WeTried Translations

Translator: ZEROSUGAR

Editor: Abstract

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◈ Regression is Too Much

Chapter 132

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The regressor is tired (7)

One robbery. Two murders.

It would be strange if the dwarves weren't angry. Especially if they'd been getting along fine among themselves until players barged in and caused all this.

"Hmm..."

Tap. Tap. Tap.

I drummed my fingertips against my thigh, lost in thought. How was I supposed to resolve this? Why had the situation gotten so twisted? I lacked far too much information to be certain about anything. However, I’d at least grasped the general outline.

To fill in that missing information, I locked eyes with Anael.

"First, I'd like to get a rough sense of the value of money here."

Bronze, silver, gold, these terms didn't really register with me. In typical fantasy novels, they'd say one gold lets a commoner family survive for a month, but from a modern person's perspective, 'survive' was too abstract. Living on instant ramen and convenience store rice balls was surviving, and so was visiting high-end restaurants for fine dining every single day.

Anael nodded at my question.

"When floor 11 was first designed, I heard they assumed players would earn 1 gold per day!"

The forest of floor 11 was an artificially created environment. From precious mushrooms to various minerals and rare animals, if you gathered them and submitted them to Anael, you could obtain money equivalent to their value.

"Of course, expensive items are that much harder to obtain! It's the principle of capitalism!"

Anael vigorously waved the placard in their hand. Their voice was quite lively, as if every sentence ended with an exclamation mark.

"However, since the people entering floor 11 now are all so exceptional, they earn at least 5 gold and as much as 20 gold per day! On average, I understand they make about 10 gold!"

"...How much is the passage stone?"

"50 gold! Oh, and for reference, a well-made famous sword costs about 20 gold! Lodging is 30 silver per day! 100 silver equals 1 gold!"

"Hmm..."

By top-tier player standards, you'd need to stay about five days on average to clear floor 11. It would take even longer if you wanted to buy weapons and other things.

If I were an impatient psychopath, the option of stealing from the dwarves would look pretty appealing. As for killing them, I didn't really understand that, but...

Then a question suddenly occurred to me.

"...Didn't you say the first player who entered left after three days?"

"That person must have been exceptional! Though not as much as Jun-ho-nim, of course!"

If they earned 20 gold daily and left with just the passage stone, that would make sense, but if they grabbed everything they could and still cleared it in three days, they must have been an absolute monster.

Anyway, I'd roughly grasped the value of money. Next came crime.

"Is there no separate punishment for crimes? Like on floor 2."

Floor 2 also had a city from another world, just like floor 11. If you committed a crime there, the master of the city would pop out and bam, turn the criminal to dust. I wondered if floor 11 had a similar system.

"Well... it's not that there isn't one, but it's not deterrent enough like floor 2!"

According to Anael, floor 11 did have punishments for crimes. If a player committed immoral actions, they'd receive a debuff that reduced their status window stats according to the severity of the offense. Looking at this alone, it seemed quite severe, but...

"The debuff only applies on floor 11!"

The moment you left floor 11, the debuff would lift. Moreover, since the dwarves' combat abilities weren't particularly high, strong players could easily beat down dwarves even with the debuff active.

"Hmm..."

So the criminals left floor 11 in a hurry because of the debuff.

No matter how much I thought about it, I couldn't shake the feeling that the archangel had orchestrated this situation. Committing crimes and running away had been no-risk, high-return. From a criminal's perspective, it would be drool-worthy.

It was no different from setting up a precarious Jenga tower in the middle of the street and saying, 'If this falls, you're all screwed lol.' Right, if you just left the Jenga alone, nothing would happen besides the fact that the probability of it collapsing was extremely, extremely high.

"..."

I came to realize that Archangel Raphael's statement 'I am favorable toward climbers' was never a lie. It had been proven that designing an unreasonable floor while pretending to be fair on the surface was entirely possible.

"But this is just what I heard from fellow angels! Since the person involved is under disciplinary action, it might be slightly different from the facts!"

Of course, this was secondhand information.

"...Who's the dwarves' representative?"

I felt the need to talk with the dwarves too. That is, if they'd talk.

"Hello."

"..."

"We meet again."

Surprisingly, the dwarves' representative was the passage stone shop owner. Fortunately, while he was incredibly rude, he was someone you could have a conversation with.

"...Why are you here? Did you already collect 100 million gold?"

The shop owner, who'd been wearing a monocle while carefully examining a passage stone, set down both the stone and monocle to look at us.

"I wanted to discuss the current situation."

"I have nothing to say."

"Please don't be like that."

"Don't be like what? I said I have nothing to say."

The shop owner shot out his words curtly. As if to express he truly wasn't interested, he picked up the passage stone he'd just set down.

This wasn't going to work. We weren't making any progress. After briefly exchanging glances with Ji-won, I got straight to the point.

"The murder cases."

"..."

His hand holding the passage stone froze.

"...Are you certain players committed them?"

"..."

The shop owner mulled over what I'd said for a moment, then...

Bang!!!

"You fucking bastard!!!"

His face turned bright red as he slammed his fist down on the glass display case.

"I don't know where you picked this up, but what? Are we certain that climbers did it?"

The shop owner vaulted over the glass display case in a single bound, reaching to grab my collar.

Thud.

"That's enough."

