WeTried Translations

Translator/Editor: Coughing Baby

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◈ Climbing the Tower with Time-Stop Ability

Chapter 113

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Nightmare Floor 8 (1)

Back on Floor 6, the Tower had tried to block my attempt entirely, using the Ark as its bargaining chip.

But this time, the penalty was...

[Penalty: While 'Person123' is clearing Floor 8 for the first time, one randomly selected item in their possession will be prohibited from use.]

One random item, banned.

That was it.

What was this supposed to be?

The Tower was making proposals that were completely off balance.

Maybe this thing had fried its circuits trying to patch bugs because of the Sage... No, that couldn't be it.

"Hss..."

I crossed my arms and leaned back in my chair.

I pushed the idle thoughts aside and started thinking seriously.

I knew there had to be some angle to it.

The Tower wasn't doing me any favors.

And yet my mind kept churning, because...

'The terms are too good.'

Just one item.

One item out of everything I had.

Even if the Tower rigged it so it wasn't actually random and just banned whichever item it wanted most...

What's the one item I can't live without? The Demon King?

Either way, whatever got banned wouldn't hit my combat strength hard enough to matter.

And what I'd get in return was the Ark, covering a ten-kilometer radius.

A last line of defense, so that even if I failed now or sometime in the future, humanity could hold on just a little longer.

Once activated, the Ark would persist indefinitely, they said. Even if I died, it would keep going.

The temptation was hard to shake.

Sure, it was probably a dirty trick. Obviously. But...

I had pulled it off on Floor 4, hadn't I?

And compared to Floor 4, the penalty was even weaker.

- Do not accept it.

The Demon King spoke.

- The moment you begin seriously entertaining this monster's temptation, you are already dancing in its palm. Do you not see that?

A firm argument against taking the deal.

Come to think of it, the Demon King had said something like that before. The memory of the world's end was gone, but apparently the Tower had made an offer then too.

So the Demon King had been burned badly by one of the Tower's proposals at some point.

"Still, I accepted the proposal on Floor 4 and came out fine. Isn't this another gamble worth taking?"

The Demon King scoffed.

- Then take it if you want. I won't stop you.

I laughed too.

The Demon King already knew which way I was leaning.

Since this was a global notification again, the Communication Window and the news were in an uproar. Arguments flying about whether to accept or refuse, people talking over each other...

But I had already made up my mind.

[Nightmare]
Participants: 476,805
Time Remaining: 20 days 1 minute 1 second
Floors Reached: Floor 8

One day passed.

I settled myself and finished my preparations.

I ignored the proposal window and stood in the middle of the hotel room.

"Let's go."

I would not be accepting the proposal.

The temptation had been real, but the rotten smell coming off it was just as real.

There was also this nagging thought: what if one of my items was something I'd absolutely need for this floor?

It had been that way at the masked auction too.

This was, in a strange sense, trust in the Tower.

Trust that this thing, packed full of malice, would never do anything genuinely in my favor.

So I wouldn't waver.

I shook off the last of my hesitation.

[Would you like to enter Nightmare difficulty Floor 8?]

One deep breath, and then...

"Enter."

My vision shifted.

* * *

Floor 8's field was a desert.

Nothing special about the theme.

The basic version was to defeat or dodge Sandworms that burst up through the ground and reach the destination to clear the floor.

That was for the other difficulties, of course.

Nightmare would have its own extra seasoning. I'd have to see what they'd thrown in.

[You have entered Nightmare difficulty Floor 8.]
[The Tower's proposal has been nullified.]

The moment I arrived, I stopped time.

I took in everything visible around me.

Dead center of a desert.

Every direction looked identical no matter where I turned.

I released time.

'Ten minutes, they said.'

The Sandworms would come for me soon enough. I just had to hold out against them, and the destination would appear ten minutes in.

The oasis.

Under the blazing sun, I waited.

It was genuinely hot, though.

At my level I could handle it, but this was probably a temperature that would cook an ordinary person alive.

Ku-gu-gu-gu...

A vibration rolled up from beneath my feet.

Off to the left.

My sharpened Sixth Sense read it easily. I braced for the strike without much urgency.

Kwaaaaah!

The desert heaved upward and threw a shadow over me. Sand and dust scattered like a storm.

An enormous centipede-like creature.

A Sandworm burst above ground and lowered its head as if staring down at me.

Its cylindrical maw was lined with rows of small, disgusting teeth.

Hm. Disgustingly big.

Hard difficulty Sandworms were supposed to be about the size of a five-story building.

This thing was practically a skyscraper.

Well within the expected range, though.

Kuuuuu...!

The enormous body curled and lunged toward me.

I stopped time.

Focused, then launched a Flame Barrage.

Kwaaaaang!

Fireballs streamed in a column and hammered the Sandworm's body from end to end.

Keeeeee-!

An ear-splitting shriek.

One hit was all it took. The Sandworm's body burst apart completely.

It writhed and gushed green fluid like a waterfall.

I stepped back to avoid the spray.

The fluid was clearly toxic—wherever drops landed, the sand melted away.

Ku-ung!

The Sandworm collapsed.

I looked at the carcass.

'Nothing special...'

Just massive and disgusting. For anyone else this might have been a serious fight, but for me it was a basic mob. Ordinary.

Not that I let my guard down even slightly.

This was only the beginning.

