Leveling with the Gods

Chapter 96

The test examiner of the 20th Floor’s test was Theseus, an Olympian Ranker.

He was pretty highly ranked, and he had quite a bit of influence in Olympus thanks to being the son of a certain person.

“Kim YuWon…”

Theseus raised his head and frowned, reading the order he got from Olympus.

“The conditions are troublesome.”

They gave him a job to do, but there were a lot of conditions attached to it.

“‘Don’t directly involve myself in the test. Don’t be spotted by other players. Be careful of the penalty.’”

They were all troublesome conditions.

“Olympus has gotten quite timid. They must have quite a number of skeletons in the closet,” Theseus commented.

“There were incidents on the 1st and 11th Floors, so it can’t be helped, sir.”

Theseus looked over at Sipholiose, a fellow Olympian Ranker who had brought him the order.

Theseus was aware of the situation. “A lot sure has happened. After failing to capture Hephaestus on the 1st Floor, Hypnos got caught interfering with a test on the 11th Floor by the Administrator.”

Thanks to all that, Olympus was currently under special watch by the Administrators.

“For me to be tasked with cleaning up after the mess created by those idiots…”

“Lady Hera believes you’ll do an excellent job.”

Theseus let out a deep sigh.

It wasn’t that difficult of a task, but the problem was that it was something that violated the rules of the Tower, and if the Administrator were to find out, this could be the final nail in the coffin.

Something that shouldn’t be done had already happened twice.

“It isn’t all that difficult of a task, but…” Theseus stopped and shook his head after a thought came to him. “No, if it wasn’t difficult, people wouldn’t have failed twice now.”

This was a guy who had started fighting a Ranker on the 1st Floor. He then won against a Ranker test examiner on the 11th Floor, and it was unknown how much stronger he might have become by now.

Theseus decided that he would no longer view Kim YuWon as a ‘player.’

“So, who are the players that will be helping me? I don’t think we should be using Rankers for this.”

“The Crimson Wolf Guild offered to cooperate with us.”

“Crimson Wolf?” Theseus nodded his head while trying to remember who they were. “Oh, those psychos.”

“They’re infamous for being bad guys in the lower floors, even though they’re just a small guild with only two Rankers.”

“I heard that Horang is quite the guy.”

“He’s currently on this floor, sir.”

“Oh really?”

“He was the first one to bring us news that YuWon is on this floor. I believe he’ll be a great help.”

This was good news.

The Crimson Wolf Guild was a relatively useful guild, and Horang was a player who had started to prove his worth lately, enough that even Olympus offered to recruit him.

“Let’s leave that to the Crimson Wolf Guild then. Tell them to make a move before or after the test. As for the test itself…”

“We’ll be planting players from our side, but I think it’ll be best if you don’t have any expectations, sir.”

“Go figure.”

“Will you personally make a move, sir?”

“There’s a chance that the Crimson Wolf Guild might fail, so I’m thinking of bringing along a few guys from the Bureau.”

Anyone with the Bureau was going to be at least a Ranker. Theseus alone was worth at least three or four average Rankers, but now there were going to be a few more Rankers added to the mix.

‘For certain this time.’

Sipholiose bowed down, “I shall leave this in your care, sir.”

“Scram already.”

“Yes, sir.”

Sipholiose disappeared like melting snow. But Theseus was not surprised as he knew it was just an illusion all along.

Flop—

Theseus dug himself deep into his sofa.

He was given such a headache-inducing problem to take care of.

“Kim YuWon…”

He had heard a lot about him. From how he was the strongest player ever to how he has been nothing but a sore spot for Olympus recently.

There was no mistake that he would become even more of a headache in the future. He was a pest they had to crush before he got a chance to grow bigger.

But at least for now, or even quite a bit into the future, there was no way he could actually rival Olympus, so Theseus didn’t really care about YuWon that much.

There was only one thing he really cared about.

“So he disappeared with the Giants, huh.”

The thing that his father, Poseidon, was desperately searching for. The 「Stone of the Sea.」

* * *

The test of the 20th Floor was held on a tiny island.

The island named Triton was about 10km wide, and it was covered in seagrass.

Atop the island, various sea monsters resided.

“This place always gives me the heebie-jeebies,” Buar commented.

“Yeah, you almost died to a chimera back then,” Nwiar responded.

“I never saw something that creepy before.”

“This place is really similar to the Tutorial island. I wonder if maybe they modeled it after this place?”

Buar and Nwiar chatted as they arrived on Triton.

As ordered by Urpha, the two acted as a guide for YuWon. Their job was to show YuWon to the test site and shield YuWon from anyone who might try and pick a fight with him.

“The Elder’s worried about nothing. Like, what could possibly be a threat to this guy?” Buar said in disbelief.

The 20th Floor’s test was much harder in comparison to previous floors, but it was a test that Buar and Nwiar had managed to pass. He saw no reason why YuWon wouldn’t pass it.

“Maybe it’s not a normal test,” Nwiar hypothesized.

“Maybe.”

“Rankers from our side are keeping an eye on this test, but only a few have managed to come so that it doesn’t break out into a war.”

“So it really is a big deal,” Buar said while turning his head back to YuWon.

YuWon hadn’t said a word since they arrived on Triton. He wasn’t much of a chatter, but it was also strange for him to be completely silent.

