Chapter 4: The First Tower
The tower loomed over what used to be Seoul's financial district. From a distance, it had looked like a dark spire piercing the bruised sky. Up close, it was something else entirely.
Alive.
The surface wasn't stone or metal. It was flesh—gray, veined, pulsing with a slow rhythm like a heartbeat. Windows that weren't windows dotted its surface, each one glowing with a sickly amber light. The entrance was a gaping maw, its edges lined with jagged protrusions that looked like teeth.
I stopped at the edge of what had once been a plaza. The bodies of goblins and humans alike littered the ground, most of them already being processed by the System into fading motes of light.
Seo-yoon stood beside me, her sword drawn. Behind us, the rest of the Butcher's Block waited in a loose formation—more frightened than ready for a fight, but I'd made them all equip at least a bone spike or a salvaged weapon.
"You don't have to come," I said to her without looking away from the tower.
"I'm A-rank," she replied flatly. "If I can't handle the first floor of a dungeon, I might as well die now."
Fair enough.
Inside the tower, a system of tunnels spread like veins through the structure. On the first floor, a pack of goblins had established a nest around a glowing core—the heart of the dungeon's first level. Among them, a hobgoblin with gray skin and four arms sharpened its blades against each other, waiting. It could smell the humans approaching. It smiled.
I stepped forward. The moment my foot touched the plaza's center, the System announced itself.
\[DUNGEON ENTERED: SEOUL TOWER – FLOOR 1\]
\[Recommended Level: 5-10\]
\[Objective: Defeat the Floor Boss to unlock passage to higher floors.\]
\[Warning: This dungeon is classified as 'Growing.' Difficulty may increase over time.\]
Growing. That word sat in my gut like a stone.
"Seo-yoon, stay close. The rest of you—" I turned to the group. "Stay behind us. Don't engage unless you have to. If anything gets past us, run back to the Hub."
The Scholar boy, Min-jun, adjusted his glasses. "What if they chase us?"
"They won't," I said. "Because I'll be right behind them."
I didn't wait for their reactions. I walked into the tower's mouth.
---
The air inside was thick, wet, and smelled of copper. The walls pulsed with the same fleshy rhythm I'd seen outside. Dim lights embedded in the ceiling cast long shadows across the corridor.
Seo-yoon's sword glowed brighter, pushing back the darkness. "This place is disgusting."
"It's just meat," I said. "I've worked with worse."
She gave me a look I couldn't quite read, then focused ahead.
We moved down the corridor. My Weak Point Detection was active—a faint overlay that highlighted stress points, weak seams, and vital structures in everything I saw. The walls had weak points. The floor had weak points. Even the air had currents that could be exploited if I had the right skill.
The first goblin appeared around a corner.
It saw us. Opened its mouth to scream.
My bone spike caught it in the throat before the sound could form. It crumpled.
\[Goblin defeated.\]
\[Strength +1\]
I didn't stop to harvest. There'd be time after we cleared the floor.
"You're fast," Seo-yoon muttered.
"I've had practice."
We pushed deeper. Two more goblins came at us together. Seo-yoon's sword cut one down with a single slash of golden light—A-rank power on full display. The other rushed me, rusted blade swinging.
I saw the weak point in its wrist. My knife found it. The goblin's hand went limp, dropping its weapon. A second cut to its throat ended it.
\[Strength +1\]
\[Agility +1\]
The notifications were satisfying. I could feel myself growing stronger with every kill.
Seo-yoon watched me work, her expression unreadable. "You're not even hesitating."
"Hesitation gets you killed." I wiped my knife on the goblin's hide. "I learned that in my first life."
She started to ask something, but a roar from deeper in the corridor cut her off.
The hobgoblin.
---
The four-armed hobgoblin stood at the center of a chamber littered with bones. Its four arms each held a blade—two swords, a cleaver, and a jagged spear. Around it, the remaining goblins formed a protective ring. It had been waiting for the humans to reach this point, savoring the anticipation.
When the boy with the butcher's eyes entered the chamber, the hobgoblin grinned.
"Finally," it growled. "Something that won't break so fast."
---
The chamber opened up before us—a circular space with a high ceiling and a floor slick with old blood. At the center, a hobgoblin unlike the one I'd killed before. Four arms. Four blades. And eyes that held intelligence, not just hunger.
