When Langa opened his eyes, he was back inside the throne room of Psike's Grotto. His head was suddenly assaulted by the invasion of multiple deities watching him. It made him tremble unsteadily.
[All the gods of The Deiwos Clan are watching you.]
[The Deiwos Clan goddess: The Red Flaming Blade of Menika, welcomes you as an Avatar of the Deiwos Clan]
Right, with the Sponsorship Challenge over, other deities could communicate with him again.
"Thanks," he said, not knowing what else to say to her.
He looked around the dungeon. The place was still as broken as it was before he left, but the magic circle carved by Tarquinius’ arrival was gone. The allemaks were still lying on the floor with their heads down, and Langa walked up to them.
”Hey, wake up. Have you guys been in that state for the whole hour?” he asked in bewilderment. He knew that it was an honour for them to see a deity, but was this necessary?
The allemak elder opened his eyes and looked up. “Oh, the great one is gone! What do you mean an hour? The Incarnation was just here a second ago,” he said, sounding confused.
Langa stared blankly at him. Had time not passed when he was in Lord Adtonifulmin’s domain? Well, he was not going to get any answers just standing here, so he walked over to the dead boss monster’s corpse. Since he had killed the boss, he had to clear the dungeon or it would collapse with him in it. It was located below a waterfall, and Langa had no desire to drown. Plus, if he did not store it, the boss' body would disappear. He had not taken any of the others because his inventory had been full, and the feathervault bag would have been too heavy for him to carry, slowing him down significantly.
Bending down, he removed the boss’s jacket and scanned it. While he was at it, he checked out the boss' Mana Core.
[Psike’s Trollskin Jerkin
Item Rank: Rare
Skills:
Distortion:
Grants its wearer the ability to vanish from the light. When activated, this skill renders the user completely invisible to the eye, however, the wearer must be mindful of potential detection factors, as invisibility doesn't silence your every move.
This skill has reduced effectiveness against beings with a high Perception Stat. The invisibility effect may end if an item is activated, a magical effect is used, or when interacting with another character.]
[Psike's Mana Core
Mana Discipline: Corrosion
Item Rank: Uncommon
Properties: A trollimp Lord Boss' mana core that contains corrosion discipline mana. Can be used to purify a mortal’s mana core, as a crafting ingredient or as single-use external mana core]
Langa grinned. So that boss monster had been so troublesome for him because of this jacket. Well, he would put it to good use. He didn’t need to think about it, as he currently had no jacket, and his jumpsuit armour needed repair, so he put it on. It stank because of the nature of Psike's mana, but beggars couldn't be choosers, as it shrank to accommodate Langa's smaller body. But a corrosion mana core, huh? Was it a derivative of both the darkness and poison mana disciplines or was it related to the death mana discipline? Either way, it was incompatible with him.
The floor of the throne room started shaking and a few of the allemaks fell into the corrupted lifeblood pool. It snapped Langa back into reality, he had to concentrate on clearing the dungeon before it collapsed. From what he'd read, he knew that the clavis used to clear the dungeon would be in this room, so he just needed to find it among the debris and broken walls.
"Help me find the dungeon clavis," Langa instructed the remaining allemaks and they scattered around, searching. He looked under the throne, behind it, and all around the room as the dungeon continued to shake. He finally found it under the throne, and only because he had bent down to check, not expecting it to actually be there. The clavis looked like an antique barrel key made of lucent stone, with a trollimp head on the bow of the key. It was as big as Langa's forearm as he picked it up.
[Congratulations! You have found the Psike’s Grotto Dungeon Clavis
Infuse your mana to activate]
Langa reached into his body and pushed his mana down his arm and into the clavis in his hands. An interface popped up over the clavis, and he read what was written on it.
[You are about to clear the dungeon: Psike’s Grotto.
There are (37) allemaks remaining alive inside the dungeon. Please make a choice.
