“What the…”

When I saw him looking at me with a grin, I could not help but be shocked. But I wasn’t surprised because of his level. Rather, I was shocked at his appearance.

‘He’s basically an adult now.’

Min-Kyung resembled a woman in her late twenties, and Jae-seok looked much older. Late thirties. No, perhaps even in his forties. I wasn’t exactly saying that he looked old. His steel-tight muscles were covering his entire body, and his skin was devoid of any wrinkles. But I could feel the years in his eyes, his mouth, and skin.

‘He’s an old man’.

If Jae-seok had trained in another type of ability, he would have spent approximately the same amount of time as me. I would have thought that he had spent about 20 or 30 years in the stage.

But that wasn’t the case. What ability had he dabbled in?

He was a Life Energy Practitioner.

“How long were you in there for?”

If a Life Energy Practitioner wished to have four arms while continuing their training, the body would naturally take the most fundamental direction in order to grow four arms. First, it would modify the shoulders to accommodate for four arms, form additional muscles and develop an extended nervous system, and so on. In other words, Life Energy evolved the trainee’s body in the direction that the person desperately desired.

But when I looked at Jae-seok now, it was evident that he had aged in appearance. But who in the world wanted to grow old? Was there anyone who actually desperately wished to grow older?

Ultimately, his current appearance meant…

He had spent a long, unfathomable time in the stage.

“I don’t know exactly, but it was more than 60 years.”

“What?”

Min-kyung was more shocked than me. Moreover, she wasn’t the only one who was surprised.

“60 years? Did he just say 60 years? He really said 60 years!”

“He spent 60 years in that crazy space?”

“Some people get PTSD after clearing it just once.”

People exclaimed in wonder and shock. But at the same time, others were instantly convinced by his words.

“So that’s what it was. 60 years in that accursed space… That was why it was possible.”

“Amazing.”

“He truly possesses an indomitable spirit.”

“Befitting of a level 17.”

At their words, I observed Jae-seok once again. Instead of looking at the level exclusive for my viewing, I looked at the publicly displayed level.

Level 17

Someone spoke.

“But have you heard? Apparently, someone has an even higher level than that.”

“What are you talking about? The highest known level in the world is 13.”

“No way… That man has the highest level in the world?”

A level 5 player spoke in disbelief. He appeared to be visiting Gyeongbokgung Palace. Then, someone refuted his words.

“But there’s Iron Mask.”

“Iron Mask’s guides are the real deal, but he doesn’t raise his level. He only uploaded guides for up to level 8 as well.”

“From what I heard, his level is 0.0.5.?”

“What’s level 0.0.5?”

“Don’t you watch the guide videos? He has three classes. It’s quite rare, but if you possess the talent for various fields, you can acquire multiple classes.”

“Like that guy over there?”

“Yeah. Just like that guy… Huh? What?”

Suddenly, people’s gazes started to turn towards me, perhaps because they saw the number floating above my head. I wasn’t the only one with several classes, so I hadn’t attracted much attention until now. However… Jae-seok had come looking for me, and he was level 17. It would be hard to avoid the crowd’s attention.

“Noonim.”[1]

“…Yeah. Let’s move somewhere else.”

Min-kyung recoiled at Jae-seok’s use of the word, but soon shook her head and clapped her hands.

Tap!

The crowd of people disappeared for a moment. Then, people in odd clothing appeared in their place. We had left the Surface World behind and entered the Parallel World by passing through the Bubble World.

“Dae-ha!”

“Ah, yeap. Hi.”

“What’s with the half-hearted response! You’re such a heartless bastard!”

Jae-seok quickly approached me and hugged me tightly. He had approached me at a low angle, so I almost mistook his actions for a tackle.

“I really missed you. Keukeu. It’s not even funny. I thought of your face the second most during the stage. Even when the faces of family members and relatives were becoming hazy.”

“It seems like Brilliant Heaven Seven Lights are quite useful.”

“Well, that’s true. I couldn’t forget your face after reflecting for decades on your teachings. Ah! Of course, I only really started missing you after the armor was smashed apart.”

I asked back.

“The armor was smashed apart? It was imbued with a ton of self-repair functions.”

“I was really careful with it, but it couldn’t be helped after being smashed apart again and again. After around 9 years, it was turned into scrap metal and I had to swallow my tears as I continued the stage with my bare body. You don’t know how much I missed my armor when I was being stabbed in the arm and bitten in the leg. Oh, by the way, it’s you, right?”

