Chapter 5: Beast.
[Illegal noona current status ㅋㅋ]
[Wow looks like this is the golden generation ㅋㅋ]
[Yeorae Guild major announcement ㄷㄷ]
[Climbed to the 17th floor of the Tower.]
[Why are the newbies these days like this]
[Magic pouch euheu]
[Today’s four-character idiom (119)]
The bait that had once set the gallery on fire with custom figure orders naturally cooled down as time passed.
It wasn’t like some major incident had occurred in the first place. It was just gossip about an interesting custom figure that had appeared, so it wasn’t a topic that would roll around for long.
That was how community cycles usually worked.
I took my eyes off the smartphone screen and turned my head.
“Having fun?”
In one corner of the room, inside a space decorated like a small tent, Pet, who was gripping a Nintendo Switch, nodded its face repeatedly.
When the kart on the screen slipped on a banana peel, its short arms and legs fluttered.
These days Pet looked fairly leisurely.
Thanks to having cleared out the runaway volume of orders from the early days to a certain extent, a comfortable (?) environment had been created where it only needed to work about 72 hours a week.
By human standards, an employment labor inspector uncle from the Ministry of Employment and Labor would go “this bstard” and cuff my wrists without a word of complaint.
But Pet was a spirit, not a human, so the fact was that labor standards laws did not apply.
Spirits did not need to sleep in the first place.
Therefore they could productively use all 24 hours of the day.
What about the fire spirit?
That one was just weird.
‘I wonder if it arrived safely?’
I quietly closed my eyes and focused my senses.
There existed an invisible network connecting me to the creatures I had created.
Like a Wi-Fi signal connected to a router, I could roughly sense the current state, location, health, and so on of the spirits.
Since some kind of connection was necessary to supply and control nutrients, it was only natural in a way.
From what I could feel…
“No abnormalities.”
It seemed it was still sleeping soundly.
Having shaken off the small unease remaining in one corner of my heart, I lay face down on the bed again and began lurking on the Ascender Gallery.
While scrolling down and passing nutrient-free posts, one eye-catching title entered my vision.
[Beast monopoly is really fcked ㅋㅋ]
“Beast?”
Beast was a massive global corporation I had been familiar with even just a month ago, when I was still an ordinary person unrelated to the Tower.
It was the place that tamed monsters inside the Tower, processed them into the form of ‘Pets’, and sold them to Ascenders.
Beyond simply selling monsters, it made generous donations to every sector of society and even sponsored various entertainment businesses and sports teams, so its public image was very good as a large corporation.
But that was only the perspective of ordinary people looking from the outside.
To the actual people climbing the Tower, especially the high-floor Ascenders climbing above the 30th floor, Beast’s reputation was…
[Beast monopoly is really fcked ㅋㅋ]
Author: FurryFurry
Is this monopoly for real?
Raising the price 30 percent all at once is fck
I’m so speechless I can’t even talk ㅋㅋ
-What’s Beast?
ㄴIt’s the place that makes and sells Pets
ㄴThere was something like that??
ㄴYou don’t really run into it unless you’re above the 30th floor ㅋㅋ
ㄴㄷㄷ
[Wow was there someone among the gallery users who climbed to the 30th floor?]
Author: Anonymous
Gallery evaluation ㄷㄷ
-Isn’t that the person who verified their Tower climbing ranking last time ㅋㅋ
ㄴSeems so ㅋㅋ
-A precious person in such a humble place…
[The reason the company called Beast did wrong]
Author: OrdinaryGalleryUser
FurryFurry
← Just from the nick something about reliability is felt ㄷㄷ
I don’t know what it is but if that Beast bstard seems to have done wrong, massive recommendation ㅋㅋ
-Massive recommendation ㅋㅋ
-Good
-Good
-Hair-
-I can’t even gauge how wrong it was ㅋㅋ
-Even our house puppy is giving a massive recommendation while shedding hairㅇㅇ
[Beast 30 percent increase?]
Author: Anonymous
Why am I only finding this out now
But is that important?
-Do you even know what went up 30 percent?
ㄴ(Author) Weren’t you talking about stocks?
ㄴOh my
ㄴ?
ㄴIt’s so funny how sincerely you feel sorry ㅋㅋ
-That’s because you…
-Lower floors h2
-But there are barely any people even above the 20th floor let alone the 30th so it’s understandable ㅋㅋ Because they’re the top 1 percent
-Isn’t everyone here lower floors? ㅋㅋ If someone saw they’d think we’re high floors ㅋㅋㅋ
ㄴAbsolute agreement ㅋㅋ
ㄴReal fcking disgusting ㅋㅋ
[I’ll neatly summarize Beast]
Author: Gembung
I don’t know fck
How am I supposed to know that
-Honesty is Gempyeong ㅋㅋ
-Summarized it
ㄴ(Link)
ㄴ(Author) Oh
Just from the comments I couldn’t grasp the context at all.