1. Clear and Claim the dungeon
2. Clear and Destroy the dungeon]
Langa frowned, he hadn't paid a lot of attention to the claiming and ownership of dungeons. He felt like it would be a lot of work to claim a dungeon, manage it, and have to decide who could delve it and who couldn’t. If it were up to him, he’d just destroy it, it had served its purpose after all. He hesitated, however, wondering if there would be negative consequences for him or the allemaks if he did that.
“What happens if I destroy the dungeon? Will you guys be free to go live anywhere you want in the Tower?” he asked.
The elder allemak walked towards him and stopped at Langa's feet. He hesitated, looking down. “Free. There is no such thing for creatures blessed with life like us. Even before the trollimps were corrupted, when our world was still natural, we were hunted for our lifeblood,” he said, looking quietly at the scarred allemaks behind him. “It doesn't matter if it's a Tower, a corrupted world, a blessed world, or a natural world. We will always be hunted. You saved us from the trollimps, so if you choose to destroy the dungeon, then we'll have to find a new home somewhere in this Tower.”
That was depressing, and Langa wished he hadn't asked because now there was no way he could just watch the little creatures get slaughtered or enslaved again. Their precious lifeblood was like a curse to them. He knew that its description said that if someone bathed in it for a long period, they could gain higher health regeneration, and if players knew about this, there was no way that they would let the allemaks live in peace. The lifeblood made for great auink which was sought after by all people with skills that needed inscription and he was sure that it could be used as an ingredient in potions and weapons too.
How annoying. Why did his sister raise him to be a compassionate person? “And if I claim the dungeon?” Langa dreaded the answer. He was sure that it would make his life more difficult.
Hope was evident in the allemak elder's eyes, but he quickly masked it and spoke neutrally. “Since it's no longer corrupted, it will be reconstructed into a different type of dungeon for the remaining creatures, us. It will become a home for us."
"Without corruption, what kind of dungeon would it be, a treasure dungeon?" Langa asked.
"It will take time for the reconstruction, but no, it will likely become a herbage dungeon of some kind. I think my subordinates and I could probably make it into a garden,” he said. “Our kind love gardening, bringing new life into the world. This is a life-rich environment, so a garden for the vitality saffrons would probably work. It would be nice to create safe spaces for the children to have to play that aren't corrupted.”
Well, that made Langa’s decision for him. He didn’t want Rila or the other young allemaks to be hunted by players in the Tower. He had already paid his life debt, but if he could provide a home for them, that would be nice. A garden without monsters would be peaceful, right? If the dungeon belonged to him, then he could probably come and sleep in the garden whenever he felt like it, right? Since he controlled who could enter inside, he could make it so he alone could enter.
However, it still sounded like a lot of fucking work to get there. He had to reconstruct the dungeon? He had never done a job that required manual labour in his life. “Will I have to manage the dungeon, like build it and plant shit?” he asked, dreading how much hard work that sounded like.
The allemak elder scratched his ears with a paw. “No?” he said cautiously. “You can have the system automatically reconstruct the dungeon. It will take a while, weeks maybe, but it will emerge anew.”
Why didn't he say that earlier? That was a relief. Langa turned back towards the interface of the clavis.
“I will clear and claim the dungeon,” he said. Immediately, the shaking of the dungeon stopped, and a wave washed over Langa, over the entire dungeon, starting from the clavis.
[Congratulations! You have claimed your first dungeon.
+10 karma]
[The dungeon will have to be reconstructed. Please choose the reconstruction method:
1. Manual
2. Automatic]
He chose automatic.
[Please name your dungeon]
He thought about it. He had promised Rila a new home, so, “Rila’s Garden.”
[Acess Control for the dungeon: Rila's Garden:
1. Open Delving
2. Player Characters Only
3. Members of a specific Guild Only
4. Custom (Please state your access restriction)]
"Custom Restriction: Only I can enter," he said. Once he published the footage from his delve, he was sure that plenty of people would want to come here for the allemak lifeblood as well as the vitality saffrons. Langa would be damned if he allowed them to hunt the allemaks or disturb his future sleeping area.
[Dungeon Reconstruction is Starting. Please Wait.]
