Chapter 294: Episode 294

Five years had passed while I was away.

There was the pressing issue of the demonkin investigation, but I also wanted to meet face-to-face with the members I hadn’t seen in all this time and catch up with them one by one.

The first person to come up to the ninth floor was Samia.

“…I also don’t feel good about what happened to Na Daeyong.”

She seemed deeply hurt by the incident. She genuinely believed that her returning to Tanzania had been a crucial trigger in Na Daeyong going astray.

“Were you close with Na Daeyong?”

She gave a vague, noncommittal reaction. “I hung out often with the female members of the fourth-floor team, but Na Daeyong was… a bit overwhelming.”

“…Haha, he was a bit overly energetic.”

The calm, collected Samia and the over-the-top Na Daeyong. Their personalities were like oil and water.

“Then who were you closest to in the Magic Tower?”

“I spent a lot of time with Cha Doyeon and Seo Shimhee.”

I listened to Samia’s stories about the other members. It wasn’t a decisive blow, but the clues were slowly piling up bit by bit.

It was a very different method from my initial demonkin investigation. Asking others about my own supposed death felt ridiculous, and expecting honest answers like the ones I got from Jin Bora and Jeong Seojin would probably be difficult with the rest.

“Well then, let’s stop the questions here and move on to a serious topic. I would love it if you stayed at the Magic Tower, Samia… but your own thoughts are what matter most. Will you be returning to Tanzania?”

She closed her eyes, remaining silent for a long moment as if lost in thought.

“I have become the Commander of the East African Front.”

“I know.”

“My desire to stay at the Magic Tower is sincere. I also have lingering attachments to the incomplete Warp division. However, that doesn’t mean I can completely turn my back on my homeland.”

I figured she would say that. I interlaced my fingers.

“I feel the same way. I have a personal attachment to Tanzania, my first overseas deployment, and as a member of the World Guild, I consider the African front to be of paramount importance. If you stay on as the fifth-floor administrator, Samia, the Magic Tower will spare no support for our comrade’s nation. It will become an official cooperative relationship.”

Samia’s eyes widened. “Would that truly be alright?”

“There’s no rule saying you must choose one or the other. However, since you’d have to perform two extremely demanding jobs, your resolve is what’s important.”

“If I cannot let go of either, I believe that is a burden I must willingly bear.”

Her eyes sparkled with renewed determination. “I am always indebted to you, Kim Yusin.”

“I’m the one who’s indebted.”

Samia was officially confirmed as the fifth-floor administrator once again. She had decided to stay at the Magic Tower.

Teleportation ability users were incredibly rare, and among them, those proficient in warp formulas were even rarer.

She was practically an irreplaceable figure. Even for the sake of dealing with Nemesis, I had to keep her tied down here no matter what.

And the next person I called up was…

“Hello! Boss!”

Kim Sarang.

Despite being indoors, she wore fashion sunglasses, and her outfit, a brightly colored Hawaiian shirt and a denim skirt, screamed that she marched to the beat of her own drum. She was holding an iced franchise coffee in one hand.

“It’s been a while, Sarang.”

I chuckled and continued. “Things were so hectic yesterday that we couldn’t properly talk. How have you been?”

“The best! I pride myself on living the golden era of my life!”

Kim Sarang was an officially certified Rank-3 hunter affiliated with the global guild, Crow. Crow was a British-affiliated guild, but due to the nature of global organizations, nationality didn’t matter. Her deployment location had been Florida in the US.

First, I asked her about Na Daeyong as well.

“He was too soft-hearted and overly competitive, but… he was a good person. In the past, at least.” She let out a deep sigh and crossed her arms.

“It feels a bit weird to say this since I stormed out of the Magic Tower because of him, but… it is strange.”

“What is?”

“Haven’t you ever thought that he fell apart way too severely in such a short amount of time?”

She shrugged her shoulders and went on. “Ah, well, everyone changed a little bit over the course of five years. But Daeyong was naive to a fault. Sure, it’s true he had an obsession, an inferiority complex, and extreme stress regarding you, Boss, but it’s bizarre for a person to turn into such a crazed obsessive to that extent.”

I nodded. “That’s a valid point to raise.”

“So at first, I thought this:” She raised her index finger, her expression hardening. “Could Na Daeyong have actually become a demonkin?”

I was too stunned to speak.

