I Conquered the Tower with the EX-Class Character That I Raised - Chapter 77

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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 77
“How much can you handle?”
Yereche’s voice trembled as she witnessed Scathach’s true form drawing near.
A single one had driven South Korea to the brink of annihilation—Han Seol-ah’s ultimate counter boss…!
And there were two of them.
“I can kill all the other monsters before they reach the Fortress. As for Scathach…”
Han Seol-ah calculated coldly.
Where do I stand right now?
Watching the back of the one called ‘Apostle’ who walked ahead, my ice magic had improved tremendously.
Even Frozen described such talent as ‘genius-level’!
Given sufficient time, I was a genius capable of opening new horizons in ice magic.
However, I lacked absolute time.
Frozen assessed me coldly.
[You’re still insufficient to face both.]
“…I’ll take one.”
Han Seol-ah gripped her staff firmly, steeling her resolve.
“Now I understand why Special One—no, Apostle said ‘endure’ rather than ‘win.'”
As the situation reached its extreme, Yereche’s voice grew oddly calm.
“The other one… I’ll hold out somehow.”
Scathach’s roar grew increasingly distinct.
* * *
I had made my decision.
Hadn’t I been thinking about it since before entering?
That I would sacrifice no one.
I moved my hand gripping the Sung-dan carefully and thrust it deep into the center of the Outer God’s strangely pulsating heart.
A bizarre sensation transmitted through my fingertips—as if pushing through soft, muddy flesh.
[You have damaged the Outer God’s heart.]
A glowing red system window obscured my vision.
“Damn it.”
Status windows from Outer Gods always looked like this.
An ominous crimson reminiscent of blood.
Status windows in this world each possessed their own unique ‘color.’
If we speak of gods, the supreme god.
The most powerful, the ‘gold’ that guides the fundamental rules of the world.
Below that are ordinary red-tinted ‘warnings’ or ‘notifications.’
Tower-related status windows are blue or green-hued.
Meanwhile, status windows related to Outer Gods were a sickly, viscous blood-red that made one’s stomach churn merely by looking at them.
“Disappear.”
I ignored the window blocking my vision and carefully drove the blade deeper.
Squelch— squelch!
The black heart emitted a sickening sound as it spilled dead, mud-like black blood in grotesque spurts.
In that instant.
[The Outer God gazes down upon you]
Keeeeeeeeee—!!!
“Ugh.”
Every sound in the world evaporated, and a bone-chilling tinnitus—as if tearing through my eardrums—crashed against my ears.
A violent sensation, as though someone had extracted my brain and crushed it, obliterating my spatial awareness in all directions.
That distant godhood from beyond the dimensional veil had merely cast a single glance, yet my body felt as though it would shatter.
“Damn…it!”
Using the star cluster embedded in my heart as a staff, I clenched my teeth so hard that blood seeped from my gums and endured.
Crunch…!
From beyond the sky, something massive and ominous writhed, and a catastrophic gravity descended that threatened to snap every bone in my body.
I felt as though I would cough blood and be driven into the ground at any moment.
Yet with veins bulging in the hand gripping the sword hilt, I endured this as well.
It was the Outer God’s curse.
Because the subordinate I had created by sending down my heart faced death, the Outer God imposed an equal death upon the one who caused that death—an irrational curse.
If this continued, I would die from the curse immediately after killing the heart.
This curse cannot be blocked or evaded.
After all, it is a curse descended from the godhood known as the ‘Outer God’.
If such tricks could work, it wouldn’t be a godhood.
Instead, there is a way for me not to die.
That is, to offer a sacrifice in my place.
On the previous floors, when I had killed the Outer God’s hearts, there were plenty of sacrifices available in the surroundings.
But the 94th Floor was a battlefield created by the twisted complications of clearing the 90th Floor—a place where only I existed.
Kill the heart in such a place?
That would simply be suicide.
From the beginning, I had no choice but ‘escape’ or ‘failure’.
‘This damned Tower.’
So, while preparing to climb the 94th Floor…
I carefully selected the personnel to assign to the Defense Team.
And I laid groundwork with them beforehand.
…So they would ‘gladly’ sacrifice themselves in my stead.
Of course, one might think it would have been easier to bring that sacrifice with me from the start on the Offense Team.
But the Tower’s environment was not so forgiving.
There was no hunter capable of accompanying me while enduring the gravity and toxicity of the 94th Floor’s Offense sector.
Before I could even transfer the curse, the sacrifice’s body would have been destroyed first.
So the sacrifice had to be sent to the Defense Team side.
Here lay the first obstacle.
The Outer God’s curse descends upon ‘me’, who belongs to the Offense Team.
Of course it does. I am the one who eliminated the heart.
However, I need to transfer this curse to someone on the Defense Team.
