Chapter 1. An invitation from a pocket watch (1)
March 21st, 2018. Incheon Airport.
Yeon-woo adjusted his clothes as he walked across the airport terminal.
A shaved head with a neatly arranged military uniform. A Korean flag shined brightly on his arm, indicating his belonging to a military contingent.
After organizing his backpack, he made a phone call.
*Click*
Sergeant Cha reporting in from Korea.
[Understood. Take it easy and try to comfort your parents while you are there.]
Thank you.
After expressing his gratitude, Yeon-woo ended the call and put his phone down.
Coming back from a three-year stay in Africa, he felt much warr and peaceful in Korea than in Africa.
However, Yeon-woos mind was in distress.
With a cigarette in his mouth, he took out sothing from his pocket. It was a letter he received during his mission.
The word Obituary was written on the letter. His younger brother had disappeared five years ago, and this obituary was now notifying him of his brothers death.
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The funeral had ended.
His brothers ashes were scattered at the sea in front of Taejongdae, his brothers favorite place.
Yeon-woo hadnt heard any news him during the last five years, but now he had returned to him inside a cold urn.
This is what he was holding when the body was found.
The person who discovered his brothers body took out a small box.
Yeon-woo opened it with care. The box contained two things.
One was a faded photograph, and the other.
A pocket watch?
In the photograph, his brother was in front of a shabby looking house, wearing so kind of dieval armor, next to so people with unusual appearances.
Was he filming a movie sowhere? He thought.
Yeon-woo had road around all sorts of places, but he had never seen anything like this.
Uhm.
Oh, Im sorry.
As Yeon-woo was unconsciously touching his brothers figure in the photograph, the mans interjection brought him back to his senses.
At the sa ti, a question ca to his mind, but it wasnt an appropriate place to ask it, so Yeon-woo only thanked the man and returned ho.
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He quietly looked at the photograph in his room. In it, his brother was still smiling.
They were twins. Born with identical faces and features, and yet they were so different.
His brother was a model student, but weak and introverted. He enjoyed reading books and watching movies.
Yeon-woo, on the other hand, was very extroverted. He was also athletic, thus he applied both to PE as a major, and to the military academy.
People around them were surprised by how different they could be.
Nonetheless, the two of them had always stuck together.
The little brother would hold onto his scatterbrained brother and teach him how to study, and the older brother would tell his brother lying in bed, about how fun and exciting things were outside, several tis a day. Both of them were so devoted to one another.
But then, with only one day before the CSAT, his younger brother had disappeared.
And so many things had changed since then.
His mother, who was originally suffering from a chronic disease, had passed away. After searching for his brother for over two years to no avail, Yeon-woo had given up on everything. He enlisted in the military as a non-commissioned officer, volunteered himself to be dispatched to Africa and left Korea.
It was at that ti that he beca less of an extrovert and grew to be more cynical.
From that point on, contact with Korea had naturally been cut off. He thought he would never return to Korea, ever again.
But now, five years later, his brother had returned to him as an obituary letter.
.
At first, he had been mad at his brother, who disappeared without a word and now had beco like this. The first thing that had co to his mind was that his brother was so self-indulgent.
But as the funeral began, he started to feel empty, as if his soul was being torn apart. And by the ti he had scattered his brothers ashes in Taejongdae, his heart had been bursting at the seams.
He wanted to ask what had happened to his brother, what had he been doing, and why did he have to return like this.
But his brother in the photograph did not say a word. Just like how he hadnt said anything during the past five years.
Ha.
Yeon-woo put the photograph down and checked on the pocket watch.
It was worn out and badly thumbed, as if it were more than a hundred years old.
Only XII, the roman nural for 12, and the hour hand was left of the watch, and it was not working. He took it to a jeweler to repair, but the only answer he got was that it was too rusty to fix.
This is the present that I gave my brother back then.
When they were 19 years old, the year they beca third graders in high school, the brothers gave each other a present on their birthday. The younger brother gave him a book for him to study, and Yeon-woo gave his brother a pocket watch to wish him luck on his CSAT.
