Why Did I Have to Enroll - Chapter 24

Lesson 6. A Teacher's Grace is Like Heaven - 3

—Click, click, click

"Good heavens."

Ban Yu-won swore he had never heard Dokgo Yeon speak with such an exasperated voice before.

Well, even someone as tough as her would inevitably get tired after continuously firing off air blades at the endlessly swarming spiders.

"There really is no end to them."

"Dokgo Yeon, don't let your guard down!"

Light, who was standing on the opposite side swinging his sword of light at the swarm of spiders, called out anxiously upon hearing Dokgo Yeon's languid voice.

Dokgo Yeon snorted and retorted.

"You should focus on doing better yourself. You've been inefficiently wasting your energy since earlier... And beast, how are you holding up?"

"Grrrr......"

Luciel, who was guarding the rear with Light, responded with a voice closer to that of a beast than a human.

Her hair had already turned black for more than 70 percent.

If it were to turn completely black, what would happen then? It was clear that it wouldn't be anything pleasant, at the very least.

"This is messed up."

"Phew."

As if agreeing with Dokgo Yeon's complaint, Ban Yu-won also let out a sigh.

He had long given up on directly confronting the overflowing swarm of spiders, and instead focused on supporting Dokgo Yeon along with Eve to minimize her burden as much as possible.

"Damn, even getting messed up should have its limits."

"Grrrk?!"

"No, not you Luciel. I meant the tower."

Although Luciel could no longer speak in a human voice, it seemed she could still understand their words.

It was clear from the way she glared at Ban Yu-won with a sulky expression, having unintentionally agreed with Dokgo Yeon's comment about things being messed up.

It was quite adorable, but watching the spiders being pulverized by her hand as she vented her frustration was still quite frightening.

[Heart Furnace 71 — Anger 22, Madness 38, Sorrow 6, Pleasure 5]

Ban Yu-won frowned as he examined the various negative and intense emotions filling Luciel's internal code, the Heart Furnace.

'I can't possibly handle this right now. Thanks to the insight gained in Room 3, I can now touch external concepts, but even so, I can't touch that.'

Despite being busy fending off the pouring swarm of spiders, he had tried a few times out of concern for Luciel's ongoing transformation.

However, his ability couldn't touch Luciel's Heart Furnace, and each attempt only startled her, unnecessarily stimulating her wild nature.

'Damn it, there must be a way.'

Of course, he didn't have the luxury to leisurely explore that method right now.

Even now, wasn't Dokgo Yeon retreating with an irritated expression?

"Ban Yu-won, I need to catch my breath."

"Got it, fall back!"

Right after Dokgo Yeon's unilateral declaration, Ban Yu-won pulled out a small grenade from his inventory.

And with the skilled movements of an instructor that no one would believe was untrained, he pulled the safety pin and threw it forward!

—Ting, tong, tong...

One of the secret consumables he had brought from Earth, packed tightly with only the concept of a grenade and imbued with Magic.

It was truly a Magic Bomb (魔爆彈) filled with concepts right up to the point of explosion.

To that, he added just a touch of Spirit, Ban Yu-won's unique method for making firearms usable in the tower.

This not only prevents interference from the tower's magical wavelengths but also allows him to detonate the grenade at the exact moment he desires!

"Eve, cover us!"

"Shhhh!"

Eve transformed into a giant iron shield, temporarily creating a barrier to protect Ban Yu-won and Dokgo Yeon.

The grenade that flew beyond it quickly disappeared, buried in the spider swarm that was surging like a black wave.

'This makes three, I think. I still have quite a few left, but I hope this ends here.'

The price of these carefully crafted special grenades was enough to make one's teeth grind, and considering the concepts of Magic and Spirit that would cleanly oxidize after a single use, using such weapons long-term was really not ideal.

But right now, this was Ban Yu-won's lifeline.

—Boom!

—Screeeeech!

As the grenade exploded, it instantly annihilated dozens of spiders.

