Young Master in the Apocalypse

[The group battle rank result is A+.]

[Congratulations on getting the most kills on the battle]

[Congratulations on successfully completing the mission on the first try.]

[Congratulations, you have achieved the highest score.]

[Your personal success rank is A+.]

[You are entitled to the reward according to your rank.]

[Challenge completed. A total of 8 participants, all participants will return in 10 seconds.]

[10... 9... 8...]

Right as the notifications disappeared, they were all 'transported' back to the second hall.

As soon as they reappeared in the familiar hall, they looked at each other, smiled, and jumped in joy like they had just won the first lottery prize.

"We won!"

"Yeah! We really won!"

"This is the most amazing thing that has ever happened to me!" Barry shouted.

Boris and Torri congratulate each other by hugging. Seeing that, Eva immediately jumped into Viktor's embrace, her happiness evident in her bright smile. Meanwhile, Jessie stared at them from afar for a few seconds, while ruffling Liza's hair to congratulate the latter for her efforts.

This was an amazing occassion. They have never thought that they would succeed. They went in thinking they could only win one objective, yet ended up winning all three of the objectives.

But then, during such a happy occasion suddenly Viktor remembered something, and all his happiness quickly evaporated.

All the fighting, chasing after objectives, and struggle up to the very last second made him forget to spare some time to extract all the metal he had managed to find.

All the tier 2 metal used to create the monster tank, the tier 1 weapons from the 500 or more orcs they managed to kill, and so on including the twin swords of the warchief. Those should have been enough to let him upgrade to the sixth stage of [Core of Anvil] maybe up into the seventh stage. Unfortunately for him, as soon as the objective was completed everything disappeared like they were never there, including all the tier 2 metal suits he had painstakingly crafted.

"Fuck, fuck… Fuck!"

Viktor swore up a storm as he held back the urge to cry. However, the circumstances forced him to keep it to himself. Everyone was cheering, and as their boss, it would be unbecoming for him to ruin the mood.

<No need to be too sad, at least you get the top reward, right?>

"That's true…" Viktor sighed in defeat. "Okay, Viktor, be cool, you are a Romanov, you can do better than this."

A slight tremor on the pillar they stood in brought them back to reality, then they saw something light up in the bracelets. It was a notification.

[Congratulations on completing the second challenge, please accept your rewards!]

[The hall's level 2 facility access has been activated.]

The ground they were standing on started to shake as two new stone cubes appeared in two corners of the room. Just like the first cube, the two also glowed with strange letters, but one look was all it takes for the group to understand their function.

[Store - Level 2]

[Training Hall - Level 2]

With this, now the pillar's level 31 floor has changed into a copy of the first floor, just with higher access clearance.

Jessie told Viktor to access the main cube's panel. And currently, three pieces of information could be accessed.

[Collect prize]

[Access the 31st floor]

[Countdown Clock]

[Pillar Network]

[Access pillar ranking]

There are plenty of weird terms that Viktor couldn't really understand, but he of course was focused on the collect prize option.

However, just as he was about to touch the option, Jessie stopped him and said.

"Check the bottom one, pillar ranking!! Oh my god, this is amazing"!

Ever since they started traveling together, Viktor had always known that the girl was always of a cheerful sort. However, this time her happiness was on another level. Viktor smiled at her in slight exasperation before pressing the final option.

[Accessing pillar ranking…]

The notification persisted for a bit, before a beam of light came out from the top of the cube. It looked like a screen filled with weird letters, but thanks to the bracelet, Viktor was able to understand what they meant.

[This is the pillar rank according to completion time:]

[Rank 1. Doomsday Pillar 765 - Completed on Day 165 - Location: Italy]

[Rank 2. Doomsday Pillar 644 - Completed on Day 170 - Location: Greece]

[Rank 3. Doomsday Pillar 170 - Completed on Day 172 - Location: China]

[Rank 4. Doomsday Pillar 321 - Completed on Day 173 - Location: America]

[Rank 5. Doomsday Pillar 778 - Completed on Day 175 - Location: Germany]

[Rank 6…]

[Rank 7…]

[Rank 8...]

