Chapter 9 · 13 min
Chapter 9
Hand Sunfish
{Anon: But why is it always 7 seconds?
Are they trying to hit lucky seven or something?}
Anon: Isn’t the Leg Sunfish 30 meters away? Doesn’t that bastard take a few seconds just to run around the lake? Seriously, why 7 seconds? Is it even possible to kill the Leg Sunfish in 7 seconds?
└Anon: Guess they figured out exactly how to kill it after taking down Floors 1 and 2
└Anon: How do you kill it?
└Anon: Stab its belly hundreds of times?
└Anon: In 7 seconds?
└Anon: Maybe they just chopped it apart?
└Anon: You can’t cut through the torso bones or skull. It’s been confirmed that even a level 9 Warrior can’t
└Anon: What about an elephant beastfolk?
└Anon: Huh?
└Anon: Wait? Elephant Clan?
└Anon: Oh, this comment makes sense. Doesn’t the Elephant Clan trait give a huge Strength bonus?
└Anon: Right! It really might be Elephant Clan?
Anon: Fuck, we narrowed down the Summoner. It must be someone with an Elephant Clan summon!
____________
Items obtained from the tower occasionally came with options. Very occasionally.
[Blocks any attack exactly once]
That was the description of Absolute Defense, the option attached to the colorful bracelet I had obtained.
“How did something this amazing come out on Floor 3?”
“What came out?”
Clara came over toward me and asked.
“System window.”
Every item obtained from the tower was automatically stored in the system window’s inventory. I took it out and showed it to Clara.
Clara examined what looked like nothing more than a colorful bracelet.
“Hmm~? It doesn’t look like anything special.”
“The option attached to it is incredible. Want to check the description?”
“Hmm? Any attack...? Then would it be okay even if it touched my Wish?”
“Ah, no. Clara’s fire is a continuous attack... Even if I wore this, I think it would still be dangerous at close range.”
“Still, that’s a relief. Even if that fish attacks my husband, there will be one chance! You should wear several!”
“Wouldn’t it be better for Clara to wear it? I don’t even fight...”
“My husband’s safety is the most important thing!”
“Clara, I...”
I looked Clara in the eyes and took hold of her wrist. She could have shaken me off just by standing up, but Clara stayed still.
I fastened the bracelet around Clara’s wrist as she obediently remained there.
The colorful bracelet adjusted its size to fit her small wrist.
As expected of an item from the tower.
“Ahem! Um... Think of it as a gift I really wanted to give you because I care about my wife... or something?”
Plop.
At my words, Clara threw herself into my arms.
‘She’s so small and slender...’
“I love you too!”
I was glad I’d forced myself through the embarrassment and said it.
Because the words I’d seen in Clara’s affection level, willing to die, kept circling through my mind.
____________
“Wow! Unnie, you got first place again! You’re amazing!”
“I can do anything for my husband!”
“So romantic!”
Han Suyeon overreacted to Clara’s words again today. On top of that, she glared at me and quietly muttered.
“Someone this precious with someone so shabby... No, but that’s why she became my unnie... No, but still...”
Han Suyeon followed Clara around while muttering in a voice only I could hear. I almost reacted to my legal-family-member’s behavior, but held back.
As her oppa, I should let it slide.
Anyway, I guess this was fortunate?
Unlike the public reputation of summoned creatures, Clara got along well with my whole family.
Since it was Sunday, Han Suyeon prepared to return to the dormitory.
“Unnie, I’ll come home Friday night next week!”
Squeeze.
Clara also seemed quite fond of Han Suyeon, who followed her around calling her Unnie.
“I’m already looking forward to Friday.”
Clara hugged my legal-family-member tightly, reluctant to let her go.
“Gasp! Unnie...!”
“If someone saw you, they’d think this was a reunion between separated family members.”
“Ahem, ahem. Want to hug Dad for the first time in a while too, my daughter?”
“Then I’ll see you Friday!”
Without even answering Dad, my legal-family-member opened the front door and hurried out.
After watching her leave, Dad went into the master bedroom. His back somehow looked lonely.
_____________
{NewbieLover: Floor 4 Hand Sunfish Guide Even an Iron Can Do
lololol
I saw a comment last time saying someone got hit by aftereffects in the Floor 3 preparation room?
Congratulations
You’re at least in the top 10 percent!
10 percent of what?
You’re covered in ugly!
Ugliness
lololololololol
No lol How ugly do you have to be to fail in the Floor 3 preparation room lol
Ah, this is fucking hilarious lol
Yeah, even with the same Iron aptitude, if your looks are especially bad, this happens
But don’t worry
Floor 4 is fine
The aftereffects are lighter?
No
Floor 4 is the real newbie killer
Even if you give up, no one will think it’s because you’re ugly
It’s been a while since the towers rose, right?
