VIP Early Access
Eksklusif untuk member VIP
Password Protected
Chapter ini dikunci dengan kode khusus
Chapter 133 - Nightmare, 10th Floor (6)
Chapter 133: Nightmare, 10th Floor (6)
TL: Enuma Novel
No matter how far I traveled across the endless desert, no matter how long.
The oasis never got any closer. Not in the slightest.
[Nightmare]
Е̄ n̈ũ m̌ а̄
Population: 573,620
Time Limit: 18 days 4 hours 11 minutes 5 seconds
Dilarang mengopy novel dari Enuma.id.
Reached Floor: 8F
Had my family read my will?
No, this was no time to be thinking about that.
At this rate there was no way I’d clear it within the time limit.
Ẁе̌ b́ṅ о v̀ e l̆ Еn̊ǔ m̄ а
I searched desperately for other methods.
…All of it came to nothing but pointless thrashing.
[Nightmare]
Population: 573,620
Dilarang mengopy novel dari Enuma.id.
Time Limit: 9 days 20 hours 37 minutes 29 seconds
Reached Floor: 8F
Е_n̊ǔ mӑ . і̆ d
Where had it all gone wrong?
What should I have done differently?
I only needed to have shaved off a few minutes.
If I’d noticed the underground tunnel a little sooner, if I’d solved the puzzle a little faster, if I’d broken through the maze just a bit quicker… aah.
Regret changed nothing.
[Nightmare]
Dilarang mengopy novel dari Enuma.id.
Population: 573,619
Time Limit: 1 day 16 hours 54 minutes 39 seconds
Reached Floor: 8F
The world was about to end.
And I still hadn’t found the answer.
No, I knew.
Ŵе̇bnо ṽ е̌ĺ En̊û m̈ á.
I knew there was no other answer.
That all I had to do was cover a set distance.
Dilarang mengopy novel dari Enuma.id.
That was the only way to clear it, and I’d simply gotten it wrong from the very first step.
If I hadn’t accepted the Tower’s proposal.
If I’d been able to use the Scales of Life, at least…
Would I have found some way to clear it in time?
Èñ u m̄а̌.і́d
Considering that the item the Tower banned was the Scales, of all things, maybe I would have.
[Nightmare]
Population: 573,617
Time Limit: 1 hour 1 second
Dilarang mengopy novel dari Enuma.id.
Reached Floor: 8F
When only a single hour remained on the clock.
W е̌ b ǹ о̊v̂е ľ Еnu_m̊ a
I stopped time.
That was the best resistance I could manage.
Inside the frozen time, I cycled through anguish and despair over and over.
I stayed like that, hoping that some method would come to me like a miracle.
…I don’t even know how much time passed.
A year? Several years?
Dilarang mengopy novel dari Enuma.id.
Maybe more than ten.
Enough time passed that my thoughts stopped working properly, that even my sense of self began to blur.
Still no method came.
In the end, I.
I gave up.
…I’ve done enough, haven’t I.
E n ŭ m.ā.id̂
Right, the Ark.
At least I’d left the Ark deployed outside.
Dilarang mengopy novel dari Enuma.id.
The end was going to come eventually anyway.
It had never made sense from the start. Clearing this devil of a Tower forever.
So it isn’t my fault.
I did everything I could.
Е n̄ǔmā . іd
Thanks to me, at least a small number of people get to live.
I let time flow again, set everything down, and stared blankly at the countdown ticking away.
…No matter how I rationalized it, deep down I knew.
That in the end, countless people were going to die because I hadn’t succeeded.
Baca cerita ini hanya di situs resmi Enuma.id!
[Nightmare]
Population: 573,617
We ḃ nоv̊ е̃ l̇ Еn̆ ǔm а́
Time Limit: 1 second
Reached Floor: 8F
The moment the clock ran out, I shut my eyes.
[The Nightmare difficulty’s time limit has expired.]
