The corridor looked exactly the same as last time: the same statues with too-human eyes, the same sealed door at the far end.
Belle was nowhere in sight.
Noah waited leaning against a column, arms crossed, counting the seconds as if that would somehow speed things up.
Five minutes. Ten. Fifteen.
He checked his watch and felt frustration piling up at the back of his neck.
“I’m too late,” he muttered, scratching his head. “She already came through here before I got in. Great. Absolutely great.”
He drew his dagger, took a deep breath, and gathered up a courage he didn’t know where he was pulling from.
“Alright. For Belle Snow.”
He drove the blade into his own neck. He stumbled backward, screaming and gasping, crashing against the wall. Blood poured out in torrents. Then once more, and one more stab, until he collapsed.
[You Died.]
◇◆◇
He returned to the same corridor, this time considerably earlier according to his wristwatch. He posted himself by the same column and waited, nerves strung as tight as bowstrings.
And this time, to his good fortune, she appeared.
Belle Snow walked with that serene, indifferent bearing that seemed to carry her along more than actual walking, her black hair swaying with every step.
‘Good,’ Noah thought. ‘I just need her to kill me. Doesn’t matter how.’
“Hi!” he said, with an enthusiastic smile that probably bordered on ridiculous. “Belle Snow, right? I’m your—“
She walked right past him without even turning her head, as if Noah were part of the scenery.
Noah smiled awkwardly.
‘Well… completely ignored.’
He scratched the back of his neck, thinking fast, and went with the most direct, stupid, and potentially lethal method that came to mind: he slid his hand under the hem of her skirt and squeezed.
What followed happened in less than a second.
Belle let out a sharp cry, surprisingly cute, that didn’t fit at all with the coldness she’d shown until then —and that Noah, in the half-second he had to process it, found almost charming.
Then a blade of light sliced across his arm.
Noah staggered back with a howl, watching his own limb fall to the ground, cleanly severed at the shoulder.
“AH, MY AR—¡”
Belle didn’t give him time to finish the sentence. A knee to the gut drove every bit of air from his lungs, and before he could react, she already had him pinned by the throat against the wall, with a strength that completely belied her slender figure.
“You disgusting pig,” she said, her eyes burning with fury. “No one needs you in this world. A pathetic, useless Rank F. A waste of humanity.”
She tightened her grip.
Noah’s eyes bulged, turned red, the pressure on his throat becoming unbearable.
“Die,” Belle whispered, with absolute contempt.
And with a single flick of her wrist, she snapped his neck.
[You Died.]
[Random skill theft activated.]
[Analyzing…]
◇◆◇
“YES!” Noah shouted, waking up with a jolt in his bed. “A skill from Belle Snow! Rank SSS, it has to be something triple SSS, something that’ll take me straight to floor five hundred, something LEGEND—¡”
[Skill stolen: Requiem.]
[Rank C.]
[Accumulates and stores all damage taken by the bearer. Upon activation, releases all that stored damage in a single attack.]
Noah’s mind went blank.
“…Rank C.”
[Correct.]
“Out of all the skills Belle Snow could have picked up over her entire career… you gave me the very first one she learned as some random rookie.”
[The theft is random. It wasn’t designed for your emotional convenience.]
Noah sighed, staring up at his bedroom ceiling with a mix of disappointment and resignation.
“I guess it’s not that bad,” he murmured after a moment, sitting up slowly. “Although I would have preferred something a little more… impressive.”
He stroked his chin, thinking.
‘Well. I have her skill now. [Pilfered Hunter] locked her out; I can’t steal anything else from her. But…’ He paused mid-thought. ‘Belle Snow is an elite Hunter, from Floor 500. If I want to reach Rank SSS someday, I need more than brute force. I need connections. Allies. People who owe me a favor, or who simply… care about me.’
He smiled slowly.
“Time to try something different.”
◇◆◇
He returned to the corridor. Belle appeared, punctual as fate.
“Belle Snow!” Noah said, with an exaggerated smile. “I can’t believe I’m standing in front of such a devoted fan as myself.”
She walked past him without stopping.
“I don’t need fans. Worry about surviving.”
Noah clicked his tongue.
“Lost my shot there.”
He drew his dagger.
[You Died.]
