Chapter 40

I’m EMPTYTEXTEMPTYTEXTEMPTYTEXTnotsupposedtobehereI’mnotsupposedtobehereI’mnothuman.

About five minutes earlier.

Suho entered the square, walking through the neatly arranged interior, and soon arrived in front of the portal. Without any hesitation, he stepped into it.

 

 

 

 

The entry information was as simple as could be.

This place had claimed even more lives than the Nameless Sword Gate. No one knew why. No one had ever returned alive from this place.

‘The current Swamp of Despair is a place where no one knows if you can return or even what lies within.’

But Suho knew what awaited inside. He knew what kind of place this was. That’s why he entered without a second thought.

As soon as he entered, the surroundings shifted, revealing the inside of a large cave. In front of him stood a massive staircase leading straight up to a brilliant, shining door. That door was none other than the ‘exit’.

Simply put, entering that door meant clearing the Gate.

‘But no one has ever managed to clear it.’

Suho lowered his gaze from the brilliant exit and looked at the staircase below. He could see strange statues scattered along the steps.

These statues resembled gravestones, but Suho knew exactly what they were.

‘Those aren’t just sculptures. These are all the people who attempted the Swamp of Despair.’

There were no monsters in the Swamp of Despair. To be more precise, the long staircase leading to the exit portal was the true trial of the Gate.

The Staircase of Despair.

Those who knew its secret called it that.

‘Each step brings endless fear and despair to the challenger, thanks to a powerful mental trap.’

The only way to clear it was by having a strong mental defense skill or possessing the right items.

‘And those defenses need to be at least S-rank.’

That’s why this place was called the Swamp of Despair. Like a real swamp, if you misstep, you’d be sucked in, drowning in despair and eventually dying.

Those who turned to stone were victims of the staircase. The people trapped by it experienced such deep despair that they couldn’t take even a single step forward.

‘But none of that matters to me.’

Without hesitation, Suho stepped onto the first stair.

Shooosh!

For an instant, it felt like he was falling off a cliff.

 

 

As expected, the despair of the stairs began to sink into Suho.

But then.

 

 

Seeing the system notification, Suho chuckled.

Yes. He had Dragon Blood.

The absolute immunity skill that rendered him invulnerable to any mental debuff—Dragon Blood.

He saw the notification again as he continued climbing.

 

 

The same notification followed with each step.

Suho climbed the staircase as if he were on a leisurely walk.

Along the way, he saw numerous statues, and some of them had been moved to the side to keep the path clear.

These, too, were people who had become stone statues in their despair.

But by the time he reached the middle of the staircase, there were no more statues or even rubble in sight.

No one had ever made it this far.

The further one climbed, the stronger the despair grew, and no one had managed to reach this point.

But Suho was different.

He walked and walked, and when he finally reached the last step…

 

 

Dragon Blood continued to protect him, keeping his mind intact.

Just before stepping into the exit portal, Suho turned and looked at the statues left behind.

‘I’m sorry. I couldn’t take you with me.’

Suho knew who had originally cleared this place.

The man was a martial artist known as the ‘Ascetic’. He had an extraordinarily strong mental resistance and managed to clear the entire Gate over the course of several hundred days.

‘People said he fought against the despair that consumed him with every step.’

That’s why it took him hundreds of days. Over those long days, the Ascetic began to pity the victims here, so he tried to take their statues with him, hoping to restore them to life with healers outside.

But anyone turned to stone in this place crumbled to dust as soon as they were touched.

In the end, the Ascetic couldn’t save anyone and had to leave the Gate alone.

That’s why Suho didn’t even try to touch the statues. Instead, he pressed his hands together in a prayer, wishing peace to their souls.

‘Thank you for your struggles.’

As Suho passed the final step and reached the top where the exit portal stood:

 

 

Upon reaching the portal, a flood of system notifications indicated the successful clearing of the Gate.

