Chapter 95

How to Use Experience Points (2)

Adam flew north after splitting with Seo Jin-Wook in Beijing.

Flying at a fast speed, he thought about the observer he met that day.

However, he wasn’t chasing after the observer like Seo Jin-Wook suspected.

He recalled what he saw with calm eyes.

‘That bastard, he was definitely a Ghenut.’

Just a while ago, when the observer, Adam, and Seo Jin-Wook had a three-way meeting, Adam deliberately took out the tubes from his collarbone in front of them.

Thanks to the advanced biotechnology developed by his species, he had transplanted tens of thousands of species of body tissues into his body.

Dakegamas mole’s sensory organ was one of them as well.

Adam took the tubes out for a moment, pretending to show off, and scanned the alien disguised in a poodle shell to identify it.

‘They have a very long history since they started the main quest.’

Their long history had created a high reputation.

There was a consequence that they suffered in return for a long time.

‘The growth of their civilization has already been dampened. The whole species is suffering from a chronic point shortage. That’s why they don’t usually apply for observation jobs.’

It was in a position where it was difficult to build achievements in the Union and earn experience points as salary.

‘The greatest achievement a being in an observative position can make is to detect and deport unique illegal aliens that rarely exist.’

It was the fundamental reason why he suddenly pressured Seo Jin-Wook and treated him as an alien.

Its species desperately needed merit and experience points in the Union.

They were beggars with a flamboyant appearance.

‘He thought he had a case, so he just rushed in. When the observation skill failed to read Seo Jin-Wook’s information, the doubt would have changed to conviction.’

Adam’s eyes narrowed when he recalled that fact once again.

‘The eyes skill failed….’

His train of thought had shifted from the observer to Seo Jin-Wook.

The scene he witnessed that day was unusual in many ways.

‘Although I knew he was a peculiar one…’

It was a much more interesting subject than he thought.

In the first place, he stuck by him because he knew that he was that kind of a man.

‘He must think that I’m still stuck with him because of that little piece of experience points, huh?’

Adam thought about the 100,000 points he had just received.

‘The linked 2nd quest was the same in the sense that he did it all by himself. Summing up the two quests… Must he have received about 250,000 points?’

It was almost an accurate guess, with a little room for error.

‘He must think of my request as a respectful gesture. Since I can’t work for free, it’s a reasonable offer of… Tip for the sake of it?’

But that wasn’t true.

The 100,000 points to Adam wasn’t even considered as an allowance.

‘Well, at this stage, I’d appreciate it if he thought so that way.’

There was one thing that Seo Jin-Wook didn’t know about Adam.

The alien was one of the richest beings in the world, a point tycoon.

Even the poodle, who was in charge of observation, if he knew the exact figures, it would’ve been enough for it to foam around its mouth and tremble with jealousy.

He checked the system message.

– Current Experience Points: 58,326,120.

The 100,000 he received that day made no difference to it.

He once acted in front of Seo Jin-Wook that the admission fee of 1.4 million was a huge price to pay.

When in fact, he already had enough points to take dozens of round trips between his home and Earth.

Nevertheless, he offered a deal, acting as if points mattered to him, to create a justification to stick around.

There was a reason why he decided to accompany him by using such means.

“…!”

Adam, who was crossing Mongolian territory, stopped flying.

Before him was a vast meadow that looked like there’s nothing unusual at a glance.

He went down to the ground and reached his hand out.

Weeing!

The air fluttered, and the door to the barrier that only Adam could enter was opened.

Waiting for him inside was a subtle light-emanating gate.

It was the same as how Seo Jin-Wook had a gate in Korea and the U.S. where he only could enter without others knowing.

Adam had that type of gate all over the world.

– You entered the dungeon!

– You have already paid the entrance fee for the origin dimension. Re-entry does not consume experience points.

– Re-entry point exemption will be reset as soon as you enter another world.

Adam, who stepped inside the dungeon, opened an inventory item.

The tissue cut from the giant worm was so large that it filled to the capacity.

Wu-du-du!

From a black hole organs, muscles, and other end-of-body organs of various living things that were well kept by the storage skill poured out.

The dungeon served as a storage facility for Adam’s collection.

A place where even the eyes of observers covering the entire planet didn’t reach.

No one knew what Adam did with the ‘materials’ gathered there.

‘Looking at it now, the number of observers dispatched to this world is also odd.’

Through the list shown by Seo Jin-Wook, it had already been known that there were six observers.

Although the number was large compared to the planet’s area, he only thought six low-level ones were dispatched.

‘But a Ghenut was mixed in among the observers! Due to the nature of the species, he must be able to cover an entire planet of this size… Having to necessarily dispatch six means that there is something here.’

Some of the peculiarities were already identified by Adam.

His attention was focused on the collection that was orderly being kept throughout the dungeon.

