Chapter 37 – How A Veteran Grows (4)

Time passed quickly.

24 hours after entering the underground floor, his level had increased from 1 to 12.

—

Name: Kang Jin-hyuk
Gender: Male
Age: 27
Level: 12
Strength 8 Agility 8 Stamina 8 Magic 41 Rift 100 Luck 10 Adaptability 10
Stat points: 33
Coins: 22740
Occupation: None
Unique Abilities: Fusion, Sword Grave, Blessing of the Stars
Skills: Lv4′ Element of Fire’, Lv3′ Eye of Truth’, Lv3 ‘Communion,’ Lv3′ Stigma on Soul’, Lv3′ Shallow Breath’, Lv3 Cold Heart
—

Such a crazy growth rate.

It took two weeks for Lee Taemin and Yoo Yeonhwa, who were both veterans, to reach level 10.

However, despite his overwhelming growth, Jin-hyuk’s expression didn’t change much.

‘A raid with Elise on support.’

Level 12 wasn’t high.

And he didn’t want to be satisfied with this.

Puak!

[Lv4′ Element of Fire’ is activated.]
A stream of flame was rising from the back.

As the level of the ability had gone up, the Element of Fire too changed.

‘My fighting power is almost back to its heyday.’

His body adapted quickly.

It was thanks to the constant fighting against the monsters.

At the same time…

“Shall we bring monsters again?”

Seeing Jin-hyuk activating his skill, Elise flew into the sky.

The little wings on her back were flapping, making Jin-hyuk smile.

‘It looks like she is getting used to it now.’

Although she grumbled a lot, there was no waste of time as she was doing her job correctly.

“Do a lot more than usual;. There is no need to use bondage this time.”

“Uh? Wouldn’t it be more convenient for you if I stop them all?”

“True, but I want you to preserve your magic if possible.”

“Magic… preserve it? why?”

Elise tilted her head. She didn’t understand.

If someone wanted to hunt correctly, there was no need to think about saving up magic.

Jin-hyuk’s eyes turned towards the pit in the middle. It was the pit that the insects had been crawling endlessly out of.

“I am all warmed up now, so we can head downstairs.”

Level up and increase his strength.

Two objectives had been achieved.

So it was time to achieve his last purpose in visiting this place.

‘By now, the guilds around the world must be anxious about the boss on the 3rd floor.’

They must be getting jumpy and slightly crazy. Initially, he wanted to clean up the boss battle that they were supposed to raid after spending a lot of time growing his power.

But there was no answer despite planning for over a hundred days.

Jin-hyuk smiled.

The boss monster of the 3rd floor was something he couldn’t quite overcome yet. That was because the key to breaking through that floor was down here.

Inside an old-fashioned castle that would have been suitable for the Middle Ages.

Here, America’s ‘Titan,’ Europe’s ‘Olympus,’ China’s ‘People’s Republic,’ and Korea’s ‘Father of Fighting’ were present.

The representatives of those 7 guilds were here with a single purpose. They were to hold a meeting regarding the attack on the 3rd-floor boss, which had already failed eight times.

‘Nice.’

Looking at the rankers who continued to enter the hall, Teresa sighed.

She had heard that it was not a serious matter, but it looked worse than expected, considering all of the representatives of the guilds were stuck to their chairs.

‘I cannot help but be nervous.’

There were now less than 40 days left for mankind.

She didn’t know, but this meeting was supposed to be a turning point.

And at that moment…

A middle-aged man holding a wine glass opened his mouth. It was Patrick, an S rank player who attended as the representative of America’s Titan Guild.

“It seems like most of us have gathered, so let us start.”

And the whispers stopped as everyone looked at Patrick.

“As you all already know, the 8th raid attempt to enter the 4th floor has failed. Out of the raid group that involved 100 people and 15 relics, only 9 returned alive.

Quite the elaborate speech.

The attempt had the help of 1,500 players.

However, despite their support, the raid had failed once again.

Why?

Was it because the boss monster was overwhelmingly strong? Because there were a lot of traps?

No.

The final boss monster on the 3rd floor was an ordinary monster, and there were no traps in its room.

“Damn it. Even a holy relic failed. So how do we break through it?”

Right, the problem was neither quantity nor quality.

To reach the 4th floor, not just hundreds or thousands, but tens of thousands of statues had been knocked down.

“As I am saying again now, the raids on the 2nd and 3rd floors were done too hastily. In the end, you can see. How much did it cost us?”

Mage Maria, who was Olympus’ representative, added in.

If only there were enough players over level 15….

The raid wouldn’t fail.

However, the gap that was caused by the greed to climb the tower caused the level gap between players to widen.

In the end, a month passed.

“I guess you are right. Wasn’t it all because of the Chinese side’s monopoly of the magic crystals?”

Baek Jinho, of Dangun Guild’s 3rd raid team, growled through his teeth.

The Chinese side, silent until then, began to speak.

“It is hard for us to ignore that statement. We only climbed the tower for the sake of mankind. Misleading others without evidence is not allowed.”

Ten Wei, who belonged to the People’s Republic, frowned in protest.

“Puahahah! You sound like you are giving yourself an out. Everyone here knows how many people your side killed to create a single faction called the People’s Republic.”

