An enigmatic tower suddenly materialized near the heart of Seoul.
Already, countless people had converged at its base, forming a bustling throng.
“Due to the emergence of a new tower, entry beyond the control line is strictly prohibited. Your cooperation is appreciated!”
A police officer, clad in a yellow vest, shouted into a megaphone, while dozens of citizens murmured restlessly before them.
The newly appeared tower bore a resemblance to the Tower of Babel, yet it loomed far grander and taller, its majestic form visible from anywhere in Seoul.
As citizens flocked to witness the tower’s emergence, police and barricades held them back.
Above, control drones whirred, intensifying the palpable tension.
“Ah, I was hoping to grab some delicious gukbap (TL Note: A Korean soup dish, often served with rice) from the restaurant nearby, but it looks like that’s not happening today…”
Someone muttered with a hint of regret, their voice quickly swallowed by the surrounding din.
“We continue our report. As of now, the tower was first observed around 12:15 PM today, and the [Glory] Guild has dispatched an advance team to investigate it. There has been no word from the advance team yet, and other climber guilds are reportedly showing interest in this tower.”
Reporters, impeccably dressed and speaking with refined articulation, relayed updates on the tower’s situation from before the barricades.
“[Glory] Guild’s advance team, how long has it been since they entered the tower?”
“Approximately 30 minutes have passed.”
‘…That’s odd.’
Meanwhile, members of the [Glory] Guild had set up tents around the tower, anxiously awaiting news from their advance team.
Despite having carefully selected and dispatched their most capable members to prevent any mishaps, Guild Vice-Master Yoon Seojin (TL Note: The name is Yoon Seo-jin, but written as Yoon Seojin for flow) frowned deeply.
The agreed-upon time for their [Tower Exit] had long passed, yet the advance team had not returned, even in the absence of any apparent issues.
“Surely nothing serious could have happened? You, Seojin-nim (TL Note: An honorific suffix used to show respect), know best the strength of our guild members, don’t you?”
“Everyone deployed has experience climbing over 40 floors of a tower; they are truly skilled individuals.”
“They’re such a reliable team, I’d wager they could even take down a dragon if one suddenly appeared!”
“That’s precisely why I’m even more worried.”
“One never knows what might emerge from a tower, especially a newly manifested one like this.”
While other guild members expressed confidence in the advance party’s strength, assuring that nothing untoward would occur, Vice-Master Yoon Seojin remained visibly anxious.
He paced around the tower, clenching and unclenching his fists, his worry evident.
“Now, now, don’t fret so much! Why don’t we go to that gukbap (TL Note: A Korean soup dish, often served with rice) place right ahead and get a hearty bowl of Sundae-gukbap (TL Note: A type of gukbap made with Korean blood sausage)?”
“You’ve probably skipped lunch coming here because of this sudden tower, haven’t you?”
“Haa… yes, now that you mention it, I am quite hungry.”
“Very well, let’s eat first—”
At that very instant.
–Fwaash!
A pillar of light erupted at the tower’s entrance.
From within it, a lone figure emerged.
“What in…?”
“A-A pillar of light has appeared before the tower! And inside… Ah! It’s one of our guild’s advance team members!”
“Oh! Have they returned safely?”
Vice-Master Yoon Seojin’s worried expression finally eased.
Soon after, another pillar of light materialized, revealing Park Chunja and Ban Hwiyul as they too returned from the tower.
However… an unforeseen problem suddenly arose.
“…They are all unconscious.”
Every returning member had their eyes rolled back, utterly unconscious.
Fortunately, they were still breathing and their hearts were beating, yet their appearances were utterly ravaged, as if they had narrowly escaped death.
Their eyes were unfocused, seemingly devoid of spirit.
“This is an emergency. Deploy the healers immediately. Also, notify the nearby hospital. This might not be a simple fainting spell.”
“Um… both healers are currently inside the restaurant, eating gukbap (TL Note: A Korean soup dish, often served with rice)—”
“Gukbap?! At a time like this, how can they even think of eating?!”
