Chapter 33
Chapter 33
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>Translator: Ryuma
>Chapter: 33
>Chapter Title: What the Hell is This?
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The Tower of Trials was completely cut off from the outside world.
The external control devices had been seized.
The teleportation magic circles were dead, allowing no one in or out, and the emergency exits, built as backups, had been utterly sealed by some unknown magic.
Not only voice transmission, but even scouting via magic eyes was impossible.
The students inside had noticed the changes too.
“……? What’s up with the bracelet?”
“What? Disqualified? What did we even do?”
The first sign was the change in their bracelets.
The gems that had shimmered an iridescent green had turned a dull gray.
A signal of elimination from the trial. The students were briefly baffled but figured they’d been caught by some spell they hadn’t noticed and waited for teleportation.
But.
“Teleportation…… isn’t working?”
“It’s just the color, right? Wait a sec. Let me try a simple spell on you.”
The students tested their bracelets by casting minor spells on each other.
But the barriers didn’t activate.
The bracelets, which had served as defensive mechanisms, had degraded into mere gaudy trinkets with drab stones.
This was happening all over the Tower of Trials. Faced with the unexpected, the students puzzled over it but calmly headed toward the emergency exits.
Up to this point, there was no real sense of crisis.
A mistake on the Academy’s part.
That was all they thought.
It didn’t take long for the students to realize something was wrong.
[Die in despair.]
A voice echoed through the voice-transmission artifacts.
Eerie.
Not human.
The students shuddered at the deathly proclamation from that voice, grotesque like the Grim Reaper’s own.
A mistake by the Academy? No, that couldn’t be. Though distorted, the voice carried an indescribable madness that was anything but ordinary.
The second change came right after.
Thud! Thud! Thud!
Footsteps reverberating throughout the Tower of Trials.
Too heavy to be human.
The students held their breath before the sound. Huddled low like prey animals seeking cover from a predator, they slipped into corners and hid.
No one had told them, but instinct screamed it.
‘……Dangerous.’
‘I’m gonna die.’
Meeting the owner of those footsteps meant certain death, just as the voice had said.
But why?
Thud! Thud! Thud!
As they darted about to evade the footsteps, the students felt an eerie sense of déjà vu.
The paths were a labyrinthine maze, yet they’d left no traces. How, then, were those footsteps coming straight for them?
By the time the question arose.
The students began encountering the source of the footsteps, one by one.
Whirr—
“…….”
It was a golem.
But something was off.
Its core glowed red. What had once been blue now pulsed ominously, as if soaked in blood.
Its movements were different too.
They’d all faced golems at least once during the trial, but this was nothing like before.
Faster.
More fluid.
As if the ones they’d fought weren’t true golems but crude puppets—and this was the real deal, on another level entirely.
“Run……!”
Someone who’d spotted a golem shouted.
The students scattered in all directions, sprinting through the Tower’s twisting paths.
Thud! Thud! Thud!
Chase scenes erupted everywhere.
- Tower of Trials occupation: 10 minutes elapsed
Fatalities: 0
But in the end, it was only a matter of time.
* * *
“Hah, hah……!”
Chenbi ran along the uneven path.
Thud thud thud thud!
The rampaging golem chasing him from behind.
Compared to the earth-shaking pressure it exuded, its speed was actually quite slow. Generous as it sounded, it was about as fast as a regular person walking briskly.
But its stamina far exceeded human limits.
Upper, middle, lower.
Its three cores constantly absorbed ambient mana, converting it to magic power, which fueled its functions.
The biggest energy drain was its protective barrier; the magic power used for mobility was negligible.
What did that mean?
Unless you relentlessly hammered its barrier, it wouldn’t lose mobility.
But the human body?
‘I’m…… gonna die.’
Chenbi gasped, breath burning his throat.
His soles, sore from the rough ground, had long gone numb, and his swollen ankles sent only searing heat to his brain.
His calf muscles had weakened from the repetitive strain.
Chenbi’s body creaked like a poorly jointed doll.
Even mages, superior to common folk in physical prowess, panicked in sudden crises—and panic led to exhaustion.
‘Just…… a moment…… I want to rest.’
The temptation flashed through his mind.
But Chenbi bit his lip hard and shook off the weak thought.
‘No. If I die here, what about Father? Mother? Chensla?’
Their family wasn’t well-off.
They’d served as administrators for noble houses for generations, living more comfortably than average commoners, but only averagely so.
And the cost of learning magic was beyond “comfortable.”
When his talent for magic manifested as a child, he’d been thrilled.
- I’m going to be a mage? Me?
Knight or mage. To a boy from an ordinary home, those were dream words.
Fancy armor, ornate robes. Even without nobility, they commanded respect, and skill could earn titles and elevate status.
His young heart had raced.
But that joy lasted only then.
- Pay’s short this month. The lord gave a bit extra, but……
- Can’t be helped. With the bad harvest, even the lord’s struggling with central taxes. We’ll cut living expenses more this month.
As he grew, he overheard his parents at dawn one day.
That month, his two-years-younger sister quit her commoner school.
Nothing special about it.
