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Translator: Vine
Chapter: 20
Chapter Title: The Twentieth Floor
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“What’s with your face? Are you sick?”
I should tell her to let go…
But for some reason, Helios couldn't bring himself to tell her to let go of his hand.
“Don’t be sick.”
Her hand brought a pleasant coolness to his body, which was running a slight fever from lack of sleep.
Her voice was impassive, nonchalant even, yet why did he feel a sense of tenderness from it?
More than anything, he hadn’t often felt the warmth of another person.
A mix of awkwardness and a feeling he didn't want to shake off coexisted within him. His back stiffened on its own.
“The Tower…”
*Are you not going?*
“We have to go. Get up.”
“…”
Helios, his expression turning cold, slapped Mint’s hand away.
Mint cried out nonsensically, “Ouch, the student’s hitting the master~” but he paid her no mind and walked out the open door.
He felt like a fool for having cared so much, even for a moment, about such a master.
* * *
The 20th floor of the Tower.
A place for those from Low-Grade 3 and up. Helios looked up at the ceiling, tense.
He had cleared up to the 8th floor.
The interior of the 20th floor was completely different from the 8th, the last one he'd seen.
“A field…?”
Helios wasn't the only one who thought so; similar sentiments could be heard from those around him.
Just as they'd said, what appeared before them was a vast field of dirt.
He could tell it was a field because of the wheat visible in the distance.
Golden wheat inside a prison?
It was a truly incongruous combination.
The walls were made of rock, with holes dotted here and there.
Helios focused on the holes.
*Animals have been pouring out of holes like that since the 1st floor.*
“Staring at them won’t tell you anything right now.”
Helios turned his head.
“Haaah.”
Mint was letting out a slow yawn. Helios was a little dumbfounded.
*Is she completely devoid of tension?*
Even if she had been a guard, she would only know about the Tower in theory. She couldn't have experienced the trials herself, so why was she so calm?
*Is it confidence born from strength?*
Helios soon recalled the image of Mint sending the high-grade prisoner, Grogi, flying.
To be honest, her current appearance inspired no confidence at all.
But the way she'd looked then had been truly incredible—enough to push aside this languid demeanor that seemed like pure laziness.
“Relax, relax.”
“…You don’t have to say it twice.”
He hated to admit it, but Mint's attitude eased his tension slightly.
It was strange. Just having her by his side gave him the belief that things would somehow work out.
Was it because she had taken down a high-grade prisoner?
For him, who had suffered from anxiety his whole life under his father and the vassals targeting him, it was an unfamiliar feeling.
Thanks to that, Helios was able to look around.
On the 20th floor, you could choose a weapon before entering the Tower.
He was holding a spear, just like on the 8th floor, and had packed an extra weapon on his back just in case.
*There are quite a few people.*
By a rough estimate, about forty people had gathered.
According to Mint, there were two more trial grounds like this on the 20th floor.
The reactions of the gathered people were divided into two types.
People with tense expressions like Helios.
And people who, while not as relaxed as Mint, showed a certain degree of composure.
There were more of the latter than the former.
“…Do the numbers start increasing from the low-grades?”
“Pretty much.”
Mint replied in an emotionless voice.
“There are also ‘re-challengers’.”
Re-challengers? The word was unfamiliar.
And for good reason. How could one ‘re-challenge’ the trials of this Tower?
Failure meant death.
All those who had been eliminated while climbing to the 8th floor had died.
A question arose, but Helios didn't continue.
Because Mint's expression had changed in an instant, her face turning sharp.
*What is it?*
Mint looked around.
For the 20th floor, there were quite a lot of people. But compared to when she was on the 20th floor, it was only slightly more, so it wasn't a major issue.
However, she had felt a killing intent a moment ago.
Moreover, it was a killing intent strong enough to bother someone of Mint's skill level.
*Was it directed at Helios?*
It was a deep aura that someone with only enough skill to reach the 20th floor would never be able to sense.
*Or is it some other grudge?*
This was a place with countless criminals.
Grudges from the outside world often carried over here, so assassinations and contract killings were a common occurrence.
*But my cute pretty boy can't get caught up in someone else's contract killing.*
Mint straightened her back slightly.
