There’s Space Behind the Pillar
“Master.”
“What is it?”
“Take a turn.”
“No. I’m sleeping five more minutes.”
Kaang!
Another colossal sword strike was knocked aside.
For three straight days now, all he had heard was the howl of the Fallen King Bear.
“This is seriously exhausting.”
“Just a little longer.”
“I can parry with my eyes closed now, Master.”
“Congratulations. In that spirit, I’ll sleep five more minutes and then get up.”
“You said that five minutes ago.”
“I mean it this time. Just five more minutes.”
Andras ground his teeth.
Thanks to three days of nonstop parrying practice, King Bear had been reduced to nothing more than an attack pattern that kept getting swatted away.
It didn’t matter how much brute force he unleashed.
It didn’t matter if he brought his axe crashing down.
Even his finisher.
Kaang!
Every single blow was bounced cleanly off the tip of Andras’s blade.
“GRAAAAAAH! Just kill me already!!”
The boss’s screams echoed through the torture chamber like the wail of a man being slowly flayed alive.
And yet he still wasn’t brought down.
Because Kim Jun had ordered otherwise.
Holding back a yawn, Kim Jun stood with his arms folded, his back against a pillar and his eyes closed.
Meanwhile, Andras kept repeating Parry over and over, absorbing King Bear’s attacks without fail.
Then, at that moment—
Woom—
“Oh?!”
The veil over the boss room rippled violently.
Silver waves spread outward, announcing that something was approaching.
“We’re free!”
Andras’s mouth split into a wide grin.
Drunk on delight, as if he had been waiting for this very moment, his blade flashed.
Swish!
With a vast arc of blood, Bear’s head flew through the air and fell away.
The heavy thud of the body hitting the ground shook the floor.
Kwaang!
For a brief instant, silence settled over the boss room.
Then—
Step, step—
Breaking that stillness, heavy footsteps approached.
Four shadows slowly emerged through the black veil.
*
“I’m sure Big Brother came through here…” Park Minsu muttered in confusion.
Whenever a boss was slain, the veil over the boss room always vanished.
That had been true of King Lion’s Citadel, and true of every floor before it as well.
The boss room was, quite literally, the final zone.
Once the boss fell, it was nothing more than an empty chamber, and what came next was the door to the next floor.
Or, in most cases, the Bifrost that rose like a pillar of light to take its place.
But now...
The final area of the 19th floor, Palace of the Fallen King, was different.
“That’s weird,” Ryu Jia whispered, folding her arms.
“If the boss is dead, shouldn’t the veil be gone too?”
“What if he isn’t dead yet?”
Park Minsu shook his head.
“No way. If it were Big Brother, he’d have finished it already. There’s no way he’d be stuck here.”
“Maybe he’s off farming gear somewhere else?” Lee Seoyeon asked cautiously.
“Him? He’s already decked out in S-rank gear.”
“Exactly. That makes it even more suspicious.”
“Maybe he’s looking for skills…”
Their opinions split in different directions.
It had never happened before, so every face in the group was shadowed by uncertainty.
But there was no time to hesitate for long.
“Let’s check.”
At Park Minsu’s words, the group stepped into the veil.
Woom—
There was the strange sensation of passing through jelly, and then the scene opened before them.
What they saw was—
“Kihahahahahahaha! I’m free!!”
A demon erupting into mad laughter.
In his hand was a sword still dripping with blood, and at his feet lay a head that had been carelessly tossed aside.
The face was so mutilated it was impossible to recognize, impossible even to tell whose it had been.
Just from that sight alone, there was no need to explain who the boss of this place was.
“....”
Han Suin’s gaze turned icy in an instant.
Kim Jun’s body was slumped against one side of a pillar.
His head was hidden by the column, and one arm hung limply at his side.
“...Did Big Brother get beaten?” Park Minsu’s voice trembled.
Ryu Jia’s expression hardened, and Lee Seoyeon bit her lip and looked away.
But Han Suin was different.
Shrrk—
The sound of a sword being drawn.
A moonlike silver aura gathered along the red blade.
Dragon Tail, the weapon Kim Jun had personally given her.
The aura that bled from her fingertips shimmered coldly, like blood in moonlight.
“...”
Without another word, Han Suin stepped forward.
There was not a single trace of hesitation in her stride.
“If Big Brother got beaten, then we can at least figure out how strong he—”
Before Park Minsu could stop her, Han Suin’s sword plunged downward like lightning.
Kwaang!
Andras’s eyes flew wide as he raised his own blade to block.
Kaang!
Steel clashed, sparks scattering into the air.
“What is wrong with this woman?!” Andras shouted.
But Han Suin’s eyes were already seething with fury.
All she had seen was a demon holding a bloodstained sword, laughing madly.
And Kim Jun, motionless and collapsed against the pillar.
In that instant, to her, Andras was nothing but the boss.
The enemy that had to be killed.
Kaang—!
Cheng!
Quadududuk—!
“Ghk!”
Andras’s body was flung backward as if he had been skidding across ice.
But there was no time to breathe. Han Suin’s blade was already on him again, swift as the wind.
Her pupils had turned red.
Reason was gone, leaving only fury and killing intent.
Dragon Tail, clenched in her hand, was no longer a weapon. It had become pure, unwavering resolve to carve her enemy apart.
Shreeeik—!
Swish—
Kaang!
With every strike, the air tore open, and deep fissures split the floor.
A storm of swordplay that left no gap, no opening, no mercy.
Andras barely managed to deflect one slash with the edge of his blade before another was already driving in.
Kwaang!
Bang, bang, bang!
