Hope walked towards the Tower, his mind filled with questions.
Hope: "Master, why are we going to the Tower now? I mined illumination mana stones and got some cash. I can buy items and absorb their skills. Besides, the people outside Kara's door haven't left yet, and I'm leaving her alone there."
Master: "You need to get specific skills, and it will be far easier if you do it in the Tower. We can go buy items after this is done. Besides, I need to see how you progress in a fight and how you adjust to your stats."
Hope: "Okay, then. Are we going mining? I need to collect equipment from the rental shop if I want to mine mana crystals."
Master: "Yes, you can mine too. Even if you're training, you need a steady income source."
Hope: "Training?"
Master: "Yes, you're going to train in the Tower from now on. Yesterday, after I checked all your stats, I knew you awakened as an F-ranker, and after unlocking the two specific skills, your stats reached fifty and above. But your body is incapable of handling the sudden status change. You've likely felt the pain in your body, right? By using healing spells, you've managed that pain and gone unnoticed. But today, I'm going to teach you how to adjust your body to your stats."
Hope nodded, absorbing the information. He stopped by the rental shop, collecting several pickaxes, shovels, and other equipment. The receptionist looked surprised, probably thinking he was preparing for a large expedition.
As Hope traveled towards the third floor, he conversed with the Master about his skills and which areas needed improvement.
Master: "You have no natural affinity, but you picked up dark affinity. Good for you, kid. But you never learned how to use it properly."
Hope: "I actually got the skills a few days back and tried my best. I learned three or four attack spells."
Master: "WRONG! You've only scratched the surface. There are many more ways you can use dark affinity. It means you're closer to darkness than any other affinity. That means you can communicate with shadows, coat yourself with dark mist like the Wraith did, and if you focus, you can turn your mana into darkness and blend into it, becoming like darkness itself."
They reached the third floor hunting area.
Hope: "We've reached the third floor. Now tell me what to do."
Master: "Who told you to stop? We're going to the above floors."
Hope: "Above floors? I'll go up after I get more skills and stats. It's too dangerous for me to go up there—there will be more powerful monsters."
Master: "More powerful monsters are exactly what you need. We're going to the 5th floor."
Hope hesitated for a moment but trusted his Master's words and continued to the 5th floor.
Upon reaching the 5th floor, Hope was met with a completely different environment. The forest from the previous floor was gone, replaced by a more spacious area. He could see various monsters—goblins armed with projectiles, goblin mages, goblin warriors, and kobolds, creatures resembling wolves, as well as slimes.
Hope: "Are we going to kill goblins?"
Master: "No, we're going to kill slimes."
Hope: "Slimes? If it were slimes, we could have killed them on the 1st floor. Why are we going this high up to hunt slimes?"
Master: "Even if you have knowledge, you don't know how to use it. Do you know how your stats work, kid?"
Hope: "Stats work… they work like normal, right?"
Master: "Then tell me how each of your stats works."
Hope: "Strength increases the strength of my body. Agility increases my speed, like that."
Master: "It's not that simple. Every stat has a complex use. For example, the strength stat increases your muscles and bone strength to handle the power displayed. Agility not only increases your leg strength but also enhances your reaction speed and overall quickness. Even luck has its use. If you desire something, the luck stat can convert that desire into reality by its capacity. If you have 1000 luck, you can gain passive good luck, and by the stat's capacity, it can even grant micro wishes. And if you're an A-ranker or above, you can use specific stat skill boosts, just like Kara did the other day."
Hope: "Like Kara did? What did she do? I don't remember her using any skill other than the innate skill she got. She learned her second skill at my home yesterday night."
Master: "Oh, so you don't know. The people here need to know much about the system and the Tower. Kara used her stats in a unique way. When she calls out a stat or thinks of activating it, she can use it for 30 seconds at +50% capacity with her stats. This is an A-rank benefit. Even though she was a fake A-ranker, by focusing her stats in one area, she could utilize this advantage."