It was a sight that brought relief to watch, but seeing the empty spaces quickly filled by newly swarming spiders wiped away any trace of a smile.

[You have stolen Life 5.4, Body 7.6, Demon 4, Carapace 7 from multiple tower spiders. Carapace is a concept that humans cannot possess.]

Golden strings of text rose up all at once from the tower spiders Ban Yu-won had just eliminated.

It was by no means an insignificant amount, but considering this was obtained from killing dozens of tower spiders, it was rather bitter.

What did this mean? It meant that after stealing so many concepts from the tower spiders, the depth of concepts he could steal from them was starting to decrease.

Moreover, in the case of life, it's halved from this point.

The 'experience reduction' he had encountered while hunting goblins had begun again.

[Life 182

Body 138.5

Magic Power 156.4

Soul 372]

He inwardly sighed as he checked only the four core elements of his internal code.

'Compared to before this damned attack started, I've grown tremendously. But the problem is that even this isn't enough to face that spider swarm head-on and defeat it.'

Could there be anything more frustrating than this?

He had entered the tower and achieved growth far surpassing the average level of the academy, yet he couldn't make a significant impact in the current situation!

Moreover, even the concepts he could extract from the tower spiders were starting to diminish, so Ban Yu-won couldn't help but feel anxious.

"Well done, Ban Yu-won. Thanks to you, I got a bit of rest."

Whether aware of his anxiety or not, Dokgo Yeon, having briefly recovered her stamina, stepped forward with a more relaxed expression.

But Ban Yu-won stopped her, took out a sports drink from his pocket, handed it to her, and said,

"Rest a bit more and drink this at least. It's important that you recover fully."

"But that's not something easy to produce, is it? Even in the martial world, if a thunder bomb appears once..."

"Rest."

"Oh my."

As Ban Yu-won spoke rather forcefully and turned away after pushing the bottle into her arms, Dokgo Yeon couldn't help but chuckle.

While Dokgo Yeon obediently rested and drank the beverage as he had said, Ban Yu-won threw another magic bomb beyond Eve's sturdy barrier and then summoned Lilith to mount her.

"When those things are caught in the explosion, I'll cut down as many as I can and get out. Got it?"

Vroom, Lilith responded reassuringly.

Immediately after, a grand explosion occurred beyond, and golden strings of text were all sucked into Ban Yu-won, strengthening him once again.

"Let's go!"

Eve, reading Ban Yu-won's mind, momentarily reduced her shield to open a space for Lilith and Ban Yu-won to pass through.

Gripping the Executioner's Greatsword tightly, Ban Yu-won charged Lilith towards the spiders scattered by the explosion's aftermath.

"Hup!"

There's no point in cursing Light for letting out a battle cry at the crucial moment.

The spiders' disorientation from the explosion's impact would last only for a brief moment.

There was no time to worry about battle cries or anything else if he wanted to cut down as many of them as possible and escape in that short window.

'Cut them! As many as possible in one go...!'

Relying on Lilith's explosive speed, he lay flat on her back and swung his sword, extending it as far as possible.

Fervently praying that the power of severance imbued in the sword would cut through everything in its path!

―Swoosh

The moment his intense will dominated the sword, the Executioner's Greatsword emitted an eerie red light.

Ban Yu-won felt something being sucked from his body into the sword, and seeing the energy gathering on the blade, he realized it was none other than blood.

'This is...?!'

―Kweeeek!

―Kiiiih!

At that moment, the red sword's trajectory elongated, slicing through all the monsters caught in its path.

While Ban Yu-won was stunned by the sight, Lilith quickly made a U-turn, carrying him back to safety.

Returning behind Eve's shield barrier, Ban Yu-won felt his head spinning as he saw the Babylonia Code notification appear before his eyes.

[The blood poison depth of the Executioner's Greatsword increases to 15.]

[You have slightly grasped and acquired the concept of 'cut'. The depth of 'cut' has become 2.]