"...Fuck, fuck..."

When Ji-won restrained him with one hand, he roughly shook her off and stepped back a few paces. I could have restrained him too, but...

Anyway, since the shop owner had stopped, I continued what I'd been saying.

"No, if you think about it logically, just because dwarves died and players fled floor 11 the next day doesn't definitively prove those people did it, does it? It's all just circumstantial evidence. Of course, I agree it's suspicious, but I understand floor 11's forest has various creatures living in it, so couldn't it have been them?"

"...You know quite a lot for someone who just entered floor 11."

The shop owner jumped back slightly and perched on the glass display case. His complexion had calmed down a bit, so he seemed to have settled.

"Yeah, some people thought that way at first. Maybe this guy fell into a pit or got dragged off by some monster. You think we didn't consider that?"

"..."

"But it's different when the wounds are from a blade, and the weapon used for cutting is thrown down next to the corpse. Plus, the second murder involved beating someone to pulp with a hammer. Animals don't kill prey that way."

Judging by the shop owner's definitive tone, at least it seemed certain the dead dwarves had been killed by weapons. Fucking hell. Some tremendous trolls must have passed through here.

Then it was time for Plan B. Warn them of realistic threats.

"...I'll apologize on their behalf. I'm truly sorry this happened. But if you push this hard, it'll backfire. At the very least, you should lower the price of the passage stone."

A cornered rat bites the cat, and when people have no escape route, they attempt extreme methods.

"Right now there are people trapped on floor 11 for a week with absolutely no hope of escaping. What about them? They weren't even the ones who committed the wrongdoing."

"..."

"They're holding back for now, but exhausted people who've half lost their minds might harm you. You need to consider that possibility..."

"Let them try."

"...Pardon?"

"I said let them try."

The shop owner's face flushed bright red again.

"Boil us, roast us, fry us, whatever. My brothers and sisters would rather choose death than live in disgrace. We haven't even been able to honor the souls of those who died unjustly, and what? They might harm us? That's exactly what we want. We'll all die together and take one or two climbers with us on that road."

"..."

Because I was talking with him face to face, I could tell. This was absolutely not a bluff but complete sincerity.

"...We have nowhere to retreat. You're backed into a corner? Same for us. Go ahead. It won't turn out the way you want."

A normal person wouldn't make such an irrational decision. But the dwarves were far from being in a normal state.

You could say they were consumed by spite. Or perhaps it was the dwarves' characteristic single-mindedness manifesting. Whatever the case, the dwarves didn't fear death.

"...Of course, we also know this situation can't continue indefinitely. Maybe you're unlucky victims too."

The shop owner's tone, which had been intensely agitated, gradually softened. Even he seemed to recognize that taking such a hard stance was foolish.

"So we're also discussing our own contingency plan."

"...A contingency plan?"

"Temporarily, we're thinking of selling passage stones only at set times. After checking that all our brothers and sisters are safe, we'll distribute passage stones. The price will be... about 10 silver. And don't ask us to sell weapons too. That would be insulting to our race."

10 silver. Certainly, flooding the market with cheap passage stones would have short-term results. From the perspective of simply trying to clear the tower, it would be disappointing not to receive benefits like equipment or consumables, but at least they could clear floor 11 easily.

However, this was merely a stopgap measure. There could be people who committed theft or murder and played dumb. From the dwarves' perspective, they had no proper means to punish criminals.

"Ultimately, our goal is to migrate from here. We'll completely empty this fortress and live somewhere far away."

Therefore, the dwarves' final goal was to migrate to a place completely removed from humanity's sphere of influence. Dwarves would live as dwarves, and players would live as players, that was their ideal.

"...Then what are players supposed to do?"

But in that case, purchasing passage stones would become impossible. The means to clear floor 11 would disappear...

"Don't players need passage stones?"

The shop owner picked up the blue passage stone and spun it around.

"I'm making the passage stones myself. Only I will remain here. That'll do."

"...You make them yourself?"

"Did you think they just fell from the sky or something? This is originally an item for resisting magical pressure. It's the culmination of magical engineering technology."

Thud. The shop owner set down the passage stone and stared directly at Ji-won and me.

"We want one thing."

His eyes weren't burning with rage or soaked in sorrow. They just looked incredibly tired.

"To live in an environment where we're not threatened. And right now, you climbers are our threat."

"..."

"Tell them to wait three days. We'll resume passage stone sales. The funeral ends in three days. Give us time to honor the souls of the dead."

And then the shop owner issued an eviction order, telling us to properly convey what we'd just discussed.

"..."

"..."

Ji-won and I were kicked out of the shop and stood blankly staring at the sky.

"Jun-ho, what if..."

"Yeah. I was thinking the same thing."

What if.

Really, what if some crazy bastard killed the shop owner...

Things would be fine temporarily because of the pre-made passage stones, but...

Future players would permanently lose the means to clear floor 11.

And as soon as we came out of the fortress, an unfamiliar young man who called out to us said...

"Choi Ji-won, right? I have a proposal. Let's completely wipe out the dwarf village. What do you say?"

His words were like an express train heading straight toward that bleak future.

[1] A reference to a classical East Asian story about craftsmen and appreciation of their work, likely analogous to the famous Chinese story of Boya and Zhong Ziqi about finding someone who truly understands one's art.

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