The city's crowd filled the streets, the sound of car horns and people's noise was an irritating sound in my ears. With every step I took, I hated this damn city more and more, especially seeing him everywhere I went.
On top of a tall building, a huge billboard read:
"One of Japan's most famous hunters, Yoshida Isamu, announced he would enter the 60th Floor!"
"I'm so tired of seeing this nonsense everywhere, nobody respects or cares about normal jobs anymore, everyone just wants to be one of those damn hunters."
“When we asked Yoshida Isamu why he climbed the tower alone instead of with a team, his answer took us all back in time: 'I got here thanks to the man I admired as a kid, Felix Laytn. From here on, I will continue on his path.’”
“Felix Laytn, Felix Laytn! Do I have to hear that guy's name everywhere I go?”
"There's no one who doesn't know him; families tell their kids about his heroics before bed. The first hunter to appear, the man who challenged the highest floors alone. While the rest of the world was working together, he made it to the 70th Floor all by himself while others struggled in the 20s. But after that, no one heard from him again!"
I covered my cursed ears and kept walking through the crowd, exhausted from carrying the heavy bag on my back all day.
"I've worked for months without eating properly, but it was worth it—I've finally got enough money to cover some of my mom's medication!"
With great excitement, I ran to the hospital entrance. Doctors were rushing around, attending to patients. It was the only place where I felt normal, because here, everyone was equal—no matter how strong you were, death was the same for everyone.
I quickly walked toward the reception desk.
"Hello, I've come to visit the patient in room 149."
The woman at the desk lifted her head and looked at me. Her movements were slow, and her gaze was blank, clearly showing how exhausted she was.
"Name?" she asked slowly.
"Come on, I come here every day, I'm sure you know my name," I said with a slight joke, not knowing why I said such a thing.
"Name?" she repeated, without changing her tone or delivery.
"Alexander, but you can call me Alex."
She repeated what I said as if it wasn't enough, "Alexander?"
"Alexander—" I took a deep breath between the two words, "Laytn."
The receptionist turned back to her computer and after pressing a few keys, without lifting her head, she said, "Alright, your doctor is waiting in the patient’s room." She paused, as if thinking to herself, "Laytn, Laytn... wait a minute, you're—" But by the time she looked up, Alex was already gone.
I rushed to room 149. As I cracked the door open and stepped inside, I saw the doctor attending to her. I lowered my head and entered the room, closing the door behind me.
"Hello, Doctor."
"Hello, Alex, you haven't been coming around much lately," he said while still focusing on the patient lying on the bed.
"I’ve been working hard to earn enough for the medication. I’ve finally got the money for the first dose."
"The first dose? You know we're on the fourth dose by now, right? I've been covering for you out of pity, but I can't keep doing that."
I was biting my lips and clenching my fists out of anger. Was it because he pitied me? Does he not care about his patients at all? No, I shouldn't be angry. He's right. I'm pathetic. I can't even afford my mother's medication...
The doctor leaned closer to me and said, "Your mother's condition is getting worse, her recent seizures have increased. With the resources we have, we can only keep her alive for a little longer, that's all. If you want to heal her, you'll need a high-level healer or an equally potent high-grade potion."
I couldn't lift my head out of the shame of not being able to give my mother a better life. After all, I was just a simple craftsman. No matter how much I worked, I could never earn enough to afford a healer or a potion...
The doctor said, "I'll leave you alone with your mother, then," and left the room.
I walked over to my mother and looked at her. The golden hair she once had had faded into a lifeless color. Her once smooth skin had become dry and withered. She was struggling to breathe, and there wasn't a trace of the joyful face she used to have.
"I'm sorry, Mom..."
Tears started streaming down my face like a waterfall. I bit my lips, trying not to scream and curse at everything, holding myself back.
"I'm sorry for everything..."
No matter how much I cried, nothing would get better. The only way for someone like me to make enough money to help my mother was to become a hunter, but it was impossible for an unawakened person to be a hunter.
I left the hospital and headed to my workshop, hoping to make a few more items to sell that evening. This workshop was passed down to me from my father. When I was young, I loved helping him clean and repair his weapons. My father left my mother and me when I was 12, all because of his damned obsession with adventure. Was that stupid tower really that important? Was the price of being the world's greatest hunter abandoning your family? My mother was my father's illegitimate wife, but I always felt that he loved us. He would visit us and take care of us. While his legitimate wife and child lived in wealth and comfort, we struggled to survive in a small house, but my mother never once lost her smile, not until that day.
Six years ago...
My mother, with tears in her eyes, was shouting at my father, "You can't leave, you can't abandon us!" She kept screaming and hitting him, but my father stood there without reacting. I watched them with tear-filled eyes from the side.