Hope's eyes widened as he began to understand the complexities of the Tower and the potential hidden within his stats. He realized there was much more to learn, and the journey ahead would be filled with challenges that would test him in ways he had never imagined.
Hope: "Okay then, I'll hunt slimes."
Master: "Wait. I told you only a part of it. Your luck is 55, and on other floors, the maximum capacity for spawning a skilled slime is 2%. But with your luck, it can increase to 20%. However, this floor is different. The spawn rate and monster strength are completely different, so we can easily get the skill we want just by wishing for it. So, wish it and start hunting. Based on your stats, a good skill to fuse will be resistance skills. Just think that you want that skill, and you'll be on your way to becoming more powerful and easily reach the top."
Hope (thinking): "I need to get these skills. If I want to save my mother, I need to be powerful. I need to climb to the top floor. I need to get the skill to cure my mother. I need the skill."
As Hope wished, the Master said:
Master: "I think it's working, kid. I can see it with the Eye of Truth. This floor has hit the max kill rate. Monsters are spawning from the Tower walls, and there are more slimes than goblins and kobolds."
Hope: "Attack the slimes! Get me their bodies!"
Hope summoned his skeletons and began hunting. His skeletons traveled around the floor unnoticed, killing slimes and putting them into Hope's subspace. Hope noticed something different—unlike the lower floor slimes, the slimes here were more powerful and had different properties. After an hour of hunting, Hope and his skeletons returned. Hope pulled all the slimes from the subspace. Among them were three slimes with skills. Hope used [Eaton] on them and gained magic resistance, poison resistance, and curse resistance.
Hope's pain in his body dissipated.
Master: "Your pain is gone, isn't it? Now, use the growth skill to level up all three of them."
Hope: "The resistance skills helped me so much. The pain in my body is gone, and now I think I can feel my power rising, and my body's structure is slowly changing."
Master: "It's because of the curse resistance and mana resistance skills. I wanted you to get more resistance skills, but this is enough for now. Now, we need to go buy equipment."
Hope exited the Tower, selling the bodies and mana stones, and reached the association shop near the Tower. There were many types of armor, blades with different colors, and mana stones of various sizes. Finally, Hope entered the shop, where he saw a giant mana stone the size of a boulder. Below it, there was an engraving: "Elemental Dragon Mana Stones - We salute the fallen heroes who saved us and our future generations."
Master: "With the people's knowledge in the Tower and the system, they managed to take down the Elemental Dragon. I underestimated you guys."
Hope: "The 12 heroes… only 7 remain. They are the greatest heroes who saved us in the Great War. They were all SSS rankers, and to kill the dragon army, they sacrificed themselves to save us all. I still remember the time they saved us."
Hope's Memories: Hope's father carrying him when he was a child. They were running with the crowd to safety. His mother was putting up a barrier to cover all the people, using all the mana she had. Dragons were attacking, and as the barrier started to break, Hope's mother mended the barrier on the spot. Finally, a dragon spat flames on the barrier, trying to consume the crowd of people. Hope still remembered as his father ran, carrying him with a face full of tears. The flames that the dragon spat were blocked by the barrier, but the heat burned his mother's hands. After she turned to look for Hope, she saw him far away. She smiled lightly, with eyes full of tears, and a dragon's paw broke the barrier. Hope said, "Mom..." while his father covered his mouth. The dragon swung its hand, but suddenly a blade slash passed the dragon, and its head started to fall off from its body. There, he saw his mother saved by a man in silver armor.
His recollection was interrupted by a woman saying:
Woman: "Sir, hello… are you in need of any assistance?"
Hope: "Uh, no, I'm good. Sorry for the delay. I need equipment."
Woman: "Is there anything specific you're looking for?"
Hope: "Mainly items with skills, even if they're nearly destroyed, it's okay for me."
Woman: "Right this way, sir."
As Hope followed her, he glanced back at the giant mana stone and smiled.