“What is?”

Jae-seok replied as if it were the most natural thing in the world.

“The last one.”

I pondered over his words for a moment, but there was no reason to hide it, especially in front of the guy who was likely one of the last two remaining.

“Who else could it be?”

“Keukeuk. I knew it. You’re a nutjob.”

“What the hell are you saying?”

Jae-seok chuckled for a while, but soon calmed down and nodded.

“Well, from the moment I saw the metal aliens, I knew my teacher would be the last one remaining. You’re a metal-attribute Spirit Master and a metallic aura user… But anyhow, how did you manage to achieve a complete clear? There were over 100 million deaths.”

Jae-seok chattered away without pause. I took a good look at his body.

“Look at you. You’re so thin, it’s practically just bones.”

“What? Just bones…?”

Min-kyung had been silently observing our conversation from the side, but stuttered at my unexpected words. I ignored her and took out an object from the Unique World.

Pat!

“Eat this for now.”

It was a sandwich. A sweet, delicate calorie bomb with a lot more meat than bread, topped off with a special sauce!

“Huh? Eat this? Bread?”

However, Jae-seok reacted strangely when he saw the sandwich. After receiving the sandwich, he only looked at the object with a stupid look on his face. It was as if he had seen something unexpected. He appeared as if he had seen a sandwich for the first time in his life.

“What’s wrong with you? Since you’re a Life Energy Practitioner, you need to consume enough calories. You seem to have surpassed the level of a Compléter. I can’t believe you are in this condition.”

Even if he had aged, it didn’t make sense for a Life Energy Practitioner to have rough skin. I pushed the sandwich forward. I could not watch anymore because I felt sorry.

“Don’t freeze up and eat first. Let’s talk after you eat.”

“Ah, yeah. Food. I should eat.”

Jae-seok nodded as if possessed, then grabbed the sandwich before taking a bite.

He became stiff.

“…..?”

I watched silently. I couldn’t figure out why he was reacting as such. Some of the people wandering around Gyeongbokgung Palace stopped and looked at us, but they could not approach recklessly with the guards of Min-kyung standing around us.

“Oh.”

Jae-seok only began to move after a long time. He took another big bite of the sandwich, chewed it without saying a word and began to devour it.

The sandwich disappeared in an instant.

“…delicious.”

Jae-seok said the most natural thing in the world with a blank expression.

“Of course it’s delicious. I heard it’s one of the most popular recipes for Life Energy Practitioners.”

“Ah, is that so? It did seem like a popular product. Sweet, savory, and the meat was juicy, and…”

Jae-seok muttered in a daze, then suddenly stopped talking. His face started to distort.

“Ah, I’m being so silly… Haha. Ugh. Keugh…”

His shoulders started to tremble as he groaned.

“Heugh. Ugh. Uwaggh… Heugh…..!”

“Jae-seok?”

I became flustered and called out after placing my hand on his shoulder, but he could not come to stop.

“Keugh… Kuah… Heugh…!”

Tears started to pour down his face. He was always so cheerful, but current expression was completely shattered. I couldn’t find words to comfort him, so I continued to pat him on the back.

‘I see. It couldn’t have been easy.’

The techniques of Brilliant Heaven Seven Lights were a natural counter to the metal aliens, who used ultra-vibration blades as their main weapons. In addition, with my guide, he would have cleared the stage more easily than it should have been. But even so, the metal aliens were strong opponents possessing the skills equivalent to a Compléter.

Even if the ultra-vibration blades were rendered useless, the metal aliens had enough biting power to tear off human flesh. If one made a mistake in attacking or were unlucky, they would have to deal with more than one enemy at once.

In addition, the time he spent in the stage.

’60 years.’

It was insane. I had also experienced decades in the stage, but the quality of time we had spent was completely different. He would have fought every day in pain and loneliness, while I essentially took a long vacation.

‘But why?’

I could not understand. Why? Why was he so desperate to clear the stage? Even if real time was stopped, sixty years was worth an entire lifetime. It was long enough for ability users to start worrying about their life span.

‘If it was so painful, he could have quit in the middle and exited the stage, so why?’

A voice suddenly interrupted.

“Why are you whining in such a place?”

“…..!”

Jae-seok’s body stopped trembling. I turned my head and acknowledged the owner of the voice.

Stream of Judges

Level 11

Adjudicator Lee Kyung-eun

As always, a slim beauty in a colorful costume stood in front of us. She also appeared a bit older, probably in her mid to late 20s, just like Min-kyung.

