Ari'mir, who was watching what was unfolding inside the tutorial, let her jaw drop.
In her eternity as an administrator, few sights had ever stunned her like the scene before her eyes.
"W-what on earth is that…?!"
Even at that very moment, while countless Awakeners struggled and failed to climb the tutorial, Taeho, who had started much later than the rest, was clearing each floor at a rapid pace.
No, calling it 'rapid' did not do it justice.
You have successfully cleared Floor 20.
You have successfully cleared Floor 21.
You have successfully cleared Floor 22.
Taeho's advance was unstoppable.
Countless traps and monsters lunged at him, but none of them could pierce the armor he had made.
Furthermore, the hammer he held was no ordinary weapon.
Wondering how he had even made it, every time he swung the hammer, monsters flew through the air as their bones shattered.
"That child should be emaciated from starving for so long. How is he clearing it so easily…?"
It would be one thing if he had just entered and was brimming with energy, but Ari'mir knew firsthand the sheer depth of his physical exhaustion.
That left only one remaining explanation.
"What on earth did that child make?"
As Ari'mir watched in disbelief, Taeho steadily fought his way through the tutorial.
While the Awakeners who had entered alongside him were barely reaching the fifth floor, Taeho had already climbed to the twenty-eighth floor to face an ogre.
Seeing this, her eyes flashed.
The mission on the twenty-eighth floor was so brutally difficult that it could hardly be called a tutorial.
No matter how much it had been weakened by the tutorial system, an ogre was still an ogre—a race literally bred for nothing but violence and destruction.
Until now, no challenger had ever cleared the twenty-eighth floor, which was guarded by that creature.
Charging in blindly meant nothing but a meaningless death.
Just how would Taeho deal with it?
Ari'mir's curiosity was quickly satisfied.
Boom! Crash!
"Groooaaar!!!"
As Taeho swung his hammer, the ogre collapsed from the impact.
Its thick, sturdy bones broke, leaving its joints grotesquely twisted.
However, the ogre did not just take it.
Even while writhing in pain, it instinctively swung its club, landing a direct hit on Taeho's body.
Smash!!!
Struck by a tree-sized club, he was sent flying back.
Even if the armor remained intact, it was an attack powerful enough to rupture internal organs and kill him from the shock alone.
Ari'mir held her breath, watching in tense silence.
Surprisingly, Taeho stood right back up as if nothing had happened and dusted himself off.
"…Ha, haha."
Her tightly clenched fists went limp.
Now back on his feet, he brought his hammer down on the head of the struggling ogre.
One strike, two strikes, three strikes.
At the third blow, the ogre's body, which had been twitching as if electrocuted, stopped moving.
You have successfully cleared Floor 28.
Taeho hoisted the hammer onto his shoulder.
As he climbed toward the twenty-ninth floor, he looked only a little tired.
There was no hint of injury in his movements.
Ari'mir stared blankly at the sight.
"To make gear like that out of the items displayed on the first floor…? Is that even possible?"
Every item provided in the tutorial was Common-grade.
Challengers were allowed to take only one weapon and one piece of armor from the first floor.
Upon hearing this, ten out of ten challengers understood it meant they could choose only a single weapon and a single piece of armor.
And in reality, that was exactly what it meant.
Yet, out of nowhere, Taeho had flustered the system by asking a question no one had ever asked before.
He had single-handedly dismantled the equipment, built a makeshift smithy, and forged cheat-code level gear right then and there.
It was a method even Ari'mir could never have imagined.
Furthermore, as an administrator, she had considered it a meaningless, foolish act.
Yet, amid the loneliness and suffering, Taeho had silently hammered away, ultimately creating an impossible gear.
He was not blindly following the rules and system of the Tower; he was forging a new path of his own within it.
Has there ever been a single soul who even attempted such a thing before?
No. Not a single one.
Ari'mir stared at Taeho with a flushed face.
If it had been up to her emotions, she would have wanted to entrust him with her long years of waiting and lingering regrets right that instant.
However, for that to happen, there was still a mountain the child had to climb.
"Overcome it. And rise to the very end. If you can make it through even that adversity. If you truly do that for me…"
I will entrust you with the faded hope I have cherished so dearly until now.
It was a sentiment closer to a plea and a prayer rather than a command or a proposal.
Her trembling eyes reflected Taeho.
Unaware of her gaze, Taeho had already passed the twenty-ninth floor and was climbing the stairs to the thirtieth floor.
* * *
Climbing the stairs to the thirtieth floor, Taeho stopped in his tracks.
The strength drained completely from his limbs, and his head felt fuzzy.
This is rough.
His stomach had been violently squeezed with hunger since before the first floor, and pushing himself this hard made it feel stuck to his spine.
Though his physical condition was grueling and his head was spinning, what weighed heaviest on his feet was the unpredictable uncertainty.
So he pressed onward.
In the past, the challenger who climbed the highest in the tutorial reached Floor 28.
