Chapter 3

Chapter 3

Su-hyeok felt his insides churning. He thought he understood why and how the video he’d just watched and the place were created.

“I’m sorry, but don’t be too disappointed. Even after death, you’ll be remembered as a hero.”

‘Damn it. Is this what he meant?’ He figured he was still being revered as a hero due to Ilsu. In the past, Su-hyeok was the face of Blue Eyes itself, and Blue Zone was an allied guild that was sort of their shadow. In a world without the Blue Eyes Guild, Blue Zone would have had to either fall off or take Blue Eyes’s place.

In order to make his guild stand out in Blue Eyes’s place, Ilsu probably needed the name and halo of Blue Eyes, and honoring Lee Su-hyeok as a hero was the perfect way to publicly take both of those things while seeming humble.

“You bastard...” Su-hyeok murmured in a low voice. A few people glanced at him, but he was too angry to care.

Whish—

He turned away before the video ended. There was no reason to keep watching. The more he saw Ilsu’s face, the more uncomfortable he felt.

Tap, tap—

Maybe it was due to the blood rushing through his head during his suppressed rage, but as he passed the photos, items, and videos of himself in his past life without so much as a sideways glance, he only heard the sounds of his own footsteps.

Finally, farther into the memorial hall, something in particular caught Su-hyeok’s eyes. Visitors had left a pile of flowers in front of his photo.

‘Flowers??’ It seemed most hadn’t arrived empty-handed. He looked at the chrysanthemum flower he’d purchased on his way there. There were so many flowers in front of the photo that his flower would only be one among many.

It felt strange to think that so many people remembered him.

Swoosh—

He placed the flower in front of his photo and truly felt the weight of realizing his old self, the Lee Su-hyeok everyone remembered, was dead, and 20 years had passed. A strange feeling enveloped him for a while.

“...?” After some time, he felt a familiar magic power in the pile of flowers. He reached out and searched through the pile, which caused others to start staring, but it wasn’t the time for him to care about that.

Finally, within the piled-up chrysanthemums, he discovered an unusually transparent ice flower.

‘Don’t tell me...’ He picked the ice flower up and felt a cold chill through his fingers. A chrysanthemum made of ice... His eyes widened in surprise. ‘Siwoo... He made this.’ Su-hyeok turned and thoroughly looked through the memorial hall.

His heart was pounding. Since the ice flower hadn’t completely melted yet, the one who’d left it there probably hadn’t gone far.

* * *

“Somehow, we managed to survive another year.” On top of the clock tower overlooking the memorial hall, an old man with a hunched back looked down at the building.

“Once again, it was nerve-wracking.” Behind him, a woman wrapped in a robe appeared from the shadows beneath the tower. As if wanting to complain, she bit her thick, red lips and asked, “Did you really have to bring that? We should have just left a normal chrysanthemum.”

Psss—

The skin on the old man’s face peeled away, revealing a young man’s face in its place. Kim Siwoo... He was a member of Blue Eyes who’d supposedly died 20 years prior.

“You never know. That guy might come back to life and find the flower I left.”

“Do you still think he’s alive?” the woman asked.

“We didn’t see him die with our own eyes, did we?”

‘Contacting them right now would be dangerous.’ He calmed himself a bit and tried to organize his situation in his head. ‘They have to have a reason for hiding, so I shouldn’t draw attention to them.’

He was planning to climb the tower. He was well-aware of the abilities he’d used in his past life, and if he started climbing the tower with them again, it would undoubtedly draw quite a bit of attention.

What would happen if he contacted the presumed-dead Siwoo while he was being scrutinized? Blue Zone and the other guilds would certainly take notice.

‘First, I need to regain my power.’ There were only two days left until the tutorial that would allow him to regain his player status started. He sat up on the edge of his bed and thought about his course of action.

After thinking about how he could get even more powerful than before, he reached a conclusion. ‘If I could handle lightning properly, things wouldn’t have gone that far.’

Lightning was the most powerful weapon he’d used. The stronger it became, the more damage it inflicted on the user’s body. In other words, it was a sharp, double-edged sword. Of course, it was also the best ‘sword’ in the tower.

“As expected. The problem is Stamina.” In his past life, he’d used skills and items that increased his Stamina to help deal with the self-inflicted damage from his lightning. Even then, it wasn’t enough.

He needed a way to reach an absurd amount of Stamina. Well, there was no way he would be able to immediately solve a problem that he hadn’t been able to solve back when he’d reached the 8th floor.

“The tutorial...” Su-hyeok looked at the ceiling. The tutorial was the first and most basic trial to evaluate a player’s capabilities.

“I wonder how many stages I can clear now,” he murmured as he recalled the contents of the trial. Every player had probably wondered, at least once, how far they would be able to go if they could replay the tutorial. Such thoughts were flights of fantasy, but Su-hyeok had a unique opportunity.

‘In my past life, I reached stage 25.’ It was a record-breaking number. Even after 20 years, though all information about the tutorial had become known, only two players had beaten that record.

‘Climbing the tower again won’t be a problem in itself, but that isn’t good enough. I need to do better.’ His gaze turned to the sword placed in the corner of the room. Since the tutorial was coming up, he’d prepared his weapon in advance.

He reached out and grabbed the sword. A familiar feeling spread evenly from his fingertips through his body, and he smoothly drew the weapon from its sheathe. It wasn’t very good, but that made it feel even more like a fresh start.

“I must do well.” It was just a tutorial, but he had to give it his all on every trial and trial he faced. Climbing the tower wasn’t enough. Instead, he needed to succeed in everything with near perfection.

His gaze fell upon the mask he’d left on his desk. In essence, he had to beat none other than himself.

* * *

For two days, Su-hyeok gave himself time to get used to his new body. He felt heavier, his feet were sluggish, and his sword also wasn’t as light as he was used to. Two days were enough for him to adapt, though.

“Hmm...” He’d repeatedly swung his sword and moved in a hunting ground near the village for the past two days, and he encountered a few of the lowest-ranking monsters that appeared nearby during his training.

“How did you get beaten up so badly despite having such a body?” he asked himself. After all of his practice and a few fights against the easiest monsters, he was more aware than ever that he’d lucked out with the body he received.

All of his stats were over 10, and Concentration was at 14. He’d unlocked Magic Power without having gone through the tutorial and was clearly very talented, just based on his stat numbers alone. The previous owner of the body just hadn’t been able to use it all properly.

“Good.” Even compared to his past self, it might’ve been a better foundation. Since he’d died, something called ‘player training institutions’ had popped up that offered professional training until the moment a player entered the tutorial, so it was only natural.

He’d been dissatisfied with his start at first, but after taking some time to judge it more objectively, he thought his new body was quite excellent.

Chirp, chirp, chirp—

The bird chirped in the early-morning air. Su-hyeok, who’d moderately sweated from his warm up, lifted his head. He’d been keeping his senses heightened since he woke up.

‘So it’s starting.’ The day of the tutorial had dawned.

It was the day of Su-hyeok’s return.

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