WeTried Translations
Translator/Editor: Irevi
Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried
Chapter 17: Another Addiction
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The Tower of Trials had a system very similar to an RPG.
And when it came to RPGs, there was one element you couldn't leave out: magic. Magic existed in the Tower of Trials too.
There was even a wand for casting spells in my inventory right now. It was useless to me, but still.
Magic didn't properly come into play until the third floor and above.
On the floors below that, you couldn't change class to mage or acquire magic skills. You couldn't even encounter monsters that used magic.
So what the hell was a second-floor field boss doing with elemental attacks? Where had this asshole sold its conscience?
"Fuck!"
Lobo charged at me with flames blazing around its body. With Blanca holding me in place, I could neither dodge nor defend.
I tried to twist away as much as I could, but it bit my shoulder hard.
-Whoosh!
My high defense kept its teeth from sinking too deeply, but the flames wrapped around them were the real problem.
"Agh, fuck...!"
The savory smell of roasting meat rose from my shoulder, followed by an utterly unfamiliar searing pain.
I remembered a post I'd once seen on the community titled, 'Let's Learn the Ranking of Pain.jpg.'
It said the pain of unprepared childbirth ranked third, while having your limbs severed ranked second.
And I remembered burning pain taking first place. Now that I was feeling it, that ranking seemed about right.
Fuck, it hurt like hell.
But it was only pain. This wasn't enough to kill me, and I had no intention of letting myself get roasted alive.
-Crunch!
As if it meant to tear my entire shoulder off, Lobo kept shaking its head with its teeth still buried in me.
I grabbed Lobo by the skin of its face with one hand and braced my legs to keep my body from being tossed around.
Then I stored the shield frozen by Blanca's teeth in my inventory and grabbed Lobo's face with my other hand too.
"Aaaaargh!!"
With all my strength, I lifted Lobo's entire body into the air.
Lobo's eyes shook in surprise as it clung to my shoulder. You didn't think I could do this, did you, you dog bastard?
"This... is the power of 62 Strength, you shitty mutt!"
-Thud!
I slammed Lobo upside down into the ground. It sprang back up and regained its footing.
But I was faster, pulling another weapon from my inventory and thrusting it forward.
-Stab!
The sword plunged deep, and a red effect burst out to signal a critical hit. That landed cleanly.
I wanted to finish it right there, but Blanca came at me again from the left, blue light gleaming from its eyes.
I thrust out my left arm to block it, then realized my shield was still in my inventory.
"Argh, fuck!"
I'd stupidly offered it nothing but my arm. Cold air poured from Blanca's teeth and began freezing my left arm.
Red blotches spread even to places it hadn't bitten, a sign of frostbite. And fuck, the sensation was getting weird.
The feeling in my left arm dulled in an instant. It felt like my arm was gradually disappearing in real time.
"Ugh, you dog bast...!"
I tried to shake Blanca off, but my freezing arm wouldn't listen.
Burns were painful, but frostbite was terrifying. From where Blanca's teeth had sunk in, I started hearing a crack, crack sound.
Was it freezing all the way to my bones? If I tore Blanca off now, my left arm might come off with it.
I didn't want to become a one-armed cripple in a place like this.
But fuck, if I just stood here, it'd chew me apart and kill me. Fuck that.
-Crunch!
I forcibly yanked my frozen arm, dragging Blanca closer, then drove my sword straight into its neck.
Red effects signaling another critical hit scattered again. Its Attack was completely unfair, but its Defense seemed weak.
I twisted the straight sword embedded in its neck with a flick of my wrist. Even as the inside of its throat was gouged out, Blanca didn't let go of my left arm.
So even if it died here, it was going to tear my arm off first? You bastard. You fucking wolf bastard!
[You have acquired Passive Skill: Frost Resistance Lv.1.]
"Huh?"
The moment I saw the blue notification window floating before me, the anxiety and pain flooding through me vanished completely.
Frost Resistance. The name was so obvious that I could roughly guess what it did.
The corners of my mouth rose on their own. Before I knew it, I was grinning.
"Yeah, you bastard. Let's see who wins."
Even I could tell I looked completely insane, but I didn't give a shit anymore.
