Chapter 54

The next morning.

After spending days buried in Tower runs, Hyuk-min decided to sit down for breakfast for the first time in a while.

His father, who normally left for his construction job at the crack of dawn, was only now putting on his work clothes—because Hyuk-min had asked him to come in late today.

Fully dressed, his father wore a brighter smile than ever.

“Having a meal with my son after so long. This is just great, hahahaha.”

Something like this must have happened in his past life, too.

“Dad.”

“Hm? What is it, son? Do you need some allowance?”

He hadn’t known then. But he could change things now.

“No. Could you maybe not go to work today?”

“Not go to work? Why? Is something wrong?”

“Nothing’s wrong. I just wanted to ask. Could you please not go to work today and tomorrow?”

“Did you have a bad dream? Son, what’s gotten into you all of a sudden?”

When pressed for a reason, Hyuk-min couldn’t find the words.

But he didn’t want to lie to his family.

“Please. My intuition has been really sharp lately, and it’s telling me something really bad is going to happen. Why don’t you just stay with me for a bit? We can have an early dinner. You could even go fishing—something you never get to do.”

He pleaded sincerely, but it didn’t reach his father.

His father walked up with a gentle smile, like he was telling him not to worry.

“You work when there’s work to be had. With the economy these days, if I take a day off, other equipment technicians will swoop in, and I could lose my job.”

“You won’t have to work anymore. I’ll help you.”

“Wow. Just hearing you say that is enough to make me grateful. Our son is all grown up, talking about providing for the family. Dad’s so happy today. It really makes me want to go to work, you know?”

With a pat on the shoulder, his father turned immediately, set on leaving.

“Dad. Hey—Dad?”

“Dad’s heading out, son~ Don’t worry so much. I’ll be fine.”

“That’s not it… Dad?”

“I’ll be back early~”

Nothing got through.

And just like that, his father left with a light spring in his step.

With his mother at work and his younger sister at school, Hyuk-min was left alone.

He looked around the empty house and let out a deep sigh.

“…This isn’t enough.”

Lately, more and more things had been diverging from his past life. Anxious, he’d been cutting back on sleep to keep digging into the department store incident.

Everything suggested nothing would happen today.

But knowing the past didn’t make him calm. It only made him more uneasy.

Tomorrow, the peaceful scene of his home would be shattered.

‘I’ll protect them, no matter what.’

That was how it had been in his past life.

But not now.

He was going to undo his greatest regret—the one loss he could never accept again.

Hyuk-min pulled out his phone and sent messages to No Death and Hyun-jung.

[Going to challenge the 70th floor now. Meet in front of the sundae soup place.]

= = =

They met in front of the restaurant.

On the taxi ride to the Tower, No Death asked with a curious look.

“Hey, Leader.”

“What.”

“The more I think about it, the weirder it is. You already knew the experiment was in progress, and you knew they were gathering supplies. So why didn’t you stop the experiment itself? That would’ve been faster and simpler.”

It wasn’t like Hyuk-min hadn’t considered it while filling his notebook with plans.

No—the first thought had been to stop the experiment, and the second had been the current method: preventing harm to his family.

There was a reason he’d chosen the difficult, complicated path over the easy one.

“Is there some reason the Dungeon has to open?”

“You must’ve really been serious about your time as an agent, huh. You read my mind pretty well.”

“So what do you want, exactly?”

Hyuk-min’s mind dragged up a memory.

A memory from only a few days before his death by betrayal.

“I need to confirm what comes out of that Dungeon.”

He had to.

He absolutely had to confirm that memory.

===

「In his past life, on the day he raided the third basement level of the department store and took No Death in as a comrade.

He’d dug up everything that had been buried beneath the surface and revealed it to the press.

Naturally, the public erupted, and the laws of the Republic of Korea brought the hammer down.

He’d hoped everyone involved—including Jang Han-bit—would be uprooted in one sweep, but the full weight of punishment fell only on Jisu Construction, the company that had handled the department store’s construction.

It wasn’t unexpected.

Jang Han-bit had commissioned the construction, but feigning ignorance was enough to slip away.

