WeTried Translations

Translator/Editor: Irevi

Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried

Chapter 41: The Unknown

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Even a stupid animal's behavior gets corrected if it gets beaten enough.

After getting thrashed with the Mithril Wand for a while, that spear technician, Choi Gilhyeon, stopped coming at me.

"Fuck, fuck..."

He just glared at me with bloodshot eyes, grinding his teeth.

"You fucking bastard, who the hell are you...? Can you handle the consequences of this? Do you know who my dad is?"

Choi Gilhyeon had started saying shit like that now. Even Choi's backer had a backer of his own. Incredible.

Still, I couldn't think of any way his backer could affect me.

Seriously, what could his backer even do to me?

Once the event ended, I'd return to the Tower of Trials on Server 2661, and I wouldn't meet another Challenger for the next three years.

Even if they tried threatening me on the Festival map, I wasn't desperate to stay in this event. I could just go back to the Tower.

I had no connections in the outside world either, so trying to hurt people around me out there would be pointless.

I didn't give a shit whether his backer was the chairman of some massive corporation, the President of South Korea, or God in heaven.

"What, your fucking mom never told you?"

So I proudly threw back the mother insults I'd been hearing from them this whole time.

"Y-You fucking bastard!"

Choi Gilhyeon had no problem throwing mother insults at other people, but apparently couldn't stand hearing one himself. He flared up and tried to rush me.

Then I casually raised the Mithril Wand. Maybe because he'd been beaten with it for so long, he immediately shrank back.

-Pfft.

Seeing that, one of the spectators couldn't hold it in any longer and started to laugh.

"Which bastard was that? Which bastard laughed?!"

Choi Gilhyeon's face went bright red as he screamed. Pathetic as he looked, the area quickly fell silent because he was a Ranker.

"Fuck, who the hell was laughing just now?! Come out! Come the fuck out!"

-Clang!

"I laughed, asshole."

I gave the raging Choi Gilhyeon one last hit with the Mithril Wand, then left the crumpled bastard behind and pushed through the crowd.

Thanks to all the attention this disturbance had drawn, nobody was standing in front of the portal we'd originally planned to enter.

"Should we go back to the dungeon?"

"What? Ah, um..."

When I approached while putting away the Mithril Wand, Kim Jina looked pale as a sheet and fidgeted nervously.

It wasn't just Jina. Kim Minhyeong and Kim Jinseok didn't look good either. No, Minhyeong had a faintly bitter smile on his face.

Was that because he knew he had almost gotten beaten like that himself?

"With things like this today... let's go another time. Another time."

Jina shook her head and staggered away from me.

With the mood like this, she probably didn't feel like casually heading into a dungeon.

I nodded and left for now.

* * *

Jina sent me a friend chat message asking if we should take the day off.

I replied that I understood, but when I actually considered resting, it felt strange.

After entering the Tower of Trials and swearing to myself that I would never stop, I hadn't taken a single break.

Every day had been a cycle of challenges and growth, with blood and blades filling every moment.

Sleeping and eating were no different.

I'd reduced sleep to the bare minimum my body could endure, deliberately avoiding comfortable places to sleep.

For meals, I'd only consumed White Rolls sweet enough to numb my tongue and a fixed amount of poison.

Other than the Gukbap I'd bought after getting swept up in the Festival atmosphere, it'd been a long time since I'd eaten anything resembling a proper meal.

I thought that if I lost the dopamine that came from the satisfaction of growth, that would be the end of it. If I let go of that momentum even once, I'd become lazy and fall apart.

I'd lived by constantly driving myself forward without stopping for even a moment.

But the serotonin I'd felt yesterday, that sense of calm that had made me think, "Maybe this kind of thing is okay sometimes," hadn't ruined me at all.

If anything, taking a little breather made me feel even better.

Fitness communities said eating and resting were part of training too.

Maybe it was time for me to take a break once in a while and pull myself together.

"But what am I actually supposed to do?"

The problem was that even though I felt the need to rest, I had no idea what I was supposed to do while resting.

Was I supposed to lie around doing nothing and browse the community?

But wasn't that less like resting and more like throwing time away?

Not all rest is the same. Shouldn't I at least do something productive while I rested?

"Hmm..."

I opened the Open Community while thinking it over, then looked through the list of events available on the Festival map.

Aside from clearing mini dungeons, they were all simple minigames and quests Challengers could enjoy together.

None of them really appealed to me, and they weren't things I could do alone in the first place.

As I kept scrolling, one listing suddenly caught my eye.

[Tower of Trials Strongest Tournament - Preliminaries]

The preliminary round for one of the Festival's main events was being held today.

