Chapter 50
“What the hell are you wearing?”
“What do you mean, Master?”
“That outfit…”
At some point, Andras had changed into what could only be called the classic veteran-player look.
No armor anywhere in sight, just a single scrap of cloth draped over him.
“When I dress like this, my parries somehow feel cleaner.”
“Could you maybe consider my eyes for once?”
“You should wear it too, Master.”
“Go to hell.”
The 19th floor was simple in structure.
A straight, narrow map that stretched out like Chile.
From the first gate to the tenth, all he had to do was break through them one by one.
Unlike the 18th floor, this place was designed so that every mid-boss had to be killed before the final boss could appear.
And now.
“Fourth gate.”
Kim Jun and Andras stood before the fourth gate.
The moment they entered the 19th floor, Kim Jun activated Thread of Ariadne.
The silver thread stretched through the air, and unlike on the 18th floor, it pointed straight in a single direction.
Its destination was clear.
Fresentia and Petra.
“We need to hurry.”
There was no telling what might have happened to them.
Contrary to Kim Jun’s concerns, the 19th floor so far matched the memories from before his regression exactly.
At each gate, hundreds of soldiers stood in formation, and Kim Jun cut them down as he advanced.
Whoosh—!
Hundreds of arrows split the sky at once, while long spears poured down in a violent cascade.
───!
But with a single slash, everything was torn apart.
Black-red flames spread, and the battlefield was reduced to ruins in an instant.
Kim Jun already possessed power so overwhelming it defied even the laws of Dark Souls.
There was nothing in his way.
But the anomaly began precisely at the fifth gate.
[Intruder: 'Egioro, the Skin-Eater' has entered the area.]
[Intruder: 'Rikius, the Eye-Scratcher' has entered the area.]
[Intruder: 'Agreon, the Heart-Biter' has entered the area.]
[Eliminate the intruders.]
Crack—!
The space split open as if it had been torn apart, and strangers spilled out in droves.
“These bastards…”
Kim Jun clenched his teeth.
The intruders themselves were no longer a surprise.
They had appeared countless times ever since he entered the 18th floor.
He had already killed well over twenty of them by now.
And yet there was a separate reason his expression sharpened this time.
“These are… the ones from the 75th floor.”
Skin-Eater, Eye-Scratcher, Heart-Biter.
All of them operated on the 75th floor.
A structure of the tower flashed through Kim Jun’s mind.
There were four floors arranged in a Dark Souls theme.
18th floor, 19th floor, and then the 75th floor and the 76th floor where Drakenhart stood.
Before his regression, he had assumed the administrators were simply reusing the same theme because they’d run out of material.
But the scene before his eyes now shattered that vague assumption.
“…Are they connected?”
The 18th and 19th floors. The 75th and 76th floors.
The two regions he had thought were completely separate might, in fact, be linked.
“Master.”
“Right.”
As if telling him to stop wasting time on useless thoughts, Andras called out with a low laugh.
Kim Jun refocused his gaze ahead.
What had to be done now was simple.
Even if these things really were monsters from the 75th floor.
A normal hunter would have lost all will to fight just from their aura alone.
Crackle—!
But his opponent was Kim Jun.
The level gap was undeniable.
The average level of those intruders was around 75.
Kim Jun, by contrast, was still only level 59.
And yet he already possessed enough stats and skills to bridge that gap.
Thanks to the rewards stacked up from the countless monsters he had hunted on the 18th floor, his abilities were now warped beyond what simple numbers could describe.
First buff.
“Deus Ex Machina.”
The target was Asmodeus.
The overpowered passive that converted all attacks into fixed damage for one minute activated.
The aura of Asmodeus began to rise from Kim Jun’s body.
Then the second buff.
“Diabolic Override.”
Dark sigils spread across Kim Jun’s entire body.
For thirty seconds, every skill became demonic, its power surging explosively.
Red and black energies mingled together, and in an instant, Kim Jun’s presence escaped the bounds of humanity altogether.
The intruders shrank back, releasing wary, hostile auras.
Two top-tier buffs at once.
Without stopping, Kim Jun immediately reached out his hand.
“Infernal Dragon Breath.”
Kwaaaaaah—!
Fire and darkness fused into a single colossal dragon’s breath, spat forth in a torrent.
Black and red twisted together as they swallowed every intruder in front of him whole.
But that wasn’t the end of it.
The breath unleashed under the stacked effects of two supreme buffs produced power even Kim Jun hadn’t expected.
The flames pouring from his hand pierced the fifth gate’s fortress wall, tore through the sixth gate, and kept going until they smashed straight through the seventh.
“Did he get them?!”
“If you say that, they’re always still alive.”
Kim Jun’s worry proved needless.
Where the flames had died down, only the intruders’ lower halves remained standing, while their upper bodies had vanished without a trace.
This wasn’t the first time Kim Jun had fought like this.
For a long time now, he had despised the habit of holding back little by little and saving his ultimate move for the finish.
If you have the power, why hold it back? Isn’t it more efficient to end it from the start?
That was Kim Jun’s way of fighting.
Trading blows bit by bit might look tense, but in a fight where lives were on the line, it was just foolish.
It was far more certain to pour out the firepower needed to end things immediately.
“Haa…”
There was only one problem: since he had dumped out his maximum firepower, his mana was nearly empty.
It would take a while to recover.
“Guess you’ll have to carry me for a bit.”
“Kuhuhuhuhu. Leave it to me.”
For now, all that mattered was letting Andras run wild.
