The combined rest area, just before the hundredth floor.

After Kwon Su-Hyeok spent nearly a week on the ninety-eighth floor, the other climbers finally had to take a break from watching him for an extended period of time. People always stepped away when they needed to, but while Kwon Su-Hyeok was in the waiting room, the time that remained naturally fell to them as well.

With how many climbers remained, it was only natural that they used their downtime differently. Some trained, others rested leisurely, and more than a handful spent time with their lovers. Of course, regardless of how they spent their time, a quiet sense of indebtedness toward Kwon Su-Hyeok lingered in every climber’s heart.

It was an afternoon no different from any other in the rest area.

At some point, light flared as a soft pop echoed across several places in the rest area, including along the walls of the dining hall. It was the phenomenon that signaled the beginning of Kwon Su-Hyeok’s trial.

“Huh?”

“Oh! It’s up!”

The moment someone shouted, however, the world came to a halt. Startled by an inexplicable series of images, the climbers could do nothing as they were frozen. While everyone reeled, trying to figure out what was happening, a replay of what Kwon Su-Hyeok had endured embedded itself into the climbers’ minds.

One. Two. Three—

So as not to overwhelm the climbers, the Tower of Ordeal didn’t implant every moment. For example, it omitted most of Kwon Su-Hyeok’s breakdowns. Rather than focusing on his anguish or depression, it highlighted a simple truth: he had persevered through those difficult years and ultimately prevailed.

Scenes of him training, battling, and at last seizing victory after nearly twenty years settled into their minds, as if the climbers themselves had lived through them. Although they hadn’t experienced it all, the loneliness and desolation Kwon Su-Hyeok had felt were also conveyed all the same.

When every climber finally spectated the end of the trial, time resumed its flow. Even after regaining their senses, the dining hall remained silent for quite some time. Just when one climber wondered whether the world was still frozen, someone let out a faint sigh.

“Ah.”

That was all. For a long while, the entire rest area was drowned beneath a tide of emotion none of them could name. Within that stillness, Alexei turned to Ha Hee-Jeong. She stood with her eyes closed, entirely detached from her surroundings. It was as if she were revisiting each memory and emotion from the trial, engraving them deeper within herself. Her closed eyelids quivered faintly, and a single tear slipped down her cheek.

***

The Community on Earth, just before the hundredth floor.

[When’s it startinggg!!]

[I need my Su-Hyeok rn!!!]

[Bruh... isn’t it supposed to be tomorrow?]

[Could be. Last time he was gone for like a whole week.]

[...]

[...]

[...?? Okay, what the hell was THAT?]

[Bro, what the fuck!!]

[He was alone for TWENTY YEARS??]

[That’s insane. This ain’t even funny.]

[Light-Su-Hyeok 😭]

[Bro, I was literally in the shower, then boom. Memory got updated, so I ran out, soaking wet. Tell me I’m not the only one. Y’all felt it too, right?]

[Yeah, yeah, even the foreign Comms are blowing up. It’s global.]

[But fr. What was that whole world-freeze moment?]

[Guess Light-Su-Hyeok really is becoming a god.]

[That was wild. Everything froze, but my brain was still going lol.]

[Science community gonna combust lolol.]

[This, too, is Light-Su-Hyeok’s blessing.]

[Blessing?? What blessing?]

[Think about it. If someone were driving and got that memory upload, half the planet would’ve crashed.]

[Wait, you’re so right! Actually??]

[OK, but real talk... how did Su-Hyeok survive TWENTY years alone. So sad]

[Ngl I would’ve gone insane on day 2.]

[He endured cuz he’s literally divine.]

[We only had to deal with that suffocating cosmic-void feeling for like 5 seconds. He had to suffer that for twenty YEARS.]

[Probably worse tbh. Didn’t it feel like it got toned down for us?]

[Yeah, probs nerfed the trauma so we wouldn’t lose it.]

[Light-Su-Hyeok supremacy.]

[Su-Men.]

[Su-Men!!]

[Anyway, so now it’s the hundredth floor, right? Is this the finale?]

[Idk? There may be, like, one more surprise boss.]

[Can I drop a hot take?]

[Go on.]

[I wanna call what happened today “The Five Seconds of Silence.”]

[Five Seconds of Silence?]

[We literally experienced a tiny fraction of Su-Hyeok’s suffering. Even the whole world stopped. So, let’s make it an official moment. A tribute to Light-Su-Hyeok. Name it “The Five Seconds of Silence.”]

