Tower of Despair, Floor 3 (2)
Baek Yeon-ho shot back on pure reflex.
"Huh? How do you know that?"
Even a veteran like him knew mirages existed, but knowing about them without ever setting foot there? Confusion and doubt flooded his face.
Old memories stirred.
Every time I crossed from oasis to oasis, those damn mirages nearly drove me insane.
You had to haul massive amounts of water, and if you couldn't find the next one halfway through, you turned around and went back to the previous oasis. Otherwise the character died.
"You know too, right, hyung? That kobolds are the masters of the third floor."
"Yeah. They dig in around the oases."
"Exactly."
Thud, thud!
Hyun Si-woon stamped through the sand and flashed a grin.
"Just look carefully at the ridgelines around the mirage. If the tracks they leave—or even just droppings—are completely missing and it's too clean, it's fake."
"Ah!"
A low gasp burst from Baek Yeon-ho's mouth. It hit him like a blow to the head. Why hadn't he known? The solution was so simple!
No, wait.
What kind of lunatic played a game that hard? He wasn't a detective. Honestly, it was fairer to say no one expected the game to even implement something that deep.
What the hell is this guy really?
Don't tell me… Is he that rotten-water EndSeeker the community's been going crazy over?
"That's a whole different level. Never even occurred to me there was such a simple method."
"Hyung, enough questions. Look over there."
"Where?"
"There."
Baek Yeon-ho followed the direction Hyun Si-woon pointed. Another oasis shimmered that way, and on the sand around it, small, chaotic footprints were stamped in tiny clusters.
"…Kobold tracks?"
"Bingo."
Hyun Si-woon grinned wider.
"Everyone hang in a little longer. We go smash the kobolds, then we shower in cold water first thing."
Shiiing!
He drew the Formless Sword. The rest of the party shifted into combat readiness and picked up the pace.
Before long, the kobolds spotted them. Their eyes gleamed. The numbers were solid—roughly twenty.
"Form up."
With that many, even Hyun Si-woon couldn't just charge in wild. He had the basics of breathing methods and footwork down, but he still hadn't fully learned martial arts yet.
"Haaah!"
Baek Yeon-ho stepped forward with his shield raised. Jang Cha-yul and Hwang Dae-un took positions on either side of him. Kang Si-a planted her feet and nocked an arrow. A few paces ahead of them stood Baek Do-hee.
"Don't panic. Just hold this formation."
"Okay!"
"Yes!"
The party answered with tight faces. The training so far had been brutal, but this was their first real clash head-on against a force of this size. The tension was plain.
—Kieeeek!
A few kobolds lost patience first, bolting ahead with sharp screeches. The rest thundered after them, kicking up dust. Crude stone spears and bone clubs raised high—they looked genuinely threatening.
Whiiish!
Kang Si-a reacted first. The arrow left her fingers with a sharp whistle of air and punched dead-center into the brow of the lead kobold.
—Kyak!
It dropped, but the kobolds had no fear. Trusting their numbers, they simply kept pouring forward.
"They're coming!"
"Hold them!"
Baek Yeon-ho shouted and dropped his stance low.
Wham!
A dull crash as kobold weapons scraped across his shield.
"Kh…!"
He clenched his teeth and held. Legs tempered by training and the power of Rock-Hard Body Technique kept him from being shoved back easily.
And the kobolds flooding in from both flanks?
Thuck!
Jang Cha-yul's thrust and—
Crunch!
—Hwang Dae-un's blunt weapon took care of them. There were a few close calls, but every time Kang Si-a's arrows provided perfect covering fire.
The shape of the fight is solid enough.
Hyun Si-woon nodded. He wasn't standing still either. Slash, cut! He carved through the kobolds trying to circle the edges, one by one.
"Die, you bastards!"
Hwang Dae-un instinctively snatched a kobold's arm, slammed it into the ground, then brought his weapon down without mercy on the dazed creature's skull.
Whoa.
Was that blunt-weapon technique or judo?
In the process he took a light scratch.
