WeTried Translations

Translator/Editor: Mordor

Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried

◈ Escaping the Tower at Hell Difficulty ◈

Chapter 5

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[Detection skill level has increased to 9.]

The Detection skill activated too late.

There were five presences outside the door.

A five-person team.

Since they were clearing the sixth floor, they had to be fully prepared.

If I fought them head-on, I'd die.

Without hesitation, I chose to run.

The question was whether they'd give me time to do that...

Creeeak!

The moment the cabin door opened, the wire trap I'd set went off.

Ting!

The hunters were startled by the metallic clink from the end of the wire.

"G-grenade!"

"Get back!"

Crash!

I took the chance to slip out through the window.

There was no explosion, of course.

I didn't have an expensive weapon like a grenade.

All I'd tied to the wire was a small piece of metal.

The fact that they were skilled saved me.

The trick wouldn't have worked on people who charged in without checking for traps.

They realized too late that they'd been fooled.

"I-it didn't explode?"

"It's a fake trap! They already ran!"

"Should we chase them?"

"No. No one's hurt, so there's no reason to chase them. There don't seem to be many of them, either."

Smart people.

They had nearly walked into a trap. If they chased blindly after that, they wouldn't last long as hunters.

The blizzard still raged outside.

I was the one forced out into it.

They were the winners.

I had barely escaped with my life and my backpack.

Wandering through the blizzard again was absurd.

Normally, I'd be worrying about dinner or what to stream.

Now I was in a position where I had to worry about staying alive.

'At least I should be filming this so I can make money off it later.'

My phone still had some battery left, but I needed to save it as an emergency light source.

[Stealth skill level has increased to 9.]

[Forced March skill level has increased to 2.]

I'd barely left the cabin, yet Forced March had leveled up again.

I couldn't keep this up for long.

While there was still some daylight, I decided to make a temporary shelter.

Other hunters would naturally head for any usable buildings.

I'd thought the surface would be safer, but I was wrong.

I found a spot that wasn't too visible and took out my snow shovel.

The snow had piled up so high that it was easy to dig through.

Ideally, I should have made something like an igloo, but I didn't have time.

Besides, I had no idea how.

Not that it's something to brag about, but I wasn't that smart.

Smart people didn't spend thousands of hours on a trash game like Tower Escape in the first place.

'Though that's what's keeping me alive right now.'

What would I say if I escaped and got interviewed later?

That a game saved my life?

Maybe it would promote my stream, too.

I deliberately let my mind wander as I dug through the snow like my life depended on it. Eventually, I hit solid ground.

I dug deep and long, like a trench.

Before the blizzard could bury it again, I quickly covered the top with branches and cloth.

Once it was done, it looked fairly decent.

[Sleight of Hand skill level has increased to 4.]

'It's warm.'

The traces of my work would soon vanish beneath the snow.

When I set the Ever-Burning Heart on the floor, the shelter quickly became warm and bright.

Sleepiness washed over me, but I had no water to drink.

I piled snow into my mess tin and melted it with the heart.

The water came to a rolling boil in no time.

I'd only used a mess tin during training.

Military gear was sturdy and useful, so it was nice to have.

I even dropped a water-purifying capsule into the boiled water.

It was one that hadn't been taken at the dump.

"This should do. Whew..."

Once some hot water reached my stomach, I felt much better.

I took out the last food in my backpack.

Cup noodles.

Spicy Korean cup noodles, at that.

Someone might ask what kind of emergency ration that was...

But if you couldn't even cook cup noodles, weren't you basically dead already?

It meant you had no drinking water or fuel.

"Slurp!"

It wasn't even a large cup, just a small one, so it disappeared in no time.

I'd eaten them often because I wasn't well off, but had ramen always tasted this good?

After finishing every drop of broth, I made an air hole in the ceiling and laid out my sleeping bag.

It was only a temporary shelter, but it felt much safer than before.

I slept without waking once, then checked the weather.

The blizzard had eased somewhat, and the sky was slowly getting brighter.

I had to move quickly.

After boiling and drinking one more batch of water, I set out again.

I had no food left.

If I didn't reach the Mining Village today, I would be in real danger.

People said you could survive for days on water alone.

Having experienced it myself, that sounded like total bullshit.

Unless they meant when you were lying still in a room.

Still, it wasn't all bad news.

[Stealth skill level has increased to 10.]

[You have acquired the upper skill, Shadow Walking.]

'...What?'

For the first time, my Tower Escape knowledge had betrayed me.

The maximum level of a normal skill was level 10.

I already knew that.

But an upper skill?

I'd never heard of that in the game.

There was no way the game had gotten its facts wrong.

Tower Escape was famous for paying active hunters to keep its information updated.

Just looking at how perfectly the game developers had recreated the seventh floor's landmarks, their obsession was no joke.

'Don't tell me... even the veteran hunters they interviewed didn't know?'

It made sense.

Tower clears were usually done in five-person teams.

But I was alone.

That meant I was taking all the experience meant for five people.

'Still, it doesn't make sense that I might be the only one to acquire an upper skill.'

Had they hidden the information?

Then again, reaching level 10 wasn't easy.

Only a few top hunters must have known upper skills even existed.

The new upper skill looked quite useful.

It concealed my body when I was in shadows.

[Forced March skill level has increased to 3.]

But it didn't solve my hunger.

I kept walking with difficulty until I finally spotted a landmark.

