Chapter 50 Two Hearts (8) (1/2)

The floor at the very bottom of the staircase.

Bild hurriedly barged into a room locked behind an iron door. Inside, was a room containing hundreds of glass tubes installed along the ceiling and walls.

Bild ran past the glass tubes and stood in front of a purple stone lying at the back of the room.

Something was constantly being poured into the stone through the countless glass tubes. Something red, dark and very murky.

It was the energy collected at the expense of the lives of countless players. Bild and Leonte have been calling it ‘Quintessence’ for the past few years. And they’ve tried whatever means possible to produce more of this energy.

Now, however, things were different.

Bild tore out all the glass tubes. The Quintessence leaked out from the tubes and quickly evaporated, dyeing the air red. But none of that mattered to him.His mind was solely focused on the purple stone.

*Quiver*

Bilde carefully picked up the purple stone with his trembling hand.

How many years had he wasted making this stone. During that time, his old teammates had grown much stronger and climbed up to much higher floors.

Bild also wanted to follow his teammates steps. But in the end, he had decided to put aside his desires and dedicate himself to his master. So that he could offer this power to his master and help him become the true ‘king’ of this world. So that he could stand by his side and reign over The Tower with absolute power.

But now, Bild changed his mind. He wanted to live. He wanted to survive from the demon that was chasing him. And to do so, he desperately needed this stone.

The thing that had only brought despair, was now here to bring him hope.

Bilde opened his mouth and swallowed the stone in one gulp.

The stone being the size of a fist made it hard to put in his mouth. But now was not the time to care about such things.

The stone was a pure concentration of Quintessence that had gone through multiple purification and compression processes. His master had once told him that just by swallowing the stone, it would produce a huge amount of mana inside his body. He said that the result would be either one of the two. His body would change, or it would explode.

But again, a ‘complete’ stone would have no risk of causing an explosion. However, Bild had no other choice but to hope that the stone would be close to its completion.

So he gulped down and waited for the changes to happen in his body.

However,

“…Wh, what’s going on?”

A look of bewilderment was visible in his face.

He unmistakably felt the stone traveling down his throat and into his stomach, so something should have happened by now.

But that was it. Nothing happened.

“Why is it not working…!”

Bild shouted out loud at the incomprehensible situation.

Why?

Why isn’t it happening?

Did I miss anything?

Bild racked his brains over the problem. He wondered if he had made any mistakes, or if he had missed something when swallowing the stone. But nothing came to his mind. His mind went blank.

He started to panic thinking that the demon should be just around the corner by now.

Bild pushed his finger into the back of his throat in order to throw up the stone. He was going to try swallowing the stone again and again until it worked.

After a few gags, the stone came back out of his mouth. The stone was still emitting its capricious purple glow.

Bild drew his brows together and put the stone back into his mouth. But the stone did not give way this time. He had to vomit it back out to try swallowing it again.

Bild repeated the same process over and over again. The floor was completely soaked with his gastric juices.

“Why…”

Bild was on the verge of losing his mind.

“Why the fuck isn’t it working!”

Every time he vomited it out, the stone maintained its ominous purple hue. He could see the energy wriggling inside the stone.

Still, the stone hadn’t granted him the power. Like a rose that wouldn’t allow itself to be picked, acting so aloof as if he didn’t deserve to be its owner.

And that’s what drove Bild more and more crazy. The thought that that demon could barge in from the door any minute now kept pushing him into a corner.

But nothing changed.

And then,

*Creak*

A dark shadow fell into the warehouse.

Bild’s face turned blue as he quickly turned towards the source of the sound.

There stood Yeon-woo, smiling coldly.

“So, this is the place you chose to run away from me.”

Bild opened his mouth to scream out loud, however, no sound escaped from his mouth. His fear had become an invisible hand that was strangling him.

“Is that the ‘stone’ you were trying to make? It doesn’t look like anything. Something’s not working out?”

Yeon-woo threw his gaze towards the purple stone Bild was hugging tightly.

Startled by his words, Bild pushed the stone back into his mouth.

But Yeon-woo didn’t care about it.

‘So many people were sacrificed all for that failure?’

[Violet Stone]

Information unavailable.

The stone was an item with no identifiable information.

It wasn’t clear if it was because the stone was incomplete, or if there was a problem with the making process. Whatever the case was, if the item was unidentifiable, it only meant one thing.

It was unusable.

Obviously, nothing would happen no matter how many times he put the stone into his mouth.

Even when looking at it with Draconic Eyes, the purple stone was covered with flaws all over its surface. There were so many of them, the stone itself was hidden under the flaws.

Usually, such items were classified as trash with F Rating.

A burst of hollow laughter escaped from his mouth. He couldn’t believe Leonte spent so much time and money on such a useless piece of trash.

Even if he held onto it to threaten him, it wouldn’t come close to being his weakness.

So Yeon-woo waited for Bild to finish swallowing and then slowly moved towards him.

“Are you done eating?”

“Urgh…!”

Bild began to cry. The stone still hadn’t shown its effect. All his hopes were shattered to pieces.

He stepped back away from Yeon-woo. He then tripped and fell on his behind, so he crawled away.