Bog Standard Isekai

A falling elevator had been one of Mark’s top three irrational fears growing up. He didn’t remember exactly what form of media had spooked him as a child; all he remembered was constantly being worried that they would fall. What had finally cured him was learning about all the safety devices that they installed to prevent that. Brakes, buffers, governors, as well as the use of multiple steel cables, each of which would be capable of holding up the weight of the elevator on its own.

As for the elevators in the Tower, he’d never bothered to figure out if they used any of those. That question suddenly felt very pressing as he and several of his closest friends went plummeting down the elevator shaft.

He had three different half-formed plans on how he could slow their fall with his glass magic, but in that sudden moment of panic he failed to act on any of them.

Rhun was the first to move. He jumped out of the elevator and landed on the floor beneath the prison, and caught the roof of the elevator car with both hands. The elevator rocked as he found purchase for a split second, and then the elevator's momentum broke Rhun’s handhold and they resumed their fall.

“Bail!” said Bia, and leapt out of the car on the next level, landing in a perfect parkour roll. Marksi followed her, then gave a glance back, alarmed to see that Brin hadn’t followed in time.

Brin pushed Ares, who landed hard but a lot easier than if he’d fallen more than one floor. Then he grabbed Sion, aiming for the next floor and hoping his glass magic could help dampen the shock for them both, but before he could move, a sudden stinging wind of sand blinded him. Vitor was trying to use sand magic to slow them, and failing.

By the time he scraped the sand out of his eyes well enough to move, they were falling too fast to try to jump. The floors were passing by in a blur, so fast he could hardly make them out. He really didn’t like the way that his feet didn’t seem connected to the floor anymore.

Sion was screaming. Vitor was shooting spears of sand at the passing floors like that would help somehow. The only thing he could think of trying was using his armor’s double-jump at just the right time. The ground floor should give some more space to work with. He looked at Bedelia, who gave him a two-thumbs up. He wasn’t sure what that was supposed to convey. Did that mean Hogg had a plan, or was she just giving him positive encouragement ahead of his meeting with the afterlife?

Then he felt the elevator floor press up against him, suddenly feeling heavy is if he were experiencing several times the weight of gravity. The pressure increased and then let off as someone or something caught them and gradually brought them down to a stop.

As soon as the elevator leveled off with the floor, Vitor shoved past Brin and through the remnants of the elevator’s door, bursting into the lobby.

Brin stepped quickly after him. In the hallway of what looked like an Earth Circle office lobby, he saw Gyromia. She was flanked by a Shadow Elemental, and held two arms up towards the Tower, arms that were now shaking.

“I… I did it,” she breathed.

Brin realized he was still holding Sion, and let him down. He still couldn't quite believe that he'd lived. His pulse was pounding, and his instincts were shouting at him to keep fighting, because the rescue had come so suddenly and out of nowhere. But the feeling of solid ground beneath his feet also made him want to lay down and never depart from solid non-moving floor again.

Sion withdrew his arms from around Brin’s neck, straightened his clothes and cleared his throat. Vitor had collapsed down to his hands and knees, but looked up when he heard Gyromia speak again.

“I did it!” she said, a little more excited.

“You. You saved me,” Vitor said, a little awed.

Gyromia dropped her hands, just in time for Vitor to grab her in a hug. He was somewhat awkward again, his curse apparently deciding they were now out of combat, but she didn’t seem to mind. She seemed pleased that she’d actually pulled it off and hardly noticed anything else.

“Thanks for the save. I owe you one,” said Brin.

“You owe her more than one! We all do!” said Vitor.

“No, please, think naught of it,” said Gyromia.

“I will think everything of it!” said Vitor.

“I hate to ask, but we’re sort of in a hurry. Do you want to come fight Easterlings with us?” asked Brin.

“That hath consumed the whole of my Mana,” Gyromia confessed.

“Then we should get back up there. How far did we fall?”

Brin saw the floor marker. Fifteen. Had they really gone that far in such a short amount of time? The idea of getting all the way to the top of the Tower before Fowler and that Easterling knight suddenly felt impossible. Fowler could teleport, for Solia’s sake.

Whatever the case, he needed to get back up there. Sancha and the rest were waiting for him below the prison level, and he had no way of telling them not to go looking for him. Gyromia pressed Vitor for details on what was going on, but Brin didn’t have time for a conversation.

He went to one of the other elevator shafts and pressed the call button. There was a buzzing error chime.

Tower Message. Central elevators are temporarily unavailable.

“I hope you won’t think too ill of me for saying this, but I don’t know if I’m ready to get back into one of those just yet,” said Sion.

“Me either. I’m actually kind of glad they’re offline. We’ll see how long that lasts, though. This means we get to take the stairs,” said Brin.