A warehouse beside a large utility pole.

'I'm almost at the Mining Village.'

Just as I thought I only needed to push a little farther, a realization flashed through my mind.

The snowy surface floor was relatively safe, but it was still the sixth floor.

Dangerous monsters appeared now and then.

[Detection skill level has increased to 10.]

[You have acquired the upper skill, Complete Senses.]

The skill-level-up notification now sounded like the gates of hell opening.

Boom!

A fairly large monster burst out of the snow.

A Snowfield Troll.

It was a little smaller than a normal troll, but it was a troublesome creature that hid in the snow before ambushing its prey.

Its regeneration was excellent, so you had to kill it with overwhelming firepower.

"Kwoooar!"

"Shit..."

My cheap Soviet-made pistol didn't stand a chance.

The Snowfield Troll stretched one long arm toward me.

It intended to grab me first, then break something.

My mind froze at the sudden danger, but my body moved first.

Shing.

My body drew the dagger in an instant and chopped into the troll's arm.

I almost felt proud of it.

Right. If you want to live, you need to do your job properly.

"Kieek?!"

The troll collapsed with a strange scream, but...

my arm didn't get away unscathed.

"Agh!"

It hadn't grabbed me, but its arm was so large and heavy that it felt like I'd been struck hard with a club.

It was a miracle the bone hadn't broken.

'D-did it die?'

The troll had died cleanly again.

Just like the Goblin before.

This dagger definitely had an instant-death effect.

Throb. Throb.

My arm would probably be covered in dark bruises soon.

I hurriedly stuffed snow inside my clothes to ice it, but I had no idea how much it would help.

"Urgh..."

[Physical Technique skill level has increased to 3.]

Even while I was in pain, I had to collect the loot.

The troll had only dropped a single pure-white Snowfield Troll Hide.

Still, it was huge and thick, so it would be useful.

It sold for a decent price in the game, too.

'I'm about to starve to death, and now monsters are causing trouble too.'

If a twenty-first-century Korean starved to death, it would be a pretty unique way to die.

Maybe it would make people take a look at our society.

Clutching my injured arm, I reached the Mining Village.

As the blizzard began raging again, I opened the door to an old house.

Luckily, there was a fair amount of loot inside.

I hadn't eaten anything since waking up, so the moment I found a can of fish, I opened it.

"Ugh, this tastes awful..."

I couldn't believe I could still think something tasted bad in this situation.

If I'd paid for it myself, I would have uploaded an angry review video.

Still, it didn't seem spoiled, so I scraped it clean without leaving anything behind.

There were also some more edible-looking foods, like chocolate and hardtack.

I went through the houses and gathered as much food as I could.

'No medicine at all.'

Even if I couldn't find a Recovery Potion, I wanted to at least find some bandages.

As I leisurely collected loot, my senses picked up something strange.

Step. Step.

Complete Senses.

Even without seeing it directly, I could roughly tell that someone was approaching.

'A monster? No. There shouldn't be any notable monsters inside the Mining Village.'

It could have wandered over from somewhere else, but the odds were low.

This was a hunter.

The surface loot was poor, but...

there were only so many places to avoid a blizzard, so it was natural to run into other hunters.

'Tch. Running won't do any good anyway... Should I hide for now?'

This place wasn't very big. If it was a five-person team, they would choose another building.

I tried using my newly acquired upper skill, Shadow Walking.

I squeezed beneath the furniture in a suitably secluded room, and my body turned transparent.

Click.

The front door opened.

"Anyone here?"

"There are traces. They look old, though."

Thanks to Complete Senses, it sounded as if they were talking right beside me.

That wasn't all.

I could even roughly tell where those hunters were from.

'They're not the people from the cabin. They seem to be from the US or Europe... They're fully armed and even have night-vision goggles.'

These people spoke English.

They had to be British or American.

Still, it was better not to be discovered.

"This door is open. They left this way. There's snow piled up here, too."

They fell for the fake trail, so they didn't seem that skilled.

The piled-up snow had obviously been gathered by hand.

"Are you sure?"

"Trust me. I have an A-rank search-type Basic Skill!"

A Basic Skill.

It was a powerful skill a hunter gained after escaping the tower for the first time.

Even an E-rank skill, the lowest grade, was much stronger than ordinary skills.

The power of an A-rank skill went without saying.

Yet they still couldn't find me.

Was Shadow Walking really that good?

'It must be thanks to the Hood of Hell.'

The Hood of Hell I wore raised my Stealth skill level.

After listening a little longer, I roughly understood.

"There's no one in this village but us. I can't hear anything."

It seemed their range was broad enough to detect the entire village.

And it worked by detecting sound.

Of course they couldn't find someone hiding like me.

Still, if I moved, they would notice immediately.

'I'll stay still like I'm dead.'

They would leave soon enough.

Sure enough.

"Good. Rest for thirty minutes, then we head into the mine."

Right.

If they had full equipment, including night-vision goggles, they had naturally come to clear the underground area.

I didn't move a muscle until they were gone.

Unfortunately, my left arm, which had been struck by the troll earlier, was in bad shape.

It had swollen so badly that I could feel it even through my clothes.

I had been wearing Cold-Weather Clothes, so it probably wasn't infected.

As I waited anxiously, a new notification appeared.

[Regeneration skill level has increased to 1.]

My condition must have been pretty serious.

The moment they disappeared into the mine, I thoroughly searched the village.

Footnotes:

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