There was no entrance. And if he’d manipulated the blueprints in advance, then played dumb, there wasn’t enough evidence to refute him.

Of course, Hyuk-min hadn’t thought the Azure Lake Guild would collapse from this alone.

Still, satisfied that he’d landed a blow, he was about to set his next plan in motion.

But…

Just as the [Forced Dungeon Development Experiment] was coming to light, a problem arose.

[Jeonsin and all executives of the Invincible Guild have arrived in Korea.]

[The airport is in a state that requires crowd control due to the immense crowd. Those using the airport today are advised to….]

[Jeonsin and Invincible! They are heading to the Azure Lake Guild!]

Jeonsin and the Invincible Guild had arrived without warning…

And a few days later, an unprecedented incident occurred.

Jang Han-bit and Park Jae-hyun turned up as cold corpses.

But that wasn’t the end of it.

Starting with them, everyone tied to the [Forced Dungeon Development Experiment] began dying, one after another.

Sudden, unnatural deaths.

And every single one of them began on the first day after Invincible arrived in Korea.」

===

That record came from not long after the stone monument was discovered.

A record that no longer existed—because of the bizarre phenomenon where its text, images, and contents became unreadable and vanished on their own.

Until just before Hyuk-min died in his past life, no one had deciphered the monument.

No one knew what it said.

Except one person.

Bang Hyuk-min.

‘Ah… no. Maybe…’

Hyuk-min’s eyebrow twitched.

‘Two people. Jeonsin, and one more.’

Outside the taxi window, ordinary scenery slipped by.

He stared up at the sky in silence, digging through memories that still refused to resolve.

===

As always, the Dungeon’s difficulty spiked every ten floors.

The 70th floor was no exception.

Waiting for them was an Ogre Knight—far stronger than the giant golem they’d struggled against on the 69th floor.

It was the kind of difficulty that made most people give up at a glance, and it gave Hyuk-min’s party no small amount of trouble.

“Haa… haa… I’m gonna fucking die. Just looking at this guy… he’s bigger and stronger than the one I fought. Dammit.”

But Hyuk-min’s party was a collection of geniuses he had handpicked himself.

THUD!!

Behind No Death—who was bent over, hands on his knees, panting—the Ogre Knight’s massive body slammed into the ground with enough force to shake the earth.

The Ogre Knight lay motionless, blue blood bubbling out.

They had cleared the 70th floor in two hours.

“Fuck… that was so hard….”

No Death collapsed, spent, annoyance still clinging to his face even after the fight ended.

He clicked his tongue at the steel armor wrapped around the Ogre Knight’s body.

“Tsk. What kind of lunatic puts steel armor on an ogre that big? Fuck. I almost lost my mind—there was nowhere to hit.”

Even so, that armor—nothing more than huge and hard—was riddled with scratches and holes.

Proof of how monstrous Hyuk-min’s party really was.

No Death exhaled in relief, then shouted with a faint grin.

“Hey~ Hyuk-min, grab this. A piece this big should be worth a lot, right?”

“I’ll get it!”

Hyun-jung ran over with a bright smile.

She looked exhausted, sweat beading on her face, but she wasn’t carrying the huge bag she used to.

Before they climbed, No Death had brought her a worn-out bag for an [Inventory], and he hadn’t said where he got it.

(T/N: This old man. hahaha.)

Maybe because of that, Hyun-jung—who would normally be snapping at him—smiled like she was glowing.

“Hehe~”

“You like it?”

“Of course~ It’s so convenient. I thought you were a bad ahjussi, but I’ll change it. To a so-so ahjussi.”

“If I’m good, I’m good. If I’m bad, I’m bad. What the hell is ‘so-so’?”

“Nope. I already compromised a lot.”

“Fine. Have it your way.”

No Death looked pleased too, a bright smile creeping onto his face as he turned away.

True to her Water Rat roots, Hyun-jung couldn’t resist money. She immediately tried to shove the giant steel armor into her [Inventory].

And that was when she realized No Death’s smile hadn’t been kind to her at all.

“Huh?”

The instant she touched it, the Ogre Knight’s armor crumbled into dust and vanished.

“Puhahahaha!”

