Chapter 200 – Who Messed with Our Cuengi

99th floor waypoint of the tower.

Thump! Crash! Thump! Crash!

Woo Chun-sam ran quickly from afar.

“Woo Chun-sam, what is the matter that you are making such a fuss?”

The Bull Demon King, who was guarding the waypoint, asked with a displeased expression.

“Bull Demon King! Se-jun-nim is angry!”

“What?! Se-jun-nim is angry?!”

The Bull Demon King was greatly shocked. Until now, he had never heard of Se-jun getting angry.

Although it was because Se-jun lacked the courage to get angry at the fearsome animals of the 99th floor of the tower, the other animals misunderstood that Se-jun had great patience and rarely got angry.

“Yes! He was extremely furious, even swearing.”

“Who dared to make Se-jun-nim so angry that he would swear?! I must go and see for myself!”

Se-jun was a benefactor who had allowed them, who used to eat only dirt, to eat delicious grass.

Moo~!

Boom!!!

The Bull Demon King ran toward Se-jun’s farm more noisily than anyone, holding his legendary weapon, the Red Bone.

***

[The Tower Administrator says she will find everyone who touched your family and chew them up.]

At the words that they had touched Se-jun’s family, Aileen became agitated.

—Aileen, calm down. That could strain your Dragon Heart.

Kaiser stopped Aileen, worrying about her getting agitated.

Aileen had grown strong, possessing a vast amount of mana for her age, but she did not yet possess that level of control. If her emotions exploded, her mana could fluctuate along with them.

[The Tower Administrator gets angry, asking how she can stay still when bad guys have touched Se-jun’s family.]

—No… I understand, but still…

“Aileen, calm down just as Lord Kaiser said. I don’t want you to get hurt.”

[The Tower Administrator says she will calm down if you say so.]

Aileen, who turned a deaf ear when Kaiser spoke, but listened immediately to Se-jun’s words.

“Aileen, first look for the Three-Headed Society inside the tower.”

[The Tower Administrator tells you to leave it to her.]

At Se-jun’s request, Aileen began to search diligently for the Three-Headed Society through the crystal ball.

—She gets angry when this grandfather speaks, but when Se-jun speaks…

While Kaiser was grumbling, feeling hurt by Aileen,

Rumble!

Moo~!

Creating a massive cloud of dust, the Bull Demon King arrived.

And,

Moo?

Kruooar!

Moo!!!

After hearing the reason for Se-jun’s anger from Pinky, he began to get angry at the Three-Headed Society.

At that moment,

“Bull Demon King, can I borrow the Black Minotaurs?”

Se-jun requested the Bull Demon King to lend him his subordinates.

Moo! Moo!

[Use them as you please! No, this time I will go myself as well!]

Thrust.

At Se-jun’s request to borrow his subordinates, the Bull Demon King slung his weapon, the Red Bone, over his shoulder and replied that he would step forward himself.

The Bull Demon King, who had guarded the waypoint for 300 years. The Bull Demon King thought the time had come to re-establish the discipline of the tower.

“Bull Demon King, thank you. Then, Bull Demon King…”

Like that, Se-jun began to formulate a plan to completely eradicate the Three-Headed Society with the Bull Demon King’s help.

And there was one more being fuming here.

[How dare they touch Master’s family! I won’t let them off!]

Flamie was enraged, shivering her leaves.

***

—Hmm… we have been overlooking it too much.

Kaiser said, watching Se-jun give orders to the animals. Because he was just farming every day on the 99th floor of the tower and getting pushed around by the surrounding animals, they had underestimated Se-jun’s power too much.

Come to think of it, since the creation of the tower until now, there had been no world that had so easily blocked the first calamity, the Locust Invasion. And without major damage at that.

It was thanks to Se-jun’s Sturdy Blade Green Onions currently blocking the Locusts well outside the tower. Since there had never been a case like this on the side of Destruction, they must have been greatly flustered.

