“So this is a magic tower!” Lard shouted with excitement and I hit him in the back of the head.

“Shut up, you’re ruining the experience.” I snapped at him as I looked up the magnificent tower. I ordered my companions to find us some lodging while I go look for a tower to tour. Obviously, the first place I wanted to visit was that tower-being-destroyed-by-a-meteor. Followed by the heroes’ party, it took me only a few minutes to find my way to the tower.

The tower entrance was guarded by two musclemen wearing blue leather jackets while wearing…dumbbells attached to metal shoulder pads?

“Halt!” The two guards flexed their arms, with one of the guards crouched while the other stood behind him. “Purpose of…” One of the guards ran his hand through his entire oiled arms while talking to us in Western Commons and finally switching his pose, “…visit?!”

“Aaah…I…I’d like to see what’s inside the tower?”

“Hmm…puny looking man wants to see inside glorious Rallakadia?” The two guards looked at each other and started laughing.

“What’s so funny?” I asked.

“Puny man. No muscle. Not magic proficient. Only true sorcerers can enter sorcerer towers. Come back when you bench a thousand sets in one day, like me.” One of the guards proceeded to detach his dumbbells and started working out. I noticed that the dumbbells started glowing and the guard’s body started to shine as well.

“Now…begone!” The guard stopped working out and slapped the two dumbbells together, causing a rupture of magic power towards us. A high level lightning bolt flew towards us, the guards obviously not caring whether we get hurt or not.

In response, I slashed the air with my arm and snapped my fingers. The mana in the surroundings immediately answered to my authority and the lightning bolt split into two, arcing around me.

“What?!” The two guards shouted as they changed their pose, this time showing their backs.

…Do all these musclemen change their pose every time they talk?

“Not muscle magic, but defeat us? How?”

“Ha! You muscles-for-brains! This is the true power of real magic!” Kendra mockingly laughed at the two distraught guards.

“I don’t know why you are complimenting us, but I will take it,” One of the guards scratched his head and replied.

I looked around and it seemed that I had created a commotion. Other musclemen minding their business saw what happened and crowded around.

“Move to the side! I sensed that! My teres major muscles shook with joy as I sensed that!” An angry voice roared as someone emerged from the tower entrance. A large man wearing blue pants held up by two belts strapped across his massive chests emerged. His handlebar mustaches moved from one angle to another as he inspected the surroundings until his eyesight landed onto me.

He twirled his mustache once then approached me. As soon as he reached me, he held his hand out towards me. I was somewhat confused but I still took the hand and shook it.

As we shook our hands, I noticed that Mr. Handlebars started to grip my hand hard. His arm’s veins started to pop as he intensified his grip. Not wanting to lose, I also tightened my grip.

As we shook our hand, Mr. Handlebars’ head started turning red and sweat started to drip from his head. A vein appeared on his bald head and his lips were puckered as he struggled to keep up with my near-infinity strength.

His arms glowed with a blue hue and the area started to darken, with all light intensifying on the most epic handshake I’ve ever participated in.

Unfortunately for you, Mr. Handlebars, no matter how hard you grip, I won’t break or feel pain since I am not only an undead, but also an Archlich, the greatest undead to ever set foot!

After struggling for a minute, Mr. Handlebars finally groaned in pain and let go off my hand, and the area returned to normal. The surrounding musclemen gasped in horror at the turn of events and the two guards standing by the tower entrance had their mouths agape.

“Oh ho ho…This is very interesting, puny man! Nobody had bested me, Bicepticus Absicus, in a contest of arm strength.” Mr. Handlebars laughed as he twirled his handlebars around with sweat pouring down from his head.

“Well, I am confident in my arm strength.” I nodded as I opened and closed one of my palms repeatedly, somehow hearing cracks coming from my hand.

“Say, you wanted to visit Rallakadia? What for?” Bicepticus asked me.

“To tour it.”

“Oh ho ho ho! Interesting! Very interesting! You do not want to be an acolyte, my friend?”

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An acolyte?! Me, a master of undeath, as a lowly acolyte?!

“Sorry, no. I just want to see your tower. It looks very interesting.” I shrugged.

“Hmm…I don’t see a problem in it! Maybe after visiting Rallakadia, or in braiwnius, ‘The Tower of Arms’, you would come to appreciate my training regime and join me!” Bicepticus excitedly led my group and me into the tower, leaving the crowd behind.

*

*

*

“To actually step into the territory of these muscle freaks…” Kendra nervously walked just behind me, refusing to separate from me.

I don’t know why she is so vehemently opposed to the musclemen, but I didn’t want to pry into it. On the other hand, Lard was extremely fascinated.

“And these are the bench presses.” Bicepticus showed us around the tower. It was pretty clean inside the tower, despite its marble outer look. The floor was waxed wood and there were a lot of wall mirrors where a lot of musclemen posed in front of.

“I-I’ve never been in a gym before…C-can I try it?” Lard asked.

“Of course! Anyone that listens to their muscles is a friend of mine!”

A muscleman approached and started to assist Lard in operating the bench press. On the other hand, the rest of the heroes were either doubtful or uninterested.