How should I do it?
…The method was simple.
“Hah.”
I closed my eyes.
The more I concentrated my mind, the more I felt time flowing slower around me.
The interval between each breath stretched infinitely long.
The Outer God’s madness surged forward as if it would tear my consciousness apart at any moment, but instead of forcibly resisting, I released the tension from my body and let my inner consciousness sink endlessly deeper.
Thud!
In exchange, my body crashed pathetically to the ground, but my inner self was now as serene as a clear mirror and still water.
In other words, I had reached the state of perfect clarity and stillness.
Using the Constellation as a medium—carefully pierced so as not to stop the heart—I channeled my inner energy through its strange pulsation.
My power seeped into the Outer God’s heart like ultrafine dust settling deep within the lungs.
And through that inner energy…
I found the line connected to the Outer God’s ‘opposite’ heart.
‘There it is.’
It was difficult to express in human language, but if I had to compare it, it was like two holes bound together by a single thread—a strange connection point.
I had found the spatial coordinates of the space connected to the Outer God’s ‘opposite’ heart.
Once I understood this, everything else was simple.
I firmly committed those ‘spatial coordinates’ to memory so I wouldn’t forget them, then withdrew the Constellation.
In the slowed time, I could see black blood pooling slowly in the sword mark left by the Constellation.
Before the Outer God’s curse rushing toward me could strangle my throat, I raised the Constellation above my head and explosively drew upon my remaining inner energy.
Now all that remained was to sever the ‘spatial coordinates’ I had just discovered in a single stroke to transfer the curse.
I poured out my inner energy.
Whoooosh—!
My inner energy blazed like flames along the Constellation’s blade.
It was a beautiful golden light.
The state where energy burned like flames along the sword’s edge.
…It was the technique I had named ‘Sword Qi’.
Because my inner energy—the purest and most refined force of all—enveloped the Constellation’s surroundings, there was nothing in this world that could not be cut.
The power was proven by how easily I bisected the Outer God’s shell in a single stroke.
But what I needed to do now was beyond what Sword Qi could accomplish.
To sever the abstract concept of space itself, I needed a power that far transcended Sword Qi.
I needed a stronger blow.
Pour more inner energy into it?
Until it’s sufficient?
Unfortunately, that approach wouldn’t make me stronger.
Cutting through the Outer God’s physical body.
That was the pinnacle of what Sword Qi could achieve.
I had to cut through something beyond that.
Something that transcends the physical realm.
For example.
The true form of a divine entity—an Outer God.
Blade energy alone could not cut through it.
Something more was required.
And in the genre world I referenced, naturally enough.
There existed a realm beyond blade energy.
Energy that spread in all directions like flames. Sharp, yet ultimately a fleeting force scattered into the void.
I would contain it.
Like a blacksmith tempering steel, I hammered my inner force and compressed my internal energy to forge a solid mesh network.
Forging the inner energy emanating from my constellation and overlaying it upon the blade formed by my force.
Clang—! Clang—!
The sound of hammering echoed from somewhere distant.
‘What…?’
Originally, I would have needed to concentrate intensely on spirit, power, soul, and everything else for ages, straining until success was uncertain…
Yet somehow, the forging was already complete.
‘…’
Now that I thought about it, the timing-matching mini-game I had repeated countless times while crafting weapons in Lost Honor felt remarkably similar to this sensation.
As if… Ha Sung-woon had been trained all this time for this very moment.
‘Unsettling as it is, I have no luxury to ponder the system’s intentions.’
Lost Honor was always a strange game.
For now, I had to accept it at that.
Setting aside my doubts, I focused on the constellation before me.
Between the constellation and the forged mesh… a ‘space’ had formed.
Now, into that space…
I pushed my inner energy.
Crackle—crackle—crack!
The compressed inner energy screamed.
An enormous amount of blade energy trapped within the mesh collided with itself, straining to burst free.
A rampage that threatened to sever the master’s wrist at any moment.
I suppressed this recoil.
Not through force…
But through perfect control.
At a single point, I brought it to a halt.
Perfection.
The moment my will touched the blade.
The raging force stopped dead, as if it had been a lie.
The energy, interlocked without a single gap, trembled no more.
Even the surrounding sound seemed swallowed by a vacuum—perfect silence.
‘It’s a shame there’s no master here to marvel at this.’
If that Chinese Mushin had witnessed this, wouldn’t he have coughed up blood and collapsed?
From the star formation, a torrent of golden flames erupted anew.
Unable to escape outward, the flames became trapped within the forged mesh, beginning to swirl inward.
Without pause…
I continued forcing my inner energy inward.
Uuuuh—!
The star formation trembled and wailed.
The sword of qi enveloping the star formation quivered as well.
Into the empty space… golden flames were accumulating.
