I'm the Only Wizard Climbing the Tower - Chapter 4

Chapter 4

TL: DDTL

Back in my adolescent days.

I was a middle schooler then, deep into genre fiction.

Fantasy and wuxia. All those novels full of knights and wizards, martial artists and secret arts.

And back then, I thought:

‘What if I’m actually seeing Mana?’

I mean, it was puberty.

That age when self-consciousness overflows and kids go hunting for proof of their own specialness.

For someone like me, who saw ‘blue dots’ invisible to everyone else, arriving at that idea was only natural.

So I tried everything.

Climbing the hill out back to meditate, all in the name of attuning to Mana.

Mimicking stances out of wuxia novels, all in the name of learning martial arts.

Trying to touch the blue dots. And so on.

Naturally, I couldn’t interfere with the ‘blue dots’ in any way whatsoever.

Couldn’t touch them, couldn’t move them.

Couldn’t draw them into my body, either.

Quite literally, all I could do was look at them.

And as I gradually grew up.

I came to grasp reality.

‘Magic? Martial arts? There’s no way that stuff exists. It’s all make-believe.’

‘The blue dots are just some hallucination only I can see.’

‘If I don’t want to be treated like a mental case, I’d better keep quiet about the blue dots.’

The childlike heart that had chased magic and martial arts withered away before I knew it.

And I lived in reality.

Studied like everyone else, made friends, went to college…

And so. At some point, I started ignoring the blue dots only my eyes could see.

Just a trifling memory from my adolescence.

* * *

“…Ah.”

Blink. I opened my eyes.

The familiar sight of my own room.

“Afternoon… no. Evening, I guess.”

How long was I passed out, seriously? The sunset was slanting in through the Semi-basement’s small window.

I crawled out of my creaky spring bed and headed for the living room.

Noona was there.

“You’re up? Feeling okay?”

“Yeah… Noona, get me some water.”

“Here.”

Gulp. I took the cold water Noona held out and drank it down.

It snapped my groggy head right awake.

Noona spoke, worry written all over her face.

“Are you hurt anywhere? No psychological shock?”

“I’m fine. Not a scratch on me. That Tutorial thing? Turned out to be no big deal.”

“Still…”

“Anyway, quit worrying. You’re the one who needs some rest, though.”

I set the cup down and studied her face.

The worried face looking back at me was heavy with exhaustion.

Dark circles had settled under her eyes, and her hair was matted, like she hadn’t even had time to wash properly.

These past few days she’d been so busy she’d come home only to grab a few hours of sleep before heading right back out.

The moment she heard I’d come back from the Tutorial, she must have forced a gap in her schedule and rushed over.

“You might feel fine right now, but you need to be careful. Psychological shock isn’t something to brush off… Let’s at least get you a session at a counseling center.”

“I’m seriously fine. Counseling, what counseling. You worry way too much.”

“Right after the Tutorial is when you have to be most careful. Do you know how many Hunters end up suffering from the trauma they pick up then?”

“Come on, do I look like the kind of wuss who bawls his eyes out over killing a few monsters?”

A few tears did squeeze out during the Tutorial, but that wasn’t crying. That was a yawn.

Anyway, let’s just go with that.

“If you’re okay, that’s a relief… So. What was your Difficulty? Easy, right?”

“Nope.”

“…Don’t tell me, Normal?! Oh my god!”

Noona’s face went wide with shock.

Heh. Shocked by a mere Normal? Can’t have that.

I squared my shoulders and declared proudly:

“Extreme.”

“Stop joking around.”

“If not Extreme, then Lunatic. Or maybe Hell.”

“You’re cracking dumb jokes, so I guess you really are fine.”

“No, I’m serious.”

If a Difficulty’s harder than Hard, it’s Extreme, Lunatic, or Hell.

Calling it one of those three is basically the unwritten rule, isn’t it?

It was an unprecedented Difficulty and I had no idea what to call it, which is exactly why I’d answered with all three. Seeing her refuse to believe me felt downright unfair.

Then again, I can hardly believe it myself.

How did a scrawny stick of a weakling like me come out of a beyond-Hard Difficulty alive?

“Anyway, thank goodness. You came back in one piece… Let’s grill up some samgyeopsal to celebrate your safe return. You love it. How about it?”

“Ooh! Samgyeopsal! Days like this call for meat…”

Meat.

Suddenly the image of Goblin flesh splattering everywhere flashed through my mind.