Eight goblins circled it like dogs around a wolf.
Seo-yoon's grip tightened on her sword. "That's not a normal hobgoblin."
"No," I agreed. "It's evolved."
The hobgoblin laughed—a deep, grinding sound. "Evolved. Yes. I ate my way up from the bottom. Killed my own kind to reach this floor." Its four arms spread wide. "And now I kill you."
It moved.
Fast. Faster than the first hobgoblin. One blade came at Seo-yoon, another at me. I ducked under the sword meant for my head, rolled, and came up with a bone spike ready.
Seo-yoon met her attacker head-on. Her sword clashed against the hobgoblin's cleaver, sparks flying. She was strong, but the creature had three other weapons.
It brought the spear around in a wide arc. Seo-yoon jumped back, but the tip caught her shoulder, tearing through her uniform and drawing blood.
She gritted her teeth and held her ground.
I threw my bone spike. The hobgoblin's third hand—the one holding the second sword—deflected it with contemptuous ease.
"Pathetic," it said.
I smiled. "Was it?"
The hobgoblin's eyes flicked to where the bone spike had landed—behind it, at the feet of the goblins. They were looking at it, confused.
But that wasn't the point.
The point was that while it was watching my throw, Seo-yoon had moved.
Her sword carved a line across its chest.
The hobgoblin roared, staggering back. Black blood sprayed. But it didn't fall. It spun, all four blades whirling, forcing Seo-yoon to retreat.
"Clever," it snarled. "But not clever enough."
It turned to me, its eyes burning. "You first, little butcher."
It charged.
I had my knife, my remaining bone spikes, and a new skill I hadn't tested yet.
Skill Theft (Passive) —the ability to learn enemy skills without harvesting. The description had said it worked on "defeated enemies." But what about enemies I didn't kill?
The hobgoblin's first blade came down. I sidestepped. Its second blade followed, closer. I twisted, felt the wind of it past my ribs. Its third blade—the cleaver—swept low, aiming for my legs.
I jumped.
The fourth blade—the spear—thrust straight at my chest.
I couldn't dodge. I couldn't block.
So I didn't.
Instead, I dropped my knife, grabbed the spear shaft with both hands, and used its momentum to swing myself up and over the hobgoblin's head.
I landed behind it, my fingers already wrapped around my last bone spike.
I drove it into the base of its skull.
The hobgoblin's four arms went slack. Its blades clattered to the floor. It stood frozen for a moment, then collapsed forward like a felled tree.
\[Hobgoblin (Evolved) defeated. Experience gained.\]
\[Butcher skill activated. Processing…\]
\[Strength +15\]
\[Agility +12\]
\[Vitality +10\]
\[Skill acquired: Multi-Weapon Handling Lv.1\]
\[Skill acquired: Blood Sense Lv.1\]
\[Unique material obtained: Evolved Hobgoblin Core\]
\[Skill Theft activated. Learning enemy skills…\]
\[Skill acquired: Blade Dance (Passive) – Enhanced coordination when wielding multiple weapons.\]
I stood over the corpse, breathing hard. The notifications blurred in my vision, but I felt the new knowledge settling into my muscles—how to handle a blade in each hand, how to sense the blood of nearby enemies.
Behind me, the goblins were staring. Without their leader, their coordination fell apart. Seo-yoon cut down two before the rest scattered into the tunnels.
I let them go. We'd deal with them later.
Seo-yoon approached, her shoulder wound already closing—Paladin healing, probably. She looked at the hobgoblin's corpse, then at me.
"You used it as a springboard."
"It worked."
She shook her head slowly. "You're insane."
"Maybe." I knelt and began processing the hobgoblin. The four arms were valuable—the bones could become weapons, the skin armor. "But I'm still alive."
At the center of the chamber, a crystal similar to the Hub crystal pulsed with amber light. The floor boss's core. I approached it.
\[FLOOR 1 CLEARED. PASSAGE TO FLOOR 2 UNLOCKED.\]
\[Reward: 500 System Credits. Bonus: Floor Boss Core (Evolved).\]
\[Warning: Higher floors contain more dangerous enemies. Recommended level for Floor 2: 15-20.\]
Level 15-20. I was level 7 after the kills. Seo-yoon was level 9.
We weren't ready.
"We're stopping here for now," I said.
