Tower of Death — Floor of Sacrifice (2)
At the center of the vast hall, a single figure was drawing slowly closer.
Park Jin-hwan.
"Come along now. Right this way."
Rupnoria waved him in with the breezy impatience of a host who had somewhere better to be, assuring Jin-hwan — who was still scanning the chamber with every step — that there was nothing whatsoever to worry about. Just hurry to the middle.
What the hell is this guy playing at?
Everyone else had been locked away. Only one person — Jin-hwan, and Jin-hwan alone — was being summoned to the very heart of the hall. There had to be a reason.
The moment Jin-hwan arrived at the exact center, Rupnoria strode up and offered his hand.
"Well then. You've been selected as the one who will be sacrificed on this floor. A few words for our viewers, if you would?"
"Excuse me?"
"Your thoughts. That camera over there is broadcasting live to the entire nation, so just speak comfortably."
Rupnoria pointed at the lens hovering in front of them, as if a man who did not even understand the situation he was standing in could possibly have a comment prepared.
"I'd rather have an explanation first. What do you mean, the one who will be sacrificed?"
"Ah, that? It's nothing much. You simply need to die on this floor."
"What?"
"Didn't catch that? I said you have to die."
Jin-hwan asked again, certain he had misheard. Rupnoria repeated himself with perfect, unhurried clarity.
"Die? What are you talking about?"
"Exactly what I said. This is the Floor of Sacrifice. It ends when one person dies."
"What?"
Not a flicker of expression crossed Rupnoria's face as he told Jin-hwan to die — and then asked him to share his dying thoughts with the entire country.
"Hahaha. So you're telling me to die. Right here, right now."
"That's correct."
"Why me?"
"Because this is the Floor of Sacrifice."
With that, he set a box down in front of Jin-hwan.
Jin-hwan took it and looked inside.
"What's this?"
Whatever lay in the box, Jin-hwan pulled it out with a look of bewildered disbelief.
A kitchen knife?
That was what the box had been holding. A kitchen knife. And the reason Rupnoria had handed it to him—
"…You want me to kill myself?"
"That's right."
"I have to die for us to go up to the next floor?"
"Correct. If you don't die, no one proceeds."
Jin-hwan stared at the blade in his hand.
"And if I don't?"
"Well, you'll fail to reach the next floor, and the Calamity will occur, I suppose."
"The Calamity…"
"If that happens, a great many people will die, won't they?"
Jin-hwan still couldn't make it fit together. Even if a Calamity really did come — there was no world in which a person could just take their own life because someone told them to.
Rupnoria, as if he had been waiting for exactly that thought, stepped in close. He raised a hand in front of Jin-hwan's eyes, and snapped his fingers.
Snap.
And in that instant—
Simulating a world in which the Calamity has unfolded.
"What the—?"
Jin-hwan had been dropped into an entirely different place in the space of a blink. He thought back to the message that had just appeared, and understood at once: this was not reality. This was a simulation.
Why the hell did he send me here?
The place looked like a street somewhere in Seoul. People were going about their ordinary lives all around him — shopping, talking, walking their routes as if the world had never ended.
And then—
KRAAAAAANG!
KRAAAANG!
KRAGANG!
Explosions tore through the air from somewhere out of sight. Messages bloomed in their wake.
Failed to clear the Tower of Death.
The Calamity now begins.
The words had barely finished forming when dozens of Gates erupted into existence all around him, bursting open like wounds in the air.
And from those Gates, the monsters began to crawl out.
The first thing to step out of a Gate was a Death Knight.
Jin-hwan already knew what those things were capable of. He had seen one up close. He knew exactly how strong they were.
Even if a Calamity really did break out… we could still stop it, couldn't we?
That was what he told himself. A Death Knight had appeared once before, and they had stopped it. No matter how bad a Calamity got, there had to be a way to handle it.
As if the world itself were laughing at that thought, Death Knights began pouring from the Gates in a flood. Not one. The Gates in this neighborhood alone disgorged dozens of them — and the moment they hit the street, they started butchering every living person in reach.
"Gyaaaaah! Help me!"
"Run! These things aren't anything we can fight!"
"Mom—!"
"Ghhhk—!"
Schlick. Schlick.
People died in droves beneath the Death Knights' blades. A few tried to fight back. Against that overwhelming violence, they lasted seconds. The street vanished under a coat of bright, arterial red.
Running did not help. The Death Knights hunted every last one of them down and took their lives anyway.
"Aaaagh! Somebody help me!"
"Ghhhkkk—!"
"You bastards! Get the hell away from me!"
Thuk. Thuk.
