Welcome Climber, to your first step towards true power. Inside is a place filled with danger and opportunity. This informational pamphlet provides some essential information to new climbers that will help you identify both of these so you can make a more informed decision. Do not take the tower lightly as many climbers have lost their lives stepping forwards when they should have stepped around. Not all of the tower has been explored and changes can take place at random intervals.

Not much is known about the world before the arrival of the towers. However, what we do know is that the large amount of raw mana in the atmosphere caused powerful storms that destroyed or mutated everything within their path. Only the most powerful of beings managed to survive in that environment. The towers absorb that raw chaotic mana of the world and create a stabilised area of protection from the storms that has allowed for the creation and prosperity of the large cities surrounding them. However, the further away from the tower you are the more powerful and chaotic the mana becomes. Travel and trade between cities is possible thanks to specialised enchantments that can provide a protective barrier around vehicles, ensuring safety from the ill effects of raw mana.

That is not the only benefit the tower provides. When you step into the tower you will discover an abundance of resources that can be brought back into the city for trade. The tower has become the main source of food, water, and trade goods that allows the city to continue to thrive and expand. The tower also provides a place where climbers can test their skills against similarly powered creatures. Each floor of the tower contains increasingly more powerful creatures that allows climbers to continually gain strength and power.

The exploration and cataloguing of the tower has become a very lucrative career for those who discover magical items or locations of value. Many of these locations have been claimed on the lower floors by the knights of the tower so you may experience and learn what to look for as you make your way up the tower.

- Introduction to the tower, page 1.

The sound of Khemrok waking up interrupted my reading and I placed the pamphlet back into storage.

Waking up on the rocky ground, Khemrok wiped the snot and tears from his face as he pulled himself to his feet. He glanced towards me before turning away and stretching his back. “Tsk, embarrassing. Getting beat up by a guy forty levels below me… and he doesn’t even know how to dismiss his mana… psht.”

This guy really doesn’t know when to stop talking… “Huh, what are you mumbling about, Khem?”

The shoulders of Khemrok flinched and he went quiet for a moment before turning his head towards me. “Ahem… Listen well, young outworlder. Let master Khemrok teach you one of the basic of the basics that every child learns on the day of their awakening.”

He turned to face me fully and lifted his hand where a ball of fire manifested. “Look at this fireball.”

Is he mocking me? Fireball… Really? Out of all the spells. He must be mocking me. I continued to watch the infuriating orc while trying to hold a calm expression. As annoying as he might be, I do want to learn more about magic.

“Basic climbers, like you, will just throw the spell to the side if their target has already died. Trained climbers will do something else, watch carefully.”

The flame in Khemrok’s hand flickered for a moment, slowly fading before vanishing completely. “You might think that’s natural for this spell, but you can dismiss anything the same way, as long as it consists of your own mana. It would be pretty sad for a mage to be trapped by their own wall spell after all.” Khemrok started laughing. “In fact, I witnessed this one conjurer that allowed a goblin to pick up their spear and stab them with it.” He leaned back and laughed harder. “Getting stabbed by your own summoned weapon! Can you believe that?”

“Basic climbers like who?”

Khemrok flinched and stopped laughing. “Ah well, normally people learn these things from their guild.” Giving me a large toothy grin, he continued. “So consider yourself lucky to know such a great person willing to help you learn, like myself. No need to call me master. Also that little trick is just the beginning. Once you have a handle on dismissing your own spells, you can start to learn the more advanced techniques. There are many ways to manipulate your mana and many people dedicate their lives on researching new ways to manipulate spells. Check this out.”

Khemrok summoned two fireballs at once, one on either hand. He flashed me a smug smile as he held out his hands. The balls of fire then grew and shrunk in size and then started floating around him. Two more fireballs appeared, and then he started juggling.

“What do you think? Pretty impressive, right. An average caster would have to dedicate themselves to practicing this every day for a year to get to this level of control.” Under his breath he added “Maybe you can get there in just three.”

I let out a sigh. “You are such an ass.”

He grinned at me as he continued to juggle the fireballs.

Turning around, I looked back over the camp littered with my own conjured weapons. Focusing on one with the thought to make it disappear, but nothing changed.

Khemrok moved to stand next to me after dismissing his magical display. “It’s easier if you are in physical proximity of your spell. Try summoning a new weapon and focus on that.”

Following his advice, I conjured a dagger in my hand and focused on it, trying to feel the connection between myself and my mana that the weapon consisted of. We stood there for a while. Me, focusing on the dagger in my hand and Khemrok, patently waiting for me.

We waited enough time for some of the rat ogres to respawn. Focusing as hard as I could at the dagger, I mentally screamed for the hundredth time for it to disappear. One of the rat ogres started charging towards us, and in frustration I threw the dagger at the creature’s head. “Bloody disappear already!”