My heart dropped for a second. I managed my expression as best as I could and nodded calmly. “Please, continue.”

“I mean, if you think about cases in modern times where such extreme psychological shifts occur, ’demonification’ is the very first thing that comes to mind! I did my own research on this and that, you know.”

Right, I thought that once, too.

Until I saw his death.

“But Daeyong… in the end, he didn’t transform into a demonkin at his final moment. So I guess it was all just my delusion.”

This was a point that deepened my own suspicions as well.

Anyway, I ended the questions there and moved on to business matters.

“You’re currently working at Crow right now, Sarang.”

“Yep!”

“To be blunt, I’d like you to return to the Magic Tower.”

I tapped lightly on the table. “If you come back, I’d gladly give you a floor of your own.”

It meant I would give her full administrator privileges. It was an unprecedented offer that would make any player salivate, granting not only vast power but also Level 10 traits.

But even after dangling the heavy bait of an administrator position, her reaction was surprisingly lukewarm.

“If you really want to recruit me, there’s something far more important than that.”

“What is it?”

She rubbed her thumb and index finger together in a universal gesture for cash. “Money! Let’s negotiate my salary!”

…Oh.

“Having lived in the real world a bit, I’ve realized money is the best thing ever! If you can offer me more than the salary I make at Crow, I’ll think about it!”

I let out a chuckle and scratched my eyebrow.

Wasn’t her personality completely different before?

During her provisional license days, she’d burst into tears of pure awe just from seeing a Fire Cannon cast once. Where on earth did that innocent Kim Sarang go…

“Hehe, is it too brutally honest of me when we’ve just reunited after so long?”

“No. Being honest is good. Being a hunter isn’t charity work, so salary is obviously important.”

She lowered her eyelids, her tone softening. “I felt a lot of things five years ago. My twenty-something self thought our Magic Tower would last forever.”

“I thought those happy days would continue indefinitely. But they didn’t. The world, my friends, and even the Magic Tower… all of it completely changed.”

I fell silent.

“But money never changes!”

She immediately sparkled her eyes as if the brief moment of melancholy had never happened. It was as if a literal ding! sounded out, and cartoon dollar signs appeared in her eyes.

“I am absolutely in love with money! Money never changes, it never disappoints, and it stays by my side forever! Seriously, I don’t need anything else. Cash is king! Ahahaha!”

“Haha…” I chuckled awkwardly.

Setting her outburst aside, that was how the salary negotiation went.

I generously offered her double the salary she was currently making at Guardian. I might have been short on talent, but I had more than enough money to burn.

“Double my pay and cover the penalty fee for breaking my current contract, and we have a deal!”

“…Wasn’t I the one supposed to make the offer?”

Regardless, by thoroughly flexing my financial muscle, I successfully bribed Sarang into settling down at the Magic Tower.

She noted that she wouldn’t mind being the administrator of any floor, though she admitted she still preferred the fourth floor where she used to work.

Well, that takes care of the third, fourth, and fifth floors.

The current status of the Magic Tower’s floors was as follows:

1st Floor: Potion Manufacturing Bureau / [Potion Manufacturing Officer: Jin Bora]

2nd Floor: Grand Library / [Librarian: Jeong Seojin]

3rd Floor: Golem Workshop / [Chief Engineer: Eunsol]

4th Floor: Weather Design Bureau / [Bureau Chief: None] Please assign a position.

5th Floor: Dimensional Hall / [Dimension Keeper: Samia]

6th Floor: Mana Mine / [Mine Administrator: None] Please assign a position.

7th Floor: Magical Engineering Workshop / [Magical Engineer: None] Please assign a position.

8th Floor: ???

9th Floor: Tower Master’s Room / [Tower Master: Kim Yusin]

Back in Na Daeyong’s time, only the first and fourth floors had actually been operational. But with my return, Seojin, Eunsol, and Samia had all agreed to resume their roles as administrators.

Now, all that was left were the fourth and sixth floors, along with the newly opened seventh floor.

Maybe having Sarang, Shimhee, and Yonghee split them would work out perfectly.

Now that I had returned to the Magic Tower, filling every floor with capable administrators was my top priority.

Between the existing Magic Tower mages and the personnel absorbed from Arcane, we had plenty of manpower. Once the administrators were appointed, we would be able to run every floor at full capacity.

“Ea.”

