1.

The Jeong Cheol Guild was undeniably a top-tier guild.

Each member had the skill to fulfill their role, and Jeong Cheol himself possessed both the ability to command and the power to draw out the full potential of his Special-grade class.

But that was the extent of it.

On average, they were excellent—easily in the top 0.01% of all teams—but they weren't untouchable.

The event itself was proof. Among the participating teams, more than four boasted a Legendary class player, and that didn't even include Kim Buja or Fly.

Add in the Special-grade classes, and the competition was fierce.

Having those classes didn't guarantee a deep run—some of those teams had already been eliminated—but the impact of a Legendary class was undeniable, especially Fly's.

If the team event were framed as a simple showdown between Korea and the U.S., a direct comparison between Jeong Cheol and Fly would inevitably make Fly the victor.

Even with Kim Buja on the Korean side, that fundamental truth didn't change.

The gamble had paid off, landing them safely on the tenth floor. He was confident they could clear at least two more floors, but that alone wouldn't be enough to secure their victory.

That was the overwhelming power of a Legendary class.

Fly's impact in a team match, in particular, was so immense it felt as if it belonged in a tier of its own, something beyond a Legendary-grade class.

More importantly, the team match, like the individual one, awarded bonus points for each player's growth.

With every conquered floor, their levels rose and their equipment improved.

Fly was steadily climbing, gearing up, and improving his stats with each step. Eventually, he might very well overcome the advantage the Korean team had built with their buffs.

That had to be stopped.

The Americans were undoubtedly frustrated by their inability to interfere directly, but Kim Buja felt the same pressure.

In the end, the final score would always favor the team that reached the higher floor.

No one could predict how many more floors they could clear—or if they would ever make it this far again. If he was going to interfere, now was the time, while he still had the chance.

With that in mind, he chose the debuff.

[Buff: Reduces each floor's penalty by 50%. No duration limit.]

[Debuff: Increases each remaining team's floor penalties by 30%. No duration limit.]

To reach higher floors, the buff was obviously the better choice.

Starting from the seventh floor, the penalties grew so varied and brutal that by the tenth, they made the very act of growth feel pointless.

A 50% reduction in penalties was tantamount to a 50% increase in combat power.

Naturally, the effectiveness of his buff food and consumables would skyrocket, which could easily decide whether they cleared another floor or failed right there.

Even so, he chose the debuff, mindful of the inherent limitation he'd recognized from the start.

"At this pace, even with a stroke of luck, we'll either clear the thirteenth floor or fall trying. The buff would only nudge those odds slightly. The debuff, on the other hand, lets us leave a nice little present for the Americans, who are just about to start the seventh floor."

And then there was the efficiency gap.

"Seventh, eighth, ninth, tenth, eleventh… I don't know how far they'll get, but they'll have to climb at least five floors with a 30% penalty boost. In other words, they'll be fighting with 30% of their power shaved off. Of course, it might not be a fatal blow to Fly himself. The guy's a monster; he'll probably just keep blasting Legendary skills all the way up regardless."

It was the same logic as min-maxing stats. Once you had a near-perfect build, raising your stats even a fraction required astronomical costs. But if you invested that same cost into a more modest build, you could see noticeable gains almost immediately.

A tiny bit of growth for himself, or a very visible hindrance to his opponent. At the very least, there was one thing Kim Buja could be sure of. That was why he had confidently chosen the debuff.

"But Fly's guild members aren't like him."

They were all elites, that much was true. But that didn't mean they were all on Fly's level. The same penalties that had wiped out nearly half of Jeong Cheol's guild would now hit Fly's team, but 30% stronger.

For the sake of efficiency, Fly's guild would undoubtedly funnel all their resources into him, but his teammates wouldn't be able to withstand the pressure and would start dropping one by one.

By the time they reached the tenth floor, they would likely have fewer members left than Jeong Cheol's guild did. Even if Fly survived and grew as powerful as he needed to, the team match was still an event where twenty players had to combine their strength.

"From here on out, we only have two things to do."

All eyes turned to Kim Buja. Hamburgers in hand, they stared at him as he spoke in a serious tone.

"First, we break through to the thirteenth floor, even if it kills us. We get there. Then, we literally throw our lives away to punch through the fourteenth. If we get eliminated there, that's the best-case scenario."

Everyone nodded. Even as they did, worries crept in about whether they could even clear the next floor, never mind the thirteenth.

The difficulty had become that high. It kept climbing, impossible to predict. Even so, they believed in him. There had never been a time when Kim Buja was wrong.

In boss raids, as long as they did exactly what he told them, they didn't die. And even if someone did fall, they had seen with their own eyes how he never let that death go to waste.

Then he revealed the second thing they had to do.

"The second thing is to pray."

The guild members looked at him in confusion.

"Pray that Fly suddenly drops dead. That his whole team wipes and drags him down with them."

Someone snorted, and the laughter spread until it filled the rest area. The sad irony was that he was right.

They were barely clinging to first place now, but under normal circumstances, they would have been down there with everyone else, watching Fly's solo performance.

