Chapter 70: The Brutality of a Low-Floor Wizard
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 70: The Brutality of a Low-Floor Wizard
“So, let me get this straight. Your partner went into Blackdog and got caught.”
Back Attack had raided the casino with the constables.
“And your team leader is a Blackdog mole?”
“…”
“At this point, isn't the Public Security Headquarters just Blackdog’s B-team? On top of that, you weren’t confident enough to go alone, so you dragged in a civilian, and now he’s about to die?”
“I have no excuse.”
The Public Security Headquarters, led by Chief Constable Neko, subdued Blackdog’s guards and rushed up to the second floor.
The moment she realized how twisted the situation had become, she had issued a Code Yellow alert via mass message, summoning plainclothes constables to surround the casino.
But she never imagined Krom would be so reckless.
Caleb had found the Wizard’s Eye for him, so wouldn’t he have been informed of the constables’ movements?
And yet, he killed Enver right in front of him.
Please don’t let me be too late.
To Neko, who hadn’t heard the conversation, it looked as if Krom had gone berserk and was about to kill them both.
However…
Huh?
As Neko reached the second floor, she was met by the sight of Krom surrendering meekly, followed by the Wizard’s Eye.
And…
“Krom, you son of a bitch—!”
The last one out, Inspector Ennes, screamed.
“You’re abandoning me? After everything I did for you, you bastard!”
“Ennes! Don’t move!”
Neko aimed her wand at Ennes.
“Stay back!”
Ennes grabbed the mace hanging from his belt.
“What are you going to do with that! It’s already over!” Neko shouted.
Ennes knew that as well.
It was over.
Sure, Blackdog had plenty of wanted criminals who committed crimes and then lived out a second life hiding in their secret bases. But Ennes couldn’t do that. There was no escaping a situation like this.
“Fuck…”
But as Krom had said, humans aren’t always so rational. Completely panicked, Ennes gripped his weapon tightly, looking ready to cast a skill and take one or two constables down with him at any moment.
But behind him…
“Dust Explosion.”
A wizard’s incantation rang out.
*
BOOM!
The explosion wasn’t aimed at Ennes, but at the wall. The wall separating the hallway from the room where Enver had met his end crumbled, showering broken bricks onto the floor.
Through the smoke-filled hole, the sloshing water and a Cumulonimbus on the floor became visible. The cloud had been ready to respond to its master’s call at any moment.
“Cumulonimbus.”
But for the wizard, one cloud wasn’t enough. He summoned another above the hall, outside the second-floor railing.
In an instant, there were five.
Right after the first summon, he had flipped the Hourglass, timed the cooldowns, and churned out four more.
“What…?”
“It’s High-Speed Casting…” someone muttered.
Neko, a wizard herself, recognized it too.
Suddenly, a swarm of dark clouds filled the casino.
SHWAAAAAA!
A torrential downpour flooded the first floor. Normally, the first floor would be clearly visible from the second-floor railing, but not now. The clouds completely blocked the view.
The wizard’s wand pointed at Ennes.
“Lightning Shock.”
A blue current shot from the wand and struck Ennes in the shoulder, electrocuting him.
Normally, the inspector was a much higher level than Caleb, but this time, he couldn’t resist the status effect.
He was already under the ‘Wet’ status from being drenched in rainwater inside the meeting room.
The Cumulonimbus clouds would strike any enemy hit by lightning with an additional bolt.
It was the same technique that had once created a lightning torrent on the 1.5th Floor.
Back then, he had fired Lightning Shock into a flood, but this time, the target wasn’t a body of water, but Ennes’s body.
Crackle!
The first to react was the Cumulonimbus in the meeting room. Something like an arc discharge flared out from the hole in the wall, striking Ennes from behind.
BOOM!
The lightning bolt slammed into him, and Ennes’s legs gave out.
CRACK!
Simultaneously, the clouds filling the casino hall began to react, one by one.
BANG!
BOOM!
“Ghk… Heok.”
Ennes collapsed, and screams echoed from the first floor below the railing.
The sight from below was one of pure terror.
Amidst the massive downpour, rumbling lightning flashed incessantly between the clouds.
“Get out!”
“Evacuate outside!”
The sounds of casino employees and constables evacuating the civilians could be heard.
Ennes, who had fallen, grabbed the railing and pulled himself back up.
He staggered forward like a zombie, his fingertips reaching for Caleb.
However.
“Superconductor.”
