Yes, after discarding Stevens, Lee Gun had gone north of Seoul.
“Wake up, Sungjae.”
“Huh?”
Lee Gun was holding Chun Sungjae across his shoulder like a sack of rice.
Chun Sungjae raised his head. His uncle had suddenly knocked him out and kidnapped him.
The young man looked at his surroundings, confused. “Uncle? Where are we?”
“Devil’s Tower.”
“Oh! That’s where I am— What?!!” Chun Sungjae screamed when he saw the tower in front of his eyes. “Why are we here?”
Lee Gun had brought Chun Sungjae to that place. Not caring about Chun Sungjae’s reaction, Lee Gun walked toward the entrance to the Devil’s Tower with the young man in tow. “From what I’ve heard, people tried to explore this place when I exited it. Some reports said they encountered some unknown monster.”
“!”
“I’m sure I killed all the monsters before exiting the place, so that’s interesting. However, there is something I have to confirm.”
“Confirm?”
“I want to find out who stabbed me here.”
“!”
Chun Sungjae looked at Lee Gun in surprise. “W-Why am I here…?”
“Why? Didn’t you say you wanted to leave behind the S rank as soon as possible? Weren’t you about to cry about an hour ago because you lost badly to your two noonas?”
“!”
Chun Sungjae bit his tongue. It had indeed happened around an hour ago.
“Listen! I am going to become Uncle’s Zodiac Saint!” Chun Sungjae had tried to challenge the two noonas, whose eyes had turned round at his declaration. “Do you know this? I can use the Demigod state, something only Zodiac Saints can use! Both of you can’t do it! That’s why I’ll serve Uncle!”
“Hmmph.”
In the end, both the noonas had snorted and beaten him up. He had been sent flying.
It meant a mere S-rank shouldn’t join the conversation they were having. Of course, S-ranks were undoubtedly at the general rank. Yet, they were mere worms in front of the SS-ranks.
And while the younger Chun sibling had been sniffing, Lee Gun had come to him. So, he had asked, “Damn it. I want to get stronger quickly.”
“Really? You want to grow faster, Sungjae?”
“Yes! I want to be like you, Uncle!”
“Is that so? Like me? You don’t care what method I use?”
“Yes! I’ll become stronger at all costs!”
Chun Sungjae should have known at that moment. He should have known that he couldn’t speak idle words in front of his uncle!
And that was why Lee Gun had kidnapped him and brought him here.
Lee Gun asked, “Then you should be able to clear the Devil’s Tower by yourself, right?”
“What?! What do you mean—”
“You know what I’m saying.” Lee Gun threw Chun Sungjae into the tower.
“Ahhhhhhhk! Unnnnnnncle!”
Listening to his nephew’s screams, Lee Gun dusted off his hands.
Of course, the Devil’s Tower was destroyed when he came out of it. However, it hadn’t been destroyed completely. The entrance was completely broken open, and the top floors of the tower collapsed. The tower had turned into a ruin.
Boom!
“Ahhhkh!”
However, now that he had revisited it, he could clearly feel the magical energy emanating from the Devil’s Tower.
‘I didn’t sense this the last time, but there is something inside it.’
Rumors had said the explorers who entered the tower had been kidnapped by some unknown being; they were missing. And the explorers who had barely left this place alive had caused a ruckus. They claimed it was crazy that Lee Gun could hold out in this place for twenty years.
Lee Gun was wondering what was going on when…
[The Serpent Bearer’s power remains within the tower.]
[The tower is showing a reaction to the Serpent Bearer’s power.]
[Warning! You can sense the energy of a monarch in the tower’s basement.]
Lee Gun laughed as this amused him.
‘There is a monarch in the tower’s basement?’ Was it the one the explorers encountered?
At that moment…
“Ahhhk! U-Uncle!!”
Lee Gun quickly moved toward his nephew, who was screaming. When he entered the first floor, he found Chun Sungjae deep on the floor.
“The monsters’ corpses are moving…”
Chun Sungjae was surrounded by an army of monster corpses, which numbered around a thousand.
Lee Gun furrowed his brows. It was to be expected. “What the hell? By the looks of their wounds, I’m the one who killed them.”
“What?! Uncle killed all of them?” Chun Sungjae covered his mouth in reverence.
Lee Gun tilted his puzzlement as he looked at the army of monsters groaning as they moved. “They look like zombies, but something is off. I killed them all before I left, so why are they moving right now?”
That wasn’t all. In truth, Lee Gun had come here because he wanted to use a specific tool.
[It is an honor to give Lee Gun-nim this Music Box (SS)]
– Memory from a certain space can be read. (Up to 50 years)
– Manufacturer: Jinmyung
This was an item that the fanboy appraiser had given him. Lee Gun could use it to see the face of the culprit who had pushed him into the trap.
