Chapter 61
The Pilgrim's Tower, Fifth Tier.
In truth, it wasn't unexplored territory.
To be precise, two people had challenged it.
'Who was it in America again…? Anyway, that guy.'
The American Awakener who became the first person in the world to clear the Fourth Tier.
He reigned as the strongest for a full ten years.
Even clearing the Third Tier earned you treatment on par with Hwang Hee-chan, so imagine what the Fourth Tier brought.
People even said that the history of Awakeners was divided into the eras before and after his appearance.
But despite all that fame.
He died young.
Because he challenged the Fifth Tier.
'I heard his parents got cancer, so he went to find a cure.'
Unable to bear watching his elderly mother suffer, he resumed clearing the Tower.
He declared that he would be the first human to climb the Fifth Tier.
It happened before I was even born.
But what was the result?
'He couldn't even clear Floor 41.'
He had said he would leave strategy information for every floor for the sake of humanity, but not a word had been heard from him since.
There was even an urban legend that he was still challenging the Fifth Tier.
But all Awakeners knew this.
You could still open a 'channel' while climbing.
So if all contact had been cut off?
There was only one possibility.
The strongest man of an era.
Had died without even having time to write a single post.
'Hard Tower only lets you return after clearing the boss floor, too. If Floor 41 was a problem, everything above it must be even harder.'
That was why Awakeners didn't challenge the Fifth Tier.
Clearing the Fourth Tier was already a historic achievement, so there was no reason to challenge it needlessly.
There had apparently been a Russian daredevil who challenged it while shouting, 'I can do it—I'm the one for the job!!' But that was beside the point.
So it was only natural for people to leave comments worrying about me…
-Snicker.
'Sorry, but I've already cleared Floor 47.'
Would they get angry if they knew?
If they found out I'd climbed seven floors in just a few hours today.
Of course, I'd climbed Egen Tower, but I was collecting the Hard Tower rewards.
So the end result was the same.
'The problem is Floor 49 and the boss floor.'
The important thing was that I'd decided to challenge those two floors in Hard Tower.
Even I was nervous about this.
I'd already decided to use the Whatever Genesis Sword and Whatever Inner World, but hearing everyone scare me made me nervous again…
[Comments]
- Show us your mana pool before you go!!!!
- We can't lose the busty goddess Renya vouched for!!!!
"……."
'These bastards, seriously.'
I had almost gotten scared because it was so late at night.
But thanks to those men being so honest about their desires, I completely changed my mood.
Of course, it changed for the worse.
[Gallery]
Title: Do you want boobs?
(A photo from Renya's topless pictorial)
(A close-up photo of a chest)
(A photo of the Monkey's Paw)
'Granted.'
- Agh, noona, fuck!!!!!!!
- This is right for noona, but—no, wait.
- How is the gallery owner trolling us…?
- Look at them rushing over the second they stopped worrying, lmao. The view count is fucking insaneㅋㅋㅋㅋ
- Such transparent bastards…
"…You said it."
After reading that far.
I abruptly stood up.
I was going to stop paying attention and go to sleep.
'Then… huh?'
[Gallery]
Title: What's with Renya ㄷㄷㄷ
Title: Going to a meetup???
Title: Is something big coming???
"What does this mean, now?"
But just as I was about to put my phone away.
A strange lead happened to catch my eye.
The name Renya appeared especially often.
'Asking for the cloak back? Nope, it's mine now. I'm not giving it back.'
I probably didn't need to pay it any attention.
Let's ignore Renya. Ignore Renya.
* * *
A few dozen minutes before Hwi-min turned off his phone, lay back down, and returned to serving as a living body pillow for the two women.
A man trembled.
It was Renya, Japan's number-one S-rank Awakener, who had rushed over with a translation app after hearing the news about Iron Gangmin.
'The Fifth Tier… If it's that person, they can do it!!'
Renya wasn't planning to discourage them.
After all, Renya had seen Iron Gangmin's abilities.
Iron Gangmin had transformed the inside of a Gate into a paradise in an instant and chopped a giant into pieces with a single blow.
On top of that, Iron Gangmin possessed an almost divine information-based Trait.
Renya knew that better than anyone—even Hyeonseo.
He believed Iron Gangmin was more than capable of climbing the Fifth Tier.
-Gulp.
'And if Iron Gangmin wrote a strategy guide…?'
Renya started thinking even further.
Iron Gangmin was such an incredible Awakener that they could figure out the strategy for the Seven Great Gates at a glance.
What if Iron Gangmin climbed the Fifth Tier and wrote down the strategy for each floor in detail?
'Then we could challenge it too!'
The history that had stalled at the Fourth Tier would finally break through.
Awakeners would only have to follow the path opened and paved by the pioneer named Iron Gangmin.
The possibility of more Fifth-Tier Awakeners would open up.
'This… isn't something I can handle alone.'
After reaching that conclusion.
Renya hurriedly began making calls.
Skilled English passed back and forth over the phone.
[Sugiyama, what the….]
"Iron Gangmin is challenging the Fifth Tier. In a few hours."
[…Fuck, I almost missed a major event because I was asleep.]
"You're coming, right?"
[Of course.]
The people on the other end were the same Fourth-Tier clearers as Renya.
Except for a few who had been asleep and learned of it late, all of them were monitoring the situation just like Renya.
That was how historic a declaration to climb the Fifth Tier was.
The world's strongest Awakeners—those within the top ten—immediately decided to gather together.
[Ask them for the Fifth-Tier strategy?]
