Climbing the Tower with Multidimensional Avatars - Chapter 37
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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Chapter 37. Galaxy Martial Arts Academy – Entrance Examination (1)
Upon returning to the 10th Floor, cool air enveloped my entire body.
Since time flowed more slowly on the 10th Floor than on the 14th Floor, the sun hadn’t yet begun its final descent.
However, gazing at the sky, I could see it was gradually turning amber—a sunset was approaching—making it too tight a schedule to accomplish anything else of significance.
“Let’s start with the distribution first.”
Lee Su-young and I left the park at the center of the City and began our distribution at a quiet resting spot nearby.
We divided the smaller items like mana stones on the spot, but the Goblin ears we’d exchange for official credit at the Hunter Association, along with the blades we’d severed from the legs of the 12th Floor’s grain-eating monster, the Blade Vulture, were heavy enough that we’d stored them at Tower Floor 1.
Originally, I’d intended to take only the mana stones and leave the rest, but the Farmer mentioned the blades were quite valuable and urged me to take them along.
I was grateful the Farmer had sold us the net; thanks to his help harvesting the blades from ninety-five Blade Vultures, collecting them hadn’t taken nearly as long as it could have.
Since the Blade Vulture parts were items the Hunter Association purchased, I didn’t need to hunt for alternative buyers or search through the Community.
Once the distribution was roughly complete, Lee Su-young headed straight to the Hunter Association to sell what wouldn’t fit in her inventory.
At the Association, a Guild Staff Member who’d been preparing to leave for the day frowned upon seeing the sack overflowing with Goblin hunting tokens.
“Ah… it’s almost dinner time.”
I felt bad for the staff member.
However, the conscientious Climbers’ Association staff member meticulously counted each item and converted them into credits and official points.
“Goblin ears and Blade Vulture blades—a total of 63,000 credits and 250 official points. Split evenly, that’s 31,500 credits and 125 official points each.”
Accumulating this much felt far more lucrative than I’d anticipated.
Since the Tower Shop didn’t accept returns, I’d been reluctant to spend credits on shop points, but there was no need for such caution anymore.
Including the value from selling the net to the Farmer, it came to roughly 49,000 credits—about 4.9 million won.
I could comfortably live idle for the next two months.
Outside the Tower, they wouldn’t shower you with money for hunting Goblins like this; such abundance was only possible within the Tower.
“Shall we grab dinner and call it a day?”
“Sounds good. I haven’t eaten properly, so I’m exhausted. There’s a place I’ve been wanting to try!”
Lee Su-young and I entered an elegant Restaurant located near the Hunter Association.
After a grueling day, indulging in delicious food was only proper respect for one’s life.
Besides, I’d just earned a substantial amount of credits.
We ate boldly without considering the price, only to be shocked upon leaving that the dinner course menu was 8,000 credits per person—roughly 800,000 won—but what could be done?
It was already consumed.
The food was delicious enough to justify the price, but I’d need to be careful about this in the future.
I was beginning to understand why stories of Tower returnees squandering money like water and facing bankruptcy were so common.
If one climbed high enough to grow proportionally stronger and earn well even outside the Tower, it wouldn’t matter; but if one climbed only moderately while spending recklessly, their earnings couldn’t keep pace, leading to financial ruin.
Most of those invited to the Tower never escape the lower floors—they either die climbing or abandon their ascent midway.
I could have easily been one of those statistics.
I should start keeping a household ledger or something.
* * *
I returned to the Inn where I was staying and took a shower.
Even with a cleansing magical tool, it couldn’t wash away that uncomfortable feeling of blood and grime clinging to my skin.
Hot water had the effect of relaxing tense muscles, and it also relieved stress.
Lying on the bed, I looked at my combat top, now reduced to tatters.
“Hmm, do they sell just the top separately?”
Since Harpies attacked from sky to ground like a dive strike, my lower half was nearly intact while my upper half had become rags.
If I’d reached the 2nd-rate level, I wouldn’t have been reduced to rags so pathetically.
“Sigh… Can’t be helped. I’ll have to buy new ones.”
Thanks to this, I managed to save my life—otherwise, I would’ve been covered in blood within three minutes and nearly dead.
Still, I wasn’t planning to buy replacements right away; I’d wait a bit before purchasing.
If I bought them immediately, Siu would nag me about it.
Siu rarely nagged about anything, but there were exactly two things: when I spent too much time on the internet and when it seemed like I was overspending.
Siu had made considerable effort for my healthy development.
Well, this body was newly acquired and still belonged to a child, so buying combat gear that didn’t even fit was clearly not the right choice no matter how I thought about it.
Before entering my reincarnation clone’s body, I checked the Tower Shop.
Looking at the points, I was amazed at how many monsters I’d killed in just one day.
The shop points had exceeded 1,000.
Seeing that the 12th and 13th Floors were split between me and Lee Su-young, while the 14th Floor was divided among four people, made it even more surprising.
Of course, the higher the floor, the more points monsters gave, but it was still amazing nonetheless.
I purchased the Appraisal Scroll that I’d been putting off due to point scarcity.
[Appraisal Scroll (F): Reveals the name and approximate appraisal results of the target. / Price: 10 Shop Points]
I purchased five Appraisal Scrolls.
I appraised the ability stones from the Hop Goblin, the Monstrous Wolf, and the Goblin Shaman, the Goblin Shaman’s staff, and the strangely-shaped stone I’d purchased from Lorolren in order.
[Berserk: Lowers Intelligence while raising Strength and Stamina.]
[Hemorrhage (Passive): Wounds caused by attacks do not recover naturally.]