[Lmao.]

[Laugh all you want, but he’s right. This should be a national holiday. Everyone bows their heads for five seconds.]

[Fr fr.]

[But “The Five Seconds of Silence” sounds kinda meh? What about “Five Seconds of Worship”?]

[Hmm, nah. “The Five Seconds of Silence” hits better.]

***

The indescribable swell of divinity pouring into me was unlike anything I had ever experienced. A weightlessness spread not only through my mind but through my entire body. In its own way, it was euphoric, a kind of quiet ecstasy that settled over me before I even realized it. Although I had been receiving divinity for quite some time now, an experience this vivid and overwhelming was entirely unprecedented.

Anyway, the source of this divinity remained the same. The majority were climbers or ordinary people from Earth who had placed their hopes on my ascent. I noticed some faint streams of faith coming from Natalie, Gehenna, and even Seorden’s Forest as well, yet the quantity was so vastly outmatched that it wasn’t even comparable.

How the fuck?

The tower had clearly stated that no matter how long the trial took me, it would only register as a fleeting moment to anyone outside the floor. However, that didn’t explain how such an overwhelming amount of divinity was pouring in all at once.

Still, I was certain of one thing. Everyone knew what I had endured on the ninety-ninth floor. The tower, guided by its own underlying intent, had apparently delivered it to them in some form. Of course, the spectators couldn’t have witnessed all of it. There was no way a single fleeting moment could contain nearly twenty years of information. That was a far too long and heavy span to imprint onto the mind of an ordinary person. It would have presented the information in a shortened, condensed manner.

I am not upset by the thought, though.

While climbing the ninety-ninth floor, and even after emerging from the trial, I had been overwhelmed by countless emotions. Two decades of loneliness, isolation, sorrow, joy, pity for the other me, and longing for Ha Hee-Jeong.

Not everyone could fully empathize with those emotions, but the fact that others understood even a fraction of what I had felt—and placed their faith in me despite that—brought me immense comfort. Part of my sense of euphoria came from that. In fact, my chest felt as if it were swelling.

My face started to flush slightly.

“Ahh.”

I let out a short breath and fought to steady the emotions rising within me.

Not yet. Not yet.

I hadn’t finished climbing the tower. The hundredth floor still remained, and I couldn’t guarantee it would be easy. Even so, no matter how hard I tried to settle myself, the quiet sense of fulfillment refused to fade. The hardships I had endured and the pain of those long years were being acknowledged by the ones who believed in me.

It wasn’t that I hadn’t received recognition before, but this time, I had suffered so much.

To be truly recognized for something I did for others.

Perhaps, without realizing it, I had longed for this. The feeling was pleasant, and I released a faint smile. I simply wanted to linger in these emotions for a moment. Closing my eyes, I focused solely on the divinity flowing toward me.

After spending some time like that, I lifted my head and beheld the waiting room. It looked familiar, but strangely foreign.

Even if only a brief instant passed outside, it has been twenty years for me.

Nothing in the waiting room had changed, but it all seemed distant. It was merely a place I had rested in, but it had become familiar over the floors, filled with memories both good and bad. I slowly took in my surroundings, the looming hundredth floor consuming my thoughts. All of this would soon disappear—the waiting room, the training room, the hot springs, the shop, the bed.

Everything was nearing its conclusion. It had to.

As before, it felt extraordinary, perhaps because I had been alone for so long.

Have I become someone who feels moved too easily?

After a long moment spent looking over the room, I turned away. It was time to focus on what lay ahead. I had missed this place and would likely miss it again soon, but time here was unlimited. With no certainty of what awaited on the next floor, there was no reason to rush.

For now, I needed to rest.

After those long years, I was physically fine, but not mentally so.

***

Even though I usually headed straight into the training hot springs, I found myself showering for quite a while instead. It had been nearly twenty years since I had last washed myself in any meaningful way.

I had kept myself clean using the limited water I carried, but that could never amount to a proper shower. There simply hadn’t been enough to spare, and every drop had needed to be taken with care.

Despite not being thirsty, I had drunk water for several reasons. Among those, during intense training sessions, my throat sometimes burned as if it were drying from the inside out, separate from any real thirst.

After dying, I always returned as if I were a slate wiped clean. Therefore, I never felt outright dissatisfaction from my lack of cleanliness. Even so, the warmth of true running water was incomparable. Besides the shower, the heat of the training hot spring held a comfort that defied explanation, a deep, enveloping warmth that eased both body and mind.

