A week had already passed since [My Home Tower] first manifested on Earth.
“Hello, everyone, and welcome!”
“This is Tower View Reviews, your Youtuber for all things emerging from the Tower!”
“So, what do we have for you today?”
“We’ll be taking some time to review items acquired from the hottest new destination: [My Home Tower]!”
Under the glow of a yellow light, a series of strangely atmospheric objects began to appear one by one before the camera, arranged on a desk.
A subtitle briefly flashed across the screen, stating that holy water had been too expensive to procure.
“Do you know what this is?”
The first item he presented was a watermelon, though it was far from ordinary.
Two watermelons were fused together side-by-side, creating a shape strikingly reminiscent of a peanut!
“What? You’re saying the melons (TL Note: A play on words, `mongmi` sounds like a vulgar term for breasts, amplified by the large, fused watermelons) are huge?”
“I was surprised when I first saw them too!”
“These watermelons really do look like they’d make you swear— *ahem*!”
“Why am I the only one touching the good stuff?”
“You think my hand movements are suspicious?”
“Oh, come on, everyone, what kind of thoughts are you having?”
“This is just a watermelon, a watermelon!”
“This isn’t *that* kind of channel!”
As the watermelon’s peculiar appearance subtly invited misunderstanding, the chat window exploded with activity.
Although dozens of users were blocked by the moderator for posting inappropriate comments, the broadcast continued unabated.
After slicing and tasting the watermelon, comparing it to a regular one, the atmosphere gradually warmed and mellowed.
Next, jerky, reportedly purchased from a climber, was introduced.
“And this is… ‘Bomb Rabbit Jerky.'”
“You can obtain it by clearing the trials of [My Home Tower]’s second floor, and it’s said to grant a [Explosion Resistance] skill for the first consumption!”
“It supposedly reduces explosion damage by a whopping 70%!”
“I’m going to try it now!”
After consuming the jerky, he instructed his assistant to throw pellet bombs at him, claiming he would test its effects.
“It really feels like I’ve gained resistance!”
“Pellet bombs exploded on my body, but it didn’t hurt at all!”
“It’s almost ticklish!”
Jokes like ‘Can you handle a grenade too?’ and ‘I’ll send 100,000 won if you survive a nuclear bomb!’ flooded the chat, further intensifying the broadcast.
“There’s even a rumor that long-term consumption evolves it into [Explosion Nullification].”
“I’ll be experimenting by eating one every day to see if that’s true.”
“Alright, let’s move on to the next item!”
The next segment showcased a variety of otherworldly products: dragon hide, silk crafted from the wool of a sheep-spider, Minotaur milk, Cockatrice eggs, and rainbow-colored mushrooms, among others.
Five years had already passed since the Towers first appeared on Earth.
Why, then, were people so captivated by the diverse array of products emerging from the Towers?
The reason lay in the unique properties of [My Home Tower].
Unlike other Towers, which primarily spawned aggressive monsters such as goblins, slimes, ogres, and cyclops bats, acquiring otherworldly resources typically required either risking life and limb through direct harvesting or trading with the ‘Tower Residents’ occasionally encountered on upper floors.
However, [My Home Tower] presented a different paradigm.
By allowing all these items to be directly traded with Tower Coins, it facilitated an unprecedented influx of otherworldly goods into the Korean market!
Naturally, various online communities and forums once again reacted with explosive enthusiasm.
****
[Author: Static Mage]
[Title: Blown Up by a Rabbit on [My Home Tower]’s 2nd Floor, But I Resurrected LOL;;]
What kind of messed-up Tower puts something like *that* on the second floor?
Seriously, I approached it because it looked so cute, but then some crazy Berserker next to me tried to kill a rabbit, and it just went *bang*, blowing up and killing him;;
Then, it seemed the other rabbits recognized us as enemies too, because they all just went *click* and exploded.
Of course, I died along with him.
But when I came to, I’d resurrected outside the Tower, LOLㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋ
If it weren’t for that resurrection buff, I wouldn’t even be able to post this on the forum, LOLㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋ
–Why did the rabbit explode, WTFㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋ
└Is it some kind of Killer Queen’s Sheer Heart Attack, LOLㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋ
└『Sheer Heart Rabbit』 has… 『no weaknesses』…!
–A Tower that kills you with explosions from the second floor? Is this for real, LOLㅋㅋㅋㅋ
–I think I saw something like this in Warcraft…
└Ugh, my head…!
–Still, if you don’t attack them, they’re docile, so it’s fine.