[You may check the progress of the reconstruction on the new Claimed Dungeons Tab on your system interface]
[All Player and Non-Player Characters will be teleported out of the dungeon in 30 seconds. No mortal will be allowed back into the dungeon until reconstruction is complete.]
“Wait!” Langa said. He hadn't expected to be booted out, but the countdown was not stopping. Shit, he hurriedly shoved the throne into his feathervault bag, looking around for anything else that could earn him money before the dungeon kicked him out.
There didn't seem to be anything of much value in here except for a bunch of common life and rare darkness lucent stones that he found inside a broken wooden chest behind where the throne had been. They weren't from the four basic mana disciplines, so they would earn him some money or he could exchange them for lightning lucent stones.
He began hastily packing Psike's body into his bag, and looking around for any treasures in the next room. He had a free slot in his inventory now that he had used up all of his Kiribo's Sweat flaxes, so he placed the huge cauldron full of allemak lifeblood that he found in the room adjacent Psike's throne room inside his inventory.
There was another chest inside that room as well, this one made of bronze-looking metal and locked, so he placed it inside his feathervault bag whose weight he was starting to feel now. His strength was not very high after all.
“Thank you, Avatar of The Lackadaisical Herald. We owe you a great debt,” the allemak elder said as Langa looked around for anything he might have missed. “I swear, we will take care of the dungeon and grow only the most pure vitality saffrons for you.”
“Just tell Rila I said thanks for saving my life. You guys need to make a new home here, and don’t waste your lifeblood on growing flowers,” he said with a smile as the timer ended.
He was also happy because he was close to clearing the 1st Floor now that he had cleared an unclaimed dungeon. All he needed to do was gain 10 000 karma and he could Ascend to the 2nd Floor.
There was a familiar prickling sensation all over his body, a blinding white light, and Langa found himself outside, standing on top of the mountain right above the waterfall.
What caught his attention, though, wasn’t the magnificent beauty of the flowing water. It was the number of players, perhaps ten or so standing in front of the dungeon entrance below him, led by Statia.
Langa guessed that they must have either known that he’d cleared the dungeon and were waiting for him to come out, or they had just spent the last four days here waiting for him, to attack him for trespassing on their territory. Unfortunately for them, the system had teleported him up here, right above them.
The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.
He couldn’t help the malicious laugh that escaped his mouth, it served them right, all Tier 1 players waiting to ambush one newbie. They must have cared about their guild's reputation. Well, they would get their comeuppance.
"Now, Legacy, let me show you how I deal with bullies," he said gleefully.
[The Deiwos Clan god: The Faceless King of The Hidden Mask, wonders why you are talking to yourself.]
Langa flinched. Crap, five days with the Legacy had made it a constant companion for him. Tonare vibrated in his hand. "I'm not speaking to myself, I'm talking to my glaive," he whispered.
[The mid-tier constellation: Tarquinius, says he understands you missing Tonare, he misses him too.]
[The Kwara Orisha Clan goddess: Mother of The Nine Winds And Storms, congratulates you on your Sponsorship Contract, however, she urges you to make real mortal friends, or else you will end up a lonely recluse for the rest of your life like your patron deity.]
[The Deiwos Clan god: The Lackadaisical Herald of The Lightning Storm, wonders why he was just insulted in a conversation that had nothing to do with him. He threatens to ban The Mother of Nine Winds and Storms from accessing your karma channel.]
The deities continued to argue while Langa took stock of his surroundings. He looked down at the players below, debating what to do. They couldn't go inside since the dungeon was restructuring, and even if it wasn’t, they couldn't have gone in anyway because they didn't have a quest and were not Blessed by a god of life. Anyway, those were the conditions for entering Psike's Grotto, not Rila's Garden. For that, they would need Langa's permission and he sure as hell was not going to give it.
Langa could have left, and they would have been none the wiser about it. They would have spent a day or so longer waiting outside for him, only to realise that he wasn't coming out. But he was still unsatisfied over his fight with Statia; he hadn’t lost, but he hadn't won either, and he didn't like leaving it like that. He figured a little payback was due to him.
