Chapter 75: Nightmare, 6th Floor (1)

If Floor 4 had been built around defense, Floor 6 added offense to the equation.

Units from both sides clashed along the lanes, and victory went to whichever side pushed into the enemy base and destroyed it first. Anyone who had ever played video games had probably encountered the genre at least once.

League of Hero.

It was not quite as popular as it had once been, but one famous title in particular was practically Korea’s national pastime.

The easiest way to understand Floor 6 was to imagine the format of that game.

There were lanes. Monsters spawned from each base and advanced along them.

Turrets were positioned at intervals along the lanes, and victory came from breaking into the enemy base and destroying its nexus.

The obvious difference was that this was not a five-versus-five team match.

It was a solo game.

League of Hero also featured two °• N 𝑜 v 𝑒 l i g h t •° kinds of maps.

Three-lane maps and single-lane maps.

Floor 6 was supposed to resemble the single-lane version.

[You have entered Nightmare Difficulty Floor 6.]

[Absorbing Floor 5’s Power of the Floor.]

[Level has increased.]

[Level has increased.]

[Level has increased.]

.

.

.

Messages cascaded before my eyes the moment I entered.

As expected, stepping onto Floor 6 had granted me the level rewards from Floor 5.

[Level: 70]

I stopped time immediately.

As always, the first thing I did was examine my surroundings.

Thunderclouds crowded the sky, looking ready to split apart at any moment.

An enormous overpass stretched out before me.

That bridge was the lane.

Far beyond it, in the distance, stood the enemy base.

With my eyesight, I could make it out clearly.

I could even see its nexus.

The bridge looked to be about five hundred meters long.

Judging by eye, the distance seemed roughly the same as on the other difficulties.

I released time and looked around.

I was standing inside our base.

A massive red gemstone hovered faintly above its center.

That was our nexus.

An HP bar floated above it, just like in a video game.

“...?”

But something was wrong.

Why were there three bridges?

The bridge in front of me was not the only one.

Two more extended outward from the base, each pointing toward one corner of an enormous triangle.

In other words, there were three lanes.

Ah.

I understood now.

So enemies would attack me from three directions?

“Goddammit.”

I was not even surprised.

Unlike the other difficulties, which apparently had only one lane, Nightmare had three.

Of course it did.

That was Nightmare for you.

I had to defend all three lanes by myself.

And destroy three enemy nexuses as well.

‘This won’t be easy.’

Whatever it took, I would simply have to make it work.

Same as always.

I prepared myself.

Monsters spawned thirty seconds after entry, so the match would begin soon.

I quickly checked my body, now strengthened by reaching Level 70.

From the weapons hanging along one side of the base, I selected a mace.

[The match is starting!]

[Destroy all of the opponent’s nexuses!]

A moment later, another message appeared.

Pop.

At the same time, three blue portals formed near our nexus.

A goblin emerged from each one.

The moment they appeared, the goblins began marching toward their respective lanes.

The ground at each lane entrance was conveniently marked with the numbers 1, 2, and 3.

I headed for Lane 1 first.

Passing between a pair of colossal blue stone statues standing at the entrance to the bridge, I followed the goblin.

Goooooo...

When I looked over the side, I saw a bottomless abyss below.

A cold wind drifted up from its depths.

The battlefield felt like a giant fidget spinner suspended in midair.

I turned my attention back to the goblin.

Kerek, kaerek.

It marched along, muttering to itself, completely unconcerned by my presence.

As far as I remembered, allied units could not be given commands.

Their entire programmed behavior amounted to one instruction:

Follow the lane and attack the enemy.

That was all.

There were two types of turrets: First Turrets and Second Turrets.

The pair of stone statues I had passed at the entrance to the bridge were the Second Turrets.

The single statue positioned near the middle of the bridge was the First Turret.

The enemy side had the same number and arrangement.

So, to summarize:

Destroy the enemy’s First Turret.

Destroy its Second Turrets.

Enter the base.

Destroy the nexus.

Simple.