At the same time, Suho’s level increased, and he was awarded various bonus stats.

There were no monsters listed as defeated, as this place had none.

However, due to the inherent difficulty of the Gate, even without any monsters, Suho earned a significant amount of experience, enough to level up.

But Suho was still waiting for what he truly wanted.

At that moment:

 

 

Seeing the notification, Suho finally smiled. Yes, this was the reason he had come here.

While the Swamp of Despair was one of the easier sealed Gates for him to clear at his current level, it also held an item that could only be obtained here.

Suho checked the details of the ring he had acquired:

 

 

The Ring of Emotions, an S-rank item.

It was once a treasure held by the Seeker, who used it not only to continuously improve himself but also to help countless people struggling with their emotions.

‘With this, I’ll be able to control the emotions of any being—whether human, animal, or monster.’

That was why the ring was eventually stolen by nefarious fiends.

The Ring of Emotions could be used for good, but in the wrong hands, it could become a deadly poison or a tool for terrifying acts of terrorism.

This was why Suho believed he had to be the one to take possession of it. At the very least, with him holding it, there was no risk of it falling into the wrong hands.

After reviewing the ring’s information, Suho placed it on his finger.

The ring adjusted itself perfectly, then became transparent and eventually disappeared entirely, to the point where it couldn’t even be felt.

Suho turned around and bent down, reaching toward the last step he had climbed.

 

 

First, the step attempted to corrupt his mind, but Dragon Blood prevented it. Then:

 

 

The Ring of Emotions had activated.

Suho accepted the system’s prompt.

 

 

Shwaaa!

The item’s effect triggered, and dark energy from the step was drawn into Suho’s hand.

Soon, the ring had absorbed the maximum amount of Black energy it could hold.

The staircase still remained dark, as it wasn’t something that could be purified by absorbing a little energy.

‘Time to head out.’

Having secured the Ring of Emotions and a full store of Black energy, Suho finally exited the portal.

 

***

 

Once outside, Suho checked the time. It hadn’t even been five minutes.

‘With a record like this, I’ll probably be recognized as the fastest person in the world to clear an S-rank Gate.’

It was likely that his name would enter the Guinness World Records.

Suho waved toward the camera, and soon the Gate opened, revealing the people waiting eagerly outside.

“Suho!”

“Pro Suho!!”

The first to rush over were Jung Chulmin and Jo Jin-hwi.

They were ecstatic, as though they had discovered some priceless treasure, while the PR team leader and the square manager looked utterly dazed, as if they had seen a ghost.

What they all had in common was the white aura of positive emotions that Suho could now see surrounding them.

Jung Chulmin and Jo Jin-hwi were chattering excitedly.

“Suho, how is this even possible? You cleared the Gate in 4 minutes and 17 seconds! You cleared a sealed Gate in just 4 minutes and 17 seconds!”

“This is a world record! We have to release this as an exclusive report right away!”

“What’s your secret? This Gate was classified as more dangerous than the Nameless Sword, so how did you do it…?”

As questions flooded in, Suho calmed them down, then approached the PR team leader and the square manager.

“As you can see, the Gate has been fully cleared.”

“Yes! We were watching in real-time through the camera.”

“Could we take a photo together for verification?”

“A photo?”

“I need proof for certification.”

The square manager, momentarily stunned, quickly nodded.

“Oh, yes! Of course!”

“PR team leader, can you take care of this?”

“Yes, I’ll handle it right away!”

With the PR team leader snapping photos, Suho made sure to leave behind clear evidence of his successful Gate clearance, just as he had done at the Nameless Sword Gate.

 

T/N: Hiya guys, it seems someone else has picked this up, so just wait for them to catch up to this chapter. I don’t think I can stomach another race for chapter uploads, so I’ll be dropping this.

Good news though, I’ll be focusing more on -99 and Ghost Story! With one less on my plate, I’ll be sure to get into a better groove of updating those two novels.