└That’s a relief. I thought they were those carnivorous rabbits from Re:Zero, LOLㅋㅋㅋㅋ
–After seeing this, I want to raise a bomb rabbit.
└Officer! This person is raising bombs at home!
└Whoa, illegal bomb mass production ㄷㄷ
****
[Author: Lyans]
[Title: My Story of Milking a Minotaur and Becoming the Protagonist of Labyrinth Food]
No way, a Minotaur actually had udders, LOLㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋ
I didn’t believe it, but a creature that genuinely looked like it could be milked appeared, for real LOLㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋ
They said Minotaurs are carnivores, so I gave it some jerky from the second floor and said, ‘Good boy~,’ and it ate it, then just lay down on its own and let me milk it, LOLㅋㅋㅋㅋ
I could milk 1L really quickly, so I cleared the trial in no time.
As a reward, they gave me a 500ml carton of processed Minotaur milk, you know?
I drank it right after I got it, and it tasted nutty, and the effects were insane LOLㅋㅋㅋ My muscles grew immediately LOLㅋㅋㅋㅋ
Glad I watched Labyrinth Food, LOLㅋㅋㅋㅋ
–Are you some kind of tamer? How did you domesticate a Minotaur??
–WTF, I died trying to milk it, got gored by its horn.
└You have to time it right. You can approach when its horns are lowered.
–Is this a Tower or a farm experience, LOLㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋ
–Labyrinth Food come to life, LOLㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋ
–I thought the Tower was an RPG, but it turns out it’s a slow-life simulator, LOLㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋ
–Minotaur milk is so popular they say there’s a waiting list now, LOLㅋㅋㅋ
–I chose to dissect a bomb rabbit, and even though I followed the instructions, it still went *bang* and exploded.
└Someone actually chose that???
└If you eat the jerky beforehand, you don’t die, so it’s manageable? They even let you make mistakes up to three times.
└Oh, so dissecting the rabbit is more profitable than the Minotaur?
└No, my body survived, but all my equipment got blown away by the explosion, so I have to get new gear, WTF.
└LOLㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋ
└So the equipment couldn’t handle it, LOLㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋ
└After seeing this, I’m going to dissect a rabbit naked.
└???
****
[Author: CheeksGodGame]
[Title: What Appears on the 4th Floor]
On the fourth floor, you’ll encounter sheep-spiders.
They’re literally a sheep + spider.
They have the head of a sheep, but eight eyes and eight legs, and their bodies are covered in web-like fur that resembles sheep’s wool.
They’re larger than a human, making them truly horrifying to behold.
However, to clear the trial, you have to shear the sheep-spider’s wool.
They say if it’s too difficult, you can just capture and bring back one [Venomous Sheep-Spider] from another area, but all the climbers who went to capture it were dissolved by the venom and died…
It seems to be a potent venom that even [Angel’s Blessing (Minor)] cannot ward off.
So, I just cried while shearing the sheep-spider’s wool.
But it was surprisingly docile, and its wool was incredibly soft, which was nice.
After shearing its wool, I actually grew fond of it.
–Sheep-spiders are scary at first, but they’re really docile and cute LOLㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋ
└But seriously, their first impression is cheating… it’s like a horror game all on its own…
–The blanket made from their wool is sold in the Tower, and it’s incredibly soft and warm.
–Still, there’s a certain satisfaction to shearing their wool. The *snip, snip, snip* sound of the scissors is surprisingly therapeutic LOLㅋㅋㅋ
└Shearing wool and milking… isn’t this basically a real-life Mabinogi?
└Ah! This Tower was actually Erinn!
└Even there, sheep-spiders don’t live, WTFㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋ
****
Beyond these, posts continued to describe other trials: on the fifth floor, one had to collect honey from spear-wielding bees, known as [Spear Bees]; and on the sixth floor, where pigs with mushrooms growing on their backs resided, the trial involved harvesting ten different types of mushrooms.
As climbers ascended the Tower, they shared their knowledge and exchanged strategies they had discovered, gradually growing accustomed to its peculiarities.
Conversely, floors dedicated not to trials but to relaxation also garnered immense popularity.
One climber boasted of having eaten Hellflame Dragon Steak.
An insomniac claimed to have slept soundly for the first time in their life at the Milky Way Hotel.
Another climber expressed delight, stating that after bathing in the carbonated hot springs, their skin had become smooth and they had even lost weight.
And then there was the climber who wept openly (…), lamenting that after a consultation with a Succubus, they lacked sufficient Tower Coins for additional services.
Moreover, with the maid in the first-floor lobby announcing that free movement to other floors would soon be possible, climbers’ expectations soared day by day.
