Chapter 210: Fifty-Fifth Floor, The Seized Fortress (4)

[Assist the employer in reclaiming the fortress. Time remaining: 47 hours 16 minutes.]

“What the fuck are you doing?”

Without meaning to, I had let my irritation show. Given how consistently Kyuntriachae had gotten on my nerves, it had been inevitable.

“

Eek!

”

Startled by my abrupt appearance through the portal, Kyuntriachae flinched and fully tensed—he was unmistakably flustered.

Doppy followed right behind me and stepped through the portal. “Su-Yeok!”

I closed it and turned to Kyuntriachae once more.

“Answer me. What are you doing?”

“Oh, well. I was suddenly transported here, and I figured I'd wait for you, but then, we-well... I-I got curious, a-and...” Kyuntriachae stammered, fumbling over his words.

Wait? How long has it even been?

The veil had disappeared mere seconds ago—he really hadn’t waited for long.

“And

how

exactly did you break the veil? It isn’t that easy to dispel.”

“With magic.”

I scoffed, “Gosh.”

His magical attacks barely packed a punch, yet when it came to undoing enchantments, he was oddly efficient.

Was he a notorious thief in his younger days?

“You weren’t planning on stealing this, were you?”

“Of course not! It’s just, um, being near it makes me feel at ease. My mind clears, you see.”

Hmm.

No matter how I looked at it, his actions seemed far too suspicious. Even his earlier words had been telling.

When I had first set up the Core of Decay, Kyuntriachae had been quick to claim innocence in the event that it disappeared.

“So you're saying it makes you feel clear-headed? That hardly explains why you had to break the veil.”

“Uh, well. I just wanted to get a little closer, that’s all.”

“

Hah

. Tell me, did you already know about that teleportation spell? Did you pretend to get caught in it?”

“Ridiculous! I told you that I didn’t!”

I found it unbelievable that he had the nerve to act indignant now.

Irritated, I narrowed my eyes. He was throwing a tantrum like a child, yet his words carried the shamelessness of a seasoned con artist.

Seeing him behave like this, plus his childlike appearance, only made me want to flick him on the forehead.

I scrutinized him for a long moment. Unfortunately, as frustrating as he was, there was nothing I could do—at least not yet. I had already wrestled with this dilemma countless times. No matter how suspicious he seemed, I couldn't simply kill him on a hunch.

Rather than getting caught up in another pointless back-and-forth argument, we needed to keep moving.

I exhaled. “Fine. Forget it. Then, what exactly was that teleportation spell?”

“It wasn’t just a simple displacement spell. The entire fortress brimmed with magic.”

Suddenly—

“KRUAAGH!”

“Whoa! What the—?!”

A monstrous roar erupted from the courtyard, reverberating through the fortress walls.

Kyuntriachae clutched his chest in fright.

The guttural, rasping growl belonged to none other than the gatekeeper.

No way.

I immediately sprinted down the corridor, retracing our path. Unfortunately, that only confirmed my worst fears. The shattered suits of armor that had littered the halls now stood upright, looking as if they had never been broken in the first place.

It hadn’t been a teleportation spell. The spell had reset the entire fortress.

“You've got to be kidding me.”

Is this why the tower gave me forty-eight hours?

Given how quickly we had progressed, the time limit had seemed excessive, leaving me slightly confused. Now, everything made sense.

Tch.

Hopefully, the respawned enemies wouldn’t be stronger than before.

I wondered how long this cycle would continue. This floor was turning out to be far more tedious than I had anticipated.

I turned to Kyuntriachae. “It looks like everything we defeated has come back.”

“This just got a lot more annoying.”

“Yeah. First, let’s deal with the gatekeeper.”

I decided to leave the Core of Decay in the hall. There was no telling when the gatekeeper would storm inside, and I needed to take it down before that happened.

***

[Assist the employer in reclaiming the fortress. Time remaining: 47 hours 16 minutes.]

We fought our way through the fortress again, cutting down the same enemies we had already slain. However, we moved far more efficiently this time, having already learned their attack patterns.

