Only I Am A Reader-Chapter 604: White Gate Of Ascendance

"Hello everyone! Here we are, back again in front of another Color Gate. Despite the scare that Aurora gave us last time, Team New Aurora is currently preparing to enter this Gate just three days later!"

"Most of the fans around here are concerned for Aurora’s well-being, but the Hero of Light herself seems unbothered. Would the fans’ greatest fears come true, or will Team New Aurora give us another shock with another record-breaking Gate Clear?"

Once again, the Gate Clear Project’s parade had moved to another location.

With the Thorn Queen deciding to report everything going according to plan, everything was progressing as smoothly as it should.

For once, Aurora felt like she was finally in control.

’Once the immediate danger is over, this facade will no longer be necessary.’

The first step towards Aurora’s new future wasn’t that much different from the first part of the higher-ups’ plan, clearing more Gates.

Only when all the Color Gates are dealt with could Aurora truly let go of her restraints.

After all, regardless of her anger towards the higher-ups, Aurora still cared for the well-being of the normal people.

The most problematic feature of Color Gates was that their Gate Break was always disastrous.

As for other normal Gates, the current number and quality of Heroes were enough to deal with them in time.

The higher-ups greatly detested being considered incompetent, at least not without a proper excuse. So, the little threat that would be left, Aurora expected them to properly manage it.

’Let’s finish this as quickly as possible.’

Since they wanted her to be fast, Aurora was simply going to comply.

In order to properly wear her old guise of a foolish self-sacrificer, Aurora planned on speed running every Gate she went into.

That way, it would make sense for her to come out greatly ’injured’ every single time, all while hitting her goal faster.

"Let’s go."

With three dead weights following behind and only one true companion per her side, Aurora rushed into the white portal in front of her.

What met her inside was...

Grrrr!

A large-sized circular room decorated with torches burning with black fire. As soon as Aurora appeared inside, she found herself trapped with a small army of over a hundred small fur-covered humanoid creatures.

’Is this a test of team combat?’

Both Kara and the Thorn Trio were right beside her, so Aurora could somewhat guess the purpose of the Gate.

Just like the last Gate was focused on the concept of puzzles and cautious exploration, this Gate seemed focused on the concept of coordinated team combat against many.

From her experience dealing with all sorts of Gates, Aurora even considered the possibility that the number of monsters might have decreased if the entrants were fewer in number.

’Imagine being even more of a burden.’

In any case, even if the number of monsters was constant, following the more general concept of one against many, nothing really changed.

’Let’s just get this over with.’

Spreading it into the form of a blade, Aurora’s hand shone with light as she accumulated Enigma.

Grrrr!

Naturally, the bright light instantly triggered a reaction from the small army of monsters.

Unfortunately for them...

Swish!

An arc of light spread forward as Aurora swung her forearm, covering the entire room. When dealing with small fries like this, a few seconds of Enigma accumulation was already considered overkill.

Splat.

With blood surging mid-air, the entirety of the small army split into two sections, upper and lower.

In an instant, the hyper-aggressive dog-like beasts collapsed onto the floor, the number of their masses multiplying by two with a neat cross-section in the middle.

Ring, ring, ring!

With sudden fanfare sounding like Gong drumming, all the blood and corpses on the ground glowed before fading away, only leaving behind scattered sand particle-sized Enigma Stones.

Click!

Following that, the floor that Aurora and the rest of the team were standing on started moving, lifting them upward.

At the same time, the scattered glowing sand particles rushed towards Aurora as if they were attracted by a magnet, only stopping to form a tiny pile next to the clearer of the room.

Click.

As Aurora contemplated the full nature of the Gate, the floor finally stopped moving, clicking once more as it latched into a higher socket.

Furthermore, the moment everything settled down, the same white light that the Gate’s portal consisted of formed into over a hundred figures, fading away to reveal the form of their new opponents.

"Are we ascending a tower this time?"

Looking at the tall, green-skinned monsters full of muscles, Kara couldn’t help but let out an interesting comment.

Compared to the last Gate full of leisure and brain workouts, this one was a straightforward slaughter-type.

It was just that the enemy distribution was a little, no, a lot different. The density of each encounter was far beyond what the normal Hero could handle.

’Even better.’

For Aurora, however, that only left a big smile on her face.

In front of her current capabilities, unless it was an invincible colossal beast like the one she met in the Encroachment Gate, numbers were just a formality.

The difference between one and a hundred wasn’t very drastic.

In fact, in the current situation, when she couldn’t rely on over half of her team, being able to deal with a lot of enemies at once was actually great for conserving her limited Enigma.

’The only possible problem is...’

Swish!

Cleaving the second wave of monsters into two, Aurora considered the only dilemma she could face in a Gate like this.

’How far up can this floor go?’

Although they both took her the same time, the difference in strength between the monsters on the first two floors wasn’t small. 𝑓𝑟𝑒𝘦𝓌𝑒𝑏𝑛𝑜𝘷𝑒𝘭.𝒸𝘰𝑚

If the increase was this exponential in the long run, things could be potentially dangerous at the very end.

’Not like it matters.’

Even so, the only thing that Aurora could do was deal with each floor as it came.

It wasn’t like there was an escape button to leave the Gate, and even if there was, Aurora had no plans of pressing it.

’Great!’

Standing on the back and watching Aurora’s one-man show, the Thorn Queen almost openly snickered.

Once again, everything had ended up in her favor!