Chapter 8: Chapter 8 - A Beginners First Step 03
I took Hahn Se-ah and left the guild lot, ignoring the chatter coming from behind. Our destination this time was not the tower at the center of the city, but rather various places that adventurers should have knowledge of.
"First of all, I want to tell you the places you should know about inside the city."
"What kind of places?"
"A skillful smithy, an inn good for beginner adventurers, a tavern with delicious food, and a temple."
As an adventurer, the only essential things to know are the Adventurer's Guild and the Mage Tower branch. But since there are many shops that try to scam rural adventurers. It's important enough that I should introduce some of the better places so she avoids the many shady shops that prey on unsuspecting travelers.
Some blacksmith's sometimes use subpar materials or charge exorbitant prices when repairing or crafting new equipment.. Cheap inns may have the problem of being robbed, and some taverns serve medieval-style dog food.
Of course, Han Se-ah is a player, so she may be immune to those types of problems with item appraisal or an inventory system. However, I have to maintain the image of a senior adventurer.
"So this is the pub… I guess I can recruit new members here later on?"
"...."
"Wait, why am I lost even though I marked the spots on the map Roland was talking about? Am I really that bad at directions? And why are people saying I'm being carried in the party when I said I'd follow now that I got a 6-star NPC? If we travel together and I show off my skills, won't Roland reward me with some good equipment? Materialistic? Uh-huh, how important is the difference in equipment when climbing in the beginning of an RPG? Are you calling me fake or something?"
While wandering the streets like that, I almost reacted to Han Se-ah's monologue from behind, but I was able to keep my mouth shut with superhuman reaction speed. Recruiting new allies was definitely not a phrase that warranted a response, no matter how much I thought about it.
Han Se-ah openly starts talking as if there is a filter function between what she says to me and what she says to her viewers. As I listened in on the nonsense conversation with her viewers, we arrived at the entrance to the tower after passing by a temple.
"Anyway, we seem to have arrived at the entrance, so I'll focus on the game again."
The imposing tower stretched up towards the clouds, a stark contrast to this semi-medieval fantasy world. It is too tall for a structure standing in the middle of a city like this, where even a three- or four-story buildings are hard to find. The view from the entrance, looking up at the tower and the blue sky, is one of the landscapes that made me admit that this world was based on a game, as it was one of the games loading screens.
"Wow~ It's so high!"
Han Se-ah was also amazed by the magnificent sight… She was looking up at the sky with her mouth wide open. The camera drone's angle changed as her head tilted back. The huge tower that pierced through the clouds was so grand that it never get old even after 10 years, the viewers' reactions were bound to be hot.
Wearing leather armor, holding a long staff and standing in front of a magnificent tower piercing the clouds, Han Se-ah stood transfixed for several minutes.
The tower rising up into the sky on a sunny day was a magnificent sight, but the sight of adventurers coming and going from the entrance below was also a fantastic scene to enjoy. There were groups of warriors with steel helmets thumping their feet, wizards with shiny robes fluttering in the wind, and adventurers in old armor covered in mud, staggering out of the tower.
As Han Se-ah was lost in thought, she suddenly twitched her shoulders and jumped in place, startled.
"oh! sorry. It's just too cool."
"Don't worry, everyone who sees the tower for the first time reacts like this. When I was a novice adventurer, I spent a long time just admiring it before finally going inside."
"…If you play that annoying voice donation thing again, I'll block it all, so just be careful, okay?"
Han Se-ah, startled with a jump, lowered her head slightly as if apologetic, then looked down at here feet and muttered softly. It seems that some kind of chat experience has left her quite stunned, or maybe she is embarrassed about being surprised.
After making a few more threats to her viewers, she raised her head again. Not towards the tower, but at the adventurers who were coming and going from it.
"Are there any special inspection procedures?"
"Not really. Actually, anyone can enter the tower, not just adventurers."
"Really?"
"Yes. The Adventurer's Guild isn't exactly known for being kind enough to discourage people from risking their lives."
"… What?"
Han Se-ah was startled by my words. As a gamer, she might think the tower is nothing special, but for people who live in this world, the tower is a terrifying place, more than anything else.
