Chapter 34
Chapter 34: Hallelujah
Hae-jin?
He immediately called.
Tuu tuu—.
[The customer is currently unavailable, and has been forwarded to voicemail—.]
He called several times, but it was the same every time.
"What's her deal?"
She sent a message, but won't pick up the phone? Something was strange. The first time he'd called her, it had clearly said the number didn't exist. But now the ringtone was going through? Hmm……. Should he go find the police or a lawyer? It felt like you could track someone down with just a phone number. Catch her and feed her some Gu Poison? No. If he forced her out of hiding, she might go deeper underground. Damn. For now, it seemed like she'd reactivated her phone number, so there was nothing to do but wait for Hae-jin to reach out.
He had something to do this evening. He'd made plans with the Choi brothers. He took the subway. He still hadn't gotten his driver's license. During his break, he'd passed the written exam, but hadn't yet taken the road test. For reference, he'd barely scraped through the written portion.
He'd gotten every one of the difficult legal questions right, but then gone and gotten the common sense questions wrong.
[Q. While driving, the car in the adjacent lane turns on its blinker and suddenly tries to cut into your lane. What is the appropriate response?]
① Slow down and yield.
② Lean on the horn and tailgate to prevent them from cutting in.
Easy. Number two. How dare you cut in! What, there's no option to burst their tires? Wrong! Ah, the gap between the Poison Demon's common sense and Korean common sense.
The disconnect was severe.
If he was going to drive in the future, he'd need to think the opposite way.
***
He was riding the subway when someone holding a cross cried out.
"Unbelievers go to hell! Unbelievers go to hell!"
It was someone who believed in the gods of this world. How noisy.
"The Murim Tower is a revelation calling unbelievers to repent! Everyone, repent! Hallelujah!"
Hallelujah. What did that mean? He searched it up, and found it was an expression of praise for God. A shout for when something supremely joyful or happy has occurred. He'd learned something new. ……Though he wasn't sure if he'd ever have use for it.
***
"Senior, it's been a while."
Choi Jae-jun, the second brother, extended his hand for a handshake. A light handshake.
"I missed you, Senior."
Choi Jae-hwa, the youngest, gave him a brief hug. A bit much.
The place they'd met was a Chinese restaurant. A restaurant run by a Chinese chef who frequently appeared on TV. Heard it was hard to get a reservation, but they'd managed. Chinese food, huh. It reminded him of the old Gangho. The food tasted different, but still. They ordered a variety of dishes and had a conversation.
He asked first.
"Have the Goryeo Sword Sect or Gukmubon been giving you two any trouble?"
He'd revealed the strategy for clearing the 21st floor and had everyone shout it out.
"Nameless Hero! We're happy thanks to you!"
【A Goryeo Sword Sect climber shouts that they're happy because of you. +10 Happiness】
It had started as a scheme to rack up some points, but it carried risks too. 'Who is this Nameless Hero?' It was only natural for that question to arise.
He and the brothers had gotten their story straight in advance.
The Nameless Hero.
He was a middle-aged man in his mid-fifties. Thick eyebrows, tiger-like eyes. A solid build with rough hands. Average height. Whether Korean or foreign was unclear, but he held affection for the Republic of Korea.
The Choi brothers had encountered him by chance at the Black Market, and had received information on clearing the 21st floor in exchange for a large sum of money.
Of course, the Choi brothers had asked Goryeo Sword Sect and Gukmubon not to pursue the Nameless Hero, but there was no way that would hold.
Rumors had a way of breeding more rumors.
They would fabricate some plausible figure, and rumors would exaggerate and expand to create a fictional person.
Gukmubon would chase shadows, but that was all they'd be chasing. Shadows.
The brothers answered.
"Now that we've handed over the information, they don't bother us anymore."
"Still, be careful."
Honestly, even this meeting today made him uneasy.
If he met with the brothers frequently, Gukmubon might start suspecting him. The brothers smiled and replied to his concern.
"Don't worry, Senior. We're a chaebol family."
"We meet dozens of people in a single day."
Is that so? He'd been thinking from the perspective of Kim Tae-yang, who had an extremely narrow social circle.
Well, great merchants were always busy meeting people. Of course it would be the same here.
He asked them another question. An important one.
"You two aren't going to keep climbing the Tower, right?"
They'd already acquired the Onon Grass to cure Chairman Choi, and as chaebol heirs, they had no more reason to climb the Tower.
They'd considered the Murim Tower a new-age money-maker, but the risk was very real. But the answer was unexpected.
"We're going to keep climbing."
"Why?"
"Probably for a similar reason as you, Senior."
"Hm?"
"After receiving your help last time and succeeding, I felt a kind of exhilaration I'd never felt before……."
"I want to feel that sense of elation again, so I'd like to keep going."
Oh boy. They'd gotten hooked on dopamine. They said it was a condition many climbers developed. There was nothing that could replace the thrill of surviving a brush with death.
……This is a problem.
My friends, brothers.
