Chapter 5

The Village of the Lowest Floor

The Mana-Freezing Bomb.

It was an item that froze the mana of all living creatures within a hundred-meter radius for five seconds.

In an instant, the mana I felt flowing through my body turned to ice, locking up entirely. Right before my eyes, challengers lunged forward, thrusting swords and spears straight at me.

Grind—!

With a heavily distorted expression and teeth clenched in fury, I threw my body down toward the stone floor.

Only five seconds.

If I could just endure for five seconds, the mana-freezing effect would lift. But those fleeting five seconds felt like five agonizing hours. Because my mana had frozen right at the exact moment my spell was about to manifest, the magic canceled, leaving my body slightly rigid from the backlash.

Whether the bastards had planned it this time or it was just a terrible coincidence, it was the absolute worst-case scenario.

Swish—! Slice!

Seeing a spear graze past my neck and a sword slice lightly through my side sent an icy shiver shooting straight up my spine. Had I not kept my senses razor-sharp from the very start and forced my body to dodge by a hair’s breadth, I might have been skewered on that spear.

‘Dammit!’

Through my spinning field of vision, an arrowhead suddenly loomed right in front of my nose. They had accurately predicted the direction of my evasive roll and released the projectile right into my path.

Thud!

“Ugh…!”

I bit down hard, suppressing the groan threatening to spill from my lips. Had I not raised my arm with superhuman reflexes to block it, that arrow would have pierced straight through my heart.

‘How many seconds has it passed? Two? Three?’

Trapped in a stretch of time that felt like eternity, I rolled across the floor once more.

The enemies’ assault hadn’t ended yet. God damn it. Just how thoroughly had they prepared?

Another arrowhead whistled through the air toward me, while the weapons of those whose initial attacks had failed surged precisely toward my blind spots. There appeared to be no safe place to dodge, and triumphant grins began to bloom across their faces.

At the exact same time, however, a mocking smirk spread across my own lips.

My rolling body collided with a small stone pagoda I had placed nearby. The impact shattered it, triggering a ring of light around its perimeter that instantly erected an invisible, barrier-like membrane.

Clang! Clang! Clang! Clang!

The arrows, spears, and swords bounced off the barrier uselessly, clattering onto the ground.

“Wh-What?”

“His mana was supposed to be frozen!”

“What just blocked that?!”

“Don’t stop! Keep moving, attack until the end!”

The challengers, momentarily stunned by the abrupt activation of magic, hesitated. But at Park Hye-won’s frantic shouting from the rear, they tried to press the attack once more—only for their expressions to collapse into dismay.

The sensation of mana was slowly returning to my veins.

It had only been five seconds, but the sense of liberation was beyond description. The mana dormant at my fingertips burst forth in a wild, unrestrained flood, celebrating its newfound freedom.

[Air Bomb]

Bang! Boom-boom-boom-boom!

Compressed air detonated violently in midair.

The challengers who had closed in to finish me off were sent flying backward in an instant, spitting blood.

Crack!

Using a sliver of magic, I snapped the arrow shaft embedded in my arm and glared at the challengers with a feigned, relaxed expression.

“Is that all you’ve prepared?”

Pillars of light rained down into the sky of the First-Floor Waiting Room.

“Oh, son of a bitch!”

“We failed again! That strategy was completely flawless!”

“Seriously, how are we supposed to win when he just keeps getting stronger?!”

“For a second, I really thought we were going to clear it this time…”

“Hey guys, we’ve taken so many beatings that our health has already gone up by 300! Not to mention how much our stats have increased!” Baek Hyun complained bitterly to the group.

The challengers who had returned to the waiting room collapsed onto the ground in utter defeat, wearing hollow, desolate expressions.

“What’s the point of higher stats, increased health, and more mana? Ha…” Kim Kang-cheon sighed heavily, frustration practically radiating off him.

Because ten more challengers had trickled in two days ago, their total numbers had swelled to fifty. They had sworn that this time they would defeat that damn boss, but… they hadn’t even come close.