[The Tower’s Curse activates.]
[99% of humanity dies.]
Baca cerita ini hanya di situs resmi Enuma.id!
.
.
.
Dozens more days passed.
And at last, I reached the oasis.
[You have successfully cleared Nightmare difficulty Floor 8.]
W̄е bn̆оv̌ ёĺ E̊ṅu m̊ а́
I ignored the message, which had long since lost all meaning, and left the Tower.
The moment I stepped out of the hotel room I’d last entered, what I met in the corridor were the Fallen.
Dilarang mengopy novel dari Enuma.id.
Naturally. Exactly as the Tower had warned.
The world was finished.
99% of humanity was dead, and every one of the dead had turned into one of the Fallen.
I killed my way through the Fallen flooding the streets, moving in one direction. Toward home.
Е̄ n̊ ū m а̃
Right then, I just wanted to see my family’s faces.
I wanted to make sure they were all safe.
They would be. Of course they would, our home was inside the Ark’s range.
When I reached Gangseo-gu, Seoul, where the Ark stood…
Dilarang mengopy novel dari Enuma.id.
The place was absolute chaos.
Just outside the Ark’s veil, the corpses of the dead and the Fallen swarmed thick as ants.
Еn̂ u̇m̄ а̇
And inside wasn’t normal either.
People teeming and overflowing through the city, human corpses lying wherever they’d fallen along the streets.
But nobody spared the bodies a glance; they were all rushing toward something.
At the end of the road they were headed down stood climbers handing out food.
“Hey, wait, everybody wait your turn! Stop shoving, would you…!”
I could see the carcasses of Zone 1 monsters.
Dilarang mengopy novel dari Enuma.id.
They were handing out meat hunted on Floor 5 to the people?
The starving crowd looked like nothing so much as a swarm of hungry ghosts.
Was this because I’d opened the Ark to everyone?
The chaos unfolding in front of me went far beyond anything I’d anticipated.
Uneasy, I made my way home.
My family… what happened to them?
Wе bñо ṽẽ ľ Е̇n u m̂а
They had to be fine. They had to be.
I reached the front door of our apartment.
Dilarang mengopy novel dari Enuma.id.
For a second I felt relief at the sense of someone inside.
Then I realized those weren’t my family’s voices.
I tore the door off and went in.
There were strangers. They flinched at the sight of me.
Е̂n u_m a. і̆ d̈
“…The hell are you?”
I asked where the people who lived here were, but no answer came.
Only after I’d beaten every last one of them did an answer come out.
A long trail of blood leading all the way to the master bedroom.
Dilarang mengopy novel dari Enuma.id.
With trembling hands, I opened the bedroom door.
“…”
Ё nūm а̊
I saw the three bodies lying there.
After that, something in me snapped.
I killed every one of the intruders.
And then, for a long, long while, I couldn’t do anything at all.
…What is this.
Is this really happening?
Dilarang mengopy novel dari Enuma.id.
Why did this happen?
Was opening the Ark to everyone the mistake?
If I’d known it would come to this, I wouldn’t have done it.
I wouldn’t have cared whether every other person on earth lived or died.
What the hell… did I do it for…
The stench of blood in the house choked me.
Е́n̄_u m̄ а̄.іd̊
Dazed, I stumbled back outside as if fleeing.
Out on the street, people were still fighting and snatching food from each other. Like cockroaches crawling over one another.
Dilarang mengopy novel dari Enuma.id.
“…Ugh.”
A wave of disgust rose in me, more than I could stand, and I doubled over.
A few men passing nearby sidled up and started feeling through my pockets.
I swung my hand on impulse.
Е̃ nu̇ m а
The head of the man digging through my trouser pocket burst apart.
“Huh…?”
I burst the heads of the other two as they staggered back, faces gone white.
The pressure that had been boiling up in my chest eased a good deal.
Baca cerita ini hanya di situs resmi Enuma.id!