This was that pocket watch.
Yeon-woo grabbed the pocket watch, it slipped and clung perfectly into his palm. It was just the right size.
I knew it.
He rembered how he wandered around every jeweler, looking for a pocket watch that would perfectly fit in one hand.
Then Yeon-woo flipped the watch over, and on the backside saw a na written in cursive on one corner.
J. W. CAH
Whoa! I really needed a watch. Thanks bro. Compared to a digital watch, this is way cooler.
Puhaha! How is it? Your big brothers got a nice fashion sense.
But what is this written on here? Looks like J. W. is my na, but CAH? *pft*
Hmm? Thats our family na, Cha.
How is this Cha? Its spelled CHA!
What? Dammit! Give it to .
Why?
Im gonna talk to the guy from the jeweler to fix it.
Its OK, dont bother. Ill take it. From now on, Ill just write CAH whenever I write my na.
Then, the younger brother confidently put the pocket watch into his pocket.
After that, the younger brother proudly wrote CAH as his na when he went to apply for a passport.
At that ti, Yeon-woo had felt both sorry and grateful at the sa ti.
Yeon-woo chuckled as he recalled his past mory.
While he was running his hand over the pocket watch, he pressed on a knob by accident.
*Click*
Huh?
Wasnt it broken? He thought.
The knob slid inside the watch.
Then suddenly.
*Tic* *Tac*
The hour hand that seed to be stopped started to run.
To my older brother who will listen to this soti in the future.
A familiar voice was heard inside his head.
!
Yeon-woo subconsciously sprang up to his feet.
It was a voice he hadnt heard in five years. It was a voice he thought he would never hear again. It was his brothers voice.
*Thump* *Thump*
His heart started to pound like crazy.
By the ti you hear this, I guess I will be already dead.
It was not a hallucination.bender
Yeon-woo checked if there was a recorder inside the pocket watch, but it was nowhere to be found.
The voice was clearly ringing inside his head.
How is this possible? He thought.
I am sorry. Everyone had a hard ti because of , didnt you? I just wanted to find a dicine for mom. I thought I could return ho soon, but ti had gone by too quickly.
What?
It was at this mont when his eyes got strained.
*Whoosh*
Suddenly, in front of his eyes, a flood of his brothers mories passed by like a panorama.
It, was a diary.
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*I think you should take a look at dsnovel.cm
Oct 9th, 2013.
A strange text ssage arrived on my phone. It said it will fulfill whatever I wish for. Nothing else was written in it, only buttons to decide whether I want to join or not.
Normally, I would have ignored the ssage, but I couldnt help thinking about mom in the hospital looking more and more haggard everyday.
So I pressed the yes button just in case my mom would be cured.
Nothing had changed.
I felt very hollow. In the end, it was just a prank.
But from that day on, I started having a strange dream.
It was a dream about climbing what seed like an infinitely tall, 99-story tower.
Oct 12th, 2013.
It was definitely not a dream!
Everything was clear. It was a real world.
A world where not only different races like elves and dwarves, but also monsters like orcs, trolls and dragons exist, and a world where several universes and dinsions intersect in one place.
The tower is sitting in the middle, waiting for people from all over the world to climb it. The mont when a person breaks through the ninety ninth floor, he or she will beco a god, or thats what I heard soone saying.
People pointed at the tower and called it,
The Tower of the Sun God,
Obelisk.
But that doesnt an a thing to . Instead, the only thing that matters is that sowhere in this tower exists an elixir that can cure all diseases, the Panacea.
With that in my hand, I could save mom from her illness.
Oct 28th, 2013
I was able to team up with so like-minded friends and started climbing up the tower.
Still, it wasnt easy at all.
We had to kill all sorts of monsters, and each and every ti we faced mortal dangers. This place, it may look like a ga, but its not. Its reality. If you die, everything is over.
ndsvl m But my teammates and I are talented. Back in reality, my far-from-well body always caused worries for my family, but in this world, through runes I was able to see the light.