He wondered if he should use his divine skill, but he still didn't know how to activate it just yet. He had never used a pure magic skill before so he did not know where to start. Most of the mages he knew used staves or wands, and they sometimes said unintelligible words to cast spells.
"Lightning Lancer of The Herald?" he said, infusing his mana into his glaive. Immediately, he knew that he had done the wrong thing because he felt the distant laughter of thousands of deities.
[The Deiwos Clan god: The Sullied Demon Cloud That Overcame The Void, says that players from lost worlds are amusing.]
Mercifully, Tarquinius took pity on him.
[The mid-tier constellation: Tarquinius, says, 'You have to draw the magic circle for the skill first and draw upon your Faith and the required amount of mana before you can activate the skill.']
"Thank you, Tarquinius, if only more deities were helpful to mortals in need of knowledge, they might have a lot more followers," he said venomously.
He would have to sacrifice both his health and stamina to boost his mana, leaving him vulnerable, so he decided that now was not the time to practice his divine skill.
Instead, he chose to use the only other ranged weapon that he had currently: the scroll he earned from the trollimp archers. He didn't know which kind of arrow would come out, and he was curious, so he retrieved the scroll from his inventory and infused 50 mana into it to activate it.
He had deactivated affinity and resistance notifications, so all he saw was that the random arrows that were released from the scroll this time were poison arrows. The arrows materialised above the Retessa Guild players, and before they even looked up, the spell activated.
Poison arrows rained down on the players from the air, and screams erupted as they tried to dodge and run from them. Some of them fell to the ground, the poison eating into their skin. Statia remained unscathed, however, because of his force shield, but he couldn’t move. He looked up and saw Langa.
Fury covered his face as Langa grinned, and waved at him. Then, he ran away as fast as he could.
*
As he made his way across the mountains, Langa looked around for corrupted monsters to kill for some experience. He was so close to levelling up that it was laughable. Finally, after killing two level 10 corrupted monsters, the message he was waiting for came.
[You have killed 2 level 10 corrupted beetles
+390 EXP
+20 karma
+2 Corrupted Beetle Eyes
+2 Corrupted Beetle Antannae]
[Congratulations! Level Up!
Level 11
+11 karma
+3 AGI, + 2 MND +1 VIT +1 Special Stat: VEL
You have 5 free attribute points to distribute.]
Even though levelling up restored his health, mana and stamina, he was still mentally exhausted. Right now, he wanted to sleep. He had not slept in almost five days, unless you counted the time that he was poisoned and unconscious.
Langa was exhausted when he finally made it back to the Valley of Guardians. It turned out that running for 100 kilometres was not fun when he was alone, with no snarky Legacy constantly criticising him. It was still hard to adjust, and remember that the Legacy was here, on his belt as his glaive. It made his brain hurt.
To his surprise, he nearly ran smack into Jandri as he walked into the guildhall.
"Easy," she said, stepping back, and allowing him to find his balance. "Why are you in such a rush?"
"Sorry," he apologised, straightening up. "I need to sleep. I just completed my Sponsorship Challenge, so I'm beat."
Her eyes flickered with interest. "How'd it go?"
Langa grinned and sent her the video. He wondered how long it would take for her to go through four days worth of footage. "My god said I did very well," he said proudly. "Although, there are some parts that you might need to edit out when I was acting dumb."
She raised her eyebrows. "Did you rob another group of innocent children of precious loot?"
Langa laughed. "You'll see."
"Well, I've been meaning to send you this, but it was not going through while you were in the dungeon. It's a basic freelance contract, the standard that you get paid for every bounty and you get paid extra if we commission you for voi-den raids. I tweaked yours a bit, so it allows our Marketing team to manage your Dent profile, but we are not allowed to disclose anything about you or your skills that you don't want out," she said, sending the contract to him on his comcer.
"Sure," Langa said, skimming it. "I don't have the mental capacity to read this right now. I'll send it back to you tomorrow. As for the video, after you watch that, you'll be begging me to join the Guardians. Ah, you should probably edit out the enchanting part, people might get bored."