"Dae-un!"
Baek Do-hee, eyes wide as she watched, immediately pressed her staff against him and healed.
At that pace, wiping out the kobold pack that had claimed the oasis didn't take long.
"Hell yeah!"
"Nice!"
Hwang Dae-un and Jang Cha-yul shouted with bright faces. Relief and the release of tension showed clearly on everyone else's expressions too. Faces caked in sweat bloomed into smiles.
"Everyone over here."
Hyun Si-woon had already claimed a spot under the palm shade at the oasis edge and called them over.
"Haa… I feel alive again."
The moment they stepped into the shade, the choking heat seemed to ease a fraction. But every body was already soaked through with sweat—sticky and miserable. Clothes clinging unpleasantly to skin. They wanted nothing more than to strip them off and wash.
Here too the gap between game and reality showed itself.
In the game you just grabbed water with the tools the kobolds used and left…
Reality wouldn't allow that. In heat this murderous, proper rest was mandatory.
"Everyone sit and rest. We secure drinking water first."
"Si-woon."
Baek Yeon-ho approached.
"But this is water the kobolds were using. Is it safe to drink?"
Of course it felt disgusting. The thought of monsters rolling around in it and drinking made it worse.
But?
"No choice. There aren't other options."
They hadn't come here for a picnic. They were here for survival and to clear the tower. Even if that water was filthy, they would drink it to live.
"Yeah… water is life in the desert. If we get sick, noona will just heal us, right?"
"Oppa."
Kang Si-a brought over several crude jars.
"Places to store it over here. Leather water skins on that side too."
That was Kang Si-a. Acting before anyone even had to speak—best possible.
"Rinse them out properly and fill them."
"Yes."
The party rinsed the containers several times, then began filling them with water for drinking.
Slurp.
Hyun Si-woon carefully took a sip.
Hm?
Surprisingly, it just tasted like water. No fishy smell—cool and clean.
"It's fine."
Did the oasis have some purifying ability? Maybe it was a game effect. Either way, drinking the water was part of clearing the third floor.
"Really?"
"I want some too."
One by one the others tasted it, then started gulping it down like mad. Gulp, gulp!
"Ahhh!"
"So cold!"
"This is real water!"
While drinking, Hwang Dae-un couldn't hold back any longer. He yanked off his sweat-soaked old T-shirt and tossed it. A torso hardened by training was revealed.
"Hyeong-nim, okay if I wash?"
"Do whatever you want."
"Thank you!"
Splash!
He dove straight into the oasis.
"Khhh! This is it!"
Baek Yeon-ho hesitated a moment, then thought Screw it and stripped off his top as well. Hyun Si-woon silently removed his own upper clothes.
"Wash your clothes yourselves and hang them to dry. Leave them out a bit and they'll evaporate fast."
But the women were left in an awkward spot. Kang Si-a, Jang Cha-yul, and Baek Do-hee, still in sweat-soaked clothes, exchanged sheepish looks. No spare clothes. And they couldn't exactly strip down to underwear either.
"We'll just wash our faces and arms for now."
Baek Do-hee suggested it first and carefully scooped water at the edge to wash her face. Jang Cha-yul and Kang Si-a followed. They couldn't splash around like Hwang Dae-un, but the cool water on skin alone made the heat ease somewhat.
After roughly washing off, Hyun Si-woon scanned the surroundings from the shade. Baek Yeon-ho came up beside him.
"Si-woon."
"Yeah, hyung."
"Looking for the cave?"
"Right. Might as well find it while we're at it."
The solution to the third floor lay in the caves. This wasn't a hidden route—it was the official one. The standard clear most Ascenders followed: find the hidden passage somewhere in an oasis cave, infiltrate the kobold city built beneath the desert, and kill the kobold king who ruled it.
But?
Of course they would step on the hidden route first.
Baek Yeon-ho seemed to want to address that point.
"You're enough of a veteran that you already know, but there's a hidden route on the third floor."
"Kobold Shaman?"