Experience gained

The ogre fell flat on it’s back with my dagger embedded between it’s eyes, the handle pointing towards the sky in mockery of my attempts to dismiss it.

Khemrok groaned. “Ah, you really are terrible. It looked more like you were trying to intimidate the dagger into vanishing than dismiss it. Let’s go, we have wasted too much time here.”

Ignoring the orc, I strode into the camp where more and more rat ogres were respawning. I felt frustrated and needed to relieve some of my stress.

After wiping out the camp a second time, it was now littered with even more of my conjured weapons. A monument to my ability, or lack thereof, to control mana. Just as I was about to leave, an even larger creature appeared. Pulling itself out of the mining tunnel was a huge rat crawling out on hands and feet with two massive pickaxes. As it started to pull itself to it’s feet, I cast identify.

[Mr. Nibbers]

Health: 980 / 100%

Class: Pack leader

Level: 7

The narrative has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

Race: Rat Giant

Turning to Khemrok I asked, “Think this thing will drop a floor key?”

Grinning he replied, “I’ll be surprised if it didn’t. What’s that on it’s back?

On the back of Mr. Nibbers was what looked to be a small tree with different coloured glowing lights. It was almost like a misshapen Christmas tree. Only the glowing colours were from what looked to be small round fruit.

Khemrok laughed “Oh, I bet Master Teek is going to love me when I visit him next.”

Wincing, I cursed myself. “Damnit, I still have not learned the skill or spells Teek gave me.”

Khemrok laughed harder as he moved towards the giant Mr. Nibbles. “Perfect! I didn’t want to share anyway.”

Son of a bitch was going to steal my experience! I started launching spearbolts into the creature as Khemrok continued to move closer.

The creature focused on me, allowing Khemrok to sneak around to its back.

Mr. Nibbles was a great opportunity to see how far my few days of training had improved my combat ability as it seemed to be similar in strength as the war troll I previously faced with Burin.

The war troll’s skin was too tough for my spearbolts to penetrate but that was not an issue with the rat giant. Either the creature’s skin was weaker or more likely that my conjured weapons had become stronger and sharper.

Unlike the troll however, the rat giant was slow and continued to stomp around trying to squish me with its feet. Occasionally it would swing down with one or both of the large pickaxes that would burry themselves into the rocky terrain.

Khemrok did not seem interested in damaging the creature and was instead holding onto the giant’s fur as he continued to pluck the glowing fruit off the tree growing out of Mr. Nibbers’ back.

The fight took longer than I would have liked but in the end the creature was slow, and I was able to easily avoid its clumsy attacks as I turned it into a pincushion with my spearbolts.

Khemrok jumped off the giant’s back as it lay face down on the ground and flashed me a grin. “Nice work. Though you would have slayed it much faster if you stopped throwing your weapons at it.”

“What do you mean?” I asked.

“Don’t act dumb. You are able to best me in a friendly spar. Your combat ability is much higher than just throwing weapons from range.”

Stretching my back and shoulders, I let out a frustrated sigh. “I’m not throwing weapons. I am launching my spells at the creature. Do I look like some kind of warrior to you?”

“Yes. Are you stupid?” He pointedly looked me up and down. “Have you even looked at yourself? If you are a caster, then I must be a great magus. How can you call yourself a caster? You can’t even dismiss your spells…. Here.” Khemrok picked up one of my spears from the ground and held it towards me. “If you can dismiss this right now then I’ll acknowledge you as a caster.”

Looking at the spear in Khemrok’s hand, I tried to focus, really focus on the conjured weapon. Time seemed to slow down, and I was shocked a moment later as the spear disintegrated into motes of light.

A look of surprise came over Khemrok as he looked down at his now empty hand. “Oh wow. You really are… Oops, nope. Sorry, I accidentally squeezed too hard and broke it.” He smiled at me smugly before chuckling. “I’m sorry, Reigner. You really are...” He placed his hands over his mouth to cover his mouth as he said the next words between his laughter “An idiot.”

I was too distracted to give much thought to his prank. I knew it was him that shattered my weapon. However, I felt something when it happened. Like a small link to something I never noticed before snapping. I closed my eyes and tried to remember that feeling. I could feel… things around me. Some moving, some still. I was close, I could feel it. One of the things moved closer to me. Just as I was working out what it was, I felt a hand slapping me on my back. The physical impact broke my concentration and whatever epiphany I was about to make.

“I jest. Don’t worry. You will get the hang of it. Still, you should consider fighting the way we sparred. It’s odd that you insist on just throwing sticks around.”

My eye twitched and I had to count to ten, and then twenty before my urges to rip that smug orc’s head off left my mind. Violence did not seem to change his disposition towards me for long, so I didn’t see the point in beating temporary silence into him, again.

