Exactly 5 minutes…

The time Ian took to clear the first floor to the fifth floor of the Spirit Dojo was no more than five minutes.

It was a known thing for such a situation to happen.

It was a matter of course.

In the Spirit Dojo, each level of the opponent that appeared was according to the challenger’s level.

The monsters’ level of transcendence, which Ian was hunting, was around 13 to 14 so clearing the 5th floor wasn’t an easy task.

Tring-!

[You have won against the trainees!]

[You have successfully cleared the 6th floor of the spirit dojo.]

[You have acquired the item ‘Medium Wind essence’.]

[You have earned 5 points.]

… Syncopation…

[You have successfully cleared the 7th floor of the Spirit Dojo.]

[You have successfully cleared the 8th floor of the Spirit dojo.]

Clearing 8 floors one after the other, Ian could feel the greed rise inside himself the more he kept looking at the dojo.

‘The reward is surely great. Maybe I should have come here before going to the Contaminated Mine?’

Ian smiled while thinking about it.

While Ian was busy doing the Spirit Mountain quest, someone had already pre-empted the content there.

Maybe around the first clear, he was thinking that it would have been very rewarding if he came here first.

‘Uh, I don’t know who was that user who came in here first, but I just hope that they haven’t cleared the 15th floor yet.’

Ian’s goal and the quest achievement was to defeat the dojo master on the 15th floor.

As much as he wanted to get the ‘Gearbox’ on the 15th floor, he wanted to get double the reward.

“Huhu.”

A greedy laugh came out of Ian’s mouth.

The thought of clearing the quest and then opening two of the transcendence gearbox made Ian feel so good.

Ian quickly stepped into the gate that would take him to the next floor.

System messages appeared.

Tring-!

[Do you want to challenge the 9th floor of the Spirit Dojo?]

‘From the 9th floor, the trainees will be at the same level as me. I need to be a bit more careful.’

Ian nodded to himself.

Ian’s form quickly got sucked into the gate.

* * *

Wheeeing-!

The gate opened with a low resonance, and the quiet hall was disturbed.

“Huk, huk!”

“Wah, that was close.”

“Yah, Chesk, we would have almost slipped out of the 13th floor because of your mistakes!”

Ralph’s hard voice could be heard all over the place.

One would already know what happened on the 13th floor just by hearing their voices.

“I should have been out if hyung didn’t hit that paralysis arrow!”

“I’m sorry. I have been playing for so long that my arms are getting numb.”

Ralph and the others just cleared the 13the floor. They were gathered in the waiting room, wiping off the sweat from their foreheads.

If they slipped out of the 13th floor instead of reaching the 14th floor, then he would have lost all of his enthusiasm.

Tring-!

[You have successfully cleared the 13th floor of the Spirit Dojo.]

[Hero score of 13 points has been achieved.]

[Vitality has been restored.]

[You have entered the waiting room.]

Looking at the messages, Ralph just shook his head.

He had seen the same messages a dozen times already.

‘Yeah, well, we need to clear the next floor unconditionally this time. We’ll have to break through the 14th floor and then find out what is on the 15th floor… I’ll clear it at all cost.’

Ralph was adamant and quickly checked his condition.

After entering the waiting room, all of their vitality and skills were reset, but it had become a habit for rankers to just verify and maintain everything.

Ralph looked at it and moved ahead with a firm look.

His whole body had already reached its limit because of being in the tower for three days, but he was still trying to keep himself standing with his mental power.

Tuck- Tuck-!

Ralph, who reached the gate with heavy steps, looked back at his two other party members.

He opened his mouth with a very low voice.

“Well, the spirit of Inisco had just evolved, so let’s clear it this time.”

“Kay, Ralph.”

“Nice, Hyung.”

Ralph’s gaze went toward Chesk and spoke once more.

“Chesk, if you make such mistakes again, I won’t tolerate it.”

“Okay, I will get myself together.”

The three men with firm faces alternately stared at each other.

After a while, they were ready to step into the gate.

Swoong-!

The gate began to emanate blue light and started to suck in the three people.

The waiting room once again turned silent after the three left.

Was it around 30 minutes since the party of Ralph had disappeared?

Woong-!

At the gate where they appeared, a new resonating sound came out.

Someone other than Ralph’s party had cleared the 13th floor.

Subsequently, the shadow that appeared at the gate mumbled to itself, “Phew, it wasn’t so easy. I cleared it all somehow until I get here.”

Tat- tat-!

The shadow began to walk in a relaxed manner toward the gate.

He was none other than Ian.

