I Conquered the Tower with the EX-Class Character That I Raised - Chapter 17

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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 17
Kim Min-seok rubbed his damp palms against the inner lining of his coat.
The smooth texture of a gemstone brushed against his skin.
[Artifact: Return Stone]
An item that teleports anyone in contact with the user to a designated location.
In South Korea, where artifacts are impossible to obtain, it would be an extraordinarily rare treasure.
But for Pandemonium, which controlled numerous low-tier Towers, it was merely a common item.
I had to plunge into that monstrous battlefield and carry Han Seol-ah to safety.
The time for sentiment had ended.
I was a hyena of a man.
I knew survival better than anyone.
Admiring Han Seol-ah’s nobility and having my lifeline severed were entirely separate matters.
‘If Han Seol-ah dies, I’m finished too.’
I couldn’t let my life and future be buried in that rubble.

‘…The boss’s request. How I defeated the Frost Dragon. I can piece that together later.’
As long as Han Seol-ah survived, opportunity remained.
I began to watch for my chance.
* * *
Death rippled before her eyes.
The moment she loosened her grip on tension, even slightly, death would claim her.
More than ever, Han Seol-ah felt the weight of mortality pressing down upon her.
Boom!
She scattered Scathaha’s playfully conjured magic before it could fully manifest.
It was no simple feat.
A dense web of mana spread in all directions.
Mana from the Eternal Winter, exquisitely sensitive to temperature shifts.
Whenever Scathaha cast a spell, the temperature would change ever so slightly.
Sometimes growing colder, sometimes warmer.
The difference was so minute that without a mana-sensing network, it would be imperceptible.
Scathaha scattered exactly ninety-nine points of such variation.
Of those points, only one led to the actual spell.
The rest were all traps.
She had to identify the correct point before the magic completed its formation.
If it was growing hot, she struck with cold.
If it was growing cold, she struck with heat.
At the precise temperature, she marked the precise point.
The essence of magical combat, learned in the Other World…!
Boom!
She had found the answer.
The magic cuts off.
What if I’d missed?
···I push such worries aside.
Up to this point: 0.1 seconds.
Repeat this action ten times, and one second passes.
A hundred repetitions, and ten seconds have elapsed.
The Apostle’s ‘mission’ is to endure for two minutes.
Two minutes equals one hundred twenty seconds.
…So I need to repeat this twelve hundred times.
—Can I do it?
Doubt rears its head.
Puff-puff-puff-bang!
What terrifies me.
Is that to Scathach, this is merely ‘play’.
Exactly ninety-nine points of impact.
Magic manifests once every 0.1 seconds.
The rules of the game are unmistakably clear to anyone watching.
The stakes are Han Seol-ah’s life.
And perhaps the fate of South Korea itself.
As Han Seol-ah, I cannot afford to lose this game.
It’s grueling.
But.
“Haa—”
I can endure it.
Experience with death approaching? I’ve lived through it countless times.
In The Other World, against The One.
Those one-sided battles masquerading as ‘sparring’ come flooding back.
Misuse the Eternal Winter’s magic, and I die.
Fail to react to the magic, and I die.
Cast too slowly, and I die.
Death, death—so many deaths.
Even if my breath stops for a moment before I’m instantly revived, that sensation of dying and being brought back to life was an experience only those who’ve endured it could truly understand.
But it was a time that taught me what a ‘true magical duel’ truly is.
And it was a precious moment to understand what ‘death’ itself means.
The greatest fear death holds is ignorance.
What is death? What awaits after death?
Through countless deaths, I came to understand what death is.
“Haaaa—”
Puff-puff-bang!
Even now, with death at my doorstep, I can keep my sanity.
Drip, drip—
Blood trickled from my nose, slowly, so very slowly.
My perception of time had dilated, making each drop feel like an eternity.
“Ugh…”
My limits were approaching.
Regardless of my will, my body and mind were clearly overloading.
My senses, which once found the correct answer in 0.1 seconds, now took 0.11 seconds, 0.12 seconds…
They were gradually slowing down.
—How much time has passed?
Subjectively, it felt like more than a week had gone by.
‘There.’
Upper right. Coordinate 36.
Success.
‘Next.’
Lower left. Coordinate 82.
Success.
‘Ah.’
Lower left rear. Coordinate 14.
…Too late.
Boom!
I couldn’t completely nullify the magic.
The shockwave grazed my cheek. The searing pain of flesh being torn away.
But there was no time to scream.
That was too close.
0.1 seconds.
Scathaha was keeping perfect time, like a metronome.
No—she was accelerating.
‘Faster.’
0.09 seconds. 0.08 seconds.
I was slowing down while Scathaha was speeding up—a vicious cycle.
The end was drawing near.
Boom, boom, boom!
I heard Scathaha’s laughter.
It seemed to say, ‘Isn’t this fun? Shall we go even faster?’
‘Just a little more.’
