The Crazy Battle God Has Returned - Chapter 219

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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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A Mad Swordsman Returns – Chapter 219

Around the time Han Yu-sung entered the Tower of Records.
A message appeared before the eyes of people across the entire Earth.

[Earth’s players, ‘Han Yu-sung’ and ‘Blaze Carter’, have been invited to the Proving Ground. These players will ascend the Tower….]
[The two players’ conquest of the Tower will be broadcast live.]

And massive screens appeared across the world.
The screen was divided exactly in half.
On one side, Blaze Carter, a player from the United States, was shown conquering the Tower.
On the other side, Han Yu-sung’s ascent of the Tower was being broadcast.
Actually, that description is inaccurate.
To be more precise.

“…Blaze isn’t even climbing the Tower at all?”

Han Yu-sung was the only player conquering the Tower.
Blaze Carter was stuck on the 1st Floor.
He had yet to destroy the Iron Guardian, the monster on the 1st Floor.

“Other players all went up….”
“Ugh.”

The American players watching the situation let out sighs of frustration.
Other players had initially struggled like Blaze.
But they quickly found solutions and ascended, presenting a stark contrast.
It was even more pronounced when thinking of Earth’s other player, Han Yu-sung.

[Remarkable.]

The Lords watching the Tower recalled the scene they had witnessed moments before.
It was the moment Han Yu-sung destroyed the Guardian on the 1st Floor.

[To think he destroyed that Guardian in a single strike.]
[And he’s human, no less. An unexpected development. That other races couldn’t pass through, yet a human was the first to break through.]

An attack utilizing the Thousand Blood Swords and Blood Soul Heavenly Strike.
This was hardly surprising. These two techniques were widely known to the public.
But what captured their attention lay elsewhere.

[Executing different techniques simultaneously with both hands…? Hmm.]
[The power was also incomparably stronger than what he normally wielded. I suspect he may have acquired a special skill.]
[A skill whose origin remains unknown.]

The Lord of Shadow was conversing with the Lord of Training.
They were not close acquaintances. However, having endured the Hero’s War together, they had become somewhat familiar with one another, and more importantly, they shared a common interest.
Curiosity about Han Yu-sung.
This was the reason the two had begun conversing.

[Every time I see him, I grow curious. Where does he obtain such skills? The Lord of War only recently entered the orbit—she couldn’t possibly be his patron.]
[It’s a question all Lords active on Earth would wonder about.]

Naturally, no one possessed the answer.
The Lord of Shadow gazed at Blaze Carter wandering on the 1st Floor.

[I’ve heard something about that Guardian. He possesses the power to ignore damage below a certain threshold. However, it seems that threshold continues to lower as time passes.]
[Wait, that means….]

The Lord of Training fell silent upon hearing those words.
The players who had been wandering on the 1st Floor gradually ascended to higher levels as time passed. Likely because the damage threshold had lowered.
Then, what of Han Yu-sung, who had cleared it on his first attempt and ascended?

[…It seems some significant change must have occurred.]

The Lord of Shadow murmured thus, his gaze fixed upon Han Yu-sung.
Meanwhile, the one drawing everyone’s attention was Han Yu-sung himself.

Crash!

“That, that man. What on earth is he doing?”
“He’s smashing through the maze! What kind of madness is this?”

I was breaking through the 1st Floor and now traversing the maze of the 2-3rd Floors.
More precisely, I was ‘destroying’ the maze.
I advanced by punching through the maze walls that blocked my path, my movements radiating unbridled audacity.

“Is that even possible?”
“If it were, everyone would just smash through the maze and clear it. It varies by Difficult Realm, but typically they’re designed to be unbreakable.”
“Then what about Han Yu-sung?”
“Who knows—maybe he found a weak point in the wall….”

Or he’s breaking something that shouldn’t be breakable in the first place.
More importantly, destroying a maze’s walls isn’t a sound strategy.
Especially not in a maze like this one, where the structure constantly shifts.

“A maze always has a predetermined route. If you destroy walls like that, the route will inevitably collapse. Since this maze’s structure keeps changing, he’ll end up completely lost later.”

Experienced players made such assumptions.
The Lords watching from the spectator stands thought the same.
Destroying walls in a maze designed this way wasn’t a wise move.
Was he just a man who relied on brute strength?
That’s what the Lords seeing Han Yu-sung for the first time believed.

[That can’t be right.]

The Lord of Shadow refuted their thinking.
Han Yu-sung wasn’t the type to swing his power thoughtlessly. There had to be some intention behind his actions.
What that intention was became clear almost immediately.

[Hmm, that’s….]
[Could it be—he’s located the ‘mana core’?]

The variable maze was constructed from mana itself.
Naturally, a separate ‘core’ served as the center of that mana.
The mana core constituted the maze and, by learning the actions of those who entered it, continuously evolved the maze.

[…How did he find something hidden so carefully?]

The watching Lords expressed their doubt.
The mana core was that important. It had been concealed in the maze’s deepest recesses, surrounded by countless obstacles.
Han Yu-sung had pierced through all of them and reached the mana core.
As if he were certain it would be there.

A deep resonant hum echoed out.

Han Yu-sung stood before the mana core.
Sensing an intense threat, the mana core unleashed a torrent of raw magical power.
That power spawned monsters and transformed into countless spells.
And just as those spells were about to rain down upon Han Yu-sung.

Boom!

The spells reversed direction, pouring instead toward the monsters.
The mana core itself froze momentarily, caught off guard by this unexpected turn.
Han Yu-sung seized the opening without hesitation.

Slash!