Kim Jun was absurdly strong, but Andras was hardly someone to scoff at.
By hunter standards, he was probably somewhere below Kim Jun, Han Suin, and Ryu Jia.
Kim Jun folded his arms behind his back and walked, while Andras took the lead and charged forward.
“Kihahahahahahaha!!”
With nothing but a pair of briefs on, Andras hurled himself at the enemies.
Thud—!
Slash—!
As Andras’s Shisan Hyeolhae split open their bellies, their guts spilled out and splattered to the ground.
Plop.
He really is strong.
In terms of pure “skill,” he might even have been slightly above Kim Jun.
His stats fell a bit short, but his fighting ability alone was dependable.
He had the kind of presence that made it feel like he could never lose.
All Kim Jun had to do was follow comfortably behind until his mana recovered.
Andras would handle everything on his own.
But there was one deeply irritating issue.
Could he stop moving around so much? I’m getting nervous it’ll show.
As he charged, twisted, jumped, and attacked, the places not covered by that single scrap of cloth kept coming perilously close to exposure.
Especially whenever he leapt high and brought his body down in a smashing attack…
“Ah, shit.”
Kim Jun swore.
The reason was simple.
Flop.
The demon’s massive XX had been visible through the gap in the cloth.
It had finally been seen.
“Aaaaaagh! Damn it! Change your clothes right now!”
“Kihahahahahaha!!”
Whether he didn’t hear Kim Jun or was just ignoring him, Andras shook his body even more violently.
Whether he should be happy or not was another question.
[Boss defeated: Corrupted King, Veahr]
[Experience gained: 25,000]
[Coins obtained: 50,000]
[Items obtained: Communication Device C x3]
The 19th floor boss died far too pathetically.
And Kim Jun hadn’t even done anything.
Andras had simply bitten down on the back of Boss Veahr’s neck, chewed it up, and crushed him to death.
What kind of boss is this?
Kim Jun stared at Veahr’s corpse and thought it over.
Before his regression, this had definitely been a fairly troublesome opponent.
But now it looked weaker than a stray dog.
Then again, the intruders that should have been on the 75th floor were much stronger than this thing.
Of course, comparing the 19th floor boss to beings from the 75th floor was wrong from the start, but even so, the difference felt absurd.
Have I gotten too strong, or was this guy always this weak?
“Master. Let’s be honest here. I did everything.”
“Don’t read my mind whenever you feel like it.”
I don’t like that.
As Kim Jun shook his head in thought, a system window popped up.
More importantly, the Communication Device he had just obtained was a pretty useful item.
[Item Acquired]: Communication Device
[Item Information]
- Grade: C
- Effect: Allows communication across dimensions within 10 floors
- Special Note: Can only connect with targets carrying the same Communication Device
This means I can talk to the others even if we get separated.
Kim Jun’s expression brightened.
With this, he could contact his companions freely, and even Choi Doheon—the boy he had decided to take under his wing.
They could also exchange messages if something dangerous happened.
“Andras, take this.”
“What’s this?”
Andras tilted his head as he accepted the device.
“A communicator. You can talk to me with it.”
Kim Jun pulled out his own device and explained.
“Hold on. Let’s run a test.”
When Kim Jun activated the Communication Device, a small screen appeared.
[Searching for connectable targets...]
[Search complete]
- Andras (19th floor)
“The performance is the same.”
Of course, once you entered the Tower, most things from the modern world stopped working.
Unless they were devices tied to a hunter’s power.
Smartphones were like that, and cameras too.
But these system items were different.
Made to obey the Tower’s laws, they worked perfectly.
You don’t know how much a single item like this can raise survival rates.
Just as Kim Jun was admiring the Communication Device with satisfaction, it happened.
Wuuung—
Golden light suddenly flashed in the air.
A huge treasure chest slowly materialized and landed on the floor.
Fwoosh—
The chest overflowed with golden light, dazzlingly bright.
It shone as if begging to be opened right away.
“What’s that, Master?”
“Probably the first-clear reward. I think it was Crown of El A. And there should be a fair number of coins inside too.”
Kim Jun muttered as he stared at the chest.
Crown of El A.
It was another overpowered item he had obtained once before his regression.
A broken piece of equipment that increased all the wearer’s stats by five percent.
But the truly absurd part was its passive, Royal Majesty.
It cut all physical damage by fifty percent and increased critical damage by twenty-five percent, making it an utterly ridiculous piece of gear.
“Oh! Hurry up and open it!”
“Sure.”
Creak—
With anticipation on his face, Kim Jun reached for the chest.
But then—
HP: [x] / [max]
[Warning!]
[The current 'Kim Jun' is affected by the debuff Administrator's Brand EX.]
[You will be forcibly summoned to the 75th floor!]
“What?”
[5…]
[4…]
“What the hell does that mean, Master!”
“I don’t know about this eith—”
[3…]
[2…]
[1…]
And when he opened his eyes, this was what he saw.
[Entered the 75th floor.]
[Quest generated: Destroy the forward base built by the Kingdom of Drakenhart on the 75th floor]
[Objectives:
- Eliminate Drakenhart’s Wraith Knights (0/12)
- Destroy the core facilities of the 75th-floor occupied territory (0/3)]
[Difficulty: ★★★★★]
[Reward: 100,000,000 EXP / 5,000,000 coins / S-rank equipment item]
The 75th floor.
And then—
Ping!
Thread of Ariadne had split into two strands, each pointing in a different direction.
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