─ Once again, we extend our boundless gratitude and respect to Person123, the top Climber on Nightmare difficulty, who has secured another year of survival for all of humanity. Taking his noble spirit of challenge as our example, the United States will continue to spare no effort in pursuing Nightmare-difficulty climbs going forward…
I ate breakfast while watching the U.S. President’s address on the morning news.
Two days had passed since I cleared the third floor.
I’d slept at a hotel the day of the attempt, co ho the next day and rested, so that made two days.
Another major hurdle cleared, and coming back ho afterward really drove it in: nothing beat ho. It actually felt like a proper rest for once.
─ …With the clearing of Nightmare Floor 3 bringing joy to many, the Tower’s 3-Year Rule is now right around the corner. The First-wave Climbers, the very first to receive the Tower’s call, have only a little over ten days remaining, and the number of First-wave Climbers who have yet to attempt the Nightmare difficulty is estimated at a minimum of 50,000…
When the next segnt ca on, I checked the current Nightmare climbing status.
[Nightmare]
Personnel: 250,036
Ti Limit: 1 year, 20 days, 9 minutes, 57 seconds
Highest Floor Reached: 4F
“…What the hell are these people supposed to do?”
The First-wave Climbers, the very first group to beco Climbers, myself included.
How many had been left by the ti the first floor was cleared? Sothing like 75,000?
Either way, tens of thousands of people were weeks away from death.
I’d catch bits of news here and there about expanding training facilities, pledging active support, that kind of thing, but…
The other difficulties were one thing; Nightmare was genuinely hopeless.
─ I’ve decided not to attempt it and just accept what cos. I’d rather die peacefully than enter the Tower and die horribly. I don’t think I’m the only one who feels that way, either.
Next ca an interview clip with one of the Nightmare First-wave Climbers.
A man with a composed expression said those words, smiling calmly.
I felt a twinge of sympathy and turned off the TV.
‘A peaceful death, huh.’
Why did those words feel so unsettling?
The death the Tower had promised… how exactly would it happen?
Would people just suddenly collapse as if from a heart attack out of nowhere?
Or instant death, too fast to even feel pain?
If it were sothing that mundane, then maybe that man was right. Maybe not attempting it at all was the better choice.
Better than being torn apart by Goblins sowhere with no one around to help.
On top of that, entering the Tower ant not even leaving a body behind.
“Thanks for the al.”
I soaked the dishes in the sink, went back to my room, and lay down on the bed.
Out of habit, I opened the Communication Channel.
A mountain of Whispers had piled up.
Since I’d announced this attempt in advance, the Whispers had actually been pouring in nonstop even before the third-floor challenge. Most of them were ssages of encouragent.
[Chicken Sandwich: You’ve worked hard, Mr. Kim. You truly are the only one who can save humanity. If there’s anything you need from , please don’t hesitate to say the word.]
I’d also had a brief exchange with Bilon after the clear.
Bilon was practically the only person I could talk to openly about my runs.
Part of wanted to tell him just how much hell I’d been through, but…
It would’ve just sounded like whining, “Oh, you have no idea how rough I had it, seriously,” so I dropped it. No point making the guy anxious for nothing.
[Lotus: Thank you. I’m cheering for you.]
I’d also gotten a ssage from the Section Chief at the Tower Climbing Special Agency.
Long conversations still felt like too much, so I just sent a short reply.
[Pringles: But y’know, Person123 only needs one more floor to hit 5F.]
[Yatmon: Think they’d actually go around the Common Zone? They’re still hiding their identity and all]
[Bamboo: Could walk right past you and you’d never know lol for real]
[Hobby: They’ll probably just move around quietly on their own. Still, they’ll grab everything worth grabbing on 5F before going for 6F]
[Lubrublubru: I just wanna know what country they’re from at least, seriously]
[Iron Armor: Why are you guys talking like 4F is already cleared]
[Wheat Field: Because we believe they’ll clear it~]
[Blue Marlin: You don’t trust Person123? I do]
Browsing the Communication Channel and reading people’s conversations, my thoughts drifted to the fifth floor.
‘The Common Zone…’
The Tower’s fifth floor was called the Common Zone.
Because it was, quite literally, a communal area.
The fifth floor wasn’t sothing that needed to be cleared. It was a space where Climbers of all difficulties gathered together. Sort of like a rest-stop checkpoint.
Of course, no Climber on Nightmare difficulty had reached the fifth floor yet.
If I managed to clear the fourth floor, I’d be the first Nightmare Climber to ever set foot in the Common Zone.
Not that it held any particular significance. Just another floor to pass through.
I browsed the Communication Channel a bit longer, then closed it.
“Guess I should get started today.”
I still needed to put together an info post for the third floor, so there was no point dragging things out. I’d go for the Hidden route today.
[Would you like to enter Nightmare Difficulty Floor 3?]
I let my food digest a bit, then entered the Tower right away.
*
I’d struggled like hell because I hadn’t known, but the key to the third floor was speed.
Get underground and activate the Sun Emblem as fast as possible, before even more Undead could flood out onto the field.
Groooooo…
The mont I entered, I located the underground passage hatch in the floor.
‘Let’s see.’
One o’clock direction from the entry point. Noted.
I grabbed my mace and charged straight ahead, caving in the skulls of every Undead that sward toward .
My body, now at Level 40 after gaining ten Levels, was obviously much stronger and faster.
KABOOOM!
I fired off a Fla Strike to blast open the floor and dropped right in.
That whole sequence took about thirty seconds?
On other difficulties, sunrise took ten minutes. Nightmare seed to work in reverse, with ten minutes until sunset, so I needed to finish within ten minutes at minimum. Otherwise they’d co pouring in like a swarm of locusts again.