Shards of steel flew, and walls and pillars collapsed into ruin.
Yet even in the middle of that destruction, Han Suin’s footsteps never wavered.
“Hahahahahaha!!”
Andras burst into wild laughter.
Even when an arm was severed, even when his side was ripped open and his organs spilled out, what came from his mouth was not a scream but laughter.
Ripped flesh knitted itself back together in an instant, and from the stump of his severed arm, crimson muscles surged outward, rebuilding the limb.
“That’s it! That’s what I’m talking about! More! More!!!”
Not pain, but joy.
Andras reveled in agony, throwing himself harder into the fight every time his flesh was cut away.
Quadudududuk—!
Kwaang—!
Every clash of sword and blade detonated like a bomb, and the thunderous roar of tearing air shook the boss room to its core.
Even as the very space seemed to tremble, Han Suin’s swordlight kept pouring in without pause.
Swish—!
This time the blade cut across his nape, and Andras’s neck was severed halfway through.
Black blood exploded like a fountain, only to reconnect a moment later and restore itself to its original shape.
“Aaahhhhhh!! Yes, that’s it!! Keep cutting! More!!!”
His cries were not cries of pain but laughter soaked in ecstasy.
Like a monster that only came more alive the more horribly it was torn apart.
“...”
In that moment, the last remnants of reason vanished from Han Suin’s eyes.
She had already abandoned judgment long ago, but now even that had completely collapsed.
One.
The first sword strike split the air.
Two.
The second followed close behind.
Three.
The third came roaring in after it, a chained assault of deadly force surging like a storm.
Shashashak—!
When the sharp sound of blades slicing through the air rang out—
“Kihahahahahahaha!!”
Andras could no longer hide the laughter bursting from his chest in pure excitement.
He had become completely enthralled by Han Suin’s terrifying, meticulous swordsmanship.
“Die.”
But that ecstatic laughter was enough to solidify Han Suin’s mistaken assumption into an irreversible certainty.
*
“Haaah—” Kim Jun let out a long yawn.
He had nodded off with his back against the pillar for a few days, and his neck was stiff, his lower back aching.
He had expected as much from sleeping in a boss room with no proper bed, but his body had held up anyway.
I should probably head to the 25th floor soon.
Only one thing had come to mind.
Artemis’s hot springs.
It wasn’t just a place to rest.
Even if only in tiny amounts, experience points accumulated automatically there, and both stamina and mana recovered rapidly—a cheat-level healing spot in every sense of the word.
Of course, it’s a little pricey...
If you soaked there for a full day, it washed away not just fatigue but the buildup of stress as well.
Ah... I already want to go. This is a pain. Where are the others already?
Kim Jun slowly pushed himself upright and stretched out his arms.
The joints in his back popped one after another.
About time to switch out, I guess.
He had left it to Andras for over three days, so with half a mind to apologize and half a mind to keep being lazy, he was just about to rise from his spot when—
Cheng!
Kwaang!
In front of his eyes, sparks burst like fireworks.
“...What the hell is this?”
Andras and Han Suin were hacking at each other in the middle of the boss room, locked in a ferocious melee.
One laughing like a madman, the other pressing forward with a blank face and a killing blade.
“Hey. Why are you two fighting?”
Kim Jun muttered in bewilderment, but the only answer was the sound of steel.
Then—
“Kim Jun...?”
Han Suin’s eyes widened as she swung her sword.
Then Park Minsu, Ryu Jia, and Lee Seoyeon all stared at him too, their eyes going round.
What they all saw was Kim Jun, healthy as ever, rising from the pillar after napping there with his eyes closed.
“....”
A fleeting silence.
And then Han Suin dropped her sword as if her strength had gone out of her.
Thud—
Without a moment’s hesitation, she rushed forward and hugged Kim Jun tight.
“I-I thought you were dead...”
Her breath was trembling.
Her voice, too, was so small it was almost unrecognizable.
Thump, thump—
He could hear her heartbeat pounding right against his ear.
Kim Jun froze on the spot.
W-what is this?
Master. It seems she misunderstood and thought I killed you.
Then why didn’t you explain?
Because it was funny.
Only then did she seem to regain her senses and stumble backward in a flustered mess.
Her cheeks were bright red, and her eyes darted helplessly from side to side.
“N-no... it’s not like that...”
But it was already too late.
“What is it? What’s going on between Big Brother and noona?” Park Minsu blurted out, eyes bulging.
“Seriously, what is this? Noona? Oppa?” Ryu Jia was already folding her arms and lifting one eyebrow.
“Hmm~.”
Lee Seoyeon curved the corners of her lips and nodded in a vaguely satisfied way.
Han Suin’s ears turned red all the way to the tips.
She tried to deny it, but her tongue didn’t seem to want to follow her heart.
“I-it’s not like that...”
Her desperate protest came out barely above a whisper.
“Wow. Since when does Suin say so much?”
“What?! What’s with you and Big Brother?!”
“This is so cute. What on earth is going on?”
Park Minsu was grinning like an idiot, Ryu Jia was glaring wide-eyed, and Lee Seoyeon looked positively pleased.
With all three of their gazes pinning her in place, the tips of Han Suin’s ears burned even hotter.
“N-no...”
As her cheeks heated further, her excuses only grew weaker.
She really would have been better off saying nothing at all. The more she denied it, the more the whole atmosphere hardened in the direction of a misunderstanding.
“R-really, it’s not... I, I swear it’s not!”
“...”
She hadn’t even confessed, and yet she was denying it this hard.
For some reason, Kim Jun felt a little sting in his chest.
...Was it really that bad to say no?
He found himself oddly disappointed.
54