‘You’ve all held out for quite a while.’

Humanity had already reached level 10 of the End Project, but I hadn’t seen anyone age during the stages until now. But now, three of them were standing in front of me.

‘It’s all thanks to the Throne of Honor.’

The stage was not a suitable environment to hold out for a long period of time. Unless one possessed abilities that far overwhelmed the level of the stage, they could not dream of a good night’s sleep, and the limitations on food and drinking water constantly pushed the players to their limits.

But the situation changed with the appearance of the Throne of Honor.

It was a true balance breaker that restored the stamina and mana of the sitting target, and it could even distribute food and cure injuries if needed – Throne of Honor.

‘Juan, you son of a bitch. If we had something like this from level one, more people could have taken the time to develop their skills.’

At least humanity was gifted with the three gifts now, but I could not help having such thoughts. The players had awakened various abilities after finishing the first stage. If they had the time to train against the relatively weak bunch of enemies, many more players would have been able to develop their skills proportionally to the advancement of stages.

“Dae-ha.”

A quiet voice displaced my thoughts.

“Hmm?”

I turned my head. Jae-seok was whispering in my ear as he wiped away his tears with his collar.

“Lunch. No, one o’ clock. No, two o’clock… No. I’ll see you at three.”

“What? Don’t tell me… The person who came to your mind the most was…”

“Thank you.”

He grasped my hands and shook them violently, then turned around and approached Kyung-eun. Kyung-eun took on a provocative expression as he arrived in front of her.

“What the heck? You’ve grown so old. You must have rolled around quite a bit, huh?”

A strangely aggressive tone. But Jae-seok continued to approach her without answering.

“What? Are you ignoring my words now? You think you’re all that now that you’ve leveled up?”

Now it felt as if she was picking a fight, but Jae-seok maintained his silence. He kept walking forward.

Finally, Jae-seok came face-to-face with Kyung-eun. She was quite tall, enough to debut as a model, but Jae-seok was now more than 2 meters tall. She looked quite small and fragile in front of his stature.

“W, what do you want? You couldn’t even look me in the eye before, and now you…”

Jae-seok finally responded to Kyung-eun’s sharp words.

“I’m sorry.”

“What? Sorry? About what?”

“I’m sorry that I could not make up my mind until now. I’m sorry that I was a fool who couldn’t make up my mind until I felt completely equipped.”

“You! What bullshit are you.”

Before she could finish her words, Jae-seok embraced her – a lot deeper than how he hugged me. Kyung-eun was wrapped around his arms.

“Let go of me.”

She snarled fiercely.

“Let go of me! Do you think I’m joking?!”

Kyung-eun struggled fiercely, but Jae-seok did not budge. He looked like a statue as he continued to hold her in his embrace.

“What the hell are you doing!! What are you trying to do!”

Puck! Boom! Puck!

Her fist whipped Jae-seok’s side so forcefully that all the observers flinched. Jokes aside, it was a destructive attack that could instantly crush a thick, steel plate. However, Brilliant Heaven Seven Lights was the most resistant against physical attacks, after vibrations.

After smacking him a few more times, Kyung-eun’s hands went limp.

“What are you doing…?”

She slurred the ends of her words.

I could hear sounds of crying soon afterwards.

I groaned.

“Ah… I just lost my mind.”

Any romance cells in my body had gone extinct a long time ago. I could not bear to watch the sight anymore, so I turned my head. Min-kyung was looking at them with a blank expression.

“You said you had something to say, right? Let’s go somewhere else.”

“What? But.”

“But? What do you mean? You want to continue to watch them?”

“…No.”

Min-kyung and I moved from the Parallel World to the Surface World. It seemed Min-kyung was wary of drawing any attention like before, so she took out a magic tool to distort people’s perception.

But I suddenly became curious.

‘By the way. How did Jae-seok solve the food problem?’

He must have suffered a lot from shortage of food, so I wasn’t able to understand how he had survived for 60 years.

‘Even with a Throne of Honor, at best it should be iron… Right? Maybe Bronze, since he’s pretty famous for handing out weapons and helping ordinary people.’

Still, it didn’t make sense. A mere bronze-ranked Throne of Honor could not handle the calorie requirements of Brilliant Heaven Seven Lights.

‘I’ll ask him when I see him at 3:00.’

Putting aside my thoughts, I followed after Min-kyung.

1. Korean honorifics for older sister (formall)