"Oh, damn right! You knew!"
"Yeah. I even watched clips of you clearing it."
"Ah, right—you said you were a Yeon-ho fan."
Baek Yeon-ho smacked his lips. Hard to believe a monster like this had been one of his regular viewers.
Of course Hyun Si-woon knew that route. He just knew it deeper.
Sorry, hyung, but what you know isn't the full story.
Before entering the kobold city, wandering the oases gave a low chance of a Kobold Shaman spawning. From it you could obtain a Fang Flute. Blow it and the vibrations resonated with the sand, violently shaking a specific point on a dune.
That's the ruins.
Clear those ruins and you received a skill book for Poison Sword Technique—a sword-related skill. Any player who had tried Tower of Despair knew this hidden route. It wasn't even twisted up, so it was even more obvious.
The skill's decently strong…
Hyun Si-woon knew. It only worked up to floor 7. After that it was trash no one would take even if you gave it away free.
But.
Using that skill book unlocked yet another hidden route on the third floor, and in Hyun Si-woon's judgment, that one was the real deal.
"Anyway."
Baek Yeon-ho continued.
"We should grab Poison Sword Technique before we go. It'll be a bit of a grind and the kids will suffer, but…"
His gaze flicked briefly toward the other teammates, then returned to Hyun Si-woon. His voice lowered, turning serious.
"Honestly, it's a sword technique. You'll need it too, Si-woon. And for our team's survival rate, you have to get stronger."
A reason no one could argue against. If Hyun Si-woon was weak, this team had no future—everyone knew that.
…I'm not actually after Poison Sword Technique itself.
It was only a key to something bigger. Still, Yeon-ho hyung's concern came through completely.
"Yeah. Thanks."
After a proper rest and packing plenty of water, the party set out again. That was when the long, grinding slog truly began.
Find a real oasis.
—Kieeeek!
Wipe out the kobolds there. Repeat.
Very occasionally a Shaman Kobold appeared, but even then the flute didn't drop 100 percent of the time.
A day passed. Another day.
"Hah… hah…"
"Huuuh… huuuh…"
The suffering dragged on far longer than expected, and the party gradually wore down. Repeated battles in a brutal environment. Even Baek Do-hee's healing had limits. Chronic fatigue, heatstroke, desert sickness—status ailments her power couldn't fully erase.
Whirl!
Jang Cha-yul's spear tip punched through a goblin's vital point.
Thuck!
Blood sprayed. By now no one even had the strength left to wipe the disgusting stuff away.
"Hah… when. Just when…"
Dark circles under their eyes. Lips cracked and dry. If Hyun Si-woon hadn't been finding oases at exactly the right moments, they would already have collapsed and been buried in the sand.
"The shield's heavy. No strength left in my hands."
"My fingertips are tingling too."
Above all else—they were hungry.
"Aaaaargh! That damn flute! When the hell is it going to drop?!"
Hwang Dae-un vented his rage. Every kobold group living at an oasis fought differently; the tricky ones forced them to risk death. After dozens of those situations, they had hit their limit.
Then, the night after yet another day had passed.
Slash!
Hyun Si-woon's Formless Sword swept cleanly through a Shaman's neck. The head that never even managed a scream rolled across the sand.
Nothing again?
He thought it indifferently and was about to sheath the sword when—
Ping-rrrr!
From the Shaman's neck—more precisely from the severed head—something shot upward with a faint light, spinning.
"Huh?"
"Wha—?!"
Everyone froze.
It looked as if it had been carved from a beast's fang… small, strangely shaped…
"A flute?"
Hwang Dae-un breathed the word like a groan of pain. No anger or irritation remained on his face—only blank shock.
Yes. The key to the hidden route they had searched for so desperately, the prize earned through this hellish suffering, was finally in their hands.
"It's the fluuuuuute!"
"Kyaaah!"
"Waaaaaah! It finally dropped!"
No one waited for anyone else—they simply grabbed one another in hugs. Heat, pain, despair—all of it forgotten in that single moment.