WeTried Translations

Translator/Editor: Mordor

Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried

◈ Escaping the Tower at Hell Difficulty ◈

Chapter 78: Episode 78

──────

High-rise buildings flashed past outside the window.

Orca sat with her arms crossed, studying the scenery with a stern expression. Her eyes, however, had already flickered countless times.

"Wh-what is that... Never mind."

We were riding in a bulletproof van.

It was nice not having to drive myself.

Then again, I didn't even have a driver's license.

I'd heard special forces soldiers received intense driving training...

There was no reason to drive inside the Tower, so I'd skipped it.

"Team Leader, where are we going today?"

"Let's get something to eat."

I'd eaten all kinds of things at the hospital, but most of it had been hospital food or delivery. I'd had enough healthy food. Every now and then, I wanted to eat at a restaurant too.

At that moment, Orca trembled slightly as she spoke.

"Take me somewhere other than where Hunters and the ruling class live."

"... Excuse me?"

I needed a moment to process that.

The other races were supposedly hunter-centered monarchies...

It looked like their residential areas were strictly separated.

Honestly, we were the same.

Housing prices in Seoul were expensive, after all.

We headed toward the outskirts of the city as she requested, but...

The rows of apartments never seemed to end.

Orca had gone completely silent by then.

With her sharp eyesight, she could probably tell there were barely any Hunters among the people on the streets.

"It seems like Elves don't have a very large population?"

"... That's difficult to answer."

"Then roughly how many are in the Dwarf Race?"

"Ah, those bastards have around ten million people."

Maybe because she didn't get along with them, she answered right away.

Their total population was ten million.

That sounded like a lot at first...

But their standing army, skilled in actual combat, was probably no more than 150,000. Since they were a sturdy race, should I estimate it higher, around 300,000?

Still, being a Hunter was a profession that required considerable talent.

Less than one percent of them would likely be Hunters capable of properly exploring the eleventh floor and above.

Even one percent was being generous, but that still came to around 3,000.

And not all of them would be active Hunters.

No wonder they had so much room in the Tower.

'If we went to war, wouldn't we win?'

No.

We didn't even know how to cross into other dimensions yet. I shouldn't jump to conclusions.

When we arrived at the restaurant, Orca seemed pleased with the food here.

"Ah, this steak is incredible... It tastes like the great outdoors."

No matter how I looked at her, this Druid was a fraud.

After taking her back to her accommodation, I received a message from Bellion as soon as I got home.

[So I heard Orca went over there?]

"Ah, word got around already?"

[Orca is famous. The Elves who couldn't collect their debts were furious. More importantly, have you already disposed of the Reaper's Soul Crystal?]

"Yes. I used it to grant a skill trait."

[Good. Then you should be able to read its lingering thoughts. See if there's any useful information.]

"Really?"

I'd shattered the Reaper's ego, but fragments of information must have remained.

Still, for a veteran like Bellion to ask me for this...

[Their movements are unusual. They don't normally descend this often. Something is definitely happening. Even the Hunter Lords are on edge.]

Hunter Lords.

Reapers must have been a major headache for them.

Reapers mainly targeted the lower floors, so they might not pose much of a threat to the Lords themselves...

But the workers who had to earn gold were at risk.

Besides, Reapers were seriously climbing the Tower.

Armed with religious fanaticism, they didn't stop just because they had enough to live on.

If they climbed too high, the balance of power would collapse and the Hunter Lords' positions would be threatened.

'Strange...'

The Hunter Lords who opposed the Death Priests still hated the Reapers, who were practically our natural enemies.

There was a reason they were everyone's common enemy.

"I'll take a look. Ah, but is it okay to touch a Reaper's soul however I want?"

[Those malformed bastards don't even count as souls, so don't worry. There's absolutely no chance you'll be prosecuted.]

"Ah..."

He really hated them.

I settled in the center of the rabbit room and steadied my breathing.

It was probably best to do this somewhere familiar.

Sensing the ominous atmosphere, the rabbits quickly ran away.

"Haa..."

I searched for the fragments of the Reaper that had seeped into me.