Seo-yoon nodded. "The others should be able to farm the first floor for cores. It'll help them level."
I looked back at the passage leading deeper into the tower. Darkness pulsed there, waiting.
"We'll come back," I said. "When we're stronger."
Outside the tower, the pigeon circled once, then landed on a broken streetlight. Its gaze was fixed on the tower's entrance, where the boy and the Paladin emerged, carrying the core of the first floor's boss.
"Evolved already," it murmured. "And he hasn't even seen what's waiting above."
It preened a wing, considering.
"Perhaps he's worth watching after all."
High above, in a place between worlds, a screen flickered to life before a council of shadows.
*ANOMALY: BUTCHER CLASS – ANATOMIST PATH. PROGRESSION RATE: ACCELERATED. FIRST DUNGEON FLOOR CLEARED WITHIN 4 HOURS OF SYSTEM ACTIVATION. *
A voice, cold as the space between stars, spoke: "Continue observation. If the anomaly exceeds acceptable parameters, authorize termination."
Another voice, warmer but no less dangerous, replied: "Or we could see what it becomes. Harvests are always more fruitful when the crop is allowed to grow."
Silence. Then the first voice: "Observe. Nothing more."
The screen went dark.
---
We returned to the Hub to find the Iron Fist guild had expanded their barricades. The scarred man, Kang Dae-ho, was waiting at the entrance, his smile more calculating than friendly.
"Back so soon?" he asked. "And carrying something valuable, I see."
I hefted the Evolved Hobgoblin Core in my hand. It pulsed with amber light, casting strange shadows across his face.
"You want it?" I asked.
His eyes flickered. "That's an evolved core. Worth fifty goblin cores, easy."
"I know."
"What's your price?"
I looked past him, at the Hub crystal visible through the open doors. "My faction gets priority access to the Hub. No fees, no 'protection' taxes. And you stay out of our territory."
His smile tightened. "That's a steep price for one core."
"It's not for the core." I held his gaze. "It's for what I'll bring back from the second floor."
The implication hung in the air. If I could clear the first floor in hours, what could I do on the second? What would I bring back?
Kang Dae-ho was many things, but he wasn't stupid. He saw the calculation I was offering—cooperation now for a share of future spoils.
"Fine," he said. "Priority access for your faction. No taxes. But when you hit the second floor, I want first refusal on any evolved cores you bring out."
"Deal." I tossed him the core. He caught it, his eyes gleaming with satisfaction.
I didn't care about the core. The real value was in what I'd learned—new skills, new strength, and a clearer picture of how this world worked.
As I walked past him into the Hub, Seo-yoon fell into step beside me.
"You just gave away a fortune," she said quietly.
"I bought us breathing room." I glanced at the students huddled near the Hub crystal, processing their own small harvests. "They need time to level. We need to build strength before the next wave."
"Next wave?"
I pointed to the System screen still hovering at the edge of my vision.
\[DUNGEON STATUS: FLOOR 1 CLEARED. FLOOR 2 ACTIVE.\]
\[TIME UNTIL FLOOR 1 RESPAWN: 23:47:12\]
"The floors reset," I said. "We've got one day before the goblins come back. And when they do, there'll be more of them. Stronger ones."
Seo-yoon's face paled. "How do you know?"
"The System told me. You just have to know where to look." I turned to face the faction. Sixteen scared kids with basic weapons and a handful of levels between them.
"We've got twenty-four hours," I announced. "By the time the tower resets, everyone in the Butcher's Block is going to be at least level five. We're going to clear the first floor again. And again. Until we're strong enough to take the second."
A murmur went through the group. Fear. Uncertainty. But also something else—a flicker of hope.
Min-jun, the Scholar, stepped forward. "I've been analyzing the System's patterns. If we coordinate our attacks, use the weak points you showed us, we can clear the first floor in six hours with minimal casualties."
"Then you're in charge of strategy," I said. "Figure out the best formations. Assign roles based on classes."
He blinked, clearly not expecting the responsibility. But he nodded.
Seo-yoon looked at me with new respect. "You're really building something here."
"I'm building a tool," I said. "The Butcher's Block is going to be sharp enough to cut through anything this world throws at us."
I looked at the tower visible through the Hub's shattered windows.
"Starting with that."
---
End of Chapter 4