It was only too natural for the Three-Headed Society, which was related to the Apostles of Destruction, to target Se-jun’s family. On the contrary, he himself had become too accustomed to worlds disappearing, failing to perceive such a change.

This was because, at some point, the dragons had given up on protecting the worlds themselves, and only cared about maintaining the tower by accepting survivors inside the tower.

Why did it become like this?

When the dragons first began to manage the tower, they had agonized and fought to protect the worlds. However, as failures repeated, at some point, the thought that it was useless to fight became prevalent among the dragons.

They had become accustomed to failure.

—We have become accustomed to failure?!!!

Kaiser was startled by his own thought. Even if it was out of laziness, to think that the Great Black Dragon, the glorious Dragon Clan, had become accustomed to failure and given up on fighting?!

Unless something was exerting influence, this was impossible. Something was encroaching upon them. The matter was more serious than thought.

—Kellion, let’s talk for a moment.

—Huh? Why?

Kaiser called Kellion and quietly moved to another location.

***

A certain lake on the 44th floor of the tower, inside the lake was a small ice island melting.

And,

“Here… I brought 1,000 Tower Coins. So please freeze the lake.”

Kona, who had earned a large sum of money by selling equipment with Theo’s help on the 41st floor of the tower, pulled out money from his pouch and handed it to the man in front of the lake.

“Hehehe. What should we do, since I became a bit expensive starting today.”

Noticing that the amount in the pouch was substantial when Kona pulled out the money, the man spoke in a sly voice.

He had demanded an amount that this naive fellow would barely be able to obtain after desperate efforts, but admirably, the fellow had earned far more money than his expectations, whatever he had done. Then he should live up to that effort.

“Then how much is it…?”

“Hmm… about 10,000 Tower Coins?”

“Th… that much?!”

Kona was flustered at the man’s words. He had been planning to buy food for the village penguins since he had a large sum of money for the first time in a while…

“H… here it is.”

Kona handed the money to the man. Protecting the island was more important than food. Without the ice island, the penguins could not live for even a single day.

“Hehehe. Cute fellow, good job. Ice Blast!”

When the man used his ability, the ice island floating in the lake stopped melting, and the surroundings of the ice island froze, starting to grow slightly larger again.

“Bring 10,000 Tower Coins next time too.”

The man said to Kona and entered a small cave near the lake.

Thud. Thud.

Going deep along the cave, the man approached another man who was directing others in the center of a wide open space.

“Lord Togan, I am back.”

“Vincent, how much did you get?”

“It is 10,000 Tower Coins.”

“What?! Really?!”

Togan was surprised at Vincent’s words.

“Yes. This is all thanks to Lord Togan’s idea.”

“Hehehe. That’s only natural. Thanks to that, quite a bit of money will be left over even after paying the tribute to Mr. Won.”

Togan said with a fishy smile at Vincent’s flattery. The cave they were in was a hideout of the Three-Headed Society; Togan had coincidentally discovered the penguins living near the hideout and came up with an idea to secure money.

And after melting the ice island with Togan’s flame ability, they were extorting money in exchange for sending Vincent to freeze the island.

***

Slam!

“President! We have a big problem!”

A subordinate urgently entered, roughly opening the door to the President’s office of the Traveling Merchant Association.

“What is it?!”

“From the 99th floor of the tower, the Black Minotaurs have started moving south again!”

“So what? They will probably go back up quickly this time too.”

Having already experienced the southward movement of the Black Minotaurs once, Mason, the President of the Traveling Merchant Association, spoke indifferently. Nothing happened back then, so what would happen this time?

But this time was different.

“The Bull Demon King is also moving together with them.”

“What?! The Bull Demon King?!”

“Yes! The Bull Demon King is personally leading 3,000 Black Minotaurs down the tower.”

“Then this is no time to be idle! Gather the executives quickly and deploy all Secret Inspection Bureau agents to find out the reason why the Bull Demon King is moving!”