The veterans had colluded, managed to persuade the newcomers, pooled their points together, and even purchased a Mana-Freezing Bomb. It was a massive gamble, but they truly believed it would guarantee victory… yet it hadn’t been enough.

‘Did he hide his power?’

Kang-cheon shook his head. To say he was hiding his power didn’t fit; the sheer oppressive pressure and aura the boss radiated were entirely different. It was as if he had leveled up an entire tier right in the middle of it all.

‘Don’t tell me the boss grows stronger over time, too?’ No way…

“Did he actually go easy on us before this?”

“It felt like the boss got way stronger. What is he doing, leveling up by slaughtering us?”

“If that were true, why doesn’t he ever kill us?”

“Then why is he so damn strong?! Why did he suddenly start using elemental magic?!”

“Wait, how can someone use magic when their mana was blocked? Is he insane?!”

“Argh! Whatever, I don’t know anymore. I’m going back to my place to clear my head.”

Shaking his head, Baek Hyun walked away toward the wooden cabin visible in the distance. They had already built houses out of semi-despair long before; after all, if they were going to live in the first-floor waiting room indefinitely, they needed personal living spaces.

“Recovering the points we all went all-in on for this raid is going to be a nightmare… Sigh…”

“Hoo… me too.”

Park Hye-won, Kang-cheon, and a few others stepped back onto the portal the moment the cooldown for the first-floor challenge expired, while the rest trudged wearily toward their makeshift village.

With the steadily growing number of challengers and the endless stream of requests to travel back and forth between floors, Toing had simply given up and manifested a permanent portal leading directly to the upper floors right here.

“Heeing—it was getting way too annoying!”

“Then what the hell are you even supposed to be doing?” Baek Hyun asked, staring blankly at Toing, who was lounging lazily on a flat slab of stone.

“Managing this place?”

“What kind of management are you doing?”

“Uuuhm… Ah! I forgot to turn off the gas stove! Call me whenever you need me!”

With that random excuse, Toing vanished from the spot on the spot.

“What kind of rabbit uses a gas stove?” Baek Hyun muttered in sheer absurdity, looking around.

The once-vast, empty plain had quietly transformed into a bustling little village.

“Haa… haa…”

Cough—!

A hot surge of blood rushed up from his throat, spilling past his lips.

‘Incredible bastards…’

His head throbbed viciously. His entire body was a wreck.

Those fifty challengers who had just attacked—with the massive influx of newcomers, they had brought a brand-new strategy.

‘I honestly didn’t think I’d run into this thing so soon.’

The Mana-Freezing Bomb.

An item valued at a staggering 50,000 points. When challengers first entered the Tower, they were given a mere 1,000 points each. It required all fifty of them pooling every single point they owned to hit that 50,000 threshold.

Having just arrived in the Tower and being complete strangers to one another, willingly giving away all 1,000 of their starting points on a single-use consumable was no easy feat. Furthermore, the first floor was a terrible place to farm points, and even if you spent them like that, failing to clear meant throwing away your entire fortune.

‘I figured they’d need at least a hundred people before pulling that off.’

If I hadn’t prepared a contingency magic circle beforehand, I might genuinely have died. Between trying to increase my Intelligence stat via high-purity mana compression training, I barely had any spare energy to spare for magic circles. Yet, keeping that minimal safety measure as a just-in-case precaution had turned out to be my winning stroke.

The combination of my Mana Grade rising to Stage 1, the partial unmaking of my physical seal, my continuous physical training, and that backup magic circle—if even one of those elements had been missing, I would have actually been done for.

“Hoo…”

The internal injuries sustained from this battle were no joke. I needed to focus entirely on physical recovery for the time being. There were no healing potions here, nor any medicinal herbs.

Repairing the damage from this fight, let alone preparing countermeasures beyond this level of threat, would take a month or two at least.

Ever since the last raid, the challengers hadn’t launched a single coordinated attack.

While reviewing Jean’s old research notes as I usually did, I happened to notice a microscopic crack along the stone wall.