My appetite died on the spot.

“…is what I’d say, but my stomach’s a bit off. Let’s keep it simple. Just make some doenjang soup.”

“You really do need that counsel…”

“I’m fine, seriously! Forget it, just whip me up a nice hot doenjang soup, sis. I’m craving something warm, that’s all.”

* * *

After dinner, I lay sprawled on my bed.

I sorted through the things I’d need to do going forward.

‘First, quitting the convenience store job, effective immediately. If I tell them I’ve become a Hunter, I can probably claw back all the wages they shorted me, right? Then there’s Hunter registration. And Exchanging my Points for cash…’

Now that I was a Hunter, there was plenty to do.

First off, that dogshit convenience store job was done. Immediately.

The manager paid me an hourly rate that didn’t even meet minimum wage, and all this time I’d had no choice but to swallow my complaints.

Because there were more than enough people willing to work for less than minimum.

Today’s South Korea, where companies had gone under or been sold off overseas by the dozen.

Surplus labor everywhere.

That was how a social climate formed where simple part-time jobs paid less than minimum wage.

Report it to the Labor Office?

Wouldn’t get processed properly anyway.

With society in chaos and the administration riddled with gaping holes, nothing got proper attention unless it was a serious matter.

But who am I?

A Hunter. And not just any Hunter, one who Cleared an Extreme Lunatic Hell Difficulty.

Hunters are foul-tempered by default.

Rough people who kill monsters and breathe in the smell of blood every single day.

Add physical abilities surpassing any ordinary person on top of that.

Regular folks went well out of their way to avoid getting on a Hunter’s bad side.

So if I, a newly minted Hunter, demanded the wages he’d skimmed off me all this time, odds were good the manager would go pale and pay it all back with a bonus on top.

‘Hunter registration and the Exchange… best to handle those first thing tomorrow.’

Now that I was a Hunter, I had to register.

The system was simple: go to the nearest Climber Branch, show them the Status window, hand over Points, and they Exchange the equivalent in cash.

Since it came to mind, I opened my Status window.

[Baek Ji-ho (South Korea : Floor 1)]

[110 Points]

The Status window was bare-bones.

Name, country, the Floor currently being Climbed, and Points held. That was the entirety of the information.

Those 110 Points were what I owned.

10 Points for killing the Goblin Warrior.

100 Points for killing the Goblin Shaman.

110 Points total.

At 10,000 won per Point, that’s 1.1 million won.

‘If I collect the wages they stiffed me on and Exchange my Points… I’m probably looking at 5 mil or so.’

That should be enough for some starter equipment.

Simple leather armor, a sword and shield, that kind of thing.

Of course, there’s the basic issue equipment the government hands out, but that stuff is garbage in the most literal sense.

I’d heard it was better to buy gear separately.

Speaking of equipment, though…

‘I use a Staff, not a sword. Can I even buy something like that separately?’

Glance.

I turned my eyes toward the Staff propped in a corner of my room.

An old, shabby wooden Staff.

If not for the fingernail-sized crystal at its tip, it would look like nothing more than an ordinary wooden stick.

I reached out and gripped the Staff.

-Thrum, thrum.

A strange sense of oneness washed over me.

The Staff and I felt connected at the soul, as though it were a part of my own body.

Is this that “one with the sword” thing or whatever it’s called?

“Being one with the sword is old news. The hot new thing is being one with the staff!”

Having gotten that bit of cringe out of my system.

I gripped the Staff tight and focused my mind.

I called up the sensations from the Tutorial.

-Thrum, thrum…

Faintly, the ‘blue dots’ began to gather.

Just like in the Tutorial, I could command those blue dots at will.

There just weren’t very many of them.

‘Must be because this is Seoul. There are way too few blue dots.’

The amount of blue dots drifting in the air was desperately thin.

If the Tutorial had felt like scooping water from a vast ocean.

This felt like wringing drops out of a parched desert.

Well, of course. This is Seoul.

A megacity far from nature, where blue dots are vanishingly scarce.

Using the magic from the Tutorial as-is in the real world looks like a tall order.

But.

‘Maybe it’s because I became a Climber. I can feel something inside my body. If I draw on this, I think I could use magic in the real world too…’

Some kind of energy had taken root inside my body.

I sensed instinctively that if I drew it out, I could use my abilities in the real world.

And that I could replenish it by going somewhere rich in blue dots, or by eating food imbued with them.

