Chapter 531: Sword Demon (1)

Crackle, Crackle!

There was a huge campfire in the outdoor training ground of the ice castle in the snowfields of Brahms.

"This fire is burning pretty well. I think it's because the flame is from the Crimson Princess..."

"This ice castle that Specter-nim built is more surprising to me."

"Oh, fair enough. This fire is scorching, but the ice isn't melting."

"I'm the one who built this ice castle," the Frost Queen grumbled.

The Players were currently holding a small celebration. There wasn't enough food and alcohol, but everyone was all smiles.

"...?" Seo Jun-Ho inadvertently looked up. One of the most eye-catching stars among the multitude of stars in the night sky plummeted and drew a long line in the sky.

The star caught his eyes, and Seo Jun-Ho eventually ended up staring at the shooting star in silence for a long time until it disappeared.

"Do you know that star, junior brother?"

Seo Jun-Ho turned and saw Baek Geon-Woo staring at him.

"What do you mean?"

"You couldn't take your eyes off of that star, so I thought you knew it."

"That's a bit ridiculous, you know?" said Seo Jun-Ho with a smile.

Baek Geon-Woo handed over a can of beer to Seo Jun-Ho and said, "Our master liked stargazing."

"Yeah...." Seo Jun-Ho suddenly remembered the nights he had spent lying on the ground and staring at the stars in the night sky after a day of extreme training.

"How are you?" Baek Geon-Woo asked.

"I'm fine." Seo Jun-Ho rotated his shoulders a couple of times and added, "See?"

Seo Jun-Ho was still exhausted, but his recovery rate was a bit astonishing, thanks to the Vermillion Fruit he had consumed from Reiji's store.

"By the way..." muttered Seo Jun-Ho while examining Baek Geon-Woo. He didn't notice it the first time he met Baek Geon-Woo after a while because they met on a chaotic battlefield, but now, he could finally see it.

'He changed a lot...'

The biggest change was Baek Geon-Woo's black hair had turned gray, but the color looked natural rather than artificial.

"What happened to your hair?"

"Oh, this?" Baek Geon-Woo twirled his hair and smiled bitterly before saying, "Who knows? It suddenly became like this; I have no idea when it changed."

"...Is that even normal? Where the heck have you been, and what have you been up to?"

"It's going to be a really long story."

"Well, the timing's perfect; I don't have much to do today," said Seo Jun-Ho.

Baek Geon-Woo nodded and muttered, "Okay. Then, let's talk about what I did when I heard the news about our master's passing."

Baek Geon-Woo's talked for a long time.

"And that was how I came up to the 7th Floor to save you—I'm glad I wasn't late."

"..."

Baek Geon-Woo seemed relieved after he was done telling his story. He looked like a heavy load on his chest was removed. However, Seo Jun-Ho was beyond pallid.

"Geon-Woo. Are you sure you're okay?" Seo Jun-Ho asked in a trembling voice.

Baek Geon-Woo apparently had to stay on the 4th Floor for sixty years, trying to kill Erebo at Seo Jun-Ho difficulty.

'I spent a grueling seventeen years there, and I had a hard time even though I had Hero's Mind...'

As far as Seo Jun-Ho knew, Baek Geon-Woo didn't have a skill similar to Hero's Mind.

Baek Geon-Woo hurriedly explained, "Oh, you don't have to worry about me. The World Tree helped me remain sane."

"That doesn't make it any better..." muttered Seo Jun-Ho. Sixty years was a very long time, and it would feel even longer if one decided to spend sixty years training by themselves. Seo Jun-Ho couldn't even begin to fathom it.

"Shouldn't you get some rest and see a shrink or something?"

"I can't rest until that bastard's dead," said Baek Geon-Woo. His voice sounded extremely determined. It seemed that there was no way that Seo Jun-Ho's words could reach Baek Geon-Woo.

Seo Jun-Ho sighed lightly. "I had no idea that you're quite stubborn."

"It's nothing compared to yours, junior brother." Baek Geon-Woo smiled and changed the topic. "By the way, it seems like it will take quite a long time to clear the 7th Floor this time."

