Tower Climber (A LitRPG Adventure, Book 1)

by Jakob Tanner

  He disappeared and then reappeared in a burst of shadowy energy right behind Cyrus.

  Both Cyrus and the buffer’s shoulders jumped at Max’s sudden disappearance and reappearance.

  “It’s over Cyrus! Eat my fist!”

  SMASH!

  Max threw a mana-imbued fist right into Cyrus Archer’s jaw.

  The arrogant boy’s entire head exploded, brain matter shooting everywhere.

  It was as Max had suspected. Normally, he could only copy one ability at a time, but because Cyrus’ bind ability had been infused with the buffer’s passive enhancing abilities, his mimic picked up both traits at once.

  If the buffer then doubled Max’s power and then Max’s trait doubled on top of that, that meant he was sending out a mana-infused fist at quadruple his normal power.

  So much power that his fist destroyed Cyrus in one hit.

  “Impossible,” shouted the buffer with fear.

  Even if the Archer family’s plan succeeded, Cyrus, the psychopathic heir to the Archer dynasty would not get to reap any of the benefits.

  Max turned to the buffer.

  The echoes of screams and pandemonium reverberated across the arena once more.

  Now that Cyrus had fallen, the bind trait was no longer holding any of the audience in place.

  Max turned back to stop the buffer and find out more details of this evil plan of the Archer’s, but the climber had disappeared.

  Chaos and pandemonium filled the arena. Monstrous screams and wails from the city echoed all around him.

  This was turning out to be one heck of a final exam.

  92

  Sakura shuddered and turned around to face Samuel.

  “What have you done?” said the climber president turning to the man as well, his face full of anger.

  Sakura thought back to when she first met Max. The high-ranked minotaur that had made it to the walls of the tower-zone. That had been an experiment. Samuel had been behind that creature’s movement. He’d been working on this insane plan for months, maybe even longer.

  “I don’t need to listen to either of you any more,” said Samuel snidely. “All these rules in place. What good do they do any of us? And why should those of us multiple times more powerful than normal citizens have to abide by rules that protect them? What about us? Don’t we deserve more for rising so far above the ranks of humans?”

  “You’ve gone completely mad, Samuel” said the climber president. “Have you forgotten already why such rules are in place?”

  BOOM!

  Another reverberation from an attack trembled through the room.

  They needed to stop wasting time in here, thought Sakura. They needed to put a stop to this. They had to go protect the citizens from the incoming monster wave.

  “Complain all you want,” said Samuel. “There’s nothing you can do now. The tower-zone is about to get destroyed and then be rebuilt anew with the Archer family as its head leader. No more climber’s guild, no more climber president. The Archers will be running things from now on.”

  The climber president shivered with anger. His muscles stretched and his clothes began to rip.

  Uh oh, thought Sakura.

  The climber president was triggering his A-rank trait. The man had high enough mana affinity and other stats to take on most opponents without relying on his trait. It had been years since the man had triggered it. The climber president was now going all out.

  The climber president’s body grew and ripped out of his clothes. Hair burst forth from his skin covering him in fur. His fingers enlarged and his nails sharpened into huge claws.

  The climber president scowled and his angry face began to morph into that of a wolf’s. His teeth sharpened and his eyes turned yellow.

  Sakura watched on in disbelief.

  She’d only ever heard about the climber president’s power in passing, but had never witnessed it herself.

  It was absolutely incredible.

  The climber president’s trait was a rare and very powerful trait, especially as it ranked up further and further.

  The rare trait was called werewolf mode.

  “You fool,” laughed Samuel. “You did exactly as I was hoping.”

  Oh no, thought Sakura. If Samuel was able to control that minotaur, that meant he could control other monsters. Did that mean, he could—

  Samuel’s eyes flashed red as he triggered his hereditary trait: blood eyes. He then triggered his unique trait that had made him the city’s greatest doctor and healer: cellular manipulation.

  The climber president screamed out a giant wail.

  Its claws reached up to its head as if trying to fight a horrible migraine.

  The werewolf stumbled around spasmodically until docilely coming to its senses.

  The wolf’s yellow eyes now glowed red.

  Sakura looked back and forth with horror between the former climber president and Samuel Archer.

  What has this man done? What was he about to do?

  “You fool,” said Samuel, speaking to the diminutive werewolf now. “The only other A-ranker in the city and you thought you’d be enough to stop me. An old man who is still as naive as ever. Pah! You’re pathetic. Now, you’ll help me destroy the very city you love. Now go! Join my monster wave!”

  The werewolf let out a huge howl and then smashed through the window, breaking the glass and leaping out into the arena.

  Samuel turned back to Sakura with a menacing smile.

  “As I said before, it’s already done. You can’t stop me.”

  93

  SMASH!

  Max looked up from the center of the arena and watched a giant werewolf emerge.

  It landed in the stands, crushing the metal seats into mere rubble.

  “We’re saved! The climber president has unleashed his ultimate power!”

