WeTried Translations
Translator/Editor: Coughing Baby
Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried
◈ Climbing the Tower with Time-Stop Ability
Chapter 10
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Latecomers (1)
I was shocked when I read the item description.
A Rare+ grade skill?
And it was not just an ordinary Skill Stone.
It gave me five options and told me to pick one.
Just like the name grimoire suggested, every option was a magic-type skill.
I read through each skill description one by one.
[Skill: Lesser Mind Control (Rare+)]
Dominates and controls the minds of low-rank lesser creatures. You can control up to ten targets. Casting requires 3 minutes of mental concentration.
Category: Magic
Willpower Cost: 200
Cooldown: 1 hour
Lesser Mind Control.
It said I could control low-rank lesser creatures.
Was that the spell the old mage used to control goblins?
[Skill: Teleport (Rare+)]
Teleports you within a range of 10 meters. Casting requires 30 seconds of mental concentration.
Category: Magic
Willpower Cost: 150
Cooldown: 1 minute
This one was Teleport.
Just like the name said, it was exactly what it sounded like.
[Skill: Corrupting Flame (Rare+)]
Sprays corrupting flames that rot living beings. Casting requires 0 seconds of mental concentration.
Category: Magic
Willpower Cost: 20 per second
Cooldown: 30 seconds
Corrupting Flame.
This looked like an attack skill, similar to Flame Strike.
[Skill: Shadow Swamp (Rare+)]
Spreads a shadow swamp over an area, binding and attacking enemies. Casting requires 3 minutes of mental concentration.
Category: Magic
Willpower Cost: 200
Cooldown: 10 minutes
Huh, this one too?
The description looked similar to an ability the old mage had used.
It felt like an AoE skill.
[Skill: Life Drain (Rare+)]
Absorbs the life force of nearby living beings. Casting requires 1 minute of mental concentration.
Category: Magic
Willpower Cost: 10 per second
Cooldown: 1 minute
And lastly, Life Drain.
It was a life-force absorption skill.
The details were vague.
What was so good about absorbing life force? Would it heal my injuries?
"Hmm..."
So I had to choose one of these.
Cast time and Willpower cost did not matter to me anyway.
What mattered to me was only the effect and cooldown.
Lesser Mind Control and Life Drain.
I ruled those two out immediately.
Lesser Mind Control had way too long a cooldown from the start. One hour?
And the phrase "low-rank lesser creatures" was vague too.
If it could only control monsters around goblin level, there was no point in wanting it.
Life Drain got cut for a similar reason.
I could not tell what advantage I would actually get from absorbing life force.
'It is probably HP recovery or injury healing, but still.'
Since it consumed 10 Willpower per second, it looked like a sustained skill once activated.
Could I even use this in combat? Could I move while using it?
On top of that, it required me to stay close to the target.
Overall, it was too uncertain and too vague.
Three skills remained.
This was where it got tricky.
All three seemed to have their own advantages.
[Skill: Corrupting Flame (Rare+)]
Sprays corrupting flames that rot living beings. Casting requires 0 seconds of mental concentration.
Willpower Cost: 20 per second
Cooldown: 30 seconds
This one also consumed Willpower per second, like Life Drain.
Then did that mean I could keep using it as long as my Willpower did not hit zero?
And since the description said it "sprayed" flames, I could roughly picture how it attacked.
Probably like a flamethrower.
'Infinite flame spray does sound tempting.'
For me, who practically never had to worry about running out of Willpower, it looked very solid.
Still, one thing bothered me. I already had an attack skill.
And I had already seen this one with my own eyes.
It was probably that same magic the old mage used.
I could cast an AoE like this instantly?
Yeah, this one also looked really good.
Still, the cooldown was a bit long.
[Skill: Teleport (Rare+)]
Teleports you within a range of 10 meters. Casting requires 30 seconds of mental concentration.
Willpower Cost: 150
Cooldown: 1 minute
And finally, Teleport.
This one was just good.
Of course, taken at face value, it was complete trash.
A 10-meter teleport with a 30-second cast time, what kind of nonsense magic was that?
'I could crawl 10 meters in less than 30 seconds.'
But for me, cast time meant nothing.
In other words, I could fire off Teleport instantly in combat whenever I wanted.
Especially in situations like last time, where I froze time and still faced an attack I could not dodge, like that arrow.
Teleport would let me avoid it.
It was basically a very useful dodge skill.
After thinking it over, I made my choice.
[You have learned 'Skill: Teleport (Rare+)'.]
The moment I chose the skill, the mage crumbled and disappeared.
All of them looked good, but Teleport was still the better pick.
Most importantly, there was one more reason.
The Tower shared similar floor themes across difficulties.
Nightmare Floor 1 was absurdly harder than the others, but in the end, it was still a goblin floor.
And the theme of Floor 2 was a jump map.
