I Start with 13 Hidden Traits Chapter-158

Ch-158

—

‘That woman… isn’t human?’

Auril tilted her head slightly.

Because they were standing together with something that was not human.

‘A monster. And a monstrously hideous one at that.’

The moment she saw her, goosebumps crawled up her skin.

She had the outward form of a human, but she was far removed from being one.

Several unfathomable scents were mixed together on her—scents that could not be identified.

It was the scent of something extremely dangerous.

‘She has no emotion?’

More than anything, there was no desire, no emotion.

Colorless.

Yet every living being, great or small, carries desire.

Especially humans—among all creatures, humans are the most steeped in desire.

And yet she had none.

There was only one case where this could happen.

‘A corpse. An undead!’

Auril instinctively brought her hand to her waist.

Not only Auril.

All the “Warriors of the Laurel” who had accompanied her took one look at the woman and immediately entered an attack stance.

Elves and undead were natural enemies.

Never—under absolutely any circumstance—could they coexist in the same space.

It was hostility beyond mere disgust.

Just seeing her made a fierce surge of anger boil up inside them.

Why was there an undead among these humans?

“A grand welcoming ceremony, I see.”

…A freshly arrived man said this as he looked at the elves who had assumed attack posture.

And the other man in priestly garb who had come with him—

“Aruwen…?”

He froze, turning stiff like a statue as he spoke the name of the elf elder.

*

*

Andrew’s eyes trembled violently.

There was no way he was seeing wrong.

The elf standing before the warp right now—

She was unmistakably his wife, Aruwen, who had vanished one day without warning.

The woman who abandoned him and Andasar to return to the Primordial Forest.

She had coldly left them behind with nothing but a letter.

The letter contained nothing special.

Only a single line saying she would never return. That was all.

He had searched for a long time, but could not find her.

He had wanted to go to the Primordial Forest, but with Andasar in his care, he couldn’t bring himself to embark on such a journey.

So he thought he would never see her again for the rest of his life.

‘Why are you here?’

Ha.

Who would have thought that the elf elder who came seeking Randolph would turn out to be his former wife, Aruwen?

But Aruwen wasn’t looking at him.

Her eyes were fixed on Andasar.

‘Ah.’

At the same time, Andrew felt the world spin.

It was as if she, too, had realized that their daughter had become an undead—a lich.

If that were true, he would have no excuse even if he had ten mouths.

*

A brief moment of silence fell.

He didn’t know how that human in priestly robes knew the Elder’s name, but—

‘Undead are beings that defy nature. They must be returned to nature’s embrace.’

More than that, it was the undead herself that was the problem.

Auril had been trained to eliminate all undead.

She had studied directly under the Elf Queen and was one of the top three warriors even among the famed “Warriors of the Laurel.”

All the more reason she could not tolerate the presence of an undead.

It seemed the undead was hiding among humans, pretending to be one.

Laurel leaves sprouted like wings on both of Auril’s feet.

“Auril…!”

Swaeeeek!

Before the elder could stop her, Auril burst forward on the wind, pulling an old wooden branch from her waist.

And the branch formed the shape of a divine sword.

Before this sword, the undead would fall in a single strike…!

Kaaang—!

A sharp jolt shot up Auril’s wrist, and she twisted once in the air.

Someone had blocked her attack.

“Are elves always this rude?”

The man who had mentioned a “welcoming ceremony.”

He was holding a sword cold as winter, and it was he who had deflected Auril’s strike.

‘Sword Aura?’

That faint glow around the blade—it was unmistakably Sword Aura.

A secret technique usable only by those chosen by the World Tree or warriors above stage 7.

Who would have thought a human could reach such a level?

‘Ah.’

She had been too distracted by the undead to observe the man properly.

Careless.

A mistake unacceptable for a Warrior of the Laurel.

But then—

“W–what…?”

“Wh–what is… how can such a thing exist?”

“Auril… run!”

The man holding Winter.

The elves, who had heard the humans call him “Successor,” suddenly began trembling violently, their faces filled with horror.

And Auril was no exception.

Her feet refused to move.

Her body felt frozen like stone.

‘Wh–what is that… that desire…?!’

The shape of desire emanating from the man.

They had never seen—never even heard of—anything like it.

 

*

*

**Black King.**

A lion king, jet-black from head to toe.

He resembled the White King in many ways, but his color alone set him apart starkly.

He stood at the edge of a cliff, looking down.

“Kill them!”

“Wipe them out!”

“Don’t you dare lose to those ant bastards!”

“Damn centipedes!”

Below the cliff, enormous insect monsters were waging war over territory.

Creatures of the Southern Barbaric Lands.

Originally insignificant, they had gained high intelligence thanks to the Black King’s “Grace,” and with intellect came hatred—and endless war.

“Black King, my lord. Those creatures still haven’t settled the fight?”

A dark elf approached from behind and shook his head.

The dark elf and the members of the Tower of Rift had gathered together.

“Hm. Creating the strongest insect isn’t as easy as I hoped.”

The Black King shrugged.

**Gu Poison.**

A tradition of a southern tribe: sealing various insects in a jar and crafting poison from the one that survived last.

Inspired by that, the Black King sought to create the ultimate insect monster—but their newfound intelligence was slowing the war down.

It seemed the “Grace” he gave them was the problem.

The Black King stroked his chin.

“Perhaps granting them ‘Great Sage’ was a mistake. I should’ve given them ‘Mutant’ instead.”

“That would have killed them all, would it not?”

“One of them might have adapted and survived. Of course… that’s never actually happened before, but…”

The Black King could bestow “Grace,” the Hidden Traits.

