Chapter 26

Chapter 26. Tower - Slime Summoner (3)

The slime hanging from the girl’s shoulder spat out a lump of water as if it were spitting.

The Goblin struck in the face by the lump of water had its teeth burst out of its snout like popcorn, its nose crushed as it collapsed with blood pouring from it.

Isn’t its skull caved in?

The slime’s attack was powerful enough.

The problem was the number of Goblins.

What did she do for around twenty Goblins to chase her like that?

I could die without really dying, so being chased like that would not be a huge problem for me, but that girl was different.

No choice, then.

I hid myself between the trees and picked up a hand axe.

It would have been nice if I had learned stealth arts, but Si-woo had said she would teach me those after I had learned the basics properly, so I did not know any.

Still, I could hide my presence and qi wave, so I got behind the Goblin group as stealthily as possible.

WHIRL— THUD!

The hand axe I threw split open the head of one Goblin at the rear.

Huh! I was aiming for the one a little closer.

Naturally, the Goblin that had the hand axe graze right beside it turned around, and before it could fully turn its body, I rushed in and cut off its neck.

Fortunately, the other Goblins were too excited chasing the girl to even notice that their comrade behind them had fallen.

I picked up the hand axe the Goblin had been holding and threw it, splitting the back of a running Goblin. When I missed, I quickly ran in and took its head.

After I dealt with them one by one like that, before I knew it, only seven Goblins remained, and only then did the Goblins and the girl being chased seem to sense that something was strange.

When the Goblins stopped and guarded their surroundings, I threw the hand axe dyed blue with Goblin blood.

The hand axe embedded itself precisely between the brows of the Goblin beside the one I had aimed for.

“Kerrrrk!”

When I revealed myself before the six remaining Goblins, the Goblins flew into a rage.

Now it was six against two.

Assuming that girl did not ungratefully run away.

However, unlike my worries, the girl summoned another slime and prepared for battle.

“Watch your eyes!”

The girl warned me as she raised the slime.

I could not close my eyes, so I raised my arm to limit my field of vision.

A moment later, the yellowish slime burst with light so intense that it made my skin sting.

“Kerrk!”

“Kieeek!”

Two Goblins clutched their eyes and writhed in pain, while the remaining four seemed to have already suffered from it once, because they covered their own eyes.

I threw hand axes and smashed the heads and legs of two Goblins covering their eyes.

“Tsk. Should I learn a throwing art?”

For some reason, they flew in completely different directions from the parts I aimed for.

Still, fortunately, they were close enough that my hit rate was good.

The girl also caved in two heads with the slime that spat water lumps.

It seemed the maximum number of water lumps the slime could fire at once was two, because there was no follow-up attack.

I had wondered why she was running away so helplessly despite having such a powerful attack, but it seemed she did not have many attack methods.

Even so, judging by its power, she should have been able to pass the Tutorial easily enough.

Hobgoblins had better size and muscle strength than Goblins, but their durability was about the same.

I approached a Goblin that had lost its sight and cut off its neck in one stroke.

Once all the Goblins were defeated, the girl sank down on the spot as if her strength had left her.

“Thank you. I survived thanks to you.”

“How did you end up being chased? I heard Goblins usually move around in groups of only two or three.”

She looked like a high school student, but she was still someone I had met for the first time, so I should use polite speech.

At my question, the girl wiped off her sweat and answered,

“I was hunting Goblins, then had the bad luck to run into a Goblin den.”

That really was bad luck.

“Can you stand?”

“Ah... Could you wait just a little? My legs gave out....”

I nodded and opened my qi sense to see if there were any Goblins hiding nearby, then sensed mana leaving the bodies of the dead Goblins.

Half of the mana leaving their bodies scattered into the air, and the remaining half gathered toward me and the girl.

I instantly threw myself aside to avoid it, and the girl looked at me strangely.

Even though I dodged, the mana came to me, lingered near my skin, then disappeared.

In contrast, the girl absorbed about half of the mana that gathered toward her.

“Excuse me, is your body all right?”

“Yes? Ah, I’m fine. For some reason, I feel energized.”

Saying that, the girl slowly rose to her feet, and it did not seem to be a lie.

Not even ten seconds had passed since she said her legs had given out.

At that sight, the old librarian’s words suddenly came to mind: that I had shockingly little “Tower talent.”

And the old librarian had told me I would understand soon. Could this mana absorption be the “talent” the old librarian had been talking about?

My absorption rate was less than one percent of the mana that gathered toward me, while the girl’s absorption rate was, even being conservative, more than fifty percent.

I felt like I understood why Tower Returnees said they had simply climbed the Tower and, at some point, found themselves stronger.

They had killed monsters and absorbed invisible mana, strengthening their bodies, so of course they could not recognize exactly when they had become stronger.

In truth, it was like gaining experience points by killing monsters in a game and growing stronger.

It was just that the stats were automatically distributed.

Come to think of it, “mana,” often used in games, could also refer to the “power of struggle” produced by defeating strong enemies in the South Pacific Polynesian region.

The killed enemy was a kind of sacrifice, and the one who defeated that enemy gained power from that sacrifice.

In other words, the Tower strengthened Climbers by making them kill monsters and accumulate mana.

Why did the Tower invite Climbers and give them trials like this?

If it was raising them like livestock to eat them, then the fact that they could leave the Tower at any time did not make sense.

As expected, would I find out as I climbed the Tower, just as the old librarian had said?