“I do not see how one can achieve magic powers from these machines. Doesn’t magic stem from the practice of self-discipline and interacting with the spirits of the world?” Blackhair asked.

“That’s right! Magic is gifted by the Goddess of Light!” Leyna protested as she nearly fell forward in her bindings.

“Pfft, that’s what they taught you. Really, you shouldn’t listen to those priests from the Path of Light. Magic is…is…” Kendra’s face contorted as she remembered my ‘teachings’.

Both Kendra and I turned towards her so-called ‘clown’ friend. Well, to her, mana looked like faceless clowns. It swam around in the air while rotating its head, giving me the impression that it was ‘smiling’ at us.

‘You see me.’ It whispered and the voice echoed as if we were in a massive hollow dome.

“Let’s not talk about that.” Kendra decided to shut her mouth up.

“Well, friend, no matter what was told to you, there is always an alternative! That is the path of change! If you are ugly and fat, you only need to be ugly! Come, become my acolyte and we can plan your exercise regime!”

Satel, on my other flank, pulled my robes and I bent slightly. She leaned in and whispered, “I don’t get it, I don’t think just exercising would get you this muscle magic.”

“Then we’ll wait and see. There must be more to this,” I answered.

We went all around the tower, encountering all types of exercise machines. There was even a spot for people to swing a huge hammer around and a large open space for people to carry and throw marble pillars around. Strangely enough, Lard was interested in them all, trying every one of them at least once.

“I thought you’re the type to laze around?” I asked.

“Yes, but…I, Vakasa of the Darkness, also want muscles. Back in my world, I could never get myself to go to the gym to lose weight. Besides, I feel as if I would be made fun of. Not that I, Vakasa of the Darkness, was ever made fun of, mind you. But here, exercising means gaining magic power. You said I can’t use your magic, right? What about muscle magic? I get muscles and magic, that’s two birds in one!” Lard answered.

“…I can’t really say anything against that.” I shrugged at the guy.

“Hu hu hu, I swear, once I get muscles and magic, I would get all the ladies. You’ll see.” Lard grinned as he scratched his double chin with his index finger as if he had foreseen it all.

“All these talking have made me hungry. As guests, would you like to join me for a feast? It’s a few floors up so you’ll have to burn a bit of your fat off. To me, that’s a good thing! Ha ha ha!” Bicepticus laughed at his own joke but the important things here were free food and that we would get closer to the meteor.

Besides, I also wanted to know what kind of food these people ate. I hope I get to try some local delicacies, assuming that they have any. Every place has delicacies, right?

*

*

*

Meat, meat and A LOT OF MEAT!

Tables filled with stacks of meat were everywhere! There were meats of every type! The biggest problem was these musclemen were just devouring them all like they were breathing the meat in like air!

“Come, eat!” Bicepticus slammed a massive slab of lamb steak on my table and I simply stared at it. If I had eyes, they would be bulging from emotions that I couldn’t even name.

I’m an undead so food just vanishes in a dim blue flame inside my mouth without making any significant change in my body. In fact, it wouldn’t take a day for me to eat all of these towers of meat if I forced myself to.

The thing I was wary about was where did these musclemen get these meats from? This was too large for an average lamb and last I checked, lambs hadn’t change in a thousand years. Unless…

“How did you get a steak this big?” I asked Bicepticus.

“Some lower sorcerers content themselves to being simple farmers. The farmlands around the Sorcerer States are usually adjusted to meet our daily intake.”

“…And how would they do that?”

“Simple. We also buff up our animals!” Bicepticus proudly answered as he flexed his own biceps.

I gave up thinking and just followed Lard’s example of wolfing the entire thing down. The other heroes were barely able to keep up with the musclemen, with Kendra giving up after a few bites.

Some of my companions were already challenging other musclemen in meat-eating competitions but since they were also undead, the musclemen had no chance. Leyna, the priestess of the heroes’ party, was being fed by one of my companions since she was still tied up.

That reminds me…

“Bicepticus, is there any Path temples in Rallas?”

“Indeed. After all, most of Rallas follows the Path of Light. May the Buffed Mother flex her muscles unto our training regimes. The closest temple is just down the street.”

Great! I had been planning on how to get rid of Leyna ever since she started a holy crusade in the elven capital so the fact that it was as easy as dropping the nut job down the street made me relax more.

However, Leyna wasn’t top priority. It was finding how muscle magic works and I had a feeling going up the tower would bring answers.

“What’s on the upper floors?” I asked Bicepticus.

“Unfortunately for you, unless you’re an acolyte of the Rallakadia, you won’t be able to see it. Are you interested?”

“No, I’m just curious. How does muscle magic really work? I doubt just working out gets you all the magic.”

“Oh ho ho. Many mages from other nations asks me that,” Bicepticus stroked his mustaches and continued, “but they keep forgetting our source of mana is different from theirs!”

“Huh?”

“Proooooteeeein!” Bicepticus took out a flask and downed its contents. He stood up, threw the flask away and grabbed onto the long dining table we were eating on. Gripping onto the edges of the table hard, he suplexed the table in one quick decisive move.

“Protein! Protein! Protein!” The surrounding musclemen chanted repeatedly as they slammed their fists on their table.

…

What the fuck?