[My Home Tower], a place where bizarre trials and astonishing relaxation coexisted.
Climbers traversed its depths, laughing joyfully like children.
Yet, the delightful festival created by the Tower remained solely the story of its climbers.
****
Meanwhile, the South Korean government was plagued by an incessant stream of meetings and reports.
Every ministry—Foreign Affairs, National Defense, Intelligence, Science and ICT, and even Health and Welfare—attended daily ‘Tower-Related Practical Response Meetings’ to engage in discussions.
With information about the Tower being released almost in real-time and rapidly spreading across the internet, the government’s efforts to respond swiftly proved futile.
“Complaints are erupting from various nations, alleging that the South Korean government is attempting to monopolize the resources of this new Tower.”
“The United States, France, and Russia have each requested to dispatch climbers, and in Japan, there have already been observed attempts to access the new Tower by preemptively sending their own climbers.”
At the Foreign Minister’s report, a heavy silence descended upon the conference room.
“And then there’s… the holy water.”
“Numerous middle powers are exploring purchasing options, with some having formally requested it via official documents, complete with attached budget proposals.”
“If this holy water is released to the public, it will unleash uncontrollable religious and social chaos!”
“It must absolutely remain under state control!”
“However, the perception of monopolization is even more perilous.”
“We must at least feign consideration of an international co-management system to alleviate diplomatic pressure.”
“We haven’t even secured enough for our own citizens to use… so are you suggesting we sell the holy water abroad?”
The Minister of Health and Welfare responded to his query.
“When a pandemic threatened public health, how desperately did we scramble to secure vaccines first?”
“Yet now, to hand over this holy water, whose true nature remains entirely unrevealed, to other nations first—that is, quite literally, an abandonment of national interest.”
The conference room was enveloped in silence, and the atmosphere grew heavy.
Even beyond holy water, the appearance of items like [Tears of the Archangel] or [Essence of the World Tree] signaled that the situation had already surpassed the government’s capacity to manage.
Meanwhile, the instigator of all this turmoil—Crow, ranked 9th among world climbers—had gone into hiding.
He was the individual who first revealed [My Home Tower]’s holy water to the world, and as the first to encounter the [Tower Administrator], he garnered international attention.
However, only fragmented information circulated about Crow, suggesting he had cut off contact and was solo-climbing remote Towers across the African continent.
No one could accurately pinpoint Crow’s whereabouts, and some nations even floated conspiracy theories, claiming Crow was ‘colluding with the Tower Administrator to establish his own power base.’
Furthermore, the [Glory Guild] and the [Blacksword Guild], both of whom had supported Crow’s statements, were the two largest climber federations in the country.
They had unofficially conveyed their positions to the government regarding the current situation.
[Hiding such sensitive information and then having it exposed later would only increase the risks. It would be better in the long run to disclose a certain level of information from the outset and seize the initiative.]
— From a statement by the [Glory] Guild representative
[This is an unstoppable tide. As long as climbers continue to ascend the Tower, monopolizing such major information is impossible. Instead, we should first discuss how to leverage the existence of this Tower to enhance national capabilities.]
— From an internal report by the [Blacksword] Guild’s Strategy Office
The government accepted the pragmatic advice from the [Glory] and [Blacksword] Guilds and completely readjusted its response strategy.
Under the judgment that ‘securing the initiative’ was more crucial than ‘information concealment,’ the subsequent government measures were as follows:
First, all future transactions involving materials and holy water related to the new Tower must occur exclusively through the government; unauthorized removal or leakage will incur severe penalties.
Second, additional special personnel will be deployed in front of [My Home Tower], the source of the holy water, to strengthen control and surveillance over climber access.
Third, the government plans to establish a state-led distribution system for the Tower Coin-based economic system.
Following this, they were formulating response policies for requests from various countries, but…
“China… their silence is, in fact, the most frightening aspect.”
Indeed.
China was unusually quiet.
There were almost no official statements or unofficial reactions.
Not only was there no mention of the Tower, but there was also no discernible activity from related ministries.
However, that silence was an ominous harbinger.
“…Before they make a move, we must prepare ourselves first.”
The government immediately began drafting response scenarios to counter potential Chinese intervention.
Satellite surveillance was intensified, cybersecurity defenses were upgraded, and informal information-sharing channels with neighboring countries were discreetly reactivated.
But—
Would that alone be enough to stem this colossal tide?
The higher floors of the new Tower, which no one had yet ascended.
What ‘mysteries’ awaited there?
To what extent this gift, bestowed by the [Tower Administrator], would shake human society—
No one knew yet.
