I Became a Disaster-Class Newbie by Stealing Abilities - Chapter 7

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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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Episode 007. The Sewers (3)
Kailun’s neck flushed crimson.
“No. What exactly are you trying to do, just blurting out Difficulty 5 like that?”
Back when he used to play The Emperor, he’d discovered that this dungeon’s rewards were quite lucrative.
He’d found his own strategies. He’d concluded that Difficulty 1 was entirely manageable.
But Difficulty 5.
He couldn’t even imagine how dangerous it would be.
“K-Kailun, Commander.”
“Does this mean we could actually die?”
Their faces drained of color in an instant.
The six of them were seized by panic.
“Oh, I’m sorry. I only meant for all of us to get rich together—I didn’t mean any harm. You all seemed so confident, so I just thought….”
Jusang bent at the waist in a perfect ninety-degree bow.
It was the kind of angle you’d see from a politician on television.
“Damn it. Of all the rotten luck, we get stuck with an idiot like this.”
Kailun cursed under his breath and steadied himself.
There was no point in saying anything now. It was already too late.
All they could do was find the right answer and escape.
Thud.
The moment they moved toward the chessboard in the center, massive O and X tiles began gleaming across the floor.
You read the question, then moved to the side you believed held the answer.
[O/X Passage]
Back when they’d chosen Difficulty 1, the question had been something simple: “If a hundred orcs fought one dragon, who would win?”
But.
[Difficulty 5]
[Question: There are three methods to summon the Demon King, and the most reliable of them is offering five sacred relics at Bulbadrochs Temple.]
“……?”
Everyone who read the question went rigid.
They understood nothing.
Not a single word made sense to them.
The real problem was they had no time to think.
[10]
[9]
[8]
The countdown began.
“Argh! Demon King? Sacred relics? What the hell is this temple?”
“Isn’t it four, not five? Or maybe it’s not a temple—some maze or something?”
“What do we do? What do we do?”
They floundered between O and X.
Should they all rush to one side and gamble?
Or should they try to save at least half of them?
“Split into two groups of three!”
Kailun made his decision.
He divided the party in half, minimizing their risk.
Jusang had already quietly drifted toward the X side.
When time ran out moments later, a transparent barrier sealed itself over the O and X tiles.
[The correct answer is X.]
“No, no…”
“Let us out! Get us out of here!”
Crash! Crash! Crash!
They slashed at the barrier with sword and axe, but it bore not even a scratch.
Boom!
One of the massive chess pieces moved.
A bishop in robes of a sorcerer raised his staff.
And then.
Kaboom! Kaboom! Kaboom! Kaboom! Kaboom!
Black flames erupted from ceiling and floor, consuming those standing on the O tiles.
“Screeeaaagh!”
“Aaahhh!”
The screams were mercifully brief.
The heat beyond imagination had melted everything down to the bone.
“H-Harin.”
“This can’t be….”
The six survivors—or rather, the three who remained—stared blankly at the space where their comrades had been.
“This bastard! I won’t let this slide!”
Shing!
Kailun drew his blade.
His mind burned with only one thought: to cut down the source of all this calamity on the spot.
But then.
[Rewards for the O/X Passage have been calculated.]
Plink.
A luminous and beautiful mineral rolled forth.
A Magic Stone.
The Magic Stone was the essential core of magical engineering—its value was whatever price one could name for it.
And given its size and concentration, an extraordinary sum was to be expected.
“This thing has to be worth over fifty million won, right?”
“Unbelievable.”
The reward was sweet enough to make them forget the death of their comrades.
Moreover, with fewer mouths to feed, their individual share would only grow larger.
“Commander. Let’s put off killing him for now. We’ll need a meat shield for the next passage anyway.”
Back at Stage One, failure had meant nothing worse than severe bruising.
But having chosen Stage Five, there was no way they’d escape with merely that.
“Yeah. That makes sense.”
Kailun nodded.
* * *
Click-click-click-click!
The chessboard warped, and a long corridor materialized.
Chess pieces stood on either side of the path, seeming as though they might spring to life at any moment.
“Because of you, we’ve lost three comrades. I don’t ask for compensation, but you will stand at the very front for the second passage.”