…My consciousness was beginning to slip away.
—How much longer?
“Ugh…”
Boom!
How much… is left?
* * *
“I feel like I’m about to collapse.”
All I’d managed was brief snatches of sleep during the few moments I’d paused to rest.
Enduring the backlash of synchronization had left my body in the worst possible condition.
But I couldn’t afford to rest…
Time was up.
“Hah. Let’s go.”
I activated synchronization and sprinted toward the Appraisal Center at maximum speed.
On the rooftop of the Appraisal Center, a platform had been constructed by haphazardly stacking enormous containers.
And at the very top, a massage chair bristling with various wires and mechanical devices had been placed.
The name of this grotesque chair that Min Ji-hee had introduced was… the ‘Ultra-Long-Range Ballistic Calculation Seat’.
It was a custom piece I’d asked Min Ji-hee to prepare.
This chair had exactly two functions.
To serve as the ‘eye’ that would drive the non-standard firepower I unleashed into the heart 200 kilometers away.
And to serve as the ‘support structure’ that would disperse the recoil I’d have to endure upon firing.
‘It said it would synchronize in real-time with the Hunter Association’s observation satellite and automatically lock onto the target, right?’
I sat in the chair and put on the goggles.
I tapped the microphone attached to the goggles.
[Standing by.]
“Display the screen.”
Coordinate information synchronized with the Hunter Association’s observation satellite flooded in.
[Aiming system activated. Beginning coordinate lock.]

One lens of the goggles displayed a panoramic view of Pyongyang.
Anticipating that the cameras would be destroyed by the mana Scathach emanated, countless optical cameras had been strategically positioned throughout the Pyongyang region, their feeds synchronized in real-time.
‘There she is.’
Han Seol-ah, her expression steely and resolute, was visible as well.
I inserted Eternal Winter into the mounting bracket extending from the side of the chair.
Click.
With a heavy mechanical sound, the colossal sniper cannon’s barrel locked into place perfectly.
[Aiming.]
Whirrrr—
The chair rotated toward the location where Scathach stood.
Incheon to Pyongyang—the distance was vast and unforgiving.
No matter how much one reinforced themselves with mana, it would be impossible to visually sight and aim at Pyongyang from Incheon.
That’s why I borrowed the Hunter Association’s resources.
I would handle the ultra-long-range shot.
They just needed to manage the targeting themselves.
At my ‘second request,’ Min Ji-hee nodded with a grim expression.
In just a day or two, she’d whipped up this ‘whatcha-ma-call-it system’ for me.
‘She’s got real talent.’
—Crack!
‘Oh… the cinematic effect is killer.’
As if the very sky itself were a monitor screen being torn asunder, ominous fissures spread across the heavens above Pyongyang in a dazzling display of effects.
The grand finale of a spectacle that would make ordinary people believe the world itself was ending.
From within that chasm, an enormous ice dragon emerged.
‘Is this the real Scathach?’
It was my first time seeing her in person…
‘She looks identical.’
There was no difference from what I’d seen in the game, which somehow deflated my excitement.
Soon.
Han Seol-ah initiated combat.
Boom, boom, boom!
According to plan, Scathach remained stationary and began ‘toying with’ Han Seol-ah.
‘She’s holding her own.’
I checked the timer.
[01:58]
‘…Hang in there, Han Seol-ah.’
I harbored no doubt that she would falter.
Simply offering silent encouragement from within.
I activated my ‘magic.’
Just as Han Seol-ah would channel all her mana to unleash her ‘ultimate technique—Eternal Permafrost.’
It’s said that every hunter on Earth possesses such a ‘ultimate technique’ of their own.
The ultimate technique—the final and most powerful move that could be unleashed by mobilizing every resource at my disposal to slay even the mightiest of beasts.
Lost Honor possessed such an ‘ultimate technique’ as well.
One for each class.
A spell that could only be unlocked after reaching level 99 and completing a special quest.
An ‘ultimate skill’.
The Frost Mage’s ultimate skill was a spell with a concept that grew infinitely stronger with each point of mana invested, and whose range expanded infinitely as well.
“—Absolute Zero.”
I gathered my will and spoke the incantation…
[Charging begins]
The message I’d seen in Lost Honor flashed before my mind.
The moment I witnessed it.
I began operating my mana at full capacity.
“Haaaaaah….”
It felt as though my organs were being torn from my body.
I gritted my teeth and endured.
My lifeline of 50,000 MP.
…I exceeded it.
‘More.’
Nebula’s total MP of 99,999.
I exceeded it!
‘More!’
I kept pouring it in relentlessly.
There was no risk of desynchronization.
This wasn’t ‘my’ mana—I was drawing from the surplus mana I’d stored in Eternal Winter like ammunition, packed tightly like spare batteries!
“Ugh, ughghgh.”
Yet still, blood surged up from my organs.
Even with my body reinforced by EX-grade mana, to suffer internal injuries of this magnitude!