Fortunately, the cycle did not repeat again despite my concerns.

That led me to believe that the spell had only been cast to delay in case the dark mage had left. Even so, forty-four hours still remained on the floor’s timer.

Why give me a full two days? Have I been clearing floors too fast?

I couldn’t be sure.

Honestly, the trials seemed to have decreased in difficulty. The fifty-second floor had been an exception, but I had cleared the fifty-third in under a minute.

Normally, these trials factored in time for rest and recovery after battle—forty-eight hours seemed excessive.

Keugh—

I yanked my axe from the beast’s mangled body with a squelch, marking the end of the sixth floor.

Now, only the seventh floor remained, the very top of the fortress. Finally, this floor neared its conclusion.

“The dark mage still hasn’t returned?”

“Indeed. I still don’t sense their presence. We may have to wait for them at the top.”

The enemy reset had triggered on the fifth floor, so it didn’t make sense that the necromancer still hadn’t appeared. It struck me as suspicious.

Once again, I became slightly on guard for a possible betrayal.

As we climbed the stairs, I kept Kyuntriachae within my peripheral vision.

This is the moment to be extra careful.

“Shall we head up?”

“Let’s proceed.”

I took the lead alongside Doppy, keeping Kyuntriachae behind us. Even though he was a mage, I couldn't rule out the possibility that he would try something unexpected. I still didn’t know enough about him.

My muscles tensed as I prepared to activate Flash Strike at a moment’s notice.

The stairway leading to the seventh floor was longer than any of the previous ones. A thick, black sludge dripped down the steps.

Something is definitely up there.

A rancid stench was thick enough to make my stomach churn. Even with the Core of Decay absorbing the corruption, this area seemed largely unaffected.

At last, we arrived.

A heavily reinforced iron door, sealed shut, stood at the top of the stairs. Dark mana pulsed from its frame, lacing sinisterly through the air like a mass of tendrils.

It had been magically sealed shut.

“Can you dispel this one, too?”

“Of course.” Kyuntriachae began chanting, but unlike when he had removed the barrier at the fortress entrance, the incantation dragged on.

“――――――”

Even though he had effortlessly unraveled my Shadow Veil, he was struggling now. This was no ordinary enchantment.

About thirty seconds passed.

Crack—!

The magical barrier encasing the entrance fractured and collapsed. Kyuntriachae, however, looked slightly drained from the effort.

I turned to him. “I'm heading in.”

He took a measured breath and nodded. Though he looked like a child, I reminded myself of his true age. Perhaps casting magic of this caliber weighed on him more than he let on.

I pushed the door open, immediately scanning the interior.

At a glance, it stood out as a laboratory. Oddly shaped vials and alchemical tools cluttered the space, and the entire room was steeped in an eerie, dark aura. It looked exactly like the kind of place a necromancer would inhabit.

However, just as Kyuntriachae had claimed earlier, our enemy was nowhere in sight.

“What now? Do we wait?”

“Yes. In the meantime, I want to examine this place.”

I nodded, shifting my attention to my surroundings.

Strange and unsettling artifacts filled the room, but one object immediately drew my eye—a large, pulsating mass in the corner. Black and gelatinous, it throbbed rhythmically, as if alive.

Its thin membrane of veins glowed blue from the liquid pulsing inside, expanding and contracting in a steady rhythm.

“Kyuntriachae, do you know what this is?”

“It looks like they’re breeding a monster.”

The words had barely left his mouth when the temperature in the room plummeted. A wave of magic surged through the air as a dense black mist slithered in through the windows, coiling like it was alive.

I instinctively tightened my grip on my axe. The swirling shadows condensed, forming into a humanoid figure.

[Delikurn]

The necromancer, draped in tattered black robes, had arrived.

Pulling back the hood of its cloak, the necromancer unveiled its glowing blue skull. It was a lich, a monster I had only ever heard rumors about.

“Kyuntriachae. A new test subject is a pleasant surprise... but today of all days? What poor timing, " the lich murmured, sounding hollow and frigid.

A test subject?

I stiffened.

