TS - Chapter 29

Bright but diffuse light shown down from a featureless sky.  From the second Kat had opened her eyes, she’d been sitting atop a square pillar with nothing around her.  Each side of her platform was about six paces long, just big enough that she could walk and move a little without risking herself, but not nearly large enough for Kat to try anything strenuous.

A quick check of her status sheet confirmed that Kat was in the Tower, but she pretty clearly wasn’t on the twenty second floor where she belonged.  She glanced at the edge and rolled her eyes.  Usually a fairly basic requirement of being on a certain floor was the existence of said floor.  Kat suspected that the title didn’t apply to whatever void she was trapped in.

She closed her status and laid down on her back, looking up into the bright but empty sky.  The seconds ticked past, one after another and nothing changed.  Kat’s hearing could pick up a cricket walking through grass at a dozen paces, but the entire floor was soundless.  Other than the sensation of the stone platform against her back, it felt like Kat was in a sensory deprivation chamber.

After almost a minute passed, she closed her eyes and reached out to the gravity around her.  It was strangely distant, hard to manipulate, like Kat had to thrust her arms elbow deep in thick mud in order to grasp and pull on the force that usually reacted instantly to her lightest thoughts.

A couple seconds of pushing lowered its pull on Kat and she began accelerating upward.  She tried to readjust, tweaking her gravity up just a bit so she would slow down, only to accidentally push the force too far.

With a soft thump, she landed back on the platform, her body still a little lighter than normal, but far from buoyant enough to hover seamlessly.

“Are you ready to be tested?”  The voice was deep.  As heavy as a mountain as it pounded into Kat’s chest.  She could feel more than hear the words as they rattled their bones.

“I take it that you are T?”  She asked, once again reaching out with her domain to see if she could try and locate the speaker.  The air around her practically crackled with mana, disrupting her mental senses and halving their range.

“Yes,” the voice said dryly.  “Just as you are Katherine.  I have been watching your climb through the tower and I must say, for one of the junior races you have been entertaining.  When I was young, the galaxy was a dangerous place.  We were not using mana for games and petty power struggles.  We used it to tame the titanic rampaging energies that filled the galactic core.  We cooled suns so that new worlds could sustain life.”

“That bred a certain kind of warrior,” it continued “someone who struggled and bled for power.  Someone willing to wrestle cosmic forces, beings made of nothing but mana, gamma radiation and malice, simply so that civilization could live and flourish.”

“And now,” it rumbled onward, almost sadly, “it is time for our people to step back.  We created a path to power, a nod to the times when sheer strength and violence might be needed again, but none of us really wanted our grandchildren and great grandchildren to live the lives we did.  Our people laid the groundwork for a safe and orderly galaxy.  A place where the young ones could grow up in peace, creating art and culture while living their short lives to the fullest.”

“It appears that we have been absent too long,” the voice finished.  “The handful of us that have remained to watch over the system have turned a blind eye to the factions and petty nonsense that has taken place in their Consensus.  We reasoned that you can tell a child not to touch a nova, but they will not learn properly until they have burned themselves.  Unfortunately, it appears that their squabbles have changed things.  Some of the children think themselves superior to the others and are forcing their younger siblings to hold onto the nova, all while reaping the benefits themselves.  It is a perversion of our intentions.  One that extends beyond the realms of the freedom that we intended to grant the younger races.”

The empty chamber lapsed into silence when the voice stopped speaking.  Kat waited for a second for it to speak up.  Then another.  Before she knew it, a half minute had passed without any words or sound.

A bead of sweat rolled down the side of her face.

“Are you going to help me?”  She asked.  “I thought you said that you were going to draw me into a test or something of the sort.  

“I cannot interfere fully,” it replied, a hint of contrition in its bass voice as it echoed through the empty chamber.  “Our race re-emerging on the galactic stage would upset things too much.  As bad as things have grown, many of our grandchildren, such as your lokkel companion, are living as they should.  If we were to appear suddenly, entire civilizations would collapse in order to worship us as gods.  It has happened in the past and the adulation is beyond tiring.”

“If it makes you feel any better,” Kat said, smiling up at the empty and invisible ceiling, “I’ll make sure to still sass you.  You might be able to crack suns apart and eat black holes or whatever it is your people do, but that doesn’t mean you should get too comfortable.”

It laughed, a great booming sound that seemed to shake the pillar underneath her.  For a second worry filled Kat as she remembered the difficulty she had with hovering in the strange place, but she quickly dismissed it.  T wouldn’t drag her here and hint at aiding her just to destroy the pillar she was standing on.  Probably.