Taking a deep breath, I exhaled my frustration. I was positive that I could find that feeling again, once I found a quiet place away from loud orcs. Opening my eyes, I looked down at the corpse of the giant only to see it break into motes of energy. Khemrok was standing above where the giant corpse was with his hand outstretched.

He turned to look at me. “What? It didn’t look like you wanted to loot it, so I did the honours. You don’t even have the spell, right? You can have the next one.” He fished around the inside of his jacket for a moment before pulling out a crystal and tossing it to me. “Here is the floor crystal. Let’s get going!”

Holding the crystal in shaking hands, I watched as Khemrok happily walked away, not even realising how close to death he repeatedly brought himself. I needed to get to the tower and away from this guy as fast as possible before he got himself killed. Before moving off to follow I pulled out the gifts Teek gave me and activated them.

Spell Gained.

Sleep or meditation required.

Spell Gained.

Sleep or meditation required.

Skill Gained.

Harvest

Rank: 0

Cost: 10 SP

Description: Allows you to collect fruit, seeds, and any other resource that can be regrown from targeted plant. Rank impacts the quality and quantity of the harvest.

Khemrok yelled towards me from the distance “Hurry up outworlder, or you will be left behind.”

Brushing off the dust from my clothes I walked towards the orc and wondered if he would survive the trip to the tower with me.

The canyon had the occasional bush or plant growing, mostly on or near the bank of the river we left behind hours ago. Now that I also had the harvest skill it turned into a bit of a competition between myself and Khemrok. Whenever a bit of greenery was spotted, we would race towards the plant to try and rank up the harvest skill. The person that managed to spot the plant first would often have the advantage. Unfortunately for Khemrok, I turned out to be just a bit faster than he was. If he did not build enough of a lead before I spotted the plant he was after, I would more often than not, reach it before him.

Khemrok would moan and complain each time I managed to steal a harvest from him. It was sweet music to my ears, and I felt my earlier frustrations with him wash away.

“How are you only level seven?” Khemrok complained again as I reached the third plant in a row. “You are so broken. You have stupid levels of speed and strength.”

Angrily scratching the back of his head, he continued. “What is wrong with the world? I mean you don’t even know basic mana control.”

I tried not to respond but he must have noticed a something from me as he went quiet for a moment. I could hear the amusement in his voice as he spoke. “I mean even my nephew knew how to dismiss his spells before even reaching twelve years of age. How old are you, Reigner? Don’t tell me. Your age looks to be around my level. Forty something, right? Man, you sure are lucky you are physically gifted. Who knows if you would have even been able to make it past floor ten with your spellcraft knowledge.”

“Shut up. Shut your bloody mouth, you ugly green skinned loot ninja!” I had been trying to ignore his attempts at getting a reaction from me for the past few hours, but he was just too damned annoying.

Khemrok let out a laugh that echoed down the canyon. “Finally! Some fire in your words! You really…” He stopped talking as his eyes snapped to something ahead of us and he launched himself into a sprint. I watched the idiot as he reached a vine that was growing in a crack of the canyon. He let out a yell of triumph as he used his harvest skill. “Level three!”

I let out a sigh as I felt really tired. This day felt like it was really stretching. Tears welled in my eyes as I looked up only to see that the sun had just reached its zenith above us. Finding a rock to sit on I summoned myself a sweet drink in hopes of cheering myself up.

Khemrok joined me a moment later. “Tired? Yeah, I am feeling a bit hungry myself.” He reached into his jacket and pulled out a fruit that I recognised from Teek’s farm. It was triberry, a large three flavoured berry that was the size of an apple.

Khemrok noticed me looking and flashed me a grin. “I took a few from Master Teek’s farm before we left. Trade you one for one of whatever you are drinking.”

The triberry was one of the fruits that Teek allowed me to collect myself allowing me to conjure them, only the taste and texture paled in comparison to the real deal. Agreeing to the trade I summoned another drink and passed it over.

“Mmm, not bad.” He looked up into the sky. “Wow the day is passing by fast. Once you catch up to me in levels, we should climb the tower together. I think we would have a lot of fun.”

Sipping my drink, I stayed silent as I watched him greedily bite into another triberry, sending juices running down his chin.

I continued to sip my drink in silence.

Khemrok was suddenly acting suspicious. He was quiet, which was a warning sign that he was thinking. Likely thinking of some new way to provoke me.

He cleared his throat and glanced at my eyes before looking downwards “Uh, hey Reigner.”

Choosing to remain silent I did not want to walk into whatever prank or joke he had lined up. After a moment of silence, he continued. “I have been thinking… Could you teach-” He stopped mid sentence. “Trai-“ He stopped again. “Show me…” He seemed to think on the word for a moment before nodding to himself.

Khemrok looked up and asked, “Can you show me how to improve my combat ability?”