[Adventurer's Association, Front Desk]
Melvina, the elven receptionist, watched Reece's retreating figure disappear into the crowded streets outside, his cloak trailing behind him like a shadow. She blinked, a faint feeling of disorientation lingering as she returned to the stack of papers in her hands. There was something unsettling, perhaps even haunting, about the man in the blank black mask. But her mind was still processing her recent interaction with him when her colleague approached.
"Hey, big sis Melvina? Who was that person in the shady mask who just left?" Cassidy asked, her tone a mixture of curiosity and confusion.
Melvina glanced up from her papers, her brows knitting together. "What are you talking about, Cassidy?"
Cassidy sighed as she took a stack of paperwork from Melvina, noticing the strange look in her senior's eyes. "Oh, you know exactly what I mean! You were polite to a newbie! Who was he?"
"Polite?" Melvina echoed, a bit thrown off. "I don't even remember his name… and yet…. the system registered his card."
She sifted through the stack of papers, her fingers pausing over the only recent application that seemed out of place. "Hold still for a moment, Cassidy," she murmured as she scanned the form. Her eyes landed on the name—or rather, the alias—that the mysterious climber had given.
"Prime… When did he say that?" she mumbled to herself, a faint look of bewilderment crossing her features.
"Wait, wait, wait… did you just say Prime?" Cassidy stuttered, her eyes widening as she repeated the name, trying to keep her voice steady.
Melvina shot her a look. "Now you're the one acting strange. Go on, get back to sorting these."
Cassidy ignored her senior's reprimand and leaned in, her eyes alight with excitement as she scanned the application form for herself. "Big sis… if this is who I think it is, you've hit the jackpot!"
"Explain," Melvina said simply, her gaze sharpening.
Cassidy took a deep breath, her words spilling out in a rush. "Since you rarely deal with new applicants, the rest of us usually work with them. But today, this mysterious guy dressed in all black, with a blank mask, went to your queue, and you ended up handling his application." She cast a meaningful look at her senior, her voice dropping. "This isn't just any climber, big sis… he's the rumored monster among monsters!"
Melvina's eyes narrowed. "And I'm guessing this Prime is the one?"
Cassidy nodded, her face a mix of excitement and disbelief. "You bet. And don't take the word 'monster' lightly. Even I had a hard time believing it when I first heard it."
Melvina tilted her head, intrigued. "What exactly are you struggling to believe?"
"Well," Cassidy began, "the rumors among the other newbies say that he's the first to clear this round's tutorial."
Melvina raised an eyebrow. "What's so impressive about that?"
Cassidy shook her head, clearly exasperated. "Big sis, he cleared the tutorial in under three hours. His rating was a 9.5! Do you understand what that means?"
Melvina's eyes widened as realization dawned on her. "A 9.5… which means he could potentially reach the 95th floor or higher."
She fell silent, a slow grin spreading across her face as she absorbed this information. "Interesting," she murmured, a spark of fascination lighting her eyes. She glanced back toward the door, her thoughts racing. "Very interesting…"
***********************
[2nd Floor, Safe Zone]
Reece spent the next week entrenched in a routine of rigorous combat and relentless training. After registering with the Adventurer's Association, he wasted no time in heading across the street to the Floor Teleportation Building, ready to begin his ascent.
Many new climbers might have thought that starting the climb was a grand, ceremonious event—a declaration of their entry into greatness. But in reality, it was far more sobering. Entering the Tower was akin to setting foot on a one-way path to death, with only one's mental resilience and raw strength to carry them forward.
Reece, however, understood this better than anyone. He had seen countless climbers fall prey to the Tower's challenges, overestimating their strength or underestimating the consequences of failure.
In many ways, the climber's respawn crystal—the crystallized soul that granted climbers three lives—was both a blessing and a curse. Climbers grew overconfident, treating the Tower like a mere game until they faced the chilling reality of their final death. For Reece, this was just another cycle, a climb he had completed more times than he cared to remember.
As he stepped onto the teleportation pad, he took a slow breath, readying himself for the journey ahead. This time, he planned to grind ruthlessly through the lower floors, gathering as much power as he could before seeking Liz on the fifth floor. He needed strength, enough to blaze through the mobs without hesitation.
"Prima, show me my stats. I want to see what we're working with this time," he requested as they landed in the safe zone of the second floor—a small patch of grassland surrounded by dense forest as far as the eye could see.
A translucent screen appeared before him, different in design from the Tower's typical interface, displaying his status in crisp, clean text:
[Race: Primal Human]
[Evolution: Normal Primal Human]
[HP: 100%]
[PM (Primal Mana): Mana Heart: 100%, Mana Brain: 99%]
[Gifts:]
RegressionUnknown…
[Stats:]
Strength: SSVitality: AAgility: S+Intelligence: SS+Wisdom: EX
[Passive Skills + Techniques + Spells:]
Technique: Soul Sense – Active
[Active Skills + Techniques + Spells:]
[None]
[Comments:] Let the daily grind begin! (¬‿¬)
Reece chuckled at the comment. "Your comments are getting weirder and weirder, Prima."