“Understood.”
“If you refuse, I’ll force you to—wait?”
“I’m going. I’ll be first. That settles it, doesn’t it?”
“Well… yes.”
Kailun clicked his tongue, his expression sour.
The Lord’s composure and confidence troubled him, but in any case, things were proceeding as desired.
[Binary Choice]
[‘Both eyes and one leg’—choose one.]
[The chosen body part cannot be used while passing through the second passage.]
[When one person dies, the trap ceases.]
Blindness.
Or hopping forward on a single leg.
Whatever he chose, hell awaited.
Of course.
‘This has nothing to do with us.’
‘The moment he dies, it’s over.’
‘Let him drop fast.’
The plan was flawless.
Until they witnessed what came next.
“Lulu.”
Humming idly, the Lord selected [eyes].
Whoosh!
Darkness flooded his vision.
Specially crafted black cloth bound tight against his skin.
‘Haven’t had a chance to set a new record in a while.’
Even as his world turned black, his entire body’s awareness danced and leaped.
He had done this countless times before; his body remembered, even with one sense severed.
Swift and light.
Slash!
He crossed the corridor.
Crash-crash-crash-bang!
The traps sprung to life at once.
Poisoned arrows streaked toward his arms and legs, but Ju-sang sidestepped them with a margin of 0.1 seconds to spare.
‘Three, two, one. Now!’
Clang! Clang-clang!
He batted away the arrows that came at angles too sharp to dodge.
Four volleys from the corners—that was the total count.
‘This is insane.’
A smile spread across Ju-sang’s lips.
Under normal circumstances, using only his left hand would have left him unable to handle the fourth volley perfectly.
He would have suffered even a minor wound.
But now that his right hand was free to move, the entire picture had shifted.
His options had multiplied.
Twofold? Threefold?
No—five times over and beyond.
Hop.
Ju-sang sprang lightly, dodging an arrow aimed at his Achilles tendon, and glanced to his right.
He couldn’t see anything, but he needed a rough sense of direction.
‘Next comes close combat.’
Step left four paces, then roll and—
Crash!
One of the chess pieces standing to either side swung its blade, shattering the ground beneath.
A few strands of hair sliced away and scattered through the air.
Oh!
That one was close.
His reaction speed had actually accelerated because his stats were overinvested compared to his usual state.
He recalibrated his overall balance in light of this.
Going forward, not a single hair would be harmed.
Boom-boom-boom!
The wizard-shaped chess piece hurled a fireball.
Thundering hooves!
A knight mounted on a fully armored war horse charged straight ahead.
It seemed certain that anyone would die a hundred times over in such a situation.
And yet.
It made no difference.
No matter how densely the attacks rained down or how they threw off his timing with syncopated patterns, they couldn’t stop Ju-sang’s forward advance.
His defense success rate had climbed several times higher now that he could use both hands freely.
This was child’s play.
“Wait—you really did lose your sight? That eye blindfold doesn’t actually see everything?”
“Even if it did, that doesn’t make sense. How is a human moving like that….”
The six-member party had run several raids and had chances to fight alongside those who were called the strong.
But.
They had never encountered anything this overwhelmingly dominant.
It wouldn’t have seemed strange if a Knight-ranked awakener had walked in instead. Ju-sang’s movements transcended humanity by an unfathomable margin.
At that very moment.
[The chess piece ‘Queen’ activates the skill ‘Black Lightning’!]
Crack-snap!
Magic surged with such intensity that his skin tingled.
Black sparks raced forward in a straight line, targeting every object in their path.
No place to escape.
No cover to hide in.
This time, surely, he wouldn’t survive.
No human could endure an attack so devastating.
Boom-boom-boom-boom-boom!
Black Lightning swallowed Ju-sang whole.
It wasn’t a matter of his heart stopping—it was as if his entire body would crumble like a biscuit.
But.
The expectation was wrong again.
“He—he’s withstanding it with his bare body?”
Kailun stammered.
Smoke was rising from his body, though only for a moment.
Jusang trampled on Quinn’s shoulder in one fluid motion, then launched into another all-out sprint.
