Antagonist Protection Service-Chapter 180 - The Augury Tower (7)

180: The Augury Tower (7)

180: The Augury Tower (7)

Ever since the first night, my progress slowed significantly.

By the time the third sun rose and set, the size of the map hardly increased, and whatever new distance had been covered, was simply not enough.

I needed to move faster, but…

‘They’re back again…

Bastards…’

Every day, from dawn till dusk, packs and packs of those furry dwarfs would chase and harass me almost every other hour, continuously swapping attitudes between unleashing an endless assault of pesky projectiles at me and fleeing for their lives.

They didn’t pose much of a threat to my life, but damn was it annoying.

Every time another group of them arrived, I would find it impossible to rest for just a moment.

Running away also wouldn’t solve the issue since they’d just chase me, and so I’d end up just constantly chasing them down and slaughtering them.

Of course, I didn’t want to if I could help it, but I couldn’t think of anything else to solve the problem.

It’s a complete waste of time unless I could confirm that all of the monsters in the entire jungle were eradicated, but needless to say, that was impossible.

The only silver lining was that there were no other monsters in the jungle but those small guys, meaning this was still likely part of the ‘Tutorial Floors’, as I called them.

Even still, in this situation where I could not have more than one or two hours to myself at a time to rest, including the time I would have taken to sleep, and not to mention going to the “bathroom”, things were already bad enough.

Nevertheless, the more I was attacked and hindered from completing the Objective, the more I was filled with the resolve to get it done.

Gritting my teeth and pushing forward was all I could do, no matter how much sleep I was lacking, no matter how irritated I was by the furry creatures ceaselessly attacking me.

And then, only when four days had already passed, I belatedly realised something. ƒrēewebnoѵёl.cσm

‘…Wait.’

Halting in my tracks, I had just finished hunting down yet another group of those pesky creatures when something occurred to me.

“Librarian…

Can you take me back?”

[Certainly!

Because this Tower is on Earth, your location is also still registered on Earth, meaning the cost to transport you is insignificant!

Are you okay, Enki?!

Would you like me to bring you back?]

“…Yes.

Please do.”

[Alrighty!]

In the following moments, I appeared back in the Library, as if everything that happened over the past number of days had been but a dream.

Or maybe I was just feeling like that because I was so exhausted.

“…”

‘Why did you not tell me I could do this…’

“Hey, I did tell you!”

Of course, if I took the time to think back to just before I entered the Tower, I would find that the Librarian was, indeed, correct.

She did tell me, and in fact, that was one of the reasons I decided to challenge the Tower so early in the first place.

‘Right…

I did forget…

I got too focused on clearing the Tower quickly, I forgot it wasn’t a typical Contract…’

Either way, that wasn’t the important thing.

What was important, was that I was now aware.

And now that I was aware, I could do the most important thing.

“…Sorry.

I’ll be back tomorrow.”

“That’s okay!

Sweet dreams, see you later!”

Giving a faint nod to her, I exited the Library, collapsing directly into my bed.

What followed was perhaps the most satisfying sleep of my entire life.

In fact, it was so satisfying that I ended up sleeping for a total of twenty hours.

Upon waking, I did not return to the Tower right away, instead taking the time to clean both myself and the Holy Sword, eat, and make sure I was ready first, even taking some time to plan out what I would do next upon my return.

‘Fuck’s sake…

I can’t believe I did all that for no reason…’

I was royally pissed at myself, and rightfully so, as much of the effort I spent and sacrifices taken turned out to be utterly unnecessary, but regardless, I managed to move past it and onward.

Like that, roughly twenty-four hours later, I returned on the dawn on the sixth day.

It seemed the Time Limit still counted down even when I left the Tower completely, but I already acted assuming that that would be the case.

“Anyway…

It probably isn’t long until they realise I’m back.”

I took a short break, but now I’ve returned to full capacity.

And, not only that.

‘The map…

might not be the way to go after all.’

It was a good idea in theory, but when put into practice, the jungle was just way too vast to explore it all and map it all down when I wasn’t even entirely sure on what I was looking for, and with the addition of the furry bastards obstructing me at every step, it would take months at the earliest to be able to clear the Floor within the Time Limit.

At least now I understood why it took so damn long for it to be cleared, but during my moment of respite, I thought about it a bit more.

John Pierce, the one and only Protagonist of Earth, rose to the ranks and cleared this Floor before anyone else, and in record time no less.

If he hadn’t simply gotten exceptionally lucky and found the relic right away, there must have been some sort of tactic he used to clear this Floor so fast.

Brute forcing it by examining every square inch of the jungle was not the solution.

Even after I spent some time brainstorming, I never came to a conclusion that was one hundred percent certain to succeed, but that didn’t mean I failed to come up with any plan at all.

‘And if that doesn’t work, I don’t know what I’ll do…’

Either way, I had to give it a shot.

Rustle~

Right as I resolved myself like so, I sensed the enemies’ return.

‘Perfect timing.’

Summoning the Holy Sword, I put the Villainous Vizard back on and faced the direction in which they were hiding.

The hunt was back on.