Only My Skill Tooltip Is Strange

Chapter 84

It’s the 5th floor of the Tower of Struggle.
I’ve seen people die over a hundred times while climbing up.

Even when brains get smashed and blood splatters, I don’t feel anything.
The ones dying deserve it, so the feeling is more of relief.

But Riz’s reaction was different.
Should I call it fresh?

“AAAHHH!”

She screamed after seeing someone die.
It’s not like she was just summoned from Earth; she’s made it all the way up here.
Is she just pretending?

“What’s… what’s going on?”

Yujin was surprised.
It looked like he was pretty shaken up seeing someone’s head explode in the blink of an eye.

“You’re a bad guy too, right?”

At this point, it’s better to kill Yujin as well.
It’s pretty clear he’s with the Poison Coffin.

‘But what if he’s on the same team as David?’

The moment I try to kill Yujin, David will rush to stab me in the back.

I threw a punch at a slower speed than before.
I controlled my strength enough that he could block it if he wanted to.

‘David, save your teammate.’

It doesn’t even have to be David.
It could be any of his team members who followed him, or even Riz, the hostage.

Thud-!

Yujin’s head exploded.
He couldn’t dodge my punch and died.

I couldn’t believe it.

‘I even adjusted the power, and he couldn’t avoid it?’

Even David’s team didn’t try to stop me.
They let Yujin die.

‘Are they even loyal?’

I thought back to my goblin friends on the 4th floor.
I don’t remember their names.
It’s been a month, so it’s strange to remember such small fries.

But the loyalty they showed back then stayed with me.
They charged at me knowing they’d die.

‘Can’t you even do that, David?’

I was disappointed.
If you’re going to die, you should die with your team.

“Riz! Riz!”

David rushed over and embraced Riz.
He seemed to immerse himself in the role of a father finding his kidnapped daughter.

The rest of the teammates hurried over.
They shed a few tears while looking at Riz, who seemed to be perfectly fine.

“I’m glad, David.”
“Are you okay? Are you hurt?”
“These damn bastards. No matter where you go, there are people trying to steal your skills.”

Some people even vented their anger on the already dead body.
I heard a vicious sound as someone kicked Yujin’s body.

I shuddered.

“Thank you for helping us.”

A woman thanked me.
She was the woman who had greeted me at the ramen shop.

She must have done some research on me and planned something.

I smiled kindly and accepted her thanks.

“We Earthlings have to help each other.”

Let’s see when she’ll stab me in the back.

“You’re a good person. It would’ve been great if there were more players like you on the Tower of Struggle.”

The woman paused mid-sentence, her eyes widening as if she had just remembered something.

“Come to think of it, we never even told you our names. We were in such a rush that we didn’t introduce ourselves.”
“You didn’t talk to me so nicely at the ramen shop?”
“If I started talking seriously right off the bat, you’d be suspicious. No race likes Earthlings, right? Even among us Earthlings, we’re suspicious of each other.”
“......”

Is this a preemptive strike?
It seems like she’s pointing out how cautious I still am.

‘Do you think that will make me let my guard down?’

How many times have I been betrayed?
I’ve been caught every time I’ve climbed to a new floor.

Now, I’ll never let it happen again.
Once was a mistake, twice too, but five times is my ability.

“My name is Suyeon. Jung Suyeon.”
“So you’re Korean?”
“Of course I’m Korean. Did you think I was American like David? Look at my mouth. Anyone can tell I’m speaking Korean.”
“That’s true. I’m an Error Player.”
“…Error Player?”

Jung Suyeon’s face twitched slightly.
It was a familiar expression.

I casually added more explanation.

“I really am an Error Player. I’m not joking.”
“…Is your name really Error Player?”
“Yeah.”

Sometimes when I tell people my name is Error Player, they think I’m joking.
Jung Suyeon was one of them.

In that case, I just introduce myself again.
No one jokes about their name twice.

Even the biggest dorks wouldn’t do that.

‘She really doesn’t know I was a national representative, huh.’

Riz regained her composure.
She shook off the fear she felt when she was kidnapped and stood up.

Maybe she’s adapted to the Tower faster than I thought.

She must’ve come close to dying a few times while climbing.
It’s silly that she’s crying here.

“Thank you. I really appreciate you saving Riz.”