That was plenty.

If I could use magic even where blue dots were scarce, it would be more than enough to protect myself in the real world.

Anyway.

It felt unreal.

“To think I can actually use magic…”

Memories of my adolescent years flickered through my head.

All the ridiculous stunts I’d pulled trying to use magic or martial arts.

The kind of memories that still make me kick my blanket in shame.

But now that I could genuinely work magic, they hit differently.

“I’ll figure out the details of my ability bit by bit. For now…”

I pulled out my smartphone.

“Time to put up my Hunter Verification post.”

I logged onto Hunter Gallery without a moment’s delay.

Hunter Gallery.

A place whose name ought to be changed to Hunter Bashing Gallery, but paradoxically, it was also the only place where freshly minted Climbers could get information.

Established Hunters had their own communities where quality information flowed.

Rookie Hunters fresh out of the Tutorial had nothing of the sort.

So the standard path was this: once Awakened, post on Hunter Gallery for a while, and after climbing past a certain Floor, get invited into the established Hunter communities for better information.

I’d follow that same well-worn path: post my Verification and stay active.

So I logged onto Hunter Gallery.

“Huh?”

And immediately found myself puzzled.

The mood on the forum was different from usual.

[Passed the Tutorial, here’s my review]

[Goblins are total fucking fodder? One-shot them lol]

[I’m a Hunter now too, time to start Rice-eating]

[What, did a Hunter Mobilization Order drop or something? Why are there so many new Hunters]

[Why there’s a fuckton of new Hunters right now.txt]

[I passed the Tutorial.]

[New Hunter here. Pleased to meet you all.]…

Verification posts from Hunters who’d passed the Tutorial were everywhere.

Dozens just in my immediate view.

Page after page of more Verification posts; at minimum, several hundred people must have posted.

‘Why did the number of new Hunters spike all of a sudden?’

I found a post that looked like it might explain the situation and read it.

[Title : Why there’s a fuckton of new Hunters right now.txt]

You know Korea’s done for in 3 months, right?

So we gotta Emigrate, yeah?

But as you all know, no country takes Rice-eater Hunters parked on the Low Floors

Even Japan, the easiest target, only takes Hunters who’ve made it past Floor 11 minimum.

And for the US or Europe you need to be in the Floor 20s.

Meaning in 3 months all the low-Floor Rice-eater fuckers die too

So the Rice-eater fuckers got fires lit under their asses and now they’re Climbing the Tower with everything they’ve got lmaooo

And a shitload of Low Floor Hunters died in the process

Which opened up Climber slots, which is why there’s a flood of new Hunters this time.

These dumb fucks should’ve climbed up ages ago

Now their asses are on fire so they overextend and drop dead lmaooooo

Serves them right LMFAOOOOO

└Still jealous tho, if they somehow get past Floor 10 they can Emigrate, the rest of us are straight up dead

└└Getting past Floor 10 isn’t easy. Out of 50k Hunters in this country only a few thousand are active above Floor 11

└└Most of them are Rice-eaters scraping around below Floor 5, you think hitting the Mid Floors on short notice is easy?

└Rice-eaters are still Hunters tho, they must have fat stacks saved up, can’t they just buy their way out?

└└Nope, doesn’t matter how rich a Hunter is, low Climb Floor = instant Emigration rejection

└└Every foreign Hunter who immigrates takes a Climber slot from a domestic Hunter, so no amount of money gets a low-Floor Hunter in. They’ve got plenty of their own low-Floor Hunters anyway.

└How do I even get to Floor 11, I pushed to Floor 5 yesterday and nearly died on the spot…

└└This fucking Rice-eater’s trying to escape Korea? Fat chance lmaooo perish with your homeland. Pay the price for chasing money and slacking on your Climb

└└Don’t run away, let’s die together~~

└└Loved showing off all that money you were making, didn’t you? You’re coming with the rest of us

└Grind your way to Floor 11 in 3 months and Emigrate to glorious Nippon VS blow all your savings partying for the 3 months you’ve got left, then die. Which one?

└└Latter, no contest. If I’m going out, I’m going out broke lol

└└Society’s collapsing in a month or two anyway and money’ll be useless even if you have it. Climbing the Tower is the right call, yeah

└└Former, obviously. Make it to Floor 11 and you get to meet sushi girls lmao

└└Isn’t Japan Emigration kinda iffy tho? They’re not a Hunter powerhouse either, they’ve only got 9 months of Points left. Even if you make it over there you only live like half a year longer…

└└Half a year’s still half a year, I’ll drink to that

└└Japan still has a lot left. If they liquidate everything like we did, they could probably secure 1-2 years’ worth of Points?