Another burst of current forced Ennes back down.
Superconductor was originally one of the close-combat countermeasure skills for wizards.
It was excellent for subduing opponents but had minimal destructive power. This time, however, was different.
BOOM!
CRASH!
CRACKLE!
Because Superconductor was also a lightning spell, the Cumulonimbus clouds responded, unleashing a concentrated barrage on Ennes.
The inspector had been skilled enough to reach the 6th floor during his adventurer days, but the twelve lightning strikes that had accumulated in just a few seconds drained his strength.
Putting a few steps between himself and the collapsed man, the wizard waited for the cooldown.
Not for his own magic, but for the lightning bolts fired by the Cumulonimbus.
Three seconds.
Two seconds.
One second.
The wand aimed at the target again.
“Lightning Shock.”
“…”
Under the renewed high-voltage bombardment, Ennes collapsed completely.
He couldn’t move an inch.
Neither could Neko or the other constables.
Brutal.
The word surfaced in the minds of some of the constables.
The merciless, almost cruel torrent of lightning left everyone breathless.
“Wh-What the… What’s with his vibe…?”
Even Back Attack was taken aback by his party member’s unprecedentedly savage display.
Fragments of the railing, scorched by a stray lightning bolt, clattered to the floor.
*
Krom, in handcuffs, was quietly led outside by the constables.
He watched Caleb’s battle from a distance.
That combat prowess… he’s no ordinary 3rd-floor wizard.
As one of Blackdog’s top executives, the orc berserker had already heard reports of Caleb’s exploits on the 1.5th Floor.
He had single-handedly developed a spell combination called Cumulonimbus and used it to wipe out the inter-floor village’s monsters.
Could that be the knowledge passed down from that fox spirit?
Of course, it was standard for wizards to build their memory books with spells suited to their abilities, but Caleb was different.
It was truly fortuitous that he had developed a new spell like Cumulonimbus through spell combination.
His High-Speed Casting ability, which eliminated spell cooldowns and allowed him to fire off several shots at once, was maximized by those summons.
The mass of summons, created in an instant, dominated the battlefield, stacking additional damage every time he cast a lightning spell.
Thanks to that, he could momentarily unleash destructive power far exceeding that of a 3rd-floor adventurer.
To think we lost a man like that to the Assembly.
It was a true shame.
But…
I think I’ll watch him for a while.
Krom had read the shock in the wizard’s eyes when he mentioned the White Lion.
There might be something more to him.
Perhaps his role wouldn’t end as a mere disposable pawn for the Assembly.
*
After Ennes fell, I cast a dispel spell to remove the Cumulonimbus clouds.
The entire casino was a wreck, soaked by the downpour.
My mind was in a similar state of disarray.
“Take him in for questioning.”
I handed the unconscious Ennes over to Neko.
“As you probably know, he’s a mole for Blackdog. He seemed close with Krom. He revealed our entire plan to him. He probably also knows about the constable who was captured.”
“…”
Neko swallowed hard.
“Y-You didn’t have to step in like this… We could have caught him.”
She said it not as a complaint, but out of concern.
“I’m just saying, you could have gotten hurt. But… thank you. Caleb. Thank you, and I’m sorry. We’re deeply in your debt.”
Neko bowed her head deeply.
“Please recover the professor’s body from the meeting room as well.”
“…I will. By the way… would you be available for a witness statement?”
Neko looked extremely apologetic for causing yet another inconvenience.
“Can it wait?”
“O-Of course! Of course, not right now. Please, get some rest.”
I quietly left the scene.
Back Attack followed me.
“Boss, what the hell happened in there? Were you close with that professor?”
Was I close with Enver?
No.
If I had to label him as friend or foe, he was closer to being a foe. For now.
He had hidden his affiliation with the Assembly and his true intentions, trying to use me for his own ends.
“Why were you so pissed off, boss…? You okay?”
“Yeah, I’m fine.”
I didn’t understand why I felt so shitty about the death of Enver, who was practically an enemy.
Was it because I didn’t turn the Hourglass when the axe fell on him?
Did I feel responsible?
Was I ever in a position to be responsible for Enver’s life in the first place?
He wasn’t my party member, my colleague, or my friend.
If I had turned the Hourglass, could I have saved him?
The downpour was drenching all of us, so if I had used Superconductor or Lightning Shock, I would have been electrocuted and collapsed myself.