So Kyuntriachae isn’t the final boss?

That revelation shocked me more than the lich’s sudden appearance.

Given Kyuntriachae’s erratic behavior, I had assumed he would eventually turn on me. He was a demon who had obviously grown senile, with details constantly slipping through the cracks in his memories

“Today is not a good day,” the lich whispered ominously.

Wait... do these two know each other?

A creeping sense of unease crawled up my spine. Given the way they spoke, it almost seemed as though Kyuntriachae was the necromancer’s subordinate.

I immediately positioned myself in front of Doppy, ensuring Kyuntriachae and the lich would have to go through me. If things went south, I needed to be ready to take on both of them.

Surprisingly, Kyuntriachae looked just as bewildered as I.

He squinted at the lich and asked, “Do you know me?”

“Of course I do.”

“Then you’re not some random squatter in my fortress. You came here for me?”

The lich chuckled deeply, his laughter sending an unpleasant shiver down my spine.

“

Hahaha

. Your reactions never cease to amuse me.”

I had no idea what was happening. The lich recognized Kyuntriachae, but Kyuntriachae’s confusion was very clearly genuine.

Unless... Did he forget everything?

BOOM—!

A tremor shook the fortress, originating from the first-floor hall, where I had left the Core of Decay.

Has someone tampered with it?

No, the Shadow Veil remained intact.

Expanding my senses, I absorbed all of the new information. The corruptive energy that had been lingering throughout the fortress was now rushing into the Core of Decay at an accelerated rate.

So the absorption speeds up over time.

I had only used it briefly before, so I hadn’t realized this.

The lich turned his glowing blue eyes toward me, intrigued. “

Hmm

. You’ve set up something peculiar in my fortress. Fascinating.”

His smirk widened. “But I’ll examine it after I kill you.”

He stared eerily at me, his glowing eye sockets burning with deadly intent.

Then, out of nowhere, Kyuntriachae screamed, “

Ah

...

Ack

...

AAAAH

—!”

At the same time, a dark purple mist erupted from his skull—it looked identical to the corruption the Core of Decay had been absorbing.

What the hell is happening?

Even more surprising was that the lich himself looked utterly stunned.

“Wh-what?!” Panicked, the lich hastily began chanting a spell.

“―――――.”

I didn’t know exactly what was going on, but I wasn’t about to let him finish.

Without hesitation, I lunged forward, lightning crackling at my fingertips.

Time to hit first, then ask questions later.

I fired a bolt of electricity, preparing to follow up with my axe.

Unfortunately, before my attack could land, the lich dissolved into black fog, narrowly dodging the strike.

In that instant, Kyuntriachae’s eyes regained their clarity. “You... you bastard... Delikurn! How dare you manipulate my memories and cast a curse of dementia on me?!”

Something clicked in my mind. Kyuntriachae had said the fortress had been abandoned for two hundred years. Yet, he also mentioned that the last time he had returned had been a hundred years ago.

Now that his memories had returned, I realized those two statements contradicted each other.

I recalled what the lich had said earlier.

"A new test subject is a pleasant surprise.”

Wait, did Kyuntriachae fall under the lich’s curse a hundred years ago? Since then, has he unknowingly lured others here as test subjects, just as he did with me?

In some ways, this outcome was almost ideal. If not for the Core of Decay, Kyuntriachae would have still been under the lich’s control. I would have had to fight them both.

Now, Kyuntriachae’s mana flared violently, its raw power surging around him. I now realized he hadn’t lied to me about his power. His strength had just been sealed along with his memories.

The skeletal lich let out a snarl. “

Tch.

Kyuntriachae, you just had to bring in some meddlesome brat and ruin everything.”

With an irritated sigh, the lich thrust his hand toward the pulsating black egg.

“Wake up!”

The massive black egg swelled ominously, its entire surface pulsating with raw, dark mana.

***

「Invisible message: Demon Slayer is now lvl 6.」

「Invisible message: Challenger Kwon Su-Hyeok has completed the hidden mission ‘The Forgotten Memories of the Fortress’s Master.’ All stats increased by 2.」