Chapter 1 - The Regressor Is Too Weak (1)

“Fuck! Where the hell am I?!”

A loud noise somewhere woke me up. Was some drunk making a scene outside my place?

“Ugh... My head...”

Clutching my pounding head, I carefully push myself halfway upright. My whole body aches like crazy. Did I get drunk and sleep outside last night? No. I even remember punching in the code to my front door.

I picked the crusted gunk from my eyes and forced them open. Instead of my familiar studio apartment, I saw a whole crowd of people sitting up just like me.

My back was wet. Feeling around, I discovered I’d been lying on damp earth. Apart from being soft, it was about fifty thousand light-years removed from a bed.

Come to think of it, there were way too many trees around. An excessive number.

“... Inhale. Hah.”

I drew a deep breath, taking in air that couldn’t have been fresher or cleaner. It tasted of phytoncides, I guess you could say.

Wherever this was, it definitely wasn’t Korea.

A large clearing surrounded by trees. A crowd of people sitting inside it.

“Fuck! I asked where the hell we are! Did you even get our consent for thiiis?!”

Wasn’t there a saying about being too dumbfounded to speak? Aside from the bald middle-aged man screeching his head off, nobody raised their voice.

“What the... Fuck... What the hell is this...”

Just as the man finally wore himself out with his tantrum and started panting...

POP!

With a cute sound effect, a being that looked like a winged child appeared.

“Hello, you inferior humans doing such a splendid job of wasting your lives! Lovely to meet you!”

The thing greeted us cheerfully. But the pointed teeth that occasionally showed as it spoke were as razor-sharp as a predator’s.

I’d woken up in a strange place full of people who seemed to have been dragged here like me... and now some winged fairy-looking thing had appeared?

This situation felt familiar somehow. No, it was beyond familiar. It was downright clichéd.

“It’s one of those tutorial fairies from webtoons...” someone muttered.

He was right. Floating above our heads was the tutorial fairy everyone knew so well. The very same tutorial fairy that would blow your head off if you did anything to get on its nerves.

“...”

Without realizing it, I clamped my stupidly hanging mouth shut. If I ran my mouth for no reason, I might end up as the unfortunate victim whose head exploded in the prologue.

Apparently plenty of people had the same thought, because a heavy mood settled over the clearing.

“Uh... Um... Never mind...”

The potbellied bald man had looked like he had something to say, but after glancing all around, he cautiously sat down too.

Everyone sat there like a flock of docile sheep. Perhaps displeased with this behavior, the tutorial fairy worked its mouth petulantly.

“... Hmm. Does anyone have an honest opinion they’d like to share? Or some constructive feedback? Right now, I’d be willing to give it favorable consideration.”

As if itching to get its hands on someone, the tutorial fairy drifted about, making eye contact with people. But far from talking back, everyone lowered their eyes to avoid its gaze.

“... Everyone seems to know us pretty well these days, huh? You certainly know your place, unlike most inferior humans.”

It was doing its best to provoke us... but unfortunately for the fairy, nobody in this clearing was stupid enough to give it an excuse to blow their head off.

“... Aww. Guess I have to follow procedure.”

The fairy visibly wilted. Apparently blowing people’s heads off in the tutorial was its greatest joy in life.

“... I’ll just cover the essentials and get this over with, okay? I don’t want to do this either, but it’s procedure. I don’t have a choice.”

The fairy slowly began its explanation, its voice a mixture of irritation, sorrow, and sheer reluctance.

To sum up what it said... God had recently grown sick of humanity’s arrogance, and Earth had been brought before divine judgment. Humanity was now forced to prove its worth, and the way to do that was to climb this tower. We were the chosen humans summoned to make that climb.

It was a tower-climbing premise I felt like I’d seen a hundred times before. Basically: climb the tower if you don’t all want to fucking die!

“So, one of you needs to clear the sixty-sixth floor of this tower. Otherwise, humanity goes extinct. Understood?”

“...”

Everyone cautiously nodded without a word.

“All right, that’s the gist of the background... Take whatever you like from here...”

The fairy dropped a shower of assorted weapons into the middle of the clearing.

“The system will explain the details... Tutorial start!”

It gave a casual flick of its wrist and vanished with a cute sound effect.

POP!

An awkward silence lingered for a while after the fairy disappeared.

“What the fuck... My phone doesn’t work either...”

“This isn’t some hidden-camera prank, is it? I saw a YouTuber build an Octopus Game set... Couldn’t it be something like that...?”

“I heard there were a bunch of simultaneous disappearances recently... Could this be connected?”

Only then did people cautiously begin to whisper. All around me, they were pouring out the words the oppressive atmosphere had kept them from saying.

“... Ha. Fuck.”

I swore under my breath too.