“That can’t be right. When I first scanned him, he wasn’t carrying any high-grade defensive equipment.”
“Could his Magic Resistance really be that high innately?”
It was impossible to believe, yet there was no other explanation.
Magic Resistance: 52.
That number—earned through repeated poison infusions—proved just how broken it truly was.
“I made it through! Like you said, it’s totally manageable, so don’t worry and send the next person!”
Jusang waved from the far side of the passage.
1 minute, 11 seconds.
The fastest time on record.
* * *
At that same moment.
In a bar located beneath Itaewon Underground, a man and woman sat across from each other.
“Hey, Lady Hong. Look at this. I got my hands on video from the 33rd Batch Selection, and a real monster showed up. Might actually be stronger than you.”
A muscular man of Eastern descent waved a Magic Stone containing the footage.
“You’ve got some nerve. Me, who survived since the 1st Batch Selection, weaker than some greenhorn who just arrived?”
The woman across from him shot back without hesitation.
She looked to be in her mid-twenties.
Her crimson eyes and flame-like hair made for a striking beauty.
“Enough talk. See for yourself.”
“If this is you getting excited over someone killing a few orcs again, you’re in for it.”
She’d been burned too many times before; her patience was paper-thin.
But the moment she watched the footage, her expression turned serious.
“Who the hell is this guy?”
“Hah! Told you he was a big catch, didn’t I?”
“Yeah. He’s a monster.”
A Giant Scorpion—a 3-star monster—was something no beginner should be able to defeat.
She’d never even heard of an “off-spec Difficulty” like that before.
“Is he using Stat Manipulation? He’s deliberately provoking the boss monster?”
“Seems like it. I’ve never seen that kind of Stat Manipulation before, so I can’t say exactly what he’s doing. But anyway. He plays like some hardcore veteran.”
This wasn’t a game.
To show that kind of composure with your life on the line.
How overflowing with confidence did you have to be to pull off a stunt like that?
“Hey, Lady Hong. This 33rd Batch warrior… could it be that guy?”
The veteran who’d pulled off every kind of insane stunt.
Back then, his player name was definitely “Left-hand Spoon Killer.”
He once summoned a water dragon in the middle of the city in the height of summer and announced it as “Water Bomb Season.”
He’d even kidnapped a high noble’s daughter and demanded ransom.
When he started “sharing pro tips,” he left graffiti all over imperial cultural heritage.
Back then, she’d written him off as a madman.
But looking back now, she understood.
That someone like him was needed more than ever.
However.
“It can’t be. A guy that good would’ve been Selected by now. Besides, this one uses both hands. Left-hand Spoon only uses his left, like the name suggests.”
From the data so far, warriors who arrived early tended to have logged more playtime.
Still, a small part of her wondered.
Exceptions did crop up now and then.
“Is this the best quality you’ve got? I can’t even make out his face.”
“Hey, Lady Hong. I only got this because I’ve got connections, you know.”
The man puffed out his chest.
“There had to be witnesses in the 33rd Batch Raid. Find out who he is—even if you have to kidnap every last one of them.”
“I’m already looking into it, but something’s strange. Information about the 33rd Batch players is being restricted. It’s like someone’s trying to erase the entire generation. There are already quite a few missing persons.”
“You’re saying someone’s pulling strings?”
“Someone big. The Knights are moving, too.”
An anomaly unique to the 33rd Batch, unlike any other generation.
Someone was interfering.
Whether it was the Empire’s doing or someone else’s, something unprecedented was happening.
‘Talent like that can’t be allowed to slip away.’
It had been two and a half years since arriving in The Emperor’s world.
After going through all manner of trials, she’d assembled a force made up of the strongest warriors.
The Invaders—a faction of heroes that even massive corporations and guilds dare not ignore.
And yet.
No matter how hard they tried, they couldn’t so much as catch a glimpse of The Emperor, let alone uncover a single detail about him.
The strongest organization, led by a figure shrouded in mystery.
That strength moved through invisible depths, like something haunting an abyss no one could reach.
Which meant.
They needed someone stagnant.
As many as possible.
“Contact the Commander right now. Tell him priorities have changed.”
For the first time in six months, every single member would have to gather.

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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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