◇◆◇
On the next attempt, he tried a different angle —a compliment about her fame, something more subtle— and the result was, if anything, worse. Belle looked at him with icy contempt and finished him off with a line that stuck with him far longer than he would have liked:
“A mediocrity with no future.”
“That didn’t work either,” Noah admitted, drawing his dagger again. “Alright. Again.”
[You Died.]
◇◆◇
This time, before positioning himself, he activated Awareness, sensing Belle’s presence approaching through the adjacent corridor.
‘The collision,’ he thought. ‘That was the best opening move. I’ll repeat it.’
He timed his steps, feigned being distracted, and just as she turned the corner, the two collided. Noah fell backward, wearing a perfectly calculated expression of surprise.
“Sorry, sorry,” he said, raising his hands. “Didn’t see you.”
Belle looked down at him with her usual coldness.
“Rank F,” she said, as always. “People at your rank don’t even last one floor.”
Noah, instead of responding with humor or persistence, thought fast: ‘She hates being talked to like she’s some idol. I’ll try something casual.’
“I bet you were Rank F once too,” he said. “With enough effort, anyone can reach Rank S, right?”
Belle studied him a moment longer than usual.
“Only if you’ve got what it takes,” she replied. “Most people die before the first week is out.”
She turned to leave.
“Wait,” Noah said. “What brings you here, to the first floor?”
“I needed fresh air.”
And she left.
Noah stood there mulling over the conversation, analyzing every word, every gesture, every pause.
‘Fresh air,’ he thought. ‘She’s tired of something. The Fortress, probably. Of people who admire her without really knowing her.’
He drew his dagger again.
[You Died.]
◇◆◇
And so, death after death, attempt after attempt, Noah refined every word, every gesture, every silence.
He tried jokes that failed spectacularly. He tried silences that made her uncomfortable. He tried questions that made her wary, and others that, to his surprise, made her pause a second longer than usual before walking on.
He learned what made her sigh with exhaustion and what made her —barely, almost imperceptibly— smile.
He learned about her weariness with fame. About her contempt for those who treated the Fortress like a game. About the exact point where casual conversation turned into something genuine.
Thirty-three deaths later, Noah had the perfect route memorized with the precision of a script rehearsed a thousand times.
It was time for the final performance.
The collision happened exactly as it always did. Noah fell backward.
But this time, instead of apologizing with feigned clumsiness, he spoke with a natural, almost friendly warmth.
“I’m really sorry. I should’ve been paying more attention. I don’t want to be a bother to anyone, least of all you.”
Belle seemed to pause a fraction of a second longer than usual. Something in her expression, barely visible, softened.
“No,” she said. “I’m the one who’s sorry. I was distracted, lost in thought.”
Noah seized the opening immediately.
“Is something wrong? If you need to talk to someone about it, I’m actually a pretty good listener.”
“They’re my problems,” Belle replied, a shadow of exhaustion in her voice. “I don’t think there’s anyone who could understand them.”
“You don’t need me to understand them,” Noah said, shrugging with a crooked smile. “You just need to vent a little. Besides, I’m some random Rank F nobody. I’ll probably be dead by the end of today. No one else is ever going to find out what you tell me.”
Belle smiled, just barely, but it was real.
“You shouldn’t talk about yourself like that,” she said. “Rank Fs aren’t tools.”
She leaned down and offered him her hand.
“Come on. Let me help you up.”
Noah took her hand, thanking her as she pulled him to his feet, and when Belle started walking again, he kept talking, not letting her slip away entirely.
“The paths in this Fortress are exhausting, you know? It’s like, after staring at them for so long, all you want is to step outside for some fresh air just to stop thinking about them.”
Belle stopped.
“Right?” she said, with a sincerity she hadn’t shown in any of the previous thirty-two attempts. “After so long in here, it’s draining.”
“I don’t get how anyone finds excitement in living here,” Noah added.
Belle sighed.
“I think exactly the same. I’m sick of hearing people call the Fortress their ‘second home.’” She looked at him with an eyebrow raised. “I’m surprised a Rank F thinks that way. Most of them are reckless, naive, they charge into the floors like it’s an amusement park.”
‘Exactly what I think, and exactly what I did,’ Noah thought, holding back a smile.
There it was. The moment for the next move.
