The Protagonist Doesn't Want to Leave the First Floor - Chapter 49

WeTried Translations

Translator/Editor: DereKimchi

Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried

◈ The Protagonist Doesn't Want to Leave the First Floor ◈

Chapter 49: 049

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[What is this?]

Who killed it?

-I thought they said no one could kill the boss there? It keeps flying into the sky.

ㄴYeah, it barely comes down, and it has tons of minions too. Such a pain.

-I know who killed it.

ㄴWho?

ㄴDon't know the name.

ㄴThen you don't know.

ㄴNo, I don't know the name, but I saw how they killed it from far away.

ㄴHow?

ㄴLightning rods.

ㄴ?

ㄴFor real.

The truth quickly came out.

People had said the boss of the Rocky Cliff Field could not even be attempted without special magic or skills, yet it had been taken down by nothing more than lightning rods.

But photos and videos someone had taken were uploaded later, and people realized it was not merely a few lightning rods.

At the peak of a rocky mountain, thick metal poles had been driven into every part of a space that was not particularly large. More were still being added.

-Getting all the way up there is work in itself.

ㄴYeah, and someone could've stolen those. They got lucky.

The lightning rods were naturally made of iron.

Iron was valuable here. Considering how much iron had gone into those rods, anyone who saw them would be tempted.

Of course, the person who installed them would be waiting nearby. But what if their opponents came in a group and were stronger?

They had been lucky in several ways.

‘There are quite a few people steadily making money without saying much, besides me.’

He had seen them in Logger Forest too.

People who did not care what issues were happening in the Area and simply worked hard.

He had also seen people in the Wasteland mining rocks containing metal, or selling minerals refined from them.

The Swamp and Rabbit Field were too cold to do much for now, but once the weather warmed up, they would become lively again.

‘Giant Lake really did have the most people loafing around.’

It was a place full of genuine layabouts.

Even Villains ignored the users there because they had nothing worth looting.

Of course, killing them would at least produce a Personal Effects Bag. But the fishers there were surprisingly united.

Whenever word spread that someone was being attacked, they threw down their fishing rods and joined forces. Even a decent-sized Villain group could not act rashly.

‘Apparently, plenty of Villains got killed instead and became fish food.’

If bodies vanished like monster corpses, they would not suffer that fate. Why had users been designed to leave bodies behind?

‘Anyway, the boss in that field is dead too.’

Every Field Boss in the Area had been defeated.

Everyone on the community board had been guessing that something would happen.

-There has to be something. Otherwise, it makes no sense.

ㄴFor real.

And something really did happen.

It was about ten minutes after the boss-clear notification appeared.

[The rulers of every Area have been defeated.]

[The Test Area's basic objective has been reached.]

‘Objective reached?’

As Seo Hajin tilted Juggernaut's head, notifications continued appearing beneath his vision.

[You have worked hard.]

[Thank you for participating in the test.]

[All of you have been granted eligibility to return.]

[Once you meet one of the given conditions, you may choose to return to where you were before.]

[It says we can go back?]

What is this? Is it real?

-There's more below. Read that.

ㄴThe conditions are insane LOL.

ㄴ(OP) What the fuck is this?

Seo Hajin was looking at those conditions as well.

There were three in total.

It said meeting just one would be enough.

1. Defeat all Area Bosses at least 10 times.

2. Pay 1,000,000 Points.

3. Accumulate 20,000 hours of stay time.

-Is number 3 the easiest right now?

ㄴRead it properly. It starts from now.

ㄴAh, fuck.

-Should we give up on defeating every Area Boss and choose one of the other two?

ㄴWouldn't number 1 be doable if we keep leveling up? Now that we know the conditions, we could all join forces and make it happen.

ㄴYou think that'll happen?

ㄴLOL, no one can unite.

ㄴStill, they'll probably band together by Clan.

The three conditions.

Each seemed impossible at first, but also possible with enough time and effort.

Seo Hajin thought he could attempt number 1 too, if he had enough time and the timing worked out.

‘The Eagle in the Rocky Cliff Field is the problem. Right now, there doesn't seem to be an answer besides covering the place with lightning rods and praying at the sky.’

If he could secure many long-range arrows or weapons from another world, dealing with aerial monsters would not be so difficult.

But the choices that seemed realistically possible to him right now were numbers 2 and 3.

‘One million Points... If I stop expanding the Subspace, and my income stays at this level, I can do it within six months at the latest.’

Sometimes, he earned ten thousand Points in a day.

But that was only possible when he spent the entire day hunting Wolves and sold Firewood separately.

