The Tower had several systems. The most prominent were the status window and the item window. Tapping your left chest once would open the item window, and tapping your right chest would open the status window.
The second was the notification system. When a Hunter hunted in the Tower or met certain conditions, the Tower would inform them of the fact. And when they achieved a feat that was either a first or something no one had ever accomplished, a notification was sent to all Hunters.
This time was no different.
[You have killed 10,231 goblins on the 1st floor of the Tower.]
The moment someone accomplished a feat on the 1st floor of the Tower that no one else had, that notification was delivered to all Hunters. Naturally, everyone thought the same thing.
"What kind of crazy bastard kills over ten thousand goblins on the 1st floor?"
"He must be out of his mind."
That the Hunter who achieved this was by no means normal. That was why, the moment the notification spread, Kim Jeong-bin thought the person responsible was Park Jin-soo.
‘Only an unconventional person can produce an unconventional result.’
He was certain, so he prepared immediately. Before Park Jin-soo entered the Tower, he sent special forces there to prepare for any unforeseen circumstances.
‘In that sense, Park Jin-soo is the best.’
Of course, even as he made preparations, Kim Jeong-bin thought that Park Jin-soo would not show any hostility.
‘He’s the type of man who can’t stand by when he sees a crime.’
To anyone who hadn't committed a crime, Park Jin-soo was more harmless than any other being. The life he had lived was proof of that. So, when Park Jin-soo, having returned from the Tower, greeted him with a bright smile and showed goodwill, Kim Jeong-bin was not surprised.
"A Ticket to Challenge the Floor King?"
"Yes. An alert popped up after I killed all the goblins and gave me that."
But faced with the news Park Jin-soo brought back, Kim Jeong-bin was at a loss for words for a moment.
‘This is a reward I’ve never heard of.’
The term Floor King itself was something Kim Jeong-bin was hearing for the first time. That was why it was so shocking. Kim Jeong-bin was a man who prided himself on having more information about the Tower than anyone else.
At least in South Korea, there was no one who knew the Tower better than him. And yet, even he was hearing this for the first time?
‘Uncharted territory.’
Proof that a Hunter named Park Jin-soo had reached a place no one else had ever reached. At that, Kim Jeong-bin did not hesitate.
"Mr. Park Jin-soo."
"Yes."
"It seems we have something important to discuss, so let's move to another room. I've also had a meal prepared."
"A meal? What is it?"
"I've prepared what you requested back then."
"The chicken legs?"
"Yes."
And at Kim Jeong-bin's proposal, Park Jin-soo also did not hesitate.
"Let's go right now!"
There were hundreds of chicken brands in South Korea. A mountain of drumsticks, made by gathering only the fried chicken drumsticks sold by those brands. As Park Jin-soo gazed upon it, his expression was a mix of wonder and ecstasy.
"I didn't think you'd actually prepare this."
"I can only apologize for the delay."
"No, not at all. It was my dream to eat chicken to my heart's content just once like this. Thank you for making that dream come true."
These weren't empty words; it truly was Park Jin-soo's dream to eat all kinds of chicken to his heart's content like this.
"It was a really unreasonable request."
So he expressed his sincere gratitude to Kim Jeong-bin. At that, a faint smile graced Kim Jeong-bin's lips. To Kim Jeong-bin, who had faced even the top three Hunters of South Korea and, furthermore, managed one of them, Park Jin-soo's request was frankly all too trivial.
To put it another way, Kim Jeong-bin was now placing Park Jin-soo's value on a similar level to those three Hunters who were responsible for the fate of South Korea. And that was only right.
"The thing called a Ticket to Challenge the Floor King."
Because Park Jin-soo had now obtained something that even those three had not.
"Would it be possible for you to show it to me? It's not compulsory. If you don't wish to, you can just leave it in your item window."
That was why Kim Jeong-bin, as he uttered these words, was more tense and cautious than ever. To ask to see something that could potentially change the history of the Tower for the mere price of some chicken? It was an impossible trade.
Park Jin-soo felt the same.
‘Looking at the situation, it seems what I got is much more valuable than I thought.’
He wasn't slow on the uptake, after all.
"It feels a bit wrong to show it to you for the price of chicken, but if I don't, I'd be a liar. Let's do a give and take."