Gruuuung—
The flames clumped together, coalesced, and merged.
Unable to burst outward, they pooled and accumulated inward.
Compressed.
The flames that had shone golden, upon crossing the critical threshold, gradually began to tint with a black light resembling the night sky.
Crack! Crackle—!
Like lightning within storm clouds, the energy compressed to its limit flickered intermittently yet threateningly, as though it would detonate the instant it was touched.
The sight resembled a cluster of stars in the night sky.
Bound and imprisoned, held at a single point—in that moment, qi transcended the barrier of matter and became罡.
Qi had finally transformed into罡.
Sword qi becomes罡.
A constellation forged from sword qi.
Its name: Sword罡!
“Heh heh…”
To put it in terms of martial arts, it was both a finishing move and an ultimate technique.
Blood dripped slowly from my lips.
A sense of complete depletion, as though hollowed from within, engulfed my entire body.
With trembling hands, I raised the star formation.
‘I’ll cut.’
And slowly, but with absolute certainty, I brought it down.
Screeeech—!
The moment that primal, overwhelming intent made contact, the mesh binding the qi shattered beyond its limit into countless fragments.
Simultaneously, the sealed constellation of the night sky, releasing its suppressed violence, erupted explosively toward the front.
Kwaaaaa—!!
A pitch-black trajectory extended outward, devouring the darkness itself.
The Outer God’s heart, which would have deflected ordinary sword qi, was silently erased without any resistance whatsoever.
Yet that was not the end.
Screeeech…!
With an eerie tearing sound, a dark fissure was etched across the empty void.
Transcending the physical body, even the abstract concept of ‘space’ existing beyond it was—
Completely severed in two.
And in that gap.
The Defense Team—Kim Chul-soo’s face appeared, pressed right against the core.
“Kim Chul-soo!!!”
Chul-soo reflexively turned to look at me.
Startled eyes, yet in the next instant, steely resolve crystallized within them.
Chul-soo leaped into the severed spatial rift!
* * *
Chul-soo had not forgotten Ha Sung-woon’s words—that as time passed, the core would swell enormously and a new Gate would be created.
So even after constructing, reinforcing, and fortifying the earthen walls and establishing defensive positions, he provided support from a distance with B-rank divine power, never once allowing his attention to waver from the core.
As Chul-soo guarded the core and observed the unfolding battle, his insides were burning with anguish.
Han Seol-ah, Yereche, and Lee Ah-woon faced Scathach.
All of them were desperately carving away at their own lives.
‘Sung-woon, hurry. They’re all reaching their limits soon!’
“Uuuaaahhhhh!!!”
Yereche unleashed a blood-curdling cry, pouring forth divine power.
Scathach’s tail, swung with enough force to shatter the earthen walls, cut through the empty air.
To block that tail as it whipped like an iron flail, Yereche thrust her own body into its trajectory.
Crash!
Rather than physically blocking it, she was closer to using her own body as a shield to protect the fortress’s barrier, taking the brunt of the impact instead.
“Kugh—!”
A devastating impact severe enough to crush a body reinforced with divine power.
Yereche gritted her teeth, suppressing the bestial scream that threatened to tear from her throat.
Even amid the agony of bones and flesh being crushed, Yereche did not break.
Rather, with vicious tenacity, the immense divine power coursing through her entire body instantly restored her flesh.
“Nothing to it, Scathach!”
Over that defiant cry tinged with bravado, a small voice followed.
[Well done, insect!]
I couldn’t fathom how such skill emerged from that tiny frame, but…
Rat-dol swept in all directions at imperceptible speed, severing, deflecting, and parrying the cascading icicles.
Thanks to this small yet reliable escort constantly drawing attention, Lee Ah-woon could stand in place and concentrate entirely.
Occasionally, shards of icicles shattered by Rat-dol scattered about, leaving lacerations here and there, but he seemed utterly indifferent.
His skin split across his entire body, blood gushing forth in waves.
It was the price of forcibly drawing extreme power from within his body to weave spirits.
Yereche lacked the divine power to spare for reinforcing and healing herself, so…
Lee Ah-woon’s treatment fell entirely to Chul-soo.
Even though Chul-soo poured healing without pause, Lee Ah-woon’s wounds showed no sign of closing.
The moment a wound began to seal, fresh flesh would tear open again, and instead of blood, pitch-black spirits would scatter forth.
Those spirits that appeared would fly toward Scathach, cling to her, explode, and vanish in repetition.
“Heh…”
‘…Hmm. His mind hasn’t shattered, has it?’
When Lee Ah-woon’s life force drained faster than Chul-soo’s healing could replenish, Yereche’s S-rank divine power would surge forth at precisely the right moment, allowing them to narrowly slip past death’s threshold—a pattern that repeated itself over and over.