A Dust Explosion would have been far too weak against a Deep Layer adventurer in the middle of a storm.
Using Psychokinesis to alter the axe’s trajectory was also impossible. I didn’t have that kind of physical force.
No immediate solution came to mind.
But maybe I could have found a way within those sixty seconds. That wasn’t the reason I didn’t use the Hourglass.
I was saving the Hourglass.
Instinctively.
If Krom really went on a rampage after killing Enver, I could be in danger too. Or maybe a panicked Ennes would have taken me hostage.
In that moment, I felt I had to prevent the Hourglass from being on its sixty-second cooldown.
That created a split-second of hesitation, and in that instant, it was over. Krom was too fast, too decisive. So much so that I couldn’t even react past my hesitation.
I see.
I knew the reason. The reason I felt so dirty.
To be honest, from the moment Ennes came in and started rambling, I had a feeling Enver might die.
If the situation turned dangerous, my life was the top priority. That was a constant. If the Hourglass was the only lifeboat to escape that situation, then of course I had to be the one to use it. Besides, Enver wasn’t my party member, my colleague, or my friend.
So I thought I could remain relatively calm in the face of his death.
And yet, the fact that I didn’t turn the Hourglass kept nagging at me.
Why?
Because after stripping away his masks—Assembly member, university professor—I had come face to face with the twenty-seven-year-old university student underneath.
Kim Min-sung, was it?
How badly must that kid have wanted to go home.
Recalling that moment, my heart grew heavy again.
Dammit.
That could have been me.
Now that the incident was over, a delayed tremor ran through my arm.
I could die a violent death just like that at any moment.
I’ve been dropped into that much of a shithole. I have to keep my wits about me.
A seasoned Deep Layer adventurer was no pushover. To think he’d even sacrifice his own man just to take Enver down.
And…
Developer difficulty is fucking hard.
*
“Caleb! I did everything you asked me to do, perfectly!”
Yernil was waiting in the dorm, looking incredibly proud.
You have no idea what kind of hell I saw today, Yernil.
Still, seeing her smile so happily was better for my own recovery.
“Did you sell everything?”
She had been carrying the bag containing all our party’s loot from the Labyrinth, selling magic stones and miscellaneous items.
“And I went to the College of Magic and got the magic equipment appraised! Under your name, Caleb! The stuff we got from defeating Antonelli. And that hooded cape you brought from the treasure room. They said it’s for wizards. You should use it, Caleb. Right?”
Yes. You did a great job, Yernil.
I’m proud of you!
“I was so nervous, you know.”
The process seemed to have been a huge burden for her.
“I was so scared of getting pickpocketed that I hugged it to my chest and tied it to my waist!”
“You did well. How much money did we get?”
“The exact appraisal for the magic stones isn’t out yet, but they said it’ll be around 170,000 gold! We’re rich!”
Typically, a four-person party could expect to earn about 100,000 gold from a normal adventure on the 3rd floor of the Labyrinth.
But we had a lot of variables, and we had cleared several exit rooms in quick succession, so our profits were much higher.
“And we still have to collect the service fees from the parties we rescued!”
Yernil beamed.
“Plus, we don’t know how much the items we left for appraisal at the College of Magic will fetch! But they said they have high magic power, so they’ll be expensive!”
Who could have turned the pure, innocent Yernil into this?
Yernil has been corrupted by money!
“When are we going back to the 3rd floor!? Let’s go soon!”
“The 3rd floor…”
Originally, I had planned to stay on the 3rd floor for a few months and run it several times.
But my plans had changed.
“Instead of the 3rd floor, let’s go to the 4th floor next.”
“…”
Yernil’s excited smile quietly faded. Her corruption by money was cured in an instant.
“The… the 4th floor?”
She was back to being the timid Yernil.
“C-Caleb… I’m perfectly happy earning money on the 3rd floor.”
But I’m not.
There’s a bigger problem than money.
I need to level up and get stronger, fast.
Because it’s too dangerous outside the Labyrinth.
Catching Ennes was, in fact, partly a matter of luck.
In game terms, Ennes had been hit with a ‘Surrounded’ status by Neko’s group, and my sudden attack from behind added an ‘Ambushed’ status on top of that.
What if it had been a head-on fight without those situational advantages?
My head might have been smashed by his mace before I could even utter “Lightning Shock.”
“Let’s go shopping tomorrow.”
First, I needed to buy some spellbooks. I had new magic slots in my memory book, after all.