Compared to that, Taeho was now challenging the thirtieth floor.
This was a floor no challenger had ever reached.
In other words, there was no telling how many more floors he had left to climb.
If he kept pushing himself like this, he felt like he would collapse before he could even put up a proper fight.
Should I just leave?
There were no windows or clocks inside the Tutorial Tower.
Because he had been so absorbed in crafting the armor and hammer, Taeho did not realize that half a year had already passed.
He merely thought that quite a bit of time had gone by.
Even if he left in this state, he could still receive a class.
Rather than continuing with no end in sight, wouldn't it be better to leave a bit sooner and spend that time doing something else?
"…No. That's just a poor excuse."
Shaking his head, Taeho moved his feet once more.
His purpose after regressing was not just to see the end of the Tutorial Tower.
However, if he couldn't even clear the Tutorial Tower, how could he possibly climb the real Tower outside, which was far more difficult and dangerous?
To climb the Tower later, he had to give his all at this very moment.
Step!
Frowning from exhaustion, Taeho arrived at the thirtieth floor.
Soon, a message popped up before his eyes.
You have entered Floor 30.
This is the final floor of the tutorial.
"The final floor?"
Taeho was surprised.
To think the thirtieth floor was the end of the tutorial, right when he had been contemplating giving up just moments ago!
If he had found out after quitting, he would have regretted it for the rest of his life.
Thank goodness. I won't starve to death for nothing.
Life returned to his exhausted eyes.
Knowing it would be over soon seemed to revitalize his body.
Since it's come to this, let's become the first to clear the Tutorial Tower.
Taeho stepped inside the thirtieth floor.
Perhaps due to the pressure of it being the final floor, the air on the thirtieth floor felt cold and sharp.
As he moved further inside, something caught his eye.
It was an ancient knight's armor, standing all alone as if on display.
As soon as he recognized the armor, a message window popped up.
Floor 30 Clear Condition: Defeat the Elf Knight Vedilehem, whose soul is trapped in the armor.
"What? An undead?"
His eyes widened.
Trapping a soul in an inorganic object like armor was an ability of classes that dealt with the undead, such as Necromancers.
Naturally, he knew at least that much.
His shock, however, stemmed from a brutal reality unique to the undead.
Defeating the undead required either holy power or Qi—and without a class, he had access to neither.
What kind of design is this? Making an Awakener who can't even use Qi fight the undead?
His face contorted at the structure of the thirtieth floor, which seemed designed to be impossible to clear from the start.
While he pondered whether it was some sort of riddle, his eyes snapped wide open.
Don't tell me… Only those who can use Qi from the very beginning are qualified?
Qi—a transcendent power that boosted physical abilities and manifested supernatural powers impossible in reality.
Usually, it was a power that could only be used after Awakening and establishing Qi circuits.
However, there were a tiny minority of Awakeners who could handle Qi before even gaining a class or skill.
And most of them later became powerful challengers, serving as pillars of strength for humanity.
Is it telling only those with such qualifications to challenge this…!
Inferring what the clear condition implied, he gritted his teeth.
If that were truly the case, he could not clear this floor.
While Taeho was deep in thought, a sharp screeching sound rang out, and the knight's armor began to creak and move.
It meant the trial of the thirtieth floor had begun.
Whoosh!
The armor kicked off the ground and lunged at him in an instant.
Leaping backward to open up some distance, Taeho calmly swung the hammer he had been carrying on his shoulder.
Clang!
Sparks flew as the hammer and sword collided.
Even in the midst of this, his mind was racing.
Don't make me laugh. Telling me to give up because I'm not qualified after coming all this way?
He swung the hammer again.
However, the knight ducked to evade the attack and countered Taeho with a kick.
Thud!
The kick landed a clean hit on Taeho.
And the knight, having delivered the kick, flew back from the impact.
"?!"
The fallen knight's armor creaked as if in confusion.
But that was only temporary.
Moving its body mechanically like the undead it was, the knight swung its longsword at Taeho once more.
Clang! Crash! Clank!
The longsword struck repeatedly.
As fast and powerful attacks poured down consecutively, dust kicked up, obscuring the view.
While the knight looked around to find Taeho in the dust, the war hammer burst through the dust cloud and smashed into the knight's helmet.
Boom!
The knight lost its balance.
But that was all.
The hammer, swung with full force, bounced right off without leaving even a scratch.
Taeho let out a ragged breath.
"As expected, attacks don't work without Qi. But it's the same for you; your attacks won't work on me either."
If the opponent had been the ogre, he might not have been hurt, but he would have been sent flying through the air every time he got hit.
However, the knigh lacked the absurd, monstrous strength of the ogre.
And the knight's longsword could not pierce Taeho's armor.
Having grasped the situation, Taeho nodded.
"Hold on a second. Let me think."
Without waiting for an answer, he sat right down on the floor to make himself comfortable.
While Taeho rested his chin in his hand and pondered, the armor rained down a flurry of desperate attacks.
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