WeTried Translations

Translator/Editor: Coughing Baby

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◈ Climbing the Tower with Time-Stop Ability

Chapter 71

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Floor 5 (9)

The Zone 3 boss plummeted with its head blown off.

Far away, on the opposite side from the Peacekeeping Corps, the Black Star Society Climbers watching the scene were just as stunned.

Especially those who had been present when Wang Kai died all came to the same realization.

Ah, Wang Kai had no chance but to die.

How could any human survive something that one-shot even the Zone 3 boss?

“This makes no sense...”

Li Zeyan, a Hard-difficulty Floor 14 Climber and now the Black Star Society’s public leader, swallowed hard.

He had heard countless stories about how Wang Kai died, but even after seeing it with his own eyes just now, he still couldn’t understand how a game-breaking skill like that could exist.

Did Nightmare Climbers get rewards on a completely different level from other difficulties?

And it was clearly magic-type, so how was he using it without any sign of concentration...?

Clap, clap, clap...

Applause broke the silence.

Ye Tianwei, who had been watching from the front, suddenly started clapping quietly.

The Black Star Society Climbers, including Li Zeyan, read the room and followed suit.

Ye Tianwei turned around with a flushed smile and said, “That was a rare spectacle. Let’s return.”

* * *

A message popped up saying I had obtained the first-time reward.

Soon after, the boss’s corpse scattered away like ash.

I’d heard that unlike normal monsters, zone bosses didn’t leave collectible byproducts.

Then again, even if it did, I wouldn’t have bothered taking it.

“So easy.”

[1:51]

I checked the Warp Device timer.

There was no reason to cancel activation.

I’d already killed the boss, so all I had to do was warp straight to Zone 0.

I looked around.

The Peacekeeping Corps and the Black Star Society were both standing far away, watching me in silence.

All those eyes felt annoying, so I used Stealth.

[0:01]

The Warp Device timer hit zero.

I warped to Zone 0.

I immediately moved to the portal to check my rewards and entered the Reward Room.

There were two rewards for killing the boss: the first-time reward given to a single person, and a normal reward given to each individual. The message had said so too.

What I was really looking forward to was the first-time reward.

Now then... what did I get from the Zone 3 boss?

“...A bracelet?”

First off, it was a bracelet.

I picked up a bracelet made of something like red scales.

[Flame Scale Bracelet]

This is a bracelet containing the power of a Red Wyvern. The power of fire-attribute skills increases by 70%.

Simple, straightforward description.

And the effect was just as straightforwardly good.

Damn... a 70% damage boost?

Since Flame Strike was my main skill, this was insanely good.

I also had Searing Zone.

“Perfect timing. It rolled fire attribute.”

What if I’d gotten something useless like increased lightning-attribute power when I didn’t even have a lightning skill?

Thank god Zone 3 had a lava-field concept.

Without even bothering to store it in Subspace, I put it on right away on the same wrist as Diul’s bracelet.

I should head out and test the effect immediately.

Judging from the color, it looked like a Rare-grade skill stone.

Hoping it rolled magic-type, I checked the skill info.

[Skill: Lesser Flame Refinement (Rare+)]

Refines and enhances fire-attribute magic. Fire-attribute magic power increases by 10%, Willpower Cost decreases by 10%, and cooldown decreases by 10%. If a higher-tier skill exists, effects do not stack, and only the higher-tier skill effect is applied.

Classification: Magic-Type (Passive)

Willpower Cost: None

Cooldown: None

“Oh...?”

Huh?

That was not what I expected.

Magic-type, but passive.

Well, physical-type had passive skills too, so there was no reason magic-type couldn’t.

Still, I’d never heard of passive magic-type before...

Was it special because it was a boss reward?

“The effect is... pretty good?”

Increased skill power, reduced Willpower Cost, reduced cooldown.

A full three-piece set.

I didn’t care much about Willpower, but power increase and cooldown reduction were excellent, especially cooldown reduction.

Sure, 10% wasn’t huge, but skills could be enhanced, right?

And thankfully this was fire-type too.

I hadn’t expected much from the normal reward, but I got something better than expected.

[You have learned ‘Skill: Lesser Flame Refinement (Rare+)’.]

By the way, I wonder if the power increase from this skill and the bracelet is calculated multiplicatively. Hopefully.

After checking my rewards, I went back to Floor 5.

Now that I’d killed the Zone 3 boss, Zone 4 should be open...

[Zone 1 (39.1%)]

[Zone 2 (20.5%)]

[Zone 3 (0%)]

[Zone 4 (0%)]

When I checked the boss gauges, Zone 4 had appeared.

I headed straight to Zone 4 to test how much stronger my fire skills had gotten.

I rode Pli and sped over until I reached the entrance to Zone 4.

Hwoooooong!

The moment I crossed the boundary, the air changed from blazing heat to bitter cold.

An ice field swept by freezing, blade-like winds.

My clothes were thin, but at my level, ordinary heat or cold barely affected me.

“Where are you, monsters?”

After entering Zone 4, I walked around, crunching through piled-up snow.

I found one soon enough.

It was a furry monster that made me think of a yeti.

The yeti spotted me too and charged like a lion spotting a chunk of meat.

I stretched out my hand.

Fwoosh!

I cast Flame Strike, and fireballs bloomed in midair.

“Oh.”

The fireballs were visibly larger.