I had heard lava rose from below while you had to step on footholds and climb upward.
So thinking about Floor 2, choosing Teleport was the right call.
I had to pick what would help most with clearing floors right away.
I tried using Teleport immediately.
Pop.
After 30 seconds of concentration, my body teleported.
"Oh."
I turned around and checked the distance I had moved. It was pretty surreal.
After experiencing teleportation for the first time in my life, I checked the other rewards too.
[Rare Skill Enhancement Stone]
Can enhance one Rare-grade skill.
I got a Skill Enhancement Stone.
I had heard this was even rarer than Skill Stones.
Right now, the only Rare-grade skill I had was Flame Strike.
Should I use it on Flame Strike right away?
I did not hesitate and used it.
'If I hoard it, it turns to crap.'
I would not get another reward skill unless I entered Floor 2 anyway.
And if I did end up entering Floor 2, there was no reason to hold this back and not use it.
[Would you like to use 'Rare Skill Enhancement Stone'? (Available skill: Flame Strike)]
['Rare Skill Enhancement Stone' has been used on 'Skill: Flame Strike (Rare)'.]
['Skill: Flame Strike (Rare)' has been enhanced, increasing the number of fireballs.]
[Skill: Flame Strike (Rare) (+1)]
Launches two condensed flames forward, causing explosions. Casting requires 0 seconds of mental concentration.
Category: Magic
Willpower Cost: 100
Cooldown: 30 seconds
A +1 mark appeared next to the skill name.
If the number of fireballs increased, did that mean I could fire two now?
I almost tried firing Flame Strike into empty space, then stopped.
One use of Teleport had already drained my Willpower dry.
Waiting was annoying, so I would check later.
Last reward to check... Mana Stone.
[Top-Grade Mana Stone]
This is a Top-Grade quality Mana Stone.
It looked slightly bigger than the last reward.
'Still useless to me.'
To sell a Mana Stone, you had to register as a Climber and gain sales authorization. I was an illegal unregistered Climber, so I had nowhere to sell this anyway.
Well, I never climbed for money in the first place.
I kept going in and out of a Tower I had never planned to touch in my life, all for the peace of this world.
Wow... what noble self-sacrifice.
If I died like this, maybe someone would build me a statue.
'Still, this feels unsettling.'
Were these rewards too generous?
First-clear reward or hidden route or not, this was a lot.
From Floor 1 alone, I had already gotten one Rare skill, one Rare+ skill, and one Rare +1 enhancement.
On top of that, I was already level 15.
...Just what kind of insane trial was waiting on Floor 2 for them to hand out this much?
That part felt ominous.
"Can someone else clear Floor 2 for me..."
Please, before the time limit runs out, let someone other than me clear up to Floor 2.
Though before that, we still needed at least one more person to clear Floor 1.
I wondered whether that Nightmare clear project in the U.S. was going well.
That noble-sacrifice talk from earlier had long since vanished. Honestly, it was never there in the first place.
I really did not want to do this.
I already did Floor 1, okay?
From Floor 2 onward, please let someone else do it.
If that happened, I was confident I could cheer for them harder than anyone.
[Do you want to exit the Tower?]
I left the Tower.
I was hungry.
I should eat the leftover braised short ribs and rice from this morning.
* * *
After clearing the Floor 1 Hidden Route.
Time passed quickly.
Whenever I had free time, I often entered Floor 1 and cleared it repeatedly.
Maybe because I had already cleared the hidden route, even if I went down into the underground passage, the old mage no longer appeared.
I did not need Mana Stones, but I kept doing repeat clears just to stay sharp.
No matter what, I could not just sit still without preparing for Floor 2.
[Rhino: Thank you as always. Have a good day.]
I also exchanged whispers with Rhino-ssi from time to time.
He still kept asking me for advice.
All I did was share what I had experienced in as much detail as I could, so calling it advice felt like a stretch, but if it helped them at all, that was enough.
While talking with Rhino-ssi, I added even more detail to my information posts.
For example, whether the timing for the three-goblin wave was fixed, or whether the next three only appeared after all current ones were killed, exactly how long it took for the stone gate to close, and exactly when the Crossbow Goblin appeared... things like that.
Even those small details could matter a lot.
Rhino-ssi was only the first. After that, many others also whispered me asking for Nightmare floor advice.
Some of them were from our country's Climber Special Affairs Office.
I did not know the details, but I figured our side was working hard in its own way too.
I did not care about nationality. If anyone asked for Floor 1 advice, I helped as much as I could. If it was anything else, I ignored it completely.
I just wanted anyone, literally anyone, to succeed and show me hope.
Maybe that wish finally reached someone.
[Nightmare(2)]
"...Oh!"
One day, I opened the communication window and froze when I saw the changed number.
About three months had passed since I cleared Floor 1.
At last, a new clearer of Nightmare Floor 1 had appeared.
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