Chapter 4
Seong-un pulled the dagger out of Han Geon-woo's neck and lightly pushed his chest with his foot.
The huge man fell backward without resistance.
Expensive axe.
Helmet.
Armor.
Shoes.
Gloves.
He had been equipped from head to toe.
But a beginner was still a beginner.
His movements had been simple enough to avoid even without anything else.
With Super Sense added on top of that, Seong-un had been able to predict Han Geon-woo's next attack with absolute certainty.
This is definitely good. For someone like me who plans to walk the path of the sword, it's an unbelievably useful skill.
As for the guy who had just picked a fight with him...
He had acquired a skill immediately upon Awakening.
Indestructible.
Combined with naturally outstanding physical ability, it made sense that a large guild would want him.
If the skill had at least reached C-rank, it might've taken a little longer.
He had probably only recently acquired it, so it should still be E-rank.
Indestructible hardened his body.
But at its current level, it couldn't fully protect an already injured area.
Seong-un shook the blood off his dagger and walked forward.
"Uh..."
The beginner climbers who had watched the fight flinched and stepped aside.
None of them had imagined the giant man would lose so helplessly.
"Kerrrk."
Once Seong-un left the entrance area of the first floor, a huge number of goblins greeted him.
There were at least thirty visible with the naked eye.
The monsters had been prepared for the one hundred participating climbers.
I'll kill all of them.
To maximize his clear evaluation, Seong-un needed to hunt as many monsters as possible.
He kicked off the ground.
"Kerrrk?!"
A goblin raised its guard.
But Seong-un was one step faster.
His dagger sliced its throat.
Slash.
The goblin group fell into confusion at how quickly one of their own had died.
Seong-un didn't waste the opening.
He immediately targeted the next goblin and cut through its neck.
I can sense all of them.
Even the goblins he couldn't see.
Whoosh!
He stepped aside, easily avoiding a club.
Then he drew his dagger across the goblin's throat in a straight line.
Every time one of them swung a club, Super Sense sent him a danger signal.
That allowed him to avoid every attack perfectly.
Not a single effective hit landed.
Slash.
Meanwhile, Seong-un followed the flow of mana and precisely targeted vital points.
Goblin corpses began piling up everywhere.
"Kerrrk!"
The goblins seemed to realize that charging individually wouldn't work.
They surrounded Seong-un.
"You think surrounding me will kill me?"
Seong-un chuckled.
Anyone who climbed the Tower experienced all kinds of absurd situations.
There had been countless moments when Seong-un almost died.
That was why being surrounded by a few goblins only made him laugh.
The idea that creatures like these thought they could suppress him was simply too ridiculous.
"Come."
Seong-un drew another dagger and held it in his left hand.
Then he crooked a finger at them.
"Kerrrrrk!"
The provocation worked perfectly.
The goblins charged all at once.
The battle ended quickly.
[You have defeated 61 Goblins.]
There had been sixty-one goblins in total.
Seong-un had successfully killed more than sixty percent of them by himself.
He would've preferred to kill the rest too.
But the climbers following behind became impatient and charged into the remaining goblins.
There was nothing he could do.
The rest became theirs.
[Calculating Floor 1 results.]
[1st Place - 61 kills]
[2nd Place - 7 kills]
...
Second place had killed seven.
That man.
Seong-un looked at a slender man around 170 centimeters tall.
At first glance, he looked like he might fall over from a single punch.
But the robe he wore and the wand in his hand both looked extremely expensive.
If Seong-un weren't here, that man probably would've taken first place on Floor 1.
Like Han Geon-woo, he had also used a skill.
So Tutorial Mode is still dominated by skill users.
A blessing permitted only to a small minority of Awakened.
Because of that, Tutorial Mode had long since become a place dominated by those who possessed skills from the beginning.
[A portal to the upper floor has been created.]
[Only ranks 1 through 50 may enter. Climbers outside the ranking will be automatically removed.]
"No!"
"Fuck! Couldn't you at least let 52nd place through?!"
The climbers who failed to make the ranking screamed.
The System ignored them completely and expelled them.
Forty-nine disappeared.
Fifty climbers remained.
It should be a little quieter now.
Seong-un walked toward the portal and entered the next floor.
Balhae Guild.
Currently ranked third in South Korea.
Park Seung-beom was a magic-type Awakened who had acquired the skill Blessing of Lightning upon Awakening.
Balhae welcomed him with open arms.
We sincerely thank you for choosing Balhae.
They treated Park Seung-beom exceptionally well.
And for good reason.
He possessed Blessing of Lightning.
It was a skill capable of growing all the way to S-rank.
Since he had started with an S-rank potential skill, his growth rate would undoubtedly be extraordinary.
Because of that, Balhae supported him generously.
A robe worth six hundred million won.
A wand comfortably exceeding one billion won.
Shoes worth slightly over eighty million won that had Haste magic engraved on them.
They spared no expense on his equipment.
We heard Cheonha also recruited someone talented and sent him into this Tutorial Mode. The chance of meeting him is low, but keep it in mind.
Cheonha.
A large guild ranked around ninth.
It was considerably weaker than Balhae, but still powerful.
If they had recruited someone immediately upon Awakening, that person was probably a talent similar to Park Seung-beom.
Since they had Awakened and been recruited around the same time, there was certainly a chance they could meet inside Tutorial Mode.
That's fine. His limit is only A-rank anyway.