“If you say another word…”

“What? What will you do?”

“Stop!”

As they were about to get up, Patrick intervened.

“This isn’t the time to bring up past incidents.”

There was a reality that they had to address now. This meant that this wasn’t the time for them to fight.

“You have something in mind?”

“Yes. There is only one way to get around this situation.”

Patrick’s face darkened as his lips trembled at the thought of saying the words he never thought he would say. But he was determined as it was something that needed to be done.

“Yesterday morning… I received a call from demonic humans. They will help under one condition.”

At Patrick’s words, there was a massive commotion in the hall.

“No!’

“You want to accept their offer?”

“They are a collection of human trash!”

“We can never side with those bugs. Never!”

The representatives of each guild began to raise their voices. Currently, the influence of large guilds exceeds that of governments.

This was why a cause for any action was important. One word and one action could cause infinite ripples.

Everyone was reluctant to join hands with the demonic humans because of that.

“Kulkul. They are garbage, and hearing the words of garbage hurts the heart.”

Then, something wriggled from the shadow of the room’s fire as an ominous shadow rose up.

Crackle!

The shadow soon took on a human form. It was an old man with a thin, white beard. However, the magic emanating from this man was too large to ignore.

“It’s good that you guild people have pride, but you know you can’t do it either, right?”

The old man asked.

“You impudent man! How did you get in here!”

“Mr. Patrick. Did you bring such a man into the room?”

“I will cut off your filthy head and hang you from a tree!”

Srng.

Clack!

Various weapons were pulled out as magic was infused into them. The once quiet hall devolved into chaos in an instant.

Chachacha!

The old man clicked his tongue.

“There are only bloodthirsty friends here. However, if only our conditions were heard, you would change your mind. We have the power to break through the boss.”

“Bullshit! What do you mean when your small number of men are nothing before us!”

The power of the demonic humans was, in actuality, not that significant, and such a small group would never be able to win against the 3rd-floor boss.

Even a raid that consisted of a thousand men had been annihilated, with no one surviving longer than three days.

“Hmm. Wouldn’t it be enough to make the numbers then?”

The old man struck the ground twice with a stick that had a skull atop it.

Thud! Thud!

A dull noise echoed around the hall and…

[Unique ability ‘Tomb of the Cursed Graveyard.’]
Kukuku!

Cracks appeared on the floor.

“W-what….!’

“This….!

People who spotted the cracks appearing were shocked. At the same time, corpses and bones that had been below the ground began to rise up one after another.

“Hehehe. There are many useful corpses buried under this land. Thanks to you, we can get good quality soldiers.”

The skeleton soldiers, which seemed to number in the three digits, approached them.

Although they had the appearance of those who had been trapped underground for many years, their swords and shields were in fine condition.

“This can be called an army as well. As you can see, among the demonic humans, there are many friends who are good at necromancy and summoning.”

“Necro… mancy? But, you want to play on such a scale…”

Ten Wei, who was mumbling, then said.

“No, that staff!”

The old man holding that staff.

He had seen it before. To be precise, he saw it when he played the Tower of Trials.

“Oh? There’s someone here that knows this?”

The old man proudly stroked the staff. A special item that could only be made after collecting 99 materials.

It wasn’t easy to make because it required bizarre and cruel items. If the synthesis was successful, this item displayed the best abilities of a Necromancer.

“As expected… a combination of a staff of greed and necromancer would have a good chance. A 9th attempt might be possible.”

“Mr. Ten Wei! No!”

Maria glanced over.

“If these people are approaching us to do some trickery, I don’t think they will end it with just this, but they don’t seem to be planning anything. And this plan isn’t bad.”

“Hm. I am sorry. But I agree with the Chinese this time. Of course, there is a condition that the public shouldn’t know of this.”

Baek Jinho spoke in agreement.

One by one, the atmosphere slowly turned to one favorable to the demonic humans’ proposal.

Teresa bit her lip while looking at the scene in front of her.

‘How did this come to happen?’

No matter what, to join hands with demonic humans?

She wanted to stop and not let them accept such a deal. However, with the absence of a way out, she couldn’t blindly oppose it.

‘If only Mr. Jin-hyuk was here.’

Then.

There would be no reason to worry about this.

Unlike the ‘fakes’ here, he was the only real veteran to her.

Considering the many things she had seen him do in the ruins, he must know how to get to the 4th floor.

But…

‘I alone cannot do it.’

Right. That could not happen.

It was impossible to reverse the situation on her own. It was as she thought that…

Woong!

A blue status window activated in front of her.

[A video call has been requested.]
She usually wouldn’t care about other players contacting her. But…

Ba-dump!

After reading the following line, her heart began to beat like crazy.

[The target player is Kang Jin-hyuk.]
Here it was

[Are you sure you want to accept the call?]
A call from the person she desperately needed.

“Mr…Jin-hyuk!”

With trembling hands, she pressed to accept, and a relaxed face could be seen on the other side.

The figure of Jin-hyuk, who looked as confident as ever.

And Jin-hyuk.

“What is this? Do those skeletons have osteoporosis?”

He started with the most sensible words.