Prima's voice held a playful tone. "Camila and the others used to say it was a way to keep things light. You tend to get too serious, Master."
Sighing, Reece shifted his focus back to the task at hand. His immediate goal was simple: carve a path through floors two to four and start grinding the mini-boss on the fifth floor. Each level he gained brought him closer to the strength he'd need to secure Liz's survival and evolution.
The structure of the Tower's lower floors was familiar—forest terrains populated by a variety of creatures adapted to the shadows and dense underbrush. The real chaos of the Tower only started beyond the 50th floor, where gravity ceased and space itself twisted. But for now, the dense forests of floors two to ten were his playground.
Ahead lay The Verdant Tangle, an endless stretch of forest that dominated the second floor. Towering trees loomed above, their roots twisting across the ground like veins, thick and knotted. A heavy canopy shrouded the forest in a dim green light, casting everything in a perpetual twilight.
Vines and moss clung to every surface, and the damp, earthy scent hung thick in the humid air. Within these woods lurked the creatures that populated the Tower's lower floors—primarily low-ranked goblins, wargs, and the occasional vine serpent.
The second floor, in particular, was home to grub-goblins, the lowest tier of goblin-kind. Small and scrawny, these goblins looked like furless, rodent-like creatures with wrinkled, beady eyes that squinted in the dim light. They moved in large packs, driven by a primal instinct to consume whatever crossed their path.
It didn't take long for Reece to find a horde of them as he left the safe zone. A drove of over fifty grub-goblins was scattered through the underbrush, scavenging for their next meal, unaware of the predator in their midst. For a novice climber, this swarm would have been a death sentence. But for Reece, this was nothing more than a warm-up.
He studied the horde, noting their positions and calculating his next move. "Prima, a simple area spell should do the trick."
In these lower floors, Reece needed to gather experience points quickly, eliminating as many creatures as possible to meet the Tower's requirements for leveling up. The Tower's system evaluated climbers based on a straightforward formula: grind against weaker monsters or challenge stronger foes. For Reece, who had the mythical class of Arcane Warlord, the choice was clear. He would clear these floors through sheer power, displaying dominance and efficiency in every encounter.
As he prepared, he cast a protective barrier around himself, designed to shield his clothes from the destructive force of his attacks. With his mana charged, he unleashed [Flame Domain], an area spell that engulfed the surrounding forest in a controlled blaze. Flames erupted around him, consuming the goblins in an instant, their shrieks of pain swallowed by the roar of fire. The entire area was scorched, the once verdant forest floor reduced to smoldering ash.
"That's one way to clear a path," he muttered, stepping over the charred remains.
The next hours passed in much the same way, with Reece moving methodically through the forest, clearing wave after wave of goblins and wargs. His power was overwhelming; primal mana surged through his spells, a rare energy source that defied classification by the Tower's standards. His attacks left trails of devastation in their wake, patches of scorched earth and the twisted bodies of monsters marking his path.
The mass slaughter did not go unnoticed. Veteran climbers and seasoned adventurers soon noticed the unusual destruction spreading through The Verdant Tangle. Forested areas, normally crawling with monsters that even they struggled to handle, were eerily devoid of life. Here and there, they stumbled upon scorched clearings, littered with the corpses of goblins and wargs, evidence of a powerful presence moving through the floor.
"What on earth…?" one climber muttered, crouching near a pile of goblin ashes. His gaze was wary, his hand hovering over the hilt of his sword. "I've never seen anything like this."
"Stay back," another warned, his voice low and tense. "Whatever did this… it isn't normal. No ordinary climber has power like this."
Rumors began to spread among the climbers who witnessed the aftermath. Words like "monster" and "demon" filled the air, whispers of a figure in black tearing through the Tower's lower floors with ease. Even veteran climbers, those who had honed their skills and developed a mastery over mana, felt a chill as they observed the destruction left behind. No one could make sense of the strange, unknown energy that lingered at the site of each massacre. Primal mana was beyond their understanding, an enigma that left even seasoned fighters at a loss.
As Reece continued his relentless advance, Prima's voice broke through his focus. "Master, it seems you're making quite the impression. Word is spreading fast among the climbers."
Reece chuckled, unbothered. "Let them talk. The sooner I reach Liz, the better."
He cast another spell, a flare of primal energy igniting in his palm as he strode deeper into The Verdant Tangle. The forest stretched out before him, a vast and shadowy maze, but to Reece, it was little more than an obstacle. With every step, he grew closer to his goal, his power resonating through the air, a force that defied the Tower's conventions.
"Onward," he murmured, his eyes glinting with quiet resolve. The path to the fifth floor awaited him, and he would carve through it without hesitation.