Since there was nothing to gain in Room 10, the party took a brief rest and had a light snack (saving the Life Elixir Jam for potential injuries in the tower) before moving on to Room 11.

From Room 11 onward, as the rooms grew larger and the monsters became stronger, Eve and Lilith couldn't just sweep through them alone, but with the support of these two vassals with their unique utility abilities, the party was able to clear the tower much faster than before.

"At this rate, we might reach Room 20 today."

"Of course we will. As long as Light doesn't have an episode."

"I told you I'm fine, look! I'm wielding my spear properly!"

It wasn't just because of Eve and Lilith.

During their previous exploration, Luciel was struggling with her mental state and Light was dealing with the Holy Sword's compulsions, so everything was a mess, but now they were both in peak condition.

Even Ban Yu-won, who had been the weakest member of the four, had significantly improved his abilities, so this party practically had no weaknesses!

Before they knew it, as they were advancing at breakneck speed...

"Oh, we're already at Room 17."

"So we've broken our previous record. Not that it's anything special."

"Yu-won and I have been to Room 19 before."

"Beast, if you want to get lost, just say it directly... hm?"

There was another reason why their exploration speed had been so fast.

Unlike before when an elite would appear every other room, no special monsters had appeared from Room 1 to Room 16. Perhaps this had something to do with their climbing record.

Fortunately, that record was immediately broken upon entering Room 17.

―Click click click click

―Boom, bang, booom!

Mixed with the wave of tower spiders that invaded the walls, pillars, and floor like black paint spreading with an unpleasant sound, came footsteps that shook the entire room.

Along with the eerie magic energy filling the area, Light gripped his spear tightly and muttered.

"It's an elite."

―Boom!

The room expanded instantly.

A house-sized spider descended the wall and landed, blocking the party's path.

Splat - the floor spiders were crushed with a disgusting sound.

"Another tower spider version. What is this, Eevee? Why are there so many evolution types?"

"This one looks a bit unusual. On its shell... what on earth is it carrying?"

While Dokgo Yeon and the others couldn't recognize it, Ban Yu-won was certain at first glance.

What the tower spider had mounted on its shell was a cannon.

This bastard was using modern technology that climbers weren't even allowed to bring into the tower!

―Gigik, kigigik

"Hm? I can feel its energy gathering in that cylinder. ...Could there be something inside? Is it going to fire?"

"Exactly. We don't know what might come out, so everyone gather near me for now."

Something that had been proven through several real battles - once any kind of weapon or projectile was fired, regardless of type, it would immediately lose power under Ban Yu-won's ability, have its concept stolen, and disappear.

In other words, Ban Yu-won possessed a projectile nullification barrier.

Just this ability alone could be considered powerful!

―Bang!

The moment the party quickly gathered around Ban Yu-won, the elite tower spider fired a shell without any preparation motion.

With his All-Reading Eyes having evolved, his dynamic vision had improved enough to precisely track the shell flying toward them.

It was a watermelon-sized projectile made of pure white thread.

'Come to think of it...'

Ban Yu-won thought as he reached out his hand to manifest his ability, completely dismantling and absorbing the shell's concept.

'No matter how well I can absorb the concepts of objects, it's useless if I get hit before I can see it. But it's just a matter of not getting caught off guard.'

The concepts absorbed from the dismantled shell were three, Thread (絲), Magic Power, and Adhesion (粘着).

The last one, adhesion, was probably what they needed to watch out for.

"The adhesive power is strong. Be careful not to get stuck, Light."

"Why are you singling me out?"

He probably remembered the humiliation from his past experience.

As Light angrily gripped his spear and charged at the giant spider, the creature made a keek-keek sound and quickly fired shells at him.

"As if I'd get hit by something I've already seen!"

Light accelerated by kicking off the ground, easily dodging the shells, and with one great swing of his spear, he cut off the monster's front leg!

Crash- Bang!

Then, as he was about to pierce through its head after smashing its carapace with his magic-charged spear shaft...

"Dodge!"

"Tch!"

