The universe is bigger than our minds can possibly understand.

Julie Stevenson

“Are you telling me you don’t know what Climbers’ Academy is?” I asked. “Are you even from Tower City?”

“I told you they are stupid,” said Susan.

“I’ve never heard of Tower City,” said Julie. “Is that just a nickname like the Windy City?”

“I’m from Tower City,” said Sarah. “But I have never heard of this academy. Is it new?”

“You are all really dumb,” said Susan. “Let me make this easy for all of you. What year were you born?”

“2022,” said Julie.

“2023,” said Amanda, half a moment later.

“58,” said Sarah, looking confused.

“273,” I answered.

“270,” said Susan smiling. “Do you all really not get it?

“Holy shit,” said Julie. “Are you telling me that you are all from a different time?”

“What do you mean different time?” asked Sarah.

“Not you or me,” said Julie. “I entered in the first year the Tower was on Earth. How many years had the Tower been on Earth when you entered?”

“Two years in,” said Amanda quietly.

“What? That’s not possible,” said Sarah. “I entered when the Tower had been on Earth for 79 years.”

“295 years for me,” said Susan.

“302 years,” I said. “How is that possible?”

“Time dilation,” said Julie. “Thanks to relativity it is more than just possible.”

“What the hell is time dilation and relativity?” I asked. “I saw the notice about time dilation on each level but I have no idea what it is.”

“Is that like time travel?” asked Amanda.

“It is like one way time travel,” said Julie excitedly.

Julie then proceeded to talk about time, gravity, light and watches on planes. I’m going to be honest, I understood maybe 2% of what she was saying. It’s not that she was using complex words, but it still felt like she was speaking a foreign language.

“I think you lost all of them,” said Susan when Julie finally stopped talking fifteen minutes later. “I will simplify it. All of your family and anyone you knew is long dead; you have all been in the Tower for a couple hundred years. That is all of you except for Mik, my love. You have only been in the Tower for about a day and a half from the perspective of the people of Tower City.”

“You shut your fucking mouth,” said Sarah. “I have only been in the Tower for two years.”

“I hate to agree with Susan, but she is right,” said Sarah. “Time dilation can either slow down time relative to you or speed it up, it can’t make people go back in time. At least 300 years have passed since I entered the Tower. But I don’t think you can know with confidence about Miki. For all we know it may have been decades since he entered.”

“I do know,” said Susan confidently. “I have a skill that lets me see the future and know certain things.”

“That’s impossible,” said Amanda.

“So is a magical tower that transports us to other worlds,” said Susan.

“If you can see the future, do I get out of here?” I asked. “Do I get to see my family?”

“Of course my love. In most of the futures I see, you live and complete the Tower.”

Stolen content alert: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.

“What do you mean most?” I asked.

“At least 10%,” said Susan smiling.

“That isn’t most,” pointed out Amanda.

“Well I can ignore all the ones where he dies in combat or gives up part way through. He will finish it, after all he is the protagonist.”

“What about the rest of us?” asked Sarah. “Do we make it out alive?”

“I don’t know,” said Susan. “Why would I waste time looking into your futures?”

“I think I am going to need a little bit to process this,” said Amanda.

“I agree,” said Sarah. “But we can’t forget that a monster wave is coming in 10 days. We better warn the village and see if we can find the trick to defeating it.”

“What do you mean the ‘trick’?” I asked.

“Like an older villager who is secretly a former adventurer that will help unify and lead the villagers,” said Julie.

“Or a crazy witch who lives in the woods that we can convince to help us fight,” said Amanda. “She will be hesitant at first but will turn out to be amazingly powerful and will turn the tide of the fight.”

“Or a cultivator who is overpowered for this floor and can do all the fighting for us,” said Susan grinning at me.

All three of the other women paused and turned towards me.

“Hey Miki, you're one of them cultivators aren’t you?” asked Sarah. “Do you mind taking care of the monsters for us?”

“I could,” I said. I quickly looked over all their levels again. They were just all too weak. “But I think it would be better if I didn’t.”

“I’m not going to sleep with you if that is what you are wanting,” said Sarah.

“I will,” said Susan and Amanda at the same time.

“What?” said Amanda. “He’s cute and some sex would be a nice distraction.”

“As tempting as the offers may be, that would be a bad idea,” I said. “We are climbing the next ten floors together and I don’t want to create any tension in our party.” And I was sure Susan would stab anyone who had sex with me.

“Then why are you being a dick?” asked Sarah. “Just go kill the monsters for us.”

“I’m not going to kill the monsters for two reasons: first they will not give me any experience if they are under level 20 and second you are all going to need the experience more.”

“I need over 30,000 experience to go up a level,” said Julie. “I don’t think I would be able to kill enough low level monsters in order to get that experience. And I am not confident in fighting the higher level monsters, since the ones in the dungeon were hard enough. I will just wait to see if I get another level up as a reward for completing the floor.”

“I will teach all of you to cultivate. By the time the monsters arrive you should be able to gain levels easier. I will also teach you some fighting techniques so you can kill the monsters easier.”

“Is it that easy to learn how to cultivate?” asked Sarah.

“Well I have something that makes it easy. Did any of you find a hidden treasure on the other floors?”

All of them said “yes” except Julie. I looked at all of their equipment and realized that Julie was the only one who did not have a storage bag on her back. I would pass my bag over to her later as I did not need it anymore.

“Well on the first floor, this was the hidden treasure,” I said, pulling out the cultivation manual and tossing it to Sarah.

She flipped through the book before looking at me.

“It’s blank,” she said, passing it back to me. I quickly scanned the pages and they were all filled out. That was weird. I guess it only worked for me.

“Well I can read it,” I said. “It taught me how to cultivate. It took me a little under a week to learn the first step. If I can teach it to you all it will greatly decrease the experience needed to level as well as provide additional stats to further strengthen your body.”

“How much of a reduction and how much does it strengthen your body?” asked Julie.

“It will reduce the experience required down to 500 for your next level,” I said flipping to a page I knew outlined the changes. “In terms of additional stat gains, they increase as you increase your cultivation. Right now each of my stats have increased 80 points from my regular levels and over 250 for my cultivation.”

It didn’t take long for all of them to agree to my plan.

“Before you start teaching us, we need to go to the village and get a place to stay,” said Julie.

“I think I need to talk with Julie and Sarah,” said Amanda. “This has been more stressful for us than you two. Why don’t the two of you go to the town and we will catch up in a little bit?”

“That is a great plan,” said Susan, grabbing my arm and dragging me away from the rest of the group towards the town in the distance.

Eventually I gave up on fighting her and instead went along with her. It was not until about halfway to the town before I could extract my arm once more from hers. As we approached it was clear this was more of a village than a town. I could count only about 30 buildings and there wasn’t even a wall surrounding the buildings.

We must have been spotted by someone since when we arrived at the edge of the buildings a small crowd had gathered.

“Rejoice mortals!” shouted Susan striding forward in front of me. “My great lord and lover Miki has come to spare your village from the thousands of monsters that will overwhelm this shithole in 10 days. While many of you may die, be glad that you may be able to see him at least once in your miserable lives.”

What the fuck. I tried to pull her back when she started to talk but she would not stop until I grabbed her hand and stepped in front of her.

“I’m sorry, my companion is a little over zealous,” I said, addressing the one I thought was likely the village elder since he was in front of the other. “I am Miki. I have been sent with a group of other heroes to fight a monster horde that is coming this way. Is there a place we can stay as we prepare for the monsters?”

The villagers looked back and forth between us in clear shock and confusion. This was not going well.