"No," said Seo Jun-Ho. Baek Geon-Woo's story was so long that it was already daybreak by the time he was done with his exposition. Seo Jun-Ho stared at the rising sun and continued. "It won't be that long until we clear this Floor."

***

"Jun-Ho. How are you?"

"That's my line, Rahmadat." Seo Jun-Ho shook his head, seemingly dumbfounded by Rahmadat's question. He turned to look at someone else and said, "Thank you for the treatment, Miss Si-Eun."

"Don't mention it; I just did my job," said Cha Si-Eun.

The room was filled by the members of the 5 Heroes and their party members, Baek Geon-Woo, and a few members of the Big 5, who were rather close to the 5 Heroes.

Son Chae-Won raised her hand slightly and asked, "What's the purpose of this secret meeting?"

"We're going to discuss our future plans."

"Future plans..."

Everyone nodded.

It was a topic that they had to talk about sooner rather than later.

"First of all, how many players are in this castle, Skaya?"

"2548 Players are here..."

"How about their level of skill?"

"For now, I'll say that they're not bad," replied Skaya.

Seo Jun-Ho turned his gaze to Skaya and asked, "What do you mean, for now?"

"Not every Overmind is strong..."

They had already verified that fact in Gulat. The Overmind residents who had been living peaceful lives in the city were so weak that Seo Jun-Ho wanted to laugh at how ridiculously weak they were.

However, the residents were still Overminds.

Their potential was higher than humans.

"They probably thought that the soldiers and imperial knights could easily handle us, but we just showed them that they were mistaken," explained Skaya.

They had killed as many as four thousand Overminds. Skaya was sure that the number of casualties had to have wounded the empire's pride.

"If I were the emperor, I would demand a minimum level of strength from the residents," added Skaya.

"I see, so that's what you're talking about," said Seo Jun-Ho with a nod.

If Skaya's words were true, then the number of enemies they had to fight would increase from mere thousands to tens of thousands.

In other words, a long, drawn-out battle would be in their enemies' favor because those Overminds would become even stronger over time.

However, they had no reason to be afraid of such a change.

"We already knew that something like that would happen..."

They would have to face the entire empire at some point if they wanted to defeat the emperor, whom they believed was the Floor Master of the 7th Floor.

"The difference in power was much bigger than I thought," Shin Sung-Hyun said with a groan, which was a rare sight to behold.

"And we also have something else to worry about..."

"...Are you talking about the traitor who is in cahoots with the Heavenly Demon?"

Traitors among the ranks were like ticking time bombs, and they had to be eliminated at some point.

"Skaya is looking into that issue," Seo Jun-Ho said.

"Yes, but no one has made any suspicious remarks or actions so far," said Skaya.

Skaya knew the ice castle as if it were the back of her hand. She had also surrounded it with many different spells, so there was no way she wouldn't know if someone was doing anything suspicious in the castle.

"Hm. I guess there is no need to worry if Miss Skaya is looking into it." Son Chae-Won nodded and said, "So I guess we should focus on gathering the scattered players for now?"

"Yes, but I think we should pay attention to clearing the Floor at the same time. As I said before, time isn't in our favor," said Seo Jun-Ho. He then proceeded to share his encounter with Helic, the 7th Floor Administrator.

"The Sun God? Isn't that the god of the Ruben Empire's national religion?"

"Hm. So the emperor is powerful enough to keep tabs on such a great being."

"In other words, we just have to destroy the facilities she had pointed out, and she'll eventually help us by using her authority as the Administrator of this Floor, is that right?"

"Yes, that's right."

It would be an understatement to say that everyone was surprised by Seo Jun-Ho's words. They couldn't have expected that the 7th Floor Administrator would end up being a literal god. The people in the conference room ruminated over Helic's words.

"The Radio Tower has already been destroyed, so where are the other two facilities?"

"I looked through the memories of the enemies and found out that one of the two facilities is the Float Force Power Plant while the other is the Chronos Laboratory," said Seo Jun-Ho.