I sprinted through the passage and arrived at the central chamber.
I went left first.
Picked up the gem on the floor, Teleported back. Clear.
Ca out, socketed the gem, and headed right.
Ignored the cheap chain-fishing trap and grabbed the gem from the wall above the entrance. Clear.
About one minute had elapsed by the ti I entered the path straight ahead.
I picked up the cube, eyes wide, and started solving it.
Click. Click-click.
Is it even possible to solve a cube in under twenty seconds?
With enough dedicated practice, pure effort could get you there.
The catch was that you needed to learn advanced algorithms, not just the basic ones…
And I obviously hadn’t practiced beforehand.
I couldn’t exactly put off the Hidden run just to grind cube-solving until I hit a twenty-second clear.
The hourglass emptied quickly, and vibrations signaling approaching Undead rumbled through the ground.
“Diul.”
Still focused on the cube, I called for Diul.
Diul activated Concealnt, and my body turned semi-transparent.
I left the Undead, who’d charged all the way here only to mill around stupidly with nothing to find, and finished the cube.
Still, it was obviously faster than my first attempt.
I completed the cube, removed the gem, and moved to the central chamber.
Total ti so far… about three minutes!
FWOOOOOSH!
Light erupted from the Sun Emblem, lting the surrounding Undead.
Now I needed to head up top and see what the boss was like.
It had to be far weaker than that monster from before. That was only normal.
Groooooo…
Climbing back to the surface, I saw Undead dissolving in the sunlight.
Soon the surviving Undead began massing together on one side.
But their numbers were incomparably fewer than last ti. A hundred at most?
The clump they ford was only slightly larger than the Minotaur had been.
Grooooooooo…
The infrasonic hum was barely enough to make my ears itch.
I flicked my ears a couple of tis, then imdiately fired off Fla Strike and Light Bullet simultaneously.
KABOOOOM!
Three fireballs and five Light Bullets concentrated their bombardnt on the mass, and it simply exploded on the spot.
“…”
Are you kidding ?
It was this weak originally?
What in the world kind of fight had I been through before…?
It wasn’t completely dead yet.
I walked up to the thing, its body blown apart and core fully exposed, and smashed it with my mace.
“Just die already.”
Part of it was that I’d grown stronger at Level 40, sure, but this was a level of easy I could’ve handled even back at Level 30.
At this difficulty, other Nightmare Climbers could probably manage it too, couldn’t they?
If they minimized the ti as much as possible, it might actually be easier than the second floor.
Granted, other people would be facing the boss at Level 20, but still.
Well, whatever.
The boss was dealt with easily enough, so now it was ti to find the Hidden route.
I looked around at the endless plains stretching in every direction.
“Where the hell am I supposed to go?”
There were way too many options.
I could head in any direction: north, south, east, or west.
Just as I was thinking about going back down into the underground passage to look around first…
“…?”
I narrowed my eyes.
Way, way off in the distance… if I looked closely, there was sothing out there.
‘A pyramid?’
So kind of pointy structure that vaguely resembled a pyramid.
It shimred like a mirage.
Leveling up and gaining physical enhancents naturally improved eyesight too.
So my eyes could see extraordinarily far. I might even beat a bird of prey in a contest.
Judging by the sense of depth I was getting, that structure was an enormous distance from here.
But… there was no way it was visible for no reason, right?
It wasn’t just background scenery, like decorative graphics beyond the edge of a ga map.
“Let’s check it out.”
I broke into a light sprint.
Every ti my feet struck the ground, the earth cracked beneath as my body rocketed forward.
It was far, but I was no slouch in the speed departnt either.
It didn’t take long to reach my destination.
“Yep, that’s definitely a pyramid.”
As I got close, it turned out to be a truly massive structure that did look remarkably like a pyramid.
Surrounding it were nurous pillars and smaller structures as well.
It gave off a vibe that was sort of like… a temple?
Rumble…
The blazing sun overhead suddenly vanished, and for so reason, dark clouds began rolling in.
Night, then suddenly morning, and now overcast.
The weather really was putting on quite the show.
The fact that sothing was changing probably ant I’d co to the right place.
I entered the temple grounds, staying on guard.
As I walked along, scanning my surroundings, I heard a sound coming from sowhere.
It sounded like fighting, so I ran straight toward it.
There were people.
Three of them. They wore armor and looked like knights.
“Sir Delrunt! Watch out!”
The knights were surrounding and fighting a large Undead, and the creature looked reasonably strong.
‘Should I help?’
As I’d learned on the second floor, the Hidden route didn’t exclusively feature enemies that had to be killed.
Given that they were fighting an Undead, weren’t they likely allies?
I decided to help the knights for now.
“I’ll help youuuu!”
I shouted at the top of my lungs as I charged in, just in case they mistook for an enemy.
The knights spotted and turned to look.
The Undead was humanoid but towered well over three ters tall, gripping what looked like a massive rusted greatsword.
It was clearly much stronger than the ones that had sward during the main clear.
The knights were too close to the Undead for to use Fla Strike.
Instead, I fired Light Bullets as I charged toward the Undead alongside them.
Pow-pow-pow!
I landed hits on the arm holding the sword to prevent it from counterattacking, then launched myself at the Undead’s head.
I swung my mace into its skull, and half its head burst apart with a heavy crack.
GRAAAHHH…!
The knights swiftly slashed at the staggering Undead’s legs with their swords, pressing the joint attack.
As it toppled, I swung my mace one more ti and shattered its head completely. Done.
Nothing special.
I looked to the side and found the knights staring at with wide, startled eyes.
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