[Hallucination: Causes the target to see illusions.]
[Goblin Shaman’s Curse Staff 4: An item imbued with an itching curse.]
[Appraisal Failed]
Since the appraisal document’s grade wasn’t high, only very rough information came through.
Berserk was quite a famous ability.
I knew it likely had side effects of reduced cognition during ability use at high probability, and loss of reason at low probability.
I’d need a higher-grade appraisal document to determine the exact probabilities or how much it increased strength and stamina.
Or I could look it up in the Library to learn about the ability.
F-grade appraisal documents were meant to give you the name so you could search for it in the Library.
Passive abilities had no levels, and if you weren’t accustomed to them, you couldn’t toggle them on and off freely.
Since passive abilities activated constantly and consumed mana automatically when conditions were met, passive abilities were generally evaluated and priced lower unless they enhanced oneself.
If a passive ability accidentally activated against an opponent stronger than you, all your mana would be drained and you’d die.
Still, an ability was an ability, so it would fetch tens of millions of won.
If it sold, that is.
But since Hemorrhage looked effective, it might sell for quite a high price?
Well, Lee Su-young has a stake in it anyway, so I’ll discuss it with her when we meet later.
But what’s this appraisal failure?
It’s an F-grade appraisal document, but this isn’t even an item from the Tower’s middle floors—can appraisal actually fail?
This stone seemed like it would be either a jackpot or a terrible curse.
“Keeping it on my main body could be dangerous, so I should have my clone store it.”
I transferred my consciousness into my Reincarnation Clone’s body while lying comfortably.
Time stopped for my Tower Clone.
* * *
I opened my eyes in the body of my reincarnated avatar living in the Galactic Martial Arts World.
In truth, as I climbed The Tower, I had often relied on my reincarnated avatar’s assistance whenever the need arose, so it wasn’t particularly long since I’d last inhabited this body.
Besides, I’d only lived as my Tower avatar for two or three days at most, so it felt like I’d simply returned from a brief journey.
Though if I was being honest, I was still traveling even now.
“You seem rather exhausted, sir.”
Siu asked with concern as she noticed my fatigue.
“Sigh~ I’m particularly tired today.”
Well, having fought countless times, mental exhaustion was only natural.
Physical fatigue didn’t carry over since my body was different, but mental exhaustion crossed over intact.
Come to think of it, it had been quite a long day.
At my words, Siu asked with worry.
“Are you perhaps ill?”
“I’m not ill. Just tired, that’s all.”
Even at my response, Siu took my temperature and checked my pulse at my wrist.
“Hmm… you’re in good health. I’m usually the one forcing you to stop your training, but today is unusual.”
“Well, everyone has days like this, don’t they?”
“Then I’ll replace tonight’s training with meditation and yoga breathing exercises.”
Meditation and yoga breathing exercises—yoga itself aligned with spiritual cultivation and were actually training methods that could relieve my mental fatigue.
Of course, they couldn’t compare to simply resting without doing anything at all.
My daily routine at four years old was a repetition of training, rest, and meals.
As my body grew, my rest time gradually decreased, but during growth periods, rest was more important than training, so my rest time was longer than my training time.
Whenever I tried to train alone, Siu would somehow sense it and forcibly make me play instead.
Yet if I went online, she’d worry endlessly about whether I’d be negatively influenced by the internet.
After Cheon So-yeon moved into the neighboring house, she visited daily to play, and as my internet time decreased, Siu finally seemed satisfied.
“Oh, when do I learn lightness martial arts?”
“Lightness martial arts? Young master, you who call for a taxi if it’s more than three steps away—you wish to learn lightness martial arts?”
At Siu’s words, I averted my gaze.
I may move about nimbly indoors and train diligently, but the outside world is still too vast for me.
Whether it’s because this is a wealthy neighborhood or the land is simply sprawling, everywhere I want to go is too far.
Even the neighborhood mart requires taking a car, and the nearby park, which is supposedly close, takes over an hour to walk to with these short legs.
Do I look like someone who won’t need to call a taxi for distances over three steps?
I’m still at an age where I should be in a stroller!
Well, actually, isn’t four years old too old for a stroller?
“Still, I like running fast.”
At my response, Siu fell into thought for a moment.
“Actually, the infant martial arts education manual states that lightness martial arts should not be taught before at least age ten.”
“Why?”
“Because if a parent looks away for just a moment and the child uses lightness martial arts to go somewhere, they can’t be found.”
Ah, that makes sense.
There’s a reason parents don’t put noisy squeaky shoes on children who are just learning to walk.
To a child, it was merely a noisy toy, but to parents, it was essentially a sound alarm.
Typically, finding a missing child involves calculating their potential movement radius based on age and time elapsed, then conducting a search accordingly—but once they mastered lightness martial arts, that radius would expand beyond all reasonable bounds.
“Well, I suppose if it’s the young master, there shouldn’t be any problems.”
After all, what three or four-year-old child would maintain double-entry accounting and operate secret investment accounts?
Even when I was kidnapped, I managed to make phone calls and stay in contact.
I was the type of person who could find my way home using public transportation, even if I got lost.
“So you’re going to teach me lightness martial arts?”
“Yes. Starting tomorrow, I will teach you the Cheon Family’s foundational lightness technique, the Windflow Step. Since the Windflow Step coordinates with the Verdant Wood Technique, learning it shouldn’t be particularly difficult.”
Excellent! Now I won’t be stuck as a mere pedestrian anymore—though I suppose I’m not exactly driving a car either.
Hmm… well then…
Excellent! Now I’ll be a swift-footed pedestrian!
(Continued in the next chapter)
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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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