There are quite a few people who’ve made it to the Hand Sunfish by now
Seems like the people who saw the Hand Sunfish were seriously shocked?
They described it in so much detail that even just reading the posts made it show up in my dreams
Plenty of people drew pictures and uploaded them online, so search Hand Sunfish and look at it
If you’re okay after seeing it, then challenge it
Separate from the aftereffects, a lot of people don’t even want to face it because it looks so fucking disgusting
Anyway, I’ll skip any more description of the Hand Sunfish’s appearance
So for this guide
First, the Hand Sunfish’s position itself is a problem
This bastard never leaves the 10-meter-diameter lake
The lake isn’t very deep, about 1 meter
Because of this, you absolutely need at least one Assassin
You know the Instant Step skill you get when choosing Assassin?
Use that
You’ll reach the Hand Sunfish in about 3 seconds
But in those 3 seconds, the Hand Sunfish will already have pulled out six of those fucking tentacles
Still, it’s nothing special. The tentacles are very soft
Even the basic dagger you got when choosing Assassin cuts through them easily
They die as soon as you cut them. Cut them quickly. The Assassin only needs to focus on this
And the turtle classes running behind the Assassin?
You guys should circle all the way around the lake and go behind the Hand Sunfish. Don’t go straight in and draw the tentacles’ aggro for no reason
Once you arrive, stab its belly like crazy
You can stick a blade into the legs too, but the belly is the most effective
Especially, you see how its eyes are empty?
So you might think it can’t see. All it can do is pull tentacles out of its eyes
If the Assassin misses even one tentacle, you’re fucked?
They’re about the size of a 2-liter plastic bottle, right?
Their bodies instantly swell to twice the size
How?
By sucking your blood
Anyway, keep that in mind, newbies}
After reading the Floor 4 guide on the Gallery, I explained it separately to Clara.
‘NewbieLover is a famous ranker, but the way he talks is a bit...’
There was a lot of profanity, and I didn’t want Clara seeing it.
“So, what if it stays in the lake and the fire doesn’t work?”
“Then I’ll go over and cut it with my sword.”
A sword?
Come to think of it, Clara had the Swordsmanship trait.
“Are you really going to be okay? They said the lake is about one meter deep...”
I thought about Clara’s height. Wouldn’t it be really inconvenient to move while more than half submerged?
It seemed like it would be difficult without an Assassin skill like Instant Step...
“Just leave it to me!”
_____________
This feeling of being carried like a princess by a girlish elf again and carefully placed against one wall of the preparation room...
Just because I like gender-bender web novels doesn’t mean I wanted to be treated like this!
Especially since after only three times, I was already starting to get used to it...
‘This... might actually be kind of nice?’
The fact that a thought like that was creeping into my mind was even more troubling.
I pushed away that strange feeling and stared through the transparent wall of the preparation room.
Right, right, we’re inside the tower. Calm down. Calm down.
“Are you okay this time too?”
“I want to cut it down right now!”
Floor 4 was especially grotesque, so I’d been worried, but fortunately she was fine.
Naturally, this was another entry in the sunfish series. It stood in the middle of a lake one meter deep.
Floor 1 had tentacles.
Floor 2 had a lake and tentacles.
Floor 3 had legs, a lake, and tentacles.
Up to here, it was the same. One thing had been added...
Hands beside its eyes.
They looked like hands severed at the wrists and attached beside its eyes, and it was covering its own eyes with them.
Like the way someone would cover their face before playing peekaboo with a baby.
You’re asking what’s so grotesque about that?
Of course, that alone wouldn’t make me call it the most grotesque of the sunfish series.
‘Because it actually doesn’t have any eyes...’
If you waited here inside the preparation room, it would eventually spread those hands and show you its eyes.
Its empty eyes.
Where eyeballs should have been, there were none, only pitch-black darkness like sinkholes.
Spread.
Cover.
Just then, the Hand Sunfish spread its hands wide, showed us its empty eyes, and covered them again.
“Did you see that just now? You’re okay even with that?”
“I really, really want to cut it down right now!”
I was more than twenty meters away, so it wasn’t close enough for me to see clearly, but Clara could see far away extremely well.
She had probably seen it perfectly.
Clara’s usual high energy hadn’t wavered at all.
At this point, it seemed fine.
“Then I’m counting on you, Clara! I’ll start?”
“Right now!”
“Here we go!”
______________
[39:59]
The moment the transparent wall disappeared, Clara ran.
“Drevo—”
This time, she couldn’t simply wait in place. The Hand Sunfish remained motionless inside that lake and wouldn’t come out.
But that didn’t mean it did nothing.
Instead, it spread the hands covering its empty eyes and revealed them.
Before I knew it, bloody tears were running from its eyes, and two purple tentacles squeezed their way out.