After that long-awaited bath, I had one thing on my mind.

“I’m going to explode.”

Eat.

My poor relationship with food had built up over those twenty years.

I had packed spare rations in Mung-chi, but it hadn’t been much. Several months’ worth of supplies wasn’t small by any means, but it had been prepared for extreme circumstances, not for regular meals three times a day. All of it had run out before ten years had even passed. With nothing but food to ease my stress, I devoured everything.

It was rough.

The years that followed were torture. Even while I trained, I wouldn’t stop thinking about food. So I ordered everything now that I had returned. Although I sometimes only ended up taking a bite before discarding something, I bought everything I had ever wanted to try. I couldn’t remember the names of all the dishes, but I had purchased at least thirty of them.

My stomach felt ready to burst.

I sat in the chair for a moment, brushed my teeth, cleaned the table, and then rose from my seat.

It was time to visit Natalie. She would have known some of the ninety-ninth floor’s details, so she surely wasn’t at ease. Her hardship wouldn’t have matched mine, but I wanted to reassure her. Also, I missed interacting with people.

“Huh? What the heck?”

When I roused my mana to open a portal, nothing appeared. I couldn’t open a portal to Natalie’s world, nor Seorden’s Forest. Startled, I tried every method I could think of, but none of them worked.

Of course, the rest area was inaccessible, but even my personal battlefield was sealed off. I couldn’t make sense of it.

Is everything blocked because the hundredth floor is approaching? There was no such notice when I entered the waiting room.

Trying to summon Gehenna or Poong-Wol ended up the same. I could feel their connection through my divinity, but I couldn’t do anything with it.

The rest area had been clearly off-limits since the ninetieth floor, but everything else had been available. Something was clearly wrong. I circled back to my initial thought. It had to be because the next floor was the hundredth.

I lifted my gaze toward the air. The tower’s notification window remained unchanged.

[Challenger Kwon Su-Hyeok has an indefinite amount of time to rest before the hundredth floor. Please take a rest.]

I awkwardly scratched my cheek. It didn’t show outwardly, but the situation was bewildering. Frankly, it was a bit absurd. I had planned to visit Natalie and Seorden's Forest just so I could socialize.

Huh?

Now that I thought about it, Poong-Lyeong was nowhere to be found. It had definitely been in the waiting room before I entered the ninety-ninth floor.

That, too, was strange.

It came to me rather late, but I couldn’t blame myself. I had spent nearly twenty years on the ninety-ninth floor alone without a single conversation. If ten years were enough to change the face of the land, then forgetting the Spirit of Storms wasn’t strange at all.

I didn’t believe the tower had harmed it. It was probably elsewhere, either with Natalie or in Seorden's Forest. Whatever the case, I wasn’t worried. What concerned me was why this was happening right before the hundredth floor.

It was clearly the tower’s intention. I had no idea what it was thinking.

Is this supposed to help me grow as well?

It had given me unlimited time and left me alone. A continuation of the loneliness that had begun on the ninety-ninth floor. Trying to look for silver linings, perhaps it was implying that to ascend, one had to first stand alone.

Unfortunately, I couldn’t be certain of anything. The tower’s intent, as always, was far beyond me. I didn’t want to immediately rush to the hundredth floor, not when I had no idea what waited there. I needed rest.

“Jeez.”

The disappointment stung more than I expected, especially since I had genuinely been looking forward to saying hello. Of course, there was nothing I could do. If it simply didn’t work, then no amount of wishing or frustration would change that reality.

I also had no desire to remain in the waiting room for much longer, anyway. I had already spent twenty years all to myself, and those long years had worn me down in ways I probably wouldn’t recover from for a long time.

Of course, lingering concerns about the next floor still weighed on my mind. Regardless, I didn’t intend to immediately throw myself into another prolonged period of training.

My opponent on the previous floor had provided me a veritable mountain of insights, and I couldn’t tell how much time I would need to fully refine them all, or whether it was possible without further guidance.

Still, that was only how I felt at this exact moment.

After resting properly, perhaps my thoughts would shift. With that in mind, I slowly turned away from the door to the training room.

Eventually, I will have to go in.

Even so, what I needed most right now was to tend to the mental exhaustion that had accumulated over that long, seemingly endless expanse of time.

I threw myself on the bed.