Blood poison, was it not about injecting poison into blood, but about creating poison by consuming one's own blood?

No, that's not it.

Perhaps the 'poison' in blood poison didn't mean 'venom', but rather 'poison' in the sense of harming and killing the enemy.

That red, elongated strike just now was too much to be considered poison, so this interpretation must be correct.

'I still have a long way to go.'

Come to think of it, blood poison hadn't been particularly effective since he defeated the Goblin Warrior.

Could it be that it was due to a misunderstanding of the language concept?

Maybe even then, an attack consuming Ban Yu-won's own blood had occurred.

And yet, he had been wasting this treasure all this time without realizing its true nature!

It was fortunate that he had finally grasped this concept, clearly experiencing what it meant to cut down an enemy, and acquiring the concept of 'cut' (斬).

'Though I'm exhausted from having my blood drained.'

It felt just like after donating blood, and to make matters worse, he couldn't even eat a Choco Pie in this situation.

As Ban Yu-won was catching his breath and feeling frustrated, Dokgo Yeon passed by his side where he was sitting and tossed him the empty bottle.

"I saw something good, and I drank well too."

"You drank all of this?!"

"It has a unique but not unpleasant taste. No, what's truly not unpleasant is what you just showed..."

Dokgo Yeon briefly glanced at the Greatsword in his hand, then unable to continue her words, she shrugged and turned her gaze to the front.

Only then did Ban Yu-won realize that something unsettling was happening in front of them.

Two consecutive grenade explosions and Ban Yu-won's charge.

It would have been natural for the spiders to be excited and rush in, but oddly enough, they were slowly retreating.

It meant something was coming.

Probably something strong.

"So I hope you won't think of what I'm about to show you as a debt. I'm just paying my dues."

"You...?"

Ban Yu-won was surprised to see the black short sword in her hand.

When had she ever drawn a sword before?

Surely, she could handle whatever appeared in front of them with her bare hands.

If she had taken up the sword solely to show Ban Yu-won, he was honestly touched.

"I just didn't want to get my hands dirty, so don't misunderstand unnecessarily."

"Ah, okay."

Ban Yu-won quickly regained his composure at Dokgo Yeon's cold tone.

But his eyes remained fixed, closely observing her movements.

Although he had already grasped the concept of 'cut' (斬), he knew that it was far from its true meaning.

If there was anything to gain from her movements, it would be a great help in handling this sword in the future.

―Thud, Boom

Instead of the spine-chilling clicking sounds made by the tower spiders, there was a sound of something heavy taking steps.

Ban Yu-won sensed that a part of the room was expanding in real-time.

As that thing crawled up, changes were occurring in the room.

"Elite stage."

Ban Yu-won muttered, recalling the content he had seen in the textbook.

"It said it's a room that changes in real-time to match the characteristics of the appearing elite monster and pressures the climber. I heard it only appears after at least... 50 rooms."

"I've heard that story so many times today that my ears are about to fall off."

"But they said if we defeat it, the tower will give us a reward."

"That's the first time I'm hearing about that."

Of course, now that an irregular was involved, it was unclear how things would turn out, but Ban Yu-won thought that the reward would only get better, not worse.

'Moreover, the appearance of an elite means this grueling battle will finally end...!'

But perhaps it was a problem that Ban Yu-won was thinking this way and feeling relieved inside, because suddenly a voice called out to him urgently from behind.

"Ban!"

"What is it, Light?"

"This elite stage thing, does it usually have multiple elites appearing at once?!"

"Damn, that's news to me too."

With Light's single statement, Ban Yu-won grasped the entire situation and let out a gloomy sigh as he glanced back.

―Boom

―Thud, Bang!

Before they knew it, a white dust had settled throughout the entire room.

No, it wasn't dust but spider webs.

It was the moment when the room was completely dominated by the appearance of three elite monsters, giant spiders.

"Ban Yu-won, look at me."

"Yeah, I'm looking..."

―Slash

...And now there were only two left.