Of course, I'd never planned to enter the tournament, so I hadn't registered for the Preliminaries.

There was no way someone at my level would have a chance to shine in a tournament where powerful Rankers and high-floor Challengers competed.

Still, watching these kinds of events was supposed to be just as fun as participating in them.

It seemed like the perfect thing. I could broaden my horizons by watching high-floor Rankers fight while getting some rest at the same time.

I'd go watch that today.

* * *

I bought popcorn and soda from a stall, then found a seat in the stands.

Even though it wasn't the main tournament, a huge number of Challengers had come to watch. It was almost like a professional baseball game.

Then again, considering it was like a sports tournament held only once every three years, it made sense.

There probably wasn't anything this exciting in the Tower of Trials, where entertainment was already scarce.

The tournament Preliminaries were battle royales where five contestants were grouped together.

They were held simultaneously in four arenas to the east, west, south, and north, and apparently their popularity varied noticeably depending on the Challengers involved.

Seeing how many people were here, one of the more anticipated preliminary matches was probably about to begin.

"Who is in this group? Anyone worth watching?"

"Kang Taejin and Lee Yeongwon are in the same group. It's practically main tournament level."

"No way. Those two are facing each other in the Preliminaries?"

Listening to the Challengers in the seats next to me, I heard names I'd seen in the community.

I didn't know who Lee Yeongwon was, but Kang Taejin was a strategy-focused Challenger who had been gaining fame in the community since around last year.

Apparently, he was a Hunter hopeful and former amateur boxer with a unique fighter-type class called [Storm Striker].

If he were the only standout, the match would probably end quickly, but it seemed there was another formidable Challenger in the group.

[The match will begin shortly.]

"Oh, it's starting."

While I listened to the Challengers beside me chat, the preliminary match began in no time.

All five Challengers who entered the arena were men. I could immediately tell which one was Kang Taejin.

The short-haired man wearing gauntlets instead of carrying a proper weapon, with a relaxed expression on his face. That had to be him.

And the Challenger named Lee Yeongwon... was that him? The heavily built warrior holding a greatsword as tall as he was.

It wasn't hard to guess, since the other three Challengers either looked terrified or held their foreheads like they were screwed.

So, what kind of fight would they put on?

* * *

The three Challengers unlucky enough to end up in a group with powerful opponents declared their surrender as soon as the match began.

All injuries suffered during the match would be healed, but they probably had no desire to test themselves against Ranker-level Challengers.

That left Kang Taejin and Lee Yeongwon in a one-on-one fight, but the flow of the match was, how should I put it...

"Jesus, he fights like a fucking fag."

Yeah. That was it.

The spectator next to me had perfectly voiced what I was thinking. That promising prospect, Kang Taejin, fought like a complete fag.

At the beginning, it had at least been worth watching. Against Lee Yeongwon, who boasted high defense and powerful single-hit attacks, Kang Taejin fearlessly closed in.

Then, fitting the name [Storm Striker], he unleashed attacks so fast that even I could barely follow them.

But after letting Lee Yeongwon land a single attack with his greatsword, he abruptly changed his approach.

-Whoosh, boom!

A cannonball of wind fired from Kang Taejin's fist struck Lee Yeongwon.

Unique classes really were something else. Kang Taejin was a fighter, yet he had a long-range attack skill.

It didn't look particularly powerful, but Kang Taejin kept his distance and continued using only ranged attacks.

He used movement skills and his Agility stat to evade Lee Yeongwon, a heavy melee warrior, then just spammed wind blasts from afar.

You could call it a strategy based on class matchups, but it was far too low-level for a fight between a rising prospect and a Ranker.

[Match Over]

[Due to the match time limit, the Challenger with the higher remaining HP wins.]

[Victory: Kang Taejin]

The result was Kang Taejin's automatic victory by time limit. He'd stayed far away, never taken a hit, and done nothing but fire wind blasts, so it was only natural.

"Fuck, that was painful to watch. Why the hell did he even show up if he was going to fight like that?"

"Watch what you say. Someone might hear you."

The spectator beside me muttered while leaving the arena, once again voicing exactly how I felt.

Rather than showing any impressive technique or skill, Kang Taejin had only revealed himself as a pathetic guy relying on his class's performance to overpower people.

Maybe I'd expected too much from other Challengers. Choi Gilhyeon, who I couldn't tell whether he was using a spear or a toothpick, was the same.

Reality seemed very different from how Challengers from their respective servers rated them in the community.

-Ding.

As I waited for the next match in disappointment, a friend chat notification rang in my ear.

[Kim Jina: Jinhyeok, do you happen to have time a little later?]

Ah, that worked out perfectly.

Footnotes:

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