‘He said this item can read the memory of an object or a room.’
The item would allow him to see the face of the person who had stabbed him, but…
‘I can’t use this tool.’
After entering the tower, Lee Gun had tried to activate the tool, but it was completely inert. The reason was simple.
[You have to use it in the space where you want to see the memory.]
Yes, if he wanted to see the face of the culprit, he would have to go to the hundredth floor. However, he seemed to have used too much brute force when breaking out of the tower. The tower’s interior was damaged more severely than he had expected.
All the staircases were destroyed, so he would be unable to walk up to the hundredth floor.
Of course, Lee Gun had tried to use his skill to repair the tower, but his Super Regeneration skill was limited to living beings.
‘I want to try my repair skills, but they won’t activate since the poison in this place is too strong.’
This meant he couldn’t go to the hundredth floor. Therefore, he had thought he wouldn’t gain much coming here. But…
‘The monsters I killed came back alive?’
Lee Gun wondered what was going on, and he soon found out the reason.
Flash!
‘!’
An item in his possession suddenly emitted a light.
[Tower Gatekeeper’s Heart] (SS)
– This item can restore the tower to its original state.
‘!’
This was the item that Giselle’s children, Yoon Taewoo and Yoon Siwoo, had possessed. It was the crystal that was originally his.
In other words, this item was the hearts of the monsters he had hunted down within the Devil’s Tower.
When the crystal was activated, the tower surprisingly started to regenerate itself.
[The corresponding Core contains the power of the “Time” monarch.]
[The power of “Time” is extending up the tower.]
[The power of reversion has extended until the tenth floor.]
Lee Gun laughed in amusement at the familiar light.
‘Reset.’
The tower’s time seemed to be reverting to a point before he had destroyed it.
[The Core’s power has recovered the tower until the tenth floor.]
[Part of the tower’s function is starting to recover.]
[The tower’s time is starting to run.]
[Warning! The time within the tower flows differently than the time outside.]
Lee Gun laughed.
‘It might take some time, but restoring the tower to the hundredth floor might be possible.’
The same thing would happen to the monsters he had killed. It was the reason they had come back to life. However, the Gatekeeper’s Core’s power didn’t seem to be enough to completely reset the tower.
‘The monsters awakened as half-dead beings.’
This was perfect.
“Ahhhk! They are starting to attack!”
Lee Gun satisfactorily laughed when he heard Chun Sungjae’s scream. It was as if he had been waiting for this. “Sungjae. You said you are willing to do anything Uncle asks, right?”
“O… Of course! Ahhhk!”
“Uncle has a business he has to take care of. You should kill all of them while I do that.”
“Yes! Understoo— What?!” Chun Sungjae froze.
The corpses were at least red zone rank monsters. Normally, Chun Sungjae could kill ten Red zone rank monsters at most!
‘That’s not the primary problem.’
The problem was the location. This was the Devil’s Tower, a place where even humanity’s strongest had trembled in fear!
Yet, Lee Gun suddenly wanted him to kill a thousand monsters in this place! And all by himself? That wasn’t all.
“Mmm. Yes. You just have to go to the tenth floor and come back down.”
Lee Gun had added nine more floors!
“Dad told me about this place! The difficulty becomes out of this world as one goes higher… The number of monsters increases by several folds!”
Lee Gun laughed as if he didn’t care. “Ah. That? It isn’t much. I cleared a hundred floors by myself. You just have to clear ten. That’s one-tenth of what I had to do. Isn’t it easy?”
“…!?!”
Uncle was different from him!
In the end, Chun Sungjae looked like he wanted to cry. He looked at Lee Gun as if to ask him to go easy.
“Oh yeah! You can’t use your family shield here.”
Chun Sungjae despaired.
* * *
Around that time, at a press conference in the US…
People were shocked at the sight in front of them.
“What?”
“Lee Gun was the one who had killed Red Eye?”
“The Zodiac Saints had gotten scared when they saw Red Eye, so they had run away?”
“Lee Gun killed it by himself?”
“That’s right.”
People were shocked as they watched Stevens bow his head ninety degrees. They wondered if they had heard wrong when they had listened to the Leo Saint’s story.
“My god! What’s going on?”
“This is completely different from what we know about that incident…”
That’s right. Stevens was revealing all the lies the Zodiac Saints had told in the press conference. Moreover, he said certain Zodiac Saints had worked against the story about Lee Gun’s competency. A large number had connived with each other to do so.
The words stunned the crowd.
“On top of that, I will step down once a Zodiac Saint proxy can be found. I, Stevens, will enlist myself in the war for humanity.”
That wasn’t the end.
“I know I can’t ask for forgiveness, but all the wealth I’ve acquired to this point will be given to Lee Gun as an apology.”
People became agitated when they saw the data Stevens put forth.