Five large fireballs shot toward the yeti.

Kwaaaaaang!

A huge explosion.

The yeti was blown apart under the surging flames.

Judging by the destructive power, it felt almost twice as strong.

The effect was obvious.

“Nice.”

I moved around looking for more monsters.

This time, I found a floating chunk of ice that looked like some kind of spirit.

That thing... was a monster too, right?

I wasn’t totally sure, so I watched it for a moment.

Then a blue aura flickered around the ice spirit.

My Sixth Sense gave a faint warning.

Kwagagagagak!

Sharp ice spikes suddenly burst from the ground and rushed all the way to where I was standing.

I hopped back and dodged.

This one used a pretty flashy move.

Anyway, definitely a monster.

I fired Flame Strike right away and blew the ice spirit apart.

I kept roaming Zone 4 and ran into all kinds of monsters.

Snow-white wolf-type monsters.

Unlike the others, these came in fairly large packs.

They circled me like I was prey, so this time I used Searing Zone.

Several wolves inside the area ignited instantly. Searing Zone had clearly gotten much stronger too.

Maybe they were smarter than average, because once a few died like that, the rest bolted immediately.

Buuuuung!

Then I ran into a gigantic hornet covered head to toe in ice-crystal-like armor.

It flew at me with a deafening roar, like a helicopter taking off.

Its stinger in particular felt dangerous, so it probably had venom.

I fired Flame Strike without giving it a chance to close in.

The hornet was seriously fast, though. It used aerial evasive maneuvers and dodged several fireballs.

It couldn’t dodge the rest, and exploded anyway.

Yeti, ice spirit, wolves, giant hornet...

Those seemed to be the main monster types in Zone 4.

As expected, they all seemed to be around level 40.

And beyond level alone, the overall hunting difficulty felt trickier than Zone 3.

No problem for me, but other Climbers would probably take heavy losses if they entered Zone 4 carelessly.

“I should post this info too.”

For public safety, I decided to organize information on Zone 4 monsters and post it in the Communication Window.

I checked the Zone 4 gauge.

[Zone 4 (0.1%)]

Monster density felt even lower than Zone 3.

I wanted to challenge the Zone 4 boss once before attempting Floor 6...

But was that possible?

The Zone 4 boss had to be at least level 80.

A one-shot with Destruction Beam... no matter what, the Zone 4 boss was probably too much.

I was level 60 right now.

Trying to cheese a boss at least 20 levels above me with a one-click kill felt pretty shameless.

Before that, could I even fill the gauge before challenging Floor 6?

I’d only know after trying.

Time to head back.

* * *

By around the time the boss was about to appear, rumors had already spread that Person123 would be challenging the Zone 3 boss solo.

[Toy: Is it true Person123 is going in alone?]

[Poison Vial: Heard the Peacekeeping Corps offered support but he refused]

[Spaghetti: Why not just do it with others, why challenge it solo lol;]

[Clock: Maybe he just doesn’t want to show himself to more people]

[France: I know he’s strong but I’m still worried... it’s still a boss]

People were naturally full of anxiety.

Everyone already knew Person123 was strong enough to instantly kill level-60 Wang Kai, but a boss still felt like a different matter.

But as if mocking all that fear and worry,

[Fried Chicken: Zone 3 boss is dead! Message just popped up]

[Doctor: What happened? Person123 is safe, right?]

[Olkar: Heard from a Peacekeeping Corps member he one-shot the boss...?]

[Lighter: Apparently the boss was some kind of dragon. They said it even used breath]

[Beer: I’m a Black Star member who saw it in person, and yeah, one-shot is real. He blew off the boss’s head with the same black beam that killed Wang Kai and insta-killed it. It was just absurd to watch]

[Geubugeu: LOL how strong is he even gonna get! Person123!]

[Pill: But wasn’t that definitely a magic-type skill? How is Person123 using that in combat?]

[Latilta: Might be an item effect instead of a skill. Either way, it’s a ridiculous overpowered technique]

The rumor that he had one-shot the Zone 3 boss spread instantly, and people were stunned. Only then could they finally relax.

Governments around the world, which had also been anxiously watching the situation, breathed a sigh of relief.

Person123’s life was the world’s life.

If he did anything even slightly dangerous, that was about the same level of threat as a nuclear launch switch being on the verge of getting pressed.

Anyway, Person123 was far more absurdly strong than people had thought, and the Zone 3 boss fight ended safely with zero deaths.

As a bonus, Person123 even uploaded information about Zone 4 monsters afterward.

[Bluebird: Damn, straight to Zone 4 info too]

[Yullu: Person123... just how selfless are youuuuu!]

[Fighting Warrior: Thank you always. I didn’t know which direction you were in, so I used to bow toward east, west, south, and north every day, but now I bow toward Korea.]

For top-rank Climbers entering Zone 4 for the first time, that information was worth its weight in gold.

Monster byproducts were resources as important as magic stones. New monsters were even more valuable, especially when no one knew what substances or components they were made of.

On Floor 5, hunting in Zone 4 began little by little, and outside the Tower, reality kept moving busily as always.

* * *

[Nightmare]

Population: 379,561

Time Limit: 64 days 2 hours 33 minutes 10 seconds

Reached Floor: Floor 5

Time passed quickly.

The Nightmare difficulty Time Limit was drawing closer and closer.

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