Ku-gu-gu.

The vibrations came again.

More Sandworms burst out.

Two this time.

I hit one with another Flame Barrage and hammered the other with Thunder Strike and a mix of other spells.

No reason to fight up close—the fluid splattered everywhere.

And since I had no idea what else might suddenly appear, I held the Destruction Beam and Hellfire Eruption in reserve.

After putting those two down, the Sandworms kept coming.

I ran across the desert and picked them off one by one with magic.

Somewhere past ten kills...

Had ten minutes passed?

An oasis had appeared in the distance without me noticing.

'Is that it.'

I moved toward it.

Reaching it meant clearing the floor... obviously not. This wasn't over.

Something would trigger when I arrived, or something would ambush me on the way.

I kept my senses sharp and ran.

Sure enough, the sand flipped up and Sandworms came bursting out.

More than before.

Not a problem.

I could have ignored them entirely—at my speed they had no hope of keeping up—but I didn't want them causing trouble later, so I cleared every one as I pushed toward the oasis.

The oasis closed fast.

It was far off, but a few minutes of running at my pace.

When I was almost there.

"...!"

A faint warning from my Sixth Sense.

I kicked off the ground and leapt high into the air.

Kwaaaaah!

A wide stretch of sand suddenly caved in, and a swarm of Sandworms burst out all at once right at the end.

"Ha."

I stayed airborne and bombed them from above with magic.

Kwakwakwakwakwang!

Clustered together, they were only easier to deal with.

The Sandworms blew apart cleanly.

I dropped back to the ground and launched a Blade Storm into the ones still standing.

'Demon King-nim.'

Then I handed the body over.

Flew clear of the collapsed ground.

Finished off the few survivors.

Some trap this was.

Barely qualified as a trap, for Nightmare difficulty. Honestly a little embarrassing.

I dusted myself off and headed for the oasis, now close.

But then.

"...?"

Less than a hundred meters out.

The oasis vanished. Like a mirage.

I wasn't rattled.

I had never once thought this would go smoothly.

'...A skeleton?'

Where the oasis had been, a human skeleton lay propped against a cactus.

Not an undead monster, surely.

I approached carefully, my Sixth Sense quiet.

The skeleton was dressed like some kind of traveler.

Something was clutched in its hand.

A notebook, and a compass.

I checked the notebook first.

Most of it had been torn out, leaving only one page.

Red letters, written across it.

[No matter how far I walk, I cannot get any closer. Have I lost my mind? Or is this desert cursed? I should never have set foot here. I should never have set foot here...]

...What is this?

Going by the content, this person had wandered the desert until they died.

Never should have set foot here.

I was already in. Not much I could do about that now.

Was this a friendly heads-up that I was done for?

I pocketed it anyway.

I checked the compass next.

[1]

The moment I touched it, a number appeared.

'...1?'

What does that mean.

I tilted my head and looked it over.

The needle pointed in one direction.

I raised my eyes that way and... huh?

Far in the distance, the oasis had appeared again.

I searched the rest of the skeleton's clothes.

Nothing beyond the notebook and compass.

"Hmm..."

I looked at the oasis again.

Something about this felt ominous... but going toward it was the only option.

Kwaaaaah!

Sandworms burst out as I moved.

I cleared them easily and sprinted across the desert.

Running toward the oasis, and then.

"...?"

Something was off.

The distance... wasn't shrinking.

I ran a little longer and confirmed it.

Definitely not getting any closer.

...Is this what "no matter how far I walk, I cannot get any closer" meant?

I checked the compass.

[8]

The number had gone up to 2.

...What was it pointing to?

"Ah."

It went up to 4.

I kept watching the number, and after a moment worked out the pattern.

The compass number seemed to double every two minutes.

[16]

...What did this mean? What was it hinting at?

A deep unease settled in.

Numbers going up didn't feel like a good sign for me.

Same feeling I had on Floor 7.

I pulled out the warp device.

First, let me try warping to the oasis at maximum range.

My willpower was fully charged, as always.

I waited ten minutes and warped toward the oasis.

And then.

"...Damn it."

I muttered a curse at the oasis.

Not a single meter closer.

Ten thousand kilometers traveled, and nothing.

So it wasn't a question of physical distance.

I tried going in the opposite direction from the oasis, and sideways too.

But no matter which way I went in the desert, the same scenery repeated endlessly.

The oasis neither drew closer nor fell farther away.

And through it all, the Sandworms kept popping up and attacking at the most irritating moments.

Kwaaaaang!

[512]

I took one out and stopped time.

Let me sort this out.

The oasis won't close the distance.

The compass number keeps growing with no clear meaning.

...Maybe finding a way to actually reach that oasis is the condition for clearing this floor.

But what kind of gimmick is this.

'Demon King-nim, anything come to mind?'

I asked for input.

- No.

'...Then think about it with me.'

Sitting here wasn't going to give me an answer.

I had to find some other way through.

I sank into thought.

Now that I thought about it... was this similar to Floor 2?

The Infinite Staircase, where I just kept looping in place.

This wasn't all that different.

Back then I had broken the gimmick by slipping through a window into a completely different space...

There was no different space here.

'...'

Wait.

Or was there?

A sudden flash of intuition. I looked at the dead Sandworm in front of me.

At the pit of sand it had torn open when it surfaced.

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