“Hm. So that’s the story.”

Apparently a lot of bottom-rung Hunters were overreaching on their Climbs.

Made sense. With the country collapsing in three months, they’d have to Emigrate somehow before then.

Hunters who’d only ever worked the Low Floors had challenged the higher ones and died in droves.

As a result, a wave of new Climbers, myself included, had been selected.

For reference, the number of Climbers is fixed at 0.1% of each country’s population. When an existing Hunter dies, a new one is drafted to fill the slot.

‘So that’s why Noona’s been so busy.’

The Low Floor Hunter team my sister manages.

Word was they’d been attempting some brutal Climbs lately.

They’d been pushing reckless strategies day after day to qualify for Emigration, and Noona, as their manager, must have been dragged into the crunch right along with them.

It was while I was skimming through the posts.

-Bang, bang.

“Ji-ye-ssi! Ji-ye-ssi! You’re in there, right?”

A voice came from outside.

One I’d never heard before.

‘What the. Who’s out there looking for my sister?’

Ji-ye is my sister’s name.

I quietly rose from my seat and went out to the living room.

“Noona. Who is it?”

“…The leader of the Hunter team I manage. I texted him that I had a family emergency and was leaving early… I never thought he’d actually come all the way here.”

“Ah.”

The voice outside seemed to belong to the Hunter team leader, Noona’s employer.

Noona spoke with a troubled look.

“Go wait in your room for now. I’ll send him off.”

“Okay.”

I went into my room like a good boy.

And cracked the window open.

‘I can see the front gate from here.’

My bedroom window was positioned to just barely overlook the front gate of the building.

Normally all it showed me was people’s ankles, plus the occasional drunk taking a piss, so I’d honestly wished the window didn’t exist at all.

But hey, everything has its use after all.

I rose onto my tiptoes and peered out the window, and saw a rough-faced middle-aged man.

‘So that’s Noona’s team leader. Looks like a thug.’

True to his Hunter status, he looks like he’s got a nasty temper.

His patchy beard was untrimmed, his eyes were fierce, and his face was menacing.

I felt a fresh respect for Noona.

How had she survived working under someone that scary all this time?

As I watched, Noona came out.

“Team Leader Gwak Hyeok-jun. You can’t just show up at my home like this.”

“You’re the one putting me in a tough spot. Ji-ye-ssi, do you even understand what being a manager means? Going home at a critical time like this?”

“I told you. My little brother got taken into the Tutorial. My family member almost died, how am I supposed to work?”

“You think the rest of us never went through a Tutorial? Whatever. Get back to work, now. There’s a pile of Loot to process.”

“I intend to stay with my brother today, at least.”

“Haah… fuck. Ji-ye-ssi, you think this job is a game? You think this work is soft enough to accommodate every little family circumstance? You want to be fired as manager? You’re normally on top of things, what’s this about. Huh?”

“…”

So Noona had walked off the job without permission because she was worried about me.

I felt terrible. Watching her get chewed out by her employer because of me, the guilt hit hard.

That was when it happened.

“Whew… fine. Anyway, putting that aside. Ji-ye-ssi. Have you thought about my offer?”

The middle-aged man, his tone going oily and insinuating.

Offer?

I don’t like the sound of this.

“Our team’s already reached Floor 8. With the 3 months left, we can definitely make Floor 11. If things go well, we might even make it to Japan.”

“…”

“You want to live too, don’t you, Ji-ye-ssi? Just be my woman, like I said.”

‘The fuck?’

Whose sister does this crazy bastard think he’s hitting on?

But it was too soon to be appalled.

“You have a wife, and a son, and you still want to say things like that?”

“The wife and the brat can fend for themselves. I’m heading to the Mid Floors soon, don’t I deserve a fresh start at life too? So like I said-”

“This is degrading. Don’t ever say that again. One more time and I really will quit.”

“Tsk. Sure, hold your head high for now. Once doomsday’s actually breathing down your neck, you’ll be spreading them too…”

He’s even married with a kid on top of everything?

This son of a bitch. I can’t take any more of this.

I snatched up my Staff and burst out the door.