S-rank and A-rank.
They might stand on roughly equal ground now.
But as time passed, the difference between them would become as vast as heaven and earth.
Even if they met, Park Seung-beom had no reason to feel inferior.
So that's the guy Cheonha recruited.
Park Seung-beom recognized Han Geon-woo immediately.
It was obvious because another beginner climber was covered from head to toe in expensive equipment.
For some unknown reason, Han Geon-woo threatened every climber around him.
That included Park Seung-beom, who possessed Blessing of Lightning.
It would be a lie to say he wasn't annoyed.
But he had no intention of stepping forward.
If he fought that huge man one-on-one, what were his chances of winning?
Park Seung-beom had almost no actual combat experience.
He was still a beginner.
He lacked enough data to become arrogant merely because of one powerful skill.
So he decided to watch.
Then Han Geon-woo suddenly focused on a shabbily dressed man and marched toward him.
It would be better not to cause unnecessary trouble.
If Han Geon-woo had already entered the royal road after being chosen by a large guild, then he should avoid causing incidents.
Apparently, that thought never crossed his mind.
He swung his axe at the shabby man.
Park Seung-beom sighed inwardly and shook his head.
He's hopeless.
Killing another climber like that was bound to cause trouble later.
But that worry proved unnecessary.
He dodged it?
Contrary to Park Seung-beom's expectation that the man would die instantly, the shabby man casually avoided Han Geon-woo's attack.
Then he avoided every wild strike that followed.
Han Geon-woo even used his skill while pressuring him.
Yet the other man used no visible skill at all.
Every movement was precise.
There was no wasted motion.
Park Seung-beom couldn't hide his shock.
If that man had entered Tutorial Mode, then he also couldn't have been Awakened for very long.
So how was he moving like that?
Slash.
The man suppressed Han Geon-woo with a single dagger as though the giant were nothing.
Goosebumps spread across Park Seung-beom's body.
Who the hell was he?
Did he join a large guild like me? No. There would've been information about him.
There was still more to see.
The man immediately began killing goblins.
Every time he swung his dagger, another corpse fell.
Feeling impatient, Park Seung-beom repeatedly cast magic and killed goblins of his own.
But he couldn't catch up.
I can't beat him in direct combat.
He had witnessed the overwhelming gap with his own eyes.
Then he would simply surpass him somewhere else.
The second floor was maze exploration.
Each participant received a separate maze.
They had to escape as quickly as possible to reach the next floor.
Another thirty people would be eliminated here.
The maze can only be escaped using your own ability.
Tutorial mazes were designed so that no item could interact with them.
The exact same maze never appeared twice either.
That meant strategy guides couldn't fully solve them.
Each climber had to rely on personal ability.
I can do this.
Crackle.
Park Seung-beom concentrated mana into his fingertips.
Sparks gathered there.
Then a line of lightning stretched straight ahead.
Blessing of Lightning wasn't merely an offensive skill.
By borrowing power from the Lightning God Ryser, it could be applied in many different ways.
For example...
Crackle.
The lightning that had been moving straight suddenly turned ninety degrees.
A short distance later, it changed direction again.
I'm targeting the open paths.
Whenever two or three routes appeared, he sent threads of lightning forward.
Only the correct path would continue.
The others would hit dead ends.
Park Seung-beom cut off the blocked threads and followed the correct route.
A smile deepened on his face as he progressed easily.
I'll show him that brute force isn't everything.
He acknowledged the man's combat ability.
But he was confident he wouldn't lose in other areas.
The problem would be intersections with five or six paths.
Can I control that many?
Before entering the Tower, he had practiced splitting his lightning into as many as six strands.
But controlling them had been extremely difficult.
Even so, he had to do it.
If he slowed down, there would be no hope of closing the gap from Floor 1.
[A portal to the upper floor has been created.]
[Only ranks 1 through 20 may enter. Climbers outside the ranking will be automatically removed.]
[Currently, '1' climber has cleared the maze.]
The message appeared before everyone still wandering through their mazes.
"What the hell...?"
Park Seung-beom stared at the message in disbelief.
He hadn't even completed a third of the maze.
Someone had already escaped?
How?
Did someone possess a detection-related skill?
Or...
Was it the man who had overwhelmingly dominated Floor 1?
Park Seung-beom's guess was correct.
[Calculating Floor 2 results.]
[1st Place - 10 minutes 37.06 seconds]
The first-place climber was none other than Seong-un.
Super Sense makes this easy.
The reason he'd cleared the second floor in only ten minutes was entirely thanks to Super Sense.
Mana flowed through the maze's passages.
In dead ends, some of that mana became stagnant.
Seong-un quickly noticed the pattern and increased his speed.
By sensing nearby presences as well, he read the surrounding terrain and reduced his margin of error.
He reached the destination without making a single wrong turn.
"Rosalein cleared it in twenty-one minutes, right?"
Rosalein, who had ultimately achieved an SSS-rank Tutorial evaluation, had completed Floor 2 in twenty-one minutes.
That had been the world record.
Seong-un had beaten it by eleven minutes.
Could anyone ever break this record?
"It's my first time reaching the third floor."
Floor 1 had tested combat.
Floor 2 had tested exploration.
Floor 3's theme was endurance.
In his previous life, Seong-un hadn't even seen the third floor.
"I'll definitely succeed."
Seong-un hardened his resolve and climbed upward.