‘Firewood won't sell once the weather warms up. Considering everything, I should extend the estimate.’

Besides, stopping the Subspace expansion would be a shame. He needed to keep putting in a certain amount.

‘Twenty thousand hours... Ugh.’

A day was twenty-four hours.

Twenty thousand hours was over two years and three months.

‘If it had counted from when we first entered, it would cut off a few months... But it starts from now.’

Honestly, it was not difficult.

He only had to survive and endure.

‘Think of it as slightly extended military service.’

Still, earning one million Points seemed like it would happen faster.

‘The problem is that I have to pay them, not gather them.’

Some users were talking about that exact point. One million Points was no small amount. Earning it would be hard enough, but they had to collect it and hand it over to the system.

In the end, most users chose number 3.

However, people looking for large Clans, guilds, or parties to defeat all Area Bosses, the first option, were already appearing.

‘We don't have to choose right away.’

Wouldn't they simply choose whichever of the three they achieved first?

-It's still better now that we have a goal.

ㄴYeah, that's true.

-Thank you, Squirrel Thunder.

ㄴWho's that?

ㄴThe lightning rods LOL.

Seo Hajin had been heading toward the rocky cliffs.

He changed direction and began moving north along the waterway. The broad river was frozen solid, thick enough that even Crocodiles did not seem able to break through it easily.

‘There aren't any at all?’

Were there none downstream?

Or did they not respawn during winter?

Snakes in the Swamp hibernated, but Crocodiles did not do that, did they?

‘I’ll find out if I go up.’

He took out a rough wooden sled he had made in his spare time. It was only large enough for about two people, but there had been no reason to make it bigger.

Grrr.

Sangun, wearing unfamiliar equipment, seemed a little uncomfortable. Still, it did not resist.

Then, the Tiger-drawn sled began racing across the frozen river.

[Breaking News: Juggernaut Is Having Fun]

The image quality sucks because it was taken from far away.

-He really is enjoying a solo game.

ㄴWow, I want a ride too.

ㄴYou think he'd let you ride?

ㄴHe'd probably feed you to the Tiger.

-Even if you can't get a Tiger, can't you get a Wolf? Seems worth trying.

ㄴSome people have succeeded at taming.

ㄴI have the items too. I should go try.

-Where did all the taming items listed on the marketplace go?

ㄴThey already sold out LOL.

ㄴYou get them while hunting monsters. Just hunt.

Quite a few users were already benefiting from tamed monsters. But once they tamed one, they had to feed it, so it was undoubtedly a burden.

Still, perhaps because a clear goal had appeared, users began taking more interest in the fact that having a helper was more advantageous than being alone.

People could not be trusted, so make pets.

That sort of atmosphere began to form.

No, it had already been an existing opinion. Various conditions had simply come together and made it more widespread.

-Is the lake still the same?

ㄴStill the same.

ㄴNo reaction?

ㄴYeah. Looks like they'll fill twenty thousand hours.

ㄴUgh, those fishers seriously.

ㄴWhy? They're good people. If you beg, they'll even give you fish.

ㄴFor real, they were good guys.

ㄴThere are women too.

ㄴAre they pretty?

ㄴ? Why is no one replying?

“Surely they didn't avoid us on purpose?”

Someone watching the Tiger-drawn sled disappear in the distance spoke, then turned to the people beside them.

The others, whose faces had similarly stiffened, each reacted in their own way. But in the end, they concluded that it had been a coincidence.

“He was definitely coming this way.”

“Yeah. Going by the route he had originally been following, he was clearly heading all the way to the final boss.”

There were several paths Juggernaut would have to pass through to reach the Rocky Cliff Field.

Of them, the place where they were waiting was the most likely.

Of course, other locations had their own preparations. Wherever he came, they would have taken suitable action.

Then, the Eagle boss had suddenly been defeated.

Lightning rods.

That had been outside their expectations.

And Juggernaut, who had been heading toward them until just before, suddenly changed direction. He was now riding an unheard-of Tiger sled away along the frozen river ahead.

“Should we chase him?”

“I don't know. That's their home ground. We'd be at a disadvantage.”

“Yeah. You don't mess with someone lucky.”

The group, which even included people known as notable figures, decided on that course and had no choice but to withdraw in disappointment.

“What do we do now?”

“First, we need to get through winter. After that... we'll have to do something.”

“Since we're gathered anyway, should we hunt bosses?”

“That's not a bad idea.”

“If we do, we'll have to hurry.”

One person's words drew everyone's attention.

The speaker adjusted their grip on their bow and looked over the others.