But among them, “Mutant” was one of the most difficult.

Whenever he granted it, all recipients died before they could withstand it.

Even so, it might have been better than Great Sage.

If his goal was to determine the strongest one, he should have taken the gamble.

The Black King slowly turned his head.

Five people had ascended the Tower.

But only four were present now.

“So the Master has died.”

“Yes. We should never have trusted such trash in the first place.”

He had been useless.

Trusting his sweet words and ascending the tower together had been the worst possible choice.

In the end, he died alone and handed all the points to the rank-1 party.

“Regardless, you still failed, did you not?”

The Black King was speaking of the failure of the entire group.

A failure was a failure.

They had moved as a party, and this was the result.

It was the same as all of them failing.

The dark elf’s eyes quivered.

“Th–there was… an unknown intruder, my lord. Someone using a ‘bug’…”

“A bug, you say…”

“He moved across divided realms alone. A being neither the floor’s master nor the administrator could have predicted. But—he killed the Great Earth Dragon.”

They had not returned empty-handed.

They brought conjecture regarding the rank-1 party and the information that the Great Earth Dragon, a subordinate of the White King, had been killed.

Only then did the Black King’s eyes show a glimmer of interest.

“The Great Earth Dragon? Who killed it?”

“…Raktusha.”

“I see. Did he truly kill it?”

Under the Black King’s gaze, Raktusha nodded.

“It suffered a fatal wound from the Black Heaven Sword. It cannot live, my lord.”

“So you did not actually witness its death.”

“…”

“Tsk, tsk. The Earth Dragon is still alive.”

“…What? That’s impossible.”

Raktusha was flustered.

The creature had been struck by the Black Heaven Sword wrapped in Sword Aura.

Any living thing would die from such a wound.

Yet the Black King claimed it was alive—despite not having seen it himself.

On what basis?

The Black King raised a finger and pointed to the sky.

Hovering in the heavens was a colossal giant.

It was so massive it seemed capable of covering the world.

“Do you see ‘Despair’?”

“…Yes, my lord. I see it clearly.”

Despair.

One of the Four Calamities, unlike the Baal, its very name was its epithet.

Invisible to ordinary eyes, but visible to those blessed by the Black King, whether they wanted to see it or not.

It was currently fusing with the Death King and, once awakened, would become the Black King’s strongest weapon.

“The four core retainers who have been with the White King from the beginning share a connected psyche. If the Earth Dragon had died, there would have been a reaction.”

“Ah…”

Raktusha let out a faint groan.

Alive?

How could it possibly still be alive after taking that blow?

“For something that should not possibly survive to be alive—the ‘bug’ user must have intervened. Did you see his face?”

“…No. But I am certain it was a party of a human and a dryad.”

“Is that so? Then the elves must have contacted them.”

“The elves of the Primordial Forest?”

The Black King nodded.

The Tower of Rift that had surfaced this time.

Considering the clear reward, there was no way the elves would stay still.

Especially the *dryads*—beings that lived by using the forest as their medium.

Elves blessed by the World Tree would be able to find it far more easily.

“But, Black King… don’t the elves avoid contact with the outside world?”

“The World Tree is dying. They have no other choice.”

“Th–The World Tree is…?!”

The World Tree existed at the center of the Primordial Forest.

Just as its name implied, it was a colossal tree whose roots spread out as if to embrace the entire world.

For the elves, it was both their symbol and a source of life itself—yet now he was saying that it was dying.

There were even tales that if the World Tree died, the floating continents of the open sky would sink into the abyss. That was how important the World Tree was.

But the Black King spoke as though it were nothing remarkable.

“The World Tree and the elves are one. If the World Tree is dying, it means the elves are dying as well. They remained stagnant far too long. This is the natural consequence.”

They had lived hundreds, even thousands of years solely within the Primordial Forest.

Stagnated, accumulated, and eventually rotted.

Only by raising their *max level*—only by attempting a limit breakthrough—could they prolong their existence.

Raktusha spoke, tension in his voice.

“Then… if the elves reached out, that means…”

In order to survive, they would surely attempt to climb the Tower.

Likely together with a *bug user*.

Hmm. The Black King tilted his head.

“Seems a rather entertaining fellow has appeared.”

A bug user acknowledged by the Tower.

He had never heard of such a thing.

There shouldn’t exist anyone capable of breaking the rules set by the administrator in the first place.

And yet, someone had broken those rules, overwhelmingly cleared the Tower, and surpassed his own elites.

“Breaking the rules… a hidden trait… that would be the only possibility.”

Only hidden traits possessed abilities that exceeded the Tower’s framework.

But even so, the Black King could not understand.

He knew every hidden trait.

Thus he could grant them, and thus he could allow someone to transcend their rank.

But a hidden trait that breaks the Tower’s rules…?

“Heavenly … or, failing that, an Operator.”

The only remaining possibility was *Heavenly (Celestial)*.

The sole hidden trait he could not grant.

But Heavenly (Celestial) was something that could never be mastered by any body.

If it wasn’t even that, then the only remaining answer truly was an Operator.

Just who could it be?

Gooooo—

At that moment, the hall fell silent.

It meant the war had come to an end.

The Black King looked down the cliff again and smiled brightly, as though he had never been lost in thought.

“Oh-ho, it has finally been born. The King of Insects—your comrade, that is.”

*

*

“…Ah.”

Auril let out a dying gasp.

Why hadn’t she seen it?

A desire of *that* magnitude should have been visible from the very beginning.

“It was too big…”

 

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