“A barrier?”

If it were merely a basic barrier, there was no way I wouldn’t have detected it until now. I slowly fed a thread of mana into the seam to analyze its structure.

‘This is…’

It was far too complex to be dismissed as a simple barrier; various spell configurations were intricately and chaotically layered over one another. The level of sophistication was too high to analyze in a single glance.

A barrier was definitely present, but another entirely separate magic was draped over it, masking its presence.

‘A double-layered barrier…?’

After wrestling with it for quite a while to parse the structure, I couldn’t help clicking my tongue in admiration at its ingenuity. Though figuring out the exact underlying principles was difficult, it seemed the creator had erected a barrier and then folded that barrier inside a localized subspace to make it entirely undetectable.

It was undeniably the work of Jean Evrium.

I channeled my mana and pierced it straight into the crack. The barrier sensed inside and my own mana smoothly harmonized.

Every mage possessed a unique mana signature. Even the minutest difference served like a fingerprint; just as no two people had identical fingerprints, no two mages had the exact same magical resonance.

This barrier had been crafted to respond only to Jean’s mana pattern.

Continually pumping mana into the seam, I pulled the hidden barrier out of the subspace and systematically unraveled it. Fortunately, dismantling the barrier itself was relatively straightforward.

Rumble, rumble, rumble—

Accompanied by the scraping sound of grinding stone, the stone wall split apart, revealing a hidden space within.

“Whoa…”

I never would have imagined a place like this existed.

A massive bookshelf crammed tight with books, a comfortable-looking armchair, and a wide desk—it was a full-fledged study. I ran a finger across the desk’s surface; not a single speck of dust was disturbed.

‘A semi-permanent preservation spell is active.’

A massive spell organically linked across the entire space. Maintaining a continuous, semi-permanent preservation network through interconnected magic of this scale was a level of wizardry beyond even my capabilities in my past life. It was a testament to just how high of a realm Jean Evrium had once attained.

Pushing open another door inside the study, I stepped through.

Various magical experimental apparatuses and raw materials filled the room, accompanied by even more bookshelves—and just like the outer study, not a single grain of dust could be found.

Unfortunately, most of the raw materials were gone. Seeing traces of burnt residue suggested Jean had likely destroyed them himself, though the exact motives remained unclear.

The saving grace was that the experimental equipment was completely intact. With this, I could finally begin serious research on how to treat this crippled body.

Up until now, all I could manage was halting the deterioration of my shattered mana meridians and achieving minor regenerations. Fixing them properly required specialized methods.

‘This is…’

Another door stood at the far end of the room.

I tried to open it, but it, too, was protected by a barrier. Naturally, I assumed injecting Jean’s mana would make it open smoothly as before; however, instead of opening, the moment my mana touched it, the barrier violently repelled it—implying it was programmed to unlock only when a specific, distinct type of mana was fed into it.

‘What on earth did he hide in there? And I can’t force it open, either.’

There was nothing I could do for now.

Stepping back out into the main study, I picked up a single book resting on the desk.

It was Jean Evrium’s journal.

—I have been defeated. Jean Evrium, the Necromancer and Grand Archmage, no longer exists.

Those were the opening lines on the very first page. There was nothing else written on the page—despite having plenty of blank space left. The handwriting was shaky, as if his hands had been trembling, and faint, dried tear stains remained smeared across the paper.

Without turning to the next page, I closed the journal.

Was it because the original owner of this body was Jean? Just reading a single line stirred up a heavy, surging emotion welling up from deep within my chest.

[A challenger has appeared.] [A challenger has appeared.] [A challenger has appeared.] . . .

Suddenly, system messages began flashing in the air one after another.

Frowning, I put the book down and stepped out of the study. Previously, since I spent all my time confined to the boss room, it didn’t matter when the challengers decided to show up. But moving forward, I expected to spend a lot more time working inside the inner study and laboratory. Being interrupted like this repeatedly was inconvenient.

‘I really ought to create a proxy.’

