02. Rank
02. Rank
+++
After getting beaten up in what was supposedly 1:1 guidance, Bari and I were invited to Yu Ina's house.
Nothing fancy—just eating dinner together and talking about Luna.
Like how we're gonna scrape together the gold, how much she can chip in, etc.
I haven't even confirmed that I'm buying Luna yet, but in her mind, it's already a done deal that I'm buying her.
This is beyond stubborn—it's straight-up delusional.
In the middle of the back-and-forth, when she found out I had 1,000 gold on hand, she tilted her head.
It'd only been two days since she lent me 30 gold, so of course suddenly having 1,000 gold wouldn't make any sense.
To her, I confidently held out the pouch of gold coins.
Carrying around 1,000 individual coins would be too heavy, so I'd divided them into lighter bundles of 10 each.
"Go ahead and check. I've got 100 pouches like this."
"..."
A human already? No way.
She muttered.
But she snatched the pouch I offered right up.
Ching.
The sound of coins clinking together.
That ear-tingling sound of money dominated the room for a moment.
'In about five days, we'll have the nanomaterials mass-production line up, so then we can really crank out the volume—'
"What the hell is this? It's fake?!"
Huh?
"What?! W-what do you mean!"
She'd been inspecting the coins with a bored expression, but then she let out a gasp like her heart dropped, and started frantically digging through the pouch.
Before long, she dumped the coins out on the table and practically snatched another pouch from me, piling them up high.
Her face just kept getting darker.
"You..."
She stared at me, unable to continue.
How the hell did she figure it out?
Bari's forgeries were perfect.
Proof? Bari was wearing an expression of utter shock she'd never shown before.
"...How did you know?"
"...I had a hunch, but you forged these, didn't you? Haah... What a headache you are."
She let out a deep sigh.
The look she gave me was pure 'hopeless case.'
"I have no idea where you get your confidence. Counterfeiting currency is a heavy crime that carries a minimum of 300 years in prison— one of the heaviest. Especially if it's gold coins."
"Three hundred years?? Are you insane?"
"Yeah. 'Minimum' 300 years. Well, if you behave like a model prisoner, you might get parole after 200... but not for a human like you."
As if.
In prison, I wouldn't even get Bari's help, so 200 years would kill me ten times over.
"But thinking about it, there's no way a mere human like you forged them. And this much in just one day."
Her gaze shifted to Bari.
Bari still looked dumbfounded.
She must be seriously rattled that her supposedly flawless work got sniffed out.
"Luna, close the door. All the windows too."
"Y-yes! Hic!"
Startled by the scene of this massive crime, Luna ran off hiccuping.
Swish.
Yu Ina held out her hand.
"You said 1,000 gold? Hand it all over. I'll check."
"..."
We're totally screwed.
"No need to check."
"...Ha."
She's not working at the mint or anything—she's an Academy instructor—and she spotted it in 10 seconds flat, so these are useless anyway.
Might as well come clean.
"What the hell were you thinking... So, did you use any?"
"Nope, not yet. Just what you gave me. Probably."
"'Probably'? Be certain."
"Didn't use any."
"Anyone else know?"
"Of course not."
"That's a relief at least."
She sighed in relief, then ground her teeth with a crunch.
"You're... just...!!"
"...But how'd you even spot it? It was perfect."
"..."
This was the part I was dying to know.
Bari's counterfeits weren't just perfect—they were indistinguishable from the originals. So how?
"Hoo... Yeah, the appearance is spot-on. But for currency, what's important is the unique ID assigned to each one, not the looks. The appearance can be faked easy enough. Like these."
"ID?"
What is this, a game? Item IDs or something?
"Every type of currency has Nobling frequencies embedded in them at different wavelengths. It's programmed so you can read that and know it's 'currency.'"
What the fuck. Where do they even get that shit?
"It's a way more complex concept if you dig deep, but that's the gist."
"...Isn't Nobling the power you guys use?"
I'd heard that those who 'use Nobling' are called Noblesse.
They control the minting too?
"Yeah. The Dwarves mint the currency, but we Noblesse assign the IDs."
"So if you can't assign that ID, no matter how identical it looks, you can tell it's fake right away?"
"That's not all. Even if you could embed Nobling somehow, when you scan the currency, it shows who assigned it, where, when, where they live, what family they're from—everything. Cross-check with the ledgers, and you're busted every time."
"Ha. And I didn't even know..."
Talk about unnecessarily systematic. For a medieval vibe.
"...I'm sorry, Sihwan-nim."
"Nah. How were we supposed to know? I just found out myself. We'll do it right next time."
"'Do it right next time'? Don't you know how to reflect?"
"So what? We didn't get caught. If you don't get caught, it's not a crime."
"Ha... You got caught red-handed by me... Unbelievable."
"Then you're, uh... an accomplice, right?"
"What??! A-accomplice?! What bullshit is that!!"
"Hell, being treated like an accomplice is lucky, isn't it? I'm a 'human' who's only been in the Tower for two days. Hu-man. But you're Noblesse, and this is your house. If we get caught, who do you think gets suspected more? You think they'd believe a lowly human forged 1,000 gold coins in one day? A human? Some puny human?"
"Y-you... damn bastard...!"