“I’ll fetch them at once!!!”
The healer, who had just been about to take a piping hot, spicy mouthful of bean sprout pork gukbap (TL Note: A Korean soup dish, often served with rice) fresh from the restaurant, suddenly found themselves—
“The Vice-Master demands one of the healers come out immediately!!!”
“What?! I ordered gukbap (TL Note: A Korean soup dish, often served with rice) because I thought there wouldn’t be a shift change!!!”
“I told you to order according to the shift schedule! Now hurry up and go!”
Ultimately, they abandoned their gukbap (TL Note: A Korean soup dish, often served with rice) and rushed to the scene, beginning to heal the unconscious advance team members.
However, despite the healer’s repeated attempts to cast debuff-cleansing spells, they proved entirely ineffective.
“That’s strange… there’s nothing physically wrong with them, and no status ailments like curses or dark magic seem to be affecting them either… It just looks like they fainted from shock.”
“So, we can’t wake them up right away?”
“Perhaps if I just pull their cheek a bit, they’ll wake up?”
With that, the healer grabbed Ban Hwiyul’s cheek and gave it a firm tug.
“Uwaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah!!!!”
At once, Ban Hwiyul’s eyes snapped open, and he awoke with a piercing scream!
His eyes were consumed by an almost bursting terror, and he gasped for breath, his body trembling uncontrollably.
Ignoring the healer who had stumbled back in shock from the scream, Vice-Master Yoon Seojin stepped forward and began to calm him.
“Are you alright? Take a deep breath first.”
“Ugh, hah! H-huh…! Hooo…!”
Only after Yoon Seojin gently rubbed his back, helping to stabilize his breathing, did Ban Hwiyul’s gaze return to normal.
Ban Hwiyul remained slumped on the ground, frantically patting his face and body before finally letting out a sigh of relief.
“You seem a little better now. May I ask what happened inside?”
“…I came back to life.”
“…What did you say?”
“I came back to life… I died once, and then I was revived!”
“What in the world are you—”
–Fwaash!
At that moment, another pillar of light materialized, and Kim Chunsik and Elizabeth returned.
The healer, who had been subtly attempting to sneak back to their gukbap (TL Note: A Korean soup dish, often served with rice), was dragged back to assess the condition of the two newcomers.
Upon examination, the remaining two were also determined to be unconscious from shock.
Just then, an ambulance, having arrived after receiving the call, began transporting the still-unconscious advance team members to the hospital.
Following closely behind, Ban Hwiyul and Yoon Seojin boarded a gray sedan.
A healer also joined them, just in case, and promptly burst into wails.
“Uwaaah! My spicy bean sprout pork gukbap (TL Note: A Korean soup dish, often served with rice)!”
“…You, be quiet for a moment.”
At the Vice-Master’s visibly angry tone, the healer cowered into silence.
Ban Hwiyul steadied his breathing and began to report on the situation.
“First… I will explain what we experienced on the first floor.”
****
“…That concludes my report.”
“Well done. For now, get some good rest at the hospital.”
After listening to Ban Hwiyul’s entire report, Yoon Seojin sent him off to the hospital with the healer.
Left alone, he stroked his chin, beginning to ponder the information he had just received.
‘The first floor is clearable just by breathing, and it grants a resurrection buff that lasts for a day…’
Such an unprecedented advantage was truly astonishing.
Resurrection—even if it was a one-time effect granted immediately upon entering the tower—no other tower had ever offered such a boon.
Consider other towers.
There were small towers, 20 to 30 floors high, easily climbed even by novice adventurers.
Medium towers, 40 to 60 floors, challenged those with moderate experience.
And then there were large towers, 80 to 90 floors, reserved for the most skilled climbers.
Though varying in size, their fundamental structure remained consistent.
Most towers featured similar difficulty levels across their first five floors.
Seemingly designed as spaces for growth, they began easily but gradually escalated in difficulty.