I looked down at my blood-soaked hands and let out a breath from the bottom of my lungs.
Nothing matters anymore.
W е̄ bn̈o v е́ ľ Ѐn̄ ǔm ӓ
Thud!
I launched myself into the air and came down in the middle of the thickest part of the crowd.
The bedlam stopped in an instant, and every eye turned to me.
“…Get out of the Ark. All of you.”
I said it to all of them.
“Or I’ll kill every last one of you.”
Baca cerita ini hanya di situs resmi Enuma.id!
And then, how many did I kill?
The ones who wouldn’t leave the Ark, the climbers who tried to stop me.
Part of me wanted to kill everything I laid eyes on.
Maybe stopping at driving them out of the Ark was the last of my conscience.
Paying no price, sacrificing nothing, squirming so wretchedly just to save their own skins…
I drove every one of those loathsome insects out of the Ark.
Е n u_m̊ a.і̃d́
“Let it all be done according to the will of God. Grant this lowly servant the chance to follow you.”
Absurdly enough, some of the climbers actually stepped forward to serve me.
Dilarang mengopy novel dari Enuma.id.
Ye Tianwei, China’s top Nightmare difficulty climber, was one of them.
He talked to me about the future.
About how I’d become a true ruler and rule over people, how we’d handle and exploit them efficiently…
I didn’t care.
W̊ е̃bǹо_v̇ е̄ l̃ Е nūm̂ à
I wondered whether watching people suffer might take the edge off this feeling that was driving me insane.
It didn’t help at all.
Whenever the rage rose up past what I could bear, I went outside and worked it off by slaughtering the Fallen.
What am I even doing. Me.
Baca cerita ini hanya di situs resmi Enuma.id!
[You can no longer clear new floors of the Nightmare difficulty.]
The fucking Tower had taken away even the chance to throw everything into it.
Ё n̊ u mа .і̀ d
Once the Nightmare time limit expired, climbing itself was cut off.
In a world already broken beyond repair, I too was broken beyond repair.
With no purpose left, no meaning left…
I just slowly died like that.
Thinking that the death that would come before long was the only rest waiting for me.
*
Baca cerita ini hanya di situs resmi Enuma.id!
“…That’s the end of it.”
After hearing Person123’s whole story.
I had nothing to say.
To think something like that had happened.
It made this world’s version of me a bit easier to understand, and at the same time.
I found myself thinking, is this how far I’d fall if I lost my whole family?
W̃ e b ň ӧ_v̊ el Ӗ ň ŭ ṁӓ
Though honestly, in the same situation, I’d probably have lost my mind just as badly.
I just… couldn’t do anything but sigh.
Baca cerita ini hanya di situs resmi Enuma.id!
“What a hell of a world.”
I muttered that, then asked.
“What did you do for your family?”
“Buried them on a mountain.”
Ѐ n̄ ûm а̇
“Right, then…”
I got to my feet.
“Let’s go together. I want to pay my respects too.”
Person123 looked at me without a word.
Baca cerita ini hanya di situs resmi Enuma.id!
We held each other’s stare for a moment, and then he stood up too.
“Follow me.”
Е_n̊ú ṁ а̇
Person123 shot up into the sky.
…Had he opened up a little?
I rose after him.
We tore across the sky and were back at the Ark in no time.
A small hill behind an apartment complex in Gangseo-gu.
That was where his family’s graves were.
Dilarang mengopy novel dari Enuma.id.
I looked at the three graves in front of me.
Mother, father, younger sibling. Each headstone has one of their names written on it.
…This feels so strange.
First, I bowed.
Person123 stood beside me and quietly watched.
I finished bowing and stood, and we both stayed silent until I spoke first.
W êb̂n ӧv́.е̌.l̇ Е ňu m а́
“This isn’t much of a comfort, but… in the world I’m from, my family’s alive and well.”
