Level -99 Archmage - Chapter 103

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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 103. Found It
The moment the Contribution Points settlement was finalized and Park Chan-woo confirmed the text announcing “Aheta’s Hidden Treasure Vault” had appeared.
Thump!
A door materialized before Park Chan-woo.
A black door just large enough for a single adult to pass through.
Beyond its plain façade lay, unmistakably, the Hidden Treasure Vault.
Creak!
Park Chan-woo pushed the door open without hesitation.
He gave it not a moment’s thought.
‘It had been long.’
This Second Night had proven unusually protracted.
Not in time, but in spirit.
Since the Second Night began, Park Chan-woo hadn’t slept a single hour.
And that was only the beginning.
He’d carved pathways that didn’t exist, passed trial after trial, killed Khan himself—it had all drained his body and mind to the dregs.
Then, clinging to the last shred of will, he’d ground through the remaining quests to accumulate Contribution Points.
That he hadn’t collapsed yet was nothing short of miraculous.
‘I can’t pass out here, not after coming this far.’
Everything he’d endured had been for this single moment.
To make Aheta wail—he’d given it his all.
Even if he couldn’t bankrupt him outright, this was the golden chance to rob Aheta of what he held most dear.
That alone had forced open the carefully hidden Hidden Treasure Vault.
Hold on.
He had to hold on.
Though it felt like dying, like he might lose his mind, he endured through sheer will.
His thoughts sharpened.
‘Aheta is a collector.’
Among all the Creators, Aheta was known to have amassed the most treasures.
That such a figure would deliberately hide something meant only one thing: it possessed extraordinary value.
It must have been so alluring that other Creators would covet it—reason enough to keep it concealed.
Truthfully, Park Chan-woo himself had only just learned that Aheta even possessed a Hidden Treasure Vault.
So naturally, anticipation surged through him.
“……Ah.”
The moment he surveyed the interior, Park Chan-woo let out a thin breath.
A space of staggering vastness.
Within it, countless treasures lay interspersed.
Tens of thousands—perhaps more.
An incalculable number of treasures piled high like mountains.
And each single one was extraordinary.
‘At minimum… Legendary Grade……!’
He was stunned.
So profoundly that his composure shattered and his pupils trembled.
If he could sell what lay here, he could buy the world itself.
The Demon Merchant Guild might collapse.
That was how overwhelmingly vast the treasures were—enough to trip over at every step.
And Aheta had been hoarding all of this.
‘Do I simply choose one?’
Yet there were constraints, after all.
Park Chan-woo lifted his gaze.
Toward the ceiling.
There hung a sign, and upon it were written the rules.
《Time limit: three hours.》
《Entrants may select only one treasure.》
《Observation is disabled in this space.》
《All magic is forbidden here.》
《Equipment and tools are also marked as unusable.》
《Additionally, selecting two or more treasures will cause the entrance to vanish.》
《Treasures taken out will automatically be configured as Specialized Equipment.》
《All materials and Coins required for that configuration will be provided by Aheta.》
It was a long list, but the meaning was simple.
‘Pick just one and take it with you?’
A warning against greed.
It meant he had to choose with nothing but his eye for detail.
In return, the treasure he selected would automatically become Specialized Equipment.
What was Specialized Equipment?
Gear crafted for that person alone.
It wasn’t something that could be made now, naturally.
A name that wouldn’t appear until far into the future had already surfaced.
No matter which treasure he chose, he would have no regrets.
But.
‘The real treasure is hidden.’
Overwhelming treasures and test-like rules.
He saw through the reason for all of it in an instant.
……There was something someone wanted to hide.
So even if someone entered this place, they could never take it away.
Magic, weapons, tools—everything had been locked down.
What could be so precious that it warranted this much concealment?
It was truly fascinating.
Park Chan-woo moved forward slowly, stroking his chin.
He turned his head and surveyed the treasures scattered all around.
‘Some I recognize. Others I’ve never seen before.’
First, he ruled out the ones he knew.
Aheta wouldn’t have constructed a Hidden Vault of this scale just to hide treasures Park Chan-woo was already aware of.
There was something here that rivaled, or exceeded, the Final Sacred Object: Star of Pride that he’d obtained by climbing the Tower of Pride.
‘Something that hasn’t appeared in the Abyss yet. A rare treasure that could fill even the Mystical Compendium—something impossible to obtain through ordinary means.’
So it had to be something he didn’t know.
A mystery and a divine treasure that Park Chan-woo, who had reached Level 99 in the past and researched the Abyss countless times, was seeing and experiencing for the first time in his life.
This was a vault called Hidden.
True to its name, the real thing was concealed somewhere.
Park Chan-woo found himself in the position of having to locate the genuine treasure Aheta had hidden.
Within three hours.
With nothing but keen observation and wisdom.
…Ah, there was one more thing.
‘Mana Wavelength.’
Objects and living beings in the Abyss possessed something called a Mana Wavelength.
Here, ‘wavelength’ differed slightly from ‘pattern.’
Mana Pattern represented that ‘existence’ itself, so unique rules were bound to exist.
It lay hidden within the core of existence.