Surprisingly, Ian climbed up the 13th floor easily when Ralph’s party had to try three times to clear it.

“So I’m going to the last gate before I meet the Dojo master, right?”

After checking his equipment, Ian looked at the gate with his alert eyes.

It took a couple of hours to get to the 13th floor, and it surely was tremendous when compared to the party of Ralph.

“I’m here.”

Standing in front of the 14th floor, Ian took a step without hesitation.

A system message that Ian wasn’t expecting appeared in front of him.

Tring-!

[The other challenger has entered the gate.]

[You will have to face the other challengers first.]

[Do you want to proceed with the challenge?]

As soon as he checked the message, Ian smiled.

“Oh ho, looks like I am late?”

Of course, the probability that the challenger was on the 14th floor wasn’t excluded.

Ian himself knew that there were other users there.

They probably were the ones who had intercepted the first rewards till the 13th floor.

Ian’s head started to work again.

‘What should I do? Should I accept the challenge even though I know that it is risky?’

Ian had two options.

First, wait in the so-called waiting room until the challengers complete their fight.

Second, try to know who the challengers were and defeat them first.

Not surprisingly, the second option had a lot of risks.

Challengers entering the 14th floor might have a higher power than Ian.

The odds of having to face a single user one-on-one like Ian was very slim, but it was likely for a party to evade.

No matter how great Ian was, it was arrogant of him to think that he would be able to turn out victorious against two or more rankers of other servers.

Ian’s decision was the second option—the risky one.

“Even if there is a risk in it… I think it is a situation that I’ll face one way or another.”

Ian was willing to go ahead with the challenge, even if it meant losing to other challengers.

Even if he was defeated, he would just be pushed out of the dojo.

On the other hand, if he took the risk and accepted the challenge, he would likely get the buff and the reward for the 14th floor.

Ian decided that it was worth a try.

“Kay, let’s see what kind of friends are waiting there…”

Ian’s eyes started to sparkle as he looked at the series of messages that appeared.

Tring-!

[You have challenged.]

[To challenge the 14th floor, you must first duel with the challengers on the 14th floor.]

[A duel with the challengers has been registered.]

[Moved to the duel room.]

Ian’s vision began to get engulfed with a white light.

* * *

Gulp.

In the quiet room, the sound of someone gulping could be heard.

Tension could be felt everywhere.

The four men, confronting the spacious room, began to look with keen eyes.

In a duel, all the information of the opponent was covered, so the only thing they knew was their opponent’s equipment.

Even their opponent’s face was covered with a mask, so even if they had met the person their facing before, they wouldn’t be able to recognize them.

‘Dammit, this was an important moment…!’

Looking at the man on the other side, Ralph bit his lip.

In fact, this wasn’t his first time to participate in a duel.

They have been in the dojo for three days, and he had met a challenger NPC a few times.

Which was why when he saw the ‘Challenger has entered’ messages, he wasn’t that surprised.

He just felt like he had rotten luck.

‘This is the first time for a challenger to come after the 10th floor… Can we win?’

Ralph didn’t think that the challenger would be a user.

It wasn’t like he wasn’t expecting to be faced with a user.

He just thought that if there was a user, he wouldn’t show by himself.

For a single user to come up to the place where three people tried hard to go to, no matter how hard Ralph thought about it, that made no sense to him.

He thought it wasn’t much of a deal.

If the challenger was a normal user, he would have surely waited for the other ones to complete the floor and then challenge it.

‘Yeah, I’m positive about it. Unless that one is a high-leveled NPC, he won’t be able to take down three rankers.’

Ralph quickly began to give out orders in the party chat.

Ralph: Let’s move slowly and surround him. Chesk, keep your bow ready. If it looks like he will cast magic, shoot him down to cancel his casting.

Chesk: Okay, Ralph.

Inisco: Okay, hyung!

Equipped with a weapon which looked like an Orb, the guy was most likely to be a warlock or a wizard class.

For that reason, Ralph thought it would be important to narrow their distance to the opponent.

After narrowing the distance and interrupting their enemy’s casting, there was no way they wouldn’t be able to kill a wizard with weak tanking abilities.

‘We all have low vitality… but if Chesk can manage to cut off the enemy’s magic, then it could be a huge problem for him.’

After his calculations, Ralph moved.

In order to not give him the time to cast any magic, he rushed over to him.

But the very next moment.

Ralph couldn’t help but panic.

“…!”

He was holding a fiery longbow in his hands; the man, who was equipped with an orb, now had a bow.

In Ralph’s short duration of hesitation, the man already began shooting his arrows without giving a second thought.