Why on earth were Pets made from monsters so important that such a large corporation was doing business with a 30 percent price hike on pure arrogance, and high-floor Ascenders, knowing that, were still being jerked around while crying and eating mustard?
The question was resolved by one concept post that went up right after.
[Info) Summarizing what Beast did wrong]
Author: Anonymous
(Green frog meme sliding up glowing glasses)
First of all Beast is the only company that sells Pets to Ascenders
You might ask why Pets are needed here, but from the 30th floor and above you have to stay in the Tower for as short as a day or as long as over a month to clear one floor
And as you know the Tower is basically 1 person per floor per day entry
What does this mean?
The value of a reliable companion is insanely highㅇㅇ
Especially night watch is the biggest
Unlike the lower floors, on the high floors you have to sleep inside the Tower too
Cases of getting your throat slit by a monster while sleeping are countless
The only ways to solve this night watch problem are if you’re lucky and a related magic tool drops, or buying a Pet from Beast
(For reference magic tools are so fcking rare they don’t even appear as auction items)
In the end for a general high-floor Ascender above the 30th floor, buying a Pet from Beast is not a choice but a necessity
They also play the role of porters, and monkey-type monsters even build crude shelters
Alright, getting the feeling now?
The Pet business is completely monopolized by Beast, and even if they raise the price like crazy just to make money, there’s nothing Ascenders can do.
For reference overseas communities are also fcking cursing Beast over this ㅋㅋ
-Summary recommendation
-Wow they were btches ㅋㅋ
-Doesn’t the government stop it?
ㄴ(Author) There’s also the International Administrator Special Law, and in the first place other companies can’t make those Pets ㅋㅋ
ㄴIs it an Ascender ability?
ㄴ(Author) Probably? Nothing’s been revealed so I don’t know exactlyㅇㅇ
-Don’t the high-floor Ascenders say anything? Once you reach around the 50th floor don’t they have the power to mess them up?
ㄴTo those ranker-level guys they probably slip them under-the-table money and give free Pets while sucking up like crazy ㅋㅋ
ㄴObvious ㅋㅋㅋ
[Yeah yeah I get it I get that Beast is a bad guy]
Author: Anonymous
So now we just do a boycott right?
-…Tsk
-Hmm ㅋㅋㅋㅋ
-Boycott (never bought)
-ㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋ
-Beast: Ah even if you found out we’re bad b*stards what can you guys even do ㅋㅋ
ㄴRunning hate images?
ㄴBeast is the one who did the power abuse so why are we Asbungs taking the damage?
While slowly reading through the posts and comments I turned off the smartphone screen and stared at the ceiling.
“Hmm…”
The sound of pleasant gears meshing and turning could be heard inside my head.
The harsh environment of the 30th floor and above of the Tower.
One-person entry restriction.
Long-term stays.
And the absence of companions who could provide night watch and convenience.
The company called Beast was scratching this fatal deficiency of Ascenders with the means of ‘tamed monsters’ and piling up monopolistic wealth.
Just because there were no competitors, they were arbitrarily jacking up the prices.
When I turned my head, Pet’s round back of the head, absorbed in the game, came into view.
“This… can’t we replace it?”
The massive corporation called Beast.
Because they were holding the national necessity of ‘Tower climbing’ hostage, even the government couldn’t casually touch them.
Of course they would be walking the line while watching the faces of other large forces or countries in their own way, but that wasn’t my concern.
What captivated my eyes was the essence of what they were holding.
The position of the superior where consumers, even while clearly knowing the unreasonable tyranny, had no choice but to open their wallets while cursing because there was no substitute.
Looking at the golden tower Beast had built up, I received a rather fresh shock.
Because it seemed I could do the exact same thing, no, do it far more sweetly.
Let’s calmly calculate.
Maintenance cost, safety, convenience, even appearance.
“In every way isn’t my spirit overwhelmingly superior compatibility..?”
On top of that I didn’t even need to tyrannize consumers the way Beast did.
Because the resource I needed most was not money but nutrients.
In fact if only nutrients were sufficiently supplied I could do anything.
This was something I had instinctively felt ever since I awakened as a World Tree.
It was just that the method of how to gather those nutrients had been unclear.
“World Tree…”
Just because I TS’d, meaning my outward appearance became a little girl, didn’t mean my intelligence was halved as well.
It was true that my emotional ups and downs had become a bit more severe compared to when I was a sturdy young man, but that didn’t mean my brain had also become retarded to match the cute appearance.
Therefore, I had no choice but to admit it.
“It might be pretty broken?”
That I seemed to have acquired a more broken ability than I thought.