“Has he lost his mind? With that much money, you can buy Alaska. You can buy any state in the US.”
“He even has stakes in hotels and resorts around the world. How much does he have?”
In the end, a reporter asked, “A-Are you being blackmailed by Lee Gun?!”
Stevens flinched. Hugo massaged his forehead at the faux pas.
‘Gun! You should maintain a better image of yourself!’
It didn’t matter in the end.
Hugo had seen his friend laugh as he whispered something to Stevens. It seemed Lee Gun had told Stevens to do this.
‘Tsk! Until now, Gun’s temple was the smallest. His temple was in poverty.’
Lee Gun hadn’t received any tributes or money from the gods.
‘I was going to make fun of him for having a temple poorer than mine.’
Yet, with this single move, Lee Gun would crush Hugo and his temple.
Hugo rolled his eyes in thought when he saw the inventory of Stevens’s wealth, which he planned to hand over to Lee Gun.
“It isn’t too late. Should I just transfer to his temple…?”
The Sagittarius flinched at Hugo’s words.
Stevens didn’t care how others reacted as he moved on to the main topic. “In truth, there is something important I would like to talk about.”
“!”
“Lee Gun was the real hero who saved humanity twenty years ago. Moreover, his skills were superior to the twelve Zodiac Saints. However, the twelve Zodiac Saints, excluding the Archer Saint, were too blinded by personal gains. That’s why we hid the truth.”
A large commotion erupted in the press conference.
“Will you really be ok making those remarks? I’m sure the others feel very differently about this subject—”
“If they don’t agree with me, I’ll make them agree with me. Most of them used Lee Gun for their own gains.”
The look in Stevens’s eyes caused a stir amongst the reporters.
“Isn’t this a declaration of war?”
The reporter wasn’t wrong. Moreover, this was what Lee Gun had wanted to happen.
Stevens continued, “That isn’t all. One of the twelve Zodiac Saints betrayed Lee Gun twenty years ago. That was the reason Lee Gun wasn’t able to come out of the tower.”
“What?!”
“I will suffer heavy consequences for muddying Lee Gun’s honor. He’s humanity’s greatest hero, and one of the Zodiac Saints had tried to kill him. Who could it be?”
The sound of the world being flipped on its head rang out.
[Shocking! The true hero of humanity, who had killed Red Eye, is Lee Gun?]
[Shocking truth! Lee Gun was almost murdered within the Devil’s Tower.]
[One of the twelve Zodiac Saints pushed Lee Gun into the trap! One of them is the real culprit!]
[Each country wants to lead the search to find the culprit]
[Eleven Zodiac Saints are suspects. Who tried to kill humanity’s hero?]
* * *
At the center of a desert in the US…
The Crab Saint Jean-Louis snorted as he watched the broadcast of Stevens’s press conference. “That muscle-brained idiot finally made a mess.”
That’s right.
While carrying out his task, Jean-Louis was also trying to look for Carly, who had taken the liberty of leaving her temple. Carly was a very important fighting power for their side.
Amid his search, he had caught sight of Stevens’s press conference.
What the hell did Stevens say in the press conference? The Crab Saint burst out laughing.
It had happened around the time when the Libra had tried to recruit Steven to her side.
‘I should have known when he flipped off the Zodiac.’
Stevens was doing good things for Lee Gun. Lee Gun probably knew Stevens’s disposition, so he purposefully told him to make the declaration of war.
Now, thanks to Stevens’s words, all the Zodiac Saints aside from Hugo had become suspects. The world had been turned upside down very nicely.
‘In the end, he wants the temples to fight amongst each other.’
This was a big picture plan of Lee Gun.
‘If the situation worsens, the Zodiacs we make deals with won’t stand back and do nothing.’
The Zodiacs considered faith more important than their lives, and this event would cause their faith to fall.
The Crab Saint made a call. “Please put out a story in rebuttal. Deny it even if they say it’s correct. Say it’s all false.”
Suddenly…
“Hmmph. It isn’t false at all.”
“!”
A voice came from the sky, and someone landed in front of the Crab Saint.
The Crab Saint narrowed his eyes. ‘The Virgo Saint…!’
Yes, the one in front of him was none other than Kevin. Kevin had made the same pledge as Stevens did to Lee Gun before coming here.
Unlike Stevens, however, Kevin wanted to kill the culprit who caused Lee Gun’s death. “Your side came up with the plan to kill Lee Gun, right?”
The Crab Saint was about to respond when Kevin took up his blade and continued, “You don’t have to answer that. In the end, the result will be the same.”
The Crab Saint laughed as if he was dumbfounded. “You lost an arm. What are you going to do as a one-armed—”
Jean-Louis suddenly narrowed his eyes. The Virgo Saint’s appearance was slightly off.
‘Green?’