After browsing through the list, Viktor finally found what he was looking for.

[Rank 458. Doomsday Pillar 888 - Completed on Day 728 - Location: Russia]

Viktor understood what it meant right away. Considering that this was the 458th out of 1008 pillars, it seems that even after 728 days passed, almost 2 years after the pillars arrived, humanity only managed to clear 458 pillars up to level 30. That was not even half of them.

As for the 888, it must be the particular pillar's code number or similar.

However, Jessie still looked interested, it seems that it was not what Jessie wanted to show him.

"Check on the completion ranking!"

Viktor, who was still confused, decided to follow along with her instructions.

[Accessing pillar ranking…]

After a few seconds, a completely different list came into view, and reading the first line was enough to surprise Viktor.

[This is the pillar rank according to completion ranking:]

[Rank 1. Doomsday Pillar 888 - Rank A+ Location: Russia]

Of course, he was shocked. How did the pillar he just completed go up to the first rank in terms of completion ranking?

Jessie reminded him about what they did in the challenge and the notification they got before. The ranking clearly means that there were no other groups that could even close to clearing the three objectives as they did.

"This is crazy!"

"Yes, it really is!"

Jessie added that the big post-Doomsday nations such as the Vatican, China, and America have all tried to send their brightest and strongest members to try and get a higher ranking, but none of them could ever reach A+. Actually, before this day, they never heard of anything higher than A before.

His curiosity pigued, Viktor decided to scroll down and go through the other pillars in the list.

[Rank 1. Doomsday Pillar 888 - Rank A+ Location: Russia]

[Rank 2. Doomsday Pillar 974 - Rank A Location: Australia]

[Rank 3. Doomsday Pillar 170 - Rank A Location: China]

[Rank 4. Doomsday Pillar 791 - Rank A Location: Italy]

[Rank 5. Doomsday Pillar 784 - Rank A Location: Italy]

[Rank 6. Doomsday Pillar 166 - Rank A Location: China]

[Rank 7. Doomsday Pillar 311 - Rank A Location: America]

[Rank 8. Doomsday Pillar 759 - Rank A Location: Italy]

[Rank 9. Doomsday Pillar 144 - Rank A Location: China]

On one hand, it was an amazing achievement, but on the other hand, Viktor was a bit surprised, why is Australia on rank 2? If that was true, it means the country that was supposed to be down under was the previous first rank holder. There has to be a story behind that.

However, if it was true, Viktor realized he had another problem on his hands. The fact that Russia is the first rank now means that he would be the focus. He started thinking and mentally questioned.

Wouldn't this just make him stand out too much? Also, wouldn't the competing nations look for the one who did it? This could be problematic, as this would lead to his presence being known. If it was before doomsday, Viktor will certainly be happy to become a celebrity but not know. He was sure it will only bring a threat to him or at least gave him more responsibility.

Out of curiosity, Viktor checked if any of the Russian pillars was in the top 20. He only found his country's name one rank after that.

[Rank 21. Doomsday Pillar 863 - Rank B+ Location: Russia]

[Rank 29. Doomsday Pillar 871 - Rank B Location: Russia]

In the top 50, there are only 3 Russian pillars, which was concerning. With the Russian pillar suddenly shooting to the first rank, Viktor could see this become a bigger issue than anticipated.

Just as he was thinking, suddenly a notification came from the stone panels. It sounded like an alarm,

"What is that? What's going on?"

[Pillar Network]

[Doomsday Pillar 311 - location America, are requesting a communication]

Jessie explained that it was one of the options that would give him access to all pillars that have completed level 30 to contact each other.

"Just like a mobile phone?"

This message could only mean one thing, someone in America wishes to know who was it that manage to clear this pillar with such outstanding rank.

Viktor muttered as he stared at the notification, "What should we do?"

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Written by Avans, Published exclusively by W.e.b.n.o.v.e.l,