Ex-level Player With the Greatest Civilization of All Time - Chapter 25

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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 25

Krim’s interview stretched on for a while longer.
The atmosphere flowed with a positive energy.
I watched it unfold, then glanced at Argelayer.
Seeing the broadcast, Argelayer collapsed to his knees.
As though some lover who’d whispered words of affection until yesterday had just been taken away.
I couldn’t help but offer words of comfort, moved by his grief.
“I’m on your side, Ar.”
“Commander… I want to grow up.”
“There, there.”
I soothed him while checking Baek Jin-seong’s expression again.
The broadcast seemed to be doing better than expected.
Having spent time with him, I’d learned his energy shifted noticeably depending on whether the broadcast was doing well or just okay.
Right now, it was clear things were going quite well.
“We’ll just have a deeper conversation over there, shall we.”
“Yes….”
By the time we’d moved to the corner and Argelayer’s gloomy mood was beginning to lift,
Baek Jin-seong approached.
“There’s something I wanted to tell you….”
Was the interview over?
“Go ahead.”
Baek Jin-seong spoke with his microphone off.
“Sir, the viewer count is way bigger than we anticipated.”
“How many came in?”
“Five hundred thousand more than the last clear.”
The scale was startling enough to catch my breath.
I could still vividly recall his excitement before, bragging about breaking the one-million mark.
And now he’s saying we have even more?
‘Is that even possible?’
It didn’t make sense, since I’d deliberately timed this to overlap with Cha Seon-ah’s Hidden Floor clear.
It seemed too soon for her clear to be finished….
When I heard the reason, it came down to roughly this.

– Word got out that a second humanoid appeared.
– Can’t skip a Neia clear.
– Watching both the S-Rank Hidden Floor clear at the same time.

Baek Jin-seong explained.
“It seems quite a few viewers are watching both streams simultaneously.”
That meant the numbers could climb even higher as time went on.
Given my plan to clear the fifteenth floor today and push into the sixteenth and seventeenth if we had stamina left, this wasn’t exactly welcome news—but…
‘I suppose I don’t know anymore anyway.’
I decided to just enjoy it.
Perhaps this confidence of mine
stemmed from the reassurance that came with my steadily growing drone count?
After all, I currently had over ten drones on escort duty in stealth mode around me.
‘Plus there’s the special effect from the spirit-blessed leather armor.’
Even if an attack broke through my guard, I could survive it once—just once—without taking critical damage.
So I decided to take it in stride.
In any case, the two hours passed far more quickly than expected.
Ding—
The queue finally dissolved.
And then, immediately, a quest appeared.

[Speak with the Gardener who guards the garden. – 0 / 1]
“Speak? With whom?”

It was one of those moments when I wondered what kind of quest this even was.
Baek Jin-seong spoke up.
“Senior, that over there…!”
Baek Jin-seong pointed beyond the Safe Zone, now passable.
‘That’s… an elf?’
It wasn’t a mistake.
Pointed ears.
Features as delicately beautiful as if sculpted.
“Let’s go.”
“Yes.”
As Baek Jin-seong and I stepped out of the Safe Zone, the elf turned his head and looked our way.
He approached slowly and spoke.
“Who might you be? Could you perhaps be those sent by the Rest Temple?”
“No, that’s not it… but who are you?”
“If you’re asking my name, it’s Krim. Gardener Krim.”
A name I felt I’d heard before somewhere.
‘Ah….’
I could see that name in my inventory.

【Gardener Krim’s Scissors】

It was the name of the boss monster I was supposed to have fought on the 15th floor.

* * *

Baek Jin-seong gasped in shock and cried out.
“Wait, so you’re that Krim?”
The elf regarded his reaction with a puzzled air.
“Do you know of me? I’m afraid I have no recollection of you.”
Baek Jin-seong started to speak to Krim but closed his mouth again.
The Krim he knew.
The primary culprit behind the Floating Garden’s reputation as an avoided dungeon all this time.
But who would look at this elf before them and think it was the same being?
‘Are they even the same entity in the first place?’
He looked nothing like the appearance Baek Jin-seong was familiar with.
‘No, even if they were the same person…’
Baek Jin-seong was certain that telling him the truth would not be a good choice.
“Ah… well… I suppose I was mistaken.”
The chat reactions were hardly different.
I glanced over to check, and everyone was saying the same thing.