What would work best? No, before that—how? The raw materials didn’t even exist. To craft anything usable, I needed at least intermediate-grade materials, and most importantly, a medium capable of housing a simulated intellect.

I had a few ideas, but…

While I was deep in thought, the challengers who had just arrived reached the boss room.

It was the main five-person party led by Kim Kang-cheon.

Jean’s brow furrowed sharply.

It was an expression born of annoyance—interrupted right in the middle of his deep contemplation, his irritation bled through unbidden.

At that glaring expression, the five jumped in fright and froze stiff on the spot.

“Wh-Why are you so… angry…?” Kang-cheon asked, sweating profusely.

“Did you five come here because you wanted to die?” Jean asked with a thoroughly displeased expression.

“It’s not like you actually plan on killing us anyway—”

“A-Are you insane, oppa?!” Park Hye-won hissed, grabbing Baek Hyun by the arm and scolding him in a panic.

“What did I say?!”

“Just shut up for a second!”

“Mmm-mmph!” Ji-hoon clamped a hand firmly over Baek Hyun’s mouth.

“We came here because we wanted to talk,” Kang-cheon said, stepping forward.

“Since when were you and I on speaking terms?”

Despite the harsh words, Jean’s eyes softened with a flicker of intrigue.

Seeing that reaction, the five inwardly cheered. They had never tried talking to him properly before, but it turned out he was a reasonable person after all.

Swallowing hard as he looked at Jean, Kang-cheon dropped to his knees and looked up pleadingly. The others quickly followed suit, kneeling behind him.

“We need to climb the Tower. Please, help us!”

“Are you asking me to kill you?”

“No. Who says there’s only one way to climb the Tower? I’m sure you already know that, Senior.”

At Kang-cheon’s words, Jean fell silent in brief contemplation before a subtle smile touched his lips. It was time to develop a somewhat more constructive relationship between them.

“…Heh, there is a way.”

A well-placed lie could be mutually beneficial at times.

“Really?!”

“Woah! For real?! There really is a way?!”

No, there isn’t.

“What is it?” they asked, staring at him with wide, sparkling eyes.

“Actually… there is a hidden boss. If you kill him, you can clear the way up.”

“I knew it! There’s no way the first floor’s difficulty was meant to be normal!”

“Oppa, I told you you were right!”

“S-See? Didn’t I say so?!”

Watching them excitedly hug each other in celebration was mildly touching, though no such boss actually existed.

“Where is he?” Kang-cheon asked.

“You’re still too weak to face him. If you actually want to kill him, you need to grow much stronger.”

“Pardon? How do we…?”

At the mention of needing to grow stronger, their expressions instantly drooped.

“I’ll teach you. How to become strong. But there’s a condition.”

“Huh? Really? You’re actually going to teach us?!”

“What’s the condition?”

They tensed up at the word condition, but in truth, the demands were simple.

“Points. Bring me the items from the shop I tell you to buy. In exchange, I’ll make you stronger than anyone else.”

At those words, the five huddled together and began whispering amongst themselves in a corner of the room. They walked all the way over there to whisper, yet every single word carried clearly to his ears. Why even bother walking away?

“Alright. Where is that boss? We want to see him at least once…”

“Not yet. When I decide you guys are actually capable of beating him, I’ll take you there.”

Though they still felt a bit uneasy, having the terrifyingly powerful boss offer to act as their mentor gave them little room to complain—especially since they had zero alternative paths to climb the Tower anyway. By this point, the thought of actually trying to defeat this boss had vanished entirely from their minds.

“Understood.”

Jean nodded, looking satisfied.

“So… should we call you master now?” Park Hye-won asked.

Jean shook his head. “Master? Nonsense. Just call me Senior.”

“Got it, Senior!”

“Please take care of us!”

“Thank you! Thank you so much!”

Watching the kids bow repeatedly with heartfelt expressions of gratitude, Jean wore a deeply satisfied smile.

“Welcome. Juniors… er, hoobaes.”