"I know better than you what to edit out," she said, and then smiled, crossing her arms. "As for begging, you won't get that from me. I was away yesterday, signing one of your top 10 members to our guild. She's not playing hard to get, unlike you. As soon as she finishes her Challenge from The Unrivalled, she's going to join us."
Raising his eyebrows, Langa matched her energy. "You're the one who recruited her?"
"Yup, The Unrivalled gave me a quest," she said proudly.
"Strange," Langa said smugly. "If she's so much more important to the Guardians than me, how come they only sent the Ground Storey administrator for her, while the deputy guildmaster came for me?"
Her lips thinned as she frowned at him, and he smirked. He still didn't know why Alfsol had come down here for him, but he had a suspicion that it was because of the Brand, as Alfsol had insinuated in their previous conversation.
Jandri glared at him. "You're really not going to join us?"
Wasn't that a question? The Guardians were a decent guild, and Langa knew that his abilities would be appreciated and he would be well compensated if he stayed with them. However, he was not ready to be tied down just yet, he was still new in the Tower, and he had The Lackadaisical Herald's protection now, so he no longer needed the safety in numbers offered by a guild.
There was also the fact that the Guardians were largely neutral and they might not do what he needed them to do when it came time to save his family on the 36th Floor. He wanted a flexible guild that he could use for his own ends but that would also not tie him down; instead, let him do whatever he wanted.
Yeah, he was not going to find a guild like that. His best option would be starting his own guild which almost made him want to jump off a cliff. He wasn’t good at management or administration! He wasn’t smart enough for shit like that.
"Are you going to kick me out of The Valley of Guardians since the seven days of free accommodation for new players are up tomorrow?" he countered.
"Of course not," she said, scratching her head. "I just think it would be a shame to lose you to other guilds like The Speedrunners or The Hallow Reapers. Your strength could make a difference in the tipping balance between us on the lower Floors. I don't mind if you join any other guild."
Langa did not think that he would make that much of a difference, but he shrugged. "You don't have to worry about me joining the Hallow Reapers. I rejected their guild's patron deity already, so I doubt he'd let me in."
Her eyes fixed intently on him, and he thought they might bore through his skull. "You rejected The Demon Reaper? Do you realise that he is the most powerful deity operating in this Tower aside from The Quartenity and The Neutriarchs?"
Langa had suspected as much, having seen his name on Liv's status back in the tutorial. Aapep was an ancient deity that Langa had read about in his father's books, associated with the Egyptian gods as their adversary, Ra in particular. It made him wonder if that was why Liv had chosen The Sun God as his deity.
"Why do the Deiwos Clan let him operate in their Towers then?"
Jandri shook her head. "Because the more powerful a deity is, and the more hostile his relationship with the Tower Administrators is, the more karma he has to pay to them in order to operate in their Tower," she said. "Anyway, didn't you say you were tired?"
Langa was, so as much as he wanted to stay and ruffle her feathers even more, he did need to sleep. What she said did remind him of something similar he'd read in the library, too. He was curious who Jandri was bound to, but he hesitated to check her status. The last time he tried, he felt like his head was going to burst open.
He figured that he couldn't use his Team Player title on her back then because he was Unbound and she was Shrouded. He hoped he was right as he equipped the title and scanned her.
Name:
Jandri Kila Kaurion
Race: Wolfkin Age: 41 Character: Player Level:
29
[Floor 1: Locked at Level 25]
Class: Mystic Stalker Available Karma: 61 752 Total Karma: 179 125 Deity: [Vaisildg-The All-Encompassing Ocean of Splattered Blood.
] - Disciple Highest Floor 15/101 (Deiwos Towers) Attribute: Herding Scent Available Respawns:
2/3
Respawn Zone:
Iskedu Layina Den (8th Floor)
Surprisingly, she was almost at Tier 3! So far, Perinda had been the highest level player that Langa had met, but Jandri was insanely strong. Since she was the administrator for the Ground Storey for the Guardians, he had expected her to have only climbed up to the 10th Floor. Schooling his features, he bade her farewell and went to his room.
