The Protagonist Doesn't Want to Leave the First Floor - Chapter 5

WeTried Translations

Translator/Editor: DereKimchi

Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried

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

Chapter 5

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At first, the sound of water had been faint.

Before long, it had grown loud enough to drown out every other sound around him.

Whooosh-

A valley with a fairly tall waterfall.

When Seo Hajin reached it, he finally found somewhere he could rest.

It was a ledge jutting out halfway up the cliff beside the waterfall, a place small animals would have trouble reaching.

It was difficult for him too, of course, but still easier than climbing a tree.

Grrf! Woof!

Awooooo!

As the wolf pack that had lost him reacted in their own ways, Seo Hajin sprawled across a rock about the size of a single bed.

He repeatedly chewed and swallowed grilled wolf meat, easing his hunger and restoring his stamina.

Once he was somewhat full, he took something from his inventory.

“So it gives equipment too.”

It was a heavy-looking fur vest.

A hood was attached to it, made from a wolf’s head.

[Wolfskin Hooded Vest]

A straightforward name.

There were no listed effects or defense stats, but it felt quite tough and sturdy when he touched it.

“Those wolves did have tough hides.”

He could tell just by looking at the hides piling up in one inventory slot. Equipment made from that material had to be good.

His clothes had already become nearly useless after the continuous fighting.

The upper half had been torn to shreds, leaving only enough cloth hanging from the rope around his waist to cover his lower body.

The moment he put on the vest over his exposed upper body, the slight chill vanished.

“Fur’s probably weak against moisture... but I don’t have much choice.”

The air beside the waterfall was humid, like sitting next to a humidifier, but finding somewhere he could rest this comfortably would not be easy.

Besides, the trees near the water were at an awkward height, too tall to climb with ropes or a ladder.

“Clothes aside...”

He organized his inventory.

There were only so many slots, so he had to throw out what he did not need.

“Wolf innards... I could eat them, but why bother?”

Sometimes innards dropped separately from the meat, but he had more than enough meat already.

Still, there were parts he had kept just in case, the intestines and bladder.

“I could use the intestines as disposable cordage...”

They could be used once and discarded, separate from any vines he collected.

As for the bladder, he had kept it to try making a leather water bottle.

The thought of making a water container from a piss bladder made him frown, but when he thought about it another way, there was hardly a better material for storing water.

“It doesn’t seem to spoil in the inventory either, so there’s no better material.”

Processing it was not difficult.

Using Cooking, he easily made a “pouch.”

It seemed meant for stuffing with ingredients and cooking, but he had no intention of using it like an oversized dumpling wrapper.

“It holds water well too.”

The smell could not be helped.

He repeatedly washed it in the waterfall, but a strange scent still lingered.

“I’ll keep it for emergencies.”

After filling it with water, he put it into an inventory slot and made two more similar canteens.

Whether because the bladder stretched or because the wolves were large, each one could hold almost a liter of water.

Fortunately, the water-filled leather canteens stacked in one inventory slot.

They must have been treated as identical items, because they stacked together with a number displayed over them.

“Then I can make more of these.”

He had not hit a weight limit yet.

That was strange.

Everything in his inventory weighed well over fifty kilograms combined.

“What’s the standard? Don’t tell me it’s body weight.”

Maybe the barbarian-like body he had chosen also increased how much he could carry.

Either way, he did not need to worry about overloading himself yet, but it was still better to discard what he did not need.

“The wolf hides are the problem. They keep piling up.”

Each one weighed five kilograms, and he had nearly ten already.

That alone came close to fifty kilograms.

He had nowhere to get rid of them right now, and Cooking could not make anything particularly useful from them.

‘If I had something like a leatherworking skill, I could make clothes or a bag.’

At this rate, he might have to throw away some hides before long, like the bones he was already discarding regularly.

“Hmm?”

Then he noticed a subtle change in the weight-limit gauge.

The inventory load had clearly not changed, yet the gauge had dropped slightly.

“No way.”

He ate more meat just in case, and his remaining carrying capacity rose a little.

“So that depends on stamina too.”

Did eating well mean he could carry more? It seemed plausible enough.

“Still, I shouldn’t overdo it.”

After sorting out the useless things and throwing them far away, he looked up at birds flying in the distance.

“There’s a sky, and there are birds... but no matter how I look at it, this doesn’t seem like Earth.”

He could not explain it clearly.

It was just a feeling.

The system had called this place the Tower Floor One Area, so there was a good chance it was not Earth.

“Should I sleep for a bit?”

It was still late afternoon.

There was time before sunset, but it would be best to sleep whenever he could.

He pushed half his body into a hollow near the cliff.

It was almost solid rock, so there was little danger of it collapsing. Simply hiding part of himself would serve as a precaution in an emergency.