“Clearly you are worth preserving,” the voice replied.  “My companions are not opposed to me helping you, but that is all it can be.  Help and you will need to earn it.  If I had my way, I would simply intercede on your behalf tomorrow.  I have seen your resolve and you are one of us.  Someone born in and tempered by struggle.  Given enough time, I am sure you will climb to the top of this silly tower of ours.  It is only reasonable that we give you a fair chance to make that climb.”

“Then what do I have to do for this help?” She asked, standing up and arching her back to stretch out any kinks.  “I suspect you don’t actually need my assistance with anything, so I am presuming this is going to be about me proving myself worthy of whatever help you’re planning on providing?”

“I cannot break the rules of the tower,” it responded, “but I can bend them.  I have created a floor of the tower for you and you alone.  One worth a quadruple claw’s worth of dungeons, all at the silver difficulty.  Not quite enough to catch you up with the other ascension candidate, but it should help you narrow the gap considerably.”

It chuckled, once again rattling the world around Kat before it continued.

“Mind you, power does not come without a cost.  The floor will be as difficult as twenty four dungeons all at the same time.  Enough that you can complete an entire floor of the Tower in one attempt.  I cannot provide a shortcut around the struggle demanded by the tower for you to ascend a level, but  I can… twist time a bit.  WIth my interference, you will be able to spend close to a month pushing through the secret floor and complete an entire level during a single night.”

Kat took a deep breath and nodded.  She hadn’t known what to expect, but a single night to progress to the twenty third floor?  Even if it came with an absurd risk, that was an advantage that she couldn’t afford to pass up.

“What about the rest of my team?”  She questioned.  “Powering myself up is a great plan, but if they’re behind the curve I won’t be able to challenge a floor boss on my own.  Our group is only going to ascend to the twenty third floor once we’re all ready at the same time.  Anything less than that would cripple our development.  No matter how fast I need to move on Earth, I’m not willing to hamstring myself for momentary gain.”

“Of course not,” the voice boomed.  “I would expect nothing less.  Your entire team seems to be forged from the same star as you, even if you have a bit more edge than them.  All three of you will enter the special floor together.”

“Admittedly,” it continued with a low chuckle, “your companions will have no idea what is happening.  They have already entered the tower and are waiting for you at an adventurer’s hall.  They are in for a bit of surprise once you agree to challenge the secret floor.”

“But I haven’t agreed to run this secret floor yet,” Kat said, hopping up and down on the balls of her feet.  “For all you know, now that you’ve told me the risks,  I’m going to opt out and try the slow but steady route.”

“No,” it replied.  “You’re not.”

“No,” Kat agreed.  “I’m not.”

The pillar under Kat’s feet shattered, rocks and boulders disappearing as they arced off into the abyss.

On instinct, Kat reached out with her gravity domain, trying to grab hold of her surroundings to keep herself aloft only for a pulse of mana to wash through the air around her.  She could still feel the gravity, still assert some control over it, but the same rules applied to someone else, and their power was far behind her.

Kat started pouring mana into her domain, but by the time the air around her began to energize it was too late.  Her control shattered and the gravity around her tripled, sending her rocketing downward into the diffuse white light and fog that cloaked the ground below.

She hit the light and it billowed around her before swallowing Kat up entirely.  She fell for almost a minute, the bright cloud obscuring her vision as she picked up speed, traveling faster and faster until her body and armor began to heat up and glow red from air resistance.

Just as she was about to cast Resist Heat, Kat burst from the clouds.  Below her was a pastoral landscape, rolling grassy hills cradling a small village with a herd of what looked like sheep grazing nearby.  Just outside the village was a singular mountain, lonely and mysterious as it jutted out of the land without any sort of foothills or change in biome to herald its existence.

All of that flashed past in a second, and just as Kat was about to hit the ground a cloud of white light suddenly appeared, slowing her to a stop in a fraction of a second before disappearing and dropping her unceremoniously into the grass.

Part of her mind rebelled.  Her time in school had focused mostly on biology and genetics, but she hadn’t completely forsaken physics.  Kat knew that falling at terminal velocity only to stop in a fraction of a second was about as healthy as jumping in front of a speeding semi.  Newton’s laws didn’t care about how ‘soft’ the cloud was.  They only cared about her speed, mass, and how quickly that speed was dissipated.