Terrified, Mason hurriedly gave instructions. When the Bull Demon King came down the tower 300 years ago, nearly ten floors suffered damage close to total annihilation. This time, he could not even imagine how great the damage would be.

“Yes!”

Slam!

The subordinate hurriedly closed the door and left.

“Hoo… to think the Bull Demon King is moving… a bloodbath will blow in the tower…”

Mason said with a sigh full of worry.

***

“Chairman Park, I’ve packed everything, meow!”

Kkueng!

[Cuengi has packed everything too!]

Theo and Cuengi ran toward Se-jun, who was looking around the farm. Se-jun instructed the Bull Demon King to search thoroughly floor by floor from the top down.

And Se-jun himself decided to go to the floor where the Three-Headed Society was most likely to be among the floors he could visit. He could not just wait for Aileen or the Bull Demon King to find the Three-Headed Society.

Once they were prepared to leave like that,

“Guys, get inside.”

He put Theo and Cuengi into the void storage and pulled out a land deed.

[Land Deed of the Lake on the 44th Floor of the Black Tower]

Rustle.

Se-jun unfolded the document and disappeared.

***

[You have arrived at the lake on the 44th floor of the Black Tower.]

[You have moved from the 99th floor, the highest floor, to the 44th floor of the tower.]

[You have descended 55 floors.]

[Due to the effect of , all stats increase by 55.]

In an instant, his stats rose by 220.

“Oh!”

Se-jun felt power overflowing through his entire body and looked around. Just as written on the land deed, there was a lake in front of him.

“Huh?! Is that ice?”

If there was anything strange, it was that there was an ice island in the center of the lake.

Clank.

“Guys, come out.”

Se-jun summoned Theo and Cuengi first.

“Understood, meow!”

Cling.

Theo came out immediately at Se-jun’s call and clung to Se-jun’s knee.

However,

Kkueng!

[Cuengi will come out a bit later!]

Cuengi, who had not yet filled his snack pouch completely, refused to come out.

“Right. Okay. Come out slowly.”

Se-jun looked around with the void storage left open.

At that moment,

[A quest occurs.]

[Quest: Lower the temperature of the lake whose temperature has risen and reclaim the rights to the lake.]

Reward: Recognition as the rightful owner of the land deed

As expected, a quest to obtain the rights to the land appeared this time as well.

“When you get a land deed, is there always a quest to obtain the rights like this? Ice Cube.”

Se-jun wondered for a moment and froze the water to move to the ice island in the center of the lake. For some reason, he felt the clue to the problem would be on that ice island.

Step.

Like that, Se-jun stepped onto the ice island.

“Theo, do you hear anything?”

“I hear something tapping inside, meow!”

“Really? Where is it?”

“Over there, meow!”

Moving along where Theo pointed,

“Stairs?”

Downwards stairs made of ice were visible. It was clear someone was there.

Descending along the stairs like that,

Clang! Clang!

The sound of tapping something began to be heard by Se-jun’s ears as well. It was the sound of hammering iron.

“What is it?”

As Se-jun continued to walk following the sound,

“Huh?! Penguins?”

He could find small blue penguins making something by diligently hammering iron.

The truly amazing thing was that the penguins were not heating the iron with fire and hammering it,

Crackle.

But they hammered the iron after freezing it with ice.

“It’s Kona, meow!”

Theo spotted Kona making equipment among the penguins hammering iron and shouted.

And,

“Huh?! Mr. Theo?”

Kona, who raised his head at the welcome voice and spotted Theo.

Waddle. Waddle. Waddle.

Kona ran toward Theo in delight.

At that moment,

Kkueeeeng!!!

Cuengi’s roar, full of anger, was heard from outside.

“Who messed with our Cuengi?”

To mess with Cuengi… they had no luck. Praying for the opponent’s soul, Se-jun went outside.