If her level was 100, this place was just a playground for level 20 newbies.
Meaning, if she wanted to find them, there was nothing she couldn't find.
*No.*
A good idea came to mind.
*Should I use this as an opportunity?*
Mint slowly turned her head and looked at Helios.
Helios, who was already on edge around Mint, flinched.
“…What is it? Why are you staring at me like that?”
“…? I was just looking.”
“No, you weren’t. What are you scheming this time? You had that same look on your face when you threw me into a trap full of thorns.”
“There, there. The technical term for that is ‘paranoia’.”
“It’s not!”
Helios clutched his head again.
Mint watched him with a satisfied look. A satisfied look, perhaps, but her eyes were like those of a predator watching its prey.
*Good, he's so energetic. I can go ahead with it.*
She had been worried because he had no energy this morning, but he seemed fine now.
Though this was by Mint's common-sense-lacking standard, which judged one's condition as good as long as they could walk.
There was no way Helios would know.
[Yo, you stray pups! Is everyone here?]
*Drrrrk.* The massive door closed.
[The 20th-floor trial will now begin. Do your best! Bwahahaha!]
With that frivolous and rough voice as the final word, the arena grew slightly dark.
This much was familiar to Helios, who had climbed to the 8th floor.
*What appears on the 20th floor?*
The floor shook violently. Then, a massive wall of dirt rose from the ground.
In an instant, the vast space was divided into five sections. Then, people began to disappear one by one.
“Don’t be surprised. They’re just moving people to different spaces. From here on, they sometimes divide people up like this.”
Mint said, as if to soothe the startled Helios.
And so, about eight people, including Mint and himself, remained in Helios's vicinity.
“Haaah.”
“Will you stop yawning?”
Helios looked at the people who remained near him. Excluding Mint, there were five men and two women.
Helios checked the changed environment.
*Krrrrrumble!*
Rocks began to sprout from the dirt wall, transforming it into a wall like the one he'd seen when he first entered.
It became a rock wall with holes dotted all over.
That wasn't all. A few holes also opened up in the floor.
He had no idea what would appear.
*Hmm, have they gathered only the first-timers?*
Mint yawned repeatedly as she looked over the seven people besides herself.
They all wore tense expressions. They reeked of being rookies.
It seemed all the people who had been relaxed earlier had been moved to a different section.
*The guards on this floor do their job well.*
The experienced with the experienced, the novices with the novices. A good choice.
Mint slowly rubbed the back of her neck before touching Helios’s back.
“Whoa!”
“What the—!”
“You were too tense.”
She patted his back a few times.
“Give it your all.”
Then she leisurely stared at one spot. It was a hole in the floor.
“They’re coming.”
*Bark, bark, bark!*
Helios gritted his teeth.
*Dogs this time.*
Helios felt that whether he broke out of or simply escaped this place, by the time he reached the outside world, he would despise all animals.
To be swarmed by such a wide variety of animals in droves like this!
The animals that appeared on the 20th floor were dogs.
The problem was that they weren't ordinary dogs. They were twice the size of a normal dog, with a double row of teeth like a shark.
“Grrrrr! Woof!”
Wouldn't it be better to see them as monsters in the shape of dogs?
There was no time for such carefree thoughts.
In Helios's hand was a spear imbued with the power of Kia, which he had grown more accustomed to.
It was glowing with a blue light, but there was no telling how long it would last.
*Klang!*
“Kuhk!”
Just then, a man fighting nearby was pushed toward Helios.
Helios grabbed the man's arm and, with his other hand, plunged his spear into the head of a lunging dog.
It didn't vanish on contact like the rats on the 1st floor, but the critically injured dog staggered and then disappeared into smoke.
“Th-thanks for the help.”
The rescued man had his hair cut short like a soldier.
Something pure white was protruding from his arm, wrapping around it like a shield.
It was bone-white.
Having already endured Mint's Kia theory lessons to the point of exhaustion, Helios had no trouble identifying the man's attribute.
*A body user.*
He was a musculoskeletal ability user.
“It’s almost break time.”
“Yeah…”
Currently, only six people remained here, including Mint and Helios.