  Max took in the ferocious-looking werewolf. That thing was the climber president? Turning into a beastly werewolf must have been the president’s trait and a deadly one at that. They needed reinforcements and a monstrous werewolf was exactly what they needed. What better way to take out a group of monsters with a monster of your own? Fight fire with fire.

  The werewolf smashed at the stands, attacking actual citizens.

  The citizens were able to dodge the werewolf’s moves, but they were in shock.

  “But—aren’t you here to save us?”

  The werewolf let out a massive roar.

  Was the climber president not on their side? Was he working with the Archer family?

  No. Max didn’t believe it. Something was very wrong with the climber president. He was being controlled somehow.

  The werewolf crouched down before making a huge leap into the air, going over the arena walls, and disappearing.

  A moment later, a giant gargoyle flew over the walls of the arena, towards the smashed observation box that the climber president had emerged from.

  The gargoyle bowed in front of the broken glass. Next, Samuel Archer stepped out from the destroyed window and onto the gargoyle’s back. The monster then flew out to the center of the arena.

  The man was lording over the destruction of his making

  Max gritted his teeth as he looked up at the A-ranked climber with disgust. He’d never had a good feeling about the man and now it was all coming to the surface. The man wanted to destroy this city, this place they all called home.

  For most of his life, Max had never felt like he had really belonged anywhere. Sakura and Casey flashed through his mind. There was something about the tower-zone though. He’d started to hope more, be more optimistic. Zestiris—for all of its problems—was still his home, where he had grown up, the place that had shaped him into who he was. He wasn’t going to let someone destroy it for their own nefarious purposes. Screw that.

  He needed to come up with a plan.

  At that very moment, Casey rushed out from one of the arena tunnels.

  “Max!” she screamed. “Are you okay?”

&nbs
p; Toto’s eyes were equally wide with concern.

  “The Archer’s are trying to take over the city,” said Max.

  “What are we going to do?”

  Max looked around. It was chaos in all directions.

  Other than his first night in the tower-zone, he’d not taken part in a monster wave, so he wasn’t really sure what the procedures were, but he imagined plenty of citizens across the city would need help, taking out whatever gargoyles or other demonic creatures that had started rampaging across the streets.

  Another figure emerged from the broken viewer’s box at the top of the arena. The figure leapt from high up and seconds later landed gracefully on the arena floor.

  It was Sakura.

  She marched up to Max and Casey.

  Max did not like the pale worried face she had on. She was one of the most powerful climbers he knew. If she was concerned, then things were going really badly.

  She materialized two mana potions from her pouch and handed one to each of those.

  “Okay, you two,” said Sakura. “Drink those mana potions and listen to me. You’re now receiving your first high-level assignment. You and Casey need to get to the tower-zone’s central wall where there’s a back-up mana generator. You’ll be able to manually turn on all the defensive wards that are currently off at the moment. After that, join the other defense climbers and city climbers and push back against the monster wave.”

  “What about Samuel?” asked Max, looking to the megalomaniac hovering in the sky above them.

  Sakura grinned. “Leave him to me.”

  94

  Max and Casey hurried out of the tower arena.

  Monsters roared out as they wreaked havoc on the city. Citizens screamed in panic, rushing in every direction.

  Max’s heart raced as he ran and looked around the city. There were horrible green slime monsters lording over people, harpies in the sky, and rock golems smashing into windows.

  “What are we going to do?” shouted Max, looking in every direction.

  “Sakura gave us an assignment,” said Casey, tugging at his arms.

  “These people need are help though,” Max said.

  If they ran past them now, who was going to help them? They could die here on their own?

  “More people are going to die if we don’t get those defensive wards powered back up,” said Casey. “There’ll be reinforcement climbers to help with the pandemonium. We’re on an official climber assignment now—we have to believe that everyone else on our side is working together to succeed and save the most amount of people.”

  Max watched a group of E-rankers take down two harpies.

  Casey was right.

  They continued moving forward. The central wall was about three miles ahead of them. If they didn’t have any interruptions, it would take them just under fifteen minutes due to their enhanced climber agility. If they did get interrupted though, who knew how long it could take.

  The lives of the citizens were in their hands.

  They rushed down a block full of cars with smashed roofs. Ahead of them a squad of climbers took on a massive ogre with over thirty eyeballs on its head.

  Down another street was a tentacled monster that hoovered up people, cars, street lamps, or anything into its body.

  “Just keep running,” Casey muttered to herself. “Keep your head down. No need to look at all the scary disturbing monster around us. They’re not important right now.”

  They continued sprinting down the main city street.

  “If we turn here,” said Max. “We might be able to take a shortcut.”

  Casey agreed so they made a right turn and then a left into an alleyway.

  They stumbled across a group of climbers who didn’t seem to be doing anything. They were smoking cigarettes and playing cards.

  “What are you doing?” shouted Casey. “The city’s under attack!”

