Reincarnated User Manual-Chapter 350: Friend (4)

One month had passed since then.

‘Seriously, what kind of place is this?’

The path from the 97th floor to the 98th. Yoru massaged her stiff neck and voiced her complaints.

A month and a half since entering the Tower of Infinity. The time taken to climb from the 70th floor was absurdly short. It was nothing short of an unprecedented record, but her face held no sense of pride for the achievement, only filled with complaints.

At the lower levels of the tower, in the residential area, the presence of outsiders breaking records caused an endless stir of regret among the locals. It was a situation where many praised Yoru, one she would normally delight in.

‘It’s ridiculous to find it strange now, but this is too much.’

From the moment she saw the tower standing tall in the middle of the Demon Realm, she felt something was off. Even if Yoru lacked education and her knowledge of the Demon Realm was incomplete, she could tell that this place defied common sense.

That awareness grew stronger the higher she climbed the tower. Yoru glanced at the demon clutching Siriel’s ankle with a look of disgust.

“Kill me… Please, kill me…”

“Let go.”

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Siriel coldly pushed away the demon blocking the path. The unknown demon clung persistently, but Siriel would repeatedly kick and fling it aside.

Although she was already exhausted and anxious to reunite with her brother, with her head spinning from nervousness, she refrained from taking aggressive actions—because of a demon following behind her.

“What murderous intent you carry. Are all humans from the outside like this?”

“They say if you kill the examiner, you’ll be forever bound to that floor.”

The demon woman Aisha, whom they encountered starting from the 90th floor, immediately volunteered to guide Siriel.

In such a strange place, it wasn’t exactly ideal to rely on a stranger’s guidance. However, Siriel found it hard to reject her offer.

“Or is it just the Prients who are special in this way?”

“I don’t know. Think what you want.”

“Isn’t it a bit cold to act this way toward someone helping you? I’d like you to at least consider my efforts.”

“You said… you said you walked the same path as my brother? Are you trying to brag about helping me now?”

“So what if I brag a little? I showed you kindness, didn’t I?”

Aisha sighed but smirked as if amused. Siriel, clearly displeased, glared at her with fierce eyes.

Thanks to her, they had managed to reach the upper floors of the tower at an unprecedented speed. But that fact didn’t matter.

‘My brother… wasn’t on the 98th floor.’

What mattered was that Shiron Prient was not there.

What mattered was the fact that killing the test examiner would permanently bind one to that floor.

‘Did something happen to my brother?’

Siriel followed silently behind Aisha, who opened the door to the 98th floor with a heavy sigh. She wanted to cheer her up, but the intense murderous aura that grew stronger with every floor made her hold back.

Aisha wasn’t a guardian of the floor. Though Siriel had been able to climb at twice her usual speed thanks to Aisha, she wasn’t bound by any promise not to kill her.

“This room is like a calamity manifest. As long as you follow me, the effects of the calamity will be minimized…”

Crunch—Siriel’s clenched fist crushed her glove. Her fingernails dug into her skin, drawing blood.

‘Should I not have come?’

…Aisha said something, but Siriel couldn’t even hear her words. They sounded like mere noise.

With a fist dripping blood.

With teeth clenched so tightly they made an audible grinding sound.

Siriel kept her gaze fixed on the ground, unable to face forward.

‘If… something happened to my brother…’

Even after a year of absence, he hadn’t returned. If he had gone to the trouble of sending her letters filled with reassurances…

Then, Siriel coming here would have been a meaningless act.

It might even be the worst decision she could have made.

Even earlier—if not for Aisha’s help, she might have impulsively killed the so-called guardian of the floor.

Though she wasn’t the type to easily take a life, even against a demon, the demon clinging to her ankle earlier had seemed so fragile it might crumble at any moment.

Like something corroded by the passage of time, as if it were disintegrating with the years.

A life so fragile that even a slight misstep in strength from Siriel could have killed it.

If that had happened, Siriel would have been bound to the tower in its place.

She thought it was an impossible scenario, yet she couldn’t shake it off.

Every day, she climbed the tower without rest. A moment’s respite would have been welcome, but since arriving in the Demon Realm, she had done nothing but sleep whenever exhaustion overtook her.

Siriel was worn out. Her body was exhausted, and her mind felt like it was shrouded in fog.

Her head, consumed by relentless worry, churned out one grim thought after another.

Worries about her brother. The letters filled with comforting words meant to reassure her. The hidden truths lurking behind those letters.