Since the nexus could only be damaged after all the turrets had been destroyed, changing the order was impossible.

And because there were three lanes, I would have to repeat the process three times.

Of course, this was Nightmare.

There was no telling what charming little gimmick it had hidden for me.

For reference, our side spawned one monster at a time.

The enemy side spawned three.

Since they did not have a player like me, it made sense that they would receive more monsters.

The main difference between difficulties lay in the type of monster spawned.

Easy produced goblins slightly stronger than those on Floor 1.

Normal produced orcs.

Hard supposedly produced orcs far stronger than those on Normal.

So why was Nightmare giving me goblins?

There was no need to wonder.

Because the enemy monsters were not goblins.

“Heh.”

I reached the center of the bridge.

The moment I saw the approaching enemies, a laugh escaped me.

A dry one, naturally.

They were green-skinned giants, several times larger than goblins.

Each looked capable of crushing one in a single hand.

They were not orcs.

Ogres, perhaps?

From what I remembered, they looked somewhat different from the trolls I had encountered in the Sub-Tower.

Not that the distinction mattered.

What mattered was that my side had one goblin, while theirs had three ogres.

The balance was completely absurd.

As though three lanes were not enough, they had added this on top of it.

The unfairness was outrageous, but I decided to look on the bright side.

At least they were not spawning ten at a time.

How generous.

Grrrraaah—!

The ogres charged.

Our goblin rushed forward as well, like an ant throwing itself at an elephant.

Before it could be flattened, I stepped in.

I leapt into the air and crushed the leading ogre’s skull with a single blow.

KABOOOM!

I eliminated the other two with Flame Strike.

Fortunately, the ogres were not especially powerful.

They were probably around Level 20.

Their corpses quickly disappeared.

I looked toward the enemy’s First Turret.

It was a colossal red stone statue, identical in shape to ours but different in color.

With the enemies gone, the goblin continued toward it.

ZAP!

A laser erupted from the turret and erased the goblin instantly.

I stopped time.

‘Let’s think.’

It was time to organize the situation.

The enemy units were ogres while mine were goblins, but with me present, the difference in unit strength was not the real issue.

The problem was the existence of three lanes.

While I pushed one lane, the other two would continue coming under attack.

Against three ogres, one goblin might as well not exist.

The solution came to me almost immediately.

I released time and sprinted back toward the base.

“Plli.”

I summoned Plli and sent her to Lane 2.

Three Level 20 ogres were easy enough for Plli to handle by herself.

That took care of Lane 2.

I ran toward Lane 3.

One ogre was already hammering away at the First Turret.

At that moment, the turret’s laser fired and blasted the remaining ogre apart.

The turret laser had a ten-second cooldown, if I remembered correctly.

Its attack could kill even an ogre in one shot.

But since three ogres appeared at once, an unattended turret was inevitably going to suffer damage.

The monster spawn interval was thirty seconds.

The next group of three ogres appeared almost immediately.

FWOOOSH!

I cast Scorching Zone in the center of Lane 3’s bridge.

The moment the ogres stepped into the zone, flames engulfed them.

Thanks to the bracelet from the Zone 3 boss and the passive increase to my fire magic, the skill’s power had risen considerably.

Even though it dealt damage over time, the ogres collapsed one after another within moments.

[Skill: Scorching Zone (Rare+)]

[Creates a scorching zone with a five-meter radius at a location within ten meters. Enemies inside the zone continuously receive burn damage. Requires 50 seconds of Mental Concentration to cast.]

[Classification: Magic Type]

[Willpower Cost: 30 per second]

[Cooldown: 1 minute]

What was Scorching Zone’s greatest advantage?

The ten-meter restriction applied only when casting it.

Once the skill had been deployed, I could maintain it regardless of how far away I moved.

In other words, I could leave Scorching Zone active on Lane 3—

While I pushed Lane 1.

Of course, Scorching Zone would also kill our goblin.

But the goblin would never destroy a turret on its own anyway, so that hardly mattered.