The moment I called her name, Ea materialized in the air.

“Please guide me to the seventh floor,” I said.

“Understood,” she replied smoothly.

“And as for who will accompany me…” I pondered the options for a moment before making my choice. “Could you tell Shimhee to come up?”

*

I stood before the staircase leading to the seventh floor.

As expected, clearing the trial in the realm of consciousness had properly updated the system. The dimensional magic that previously blocked the path to the next level had cleanly vanished.

“B-Boss!”

Shimhee came jogging up the stairs, panting softly. It felt like it had been a long time since I’d seen her in her human form, rather than her frequently used Metamorphosis state.

She had grown her hair out to her shoulders and dyed it blonde. However, her roots were showing dark, as if she hadn’t touched them up in months.

Overall, she looked fresher than she had five years ago. But… I couldn’t quite put my finger on it. Her aura had subtly changed.

“I’m sorry I’m late!” she gasped.

“I’m the one who should apologize for calling you up so suddenly,” I said with a smile. “Shall we go up together?”

Her eyes widened like saucers. “Go where?”

“To see the seventh floor for the first time. I wanted to check it out with you, Shimhee.”

“I—It’s an honor!”

With that, we crossed the threshold to the seventh floor together.

“Ooh!”

“Wow.”

I was always blown away whenever I entered a new floor for the first time, and the seventh floor—the Magical Engineering Workshop—was no exception.

The first thing that caught my eye was a massive tree growing out of a central planter. Its trunk reached all the way to the ceiling, its sprawling branches covered in an abundance of vibrant green and purple leaves.

Looking around the rest of the room, I spotted equipment commonly seen in high-end laboratories. The large glass test tubes lined up along the walls cast an eerie glow. Some of them even contained unidentifiable, floating body parts.

“Welcome to the seventh floor, the Magical Engineering Workshop,” Ea announced, beginning her explanation.

The Magical Engineering Workshop was a facility dedicated to researching exactly that—Magical Engineering, often referred to as the modern engineering of the arcane world. It was divided into two main sectors:

Artifacts.

Bioengineering.

“I assume the artifact sector handles magic items,” I said. “But what about bioengineering?”

Ea pointed to herself with a knowing smile.

“Uh, don’t tell me…?”

“Exactly. It refers to research related to homunculi and various other magical lifeforms.”

This was the place where Ea had been created! Feeling my interest peak, I took a closer look around.

Sturdy metal cabinets were densely packed with thick literature and research materials, while charts resembling elemental periodic tables—written entirely in Erendelian—were plastered across the walls.

…It’s way too complicated.

There were plenty of theories and principles here that couldn’t be understood with magical knowledge alone. This was truly the realm of specialized experts.

“What do you think, Shimhee?” I asked.

Flipping mindlessly through a magical engineering research file she’d pulled from a nearby bookshelf, she let out an awkward laugh. “I—I don’t understand a single thing.”

I had been secretly planning to dump the position of seventh-floor administrator on her, but… clearly, that wasn’t going to work.

The lower floors were mostly capable of producing immediate, visible results—like potions, golems, or warp gates. But this Magical Engineering Workshop was different.

It was a facility truly specialized in long-term research. We would need to invest serious time and resources into it before seeing any tangible results.

Is this floor a dud…?

Considering Nemesis was only six months away, it was a bit disappointing. As I continued scanning the room, my eyes were drawn back to the exceptionally large tree.

“Ea. What kind of tree is this?” I asked. I felt like I had seen illustrations of it a few times in the tomes from the Grand Library.

“It is the Tree of Life,” Ea replied. “It is also sometimes called the World Tree.”

Ea went on to explain its origins.

The World Tree was an entity that had existed in the world prior to Erendel—the very root that supported an entire planet. Upon its branches, life was born, food grew, and a massive, self-sustaining ecosystem was formed.

However, that planet couldn’t escape disaster, either. When the world was laid to waste, the surviving members of the Magic Tower managed to salvage a cutting from the Tree of Life and successfully cultivate it within the Tower’s walls.

Now, this singular sapling had become an indispensable treasure in the magical engineering sector.

“It is the most valuable item in the entire Magic Tower,” Ea stated.

“Just how valuable are we talking?”

Ea shrugged delicately. “If I were to translate it into the value of modern items, it would be roughly equivalent to an SSSSS-rank relic.”

…What?

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