– Good move, not telling him was the right call.
– We don’t even know if they’re the same entity anyway.
– But was Krim originally an elf?
– I just looked it up in detail and yeah, his ears are pointed… but how is this the same person?

The Krim who had earned notoriety was a monster with skin black as obsidian and crimson eyes.
And he swept about white hair that hung wild and tangled.
The pointed ears, trademark of the elf race, were present then as well.
Yet his appearance had been so grotesque and hideous that no one would have thought to associate him with elves upon seeing him.

– Still, who would’ve thought we’d see an elf on the 15th floor.
– Elves’ looks, every time I see them I’m like… they’re seriously insane.
– At this point I don’t care anymore. Hahahaha Krim, I like you.

While Baek Jin-seong was processing this, I spoke.
“But what were you doing in this place?”
“Nothing of great importance. I was simply… fulfilling my purpose.”
As I continued the conversation naturally in Baek Jin-seong’s stead, he reviewed the quest once more.

[Converse with the Gardener who tends the garden. – 0 / 1]

‘Right, that was the objective all along…’
In any case, the quest was simply to speak with him.
Whether the figure before me was the same Krim from before would matter later.
The most important thing was clearing the floor.
Maintaining the SSS Rank clear rating was secondary.
‘As expected of him.’
Secondary details didn’t matter.
Baek Jin-seong watched Neia with patience.
“What is this duty you speak of?”
The elf offered a hollow smile.
“What duty could a gardener have but to tend this place?”
“There seems to be more to it.”
“… You’ll come to understand without explanation. More importantly, I should properly receive our guests. Shall we step over there? I’ll prepare some tea—”
It was the moment Krim was attending to the two of them.
Grrrrrrrrrk…
A violent tremor shook the garden.
It wasn’t an earthquake.
Such a tremor couldn’t exist in the Floating Garden.
Yet Krim reacted to the inexplicable shaking as though accustomed to it.
Deep defiance etched across his face as he stared into the distance.
“Oh… it’s starting earlier than usual today, it seems.”
Crack-crack-crack. Boom-whoosh.
Something tore through the ground and surged upward.
Neia and Baek Jin-seong, standing far off, could barely make it out even as they heightened their perception.
“Vines…?”
Pitch-black vines writhed like a dance, rising up and spreading across the garden.
In their wake, flowers wilted and leaves fell.
Krim had already snatched up his large scissors and was rushing toward them.
“Let’s go.”
“Yes? Ah!”
As Baek Jin-seong ran, he glanced at the chat window.

– Wow… I know those scissors.
– That’s really the Krim.
– But those vines look familiar somehow?

Krim clashed with the writhing vines spreading through the garden.
Snip-snip.
With each cut of his scissors, the vines fell away.
“Shall we lend a hand?”
“No, let’s watch for now.”
His movements were flashy and practiced.
Even the most exacting viewers poured out admiration.

– Damn… that’s the Krim I remember.
– He was already strong before, but now he’s at least level 50 or higher?
– Asking someone to survive that attack is just cruel.
– A nightmare’s about to wake up lmao I get the PTSD from when Krim hunted us down and we pissed ourselves running.

Krim was so formidable.
In the original quest, the clear condition wasn’t even to defeat him.
It was simply to endure his attacks within a time limit.
Then Krim would clutch his head and vanish with a bloodcurdling shriek.
It sounded simple enough on the surface.
But of course, most players couldn’t survive even that much.
The reason was plain to see—he was that quick and that strong.
“Phew…”
Having dealt with all the vines, Krim returned and set down his scissors.
At that moment, both Baek Jin-seong and I turned our gaze to his hand.
Even Krim, despite his strength, bore the dark stains of fierce combat from moments before.
He spoke, concealing his hand.
“It’s nothing serious.”
“So that was your purpose, then.”
To protect this place from the vines moments ago.
Of course, despite the ease with which he spoke, I had seen those vines before.
Just like the viewers chattering loudly now.

