As the weights dropped, the entire house shook. There was a reason why he had placed all of the weights on the bottom floor. The house would have collapsed otherwise.
As he left, he quickly put his armor on, hefting his hammer. He had taken to going without his armor for the most part, as he hardly needed it in the city. At his current level of strength, and certainly after he passed his second threshold, he would be strong enough to not need the armor anymore, at least after he found a replacement. His bones and skin would be just as durable as the metal. At that point, he would need a new set, which would likely only come as some high level quest reward, or through a similar avenue. That reminded him of the question that he had for Jeffrey.
A lot of the time, his ideas and wonderings were simply lost in the haze of battle, never to surface again. This one was a lot more pressing however. He had never gained anything from any of his quests, whereas everyone else had reported doing so. They gained money, or equipment, which was a lot better than nothing. It was a mystery as to why Sam was left without any rewards. He had some suspicions as to why that was, but he needed Jeffrey to prove them.
He headed towards the city hall, the most likely place for the man to be, and whistled to himself as he went. A lot of the pleasures that he would have used to distract himself before, such as a good meal or a drink at one of the taverns were no longer a good option, as his body did not need the first one, nor easily respond to the second one. Perhaps his brewers would level up enough to increase the potency of their beverages. He would have to check eventually. It was a sad state of affairs, and it meant that all that was left was training.
If he was in a higher universe, then he would have some options, but for now, it was useless. He entered the city hall a few moments later, heading towards the main atrium. Usually there were a few of his captains there, either looking at the Metropolis Core, or doing city planning.
Today, Sam was in luck, and he spotted Jeffrey standing alongside two of the Manthrox sect captains, poring over a set of diagrams. He headed over towards the ground, and Jeffrey looked up.
“Sam! There you are. I thought you had lost yourself in training. What can I do?”
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“I have a question for you,” Sam said. “In private.”
Jeffrey nodded, and walked away from the table that he was standing at, leaving the two aliens to argue over something. The two men walked further down the hall, before stopping.
“Remember how I complained about not getting a quest reward before, but then stopped because I was in the company of the other captains?”
“Vaguely,” Jeffrey said. “Wasn't it after we got the quest for the Titans?”
“Exactly. Now, do you have any idea as to why that might be?” Sam asked.
“Such things are rare, but not unheard of. Usually it has to do with when the System takes a special interest in a cultivator. Either because they have committed a great sin, and this is a punishment for them, or because they stepped onto the Road to Zenith. As part of that road, they are denied their quest rewards, save for the most heroic of quests, in order to encourage them to use their strength more effectively.”
“Oh,” Sam replied.
The answer had been staring him in the face the entire time. Because he was on the Road to Zenith, he had been deprived of all of his quest rewards. That was disappointing, but better than what he had originally suspected, which was that the System was manifesting its displeasure at his existence. He had begun to think that there were different aspects of the System. There was the overarching, all powerful interface that provided stats and levels to anyone. Then there were the overseers, who were the arbiters of its will in a more mortal sense. The System itself had no goals, save for providing its services, but the arbiters were a lot more human-like in their motives. He knew that if it had been allowed, he would already be dead. One of those supremely powerful beings would have erased him from the surface of the Multiverse, without even blinking. It was scary to think about, but highly unlikely to actually happen. There were rules around the interference of powerful beings in a newly initialized universe, otherwise Sam probably would have been dead already.
“That makes a lot more sense than what I was thinking,” Sam told Jeffrey, smiling in relief.
The other man could clearly guess what Sam’s initial thought was, but wisely did not share it. They left the city hall together, talking amiably about things of far less consequence. It was nice, and ultimately served as a bit of stress relief for Sam, who had the entire hopes of his faction riding on his ability to kill the Titans, or at least coordinate their demise. Jeffrey peeled away, and went off to find Rax. Meanwhile, Sam went the other way, towards Sarge. It was time to see if his training had made a difference.