Five villages, five forest fairy emblems, three walking flowers, a shadow fang tiger, a starlight finch, and all sorts of miscellaneous supplies including honey extracted from flowers and antidotes made from the fang tiger.
Only after completing preparations so thorough that one could only call them excessive were we finally able to find the gate from the 61st to the 62nd floor. This was because the gate itself was hidden, and only the forest fairy from the final village revealed its location.
Yes, the 61st floor seed overflowing with gimmicks and objects, and now we learned there was even a gimmick requiring completion of all other gimmicks before the entrance would open. At this point, I could sympathize with the viewers' nonsense about experiencing "gimmick gestalt collapse."
'Is Han Se-ah actually going to set sothing on fire?'
Finding the fourth village took longer than expected, so I spent our forest exploration worried that Han Se-ah might close her eyes and torch the whole forest out of frustration. I could actually see the possibility of her setting a fire for just one day to relieve stress, then turning back ti.
What prevented Han Se-ah's arson urges was, predictably, the generous support of the wealthy viewers.
Just as so people enjoy speedrunning, others enjoy achieving 100% collection completion. Since we needed to prepare thoroughly on the 61st floor before making a straight push to the 70th, they figured we might as well aim for 100% completion... resulting in donations in the millions.
Though her viewership had reached the hundreds of millions, making her a globally recognized strear, Han Se-ah still wasn't accustod to spending money. Her mouth stretching into a silly grin at donations in the hundreds of thousands transparently revealed her true feelings.
"We've been on the 61st floor longer than expected. The fact that other adventurers couldn't find the gate must an they needed the forest fairy emblems, right?"
"The final village said we could leave once we had all five emblems, so that seems to be the case."
And so our thorough preparations finally concluded, even as Han Se-ah—whose bank balance had reached world-class levels while her economic sensibilities remained firmly middle-class—swayed dizzily from the one-two punch of donations.
The shadow fang tiger had beco Grace's hunter-exclusive pet, thanks to an enormous donation from a suspicious Chinese tycoon with an excessive fondness for panthers. anwhile, the tiny bird viewers called a "starlight finch"—no bigger than a chestnut—was a gift from the final village after we collected all five fairy emblems.
Seeing it glow softly in the dark forest, I figured it probably helped adventurers find their way through the deep woods, like a guide lantern.
"Hey, I don't mind anything else, but seriously, don't call this a dog-bird combo. It looks like a panther—why do you keep calling it a puppy? I really don't get it."
-Let's just pick up a wolf on the 62nd floor as food to complete the dog-bird combo lololol
-These unfunny weirdos forcing strange dog jokes deserve a smack on the head
-So have we really collected everything now? Please tell the minimap illumination project is over
-That round little finch is so cute, I just want to put it on my palm and pat it gently while rolling it around
-The lizard tail attached to the black panther's butt made it look so weird, it would be cuter with a round butt instead
We walked through the dark forest, following the finch that flew like a firefly in the darkness. Wasn't it said that two of the three B elents in advertising that increase consur attention are Beauty and Beast?
Beautiful won accompanied by a large panther and a cute little bird—no wonder the chat's level of weirdness had intensified. These viewers were getting strange reactions from seeing actual animals, not even harpy-style beauties with animal features mixed in.
But since all they did was pant heavily while watching the finch's wing movents, we had no choice but to ignore the weirdness and proceed.
"This place... we definitely passed through here before."
"The gate must be hidden, just like the villages were."
Following the chestnut-sized finch as it flew ahead emitting a soft glow, we could finally see the gate. More precisely, we could see an inactive gate buried among the tree roots and trunks of the deep forest.
With moss thickly covering a large stone arch, intertwined with vines and tree roots, it looked like sothing from a Southeast Asian horror movie—the kind where passing through would get you possessed by ghosts or cursed in so predictable way.
But as the sparkling finch landed on top, the horror movie scene instantly transford into a fairy tale. As the branches that had blocked the sunlight parted and energy flowing from the emblems activated the gate, it changed into sothing resembling a clearing from a fairy tale where animals gathered to dance.
"...It's beautiful. Let's go."
"An inactive gate—the Magic Tower wizards would love to see this."
So in the end, not being able to find all the forest fairy villages ant not being able to proceed to the 62nd floor—truly a vicious layer. The fact that the forest fairies were cute and beautiful and the neutral monsters adorable was beside the point; completing the gimmicks themselves was nauseatingly terrible.
※
The 62nd floor, accessible only after discovering five villages, finding walking flowers, sending them to forest fairies to collect honey, gathering all the emblems, receiving the finch as a gift, and activating the gate.
"...Are we the only adventurers here?"
"Which direction should we check first?"
Since we were the first to activate the gate into this deep forest, we had no choice but to move forward relying on luck, without any clues. No other adventurer had gone in any direction, and the quest log had stopped after only giving hints about a master and a terror.
As if its job was done after helping us find the gate, the finch had hidden itself in the branches around us. The shadow panther also tucked itself at Grace's feet with only its ears showing, wearing an innocent expression as if it knew nothing about the 62nd floor. All we could rely on was pure luck.
Looking forward, all we saw were huge trees; looking back, all we saw were thick vines. The greenery had grown even denser, as if confirming the hypothesis that each portal took us deeper into the forest.
"Since we don't know anything anyway, let's just go straight ahead from the gate."
"I'll take the lead with this guy. Everyone else follow at a distance."
"Distance? Oh, because of the noise."
The deeper forest ant less sunlight and thicker fallen leaves. Since no human footsteps had touched this place, every step crushed dry leaves and twigs with loud cracking and crunching sounds, forcing us to spread out.
Moving this noisily ant monsters would notice our party before Grace could spot them, making the distance necessary.
Of course, spreading out too far created the minor problem of the main group struggling to follow the scouts, but we had two solutions. One was the sparkling finch that naturally moved between Grace and our party, and the other was Han Se-ah's cara.
"We should probably start moving too."
"Alright, let's go."
How could we possibly get lost when she was pretending to read magical energy while attaching her cara to Grace's back, checking both the minimap and cara simultaneously? Anyone who got lost under these conditions would have to be the kind of person who couldn't find their way even with navigation turned on.
So as Grace lightly moved between trees with the shadow fang tiger, advancing forward without making a sound, Han Se-ah raised her staff high like an antenna. While viewers snickered about her staff holder being a cheat, Irene and Katie believed in her completely.
Our genius mage—blah blah—heroine Han-na must have a plan. Thinking about it, there hadn't been any major mistakes during our journey so far, so with her party mbers' trust, she confidently stepped forward.
[Han Se-ah The Staff Holder donated 10,000 won!]
[This girl looks like such a con artist every ti she does this, anyone who agrees gets a thumbs up lolol]
"Hey! What do you an con artist?! I barely managed to convince them the inventory was unique magic—how am I supposed to explain the minimap and cara?!"
Her confidence imdiately drew accusations from viewers, but the offensive wasn't too harsh. Viewers who weren't collection-obsessed considered the 61st floor's grinding as re repetitive labor, so they seed happy to be on the 62nd floor regardless of what we might find.
The cara still showed only dark forest shadows and swaying branches, but if the viewers were happy, what could I do? I knew how to block with my body and endure with my shield, but I didn't know how to move stealthily while wearing full armor and carrying a steel shield, so I could only follow making crunch-cracking sounds.
The noise was so loud as we followed at a distance from Grace that I found myself wishing for a movent fragnt rather than just sword fragnts. I could practice swordsmanship with the holy sword, but were there really no fragnts for body movent?
Enjoy the chappy!
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