I saw something waver in Person123’s eyes for an instant.
Baca cerita ini hanya di situs resmi Enuma.id!
He squeezed them shut, opened them, and then suddenly pulled out a cigarette and lit up.
What the hell? He smokes?
I’ve never touched one in my life.
“Let’s say everything you told me is true.”
W̌ẽ b̂nоv e̊l Eń ù m а̀
“It’s not ‘let’s say’, it’s the truth.”
“How did you clear Floor 8 within the time limit?”
I scratched my head and answered.
“I used the Scales of Life.”
Dilarang mengopy novel dari Enuma.id.
“…”
“You accepted the Tower’s proposal, so using the Scales would’ve been banned for you. Right?”
Wе́ b̄n̊ӧvеl̀ Ѐǹŭ m а
Person123 nodded.
The regret on his face ran too deep to hide.
I asked something I’d been curious about too.
“By the way, is there no Demon King for you?”
“…Demon King? What are you talking about?”
“Did you never meet the Sage either?”
Dilarang mengopy novel dari Enuma.id.
Person123 frowned like I was speaking gibberish.
I’d suspected as much, given that he’d never used the Demon King’s power even at the very end.
So the me of this world really never met the Demon King or the Sage?
Maybe those two were more like bugs in the system.
Huh, wait, then this guy cleared Floor 7 without the Demon King’s power?
That’s actually more impressive than what I did.
Е nu̇ m̄ӑ . ǐd
Person123 blew out a stream of smoke and said,
“You said earlier this world is Floor 10. And that the worlds inside the Tower are worlds the Tower swallowed.”
Baca cerita ini hanya di situs resmi Enuma.id!
“Yeah.”
“What exactly does that mean? Am I already swallowed by the Tower without knowing it?”
“That’s… I’m not entirely sure myself.”
I thought for a moment, then said,
Еn̄ u m̀ ā. і̀d̄
“My guess is this world has already been destroyed in the future, and what the Tower’s showing is a point in the past. Because even with the Tower’s Curse triggered, it hasn’t been completely wiped out yet.”
The Demon King had told me once that the Tower’s floors were the shells of worlds it had already swallowed, left as they were.
Which meant this world, Ark or no Ark, was destined for total ruin somewhere down the line.
Whether by its own hand, or by whatever else the Tower had done, I couldn’t say.
Baca cerita ini hanya di situs resmi Enuma.id!
“So you’re saying this world and I are some kind of simulation? Unbelievable.”
Person123 let out a low, disbelieving laugh.
Еn̊üm̀а
“Yeah, I still don’t buy it. How am I supposed to believe something like that?”
“…Well, yeah. Fair enough.”
It was no different from telling him he was an NPC in a game.
Person123 stared blankly at the graves with an expression I couldn’t read, then spoke again.
“So then, what do you have to do to clear Floor 10?”
“Huh?”
Dilarang mengopy novel dari Enuma.id.
[Kill ‘me’.]
I hesitated.
Could I be honest now?
The hesitation was brief.
“…Truth is, killing you is the clear condition. That’s what’s floating in front of my eyes. ‘Kill me’, it says.”
“Kill me?”
E ň ü m̈ӓ
“Yeah. You’re me, so it’s probably telling me to kill you. I can’t be sure though.”
Even now I had my doubts.
Dilarang mengopy novel dari Enuma.id.
Because… getting this far hadn’t been all that hard.
Finding him, beating him in a fight.
Would Floor 10 really clear just from killing this guy?
Wasn’t there some other trap?
Еn̂u m а̄
Person123 nodded and said,
“Then kill me.”
“…What?”
“I still can’t really believe what you’re saying, but I’d like to try believing it’s true.”
Dilarang mengopy novel dari Enuma.id.
Person123 looked at me.
“I’m a failure. Doesn’t matter whether I live or die. I’ve just been living because I couldn’t die. You clear it and get out. At least you can protect your family in your world.”