“You all know, right? Once one gets killed, we can't even see it for a day. And the next day, a stronger one appears.”

“Ah.”

“Right.”

Their expressions showed they had merely remembered something they had forgotten.

But those expressions gradually stiffened as another strange realization followed.

* * *

“Thinking about it, the three choices are all connected. None of them are easy.”

As the Tiger sled sped up, a cold too severe to merely call cold battered his exposed face.

Perhaps because his Avatar's head had gone cold, Seo Hajin finally realized something he had failed to consider until now.

“When you kill a boss, that field's level rises. The more you kill it, the stronger it becomes. Not only the boss, but the field's ordinary monsters get stronger too.”

But the objective was not a shared quest for all users.

It was an individual task given to each person, and unless they participated at the same time, the counts accumulated separately.

In other words, unless all the users, surely numbering in the thousands, gathered on the same day and time to raid bosses, competition was inevitable.

‘The more people aim for Boss Mob raids, the more they'll keep killing them.’

At some point, people would realize it.

Perhaps they had already realized it.

The later they were compared to everyone else, the stronger the bosses they would have to face.

But that competition would naturally lead to Field Levels rising rapidly. At a certain point, even ordinary survival would become difficult.

‘Kill bosses, and the Field Level rises. If the Field Level rises, survival becomes harder. If survival becomes harder, filling the stay-time requirement becomes harder, and earning Points will naturally become harder too.’

The third option.

Accumulating twenty thousand hours of stay time.

Why did the detailed description include the phrase, “Restart waiting time after death is excluded from stay time”?

“It means you can't keep dying and still fill the stay-time requirement. Well, you can to some extent... But in the worst case, it might really take over ten years.”

The situation might be better in unpopular fields, fields where Boss Mobs were difficult to defeat.

That was, if ordinary survival was not dangerous there.

“Giant Lake.”

Seo Hajin said the name aloud.

At least Aggressive Mobs did not roam there. At minimum, people would not die if they stayed still.

“People will gather there.”

Until now, Rabbit Field and Logger Forest seemed to have the most users, but Giant Lake would become a new hub in the future.

“The users there hate noise, but it can't be helped.”

Of course, Seo Hajin had no intention of going there.

Northern Forest had already passed level 20, and he planned to defeat the Tiger ten times before anyone else.

‘Should I control it?’

That thought occurred to him.

If others came and killed the Tiger, the monsters he hunted would become stronger too. Could he handle it?

But he shook his head.

Stronger monsters were not a loss for him.

“If monster levels rise, they give more Points. In the end, I only need to be able to handle them.”

And Northern Forest's Field Level would not simply keep rising without limit.

To fight the Tiger, they would need to clear out the Wolves around it too. Anyone without that much ability would not be able to endure there.

‘In about a month... It will probably stop around level 50.’

He had not visited every field, but considering the levels of other users he had met or seen from afar, they would likely hit a limit around then.

Afterward, they would naturally either improve their individual capabilities or increase their numbers through parties or Clans.

‘Well, they can figure that out themselves.’

Seo Hajin switched out Sangun, which looked a little tired. He also replaced Juggernaut, which had become considerably frozen and creaky.

‘I should finish ten Tiger clears before winter ends.’

He planned to get it done quickly while others could not move, then focus on hunting afterward.

‘Considering the Field Level will rise... Is there a chance I'll reach one million Points faster than twenty thousand hours of stay time?’

Would something come up that required him to spend a huge sum in the meantime?

Or would one million Points feel too precious, leading him to choose stay time instead?

He could not know that much yet.

All he knew was that the community board he checked was becoming noisy with people thinking about similar things.

“Hmm?”

However, the mood there was developing in a slightly different direction from what he had expected.

“Are regional factions forming?”

Like the remnants of the Expedition Force that had controlled the boss in the Swamp, movements to control Boss Mobs in various places were appearing.

Their stated reason was that it would be best not to kill bosses indiscriminately, but to wait until at least a certain number of users had gathered before taking them down one at a time.

At first glance, it sounded plausible. In reality, it was preferable.

But if certain groups began controlling Boss Mobs for that purpose...

That could lead to another conflict.

‘It's a difficult problem.’

But in the end, it had nothing to do with him.

“I won't control them.”

What if some people flocked north and tried to control things themselves?

Of course, he would not like it. But as long as they did not interfere with his hunting, he had no intention of stopping them.

‘If they interfere, I'll drive them out.’

That was all.

A simple standard.

Seo Hajin nodded Stone's head and looked at Sangun, sprawled beside the warm Mini Stove in the Subspace Rest Area, making soft rumbling sounds.