"You saw Iron Gangmin. We can't protect everyone anymore by settling for the Fourth Tier."
[Yeah… So that's why it's Iron Gangmin, then. We can't do this barehanded.]
At the same time, they all thought the same thing.
Asking Iron Gangmin to write a strategy guide meant asking them to share in the achievement of clearing the Fifth Tier.
Wasn't it basically asking them to suffer through the climb first and then put down a ladder for them?
They couldn't ask for that without offering something in return.
No, setting propriety aside entirely.
They had to pay Iron Gangmin.
'It would be a worldwide loss if Iron Gangmin died.'
There was no guarantee that something like one of the Seven Great Gates wouldn't erupt in their own country.
Therefore, Iron Gangmin couldn't be allowed to die an untimely death.
At the very least, they had to provide potions.
'Besides… the Fifth Tier. Just hearing about it makes my heart race.'
There was one more thing.
They were all Fourth-Tier clearers.
It would be a lie to say they had never dreamed of climbing the Fifth Tier.
So they couldn't help getting excited.
Most of them cheered on a challenge they themselves had been unable to undertake.
'That bitch pisses me off, getting treated like a goddess without even showing her face… Should I put something in her potions?'
Of course, one or two of them had malicious thoughts.
-Shake, shake.
'…She had artifacts appraised too, didn't she, that bitch?'
Iron Gangmin's abilities made even malice hesitate.
Even the Fourth-Tier clearers among them were practically naked in Iron Gangmin's presence.
"Then, four hours… No, let's meet in three hours, to give ourselves plenty of time."
[The location is obviously 'that place,' right?]
"Of course. I'll post it on the site Iron Gangmin frequents."
After they reached an agreement.
Renya's fingers busily moved across the keyboard.
Before long, a post reeking of machine translation appeared.
[Awakener Minor Gallery]
Author: Renya_Official
Title: A Message from All Fourth-Tier Clearers to Iron Gangmin
(Renya's verification photo)
I respectfully submit.
I, Sugiyama Renya, along with
the eight people who have cleared the Fourth Tier of the Pilgrim's Tower,
deeply support Iron Gangmin's challenge of the Fifth Tier from the bottom of our hearts.
Therefore, we would like to provide
the potions we have pooled together
free of charge.
We will be waiting on Floor 40 of the Pilgrim's Tower tomorrow morning.
Respectfully, Sugiyama Renya.
- Ugh, disgusting image… Huh?
- Why is this legit???
- All the Fourth-Tier clearers gathered, holy shitㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋ
Naturally, the community went wild.
It was an event bringing together top-level powerhouses, so the attention of the entire world—not just Korea—was inevitably drawn to it.
That was why those who gathered on Floor 40 the next morning were so confident.
"What a day for us all to gather like this."
"Even Iron Gangmin can't pass this up, can they?"
They were the strongest in the world.
They were the eight people at the very summit of Awakener history.
They weren't even here to flaunt their status; they had brought a considerable number of potions for Iron Gangmin.
They apparently hadn't received government support, but altogether, what they brought amounted to a hundred lowest-grade potions.
So Iron Gangmin would come as well.
Even Renya was certain of it…
Whoosh—!!!
A short while after they gathered.
The light of a portal swirled inside the safe zone.
And what appeared with it was
a woman.
"……!!!"
'Is that Iron Gangmin!?'
Everyone held their breath.
Then they turned their heads toward Renya.
If she really was Iron Gangmin, they assumed Renya would naturally react accordingly.
Renya looked crestfallen.
"That's not it… (That's not the one…)."
"……."
'As expected, Renya's disappointed.'
Then, betraying everyone's expectations, the ninth Fourth-Tier clearer to appear was Hyeonseo.
She let out a small sigh.
Naturally, it was because of Hwi-min.
[O child, I hear that some riffraff are waiting for God at a place called Floor 40.]
"Why all of a sudden? I'm busy preparing…."
[So they aren't going. Then you don't need to prepare tribute either.]
"…What?"
The message Baekrihyang had delivered that morning was simple.
Iron Gangmin wouldn't accept the potions, even if offered.
Even Hyeonseo was momentarily flustered.
The Fifth Tier wasn't the name of some neighbor's dog, so wasn't that confidence a bit excessive?
'We can't get back to Floor 40 until the boss is defeated… You're asking for a strategy guide? Yeah, no thanks.'
Hwi-min, for his part, had simply ignored them after recalling the saying that there was no such thing as a free lunch.
Hyeonseo had no way of knowing that.
"Hello, I am Lee Hyeonseo, an Awakener with the Cheonghwa Guild."
"Uh, um. Nice to meet you…."
In the end, they chatted for a long while and only awkwardly left after about six hours had passed.
"By the way, who is the Awakener with the Unique-grade Trait that Iron Gangmin mentioned?"
"Right. I was curious about that too."
"Uh… um…."
'Ms. Yuna has seemed to be fishing for information lately, which already makes things awkward. Should I mention this?'
Yuna, whose name had suddenly become known to the strongest Awakeners in the world, later saw the flood of DMs and was horrified.
This was still only a minor incident.
* * *
Meanwhile, just as Hyeonseo was making her unexpected debut on Floor 40 of the Pilgrim's Tower.
-Ding.
[You have entered Floor 48 of the Beginner's Tower.]
"……Huh?"
Inside a Tower of an entirely different difficulty level.
Hwi-min's eyes widened.
[The Trait 'Dragon Eyes' activates….]
'A chance to cheese the Hard Tower boss has appeared?!'