That was because you met me and found a shortcut—that kind of luck doesn't come around often. Your reasons and goals for climbing are different from mine.
The brothers took his hands.
"You'll keep helping us, won't you?"
Their eyes sparkled.
"We'll……see about that."
The luxury of being casual with chaebol. The brothers broke into wide smiles. They handed him an envelope.
"A gift."
"What is it?"
"Go ahead and open it."
Inside the envelope was a certified copy of the real estate register.
Ah, that 15-billion-won place in Cheongdam?
Owner: Kim Tae-yang.
He felt a strange sense of pride.
This truly was a crazy world.
The country might collapse because of the Murim Tower, and yet the price tag was 15 billion won? Did people think living in an expensive house would save them from death? He didn't understand it.
They were all on the brink of death, yet people still went to work and went to school. Perhaps they'd just gotten used to it after about ten years since the Tower appeared.
It was a remarkable absence of any sense of danger.
The brothers noticed his expression and spoke.
"Expensive, isn't it? You probably can't make sense of it."
"A little."
"Anxiety, happiness—they're all relative."
Choi Jae-jun explained in detail.
"It's not just me going under—the whole world is going under, so people feel less anxious, see."
"I suppose."
"The government is also covering everyone's eyes. If they said it was all going to collapse, who would go to work and pay taxes out of fear?"
"The world putting us all under a mass hypnosis……"
"Exactly. A collective hypnosis that says everything will be fine."
Only the politicians and the climbers knew the full truth. Mass hypnosis. Perhaps that was the role of politicians. He'd learned yet another thing about happiness.
As the mood grew heavy, Choi Jae-hwa said brightly,
"Let's talk about the house. Don't worry about taxes. We've sorted all of that."
"How?"
"There are ways. Huhuhuh."
The title had been transferred, but it would be a little while yet before he could move in.
This time he handed over the gift he'd prepared.
If something comes in, something should go out.
He handed over something wrapped in a cloth.
"What is this?"
"A health tonic."
"A tonic?"
It was a tonic made by the Poison Demon.
An elixir, to be precise.
He had been renowned in the old Gangho for his elixir arts.
It wasn't at the level of Shaolin's small revival elixir that boosted internal energy by one full cycle at a time, but it would still significantly reinforce the Choi brothers' internal energy.
Medicine is categorized by preparation type: tang (liquid decoction), san (powder), hwan (pill), and go (ointment). He was at the master level in tang and hwan.
"Wow!"
"Impressive!"
The brothers opened the cloth and gasped in admiration at the two elixir pills inside the wooden box.
Occasionally, elixirs would surface at Gukmubon's exchange or the Black Market.
In this world, elixirs were called the dream of eternal youth, alongside internal energy.
It wasn't merely a matter of improving health—they had the power to elevate internal energy and cure illness.
"How did you get these……?"
"I obtained them in the Tower."
Liquid decoctions and elixir pills differ greatly when it comes to storage. A properly made elixir could retain its potency for decades, even centuries.
It wasn't simply a matter of solidifying and compressing the ingredients.
The core was channeling one's internal energy—and sometimes spells—to trap spiritual essence within it.
The brothers had known he could brew decoctions, but didn't know he could also craft elixirs.
Those who could make elixirs were few and far between even among climbers.
Pharmaceutical companies had been continuously trying to achieve it as well.
"Thank you, Senior."
"You've given us something far too precious."
"I wanted to."
Heh.
Don't be surprised when you take it. It'll be extraordinary.
The gifts didn't end there.
"Please give this to your father."
He handed over the brewed decoction.
He had unblocked Chairman Choi's energy channels, but upon examining his pulse, he'd discovered the man's blood vessels were in poor shape.
He made sure to add a word of advice.
"I can vouch for its efficacy, but it must not be overused."
The teaching: 'Medicine is poison in excess'. The way to live longest in this world was not to stuff yourself with this and that just because it was good for you.
Misuse and overuse were more fearsome than plague and pestilence.
"Thank you. I'll pass it along to Father."
Stay healthy, Chairman Choi.
You need to stay healthy…… ……so my stocks keep going up.
The reason he'd given the brothers the elixir pills was for the same reason.
My hard-won subordinates, grow stronger.
Chaebol subordinates don't come along easily.
Following bungeoppang and chocolate, the art of medicine-making was an area he had long been pouring his heart into.
To earn Happiness Points, he would inevitably need to create a big wave across the entire world. Through the incident with the Choi brothers and Chairman Choi, he'd come to realize that medicine could be the answer.
But there was one thing that had been bothering him while brewing the decoctions.
It was that the decoction pot he'd found in this world wasn't to his satisfaction.
He'd scoured the herbal medicine market and obtained the finest available, but it was still just a regular decoction pot.
One might think anything would do the job, but that was absolutely not the case.
The decoction pot he'd used in his previous life in Gangho was something very special!
The Samgeuk Yeonokro.