Even looking down from above, the sight of Fly clawing his way up without any decent buffs was still incredible.

Maybe, just as Kim Buja said, once they had climbed as high as they possibly could through sheer effort, the most important thing left to do was pray.

"Then let's lock in our choice. Time for one last sprint. Rest up a bit first."

The final showdown. The end of the event. They were sprinting toward the finish line.

* * *

Who would dare laugh at Fly?

The power he displayed after his late start proved his worth went far beyond his reputation; no one could afford to underestimate him now.

Why could he solo dungeons that would challenge ten top-tier rankers combined?

How could a single wizard mow down everything in his path?

He answered every question with his actions.

Unlike the Korean team, he'd discovered the hidden quest late and was climbing with weaker buffs, yet his progress was seamless.

Of course, when comparing the process and the time spent, the Korean team was inevitably faster.

But the fact that he was closing the gap at all was more than enough to earn him a standing ovation. On top of that, as time passed and they climbed higher, the buffs granted to the American team also began to stack up.

They recovered so well that people started talking again—speculating, arguing, throwing out predictions—as if the match could go any direction.

Unlike the Korean team, they had already lost four players before the seventh floor, but Fly's presence only grew larger, to the point where those empty spots were hardly noticeable.

The moment they cleared the seventh floor, the gap vanished. The only difference between the Korean and American teams was now simply a matter of who had started first.

Or so people were about to say. Then the 30% additional penalty hit.

For Fly, who had been charging ahead like a runaway train with no brakes, this was practically a death sentence. No—even with the 30% penalty increase, Fly still made his presence felt. From the start, the floors themselves had always felt a bit too flimsy to contain his class.

The added penalties simply filled that gap.

The problem was that the penalties were tuned just high enough to challenge Fly. For the rest of his guild, however, they were a crushing burden that made it difficult to even move.

—They're just dropping like flies.

—Honestly, these penalties are kind of bullshit.

—And on top of that, they're even worse because the Korean team picked the debuff.

—How is Fly even holding on?

—Well, they did funnel literally everything to him, so it makes sense.

Without the debuff, they might have been fine. It was a razor's edge. Fly had been walking that blade, calculating every step.

Then an unexpected variable slammed into them, and they had already gone too far down this path to turn back.

It hit in the middle of their seventh-floor run, and by the time they cleared it and could even think about responding, it was already too late.

In the end, they had no choice but to keep going.

If they stopped to discuss countermeasures, they would have to factor in the duration of their buffs.

Fly's expression never relaxed. Instead, he pushed himself even harder.

He would show them. He would show them the true extent of his power, the limit he'd failed to display in the individual match.

As if to prove his point, he didn't stop even as his teammates' numbers visibly dwindled. From one angle, it could look like the behavior of a lone wolf who didn't understand teamwork.

But the fact that this was the best possible choice in their current situation was proven by Fly's overwhelming performance as he cleared each floor.

The ninth floor, the tenth floor. Fly cleared them and pushed on. Yet he still couldn't see the wall—the thirteenth floor.

He needed to climb three more floors to reach the Korean team.

He realized now that the Tower of Annihilation, which he hadn't even considered a real competition at first, was in fact the most competitive map of all.

He regretted it. A sigh escaped him. He wouldn't give up until the very end, but he was already half-accepting reality. This was hard. It had only been the tiniest bit of interference.

Just once. A 30% increase in penalties. But that tiny bit of interference, left behind by the advance party, had completely shattered the balance.

If that penalty hadn't existed, he believed he could have taken a real shot at it.

A weary sigh escaped him. Still, he would give it everything he had.

His team cleared the tenth floor, and although no hidden quest like the Korean team's debuff appeared, their buffs had stacked up more than he had expected.

On top of that, with fewer people left, the consumables they acquired were more than enough. If there was even a sliver of possibility, he would challenge it.

As Fly steeled himself, Kim Buja sent him one last gift. A notification appeared: the thirteenth floor had been cleared, and a second buff or debuff was now available.

[Consumable use on each floor is now restricted.]

It was an ultimatum. A final notice to end the team match.

The number-one-ranked team's progress updated from the thirteenth to the fourteenth floor, and with it came disaster.

The action itself was a message from Kim Buja.

[You have gained bonus points for Last Surviving Team.]

A prestigious bonus was awarded to the last team standing out of the roughly 200 teams that had participated.

Clearly, this was what he had been aiming for, and this was why things had turned out this way.

But Fly didn't feel the slightest bit happy. He could feel it.

"They're keeping it entertaining right up to the end."

He let out a short, incredulous laugh. It was such a ridiculous self-destruct that it was almost funny.

It was a taunt that essentially said, 'Come on, then. Try and get up here. I'm just going to drop a bomb on you and walk away.'

From the individual match to the team match. Nothing had gone Fly's way once he got tangled up with Kim Buja, but even so, he gripped his staff to the very end.

"I can't let it end like that."

He wouldn't let things go exactly as his opponent wanted.

On the tenth floor of the Tower of Annihilation, where he now stood alone, a massive meteor fell.

* * *

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