She had ignored all that and stubbornly made her way to the tower, without deeply considering what kind of fight her brother might be facing—prioritizing her own emotions instead.

She just wanted to see her brother. Trapped in her delusion of being left alone, she had wallowed in despair.

So it was only natural that her chest felt tight now.

Looking back on the time spent climbing the tower, she realized how foolish she had been.

Think about it.

She came to meet her brother, yet she found herself in situations where even her own life was in danger.

It was pathetic. It filled her with self-loathing.

She already knew how much weight her brother carried on his shoulders. And yet, without thinking, she had thrown more burdens onto him.

Crackle—

As Aisha had said,

The 98th floor embodied the calamity of the Demon Realm in its entirety.

The blood dripping from her hands had stopped. Siriel, trudging along, was grazed by a lightning bolt brimming with demonic energy.

Even though her arms were electrified, Siriel didn’t feel the pain. The ache in her heart was far worse, making her oblivious to physical suffering.

Thus,

What Siriel chose to do was slowly raise her head.

The sight that met her eyes was a storm of lightning—an apocalypse that would have paralyzed anyone in their right mind from even thinking about stepping into its midst.

Yet Siriel felt no fear. All she thought about was reaching the end of the tower as soon as possible to help Shiron.

‘If… he’s in a situation where he can’t leave the tower…’

The guilt of ignoring his plea to wait weighed heavily on her. As her conclusion began to form—

Kugugugung—

“…!”

The tower shook with an earthquake.

“Let’s destroy the tower.”

The moment they heard that Siriel and Yoru were climbing the tower, Lucia and Seira had been brainstorming excuses together.

As if worrying about Shiron wasn’t already enough, now they were debating this absurd idea. But that didn’t mean they were entirely without a justification.

Because while Shiron had already been sacrificed, they couldn’t allow Siriel and her daughter to become additional victims.

“We destroy the tower and get Shiron out.”

“Then it wouldn’t matter if that kid became the master of the tower. If the tower doesn’t exist, what does being its master even mean?”

“…You agree with me, don’t you?”

Lucia’s face brightened with gratitude. Even the arrogant Seira had agreed with the plan Lucia had come up with.

“Even I think this is a really clever solution, right?”

“…Right. There’s no other way right now. There’s no way to kill and revive the kid, after all.”

“Exactly! See? People need to learn to be flexible.”

…What was this?

Seira exchanged glances with Lucia, her expression stiff. Normally, she wouldn’t have gone along with such absurd reasoning, but given the circumstances, her mind was also half-broken.

And yet, she had no choice. Since Shiron had become the tower’s master, unless they killed and revived him, there seemed to be no sensible way to free him from the tower.

“Alright, let’s break it down already!”

Lucia rolled up her sleeves and sprang to her feet. She infused Sirius with the sharpest, hardest energy she could muster.

Kang!

Sirius struck the floor of the topmost level of the tower. Since each floor of the tower was an infinite world with no visible walls, all she could break was the tiled floor.

Kang!

She briefly worried whether even a scratch would appear, but fortunately, the tiles weren’t sturdy enough to withstand Lucia’s piercing strikes.

“Oh, this breaks easier than I thought!”

“Does it?”

Watching Lucia dig, Seira began scratching the tiled floor with her staff. Drdrdrdr! The ground resonated with faint vibrations, and rippling waves spread out, shaking the earth.

Crack! Creak!

The tiles began to crack like a spiderweb. Lucia drove her sword into the gaps, prying up the tiles and continuously digging into the softened ground beneath.

After about a week of effort,

The pit they dug began to exceed 100 meters in depth.

…A diameter of 200 meters. A depth of 100 meters. A massive pit.

Though they didn’t measure the depth, Lucia’s heightened senses instinctively told her how deep and wide it was.

“…Ah.”

And she instinctively realized something else—they needed to stop this nonsense immediately.

It wasn’t because the hole didn’t reach the lower floors as she’d hoped.

–What are you two doing?

Lucia jolted, lifting her head.

Outside the pit.

A piercingly cold gaze bore down on her.

“Shiron! Why are you so late?”

Although she had no intention of abandoning the plan to destroy the tower, Lucia’s legs moved instinctively, rushing to Shiron’s side.

“Do you even know how long I’ve been waiting for—”

But her joy was short-lived. The tears in her eyes, which had been glistening with the joy of reunion, widened in anger.

“Who’s that woman next to you?”

There were unfamiliar women.

Two of them.