Reading its memories wasn't particularly difficult, but the act of reading them was torture. It had been turning the souls it collected into Reapers.

Transforming a normal soul into a Reaper's soul was no different from horrific torture.

They made them abandon the values of their original race and be reborn as Reapers.

It was amazing they could use Basic Skills at all.

"Ugh..."

Still, the one I'd caught was relatively high-ranking, so it had some useful information.

[This is already our third deployment this year. Will it be all right?]

[Ha ha, is your faith wavering, brother?]

[P-please don't joke like that. I'm only worried...]

Reapers conversed with the screams of souls as background music.

Their needless warmth made it all the more bizarre and disgusting.

[Our stockpile of souls is plentiful, but we're short on usable bodies.]

[Don't worry, brother. Our leader has found a way.]

[Really?]

What?

If Reapers solved the problem of mass-producing bodies, they would become the strongest race.

The Reaper spoke confidently.

[I've heard one of the inferior races possesses a rather useful technology. Soon, we may be able to free all inferior races from the suffering of reincarnation.]

Flash!

That was all the useful information in its memories.

I immediately reported it to Bellion.

"It seems another race has technology these bastards need. I think they're planning to take it."

[What? Good work. I need to tell the other Death Priests as well. If it's technology capable of mass-producing Reaper bodies...]

He disappeared right away.

It seemed like he had somewhere in mind.

I left that headache to them and decided to rest for now.

The hospital bed had been soft, but nothing beat my own home.

The next morning.

I called Orca over and started filming a video with her.

Her personal information was clearly worth less than the views on my stream.

"Today, we've invited Orca, the legendary Hunter of the Elf Race! You're famous for camping out on the eleventh floor, right?"

"How did you end up staying on the eleventh floor?"

"Ah, no... I told you people last time."

Orca didn't seem to want to tell the story again.

But shouldn't everyone be warned about the dangers of gambling?

This was practically a public service broadcast.

At this rate, I felt like I could start collecting viewer fees through taxes.

[Mage Judge: The host has really been doing well lately... I never thought you'd book an alien Hunter, not just a foreign Hunter.]

[Yuki: There are already plenty of Hunters inspired by the host's greatness.]

"By the way, everyone bought the collaboration cup ramen, right? I'll terminate the Dimensional Power Reactor technology contract with any country that didn't."

"... You could export that?"

"No. Of course you have to buy it at a Korean convenience store."

Kim Yuna completely gave up on moderating the stream after hearing that.

Not long after I started streaming, though, viewers began saying strange things.

[5 Seconds to Escape: Huh? Host, did you see the breaking news?]

[Fog Lake Swim Team: I heard Hunters from another race appeared at a Tower in XX Country?]

Another race?

The viewers watching Orca right in front of them didn't seem this shocked just because of that.

Had they made official contact?

We immediately switched to a news channel and turned the stream into a reaction broadcast.

[Unknown Hunters of another race appear at a Tower on the outskirts of XX Country... Currently engaged in combat with security forces.]

"F-fighting?"

Did they cross over and start fighting right away?

They had to be overwhelmingly outnumbered.

The following footage had been filmed by an ordinary person with a smartphone.

Phone cameras were so good these days that even regular people could capture decent footage.

We couldn't help but be genuinely shocked when we saw the three massive Hunters.

"Aren't those Reapers?"

Could the technology that would allow them to mass-produce Reaper bodies be ours?

As far as I knew, we had nothing like that.

[L-look over here!]

[That's amazing. What race are they?]

The police tried to hold back the spectators, but no one listened.

There weren't any proper forces nearby. It was probably a Tower that had been neglected because it stood near the country's border.

The Reapers on screen smiled brightly as they watched people approach, waving their hands.

[There are so many inferior races awaiting salvation.]

[We can delay no longer.]

The civilians, who weren't Hunters, couldn't understand a word they said.

When a Reaper held out a hand for a handshake, even a police officer hesitantly stepped forward and reached out.

Kim Yuna couldn't watch any longer and turned off the footage.

"Th-those are Reapers! They're an extremely aggressive and dangerous race, so don't approach them under any circumstances!"