The northernmost tip of the central plains, the peak of the highest mountain, and the southernmost tip.
The Samgeukto is created by mixing soil collected from these three locations with all manner of precious materials, then letting it mature for decades. And the Samgeuk Yeonokro was crafted from that, shaped with all their might by the greatest artisan of the era.
The Samgeuk Yeonokro could be used to brew both decoctions and elixirs—that is, pills—and produces results of peak medicinal potency through complete refinement during the creation process.
In short, it could draw out the full potency of medicinal and poisonous herbs to their absolute limit.
Ahh, my Samgeuk Yeonokro.
To look at it from the outside it appeared crude, no different from an ordinary earthenware pot—but it was his precious treasure.
He'd cherished it so dearly he'd even slept with it.
……Where could it be?
***
He finished his meal with the Choi brothers. When they stepped outside, the brothers offered to take him home.
"I'll take the subway."
"Why?"
For someone from the old Gangho, the subway was far more fascinating than a car. It was such a fun thing.
You'd get to witness all manner of strange people, too.
He raised his hand to bid them farewell, but Choi Jae-hwa, the youngest, asked,
"Or would you like to come with us?"
"Where to?"
"We're heading to Gukmubon. To the item exchange."
No way! Absolutely not.
The fact that he had no Gukmubon climber registration card could be exposed on the spot.
Not yet.
"I'll pass."
"Is it because of the registration card?"
……Hm. Was he found out?
Choi Jae-hwa said,
"We know. That Senior doesn't climb our Republic of Korea's Murim Tower."
He knows. How?
"You climb a foreign Tower, don't you?"
……What?
"There are a few people, rarely, who have dual or triple citizenship and climb foreign Towers, or so I've heard."
Choi Jae-jun quickly added,
"Ah, I'm sorry. You may have misunderstood. We verified when we processed the title transfer that Senior maintains Korean citizenship. But no matter how we think about it, we've never heard of an unaffiliated climber as exceptional as Senior."
Choi Jae-hwa gave a thumbs up and said,
"If you've maintained dual citizenship, doesn't that mean you've also done your military service in Korea? Impressive! We were both exempt."
Ahh…… So that's how it's resolved? That said, exempt.
It made sense that Kim Tae-yang was exempt due to environmental changes from the Murim Tower, given he'd only completed middle school. But these gentlemen being exempt at that age…… Well. Was there something wrong with them somewhere? Or too much right with them?
***
[In Front of Gukmubon Item Exchange]
"Is it alright if I go in?"
"Don't worry. Even non-climbers can purchase certain items at the Gukmubon item exchange. They might not be up to Senior's standards, though."
Let's go in and see for ourselves.
"How is it? Anything worth seeing?"
The Choi brothers came up to him, plucking a bowstring they'd apparently purchased. I noticed they already had plenty of bows at home, and they went and bought another one? Money to burn.
"It's interesting."
He'd come just to browse, but it was genuinely entertaining.
There were chopsticks, and earthenware. Clothing too. Seeing objects he'd known from the central plains of his past life again stirred something in him.
A question suddenly occurred to him.
"But why do they have items for climbers and general items on display together?"
Why put out items you can't even buy?
Choi Jae-hwa answered,
"It's Gukmubon's own kind of marketing. A dazzling item exchange. The idea is to get citizens whose hearts start fluttering at the sight of it to try their hand at becoming climbers."
"Ahh……"
The Poison Demon, genius merchant. He'd just learned something from the Republic of Korea.
"And it benefits Gukmubon too. The desire of collectors is immense. After the Murim Tower appeared, for a time, even a pebble from the Tower would sell for a fortune."
"Hmm."
"The desire of collectors can't be stopped, and if they're going to try to use the Black Market anyway, it's better to have them buy through here."
He'd learned two things.
"Shall we head out now?"
"Yes, let's."
He finished browsing and was on his way out when—
"……Hm?"
In the corner of one of the display cases, off to one side. Something that had been carelessly left behind caught his eye! Could it be? He dashed over and pressed his face against the glass of the display case.
It's real! The genuine article! Crude-looking, no different from an ordinary earthenware pot. But one of a kind in this world. His treasure was here!
"The Samgeuk Yeonokro!"
……Hallelujah!
***
The condition was perfect. Aside from the red sticker saying it was for climbers only. He asked the item exchange clerk,
"Why is this for climbers only? It's a regular item."
It wasn't even a weapon.
The clerk scratched his head and replied,
"Ah, the division between climbers and general items was established eight years ago. Before that, everything was climbers only."
"So you're saying this item came out eight years ago?"
"Yes. It was supposed to be sent to storage since it wasn't selling, and somehow it's still been sitting here."
It seemed as though it had been waiting here for eight years, waiting for him.
I have to buy it. I absolutely have to buy it!
The price was 55,000,000 won. 100 million or 1 billion, he didn't care.
"I'll take this!"
"Yes, please show me your climber registration card."
"Choi Jae-jun!"
He called the brothers over immediately.