So, he proposed a trade.
"Yes, please tell me what you desire."
"That Tower system thing. Could you tell me how to use it?"
"Pardon?"
At the request that followed, Kim Jeong-bin let out a faint laugh. He finally understood.
‘He hasn’t been told anything. Not since then.’
That Park Jin-soo currently knew nothing about the Tower. There was nothing strange about it. It was an era where even ordinary people knew a fair amount about the Tower, but Park Jin-soo's situation was different from that of an ordinary person.
He was an outcast in prison, a monster no one could touch. After experiencing several incidents, Park Jin-soo was placed in near-perfect isolation, even within the prison. The only things he could see were the Bible, Buddhist scriptures, or the Quran.
Naturally, he had no access to even a speck of information about the Tower. He only knew that the Tower existed, that the world was noisy because of the Tower—just truly meager and fragmented information. It was the same after that.
Until he took Lee Ji-soo's test, Park Jin-soo was in custody, stewing in solitude in a solitary cell. No matter how you looked at it, Park Jin-soo's freedom, as he was still on death row, was bound to be restricted. And Lee Ji-soo, quite naturally, did not give Park Jin-soo any information.
When his thoughts reached that point, Kim Jeong-bin opened his mouth.
"Tapping your left chest will bring up the item window. You knew that from last time, correct?"
"Yes."
"Conversely, tapping your right chest will bring up the status window."
"Oh, like this?"
At that moment, Park Jin-soo tapped the right side of his chest, and a status window appeared before his eyes. - Race: Human - Level 9 - Talent: Survival Instinct (Yellow), Weakness Detection (Green) - Skills: None The contents were as simple as could be.
‘Huh? There’s one more?’
With that fleeting thought, Park Jin-soo lightly touched the words 'Weakness Detection'. A new window popped up. - Grade: Green - Effect: Detects the target's weakness. The glittering spot is the weakness.
Attacking a weakness increases damage by 300 percent.
‘Oh!’
At this discovery, Park Jin-soo let out a silent exclamation. He might not know the Tower, but he knew a fair bit about games, so he could tell this ability was quite good. At the same time, Kim Jeong-bin also knew.
‘He’s obtained a skill or a talent.’
There were only two reasons to open the status window and touch it.
‘He must have received a special reward.’
And there were two ways to receive a special reward on the 1st floor. One was by clearing the Tower floor. The other was by achieving a special feat.
So, it was only natural that he had obtained something. Here, Kim Jeong-bin did not ask any questions.
‘A Hunter’s talents and skills are their lifeline.’
It would have been a rude thing to do. It was then.
'Hmm?'
He saw Park Jin-soo touch the status window one more time.
'Two?
Two special rewards?' Kim Jeong-bin was surprised. And Park Jin-soo was also surprised. - Grade: Yellow - Effect: Can sense beings that pose a threat to survival.
‘Ah!’
The moment he saw it, Park Jin-soo understood.
‘No wonder I could sense the goblins so well when I entered the Tower, it was because of this.’
The reason why he felt something poking at him every time he entered the Tower. The reason why there was always a goblin wherever he felt that sensation.
"Thank you! It was really frustrating, but thanks to you, I learned something good."
As Park Jin-soo offered his thanks for the information, Kim Jeong-bin concealed his expression.
"Not at all. I can only apologize for telling you something so basic only now."
Meanwhile, Kim Jeong-bin bowed his head with an apology.
"It's alright. If it wasn't for you, Mr. Kim Jeong-bin, I would have been stuck in prison and never known this my whole life. Ah."
It was at that moment.
"It was give and take, wasn't it?"
Park Jin-soo suddenly spoke and took an item out of his Inventory, then handed it to Kim Jeong-bin. It was a Ticket. A blue Ticket.
The moment he saw it, Kim Jeong-bin's eyes trembled. In the Tower, where all grades were distinguished by the colors of the rainbow, even seeing a Yellow Grade was not easy. In car terms, a Yellow Grade was about a Porsche.
Naturally, a Green Grade was above that, something you'd have to consider a Ferrari or a Lamborghini. Then what about a Blue Grade? It was in the realm of hypercars, meaning it was on the level of a Bugatti or a Pagani.
It was a realm where it wasn't just about seeing one on the street; it was difficult to see even one in an entire country.