My father pulled my mother away and slowly walked toward me. He knelt down, put his hand on my shoulder, and said, "Son, I know one day you'll understand me. One day you'll become an adventurer like your father, and you'll climb the tower. A hunter never gives up on an adventure..." Then he turned and left.
A few days had passed since my father left, but my mother hadn't stopped crying even once. She had stopped eating and wasn't taking care of her health. My mother had been weak since birth and didn't have the strength for hard labor. Her family had died in a dungeon break, and my father saved her at the last moment. That's how they met, and up until that day, my father had taken care of her, but now it was up to me to take care of my mother. I did whatever I had to survive. I stole food, begged for money, and even scavenged through garbage, but eventually, my mother's seizures started. One day, it got so bad that, thanks to people who heard her screams, I was able to rush her to the hospital.
Since that day, my mother has been in the hospital, and I've been trying to take care of her by earning money from the hobby my father taught me. According to the doctor, my mother's illness had worsened because of the sadness she had experienced, and her condition was deteriorating day by day...
Present day, now.
As I walked, lost in thought about the past, I came across a large crowd.
"Everyone, move back! This is not a drill, please move away."
When I looked more carefully to see what was happening, I saw hunters standing in front of a massive dungeon gate.
The gates were different from the tower. Exactly 60 years ago, the gods chose the world as the 0th floor of the tower, and they said if people didn't climb the tower, it would destroy the world. The tower was like a living organism that fed on the world. If we didn't continue to cleanse the tower, it would begin to consume the life energy it needed from the world, wiping out every living thing. At first, people didn't want to believe any of this, but when the gates, as they were called, appeared in various parts of the world, allowing us to enter the tower, and the hunters emerged, they started to believe.
You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.
However, the most significant event that made the whole world accept this occurred three months after the tower appeared. Various portals began to appear in all countries, and after a few weeks of silence, monsters started emerging from these portals and invading cities. Although the world united and somehow overcame this catastrophe, millions of lives had already been lost. This was the punishment for not clearing the tower within those three months. As long as we didn't clear the tower, these portals kept appearing, so countries began forming organizations like hunter guilds to encourage people to become hunters and climb the tower.
With the tower's emergence, our entire way of life changed. Even though the number of portals decreased when we started climbing the tower, they never fully disappeared. If we didn’t clear a portal within three weeks, it would crack open, and the monsters inside would start pouring out. The reason why the hunters were gathered here was probably to clear the portal that had just appeared.
One of the hunters shouted, "Damn it, this stupid knife is useless now. We're about to enter the portal, and my weapon can't even cut anything!"
After hearing what the hunter said, I thought this could be a good opportunity to make some money. I tried to slip through the crowd and approach the hunter. Just as I was about to pass under the tape surrounding the portal, the officials stationed there to keep people away caught me and wouldn’t let me through.
“You can’t pass here!”
Struggling to get free, I yelled, "W-Wait, I can repair that knife!"
Upon hearing me, the hunter called out to the officials, "Let him through."
I slipped out of their grasp, ducked under the tape, and approached the hunter. From his light-looking leather armor, the mask covering his face, his use of a dagger, and his piercing gaze, I could tell he was an assassin-type hunter.
The hunter looked at me and said, “You said you could fix my knife, right?”
“Yes, I can repair it,” I said confidently. In reality, I was nothing more than a simple craftsman who made small items, but I had helped my father repair his weapons many times, so I had a decent idea of how to fix "Tower Weapons."
“Alright, here’s my knife. If you can repair it, I’ll pay you a good amount,” he said.
I took the knife and examined it for a bit, quickly figuring out what it was made of.
“A dagger made from the tooth of a Night Wolf. You must have gotten this from around the 10th floor. Although the Night Wolf’s tooth is strong, it’s a material with a short lifespan and decays over time.”
The hunter, with a surprised expression, asked, "Huh? Do you have an appraisal skill? Or are you a hunter too?"
I finished examining the knife and looked up. “A hunter? No, I’m just a simple craftsman.”
I lowered my bag to the ground and pulled out my hammer and mini anvil. I always carry these tools with me because there are always a few hunters who need repairs wherever I sell my products.
The hunter stared at me in amazement and thought, "Just a craftsman? That anvil must weigh at least 40 kilos, and no ordinary person could carry something that heavy in a backpack."
I rummaged through my bag, looking for a material that could fuse with the Night Wolf’s tooth. “The shell of a Rock Turtle! Although it lives on the 5th floor, the hardness of its shell is equivalent to that of the Night Wolf’s tooth, and it’s much more durable.”
I pulled out a low-level fire crystal from my bag and shattered it over the Rock Turtle’s shell, raising its temperature just enough to shape it.