Death Knight steel and the earth beneath it both ran scarlet. Bodies began to pile in the gutters. A few dozen Death Knights — that was all it had taken — and an entire city was already a slaughterhouse.
This is insane. This is the Calamity?
There was nothing the people here could do. Hundreds of them — thousands — were dead within minutes of the Calamity's arrival. Every last person on this street was gone.
Wooooooong—!
Now what?
A new noise filled the air, thick and grinding. A Gate that had not been there a moment ago tore itself open beside the ones that had spawned the Death Knights.
The things that came out of that Gate were not anything a human being could fight.
Jin-hwan had not even been sure they could handle the Death Knights. The people still running saw what stepped through next, and whatever hope they had left went out like a snuffed candle.
"Hahaha. You've got to be kidding me. We're supposed to fight that?"
"I'm just gonna die. I'm done."
"We're dead anyway."
The ones who had been fleeing the Death Knights with everything they had left simply stopped. Some of them looked at the new monsters, decided there was no point, and ended their own lives. Others charged in with whatever courage they had left, and died just the same.
Haha. So this is a Calamity.
A few minutes. That was all it had taken. There was no one left alive in the city — only a metropolis painted in human blood. And as if that were not enough, the air began to shake again.
RUMMMMMBLE—!
A Gate of monstrous scale tore itself open. Every other monster in sight began to tremble.
What now?
Every person here was already dead. What could possibly be coming through that needed a Gate that size?
Jin-hwan had nothing left to hold onto. He just watched.
And then something enormous dragged itself out of the dark.
Hahaha. You've got to be kidding me.
A disbelieving laugh scraped out of him. The thing that emerged was a monster with a body easily tens of meters long — living or dead, he could not tell — beating vast wings as it hauled its bulk into the open air.
KRAAAAAAWWWW!
The Bone Dragon's roar rolled out across the ruined city. Every monster that heard it shuddered from snout to tail and dropped into postures of groveling respect.
Level 300. Three stars. So this is a Calamity.
Jin-hwan could not even find the words. Calamity, Calamity — he had heard the name thrown around often enough. This was not a Calamity.
This was extinction.
If things like this were ever loosed on the country, Korea itself would simply cease to exist.
The Bone Dragon drew in a long, deep breath — and then it fired.
The Breath came straight at him.
KRA-KA-KA-KAAAAANG!
Every building in the vicinity disintegrated in a single blast — and as the world came apart, a message appeared.
Simulation terminated.
"Jin-hwan! Snap out of it! What's wrong with you?"
I kept shouting his name, but Jin-hwan did not move. Whatever that Rupnoria bastard had done to him, he just stood there.
"Jin-hwan!"
I called him again, and again. At last something seemed to come back into his eyes. He glanced once around the hall, then sank into a silence so deep it looked like he was turning a decision over in his hands, feeling for its weight.
Then his fist clenched. He turned his head, slowly, toward the camera.
He said it, and then he folded himself into a deep, formal bow toward the lens.
Wait. Is he about to—
Jin-hwan straightened from the bow. He did not say another word. He lifted the knife and set the edge against his own throat.
BANG!
"Jin-hwan! You little—! What the hell do you think you're doing?!"
I threw myself at the glass, trying to smash through and get to him, but it did not so much as shiver. Of course it didn't. They would not have built a wall we could break.
"Ssaem. Thank you for everything. I think I caused you nothing but trouble back when I was still in school."
"Don't you dare! There's got to be another way! A Calamity's nothing — we'll handle it!"
Nothing I said seemed to reach him. And how could it? He had seen it himself. He had seen what a Calamity actually was.
If one broke out, countless people would die. A lucky handful might survive. That would be all.
Nearly ten million lives, sitting in the palm of his hand. If dying here would save every one of them — how could that not feel like a death worth making?
"Ssaem. I'm sorry. I saw it. I saw how terrifying a Calamity really is."
"I don't care what you saw — that's not the answer!"
"No. I think this is the right thing. For everyone."
The knife crept closer to his throat.
A thin line of bright red welled up and ran down his neck.
BANG!
"Goddamn it! What the hell is this supposed to be?!"
My student was trying to kill himself right in front of me, and I could not stop it. The helplessness of that — my own weakness — made my teeth grind until they ached. What kind of teacher was I? What did being Rank 3 even mean, if I could not save a single student dying before my eyes?
"Ssaem. Thank you."
He said it, and drove the knife toward his throat—
Smack.
Someone appeared and struck Jin-hwan's hand hard enough to send the blade clattering to the floor.
The one who had saved him wore a human shape, with hair as black as a starless sky.
The Black Dragon.
The Black Dragon was here.