―Kwagwagwang!

Multiple shells flew in succession, turning Light's position into a spider web.

Not only had the severed front leg that had been spurting murky blood somehow transformed into a new cannon, but the cannon on its shell had also split into four!

"Ban!"

"Got it!"

He had been interested in the concept of adhesion anyway.

Ban Yu-won immediately absorbed the concept of the scattered spider web and rushed toward the spider.

"Eve, Lilith! Handle the shells."

"Sisisit!"

―Bwaang!

―Keeeeek

The division of labor was highly efficient.

Every time the spider was attacked, it would transform parts of its body into cannons and fire terrible adhesive shells in rapid succession, but...

Lilith, running swiftly across the ground (thanks to the room's expansion when the elite appeared, it could sprint freely), and Eve, freely gliding through the air, cleanly absorbed them all.

"Time to finish this!"

"-Hup!"

Meanwhile, Ban Yu-won and Light completely pulverized the spider.

There was no need for Luciel or Dokgo Yeon to step in.

[Life 1, Body 0.5, Magic Beast 1, Artillery (砲術) 13, Carapace 7, Transformation (變形) 5]

"...Sigh."

To think that even the concepts extracted from an elite in Room 15 only increased Ban Yu-won's life by 1.

Or perhaps he should say it increased by as much as 1?

As Ban Yu-won organized the concepts, reflecting on how much he had grown over the past two weeks, he saw something falling beneath the disappearing elite's corpse.

"An artifact?!"

Surprisingly, Light, who was the most sensitive to physical items among the party, cheered and ran over.

But soon, a strange groan escaped his lips as he checked the loot.

"Ughh, this is creepy.... Ban, quickly come and take this."

"Lately, there are times when you feel like my little brother."

"Quite often, you all feel like kids to me."

"Include me in that too...!"

Ban Yu-won ignored the two of them (while Dokgo Yeon was teasing Luciel, saying "Then you're just a pet.") and took the spoils from Light's hands.

Indeed, as soon as he received what looked like a cylinder, he understood why Light had been so repulsed.

Rather than being a processed artifact, it was the actual cannon that the Elite Tower Spider had been carrying.

"This isn't just a remaining body part. All the parts that could be called a cannon have been synthesized. Look, from the outside it's a large cylinder, but it has seven barrels."

"D-don't bring it closer!"

How cute.

When Light quickly ran to hide behind Dokgo Yeon, Luciel glared at Ban Yu-won again.

"Yu-won, you're mean."

"It's not even that creepy. There's hardly any trace of spider left."

Ban Yu-won shrugged his shoulders, tapped on the hard carapace exterior to show them, and then checked the inside of the barrels.

This wasn't simply multiple barrels joined together.

The synthesis was so precise that it seemed like it could fire seven rounds simultaneously if only it could be loaded.

While wondering if this might be an artifact, Ban Yu-won finally realized the answer.

'I see, this uses adhesion. I can't believe it could be joined together so naturally.'

No wonder concepts like Cannon (大砲) or Adhesion hadn't appeared when the creature died - they were all concentrated in this barrel.

Perhaps these special byproducts with monster characteristics applied would become materials for artifacts.

No, if that's the case, couldn't Ban Yu-won directly create an artifact using this?

"Whatever it is, won't you do it later, Ban Yu-won? The path ahead is blocked, but there's no shift happening."

"I'm the expert at solving things like this."

Ban Yu-won first tucked the spoils... the multi-barrel into his chest and turned around.

Looking around briefly, he soon found hints for proceeding to the next room.

Parts of some massive concept (probably the concept that would trigger changes in the tower) were scattered and embedded in the walls.

Looking closely, they were fragments of sparkling jewels.

"I found those too. But I can't extract them. I'm hesitant to break them..."

"We don't need to extract or break them. We just need to connect them as they are."

"Connect them?"

"With spider silk."

Looking at the multi-barrel that came from the dead Elite, he could be certain - the adhesive property in its spider silk wasn't just sticky, but had the ability to completely connect objects together— to put it hastily, the ability to fuse them.