  The climbers stood up at the sight of them and they started to laugh menacingly at them.

  Max was starting to regret their shortcut plan.

  It was a good plan in theory: as they’d be off the main road and less likely to run into horrible scary monsters and chaos.

  It was a bad plan in practice because instead of all that, they ran into a group of climbers who were clearly working for the Archer family.

  Their mission had just hit its first obstacle.

  95

  “Oh, the city is under attack?” one of the climbers asked with a smirk. “I hadn’t noticed.”

  Max and Casey took a step back from the group of men.

  He recognized some of them. These were climbers who had been on duty in the outer-rim. That’s what Samuel was up to when they snuck into the other part of the city. He was gathering all of the climbers who were loyal to him.

  “The girl is kind of cute,” said one of the climbers. “The boss told us to just wait here. I’m sure he wouldn’t mind if we also had a bit of fun.”

  Casey scrunched her nose in absolute repulsion at the men.

  Max felt his blood boil.

  They were going to have to fight through these guys and Max suddenly had no hesitant feelings about doing so.

  The rogue climbers rushed towards them.

  Max shadow blinked behind them and elbowed one in the back of the head with a rush of force and mana, sending his face smacking into the concrete floor of the alley.

  Meanwhile, Casey had whipped out her thousand paper crane attack: filling the alley with a gust of wind and paper cranes.

  The origami birds fluttered through the air slicing at the necks of the rogue climbers.

  They coughed up blood and fell to the ground.

  The paper birds flew in a flock back into Casey’s pouch.

  “That move,” said Max, “is seriously insane.”

  They hurried down the alley only to find a C-rank climber waiting for them. This guy kept his eyes up to the sky, paying attention to the swirling airborne monsters.

  Max suddenly understood what those other climbers they’d just fought were doing. They were guarding this guy. Another buffer.

  Samuel Archer must have buffers all across the city to help him control the monsters.

  The man stood up and pulled out a hilt with no sword. Suddenly a ray of blue mana emerged from the hilt, forming a blade of magical energy. He was channeling his own mana to create the blade.

  This guy was two ranks above them, they were going to have to be a little smarter about how they fought their way past him.

  Then Max remembered what skill he was last hit with.

  He stretched out his arms and triggered bind.

  A tiny barely visible thread shot out from one of his finger tips and wrapped itself around the D-rank buffer.

  The man squirmed.

  “Argh,” he cried. “What have you done to me, you punk?”

  Casey took advantage of the man’s paralyzed state, creating a huge gust of wind and directing it at him.

  Max undid the bind spell at the last minute as Casey’s wind blast smashed into him and sent the man slamming into a nearby brick wall.

  “That should do the trick,” Casey declared.

  The two moves combined had created a powerful combo. The bind spell meant that the climber couldn’t get a chance to dodge the wind gust. There was also the psychological torture of it too. Would he be sent flying or would he simply have to take the attack while paralyzed?

  The D-rank climber groaned and lifted himself up off the ground. He was covered in dirt, but other than that, he didn’t seem to have a scratch on him.

  “You gotta be kidding me,” groaned Casey.

  Toto poked its head out from her pocket and shook his little gerbil fist in outrage.

  The man cracked his knuckles and snickered, ready to pulverize them.

  Max realized they were no match for this man with their current abilities. As a D-ranked climber, the man had stats double their own. His endurance and strength stats were enough to make it impossible fo
r their moves to hurt him.

  Max had gotten used to having upper-ranked offensive moves in his arsenal that at double the power could break through the sheer stat gap between ranks, but at the moment he didn’t have such an ability.

  They were screwed.

  The man rushed at them with his powered up mana sword.

  Click!

  The sound of a lighter flicking on and off, echoed through the alley.

  Click! Flicker! Click!

  Before the D-ranked Climber could reach them, a burst of flames filled the alley, shielding Max and Casey from the attack.

  Then leaping right in front of them was none other than their climber academy instructor. He had a burning cigarette, hanging in his mouth and a fireball in one palm that he was ready to serve up to the D-rank climber.

  “Looks like the final exam is a different kind of test this year,” he said. “I’ve been sent by Sakura to back you guys up. You hurry ahead, leave this guy to me.”

  Max and Casey nodded and rushed forward as their instructor began trading blows with the D-ranked climber.

  They sprinted as fast as they could.

  They were almost at the generator.

  96

  Max and Casey arrived at the huge looming wall that separated the tower-zone and the outer-rim.

  There was a building attached to the wall. It was where the duty guards’ locker room and lounge area was together with the city’s back-up generator.

  “There it is,” cheered Casey.

  Max ignored the horrible noises of the monsters wreaking havoc on the city. Every second wasted was another moment of life or death for the hundreds of thousands of civilians who lived in the tower-zone without any powers to defend themselves with.

  They rushed forward to the door.

  “Oh crap,” said Casey. “What if the door’s locked?”

  They hadn’t considered that.

  Max reached out and turned the knob and thankfully the door opened.