumped her tail against the floor.
Looking at Tigris's slumped shoulders, Romanike let out a deep sigh as if nursing a headache.
Turning his head toward me, Romanike greeted me with an awkward expression.
"You've come again. I've been waiting. And anyway, this little one has been absolutely moping herself sick at not being able to play with you."
"Haha, well, I'm fine. I'm happy to see you too."
When I answered with a laugh, Romanike stroked his chin as if lost in thought for a moment, then soon spoke up.
"Now that I think of it, last time, this one bolted in fright at the sight of blood, so your bout never properly concluded. What do you say? How about a proper sparring match to settle it this time?"
Sparring.
At that word, I hesitated slightly.
All the battles I'd experienced climbing the Tower so far had literally been kill-or-be-killed fights, with blood spraying and flesh tearing.
Extreme situations where it was either cut down the monsters or lose my own head.
A fight in the formal sparring style, with established rules and exchanging blows, was the first of its kind in my life.
But as I thought it over quietly, it was quite a tempting proposition.
A chance to purely read my opponent's movements and test my skills without being crushed by killing intent.
Even just for dealing with the powerful enemies I'd face climbing higher floors in the future, this kind of experience would undoubtedly be a great help.
"Alright. Let's give it a shot."
When I readily accepted, Tigris's thoroughly drooped ears shot right up.
Overjoyed, she swished her tail and took the lead.
"Human! Follow me, nyang! I'll guide you, nyang!"
We moved our steps toward the training ground located inside the village.
The place we arrived at was a wide, circular clearing.
Thick, soft dirt was laid on the ground so that falling wouldn't cause serious injury.
Looking around, besides where we stood, several similar training grounds were visible here and there.
In those places, other beastmen were already mixing fists, breathing heavily.
Even as they threw each other down and rolled around, their faces were filled with hearty laughter as if enjoying themselves instead of showing irritation.
They seemed to enjoy sweating and clashing with each other itself rather than obsessing over victory or defeat.
To the beastmen, sparring seemed to be as natural and pleasant a culture as breathing and eating.
While I was marveling at the surrounding scenery, beastmen had begun to gather like a cloud around the circular training ground where Tigris and I stood.
Word must have spread instantly about the human who had planted Romanike into the ground facing off against Tigris, the village's greatest talent.
Expectant murmuring could be heard from all directions.
"Alright then, shall we head in slowly?"
I loosened up my body lightly and tried to step into the training ground.
My steps, armed with the Orichalcum set, were overflowing with confidence.
That was when it happened.
Romanike's large hand clamped down on my shoulder.
"Hm? What's the matter?"
When I turned my head to ask, Romanike swept his heavy gaze down from the crown of my head to the tips of my toes.
The Orichalcum helmet emitting a faint purple radiance, the sturdy breastplate, even the gauntlets wrapping every knuckle.
His gaze was fixed on my equipment.
Soon, Romanike spoke in a voice that sounded as if stating the utterly obvious.
"In our beastmen's training grounds, barehanded combat is tradition. You'll have to take off all that cumbersome metal junk before entering."
At his calm, single sentence, I froze right then and there.
What did he just say?
Barehanded?
In an instant, the terrible memory flashed through my mind of nearly having my bones shattered by one punch from Tigris last time in the forest, even while wearing that incredible Orichalcum armor.
Take all this off and fight barehanded against that wild beast with monstrous physical abilities?
I couldn't hide my dismay and ended up blurting out a dumb sound.
"......Excuse me?"
At Romanike's firm words, I ultimately had no choice but to tearfully remove the Orichalcum set piece by piece and place them in the inventory.
The moment the reassuring weight that had been wrapped around my entire body vanished, chills ran down my spine as if I were stark naked.
As I stood on the soft dirt floor in lightweight training clothes, the ferocious aura of Tigris, who was limbering up on the opposite side, pierced directly into my skin.
"The rules of sparring are simple. If you're pushed out of the circle or your back touches the ground first, you lose."
Romanike, standing outside the circular training ground with his arms crossed, took it upon himself to referee, explaining the rules in a booming voice.
But no sooner had his explanation finished than Tigris, who had been standing quietly, curled up the corner of her lips.
-Tass!
"W-wait...!"
With the sound of kicking off the ground, Tigris came shooting into my chest with a bright smile.
I cried out urgently in panic, but the small, sharp fist flying right before my eyes showed no sign of stopping.
I absolutely had to dodge.
Even when fully decked out in equipment, it was a destructive force that instantly stole my breath.
If I took that fist head-on right now without a single piece of protective gear, it would be instant death, and even grazing it would be a fatal injury shattering my bones.
I desperately hurled my body sideways onto the soft dirt covering the ground.
The terrifying sound of rending air grazed past my ears.
But before Tigris even withdrew her missed punch, she bounced back with beastly elasticity and charged at me again.