With a single stroke, I severed the mana core at the heart of the labyrinth.
That was the end.
As the mana core vanished, the labyrinth began collapsing at a rapid pace.
It was inevitable—the source of mana had disappeared.
Soon, a vast empty floor revealed itself.
Han Yu-sung climbed the staircase that descended to the floor’s end.

[Han Yu-sung (Earth) has cleared the 2-3rd Floors, 【Variable Labyrinth】.]
[The player advances to the next floor.]

Everyone fell silent.
Those watching from Earth, and the Lords observing from the stands alike.
The sight demanded nothing less than silence.

[Did you say that human belongs to Earth?]
[Isn’t that where the Trial was recently opened? Remarkable, isn’t it? A player of that caliber emerged from such a small world?]
[Considering the timeframe, it’s even more astounding.]

The Lords had never held Earth’s players in high regard.
A world where humans—a race deemed weak among the many species—were the dominant inhabitants.
And they had only recently been selected as subjects of the Trial.
Any strong individual emerging from such a place was beneath their expectations.
That was the consensus among the Lords.
And now.

[Player Han Yu-sung has conquered the 4th Floor of the Tower.]
[Player Han Yu-sung has conquered the 5th Floor of the Tower.]

That assumption was crumbling completely.
The Lords watched Han Yu-sung ascending at a breathtaking pace as if mesmerized. The speed was simply that astounding.
A pace that exceeded the existing records.

[Is that man trying to shatter the record?]
[…How far have the other players progressed?]
[A player of the Harmuk race is currently conquering the 4th Floor. Among players excluding that man, he seems to be the fastest.]

Han Yu-sung had now entered the 6th Floor.
The gap was nearly two floors. Who would have thought that a player from Earth would stand at the forefront of Tower conquest?
Even the people of Earth who knew his abilities hadn’t predicted this.

“What is this? Am I imagining things? I feel like I’ve seen this before.”
“Me too. Didn’t the Captain conquer the Tower once before?”

The Baek Min-jun Party, Han Yu-sung’s loyal subordinates, felt the same way.
They were watching Han Yu-sung’s Tower conquest from the Arca Building. Sung Ha-yan and the other newcomers were watching together as well.
They had definitely seen this sight before.

“Right, when the Captain conquered the Tower of Blood Demon last time….”
“Ah, I remember now. It was when we were under the Woman Who Cuts the Moon. I recall us saying we were envious while watching.”
“Wait, but hold on.”

In the past, when the Tower of Blood Demon had risen on Earth, Han Yu-sung had conquered that tower at an incredible pace as well.
However, there was one critical difference between then and now.
Sung Ha-yan asked carefully.

“…The two towers don’t have that much of a difficulty difference, do they?”
“Well, that’s true. Since it’s a tower created by the Blood Demon, it’s not easy, but even so, it’s not something you can compare to that tower.”
“Even the powerful ones from other worlds are struggling with it.”

Yet he was breaking through that tower without any difficulty.
Baek Min-jun swallowed hard, watching Han Yu-sung climb the Tower.
In that moment, a thought crossed his mind.

‘If he conquers that tower….’

What kind of reward could possibly be coming my way?
It was a thought that arose naturally, unbidden.

* * *

[You have entered the 7th Floor, the domain of 【Heart’s Eye】.]
[This is a place where the darkness of the abyss dwells. Navigate this space where nothing can be seen, using the ‘eye of your heart’.]

The moment I arrived on the 7th Floor, a suffocating darkness enveloped me.
It was literally a space where I couldn’t see even an inch ahead.
I tried summoning flames just in case, but it proved useless. The thick darkness shrouding everything consumed the light itself.
As I turned to survey my surroundings, I clicked my tongue.

“Calling it the ‘eye of the heart’ is being generous.”
[It’s no different from being told to rely on my senses to navigate through darkness. Needless to say, there are probably dangerous things scattered everywhere.]
“I’d call it textbook, really.”

I expanded my Predator’s Senses widely.
Just as Kakasha had predicted, countless monsters lurked hidden in the darkness. The presence of magical energy suggested there were traps as well.
It reminded me of the structure of the Hermit’s Research Laboratory that I had conquered in the past.

“Hmm….”
[What’s wrong? You seem troubled.]
“No, something’s just been bothering me.”
[Bothering you? What is it?]

Kakasha expressed his confusion.
I had climbed the Tower at an astonishing pace. And throughout my ascent, I couldn’t shake off a strange sense of incongruity.
The source of my unease stemmed from the structure of the Tower of Records itself.

‘It’s not an easy tower. It’s definitely high-difficulty….’

I recalled the text I had seen before coming here.

[Lords of many worlds, and mighty warriors who have demonstrated remarkable feats. A special event shall be held for you to showcase your strength.]
[Participate in this event and prove your power. Those who demonstrate themselves as the strongest shall be granted fragments of an ‘Eternity-rank’ item.]

This event, the Proving Ground, conveyed a singular message to all participants.
Prove your strength.
Of course, conquering high-difficulty towers was itself a process of demonstrating one’s power.
But.

“When I consider the rewards, it feels rather underwhelming.”
[Hmm, you’re certainly right….]

An event offering fragments of an ‘Eternity’ item as its reward, no less.
Yet the structure proved far simpler than I had anticipated—a tower where participants competed only in records, with no direct confrontation between challengers.
Perhaps that was why.

“Something feels like it’s missing. There must be more to this.”

Han Yu-sung had conquered countless Difficult Realms in his previous life.
Trials, events, towers—all of them.
That experience now screamed a warning to me.
The first stage of the Proving Ground could not possibly end this easily.

“Well, I’ll understand once I reach the top.”

The Top Floor of the tower was not far away.
Once I reached the end, whatever lay hidden in this stage would be revealed.
I gripped my blade and began moving forward.
Into the darkness where not even an inch ahead could be seen.

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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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