Thus, barely holding on, three hunters interlocked like gears against a single Scathach, achieving what could only be called a miraculous formation.
‘…Remarkable. Truly.’
A boss entity that had nearly destroyed South Korea with just one individual—was that not Scathach?
It was worthy of being called a miracle.
And.
Puff-puff-bang!
What was even more astounding was that Han Seol-ah was driving back the remaining Scathach entirely alone.
When Scathach had descended upon South Korea as a Break Boss in the past, the battle had been a desperate struggle of helpless endurance—a far cry from the spectacle unfolding now.
Though she had grown by leaps and bounds since meeting the Apostle, the fact that she was landing such devastating consecutive blows against a beast with perfect type advantage—’Freeze Immunity’—was a talent beyond standard measure.
‘I don’t know how she’s landing effective hits on a Freeze-Immune Scathach.’
Each time Han Seol-ah’s magic struck, Scathach shrieked in agony and scrambled backward.
The problem was that the damage… was insufficient.
There was no decisive finishing blow to kill Scathach.
Of course, after driving Scathach back, she showed signs of preparing a powerful finishing strike, but…
The cunning Scathach refused to wait for that magic to complete.
Yet it was only a matter of time.
From the midpoint of the battle, Han Seol-ah had shifted her strategy, using sharp restraining techniques to pin Scathach’s movements and divert its attention, while secretly preparing a lethal grand spell beneath the surface.
Once that magic completed, she could eliminate this Scathach…!
The moment Kim Chul-soo became certain of this.
Crack—
“?”
The core, which absolutely had to be protected, suddenly split with a sharp sound.
‘What? Is the core swelling?’
Tensing as he recalled Ha Sung-woon’s warning, the core didn’t swell at all—instead, it split clean in half.
And from the cracked seam, an abyss of darkness so alien and grotesque it couldn’t be called mana began pouring out in thick, gurgling waves.
‘He said I should… jump in? Is this a sign of a new Gate opening?’
But that wasn’t it either.
Just black sludge bubbling up and fouling the ground.
At first glance, it looked so ominous and dangerous that breath caught in one’s throat.
It was different from the development Sung-woon had described.
‘Is this right?’
As Chul-soo deliberated.
“Kim Chul-soo!!!”
Ha Sung-woon’s voice reached him.
“!”
Kim Chul-soo immediately leaped into the split core.
That instant.
A terrible gaze fixed upon Kim Chul-soo.
“Ugh!”
My heart stopped like a lie—a sudden, complete cessation.
My blood vessels froze, my vision blackened into absolute darkness, and my soul began to slip free from my body.
Thump—!
The power of the Immortal Ritual activated.
My stilled heart resumed its pumping, and the ritual’s cold grip seized me by the collar, forcibly dragging me back from the swamp of death.
“Gasp! Haaah…!”
The moment I gasped and my eyes snapped open, I realized I was plummeting helplessly into an abyssal void.
I couldn’t gauge which direction I was falling or how far I’d already descended.
For all I knew, in this twisted Dimensional Rift, my body might be suspended upside-down in empty space.
“Gasp! Haaah!”
In that strange sensation where even the flow of time felt absent…
[?!]
I sensed that colossal presence far above me suddenly recoil in shock.
It was strange, but unmistakably real.
[!!!]
And then that entity’s attention turned away from me.
“…What the—?”
Crack! Craaack!
The small Dimensional Rift through which my body had barely escaped suddenly trembled and convulsed violently.
An invisible, merciless force seized the fissure and began tearing it open without restraint.
The taut membrane of space tore with a sound like stretching fabric, rupturing helplessly.
Beyond the torn edge of space, something formless darker and more viscous than the pitch-black abyss itself began to ooze forth.
Something…
An ‘incomprehensible thing’ that defied definition, that threatened to corrupt the mind merely by witnessing it…
was crawling through.
The moment I perceived this.
[Outer God-■ gazes down upon the 94th Floor…]
[Unauthorized Access]
[Warning: Immediate Evacuation Required]
Golden messages and crimson warnings flashed in rapid succession.
[Warning!] [Warning!]
The warning messages clung to the invisible ‘massive entity’s’ body like foreclosure notices.
And so I could dimly discern its form.
It was the shape of a whale.
An enormously colossal whale.
And its entire body was covered with countless tentacles…
This ‘tentacled whale’ paid no heed to the system’s warnings, continuing to tear and widen the space with fervent intensity.
[Warning. Covenant Violation in Progress]
Then.
A brilliantly radiant golden message materialized, blocking the whale’s path.
The Whale seemed unable to ignore this message, hesitating for a moment.
[Lee Ah-woon]
…?
A hunter’s name…
It spoke.
Crack—crack—crack!
With a horrific sound, space itself tore asunder.

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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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