“Maybe I could think that way too,” he said, lowering his voice slightly. “But I can’t see it as fun. I do this for my little sister. She can’t move her legs, she depends completely on me. I want to give her a peaceful life. That’s why I don’t take unnecessary risks in here. She’s everything to me.”
Belle turned toward him, raising her eyebrows slightly.
“What’s her name?”
“Lily. She’s sixteen. She studies at the city academy.”
Belle placed a hand over her chest, with genuine warmth.
“I want to save up enough by next year,” Noah continued, “and get her into the most prestigious academy in the city: Clair. It’s not the most expensive one, but it’s the best.”
“How funny,” Belle said. “That’s where my little brother studies.”
“Really?” Noah’s eyes widened, genuinely surprised this time; that, he hadn’t known.
“Yes. I picked it because there aren’t as many problems there. It’s quiet. Even when relatives of famous people show up, most of them just want peace, so they don’t overwhelm everyone else too much. It’s a good place to leave my brother.”
Noah smiled, his tone gentle.
“Then I hope next year we can see each other more often.”
“Maybe,” Belle replied. “But first you have to survive. And take care of Lily.”
Noah brought a hand to his forehead in a theatrical salute.
“At your command, my queen.”
Belle laughed modestly.
“Then be a good knight. Make good choices.”
Noah nodded, and decided it was time to play his last card. He knew —after thirty-three deaths’ worth of field research— exactly how much Belle enjoyed mocking the castle’s monsters.
“I’ll have it rough,” he said, with a thoughtful air, “because the first floor’s boss has the worst yoga posture I’ve ever seen in my life. That pig’s got its head on backward and can’t even see its own feet.”
Belle burst out laughing.
A real laugh, loud and full, that made Noah stare at her with his mouth slightly open —because, for the first time in thirty-four loops through that same corridor, he saw Belle Snow’s smiling face, and felt his heart do a somersault completely off-script.
“At least yours has style,” she replied, still laughing. “The one on floor two hundred looks like it lost a bet with its tailor. It’s got fabric hanging everywhere and doesn’t even know what to do with its own arms. Someone should rip them off and shove them up its ass.”
Noah burst out laughing too, genuinely this time, which only made Belle laugh harder.
“I didn’t expect to run into someone who also enjoyed making fun of the bosses like this,” Noah said.
“Neither did I,” Belle admitted.
When the laughter died down, Noah decided not to let the moment slip by.
“I really enjoyed meeting you,” he said. “I’d like to be your friend.”
Belle seemed a little surprised, but smiled, closing her eyes warmly.
“I don’t have a problem with that. I enjoyed meeting you too. I liked this conversation.”
She pulled out her phone.
“I’ll give you my number.”
Noah patted down his pockets, empty.
‘Damn it. I didn’t bring my phone. I didn’t think I’d get this far.’
“I don’t have anything to write it on,” he said.
Belle waved a hand, dismissing the issue, and pulled a marker out of thin air. Something Noah guessed was one of her skills.
“Doesn’t matter. Here, give me your arm.”
She stepped close enough that Noah caught her scent —sweet, faintly floral, impossibly feminine for someone who snapped necks with one hand— and began writing on his forearm in firm strokes.
“There,” she said, stepping back. “It’s your responsibility to take care of that number. Don’t let it wash off with sweat.”
“I know how to take care of my treasures,” Noah replied.
Belle raised her eyebrows, went quiet for a second, then laughed briefly.
“You’re creative with your comebacks.”
She said her goodbyes with a nod.
“Time for me to go.”
“It was a pleasure meeting you,” Noah said.
Belle nodded once more and walked off down the corridor.
Noah watched her go, noticing the natural sway of her walk, until he shook his head hard.
‘Stop looking at her like that,’ he scolded himself.
He looked down at his forearm, where ten digits written in black ink gleamed like the most ridiculously valuable trophy he’d ever earned in his life.
‘I got Belle Snow’s number,’ he thought, a smile he couldn’t wipe off his face. ‘The solitary SSS-Rank Hunter.’
And for the first time since he’d set foot in the Fortress, he had a thought completely unlike his usual ones.
‘I don’t want to use Return. Not even once more today. I need to make it home alive.’
He looked down the length of the corridor, toward the boss’s sealed door, still closed, still waiting.
“I’ll come back for you tomorrow,” he said, pointing a finger at it. “And this time, I’m not going to let you eat me.”