"Here you go."
Park Jin-soo handed it to Kim Jeong-bin.
"This is the Ticket to Challenge the Floor King."
As if it were no big deal.
"Is it alright to show it to me so easily?"
"It's give and take, isn't it? You gave me good information, so I have to keep my promise too."
At the words that followed, Kim Jeong-bin reached out with a strange expression.
Whoosh!
"Huh?"
But the moment Kim Jeong-bin's fingers touched the Ticket, they passed right through it.
"What? Why is this happening?"
Park Jin-soo was surprised by the sight.
"It must be untradeable."
In contrast, Kim Jeong-bin nodded his head as if this was familiar.
"Could you perhaps tell me the item's options?"
"Ah, that should work."
At the ensuing request, Park Jin-soo spoke without hesitation.
"Can challenge the Floor King. Hunting the Floor King allows you to conquer the floor. That is the item's option."
Calmly.
But the moment he heard those words, Kim Jeong-bin couldn't help but let his emotions show. He looked at Park Jin-soo with a harder expression than ever before. At that expression, Park Jin-soo grew slightly tense.
‘Did I do something wrong?’
That was how hard Kim Jeong-bin's expression was. It wasn't just hard. It was the kind of expression a student who had failed the final bar exam for the fifth time might make, a level of shock that one might only experience a few times in a lifetime.
At that, Kim Jeong-bin covered his face with his hands as if massaging it.
"My apologies. The shock was so great that I've shown you an unseemly side of me."
Then he spoke.
"Mr. Park Jin-soo, you have just accomplished something that no one else has ever accomplished."
"Is this that big of a deal?"
"This is in the realm of conjecture, but the Ticket you've brought is likely the method to conquer the Tower."
"Conquer?"
"Yes, it means that no more missions will be given for that floor."
Even as he spoke, Kim Jeong-bin still couldn't recover from the shock. It was understandable. The reason the Tower was so troublesome right now was the fact that missions came out for each floor every month.
Now that it had been well over five years since the Tower appeared, most countries had to clear missions on over sixty floors every month, meaning over sixty missions. But what if the Tower could be conquered? What if missions for that floor no longer appeared?
Ping!
Then the dimension of risk management would change, as they would only need to go up.
‘This is a historical turning point.’
Like the Wright brothers developing the airplane, like the nuclear bomb coming out of the Manhattan Project. It was a historical moment, one that would change the world. At this, Kim Jeong-bin did not stay still.
"Mr. Park Jin-soo, would you like to make a deal?"
"A deal?"
"Please kill the Floor King. In return, I will reduce your prison sentence by ten years."
"Huh, by ten years?"
Park Jin-soo was surprised by those words. He was currently in a situation where his death sentence had been changed to fifty years in prison. And now they would shave off ten years in one go?
"I'm sure making a deal with your sentence doesn't feel good, but..."
"No, it's freaking great. Ah, my apologies. I was just so happy. Anyway, going from fifty years to forty makes me happy! So, I just have to tear this right away, right?"
At that moment, Park Jin-soo tried to tear the blue ticket in his hand. Without a shred of hesitation. To go hunt the Floor King right away.
"Ah!"
Startled by this, Kim Jeong-bin grabbed Park Jin-soo's wrist. At Kim Jeong-bin's surprisingly fast movement, too fast for him to react, Park Jin-soo's eyes narrowed.
"... It's dangerous if you go alone. I will make preparations."
At Kim Jeong-bin's following words, Park Jin-soo put on his usual bright, smiling expression and said.
"Ah, my apologies. I'm a little lacking in social skills. I thought I could just go right away. But what do you mean by preparations?"
"I will lend you some items."
"Wow!"
"And we will form a party."
"Huh?"
And at the word 'party', Park Jin-soo's expression immediately hardened as he spoke.
"Excuse me, but wouldn't it be better if I went alone? I'm not very good at doing things with other people. And I'm still a criminal, am I not? I'm afraid I might cause trouble for others."
"It's alright. I will bring trustworthy Hunters."
At the same time, Kim Jeong-bin released his hand from Park Jin-soo's wrist and immediately picked up his smartphone. He made a call.
"Ms. Lee Ji-soo, please prepare for a hunt."