David expressed his thanks several times.
I watched his expression carefully.

I kept my eyes on him, wondering if there were any hidden daggers behind the gratitude.

“We don’t have much, but…”

David took something out of his pocket.

‘A dagger?’

I got ready to retaliate.

“This is the money I’ve saved up. I’ll give this to you. Since you just came up from the 4th floor, it’ll definitely help.”

David handed me 20,000 yen.

To sum it up, David’s team didn’t betray me.
I watched them until the moment we parted, but there was no killing intent.

‘Are they more skilled than I thought?’

Could they control their murderous intent completely?

I spent the 20,000 yen David gave me for a day.
It was enough money for one meal and sleep.

According to Jung Suyeon, if you’re frugal, you can make it last for a week.
Of course, I wasn’t planning to live that miserably.

‘If I run out of money, I’ll just do missions.’

There are many types of missions.
They just offer less rewards, but you can join them anytime.

?Thieves Faction (10/10)?
[Earthling King] ? Don’t interfere.

I left a message and went to steal treasure.
Since I have overwhelming stats, the mission itself was very easy.

‘There aren’t many cops either.’

The other thief players followed my orders quietly.
No one acted out of line.

It took me only 10 minutes to secure living expenses.

The reward was F-rank equipment.
I was disappointed when I saw what I got.
I wondered what I would even do with something like this.

It might help other players, but for me, it was useless.

‘But it’s better than nothing.’

I got an artifact.
It’s an F-rank artifact, but I judged that it might be useful when combined with my tooltip error.

It wasn’t as dramatic as Hermes' Shoes.
It was the limit of an F-rank artifact.

I spent a week.
I did missions, earned living expenses, and stored artifacts.

I mostly avoided high-difficulty missions.
I didn’t want to take unnecessary risks.

Having seen the example of the Poison King, I made the choice to be cautious.
Who knows where someone like me might show up again?

“I heard rumors about you already. Earthling King. What on earth are you doing? The police station is in chaos.”

I kept my interactions with David’s team going, but it felt ambiguous to cut them off before anyone betrayed me.

“You know you can change your mission nickname, right? Why haven’t you changed it? ‘Earthling King’ has become way too famous.”
“There’s no reason to change it.”
“…You’re surprisingly attention-seeking, Error Player.”

Jung Suyeon said.

“True. When you climb the tower as an Earthling, you face a lot of unpleasant things. You start wanting to vent. If I had power like Error Player, I might’ve done something too. It’s fun.”

Jung Suyeon giggled while watching a player shouting loudly in the street.

“Why is that person acting like that?”
“They were showing off in the mission. So, I killed a bunch of cops.”
“Ahh.”

We couldn’t see each other’s faces.
I had no idea who it was.

Thieves who had been casually doing missions often started acting cocky from the very beginning.

‘They must be confident in their abilities.’

If you look at the average combat level, the Thieves faction is stronger than the Police faction.
Naturally, there’s a lot of power struggle.

I got caught up in it.
So I dealt with it.

There was no need to dirty my hands directly.
I could have made the thieves suffer without killing them in the mission.

If I killed the cops and raised the Police faction’s stats, they would handle the thieves and build their stacks.

“I’ve been hearing a lot of clues coming out of the police station lately. They’re busy arresting thieves.”
“The thieves are surprisingly complacent.”
“Neither the cops nor the thieves really put their all into the missions. It’s all just a show. Something that would satisfy the floor’s owner…”

I agreed with the idea of a show.
The floor, after all, is just the owner’s playground.

3rd and 4th floors are no different.
The 5th is slightly better, but the essence is the same.

“They’re doing WWE, but Earthling King would turn it into UFC if things go wrong. That’s why only thieves are dying.”
“Yeah, it looks like their numbers have gone down.”

The thieves were thinning out.
Even low-difficulty missions weren’t filling up.

‘Actually, everyone’s forming teams to participate. They’re removing variables.’

I couldn’t really say anything since it was partly my fault.

“Something’s being talked about inside the police station.”
“…Is it bad?”

Jung Suyeon approached first.
I had a feeling there was something coming.

‘Is this the betrayal?’

I waited.

“It’s not bad news.”

Of course, she started with something convincing.

“This time, the administrators made a new position. A secret police. They’re discussing whether it would be a good idea to put Earthling King in charge of it.”