“What the heck!”

“What do you mean, ‘what’? I was trying to mess with our leader, but I guess he already knew?”

Even Hyuk-min couldn’t suppress his smirk.

No Death had been testing him, but Hyuk-min had cleared the 70th floor in his past life too. He already knew.

He walked up to the dazed Hyun-jung, ruffled her hair, and said, “Only the [Magic Stone] can leave this place. Armor and weapons can be used here, but you can’t take them outside.”

“What—so you both knew and just stood there watching?”

“It looked fun.”

Hyuk-min glanced at No Death.

No Death gave him an amused thumbs-up.

“Our leader really knows everything, doesn’t he?”

“Rest as much as you can. You won’t be able to rest in a little bit.”

As Hyuk-min got to his feet, No Death started whining.

“Hey, come on. Let’s rest a little more. If it’s a [Hidden Room], it has to be tougher than this. How are we supposed to clear it with only this much rest?”

Hyuk-min headed toward a corner he’d marked earlier—an odd-looking pile of rocks.

“Didn’t I tell you? Only one person can enter this [Hidden Room].”

“Huh? What does that mean?”

“It means this is a special [Hidden Room]—one designed to be practically impossible to find at this point in time.”

He studied the gaps between the rocks, then slid his hand into the narrow space formed by three of them.

In a spot that was neither visible nor easy to reach, his fingers found a tiny button.

“So you’re saying there’s a [Hidden Room] that was made not to be found? Isn’t that what all [Hidden Room]s are? They’re hidden because people can’t find them.”

“This one’s different. The others have clues. This one had nothing—at least, until now.”

With those cryptic words, Hyuk-min pressed the tiny stone that no one would’ve ever suspected was a button.

As if by magic, the two rocks in front shifted left and right, opening a new space that spilled brilliant light.

“It doesn’t look that different. Besides, if only one person can enter, why do you need us?”

Before No Death could finish, a System message appeared for everyone.

“For this reason.”

Ding.

“Huh?”

“What’s this?”

[A Hidden Room has been revealed on the 70th floor of the Tower.]

No Death’s face darkened in real time.

“Don’t tell me…”

A sick thought crawled up his spine.

“This… this isn’t showing up for everyone challenging the Tower, is it?”

That thought hardened his expression by the second.

Hyuk-min snorted as he checked his gear in front of the entrance.

“I told you. It’s special.”

“You’ve got to be kidding me….”

“I told you everything. That you could rest a little more—and that you wouldn’t be able to rest in a bit.”

“Hey! That’s not what you meant! If this message went out to everyone…”

“A lot of people will flock here. And when people gather? You know what you have to do. I’m counting on you.”

Face twisted, No Death scrambled to his feet.

He drew both weapons, planted himself in front of the entrance, and bit down hard.

“If people flock here… this becomes a battlefield. The boss respawning because of the crowd. The people themselves. And then… human versus human.”

Before he could finish, Hyuk-min vanished into the [Hidden Room].

Not long after, No Death’s uneasy premonition became reality.

“There it is!”

“Over there! The [Hidden Room]!!”

Teams began appearing one after another.

And with them, the Ogre Knight reappeared.

An Ogre Knight, and a flood of people.

No Death stared at the scene, fists clenched tight—while his mouth hung loose, curses spilling out.

“Fucking evil leader. There’s a limit to how much you can work a person. I’m billing you properly when you get out. You’re so dead…”

There was no time to complain.

He was furious, but he couldn’t let them steal the [Hidden Room] he’d bled for.

Spinning a dagger in his palm, No Death shouted with killing intent.

“Hyun-jung!”

“Yes. I’m ready.”

No more words were needed.

At the sound of her name, Hyun-jung raised her gun, activated her stealth [Skill], and vanished without a single complaint.

The battle had begun again.

“Waaaaaaah!”

“Out of my way! I’m first!”

“Kuo-oooooh!”

Shouts.

The Ogre Knight’s roar.

Screams and bellowing echoes rose from every direction.

And before long…

The 70th floor was steeped in the smell of blood—fed by human greed, all for the sweet reward of a [Hidden Room].