In the early stages, only weak monsters like fire-boar, horned rabbits, and giant mushrooms appeared.
Rewards were modest: job-specific skills or small amounts of tower coins.
However, this nascent tower was drastically different.
Its very structure was anomalous.
The trial on the first floor was incredibly, almost unbelievably, easy.
Yet, it offered the aberrant reward of resurrection.
This implied an underlying motive.
‘On the second floor, he mentioned hundreds of exploding rabbits…’
That, he surmised, must be the reason.
The second floor, on the surface, seemed simple.
Survive for 30 minutes.
There were no attack conditions, nor any rules forbidding the killing of rabbits.
But according to Ban Hwiyul, all those rabbits were, in fact, [bombs].
What appeared to be a simple survival mission transformed into a high-difficulty evasion trial the moment one attacked the rabbits.
Surviving for 30 minutes amidst exploding rabbits?
That in itself was already a trap.
‘Then, what if there had been no resurrection buff?’
A question suddenly struck Seojin.
If this tower had sent climbers to the second floor without the resurrection buff?
The outcome would undoubtedly have been annihilation.
The [Glory] Guild would have dispatched another search party to find their missing advance team.
However, with no information whatsoever, the subsequent party would have met the same fate.
‘…Was an intermediate [Tower Exit] even possible in this tower to begin with?’
Even Kim Chunsik and Elizabeth, who had declared their intention to escape via [Tower Exit], ultimately died and were resurrected.
Therefore, what if it was a tower where even a [Tower Exit] was impossible?
It would mean that one could neither leave nor relay information without dying first.
If the third and fourth floors also prevented exit—
This was not a tower; it was bait.
A structure designed for climbers to enter and perish.
Yet, from its very first floor, this tower offered a resurrection effect called .
In other words, it was .
By repeatedly living and dying, information would accumulate, thereby guiding them to discover a path forward.
Though seemingly benevolent on the surface, its true nature was utterly malicious.
‘On the surface, it appears peaceful, but in reality… it’s a system where information can only be accumulated if someone inevitably dies. Truly… insidious.’
Yoon Seojin thus concluded.
He then quietly began drafting a report to be submitted to the Guild Master.
****
Meanwhile, on the 95th floor of [My Home Tower].
“Yahoo!!! Internet cafe, here I come!!!!”
[By consuming 150 Tower Coins, a portal leading from the 95th floor to outside the tower will be generated.]
The thought of finally using the internet after decades sent Ariel Tricia into an ultra-high (TL Note: A Korean slang term, ‘cho high,’ meaning extremely excited) state, unleashing her long-suppressed instincts!
She was so eager to leave the tower quickly that she even created a portal using the precious resource of Tower Coins; that alone spoke volumes!
Initially, Jibsa had tried to dissuade her, citing the danger, but Ariel Tricia had eventually convinced him by arguing that she needed to properly assess the outside situation to protect ‘our home (the tower)’!
In any case, having found a way out, Ariel Tricia immediately jumped and dived into the portal!
“Alright! Let’s GO to a digital world brimming with love, dreams, hope, and dopamine!!!!”
–Crunch!
“Aargh!”
However, her diving attempt was abruptly halted by an invisible wall before the portal.
‘What on earth? Was my diving angle off?’ she wondered, checking the newly displayed system window.
[Access denied.]
[Current entity: Ariel Tricia cannot exit the tower.]
“You f*cking sh*t! tlqkf (TL Note: A Korean internet slang term, ‘tlqkf,’ which is a phonetic rendering of a strong expletive in Korean. It is used to express extreme frustration or anger.)!!!!!!!!”
Ariel Tricia could no longer hold back her curses, letting them erupt in a wail of despair.
“Uwaaaahhhhhh!!!!!!!!”
She then burst into incredibly sorrowful tears, like a small child whose ice cream had been snatched away by a passing bully…
‘This… is a Tower Administrator…?’
The system itself began to worry about the future of this tower.