We were told that we were the first team to ever break through the first ten floors within four days.
Since then, I began to seriously consider.
I would not be able to live both my life in the real world and in the tower at the sa ti.
Nov 9th, 2013
I made up my mind.
I tried explaining to my brother about this place. But whenever I faced him, the words wouldnt co out of my mouth. Do I say, theres a world nad The Tower, and Im trying to salvage so dicine in there?
But my brother, even though he looks gruff on the outside, he has such a warm heart on the inside. What would he say? I bet he would volunteer to take my place instead.
That cannot happen.
So in the end, I decided to leave ho. They will be looking for , but it will only take about half a year.
Im sure I can find the elixir by that ti. And just like that, I disconnected myself from the real world.
Dec 1st, 2013
My teammates and I nad ourselves Arthia.
Arthia is the best in every single way, both in teamwork, and in individual skills. We are at the top of our ga.
We then rapidly broke through several floors, and there is no one in the tower who doesnt know our na.
I might be able to get a hold of the Elixir much faster than I thought.
Sep 7th, 2014
Our climbing speed has slowed down. I thought I would only need half a year, but now I might need one more year.
Nov 11th, 2014
We had a fight with so high ranking clans who regards us as an eyesore. We now have more obstacles to overco.
Feb 31st, 2015
Negotiations have broken down.
A war has begun.
Jul 2nd, 2015
The alliance of clans we fought against has just collapsed.
Arthia, which originally started with only twelve people, has now grown into one of the ten largest clans, all of our teammates have beco high rankers.
And I, Arthias leader, have risen up to ninth place. It is said that Im the fastest ranker to ever get into the top ten.
However, I cant just stand here and celebrate.
Because of the war, we havent had ti to find the elixir. We need to pick up our speed and climb the tower.
Mar 4th, 2016
Ive found soone I love.
Sep 19th, 2016
Another war has begun.
An enmity between Arthia who wants to climb higher and other high ranking clans who want to maintain the status quo has arisen. Ive been trying my best to persuade them, but it isnt easy.
To make matters worse, so of our teammates agree with their ideas. They just cant voice out their opinions because they are worried.
Even though I was fully aware of this, I pressed on our clan to continue climbing up the tower, so we couldnt avoid conflicts.
But even now, ti keeps flowing.
I feel like Im going crazy.
Jan 2nd, 2017
Arthia is now ranked in fifth place. However, the war hasnt ended yet, and everyone is too tired.
Jun 6th, 2017
We found a traitor in our clan.
We were able to kill him before he could rise up, but it was enough to cause a rift amongst our teammates. Everyone has started to distrust one another.
Our mbers are leaving the clan one by one.
Jul 1st, 2017
My body feels heavier.
I have been poisoned.
Oct 30th, 2017
Half of our mbers have already left the clan. We keep on losing battles, and now we dont dare to climb to higher floors. I tried asking all around to look for the elixir, but I couldnt obtain any kind of information about it.
And my body is slowly breaking down.
Nov 1st, 2017
The person I loved left
with a dagger stabbed into my heart.
I was barely able to block it with my skill, but I was unable to continue suppressing the poison. My body is starting to rot.
Dec 30th, 2017
I miss my brother.
Feb 1st, 2018
I am the only one left in Arthia.
Why did things go so wrong?
Was it because I trusted people too much? Or was it because I was too absorbed in satisfying my own needs, and forgot to look after my teammates?
Or else.
Was it because I left my family?
Feb 28th, 2018
On the last day of February, I finally got my hands on the elixir.
Now I need to find a way to send it ho, but theres no way I can. I cant leave the Tower even if I want to, Im being surrounded by other people.
Maybe they think I will treat my poison with it if I leave.
Everyone is coming to kill . There was no one left by my side.
Now I know.
The fact that there is only one person I can trust.
But I cannot show them my weakness.
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