Stretched out in front of him was the reason why he stayed on Earth for a long time after more than ten years when he only stayed to a maximum of one year in other dimensions.

‘Even if it’s considered to be in the tutorial’s early days, the dungeons’ levels connected to it are too high. There are countless kinds of monsters as well. Moreover, SS-Class dungeons are already opening up… At this rate, the appearance of an SSS-Class dungeon wouldn’t far away. The pace is way too fast. It’s as if the system is in a hurry.’

There was one more peculiarity he noticed.

‘Seo Jin-Wook’s presence.’

The dazzlingly fast growth might be only considered as being a genius.

However, the interpretation of the characteristic changes as soon as it was connected to another discovery.

‘He has a bizarrely large collection of Imperial Heritages.’

He even had the item that had stolen his attention the moment they first met, the [Door of Hope].

The process of acquiring items related to the Sebrarian Empire was not important.

Considering the results, the fact that the empire’s heritage, whether by fate or by chance, were so concentrated on a single mortal reminded Adam of a certain possibility.

‘If I go somewhere and tell people that the heritages are making their way back to their owners, I’ll be treated as a lame joke. But have there been people who have gathered them to this point during the tutorial phase?’

Furthermore, he witnessed the scene of the [Observer’s Eyes] failing to work.

He put all those together.

He couldn’t help but remember a story that was considered lame lore whenever it was mentioned. It wasn’t too known among the species in the main quest.

‘Does it exist?’

It’s been a long time since he had remembered that word again.

‘Successor!’

A tale that only those nerds that had roamed around various dimensions, like Adam, would know.

‘If it’s real…’

It was like a ray of light that would help him achieve his long-cherished yearning.

Adam, who was so lost in deep thought in his personal space, renewed his determination to stay nearby Seo Jin-Wook for a while.

He wanted to build trust while maintaining a friendly relationship with him as much as possible.

‘The biggest factor of interference would be…’

The first thing that came to mind was the Union.

He soon shook his head.

‘It’s unknown why the Union dispatched so many observers, but what is certain is that Seo Jin-Wook himself is not the goal. If he were, they would have made much bolder efforts. It couldn’t have shown a mediocre reaction of misunderstanding him as an alien and tried to arrest him, then withdraw immediately after learning that he was not.’

In the end, it led to the conclusion that the being that Seo Jin-Wook was desperately looking for… The alien that had phenomenal skills, according to his words, was more dangerous than the Union.

‘We need to put the risk factor away in advance.’

Not long ago, he had filed a search through his origin dimension, but the answer that returned was ‘there is no information about species or beings that possess such abilities.’

Adam hasn’t told Seo Jin-Wook about that yet.

‘But there’s another way.‘

He pondered about it for a while before making a decision.

“System.”

He proposed a deal toward the system.

It was a much more general form of transaction, different from what Seo Jin-Wook had tried before.

“Let’s make a deal with the experience points.”

Experience points were usually used to bypass and evade existing structures and laws.

For example:

Once opened, Gates became unstable over time, a concept that prevented them from returning to their previous state.

However, paying experience points not only regressed the status back to the previous level but also slowed the degradation rate for a certain period.

There was also a principle that the information of an Awakened couldn’t be obtained through [Analysis] magic or [Atlas] items, and only the person himself or herself could check it.

However, if one were to pay with experience points, they could obtain the appearance, current location, and species’ information on the condition that the being had completed the tutorial.

‘In the previously unusual deal, Seo Jin-Wook only acquired the disguised appearance and location of aliens.’

He concluded that the system could only hand out that much.

‘He’s missing the rather important species information.’

Adam was about to spend the experience points that Seo Jin-Wook couldn’t even attempt to do.

He thought of the list he showed him in his head.

“I want the race information about an Awakened.”

A total of 30 million experience points were needed to see all of the information of more than 50 aliens.

Instead of revealing them all at once, Adam decided to point them out one by one and buy information about each of them.

He was thinking about stopping when he saw a suspicious one.

In a way, that was like a gamble where he had to spend points until he hit the jackpot.

Adam started a work that Seo Jin-Wook postponed because he couldn’t handle it even with [The Successor’s Eyes].

“First of all, this guy!”

Each time he read an alien’s information, it consumed 580,000 points.

He read the information carefully.

He then clicked his tongue.

“Tsk, what a bummer. Next!”

In that manner, race information was released to Adam one by one.

“Again, next!”

Perhaps of bad luck, no unusual being was spotted after looking at more than 10 of them.

5.8 million points had already been consumed.

Even for the species working on the main quest, that amount made their hands tremble when they would try to spend it all at once.

But Adam thought those were points that he could earn again.

He said determinedly, thinking that that was also an investment.

“The next is…”

He pointed his finger as he sensed a hunch.

“This one!”

– The price is 580,000 experience points. Would you like to purchase it?

“I’m purchasing it!”