I’d been at home right up until I went to sleep, but when I woke, I’d been summoned into a tower. Intellectually, I understood that something out of a novel or webtoon had become reality, but it still hadn’t quite sunk in.

I almost pinched my cheek like a comic-book protagonist, then stopped because it seemed stupid.

“... Am I really inside a tower?”

If this tower was anything like the novels I’d read... all kinds of dangers would be lurking outside this clearing. God’s malice, laid out to take my life.

From now on, I’d have to put my life on the line. Realizing that seemed to make my headache even worse.

“Whew... Let’s stay positive.”

Even if a tiger dragged you to its den, you could survive if you kept your wits about you. Moping wouldn’t help anything. Now was the time to think and make plans.

How did protagonists usually act during a tower’s tutorial?

“... A tower tutorial, huh.”

Thinking about a tower tutorial naturally brought one thing to mind. Something inseparable from towers. Like fish-shaped pastries and sweet red bean filling, or corn dogs and ketchup.

“STATUS WINDOOOOOW!!!!!!”

Some guy must have had the same idea, because his cry of “Status window” boomed through the clearing.

“What the... What’s wrong with that student...?”

“Did he eat something funny?”

The middle-aged and older men and women who knew nothing about the tower-climbing genre gave him sidelong looks as if he were insane. But the younger people familiar with its clichés watched his mouth with a little anticipation.

“It’s up! It’s up! My status window’s up!”

The man who’d called for his status window whooped and cheered like a striker who’d just scored.

“Status window!”

“Status windooow!”

“Sta! Tus! Window!”

Seeing his reaction, people all around started calling for their status windows as if they’d been waiting for this.

“... Status window.”

After checking how everyone else was reacting, I quietly murmured it too.

[Name: Kim Junho] [LV:1]

[Trait]

-Regression [EX]

A transparent message window in a familiar format appeared before my eyes. It looked so shabby it barely deserved to be called a status window. Shouldn’t it at least have some stats?

But something else had caught my attention.

“... Regression?”

Forcing my trembling finger to move, I pressed down on the word [Regression].

-Regression [EX]

-You regress to the moment you first entered each floor. There is no limit to the number of uses.

An incredibly brief description. But anyone who’d read their fair share of web novels would know: the simpler the description, the more broken the ability.

“Jackpot!”

Unable to contain my joy, I shouted.

Regression upon death. An ability that always came up whenever people were asked to name an overpowered skill. After all, returning to the past when you died was as good as being invincible.

The key was being able to return to the past with knowledge of the future. I’d been given the chance to keep getting stronger endlessly.

Of course, people with death-regression abilities usually went through absolute hell. Wouldn’t all that suffering be hard? Sure, but wasn’t it better than dying for good?

With this ability, I was practically invincible for as long as my willpower held out. I’d been chosen.

I was the protagonist.

I was the hero who would conquer this tower and save Earth.

Exhilaration spread through every inch of my body. I could barely stop shaking.

“Woohoo!”

I sprang to my feet and took off toward the undergrowth in front of me.

Goblins? Orcs? Whatever was out there, bring it on.

I was invincible, and regression was god-tier.

Just as I was about to run through the undergrowth...

“Ow.”

The leaves must have been pretty sharp. They nicked my ankle, leaving tiny beads of blood.

It was fine. Just a minor scratch. Gathering information came first right now. I needed to find out what lay beyond this clearing.

No. Calm down. I’d gotten too excited. Come to think of it, my hands were empty. I realized I’d dashed off without even picking up a weapon.

I should go back now and at least get a sword...

“Huh?”

[You have taken damage.]

[Regressing to the moment you first entered Floor 0.]

A sword...

A...

Just like that, I lost consciousness.

* * *

“Fuck! Where the hell am I?!”

My head was pounding like crazy. A familiar voice. The same man from before.

I instinctively realized I’d regressed. I’d already been through this once.

But why? When had I died?

Had that thick undergrowth been coated in poison or something? But it hadn’t hurt at all, and I’d been perfectly lucid right up until I regressed. That didn’t fit dying of poison.

Then had something other than death triggered my regression? I remembered the message I’d briefly glimpsed just before it happened.

[You have taken damage.]

[Regressing to the moment you first entered Floor 0.]

Taken damage...? Had I taken any damage? I didn’t remember anyone hitting me or anything.

“No... It can’t be...”

Could I really have regressed because of that tiny cut from the undergrowth? When I’d barely shed a drop of blood?

Instinctively, I looked around the clearing.

Green over here.

Green over there.

Beyond the clearing, the undergrowth was so thick you couldn’t even see the ground. You could practically call it a living prison of grass and trees.

If... if even a cut from a blade of grass really made me regress...

“... Fuck.”