* * *
Blanca didn't live much longer after getting a sword through the neck.
The moment Blanca died, Lobo charged at me as if enraged, but it wasn't much of a threat.
I dragged my battered body forward and beat Lobo to death. Soon, notification windows announcing that I had cleared the field boss appeared.
[You have obtained Clear Reward: 'Wolf King's Fang' and 'Experience Points'.]
[You have obtained Maximum-Contribution Reward: 'Frost-Infused Fang'.]
[You have obtained Final Blow Reward: 'Passive Skill - Fire Resistance'.]
Maybe because it was a field boss, there was no separate first-clear reward, but I had obtained a new passive skill.
I'd cursed it out for using elemental attacks despite being a second-floor field boss, but when I saw the skill it gave as a reward, it made sense.
Resistance passives were usually acquired late and were difficult to obtain, so people normally got them through item options.
And I'd managed to get two of them this early. That was incredible luck.
"Or was it?"
I looked down at my left arm, torn to shreds and dripping blood.
I'd used a ton of potions, but this wound showed no signs of healing anytime soon. That was why elemental attacks were such a pain.
Without the relevant resistance, you took more damage than from ordinary injuries, and unless you had a specialized potion, injuries from them healed much more slowly too.
HP : 213/660
My HP still looked like this. Indomitable, which I'd only acquired recently, had already activated.
Judging by their overall stats, those two had been weaker than the Goblin Lord, yet they'd nearly killed me.
The reason was simple.
They were a boss type that came as a pair, and their stats were distributed in extreme ways.
Those two variables had been devastating for a solo player like me.
Hell, if even one level-15 warrior had tanked for me for a while, I could've beaten them without getting hurt much.
And I had reacted far too sensitively to the unfamiliar pain of burns and frostbite.
If I'd stayed calm and fought instead of flailing around while cursing, I might've gotten a better result.
This wasn't something I could brush off as luck or bad luck.
I had won because of the effort I'd built up, and I had suffered these injuries because that effort wasn't enough.
I shouldn't forget what happened today. I needed to remember it for a long time and learn from it.
* * *
After waiting for my arm to heal, I sorted through the loot piled up in my inventory and returned to the safe zone.
The shepherd girl had fallen asleep in front of the campfire, breathing softly.
Was it really okay to sleep that close to a fire? She wasn't going to inhale too much smoke and die, was she?
"Well, none of my business."
The sheepdog called Flanders was sleeping flat on the ground beside the girl too, so there probably wasn't a problem.
If anything dangerous happened, that smart dog would figure something out.
Anyway, now that all the wolves were dead, I'd planned to head straight for the village... but maybe I should rest first.
I'd deliberately avoided resting, but honestly, I was in terrible condition right now. I'd been fighting nonstop for a long time.
I pulled out a White Roll from my inventory and chewed on it.
It was an awkward time to get some sleep, so I decided to fill my stomach and browse the community instead.
Of course, I wasn't planning to waste time on the community writing pointless posts like before. This was for gathering information.
[Is there really nothing to do on Floor 22?]
[Who the fuck listed a +9 ring-pommel sword on the auction house?]
[Looking for bow recommendations for floors in the 30s]
[The boss mechanics are just fucking annoying]
[Is the difficulty of the Floor 66 boss for real?]
I scrolled through page after page of posts, going endlessly back through time until I found posts written by the earliest Challengers.
All kinds of experiences from the first-generation Hunters, who had risked their lives challenging the Tower long ago, remained here exactly as they were.
Reading posts that mentioned the names of famous people now called S-rank Hunters or first-generation Hunters gave me a lot to think about.
Even those people, who had seemed like heroes dropped from the sky, hadn't been all that different from everyone else when they first entered the Tower of Trials.
Some had stood out early after obtaining Unique or Epic classes, and others had mindsets that were clearly different at a glance.
But looking through these posts, most of them had been completely ordinary people.
"..."
Of course, nobody had wanted to become a low-rank Hunter and coast through life.
My chest started itching again for no reason. Energy flowed through my exhausted body on its own.
I said I was gathering information, but just sitting here and browsing the community didn't feel right.
"Should I do something?"
So I left the community open and suddenly started doing bodyweight exercises.
Footnotes:
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