Even just looking at the lower floors where novice adventurers roam, you can see that. Outside the tower, there are wild animals and monsters, but ordinary farmers who live nearby never have to deal with them. The beasts are driven out or hunted by village hunters, and monsters are disposed of by soldiers and adventurers dispatched from the city.
Very rarely, a whole village will be wiped out by wandering monsters, but that kind of thing usually happens in places like refugee villages that are far away from the protection of the city.
For ordinary farmers who cultivate crops near the city, the most dangerous creatures they will encounter are hungry dogs or old and sick goblins that adventurers accidentally overlooked. They can easily be killed with a club by village guards.
But at the tower?
"Monsters suddenly appear in the tower, and when they're killed, their bodies disappear and turn into mana stones. It's completely different from the monsters that are outside. Do you understand the meaning of this?"
"uh… Are the monsters in the tower stronger?"
"No, they're not necessarily stronger. They're just…more numerous."
In the tower, monsters spawn randomly, which is a problem.
Even if adventurers clear out monsters and move forward, they may reappear from behind and cause a disturbance. If they make noise, monsters that weren't nearby before suddenly appear and rush towards them. And when they try to return after clearing them out, the path is blocked by newly-appeared monsters again.
Because of this, no matter how low the floor, adventurers form a party and enter the tower. If you're really unlucky, you'll be surrounded on the way in, surrounded again on the way out, and monsters can appear in front of you right before the exit.
"There are some guys who confidently enter the Tower after bragging about how they beat one or two stray goblins outside with a club. They're mostly guys who show off their strength in their village. How good would it feel for them to catch one or two wandering goblins on the first floor and hold a magic stone in their hand? But if they go deep into the Tower… they'll face problems they've never even thought of."
"What kind of problems?"
"There are special safe zones in the tower but everywhere else is fair game. In other spaces, you never know when monsters will appear. If you sit down to rest, a goblin can pop out of the bush, or you could be fighting a monster and suddenly get ambushed from behind."
To put it simply in gaming terms, it could be seen as a random encounter.
When I first went in, there were three or four at most, so I progressed easily, but on the way out after exhausting my stamina, monsters poured out unreasonably in groups of 10 or 20 because of this damn tower. Oh, how much I suffered before getting used to it.
Monsters could appear when you were resting, when you were sleeping, when you were preparing a meal, or when you were leaving. Unless you were an experienced adventurer, there was no way to deal with these unexpected encounters.
"Of course, adventurers have ways to prevent that from happening, but if someone who isn't an adventurer goes in recklessly, they could get trapped or have their stamina slowly depleted until they die."
"Uh… The tower is a more dangerous place than I thought, right?"
"That's why being an adventurer is risking your life. Of course, the lower floors are much safer."
I walk towards the tower with a sly smile, and Han Se-ah follows closely behind. Perhaps she thought my words were just a joke to raise awareness among junior adventurers, as she chuckles and strikes up a conversation.
"Well, the first floor will be fine, right?"
"It's fine for most adventurers. But those fools who come in without the help of the Adventure Guild will die even on the first floor."
"Uh, why is that? Can't they just avoid being too greedy?"
I don't answer her question and quicken my pace. I've been idle for a while, but my fame doesn't seem to have diminished, and people's eyes start to focus on me. Amongst the acne, freckles, dandruff, fat, scrawny, and ugly people, my golden-haired statue-like appearance stands out, attracting attention.
If the one following me is a beautiful woman who couldn't hide her voluptuous body even with leather armor, then the men's attention would be even fiercer. It is best to move without loitering.
Our destination was a giant arch-shaped door that pierced through the outer wall of the tower. It was so big that it looked more like an entrance to a tunnel than a door, and I stepped into the dark space without speaking any further. Han Se-ah's light footsteps followed behind me as I entered the tower.
"Wait for me!"
As we walked further into the entrance a dark shadow enveloped the two of us, and the scenery changed in the blink of an eye.
"Why all of a sudden… uh!?"
"Welcome to the first floor of the tower."
Before us was a vast, open plain that seemed to stretch out endlessly.
Weekly Power Status
-- Power
Ranking 
-- Power
stone