Therefore, the standard strategy for this room was probably to move around while facing the Elite, inducing it to shoot spider web bullets at the wall to connect the fragments embedded there with its webs.

So that all the separated fragments would be connected and the concept would become whole.

"How... how can you come up with such ideas?"

"Yu-won is a genius."

Dokgo Yeon made a sour face, not understanding why Luciel was looking so proud.

Ban Yu-won was now used to such reactions.

"This kind of thing comes up surprisingly often in games. Connecting scattered power sources with wires and such... At least this one is fortunate since we just need to join them without any specific connection pattern."

You might ask if it's impossible to clear this room now that the Elite who could shoot adhesive bullets is dead?

Of course not, the tower never completely blocks the path of climbers.

It was set up so that breaking all the fragments at once would also trigger a shift.

However, just like finding the shortcut in Room 6 earlier that led to multiple shifts, taking the standard approach would likely yield significantly greater rewards.

"And surprisingly, I can clear this using a method that surpasses the standard approach."

"Ban Yu-won, you know what? You're really insufferable right now."

"So cool...!"

"Luciel, he's getting weirder because you keep indulging him."

Originally, Ban Yu-won, who could absorb concepts from all objects by verbalizing them, had no need to borrow the power of the adhesion concept.

As Ban Yu-won stretched out his hand, concept strings simultaneously emerged from the sparkling jewel fragments embedded in the wall.

"Ah."

"The jewels are breaking..."

"Empty jewels like that aren't important."

Eventually, all the concepts gathered above his palm, merging into one as they emitted a dazzling light.

Within it, Ban Yu-won could read the concepts of 'Ever-changing', 'origin (根源)', 'Concealment (隱匿)', and 'Passage (通路)'.

However, they were intricately interwoven with tower rules that Ban Yu-won couldn't yet replicate, making it seemingly impossible to separate or process any part.

"Now if I inject this into the wall as is."

The moment the concept extending from his hand touched the wall, light pulsed and expanded from that point, creating a hole large enough for people to enter.

He could guarantee this wouldn't end with just a simple shift when they crossed through.

Could it perhaps be a shortcut straight to Room 20?

"How about that."

When Ban Yu-won turned to look at his companions, they all showed the expected reactions.

Standing there with mouths agape in admiration - the proper attitude for an audience.

"...Whether it's traps or mazes, Ban deals with everything so easily that I can't even tell if we're climbing the same tower as other students anymore."

"Calm down, Light. The real tower hasn't even begun yet. According to the lessons, the rooms become uncontrollably large after passing Room 100."

"Didn't we agree not to use expressions like 'after passing such-and-such room~~'?"

Though for the revival of the Rebellion channel, larger rooms might be better.

Objectively speaking, there wasn't much worth keeping from today's footage.

"The progress is too easy and monotonous, what should we do? Maybe we should have gotten caught in a maze or trap at least once..."

"What you just showed was interesting enough."

Dokgo Yeon responded incredulously to Ban Yu-won's nonchalant words.

But the truly interesting part was about to begin.

—Good heavens, an individual has surpassed the tower's design? In merely Room 17!

—I believed in you, damn it! Though I never imagined you'd accomplish something this big...!

—Child, the endless vitality within you has borne fruit all too early!

"...Huh?"

Just as the party was about to step into the hole of light.

—The tower stopped, and the voices of constellations began to be heard.

Quite a number of them, at that.

—The tower has stopped. Because of what just happened here!

—To think we'd meet again so soon like this. My beloved child! May this meeting be blessed in the name of the Observer of Ten Thousand Eyes!

—Oh, I hereby designate this place as a temporary Star Sanctuary (星所). Stars, this must be approached with both prudence and caution.

Everything turned pure white, and orbs of light rose up all around, enveloping the party.

The phenomenon said to occur when many constellations gather in one place — Star Sanctuary Manifestation (星所化).

A place where humans choose constellations, rather than constellations choosing humans.

It was a miraculous moment that had occurred only a few times in history.

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