As I continued working, the hunter watched me and thought, "I feel like I’ve seen him before… wait a minute… isn’t this the kid who kept trying to sell materials in front of the Tower’s gate? Could he actually be this talented?"
I continued hammering the knife, filling in the cracks, and then sharpened the blade’s edges with a whetstone I took from my bag.
“Here’s your knife. I would’ve done a better job, but with the limited materials I have, this is the best I can do. It should still last you throughout this dungeon.”
The hunter looked at me and said, “My name is Nigel.”
“Alex,” I replied.
“Nice to meet you, Alex. I promised I’d pay for the knife, but as you can see, my outfit doesn’t have any pockets. Instead, how about we make a deal?”
I was frustrated that I couldn’t get my money, but the idea of a deal piqued my curiosity. “A deal?”
“Yes. How about you come with us into the dungeon?”
I responded in surprise, “Come into the dungeon? Non-hunters aren’t allowed in dungeons, and that’s basically a death sentence. Are you inviting me to die?”
“Of course not. I know non-hunters aren’t allowed in, but you’re aware that most hunter teams travel with gatherers, right? If we bend the rules a little, we can register you as a low-tier hunter and let you enter the dungeon. You’d get 10% of the materials collected. What do you think?”
“10% of the materials? That’s worth way more than what I’d earn from repairing the knife. With that money, I could help my mother!”
“Come on, it’s just a D-rank dungeon, and our team is made up of C-rank hunters. Besides, I’m part of a B-rank hunter group, and my friends and I have been sent here to clear this dungeon quickly. I promise nothing will happen to you.”
“A B-rank hunter? A B-rank hunter is supposed to be as strong as 100 C-rank hunters. If we have someone like that with us, clearing a D-rank dungeon shouldn’t be too hard!”
“Alright, I accept your offer.”
Nigel, with a broad smile on his face, called out to the team, “Get ready, we’re entering the dungeon!”
The whole team gathered, and together, we passed through the dungeon gate. It was my first time entering a dungeon, but thanks to the stories my father used to tell me when I was a child, it felt as if I had done this countless times before. As I stepped through the gate, a strange tingling sensation washed over my body, and as it passed, I found myself in a completely different place.
The surroundings were dark and gloomy, visibility was poor, and the light from the torches on the walls was almost nonexistent. The stone walls were cold and damp, the ceiling was low, covered in cobwebs. The smell of decaying flesh and dampness was sharp, stinging our noses.
One of the hunters stepped forward and said, “Let the mages light the way with their fire magic. Considering the structure of this dungeon, we’re in a labyrinth-type one. Don’t split up, and try to walk the same path as me. I’ll use my ability to detect traps.”
After walking for a while, we came to a fork in the path.
“Alright, we’re going to split up here. My group will go left, and you will go right. Since your group knows its formation better, it makes more sense to divide like this. I can’t detect any traps on the right side, so it’s logical for you to take that path. I’ll neutralize the traps on the left and catch up to you. I’ve entered dungeons like this countless times, and the trapless path is always the correct one.”
One of the hunters from the other group stepped forward and asked, “Then wouldn’t it be better if we all went to the right?”
With a smile on his face, Nigel replied, “But what if there’s a valuable treasure on the left? Wouldn’t finding it and sharing it be good for all of us? Don’t worry, for a B-rank hunter, avoiding traps in a C-rank dungeon is easy.”
Though the other hunter didn’t seem fully convinced, he had no choice but to accept Nigel’s decision. The groups split up, and we continued on our way. Naturally, I stayed with Nigel’s group.
We walked for a long time, but barely encountered any monsters or traps.
Curious, I asked Nigel, “Wasn’t this supposed to be the trapped path? Isn’t it strange that we haven’t come across anything?”
With a wide grin, Nigel said, “What? Why would we take the trapped path? Didn’t I say that the trapless path is always the right one?”
Confused and worried, I asked, “So, does that mean the path the others took was the trapped one?”
Nigel gave a devilish smile and said, “Hey, why are you asking that? Isn’t it their fault for entering the dungeon without a hunter capable of detecting traps in their group? If something happens to them, there’s nothing we can do except take their belongings and leave the dungeon. Don’t forget, 10% of everything we collect goes to you, so shut up and keep walking.”
I continued walking in horror. What could I do? Should I act like a protector of justice and ask him how he could do such a thing? And then what? He could easily kill me with a single move. I couldn’t leave my mother behind…
“Damn it, after all, you’re just like him, only thinking about yourself. All hunters are the same…”
We walked for a few more hours without encountering anything, and eventually, we arrived at the boss room. As we had expected, none of the others were there. When the boss monster is killed, the dungeon gate opens in the boss room, and you must leave immediately; otherwise, you’ll vanish along with the dungeon as it slowly disintegrates after the boss’s death.