Even if the equipment with its insane options was removed, the triple-digit stats that had monstrously increased through level-ups and rewards were ingrained in my physical body.
On top of that, the combat experience accumulated while crossing the line between life and death from Floor 1 to 20 had seeped deep into my bones and made my body move instinctively.
Another punch flying right under my chin.
I traced back the memory of planting Romanike into the floor with a hip throw at the village entrance last time.
Although the absence of equipment compensation and skill assistance made it a somewhat awkward preparatory stance for the hip throw, I narrowly managed to dodge the punch and succeeded in grabbing her slender forearm tightly.
'Got it!'
It was that brief, fleeting moment as I internally whooped in triumph and attempted the hip throw.
Tigris's golden pupils, her arm caught by me, lengthened vertically and split sharp.
As if she had clearly recalled that very technique her samchon had been struck by from me, that look in her eyes.
She shot out a punch with her other hand, and simultaneously, the long tail that had been gently swaying behind her hips stretched out like a snake and wound tightly around my waist.
"Huh...?"
I yanked the arm I'd grabbed with all my strength and attempted the hip throw.
But Tigris's small frame didn't budge a single inch, as if rooted into a giant boulder.
On the contrary, terrifying strength went into the tail coiled around my waist, and both my feet began to lift into the air.
"Wah!"
Using the tail wrapped around my waist, Tigris hoisted me right up, then roughly hurled me straight to the opposite side.
My vision spun round and round as my body hurtled headlong toward the dirt floor of the training ground.
-Kudangtangtang!
As I rolled and flew across the floor, soft sand and dirt dust kicked up violently like a wave.
I felt sand crunch between my teeth as I barely managed to raise my head.
Beyond the wave of sand scattering in all directions, two golden eyes flashed like a wild beast eyeing its prey.
Tigris had already closed in right before my nose and was extending her fist at an absurd speed.
There was no time to fix my stance, no room to dodge.
The moment I saw that small fist filling my entire field of vision and flying toward me, I felt the word "death" directly on my skin for the first time in my life.
It was the instant my breath was choked off and the fine hairs all over my body stood on end.
"That's it! Kim Si-woo, loss by ring-out!"
Romanike's resonant voice boomed across the training ground.
Simultaneous with that cry, Tigris's fist, which had been rushing forward as if to crush the bridge of my nose, stopped precisely one centimeter before my eyes as if it were a lie.
Only the biting blade-like wind arising from her fist roughly scattered my bangs.
Breathing roughly, I turned my head to the side.
My right hand, which had unconsciously pressed against the ground as I was pushed back, could be seen well past the white circle marking the boundary of the training ground.
My perfect defeat.
Retracting her fist, Tigris puffed up both cheeks petulantly and grumbled as if deeply dissatisfied.
"This isn't right, nyang! Different from last time, nyang! Boring, nyang!"
Hearing her whining, I clenched the sand on the ground tightly.
Seeing myself become this helpless just from removing one piece of equipment, bitterness and stubbornness surged up inside me simultaneously.
"You, don't be rude to the guest!"
Romanike strode over and lightly grabbed the back of Tigris's neck as she pouted and insisted on sparring again, calming her down.
And he extended his thick hand to me, slumped on the dirt floor.
"Are you alright? No injuries anywhere? Maybe your condition isn't good today?"
At his worried question, I brushed off the sand I'd been clutching and gave an awkward laugh.
"...Yeah, well... no major injuries anywhere."
Having no excuses to make, I swallowed a bitter smile and took Romanike's rough hand to stand up from the spot.
Watching me dust the sand off my pants, Romanike stroked his chin and asked, sounding puzzled.
"A truly strange thing. Then and now, why do you not use Qi? And all the while carrying such pure energy inside you."
That Qi talk again.
Judging that there was no longer any reason to hide or beat around the bush, I looked at him and honestly opened up.
"Actually, just like last time, I don't know precisely what this Qi you speak of is, Romanike-nim, nor do I know how to draw upon and use it."
Hearing my reply, Romanike blinked with a dumbfounded expression for a moment, then soon tilted his head back toward the sky and burst into hearty laughter as if the forest might just get swept away.
"Hahahaha! How could a man who doesn't even know how to handle Qi come to harbor such pure and colossal energy within his body! And on top of that, without using so much as a single pinch of that power, clad in that heavy armor, you smashed me into the floor—truly, a man of such shocking amazement!"
After laughing until he even shed a few tears, Romanike steadied his breath and very simply explained to me the essence of Qi and how it circulates through the body.
The moment I heard his explanation, just as I had expected, I could confirm with certainty that what they called Qi was indeed the 'Aura' listed in my status window.
Having finished his explanation, Romanike's eyes gleamed with seriousness.
Lightly patting my shoulder, he threw out a proposal.
"Leaving such splendid talent and energy to go to waste is something I, as a warrior, cannot stand to see. Very well, what do you say, Si-woo? How about I personally teach you the methods of using Qi."