Once he was settled, he checked his comcer interface for any messages but found that, besides the comments on his old video, there were no messages for him. There were only a few missed calls from Liv from two days ago.
> @langelihle To @Livkungsadu
>
> Congratulations on the legendary achievement. Sorry to respond late, I just got out of a dungeon
>
>
After sending that message, he plopped down on the bed. Now that he was alone, his thoughts drifted back to what Adtonifulmin had told him. One or more of his family members were in danger on the 36th Floor. His nephew might be dead or in mortal peril and his mother was dead. His heart lurched, wondering how he should feel. He wanted to forget it all and just fall asleep, but all he could think about was worrying about his family.
His comcer beeped, and Langa cursed out loudly. Liv was calling him. Aargh, he hated it when people called him after he sent them a message.
"What?" Langa said coolly, bringing his wrist up to his ear.
"Hello to you too," Liv said. "I thought something happened to you, you didn't post anything on the Dent for four days and you weren't responding to my messages."
Rolling his eyes, Langa snuggled into his soft blanket. "It never occurred to you that I was doing my Sponsorship Challenge inside a dungeon?"
Liv sounded sheepish when he spoke. "Admittedly, no, but you can't blame me. Most of the other top ten rankers of our batch and I finished our Challenges within the first two days. Did you complete it?” he asked nervously, and Langa almost laughed. Why was he nervous, as if he were asking about his own results?
“I am now the Avatar of The Lackadaisical Herald of The Lightning Storm,” Langa told him. Even if he wasn’t in the best of moods, he smiled.
Liv whistled. “Holy crap, that’s great, Langa. He’s the second in command of the Deiwos Clan,” he said, sounding genuinely thrilled. “I’m so jealous, you’ll probably have a lot of quests in this Tower then!”
When was the last time anyone had been happy for any of his achievements? The last person to be so excited in his place was Khaya. Langa hoped that she was okay. He pushed the thoughts away. “You’re jealous of me? You’re bound to a Neutriarch!” Granted Adtonifulmin’s master was probably a Neutriarch too, but it was different.
“Yeah, I still can’t believe I pulled it off,” Liv said, sounding far away. “He was my mother’s deity, so his approval means a lot to me.”
At the mention of Liv’s mother, Langa couldn’t help but think of his own. He balled his hands into fists and tried not to think about it. “I guess we both chose well,” he said quietly.
"Yeah, but at least it doesn’t cost your patron deity any extra karma to sponsor you. As powerful as The Sun God is, it’s gotta be expensive as hells for him to sponsor me here,” Liv told him, worry lacing his words.
Langa massaged his temple. “He’s old, he must have bazillions of karma. Anyway, I’m tired, can we talk tomorrow?”
“Sure, but are you okay?" Liv asked hesitantly.
"Fine," Langa lied.
"You sound... upset. Was the Challenge exhausting? Because mine sure as the third hell was. I couldn't get out of bed the following day, just reliving the horror of it all," Liv said. "Even now, just thinking about what I went through in there makes me shudder. It's okay if it was difficult for you."
Liv's Challenge had been bad enough to traumatise him that much? Langa couldn't even imagine it, given how calm and collected Liv always was. But then again, Liv had always felt like he was holding back a part of himself, not just his power. Maybe he, too, had just been putting on a brave face.
"It's not that. My god told me something, but I'm dealing with it," Langa said slowly.
"Are you?"
"What?"
"Langa, you don't strike me as someone who has the patience to deal with things. I mean, I know I've only known you for the seven days of the tutorial, but... you literally died, for the first time in your life, and you just went back to training like it was nothing. The first time I died, the only reason I didn't collapse and freak out was because of my father's Blessing," Liv told him in a low voice. "If you need help dealing with it, let me know, we're friends, aren't we?"
Was he really such an open book? Normally, if he needed to deal with things that he couldn't push away, Langa used to spend time with Neo, Khaya, or his sister. He didn't have any friends to talk to, not after his closest friend had suffered a near-fatal injury, and blamed it on Langa and his curse. He had not allowed himself to care about anyone outside of his family because of that fucking curse.