We set up camp for a while in front of the boss room, and later, Nigel and I went back along the trapped path, gathered all the valuable items from the bodies of the dead, and returned to the boss room.
“Take good care of those items in your bag and stay back. When we kill the boss, you’ll get your share, and we’ll leave. Don’t worry too much, Alex. It’s just business.”
I followed everything he said to the letter. The only thing I could do was stand on the side and wait.
The moment we entered the boss room, the door slammed shut, and everything went pitch black.
“I haven’t had visitors in a long time.”
A pair of red eyes appeared in the darkness.
Nigel, filled with fear and anxiety, exclaimed, “A talking monster!?”
“Monster? Hahaha! Quite bold words for a little insect.”
“A talking monster! In a C-rank dungeon?”
Suddenly, the lights turned on, revealing the owner of the glowing eyes in the darkness. A humanoid monster with pale white skin stood before them. From its red eyes and appearance, they realized what it was.
“A-A vampire!”
A vampire should at least be an A-rank monster. Dungeons were different from towers. Each floor of the tower was a world of its own, whereas in dungeons, the monsters were solely focused on killing you. While things in the tower were always the same, rare situations could occur in dungeons, just like the vampire that had now appeared in this C-rank dungeon.
Nigel was trembling in fear, and the other two hunters weren’t any different. One of them was so terrified that he lost his mind and charged at the vampire, trying to attack it.
“YOU’RE JUST A BOSS OF A C-RANK DUNGEON, YOU BASTA—”
Without even standing up, the vampire made a single motion with its arm, slicing the hunter in two.
The other female hunter in Nigel’s party started screaming and crying hysterically, while Nigel dropped to his knees and muttered, “This is the end for us…”
As for me, I was frozen in place, overwhelmed with fear and panic, unsure of what to do, standing in a corner of the room. I had hidden behind Nigel, whom I had despised just moments ago. I was no different from that scumbag, only thinking of myself. I had used my mother’s medical bills as an excuse to scavenge the belongings of dead people, and now, I was getting what I deserved.
“I have no intention of killing you despicable creatures, so I’ll offer you an opportunity.”
“An opportunity? I’ll do anything! I’ll do whatever it takes to get out of here!”
“It’s been a long time since I’ve had fresh human blood, and I’m quite hungry. If you hand one of you over to me, I’ll let the rest go.”
“What? Sacrifice one of us? That won’t work! Isn’t it impossible to leave a dungeon without defeating the boss? But no, even I believed there was a chance just moments ago, so they must believe it too. In this case, it’s obvious that I’m the one to be sacrificed, isn’t it?”
Nigel stood up with a crazed expression on his face and started approaching me.
“W-Wait, Nigel, he’s tricking you! Even if I die, you won’t be able to leave the dungeon without killing the boss, don’t believe him!”
No matter what I said, Nigel wasn’t listening to me. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw the vampire sitting on its throne, smiling devilishly, watching us with delight. It wasn’t giving us an opportunity; it was toying with us!
“Screw it, if I’m going to die, I’ll take this bastard with me!” Among the belongings I had taken from the dead, I had found a dagger, which I had strapped to my waist just in case. As soon as Nigel got close, I drew the dagger and lunged at him, but before I could do anything, he stabbed me right through the heart.
“HAHAHAHA! BEAUTIFUL, JUST BEAUTIFUL!”
Nigel, with a hopeful smile on his face, asked, “I killed him, now you’ll let us go, right?”
“Hmm, I think I’ve changed my mind. How about I kill all of you instead?”
“YOU SON OF A BI—”
The vampire moved at the speed of light, grabbing Nigel by the throat and lifting him into the air.
Meanwhile, my vision was becoming increasingly blurry, and I felt a cold pain in my heart. I was getting colder and colder.
“Hahaha, stabbed by the dagger I repaired myself…” I said, coughing up blood.
My vision completely darkened. I was dying. Just as everything was about to end, a screen appeared in front of me.
[Achievement Unlocked: Divine Comedy]
“Stabbed by your own crafted dagger? Life sure has a different sense of humor, doesn’t it?”
The system is pleased with the scenario created by your passion for craftsmanship and offers you a quest: “Revenge is best served hot! Kill everyone responsible for this pain!”
[0/3]
[Reward: The Path of the Craftsman, Full Recovery.]
[Penalty: Death.]
[If the quest is accepted, one of the craftsman’s skills will be randomly granted for 1 minute, and once the quest ends, the skill will be revoked regardless of the outcome.]
“W-What? What is this? Am I hallucinating because I’m close to death? No, I don’t care what it is, I’ll do whatever it takes to survive.”
[Do you accept the quest?]
“Yes...”