Yu Ina was completely furious, her face beet red.
Must be serious for her, but damn, it's kinda cute.
"Eh, half-joking anyway. But yeah, if this doesn't work, gathering 10,000 gold is gonna suck."
Not gonna lie, I got no clue how.
10,000 gold? You'd have to live as an Academy trainee for like 40 years without spending a dime, which is impossible. And I don't even want to that bad.
"Bari, can you read this Nobling stuff?"
"...No data yet, so I don't know."
"See? How about you lend us some?"
"..."
Yu Ina was just trembling silently.
Her anger must've hit the limit.
Ah.
Did that last bit piss her off more?
I said I wouldn't pull aggro, but here we are.
"Huu... huu..."
She desperately deep-breathed to calm her rage.
I must be stressing her out bad.
Sorry.
"For now... we'll dispose of the whole batch."
Bari quietly gathered up the coins scattered on the table.
Precious nanomaterials—better recover 'em quick.
"We'll head out. Talk tomorrow."
"Ah... G-goodbye."
Leaving her still deep-breathing and fuming, I bolted to the door. Polite Luna bowed on the way.
"You..."
Right as I opened the door to leave, Yu Ina's words hit my back.
"Be ready tomorrow."
"..."
Chills down my spine.
+++
"Huaa."
My house.
The Base-slash-home under the Academy.
I had no choice but to flop onto this fluffy spot.
Got my ass handed to me by Yu Ina, plus the counterfeiting fiasco—exhausted all around.
Who'd have thought a medieval setup like this had such tight currency controls.
"My oversight."
"I told you no. How the hell were we supposed to know?"
Bari seemed pretty shocked.
She'd been so confident in her copies, and they got busted in 10 seconds—who wouldn't be?
She's got that haughty side anyway.
But this time, it was unavoidable. No one would've known.
"Anyway, we'll think about that later... Luna'll... work itself out somehow."
Didn't need to buy her that bad anyway... It's not life or death.
"Yeah. I'll dispose of these for now."
"Back to nanomaterials?"
"Yes."
"Good. Recover every last one."
Bari got right to it.
Looked like she was determined not to leave any trace of her failure.
<Production>
Compressed Material 570L/t
Meta-atom 30L/t
Nanomaterials 0L/t
<Stockpile>
Compressed Material 1530L
Meta-atom 70L
Nanomaterials 1L
[Facilities]
Control Center : 1
Collector : 2
Nuclear Fission Device : 1
[Units]
Construction Robot : 1
"Pretty pathetic."
Checking the Base status, we'd built up some Compressed Material, but Meta-atoms and Nanomaterials were still critically low.
And even that was thanks to recovering those 1,000 fake coins.
"Hmm... Bari."
"Yes, Sihwan-nim."
"What if we're..."
"Yes."
"...in more danger than we thought?"
"...Why bring that up suddenly?"
Bari had that 'What's gotten into him?' face.
Not like she thought it was nonsense—just 'What's this about?'
"Well... it's not what I expected."
Today's sparring.
I'd brushed it off, but honestly, it was a shock.
Even these A-rank rookies not even certified as Tower Warriors yet—turning everywhere into a sea of flames, zipping around at Mach speeds... some chick delivering over 200 tons of impact with a kick like it was a TNT bomb...
Non-stop jaw-droppers. As an ordinary human body, I couldn't even imagine it.
Sure, if Bari went all-out, she'd wreck them in a second, but the point is, we're just starting at the Academy.
Once you're an official Tower Warrior heading to the upper floors, Academy trainees are less than ants to those masters everywhere.
And even those guys are struggling against the Celestial Race in this Tower.
On top of that, my money cheat got blocked.
Assigning individual Nobling frequencies to currency? Modern humanity never pulled that insane shit. Do they have surplus admin power, or is this society way more advanced than it looks?
"Maybe the society where these 'Advanced Races' live... is more developed than we think."
"I was just thinking the same... but I didn't expect you to say it, Sihwan-nim."
"If they can etch IDs onto every coin, the applications must be endless. In human history terms, at least industrial revolution level."
Factor in magic, Artifacts, and all that... actual combat power might match pre-space age humanity. At that point, even for Bari in her downgraded state, it could be a real threat.
"Since you brought it up..."
Bari had something to say too.
"You remember what I mentioned before? How events are processed differently here."
"The muscle growth thing?"
"Yes. Events here get collected in what I call the 'Server,' calculated, and the results applied to the world. It's not just muscles. Applies to everything—attack power, defense, etc."
"Still can't get used to it. Game or reality?"
"The Suit Rihana shredded in one hit... Physically speaking, no matter how hard she swung those claws, it shouldn't have scratched."
"But it got torn to shreds."
"Yes. Simply put, Rihana's attack power exceeded the alloy Suit's defense. No physics laws matter here. Even if the Suit's Compressed Material and Meta-atom bonding was vastly superior to her claws', it means nothing in their formula. So even if I 3D-print a planet-killer weapon, I can't predict how effective it'll be. Too many unknowns lead to instability."
I didn't catch it all, but yeah, she agreed—situation's more serious than thought.
"So, Sihwan-nim,"
She started heavy.
I could guess what was coming.
"Don't pull aggro?"
"Yes."
Called it.