In an instant, two tentacles the size of 2-liter plastic bottles crawled out from each of the Hand Sunfish’s eyes.
By then, Clara had reached the lake where the Hand Sunfish stood in only two steps.
Her Speed, which was nearly 50, let her cross fifteen meters in an instant.
Splash. Splash. Splash. Splash.
Then an unbelievable sight unfolded. Clara reached the edge of the lake and, without stopping, kept running with quick steps directly across the surface of the water.
[39:58]
“Empire—”
The tentacles didn’t stay still either.
Two per second.
Four tentacles had already crawled from the Hand Sunfish’s eyes and fallen into the lake. They quickly swam toward Clara.
Swoosh. Swoosh.
The tentacles leaped at Clara as she ran across the water.
The two that had emerged first from the Hand Sunfish’s eyes lunged at her to suck her blood.
Slash.
Clara’s sword swung as though drawing a crescent moon.
Holding the sword in both hands, Clara traced a semicircle directly in front of her body.
Slash.
Another crescent moon.
The two that had emerged afterward were immediately cut down as well.
A faint light shone from the ceiling of the field.
That light reflected from the sword, making its path look like a flowing band of light.
On the lake touched by that band of light, crescent moons appeared and vanished.
Slash.
After cutting even the tentacles that had just begun emerging from both eyes, Clara spun her body rapidly like a top.
Using the centrifugal force.
—Slaaash!!
The sword’s path drew a circle.
For a moment, it looked as though a full moon had appeared over the lake as the Hand Sunfish’s head was severed.
[39:57]
Splash.
“Swordsmanship.”
[39:56]
—Dash!
The Hand Sunfish’s head fell into the lake.
When no more tentacles crawled from its eyes, Clara escaped the lake with a single leap.
She had been submerged up to her waist, but one leap was enough.
[O Fire]
Fwoosh!
Clara manifested her Wish against the Hand Sunfish.
The Hand Sunfish stood there as though it had no idea what to do after losing its head.
Its legs submerged in the lake were one thing, but the body above the water was soon engulfed in scorching flames.
Even with its entire body wrapped in fire, the Hand Sunfish merely stood there motionless.
And after a short while.
[39:53]
Ding~!
[You have cleared Floor 4]
[Clear time: 7 seconds]
[You have entered the Floor 4 clear rankings]
[You have become Rank 1 on the Floor 4 clear rankings]
[Would you like to register your name]
[Yes][No]
[You have leveled up]
[Level 4 → Level 5]
[Your class is Summoner. Magic Power increases]
[Magic Power 15 → Magic Power 20]
[This is Floor 4. You have obtained an UN-grade reward]
[Lowest-grade Magic Stone Fragment]
[Youth Potion 1 Second]
[Assassin’s Clothes Made of Tough, Heavy Leather]
“Ptoo, ptoo! Lake water got in my mouth! It’s so salty!”
Clara had cleared Floor 4 in 7 seconds again.
_____________
{Anon: Hey, hey, looking at the 7-second Floor 4 clear, the elephant beastfolk theory was wrong
As you know, the Floor 4 field is 40 meters wide and long
There’s a lake about 1 meter deep in the middle, with a diameter of roughly 10 meters
Since the Hand Sunfish stands in the center of the lake, it’s about 20 meters from the preparation room
But the problem is that 1-meter-deep lake
An elephant beastfolk can’t reach it within 7 seconds
Anon: What about an elf?
└Anon: With only the Elf trait, there’s no way an Unranked-level elf can clear the Hand Sunfish in 7 seconds
└Anon: Tiger beastfolk?
└Anon: The Tiger Clan trait gives good bonuses to Strength, Agility, and Stamina, but its Strength bonus is lower than Elephant Clan, so they probably couldn’t chop it cleanly
SwordMageF: Gallery deduction skills shattered in a single day
{Anon: But seriously, what does the number 7 mean?
We need to think about this}
Anon: They’re deliberately sticking to exactly 7 seconds. Seriously, why?
└Anon: I can’t even imagine how much they must love the number 7
Anon: Are they saying they want 7 trillion won if we want to keep them?
{Anon: You know what’s especially weird about 7 seconds?]
The summoned creature is actually going along with it
They’re deliberately obeying the Summoner’s wishes exactly?
Those arrogant summoned creatures?}
Anon: Maybe sucked them off once?
└Anon: As if
{Anon: One thing is certain
They’re showing off
My summon is this strong
I like the number 7}
Anon: Then why did they skip Floor 0?
└Anon: They couldn’t summon anyone back then
└Anon: Floor 0 is already 7 seconds
└GiggleOneShot: Those bastards got 7 seconds
└Anon: Those bastards?
└GiggleOneShot: The ones who abandoned the country
└Anon: Huh? You mean?
└Anon: No way?