Plli would defend Lane 2.

Scorching Zone would defend Lane 3.

That solved the problem of leaving the other lanes unattended.

While those two lanes farmed enemies automatically, all I had to do was push Lane 1.

I returned to the first lane.

The turret’s laser had a range of approximately ten meters.

It prioritized units over climbers, so the standard strategy would be to let the goblins serve as shields while attacking the turret.

But I had no need to do that.

I possessed magic capable of striking from beyond the turret’s range.

I stopped time and concentrated for three hundred seconds.

Turret defenses were supposedly strong enough that destroying one normally took a fair amount of time.

But would a fully charged Destruction Ray work on one as well?

[You have destroyed Lane 1’s First Turret!]

It did.

The moment I fired Destruction Ray at full power, it punched a clean hole through the turret and reduced the entire structure to rubble.

A message appeared immediately afterward.

As powerful as ever, Destruction Ray.

My willpower had been completely drained, so I stopped time again and recovered.

With Scorching Zone active on Lane 3, the continuous drain on my willpower was considerable.

If it reached zero, the skill would deactivate.

I would have to stop and recover at regular intervals.

Once my willpower was full again, I advanced toward the Second Turrets.

The pair stood at the entrance to the enemy base like enormous gatekeepers.

Destruction Ray was still on cooldown, so I unleashed Flame Strike and the rest of my offensive skills.

KABOOOM!

I could not destroy the turret in a single blow as I had with Destruction Ray, but fragments broke away from its surface.

The attacks were clearly working.

I continued bombarding the turret while dealing with the ogres that appeared along the way.

Before long, the left turret collapsed.

Only the right one remained.

‘This is easier than I expected.’

At this rate, I would reach the nexus without difficulty and finish Lane 1.

Then I could repeat the process on Lanes 2 and 3.

But smooth progress on Nightmare?

No.

There was no chance.

Three lanes certainly felt like Nightmare-grade bullshit, but I doubted that was all the Floor had prepared.

You are not going to stop at this, are you?

[You have destroyed Lane 1’s Second Turret!]

Soon, the remaining turret collapsed as well.

Both Second Turrets had been destroyed.

I crossed the end of the bridge and entered the enemy base.

Only the nexus remained.

A red crystal floated at the center of the base.

Unlike the monsters and turrets, the nexus had a visible HP bar.

Destruction Ray’s cooldown had ended, so I fired another fully charged blast directly at it.

Unlike the turrets, however, the nexus did not collapse.

Its HP bar decreased by only a tiny amount.

One percent.

So even Destruction Ray could not destroy the nexus in one hit.

I had already expected that, so I was not particularly surprised.

The other difficulties also specified that a nexus could not be destroyed instantly.

One percent of its HP per second.

That was the maximum amount of damage it could receive.

In other words, destroying one required at least one hundred seconds, regardless of attack power.

BANG! BANG! BANG!

I began striking the nexus with my mace.

Ogres emerged from a red portal positioned beside it.

Their attention immediately locked onto me, and they charged.

I eliminated them with Flame Strike and resumed attacking the nexus.

The other lanes were holding without issue.

As long as I continued killing the ogres here while damaging the nexus, the time required did not matter.

I steadily reduced its HP at a rate of one percent per second.

CRACK!

After one hundred seconds, an enormous fissure split the nexus.

It began to collapse.

[You have destroyed Lane 1’s Nexus!]

The message appeared.

But then—

“...Huh?”

My eyes widened.

The shattered fragments of the nexus suddenly rose back into the air.

They drew together and fused, restoring the nexus to its original form in an instant.

[Incorrect order!]

[Destroy the opponent’s nexuses in the designated order!]

[A penalty has been applied!]

[The number of enemy monsters spawned has doubled!]

[Enemy monsters gain Stage 1 resistance!]

Ah.

So there was a designated order.

‘Of course there was.’

There it was.

Nightmare’s signature brand of bullshit.

Figure out the hidden rule—

Or suffer the consequences for not knowing it.