He continued to put 580,000 points in stakes as the gamble of 50 options continued, and the target is reduced one by one.

Adam’s point decreased quickly, but he didn’t seem to care.

He kept pointing at each of them without hesitation.

And while doing so…

“Next, this one!”

Another alien species information was revealed.

“…!”

After checking the information, he smiled as if he had finally found what he was looking for.

“Yes, this is him!”

He had already consumed more than 10 million experience points.

*

The day when a brilliant aurora covered the entire South Korean territory, there was a great sensation all over the country.

– Breaking news! An unprecedented phenomenon has been observed throughout the current domestic Gates!

“No way, am I dreaming?”

“All the dungeon conditions have stabilized to the previous level?”

The dungeon state is the most important factor in determining the order of Clear.

If the ‘very unstable’ dungeon is left unattended, it will lead to a dungeon break.

In particular, on the day that the rank was high, the government often tried to Clear it with all its might.

Siheung 8 Dungeon was the representative case.

“Oh, my God… The dungeons that used to be ‘very unstable’ have all changed to ‘slightly unstable’!”

Thanks to that, the expedition teams, which were scrambling to stop a dungeon break, could take a breather.

“I was nervous about when this dungeon would go off, but now it makes me feel like I’m living again.”

“The question is how long this will last. No, let’s say that’s the case…. Why did this happen all of a sudden?”

Causality was easy to find.

Everything started at the moment when the aurora covered the sky, after all.

Many people used their [Analysis] skill towards it.

Awakened who saw the results dropped their jaws.

[Aurora of Stability (Rank: System)]

– Item description: Stabilizes all gates in the range to the previous level and suppresses the rate of change in status for a certain period.

From the item’s rank to the detailed description, none of it was a concept that humankind had ever imagined before.

There was a burst of exclamations among the Awakened.

“The item rank is… ‘System?!'”

It was a rank that was unheard of.

The explanation was unusual as well.

For the people, systems, gates, and dungeons were like unpredictable natural disasters.

For the Awakened that had to move only within the set boundaries, there was only the concept of Clearing the dungeon to close it if it seemed like it would collapse, just as it was natural to mobilize a fire brigade to extinguish a forest fire immediately.

On the other hand, there was no means to slow down the spread of fire until the fire brigade was ready.

They only became aware of the new concept that day.

There was no immediate way to verify how much slower the rate leading up to the dungeon break sequence would be. However, it was clear that it would be effective, as although the system might have hidden the truth, it didn’t lie.

Only time could prove it.

At first, citizens worried that Aurora might be an ominous sign, but they soon began to cheer after understanding the situation.

“What, so we don’t have to be worried about the dungeon break for the time being?”

“We don’t know that. The key is how long that item will last. There are also instantaneous dungeons…”

“But it’s surely better than before!”

Foreign governments had flipped.

“Does this make sense? Why did that happen only in Korean territory?”

With the identity of the item [Aurora of Stability] revealed, the next question was who and how it was obtained…. And in what ways it could be obtained in the future.

While the world quickly exchanged communication.

From a certain point, one name began to be mentioned by those who focused on that phenomenon.

*

“Okay, it’s as rowdy as I expected.”

I mumbled as I watched the news continuously broadcasting about the Aurora and presenting their analysis.

There were two reasons why the 1.6 million experience points I spent were worth it.

One was to make it easier for the Celestial Dragon Guild to operate in Korea, its home base.

Guild members swept through the area. As I pointed out like a shaman, they continuously discovered the Gates, causing the number of dungeons being Cleared by Celestial Dragon to increase tremendously, causing the number of exploration team members to become insufficient.

Among them were ‘very unstable’ dungeons that couldn’t be found in my previous life and led to break sequences.

If the dungeon that nobody found and collapsed in my past life were found by the Celestial Dragon and still collapsed in this life, it would’ve been extremely meaningless.

‘I had bought time for enough hunters to be supplied.’

And the second reason.

I saw the breaking news on the T.V. that followed.

It was news of the arrival of notorious foreign Guild Masters who were famous all over the world.

– … In the midst of this, it was revealed that leadership and top-level hunters representing Britain’s “Matap” guild arrived at the Incheon International Airport yesterday.

– The Matap Guild is notorious for practically monopolizing magic skill cards of S-Class or higher. Their secret is due to the uncommon dungeon in the U.K., which repeatedly expanded despite being Cleared.

– The British government prohibits anyone outside the Matap Guild from entering the mentioned dungeon…

In the midst of the reporter’s explanation, the bad blood of my past life passed by one by one on the screen.

They were the aces of the Matap Guild.

They must have flown after hearing what happened in Korea like their ass was on fire.

Instead of closing the dungeon that’s about to collapse, they’re looking for a secret to keeping the door open and prolonging its life!

‘Okay, they took the bait.’

Now it’s time to take the next step.