‘Wavelength’ was the force that poured outward, pushing against other things.
The force that allowed an individual to exist as an individual.
If a Mana Wavelength didn’t exist, one couldn’t push against other presences, and without pushing, one would simply vanish.
Death in the Abyss occurred this way.
Becoming dust and disappearing happened because that existence lost its Mana Wavelength completely through death.
The moment of dying was when this Mana Wavelength ceased to exist.
‘Mana Wavelength is the force that allows us to exist in the Abyss. When it disappears, we’re eroded by the Abyss’s poison and turn to powder.’
That was also why only Abyss-forged equipment could kill Abyss monsters.
Objects from Earth lacked a Mana Wavelength.
Only awakened humans who entered the Abyss gained a Mana Wavelength.
Information gleaned from the results of long research.
Scholars who came to understand this far had grown curious.
“If we awakened an object from Earth and gave it a Mana Wavelength, couldn’t we use it within the Abyss?”
Earth weapons were devastating in their destructive power.
Guns and bombs, and nuclear weapons.
They were more powerful than most magic and required no Mana.
But even if you unleashed nuclear weapons on the Abyss, they dealt no damage.
Because the nuclear weapon itself lacked a Mana Wavelength.
Without awakening the nuclear weapon itself, it was impossible to affect the Abyss’s ecosystem or lifeforms.
But there was no way to awaken a nuclear weapon.
And so the hypothesis remained nothing more than hypothesis.
Because we never knew how humanity first awakened in its entirety.
But there was one thing.
Park Chan-woo had delved deeper into the concept of “Mana Wavelength” before.
More precisely, that is.
He could sense “Mana Wavelength” instinctively.
It was one of the qualities of a “Grand Mage” that the God of Sacrifice had mentioned.
‘The stronger the Mana Wavelength, the higher the rank and status one possesses.’
This too was only natural.
In the Abyss, a “Mana Wavelength” was emitted more powerfully by stronger beings.
But there was only one way to gauge the true power of a Mana Wavelength.
‘You have to touch it directly to know.’
He had to touch it himself.
Only physical contact would tell him.
The thickness and power of the wavelength, and such.
This wasn’t his first time using Mana Wavelength to sense something.
‘…When Khan tore Agzos apart, I sensed his Mana Wavelength.’
It was thanks to the “Mana Wavelength” that he’d discovered Khan’s weakness.
The moment Khan had ripped Agzos apart.
The instant Khan’s hand made contact with Agzos, Park Chan-woo had sensed the Mana Wavelength that the Conqueror Khan radiated.
Khan was emitting the exact same wavelength that could be felt throughout Khan’s Palace, where he now stood.
That’s how he’d been certain.
That Khan’s Palace was Khan’s weak point.
‘I don’t have time to touch and verify everything.’
The problem was the sheer quantity of treasures.
If he couldn’t use magic, if he couldn’t summon anything, that meant he alone had to verify every single treasure in this place.
Mountains of insane treasure that looked to number roughly a hundred thousand pieces at first glance.
How was he ever going to verify every treasure here one by one?
Three hours wasn’t nearly enough.
Squeak-squeak?
That was when it happened.
Bokshil burst out from his chest.
‘There was no rule about pets.’
Come to think of it, the rules had contained nothing about “pets.”
Still, it didn’t seem like Bokshil would be particularly helpful here.
Squeak-squeak-squeak!
Bokshil expanded as if stretching itself out.
Soon the fluffy mass of fur left his side and began burrowing frantically through the treasures.
Whoosh!
Dash-dash-dash-dash!
The speed was extraordinary.
It was rummaging through all the treasures at a velocity barely visible to the eye.
“What are you doing?”
Whether Park Chan-woo asked or not, Bokshil continued weaving between the mountains of treasure for quite some time.
About ten minutes or so had passed.
Thump!
Rumble-rumble-rumble-rumble!
Bokshil, now enormous, approached him again and dumped out a pile of treasures.
Then, gazing directly into his eyes.
Squeak!
It let out a confident cry.
What was it saying?
Or rather, what had it done?
The act Bokshil had just performed was….
‘…Could it be?’
Park Chan-woo touched each of the treasures Bokshil had dropped one by one.
And.
A broad grin.
He looked at Bokshil and spoke with a radiant smile.
“Bokshil. You’re truly a blessing.”
Squeak!
Praised, Bokshil bounced up and down gleefully.
He rolled this way and that, expressing his feelings through movement.
He wanted to offer more praise, but now was the time to focus on these treasures.
These treasures.
All of them possessed a strong Mana Wavelength.
Aheta’s Hidden Treasure Vault was divided into roughly ten sections, each crammed with approximately ten thousand treasures stacked densely together.
Just now, Bokshil had covered one entire section in ten minutes.
And he’d brought back only those items with the strongest Mana Wavelength among them.
Whether it was his influence or not, it was clear that Bokshil could sense the Mana Wavelength to some degree.
Besides, his small size and quick speed made him ideal for this.
‘This just might work.’
Park Chan-woo clenched his fist.
The real treasure that Aheta had hidden away.
Or rather, the treasures—there was now a real possibility he could find them all!

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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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