‘It tingles.’
But.
I wasn’t done yet.
The total mana being invested was…
300,000 MP!
* * *
Kuguguguuu-!
The Appraisal Center building screamed. The space itself twisted under the weight, filling the rooftop with an eerie, grotesque sound of rupture.
“…!”
In the War Room within the Hunter Association, Min Ji-hee, who had been monitoring the Appraisal Center through the screen, doubted her own eyes.
Geometric lines of light were radiating outward from the center of the ‘sniper chair’ where the Apostle and Nebula sat.
One, two, ten, a hundred…. In an instant, thousands of magical circles were drawn across the void.
Thousands of magical circles interlocking like gears, overlapping and rotating, constructing a colossal ‘Tower’ that stretched toward the heavens.
“What… in the world…?”
Min Ji-hee wasn’t a mage, but she could sense it instinctively.
This was magic that defied every law of Earth’s understanding.
Midsummer in Incheon.
Yet a blizzard now raged across the Appraisal Center’s rooftop.
Moisture in the atmosphere, seized by terror, had frozen of its own accord—a phenomenon beyond nature itself.
Roooaaarrr—!
The tower of magical circles erupted skyward, piercing through the clouds.
Incheon’s sky was draining of color, turning ashen.
“Insane… is that really a power a human can wield…?”
A gasp of horror escaped Min Ji-hee’s lips.
It was terrifying.
And yet, so beautiful she couldn’t tear her eyes away.
The tower of magical circles began to tilt.
Its direction…
toward where Scathach stood.
“F-fast! Recalculate the coordinates!”
Min Ji-hee screamed out.
“N-no deviation! We’re locked perfectly on Pyongyang!”
The operator, eyes fixed on the monitor amid suffocating tension, cried out in a hoarse voice.
The tower’s movement ceased.
The tilted tower had now become the form of a colossal cannon barrel.
The vibrations that had transmitted through the screen vanished.
The sudden snowstorm, dismissed as an ‘anomaly,’ also stilled.
…the silence before the storm.
Within it.
“Cough, cough. Khkhkh.”
Only the mad laughter of the Apostle, spitting blood, echoed quietly.
Gulp.
* * *
Meanwhile, within that ‘tower’—inside the staff, the core of mana—Frozen was experiencing a rapture bordering on unconsciousness.
[Ahhh… ahhhhh…!]
Those humans outside could only see the ‘shell’ of this colossal magical circle and marvel.
But Frozen could see it. The ‘inner workings’ of this magic.
[It’s perfect… so perfect it’s terrifying…!]
300,000 MP.
It wasn’t merely the quantity that astounded.
The One was controlling that vast river of mana at the nanometer scale.
Each particle of mana found its place with absolute precision.
Hundreds of millions of gears meshed together without the slightest deviation—not even 0.0001mm.
But what truly sent shivers down Frozen’s spine wasn’t that overwhelming computational power.
[Absolute Zero: The Winter That Heralds the End]
My ‘Genesis Attribute’ was forcibly torn from me.
That sacred power—the very breath of creation itself—was being seized by the collar and shoved into the magical apparatus like a component part!
[Ahhh!]
What is a Genesis Attribute?
It is a special authority granted exclusively to Genesis-grade items.
Genesis-grade.
True to its name, it is the classification of items possessing infinite energy capable of gestating ‘an entire world’.
And the Genesis Attribute wields this energy to exercise a miraculous power that no divine skill could ever approach!
An ordinary user would be swept away by the Genesis Attribute.
Simply borrowing the item’s power would leave them grateful, crushed beneath that overwhelming force, gasping for breath—that is the norm.
What unfolded before my eyes was the complete opposite.
[He dominates it!]
Genesis mana mingles between the ‘gears’.
Twisted, carved, compressed.
Within the grasp of the great one, Genesis mana obeys like a docile lamb, melting into the magical circle as ‘fuel’.
[Behold! As the great one shapes mana as one shapes stars, is this not the true meaning of ‘Genesis’?]
Fear born of an incomprehensible gap.
And something far greater than that—ecstasy.
[Absolute Zero: The Winter That Heralds the End]
A mythical spell was born at the great one’s fingertips—the ultimate ability Absolute Zero infused with the Genesis Attribute of Eternal Winter.
Hummmmmm—!
The staff cried out in rapturous exultation.
The threshold had been crossed.
* * *
Beyond my blurred vision, I see Han Seol-ah’s knees buckle as she collapses.
At the same moment, the Black Doll catches her.
From Scathaha’s maw, the ‘dragon’s breath’ is about to erupt.
A moment of absolute crisis.
I calmly turn my gaze and check the timer I’d set floating before me.
[Time Left]
[00:00]
—Exactly two minutes.
[Mana Charged]
[300,000MP]
‘You’ve done well, Han Seol-ah.’
Now, it’s my turn.
As if pulling a trigger.
I flicked my finger.
—Fire.

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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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