"My mother died," Langa confessed quietly. His heart clenched in his chest as he said the words out loud, making them feel real.
"Oh," Liv was silent for a moment. "I'm sorry. I know how awful that is. May her soul find peace in the eternal embrace of The Creator."
Langa's mother was a staunch believer in the Zulu Traditional Religion, so if what Lord Adtonifulmin said was correct, she would be with the souls of her ancestors.
"We weren't close, but I can't help but feel sad, you know. It's stupid because she doesn't deserve my affection, not after... not after she abandoned me." Now that he had started talking, he couldn't stop. "I mean, I promised myself that I was free of her, that fuck her for being a shitty parent. I told myself that I didn't care, but I hate that I'm still fucking upset."
"Of course you are. Now that she's gone, you'll never get the closure you need," Liv said gently. "I'm really sorry."
"Yeah, since I can't get anything else from Mama, I have no choice but to find some way to bury her and the pain she caused me," he said, more to himself than anyone else. He had to let her go, and live his life, free from her. "I’ve seen so much death in the past few weeks. I also need to do a cleansing ritual for myself."
"Is that a thing humans do?" Liv asked curiously.
"It's a thing some Zulu people do, it's a cultural thing, and I've been doing it since I was a child." He didn't know if he would be able to get everything he needed for the ritual, but at least now he had accepted what he needed to do to let go of his deadbeat mother. He needed to change the subject. "Are we still on to meet in the capital on the first day of next month?"
"Ah, yeah," Liv said, the change of subject throwing him off a bit. "But if you want to participate in the Celestial Clash Exhibition match, you should probably come to the capital earlier."
"The what now?" Langa asked with a yawn.
"Get some rest," Liv said. "You can decide tomorrow."
He ended the call after that.
As he lay in bed, waiting for sleep to come, Langa thought about Earth, and how the people were being oppressed by demons at the moment. How was he supposed to save a world he didn’t care much about just because one person he loved was stuck there? He was nothing more than a rookie without a guild backing him right now.
This frustration led him to think about his strength relative to everyone else in the Tower. While it was true that now that he was bound to Adtonifulmin, Langa felt like he belonged a little more in the Tower, there was still a long way to go.
Jandri was level 29, and she was not even the strongest member of the Guardians. How strong were the rankers in the Tower's overall top ten? Before he fell asleep, Langa was curious about the levels of the overall top ten players. Upon checking the Dent, however, he discovered that most of them kept that to themselves.
According to speculation, though, the highest-level player, Hucielbicon The Pioneer, who had the top spot in the overall top ten of this Tower had been stuck at level 38 for the past year. Some said that he had already reached level 39, but the general consensus was that he had not entered Tier 4 yet, as when a player was the first to reach a certain Tier or the first to clear a Floor, there would be a Towerwide announcement.
The highest-level player from batch 2, besides Merreddyd and the Insurgents of Anarchy, was a bounty hunter called Na’koma the Black Fist. Curious, Langa checked his Dent profile, and all of the videos posted showed him taking down Tier 2 E and D rank voidents efficiently.
He never spoke, and he always wore a mask as he tore through them with a black blade. He wasn't as strong as Unbound Jareeksha but he was popular with the people and the most beloved bounty hunter in the Tower.
Batch 3’s players weren’t all that impressive with very few standouts like Anarchist, Perinda and another voident called Mbakulini. It seemed if you wanted to succeed from that batch, you had to either go bad or bow before Anarchist. That was depressing.
Langa yawned again, closing his comcer interface, thinking about what Jandri had said about the Tower Administrators charging more karma for more powerful deities and deities hostile to them to operate in their Towers. It seemed like the Towers were just business ventures for the gods, and players were nothing more than ways to earn more karma.
No, he refused to believe they were all like that. Langa knew that he meant something to his master, although, as of yet, he was not sure what. Until he figured that out, he was not willing to become Adtonifulmin’s Visage.