Schools for commoners could be dropped anytime based on finances.
Chenbi would’ve brushed it off too if he hadn’t heard that talk.
He’d have thought his sister, holed up crying, was just throwing a tantrum. Complained about the hard bread on the table.
But that month.
A new magic book appeared on Chenbi’s shelf.
Nothing impressive.
Basic, foundational text that noble heirs wouldn’t glance at.
Yet its price could’ve covered his sister’s school and soft bread for the family for a month.
After that, their lives slowly changed.
What they’d thought comfortable became grateful even for crusty bread scraps. His sister, who’d wept for school, never mentioned it again.
But worse than these changes.
What stung Chenbi deepest was his family’s attitude—taking it all for granted.
- Don’t worry about anything. Just focus on your studies.
They demanded nothing.
In a house where no one was at fault, he alone felt like the sinner.
Utterly horrific.
If only they’d said: Become a mage and repay us. Pay back the favor. It’s an investment for the family. Work harder. After all we’ve done for you.
That would’ve eased his mind, at least.
So……
‘I don’t want to die. I don’t want to die.’
Chenbi kept running.
The Academy might be a given for noble heirs, a mere badge for the wealthy.
But for Chenbi, every day there was his parents’ sacrifice, an opportunity stolen from his sister.
A right snatched from his family and claimed.
‘I have to give it back.’
Guilt no one had imposed.
A debt he couldn’t escape.
He’d entered the Academy to wash it away. Greedily clung on one last time. Just three years—graduate, and he could do anything.
‘Definitely…….’
Trip.
“……Gah!”
Chenbi snagged on a rock and flew into the air with a death cry.
His limp body tumbled several rolls across the rough ground before slamming into the wall.
“Ugh.”
He tried to scramble up desperately, but something must’ve twisted wrong in the fall.
His ankle wouldn’t hold weight.
After several failed attempts, Chenbi looked up ahead.
Thud thud thud!
The pursuer charging with thunderous roars.
Its red-glowing core. Like a portent of his future. But red was just red—no future foretold.
Objectively, Chenbi’s future held nothing special.
Just fragile flesh crushed shapeless by unyielding stone.
Horrible for him, but the golem felt nothing. It merely functioned as designed, devoid of emotion.
That was all.
Of course, Chenbi couldn’t accept it.
“I’m not dying. Not dying. Not dying……. I absolutely won’t die.”
What kind of man was Chenbi?
A coward who wanted to hate his family to ease his own mind. Yet too weak to, he ended up hating himself—a bungling hypocrite.
Indecisive, neither bold nor brave, neither evil nor good. A worthless nobody.
Just that.
And yet……
“Absolutely.”
He wouldn’t give up till the end.
“Absolutely…….”
The utterly mediocre mage prepared the greatest spell he knew.
Once, a wandering mage who’d awakened his talent. The only man he could call master, leaving behind one grimoire.
Barely a year’s bond, but he’d given Chenbi much.
A glimpse of a new world, a brief sweet dream. Now just a clumsy debt on the path of magic……
Still, a benefactor.
The one spell he’d bequeathed.
[Earth Spear]
Far beyond Chenbi’s level to cast.
But.
‘Please, please…….’
Did his desperate will infuse the magic power?
Ssssh……
The earth shifted. Chenbi’s meager mana stimulated the ambient mana. A truly miraculous amount.
Drip.
Nosebleed poured like water from the overload, but Chenbi didn’t stop.
And finally.
“Please……!”
The spell activated.
Boom……!
A massive spike erupted from the ground. He’d once sneered at it as grandiose for a wanderer’s spell, but seeing it now……
‘Ah.’
Earth Spear suited it perfectly.
Awestruck by its majesty, Chenbi lost himself.
But.
No miracle followed his admiration.
Whirr.
The golem, briefly halted by the spear, moved again.
The spell was powerful, its barrier flickering out for a moment—but that was it.
A proper Earth Spear might’ve pierced the barrier and shattered the golem’s body outright……
But Chenbi wasn’t a genius.
Thud thud thud thud!
Just four steps.
The golem closed in and raised its fist.
As shadow fell over Chenbi’s face, his eyes blankly fixed on the descending stone.
In truth, it happened in an instant.
The golem had no emotions, thus no sentiments. Lingering before a captured target was for emotional beings.
It simply raised its hand and swung down—
Thud!
The golem’s fist struck the ground.
That was all.
……If not for the interloper.
“Fucking hell.”
A familiar voice from somewhere.
“……?”
Chenbi cracked open his squeezed-shut eyes.
Before him stood the back of a boy—not broad by any means. His hair was a dull, almost obnoxious gray.
As Chenbi registered that.
His mouth gaped blankly.
“……A, Aster?”
“What the hell is this shit, seriously. Hang on a sec. We’ll chat after I deal with this.”
“N-No, Aster, it’s dangerous……!”
Chenbi shouted urgently, but Aster moved faster.
He crossed his arms to deflect the golem’s fist, then plunged right in.
And just like that……
Crunch.
Aster shattered the heart-core.
Chenbi stared in daze.
The golem that had been his nightmare turned to rubble in a heartbeat.