But she was fine.  Whatever T had done, it didn’t seem to care about Newton’s opinions or her.  No matter how much she gaped at the impossibility of her situation, Kat was safe and uninjured.

About fifty paces away a sheep was looking at her, slowly chewing on grass.  Kat looked back.

It lowered its head to the grass to tear out another bite just as flashes of multicolored light on either side of her heralded Dorrik and Kaleek’s arrival.  Both of them drew their weapons in a flash and dropped into combat stances.

One of the sheep ‘baaed’ at them, apparently annoyed that the three strangers were disturbing their lunch.

“Kat,” Kaleek said, not shifting out of his stance.  “Would you care to tell me what’s going on and why I can’t use stamina right now?”

Before she could say anything, a system box popped up in front of her.

Kat mentally pressed yes.  She wasn’t sure exactly how she knew, but Kaleek and Dorrik also agreed to the dungeon.

“Fascinating,” Dorrik began.  “In all my years studying the dreamscape, I have never found any reference to a secret dungeon.  I am sure this has something to do with the administrator intervention that Miss Kat requested.  I will have to take notes this entire time.  Just what we have encountered in the last five minutes is enough data to warrant an entirely new thesis on dreamscape operations.”

“Huh,” Kaleek said, cocking his head to the side.  “That’s completely new.  I can’t say I’m thrilled with this complications line that seems to indicate that all of our tower abilities are disabled.  If I’m going to be stuck in a dungeon that’s as tough as twenty four combined, I’m going to want to have access to all my powers.”

“Restrictions are rare but there are records of them,” Dorrik replied, awe in his voice.  “But those restrictions are usually much more limited, banning fire magic or bladed weapons rather than an entire category such as magic or psi abilities.  Of course, I have never heard of a dungeon that blocks all abilities.  I suppose we still have our attributes, skills, and perks, but it seems like the goal of this dungeon is to force us to triumph as we were before the tower, without any special abilities beyond our talent with our weapons.”

“I don’t suppose anyone knows what the ‘format’ line means?” Kat asked, glancing down at her armor and weapons.  The armor was heavier than she remembered.  It didn’t fit quite as well, rubbing and chafing in places that it had previously smoothly conformed to her skin.

She couldn’t feel any mana from it.  Evidently, the limitations on equipment meant that the enchantments painstakingly etched into her weapons and armor weren’t going to function as workarounds for the ban on magic.  It sure seemed like Kaleek was onto something.

“No idea,” the big desoph responded, glancing down at his waist before squinting with displeasure.  “Did anyone else notice that all of their potions are gone?  Apparently the tower really intends for us to rough it.  I have a limited regeneration perk that I suspect is still working, but beyond that, I don’t think any of us should count on healing or mana recovery.”

“I doubt we will recover after sleeping,” Dorrik chimed in thoughtfully.  “Ordinarily an avatar dissipates when a warrior awakens and is reformed when they sleep and this process of destruction and recreation functionally heals all wounds.  If our bodies aren’t dissipating when we go to sleep-”

“Crap,” Kat said dully.  “I think you’re right.  No healing from magic.  No healing from potions.  No healing from waking up early.  We’re going to have to fight a lot more carefully.  A minor injury now that festers over the next week might be enough to cripple us during whatever this boss battle is.”

Kaleek glanced around once before raising a hand and scratching the back of his head sheepishly.

“I really feel like I have nothing but questions,” he said.  “None of this makes any sense.  For example, why does the system say that we are forty five seconds from our first encounter when there’s nothing around us?  No monsters, no foreboding ruins.  I don’t even see a shepherd taking care of all these sheep.”

Before Kat or Dorrik could respond, a blur of wings and scales whooshed past the three of them, slamming into the field beside them with a loud thump and a blast of air that knocked Kat a step backward.

Her eyes widened as she took another step backward.  Sheep ran in every direction, bleating in panic, and at the center of where their herd had been grazing stood a dragon.  It was at least fifteen paces high at the shoulder and from fang filled snout to the end of its bladed tail it was almost eighty paces long.

Underneath one of its claws, a ram struggled fruitlessly to free itself.  The dragon’s head darted downward with a fluid, snake-like grace and tore the sheep’s head off in one smooth motion before fixing its eyes on their party.

It roared and the sound hit the three of them like an avalanche, a paen of pride and triumph that threatened to overwhelm their party without the giant reptile taking a single step toward them.

“Oh,” Dorrik said quietly.  “I think that is the encounter that the system was referring to.”

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -  
<-Previous<-

Index

->Next->