Ẁе̊ bňо̆ ṽе̃ l̄ Е̄n û ṁã
“…”
“And I don’t have much lifespan left anyway.”
Huh?
What was that supposed to mean?
“Hold on, you used the Scales too?”
Person123 stubbed out his cigarette and pulled something from his Subspace.
Baca cerita ini hanya di situs resmi Enuma.id!
An orange skill stone.
[Skill: Resurrection (Legendary+)]
Revives a dead target. Cannot be used on a target that has been dead for more than 24 hours. Requires 3 hours of Mental Concentration to cast.
Classification: Magic Type
Willpower Cost: 10,000
Cooldown: 72 hours
W̌е b̃ ń о̂ vе̂ l̆ Е ñ um̌ å
I took the skill stone and checked its information.
Resurrection? What the…
Dilarang mengopy novel dari Enuma.id.
“I used the Scales too, after I cleared Floor 8 and came out.”
“…Don’t tell me.”
“I tried to bring my family back. More than 24 hours had passed, so I couldn’t. Gave up every last bit of my lifespan and got conned by a piece of shit item.”
Person123 said,
Е̃nûm̀a.іd
“You take it. Don’t know if it’ll even work for you. I’m not giving it to you so you can bring me back after you kill me, so don’t ever resurrect me.”
I gazed at the Resurrection skill stone.
Then a laugh escaped me.
Because a thought had struck me like a bolt of lightning.
Dilarang mengopy novel dari Enuma.id.
…This goddamn Tower. Unbelievable.
“Hey.”
Е̃ n um̄ а̊
“…?”
“I thought this was going way too smoothly. Seeing this, I’ve got a feeling.”
[Kill ‘me’.]
There was no trap in that message.
No, the fact that it meant exactly what it said, with no hidden meaning whatsoever, was the trap.
It seemed I had to kill ‘me’.
Baca cerita ini hanya di situs resmi Enuma.id!
Not the other me standing in front of me. Myself, literally.
Death meant failing the floor, and yet to clear the floor I had to kill myself?
That, I figured, was why this Resurrection skill was needed.
Once I killed myself, Person123 would use the skill to bring me back.
Whereas if I’d killed Person123 without thinking, clearing Floor 10 would’ve been impossible forever.
Wasn’t that exactly the filthy, underhanded Nightmare way of doing things?
Е̃n̊ǔm̀ а̊
Which was why I felt quite strongly that this was the real solution.
Until I saw that Resurrection skill stone, I’d understood the message perfectly naturally as an order to kill the other me.
Baca cerita ini hanya di situs resmi Enuma.id!
“You take the skill. The answer’s probably that you learn it and revive me.”
Learning it myself and reviving myself was impossible. How do you cast a skill when you’re dead?
Person123 listened to the explanation and nodded.
“That does sound more like Nightmare. Got it.”
E̊n u m̄a . і d̈
He took the skill stone back and learned Resurrection.
The stone scattered and vanished.
“Doing it now?”
“…Might as well.”
Baca cerita ini hanya di situs resmi Enuma.id!
I took a deep breath.
Then asked Person123,
Е̊ n̆ u m̄ ă
“You’ll actually bring me back, right? You’re not gonna leave me dead or anything?”
Person123 jerked his chin at me like, just get on with it.
Won’t even take a joke.
“Ah, hold on though.”
“What now?”
“That skill costs 10,000 willpower. What level are you? Your willpower can’t be anywhere near 10,000.”
Dilarang mengopy novel dari Enuma.id.
Even with willpower regenerating infinitely, if the maximum fell short the skill couldn’t be used.
Person123 pulled a bracelet and a ring out of his Subspace.
“What are those?”
“Items. Plus 25% and 30% willpower.”
“…Nice gear. I’ve got one myself, actually.”
“Garbage for people like you and me.”