Buar tried to demand, “Hey, tell us if you know something—”

But Nwiar cut him off short by pulling on his arm, “Big brother.”

YuWon didn’t say anything even though he should have heard Buar. He looked incredibly focused on something.

[The test will commence in 10 minutes.]

The test start message popped up.

The lower part of Triton was the entrance to the testing site, and Buar and Nwiar were not allowed to walk up higher than this.

“I’ll be back,” YuWon told them.

“Ah, okay,” Buar said while waving his hand, “See ya later.”

“And don’t worry about things over here too much,” Nwiar told YuWon.

Their faces were full of confidence.

They were the most skilled among the young Giants. They weren’t the children of the Giant Gods just for show. As long as they weren’t up against Rankers, there was no need to worry about them.

Step, step—

YuWon started to climb up the island, and Buar and Nwiar watched him walk away into the distance.

When YuWon was no longer visible, Buar said out loud, “Why don’t you guys come out?”

“Please stop hiding like rats and let me see your faces.”

Buar and Nwiar looked around and spotted the people hiding in the seagrass.

One by one, they revealed themselves. There were quite a few of them.

‘The Elder was right,’ Buar thought, thinking back to how Urpha told them that Olympus would be aiming for YuWon.

“Would you look at this,” one of the guys that was hiding said to the siblings.

“Look at them standing proud and mighty.”

“Did they just call us rats?”

There were about forty people, and mixed among them were familiar faces.

“It’s been a while,” Buar said to Horang, the red-haired fellow.

“You’re acting very different from the last time we met. What happened to the guy that was cowering in fear?”

“Things have changed,” Buar said, smashing his two fists together.

A hard sound rang throughout the air, as if he just hit two pieces of metal together.

“This time, I plan on fighting,” Buar declared.

Until now, Buar had lived by keeping himself out of fights because he didn’t want to ruin the poor reputation of the Giants even more.

That was also the will of Urpha, the Grand Elder of the Giants.

However…

“This time, you must fight. No,” Urpha told them, “From now on… you must always fight.”

Smirk—

That was the best news Buar had ever received in his life.

“You sound like you think you can win as long as you get to fight,” Horang spoke.

“You heard me right.”

Stomp—

A loud step rumbled the ground.

Horang and his gang looked to the side and spotted three Giants approaching them.

“Are you the one that’s been bullying our friend?” Kwant said, walking up with two other Giants.

A total of five Giants, including Buar and Nwiar, had gathered together. They were greatly outnumbered, but their presence rivaled the 40 players.

“Well, ain’t this a big haul.” Horang smiled at the arrival of three more Giants.

Because Olympus was greatly interested in the capture of Giants, to Horang, the five in front of him seemed like some big catch.

“Keep at least one or two of them alive. We might be able to use them as hostages later,” Horang ordered his men.

There were many ways to use the Giants, but the primary objective of this mission was eliminating Kim YuWon. Since Horang had confirmed that he and the Giants were together, the Giants could serve as potential hostages against them.

“Group 2,” Horang said.

“Yes, sir!”

“Follow YuWon up. Take him out before he reaches the test site.”

“Yes, si—”

Whoosh—

Grip—!

“Kgh!”

In a flash, Buar had grabbed one of them by the neck. He was now standing in front of the hill that YuWon had climbed.

“Where do you guys think you’re going?” Buar asked.

Squeeze—

“K-Kgh…”

Buar smiled while crushing the breath out of the man in his grasp and lifting him up. “You guys need to play with me.”

* * *

Slam—!

A loud noise occurred at the base of the island.

It was the sound of something heavy falling.

“What’s going on? Is there a fight somewhere?”

“I think it’s coming from down there.”

“Outside the test site?”

“Just leave it. It’s better for us if other competitors fight amongst themselves.”

“I guess.”

Fights between players were nothing special. And once you reached around the 20th Floor, fights on a big scale were pretty common occurrences, especially right before a test.

The participants of the test ignored the fight below, not really caring about it.

‘They’re being loud,’ Theseus thought, his face twitching ever so slightly.

He had specifically ordered them to take care of it quietly.

‘Luckily, none of them seem to care.’

It was now time to start the test.

Seeing as how YuWon was not here yet, it meant that the Crimson Wolf Guild had successfully managed to hold back Kim YuWon.

They had successfully achieved their first objective.

‘At least they’re somewhat useful.’

Theseus didn’t think that the Crimson Wolf Guild was capable of taking out YuWon. It would have been great if they could, but it was hard to expect them to win against someone who had managed to win against a Ranker on the 11th Floor.

Their job was merely to buy time. If they could just stop YuWon from participating in this test, they would have served their purpose.

‘Turn the Lackeys’ focus towards the test site and take out YuWon.’

Theseus checked the time with his player kit.

There were less than three minutes left until midnight, the start time for the test.

Tik-tok—

And so, it was almost time for the test to start.

That was when…

[We’re sorry, sir.]

A message came to Theseus’s player kit.

It was from Horang, an executive of the Crimson Wolf Guild that should have been fighting below.

[YuWon managed to escape from us.]

‘They let him escape…?’

Theseus quickly looked through the faces of the participants.

He tried to find YuWon’s face among the hundred or so of them. It was a large number, but not too large for him to quickly look through them. But…

‘He’s not here.’

YuWon, who should have arrived, was nowhere to be seen.

‘Where did he go?’

____