Just in case, he covered the exposed parts of his body with wolf hides. Then, rationalizing that sleeping while the sun was out might actually be less dangerous, he closed his eyes for a while.

The wolves’ howls drifting from afar were proof that he was safe.

If they drew closer, or disappeared entirely and left silence behind, that would mean something had gone wrong.

* * *

He did not know how long he had slept.

When he opened his eyes, the sun had set, and he was still alive.

Still, he frowned as soon as he woke because something felt wrong with his body.

‘My stamina dropped.’

It was not because he had grown hungry while sleeping.

There was another reason.

As he chewed and swallowed meat he had cooked beforehand, he checked his right leg.

There was a small mark near his ankle.

Something like a slightly swollen blister bore a wound that looked like it had been pricked.

“A venomous insect?”

Something had bitten him.

Or stung him.

What was certain was that poison had entered his body.

He did not know whether it was lethal, but it had definitely reduced his stamina.

More precisely, stamina had been consumed while detoxifying it. Choosing Detoxification among the initial options had apparently been a good decision.

‘It was good that I had it equipped before I slept, too.’

Since he had stopped in one place, there was no reason to make a map. He had switched skills because he did not know what might happen while he slept.

It might have saved his life.

A chill ran down his spine, and he hurriedly ate more meat to recover his lost stamina.

“I should only sleep after making sure I’m actually safe.”

He had not even noticed the insect biting him.

Had he slept that deeply?

After fighting the wolves to the death, it might have been natural, but it was still dangerous.

“Should I rest a little longer?”

Night had fallen anyway.

Moving now seemed dangerous.

There could be nocturnal predators.

‘Multiple Viewpoints has limits in the dark too.’

Even if he could see far away, there was nothing he could do about what the darkness hid.

‘Hmm.’

He gathered the wolf hides that had covered one side of his body. Having been left outside for several hours, they had dried somewhat and become stiff.

But when he put them into his inventory and stacked them with the other hides, they changed to match them.

They returned to the fresh state they had been in when first skinned.

‘Is that a good thing or a bad thing?’

If he had tried tanning one even a little and changed its condition, would it have failed to stack in the same slot?

Or could he restore a slightly damaged hide by mixing it in like this?

‘Should I try it?’

Damaging one hide would not be difficult.

He had plenty to spare, so he picked one and poked several holes through it. As expected, it would not stack in the same slot as the other hides.

‘Damaged ones become different items.’

Maybe items had grades.

They might be categorized by condition or rank.

‘I should keep this for now.’

He still had enough slots, so he put the hole-riddled hide away. Afterward, he passed the time processing meat with Cooking and grinding the stones he had collected during the day against the cliff rock.

‘This will take a while.’

He was grinding stones because he wanted to make a reasonably useful blade.

A broken wolf bone could stab something with its pointed end or scrape a little, but it was not good for cutting and slashing.

That was why he had picked up several rocks that looked suitable for making stone knives.

It felt as though he had suddenly returned to the Stone Age, but if it went well, he could get a useful cutting tool.

‘I won’t be able to use it as a weapon, but I could cut vines or process hides with it.’

Making a cutting tool by grinding stone was not easy.

On video sites, people speed up time or edit out the middle steps, making it seem quick.

Reality was different.

But boring, repetitive work was practically his specialty.

When he used Multiple Viewpoints, his own senses became somewhat dull, making him feel as though he were watching a game character. If he worked then, he could keep at it without getting particularly bored.

“Should I grind wolf bones too?”

Not every wolf bone broke at the same length and angle.

Many snapped off bluntly rather than leaving a point.

If items in similar states stacked in one slot and became identical, then could he sharpen one bone properly and copy-paste it onto the others?

‘Now that I think about it, this might be more urgent than a stone knife.’

He could keep trying to make a stone knife whenever he rested. He put the stones back into his inventory and took out a suitably sharp bone instead.

If he made it too sharp, it would probably be damaged after one or two stabs, but that was fine. He would treat it as disposable anyway.

“I should grind this side.”

He resumed working.

The result was quite satisfying.

The wolf bone had been ground into something like a slightly long dagger or a skewer. Holding it in one hand, Seo Hajin gave it a light swing and stabbed at the air a few times before nodding.

“Then, now...”

Next, he took every broken bone from his inventory.

If they stacked with the sharpened one by accident, all his work could be undone, so he needed to set a new reference point.

After placing the well-ground wolf bone into a fresh slot, he tried stacking a bone that had broken diagonally but was not very sharp on top of it.

‘It went in.’

It really did stack in the same slot.

The number displayed above it changed to two.

He took out one of the stored bones and confirmed it was the pointed bone he had put in first.

Then he took out the other.

The two bones were completely identical.

“Interesting.”

He put one back into his inventory, then continued stacking the broken bones on top of it.