"A Force power plant? What is that, Jun-Ho?"

"It's a facility that serves as a prison for both the failures and the Overminds who have committed serious crimes," said Seo Jun-Ho.

It was probably called a power plant because the empire was most likely extracting the Force they needed to support the infrastructures of the empire from the failures and Overminds imprisoned in that facility.

"It's an important facility, so I bet there are military personnel stationed all over that power plant."

"You're right, and I think the security of the Chronos Laboratory is stronger than the Float Force Power Plant," said Seo Jun-Ho.

The laboratory was more mysterious than the power plant. Seo Jun-Ho couldn't find any information about it, even after taking a look at the memories of many Overminds.

Gong Ju-Ha gulped and said, "Are we really going to attack those places? They sound way too scarier than I expected."

There was an overwhelming difference in numbers, so their possibility of success was closer to zero than a hundred percent.

"We have to do it if we want to clear the 7th Floor," said Seo Jun-Ho. He swept his gaze across the faces of everyone in the conference room and added, "I'm sure they're busy repairing Gulat and the capital, so I'm planning on attacking those facilities while taking advantage of the chaos."

***

The meeting was soon adjourned, and they left the conference with grim expressions.

It wasn't really strange. After all, they had to ruminate over things properly and ensure that the plan was even possible in the first place. In addition, they also had to think about the things they had to prepare if the plan was doable.

"It must be hard being Specter."

"...What do you mean?" asked Seo Jun-Ho.

Son Chae-Won shrugged and explained, "I can feel it as well just by standing next to you—the pressure, I mean..."

"I thought you've already gotten used to the pressure; you're the Guild Master of Silent Moon, after all."

"Honestly, I can't really get used to the pressure of being a leader. I think that missing brat is better at handling pressure than me."

'Missing brat...' Seo Jun-Ho figured that Son Chae-Won had to be referring to the missing Kim Woo-Joong.

"Have you still not heard anything from him?"

"Community is dead here, so I won't really be able to hear anything from him." Son Chae-Won sighed, but her expression was bright for some reason as she said, "But I'm not really that worried. It's not like this is the first time. He has done this a couple of times already, and he has always managed to come back intact."

"Yeah, he'll be fine wherever he goes with those skills."

"I'm going to slap him hard once he gets back. I'm actually getting pissed just thinking about him going missing without any warning. Anyway, I'm off," said Son Chae-Won before leaving the room with a smile.

Seo Jun-Ho slowly turned around and said, "What is it? What do you want to tell me?"

"There's something you should know." Skaya Killiland's expression was grim, which was a rare sight. "Do you still remember what we talked about last time? I told you that we crossed dimensions, and we're in a parallel universe, right?"

"Yes, I remember," said Seo Jun-Ho with a nod.

The 2nd Floor's Frontier had experienced a societal collapse during their Age of Glory, but the 7th Floor's Frontier didn't experience that collapse. Their Age of Glory was still ongoing.

"You still don't get it?"

"What are you talking about?"

"Isn't it strange how you can get in touch with the 5th Floor using your Vita? Deok-Gu even sent us troops. I found it weird the moment I heard the news," said Skaya.

"...!" Seo Jun-Ho's eyes widened.

'She's right...!' If they were in a parallel universe, then had Seo Jun-Ho been talking to a parallel universe Yeon?

"Wait, what does that mean? Could it be that Yeon has modified my Vita in a way that would allow me to contact worlds from other dimensions?"

"Of course not!" Skaya bit her lips and asked, "You know that I have been studying the formulas necessary to close the Semey Gate, right?"

"Yes, Gray taught you those formulas, right?"

"Gray's teachings are telling me that this phenomenon doesn't make sense at all. It completely goes against the established laws of physics," said Skaya before staring deeply at Seo Jun-Ho and muttering, "Keep this to yourself for now. Nothing good will come out if the others discover it, and there haven't been any problems so far."

"So why did you tell me about it?" asked Seo Jun-Ho.

"I just want you to keep that in mind..."

Skaya wanted him to keep in mind that there was something wrong with the universe.