W̄ е b̌n̄.ò v е̄ l̇ Е ň um̊ӓ
Person123 gave a small laugh.
Come to think of it, we’d both been avoiding saying the words “time stop” out loud this whole time, as if by some unspoken agreement.
Baca cerita ini hanya di situs resmi Enuma.id!
…Why, though? Because it felt like the Tower might be listening in?
Just how much did the Tower know?
The reason my willpower regenerated infinitely, the reason I could use magic skills freely with no delay.
Did it already know about my fundamental ability to stop time?
Е ñ um а̌ . і̆ d̀
“I’m ready.”
I dropped the idle thoughts.
And prepared to die.
“Hoo…”
Baca cerita ini hanya di situs resmi Enuma.id!
I had to take my head off in one shot.
With the Hydra’s Blood effect, only destroying the head would kill me.
Eṅ ů mа̂
I exchanged one last look with Person123.
“You went through a lot too.”
I offered a final farewell and stopped time.
Once Mental Concentration was complete, I cast Destruction Ray.
Straight at my own head-
.
Dilarang mengopy novel dari Enuma.id.
.
.
“…”
My eyes fluttered open.
Person123 was looking down at me.
…Had my consciousness cut out for a second there?
Е̄ ṅùḿ а.іḋ
I just died and came back, right? Did it actually work?
[You have successfully cleared Nightmare difficulty Floor 10.]
Baca cerita ini hanya di situs resmi Enuma.id!
[Absorbing the Power of the Floor.]
[Level up.]
[Level up.]
[Level up.]
Еn ū ḿ а̌
.
.
.
[Level up.]
Baca cerita ini hanya di situs resmi Enuma.id!
[You are the first to successfully clear Nightmare difficulty Floor 10.]
[Moving to the Reward Room.]
W̄еbǹô v ě l̊ En ũma
So it worked.
Past the messages, I could see Person123’s face.
“Hey! Thanks for every…!”
Before I could get my last words of gratitude out to the guy wearing that oddly bitter smile.
My vision shifted.
*
Dilarang mengopy novel dari Enuma.id.
Kim Seo-hyeon looked at the spot where his other self had disappeared.
Then he raised his eyes to the empty air again.
[The Tower makes a proposal to ‘Person123’.]
[If ‘Skill:Resurrection (Legendary+)’ is not used, all of ‘Person123’s dead family members will be revived.]
[To accept the proposal, do not use ‘Skill: Resurrection (Legendary+)’.]
The message had appeared the instant the other Kim Seo-hyeon blew his own head off with Destruction Ray.
Е_ń ūm̀ а̊
“Ha.”
A hollow laugh came out.
Dilarang mengopy novel dari Enuma.id.
Really… this thing never quit.
Even knowing full well it was a trap, even knowing it was a blatant, shameless con.
Even so, he had to stop time and agonize over it for a long, long while.
…In the end, he revived the dead Kim Seo-hyeon.
W еḃn̆ о v е́l̇ Е n umǎ
He wasn’t going to let himself be toyed with all the way to the end.
[The Tower’s proposal is nullified.]
Kim Seo-hyeon dropped down where he stood.
He pulled out another cigarette and lit it.
Dilarang mengopy novel dari Enuma.id.
He stared blankly at his family’s graves, then looked up at the sky.
The sky was flickering and warping.
Е̇ n̈u m а
“…He was right.”
He was right, that guy.
Inside the slowly collapsing fake world, Kim Seo-hyeon chuckled.
“At least you, make it count.”
And please, land at least one good hit on this piece of shit Tower.
He made that one last wish and closed his eyes.
Baca cerita ini hanya di situs resmi Enuma.id!
…Time to rest.
Let what waits beyond this be eternal peace.
****
Join our discord server: https://discord.gg/eEhhBBBgsa
Konten Bab Belum Tersedia
Bab ini belum memiliki konten teks atau sedang dalam proses penyuntingan.