When I stood still, lost in thought, the girl watched me carefully.

“Um... this is all I have to repay you with....”

The girl handed me the magic stones she had collected from the monsters she had hunted.

“Ah, I didn’t help you because I wanted compensation, so don’t worry. The magic stones from the ones I killed are enough for me.”

In the first place, I had only come outside the city to earn Shop Points and confirm my current abilities.

I had earned enough money to use for now, so I had no intention of demanding payment from someone I had helped.

“By the way, is that slime a summoned beast?”

“Ah, yes.”

The girl stroked the slime and smiled bitterly.

“I originally tried to find a party in the city, but everyone looked troubled and said a slime wouldn’t be helpful, so I came outside alone.”

“It’s true summoning-type abilities are said to have a rarity of 5 or higher, so there must be many difficulties early on.”

“Yes? Rarity?”

The girl blinked as if this was the first time she had heard the word rarity.

Does she not know about rarity?

“Did you not look up information about abilities in the library?”

“I did, but I couldn’t find an explanation about my ability. But if rarity is high, is that bad?”

Come to think of it, I had also heard about rarity from the old librarian, not from the Tower Community.

Perhaps comparing ability rarity was something that only became relevant around the middle floors of the Tower.

On the Tower’s lower floors, most Climbers probably had low-rarity abilities, so they likely had no interest in rarity itself.

I drew a graph on the ground and explained rarity to her, just as the old librarian had explained it to me.

“Ah, then my early growth rate will be low.”

“Well, from what I’ve heard, summoning-type abilities have high rarity.”

At my words, the girl let out a deep sigh.

For high-rarity abilities, one had to obtain low-rarity abilities through ability stones to support early growth, or find companions and hunt in a party.

My ability was probably of higher rarity than even summoning-type abilities, but I could grow by spending time in other worlds, so it was not a big problem.

Come to think of it, I had trained in martial arts for a whole four years, or a little over three years by my sense of time, yet if I looked at the Status Window, I was only at a level where I could operate in the 10th-floor range.

According to the Tower Community, one could see the shape of one’s growth in at least three months, so just how high was my ability’s rarity if my growth speed was like this?

Surely it isn’t 9 or 10?

“Um... if it’s all right, could you form a party with me? I absolutely won’t be a burden! No, I’ll be the porter!”

At the girl’s earnest gaze, I thought for a moment.

Looking only at her ability, forming a party with this girl was not a very wise choice.

Even if her ability was rare, this was the 10th floor, extremely early in the Tower, and since summoning-type abilities supposedly grew slowly because they were rare, that was even more true.

However, looking at the mana that had just been absorbed into the girl’s body, climbing the Tower did not seem to depend only on ability.

If anything, that was only natural.

No matter how good an ability was, the person using it was what mattered in the end, and this girl had at least a hundred times more talent than me when it came to climbing the Tower.

Seeing the girl anxiously watching me made me smile faintly.

“You don’t need to be a porter. If you’re fine with it being temporary, let’s form a party.”

When I offered a handshake, the girl brightly took my hand and bowed her head.

“Thank you!”

Seeing her be so grateful made me, who had basically no talent for climbing the Tower, feel embarrassed instead.

“I’m Che... Han Ji-woo.”

I almost introduced myself as Cheon Ji-woo, but corrected myself.

“I’m Lee Soo-young! Seventeen full years old! A bright and lively high school girl! You seem older than me, so please speak comfortably!”

“Uh... I’m twenty-two.”

According to the age displayed in my Status Window, my birthday had passed, making me twenty-one full years old.

“Then I’ll speak comfortably, Lee Soo-young.”

“Please leave off my surname and call me Soo-young!”

For some reason, I felt like my energy was being drained.

As an introvert, I wondered if I could handle the liveliness of Lee Soo-young, who looked like an extrovert at a glance.

“Then should we collect the magic stones first?”

“Okay!”

Lee Soo-young took a dagger from Inventory, extracted the magic stones from the hearts, and cut off the Goblins’ ears.

“Huh? Why are you cutting off the ears?”

Gross.

At my reaction, Lee Soo-young looked flustered.

“Ji-woo, have you not gone to the Climber Association? The Tower has a request there for beginner Climbers. If you subjugate Goblins and bring proof, they exchange each right ear for 100 Credits and merit points.”

Ah, come to think of it, I think the guidebook said there was something called the Climber Association.

There had been so much to look into that I must have missed it.

“The Association sells items necessary for climbing the Tower at low prices, but to buy them, you need to collect merit points above a certain amount. I came all the way here for those merit points too.”

“Really? I only arrived yesterday, so I didn’t know.”

“Ah! Then that makes sense. It’s only been about a week since I reached the 10th floor too. On the first day, I wandered around because it was fascinating that there was a city like this inside the Tower, and I only looked through the Tower Community. I think I went to the Association around the third day.”

I see. But didn’t she say she was a high school girl?

It was early July, so high school should not be on break yet. Was it okay for her to be here?

If she entered the Tower a week ago, would her final exams be all right?

No, was it rude to ask something like this when we had only just met?

Seeing how I worried about her exams before worrying about the parents who probably thought their daughter had gone missing, I really was an unavoidable Korean after all.

Together with Lee Soo-young, I collected the Goblin loot and divided it according to the number each of us had defeated.

We wandered through the forest, mainly along the narrow trail, defeated more Goblin groups, then talked about future distribution as we returned to the city.