I instinctively tried to gather my equipment.

It was a distant foreign country, but my body moved before my mind could catch up as a Death Priest.

Orca was already praying to the great outdoors.

But...

[Sixth Floor Ghost: Huh? I heard those guys got caught?]

[No Shotguns at Meetings: What? Already? Weren't the people there supposed to be doomed?]

[Mage Judge: The military deployed and caught them.]

[5 Seconds to Escape: Isn't that a fake announcement to reassure civilians?]

My head cooled quickly.

Come to think of it...

Reapers didn't have much in the way of defense or firepower, did they?

Their arms had been pierced by .50 caliber Enhanced Ammunition.

Even if they had come wearing equipment without worrying about the Item Level Restriction, a proper military force would suppress them immediately.

When I briefly turned off the stream, Orca asked, "What happened? Everything was so chaotic that I couldn't read it properly."

"We need to find out too..."

"Either way, three Reapers appearing is serious. If they had appeared among the Elf Race, a Hunter Lord would have stepped in immediately."

Only after seeing Orca's reaction was I certain.

These bastards really were weak, weren't they?

They barely had weapon systems beyond what was used in the Tower.

Even if they did, such weapons would interfere with the Hunter Lords' dictatorships.

After contacting Go Jiho, we received a detailed briefing from the Hunter Association.

That was one of the privileges of being active Hunters.

"This is drone footage of the battle that was just shared with us. It's my first time seeing it too."

"Let's play it right away."

Flash!

Rat-a-tat-tat!

"Aah!"

The footage was absolute chaos.

The three Reapers were easily sweeping aside the police officers and soldiers who had rushed to the scene.

Personal firearms clearly weren't enough.

[The inferior races are resisting fiercely.]

[They seem more elite than they look. Surely this isn't a trap... Their earlier reactions made it seem like they hadn't expected us to come.]

[The souls here are of decent quality. They may at least be useful as fertilizer.]

The Reapers chattered as if impressed while harvesting lives.

Just as the defensive line was being helplessly overrun, an armored unit finally arrived.

Boom, boom, boom!

A mounted heavy machine gun opened fire, and the Reapers panicked.

[Urgh! Is this the Lord's personal unit?]

[But those people aren't Hunters...]

[Our defensive skills can't handle any more! We need to retreat!]

The enraged soldiers shouted something, and air support arrived from beyond the screen.

That ended it.

Boom!

"..."

We silently watched the chunks of meat that had once been Reapers.

Since it was raw footage from the scene, there was no censorship. We could see everything in gruesome detail.

After a long silence, Kim Yuna came to almost the exact same conclusion I had reached yesterday.

"... If we went to war, wouldn't we win?"

"Why are you immediately thinking about going to war?"

"But those bastards attacked us first!"

"Calm down. Do you think war is that easy? If we start one, we'll have to fight every other race too."

Go Jiho spoke coolly, but Kim Yuna glanced at the completely terrified Orca, then spoke again.

"Even if we went to war with every other race, wouldn't we win?"

She was far too quick with the calculations.

Orca stammered from beside her.

"N-no. Um... Equipment without mana would have a hard time enduring long-distance dimensional travel..."

Was that so?

Delicate equipment broke down when mana concentration was too high in the first place.

We could defend ourselves, but attacking would be difficult.

There was a reason the other races had developed the way they had.

After spending a long time dealing with the aftermath, I was only able to return home in the evening.

My main role had been reassuring people from our country's Association and government.

"Whew... They're seriously annoying."

Beep!

Another message from Bellion.

As soon as I answered, he spoke urgently.

[Emergency summons. We found their destination.]

"We've already been attacked."

[That was a diversion. This time, it's an all-out war. More than 200 advanced Reapers may be mobilized.]

"Which race are they targeting? What race has the technology for mass-producing Reaper bodies?"

Bellion fell silent for a long time before forcing out the answer.

[Dwarf.]

"..."

This silence lasted even longer.

[... Please help.]

I began packing my things.

Footnotes:

Join our discord at https://dsc.gg/wetried