– Isn’t that the vine from the Hidden Floor?
– Now that you mention it, the Archbishop did say something about the Floating Garden…
– It’s connected like this?

“Earlier, you were about to ask me something….”
“Yeah, I know.”
I turned to Krim with a question.
“What were those vines just now?”
Krim’s expression darkened as he replied.
“The Roots of the World Tree. Or rather, Velpherus’s roots now.”
Then he went on to explain in detail.
The Seal weakened, and Velpherus began to truly consume the World Tree.
It was absorbing energy for its resurrection.
“The Floating Garden was originally a place where the Goddess’s Divine Power dwelled….”
So naturally, hardly anyone could approach it.
But recently, Krim continued, the Demonic Energy had grown so strong that it fed even on Divine Power itself.
I looked at Krim’s hand again.
The skin writhed and convulsed as if screaming.
I could guess how Krim had come to wear such a form.
‘Is this the fate he was always meant for—to resist to the end, then fall?’
Either way, I now understood why Krim had asked if we were from the Temple when he first saw us.
He must have thought the Temple would take action given the circumstances.
Baek Jin-seong whispered.
“But in that case, wouldn’t it not really matter?”
“Well… I suppose so.”
Cha Seon-ah and her group were already moving to clear the Hidden Floor.
I shared his sentiment.
“But….”
“What is it?”
I checked the Quest window, which still hadn’t moved.
The count hadn’t increased at all.
Baek Jin-seong noticed it too, and his face went pale.
“Huh? That’s weird. What…?”
His mission.
The mysterious vines.
And the state of the garden itself.
We’d covered nearly every angle of conversation, yet it remained unchanged.
“Ah, maybe….”
“Do you have an idea?”
“I’m not certain, but….”
Even so, Baek Jin-seong hesitated before speaking to Krim.
“Is there anything we can help you with?”
It was right after those words from Baek Jin-seong.
Ding—

[Speak with the Gardener who guards the garden. – 1 / 1]

The Quest completed.

[Remove the vines that harm the garden. – 0 / 100]

A new quest materialized before him.
“If you would be willing to help… could you perhaps hold back the vine overflow? To be honest, I’m reaching the limits of what I can manage alone.”

– Ohhh Jin-seong finally pulled it off
– Gotta admit, that was good.

Baek Jin-seong’s shoulders straightened.
“Heheheh, please, praise me more.”
His manner was a touch insufferable, though.
Still, despite the stumbling, he’d managed to find the way forward—that much felt clear.
“Neia, see? I can be useful like this.”
“Looks like it.”
Now it was the drones’ turn to shine.
“Lieutenant, your target is the unpleasant vine growth ahead. Pour out all your pent-up frustration.”
“Yes, sir!”
Argelayer shifted into drone configuration and launched skyward alongside the combat units.
Whirrrrrrrr—
Energy gathering in the cannon barrel.
Flash.
Argelayer’s beam split the air.
At the center of the dozens of light beams the combat drones unleashed at the target, Argelayer’s Ultra-Photon Cannon melted and severed the vines.
Boom.
The roots that sprawled across the space—their timing of overflow unknowable—dissolved in an instant beneath Argelayer and the drones’ assault.
Rumble.
As the roots collapsed back down where they’d risen, Krim, watching from below, let out a gasp of awe.
“That was… extraordinary.”
“It truly is—your technical prowess is the world’s strongest, Neia…”
Baek Jin-seong trailed off, his attention caught by something in the chat.

– But what is that?
– For real?
– There’s something underneath?
– ???

Baek Jin-seong’s eyes widened.
“Damn! Is this a Hidden Floor…!?”
And then something shocking occurred.
The quest transformed once more.

[Halt the Rampage of the World Tree – 0 / 1]

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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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