“A healthy habit, I’ve always thought so,” said Sion.

“Let’s go.”

“But to what end? And… art thou Brin?” asked Gyromia.

He must look pretty strange now that his illusions were no longer covering his armor. Vitor did a double take, noticing for the first time.

The longer he spent with the traces of Eveladis on his body, the more of a risk he was taking. He'd lost all of his Invisible Eyes, including the ones he'd kept watching his friends up above and the one he'd been using to communicate with Hogg.

He had gotten a few lessons on how to counter the Eveladis from Nunno, and one of them was most useful for his current situation. The main thing to remember was that the Eveladis was physical. It released little particles of alchemical substance into the air, and those particles were what was canceling his magic. All he had to do was remove them, and he had a useful trick for that.

Brin lit himself on fire. He summoned jets of flame in a line, like a luxury car wash, and traced it up and down his body. The armor protected him from the brunt of it, and [Heat Resistance] meant that he wasn't in any danger from this quick wash. He smelled of smoke and a little of burnt hair, but a quick no-smell tablet took care of that.

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His magic returned, and he had a mind get to work on restoring his surveillance network. He sent an Invisible Eye up to the fifty-ninth floor first, and found that everyone was right where they left him. The Easterlings had completely evacuated the sixtieth floor, and there was no sign of Fowler

"Gyromia, thank you for the save. I'll find a way to repay you for this," said Brin.

"Nay, it was the least I might do. But what--"

"I don't have time to explain anything. Enjoy the Tower Festival. Stay away from the monsters--they're real. We have to go," said Brin. He didn't leave her time to argue. He left to the stairwell, and started running his way up.

Unfortunately, he was the weak link here. He set himself a pace that he thought he could keep up with his reduced Vitality, and the aches and pains he was trying to ignore from his body. His armor was the only thing making this possible at all. If he didn't have it's power helping to push along his body, he'd probably have to quit after ten floors.

Sion, with his [Running] Skill could probably go a lot faster, and Vitor proved he could as well. He stayed behind to give a longer farewell to Gyromia, but caught up with them after fifteen floors.

Brin cast his Mirror Image of a school uniform back on top of himself, since that secret was out of the bag already. Vitor looked at him with an air of accusation.

"You were holding back in our duels," said Vitor.

"I don't really see it that way. I should be able to win against a regular warrior even without illusion," said Brin.

"Did you just call me a regular [Warrior]?" asked Vitor, offended.

Bedelia tapped him on the shoulder, giving him a meaningful look. Brin didn't know what she wanted until the third time she did it. Right, she couldn't talk with the traces of Eveladis on her.

Brin set Bedelia on fire a little. She squealed in pain and then made a big show of patting down her hair, which was exactly as shampoo-commercial perfect as always.

"Oh, cut that out," said Brin.

"Yes, master. T-thank you, master," said Bedelia.

"Ok, now spill. What's going on?"

"Spill?" she asked, and opened up a potion bottle to pour it on the ground. Wait, that was one of his! It was a water breathing potion.

"Where'd you get this?" He snatched it out of her hands and resealed the lid. "Never mind. What's the situation?"

"It's tragic. Truly tragic. We have loads of budding romances, but not a single love triangle. Vitor likes Gyromia, and she likes him back. How boring is that?" responded Bedelia.

"Does she truly?" Vitor asked.

Brin grit his teeth. "What is the strategic situation of the Tower generally, with an emphasis on the status of reinforcements for my mission to secure the Grand Focus of Keetes."

Bedelia shrugged. "Oh, yeah, the thing about that is that the Grand Magi are assuming that you'll fail. They're focusing the Tower's strength downstairs so that they'll be ready to defend the people when all the Shadow Elementals disappear. Even Hogg can't spare much more than me on this."

"So they're giving us nothing," said Brin.

"I didn't say that. [Water Mages] suck against Shrouded, so they're sending them against the Easterlings. Land's End is already up on the fifty-ninth floor. We need to catch up to her now! And you can have anyone you can recruit on the way," said Bedelia.

With that, a new plan began to take shape. At first, he'd just wanted to rush straight to the top, but that wasn't going to work. He couldn't outrun Fowler, so he had to hope some other obstacle would prevent the [Pirate] from raiding Chaos' personal belongings, which was a pretty safe assumption to make. He also couldn't beat a large group of Easterlings with his current forces, but that didn't have to be the limit. The Tower was full of power. He just had to collect it.

On the thirtieth floor, they left the stairwell to help resolve a pitched battle between two [Air Mages] and a trio of black guilt-colored Shrouded. Black Shrouded were one of the stronger variants, and liked to attack from range, so the [Air Mages] had been trading shots with them from opposite ends of a long hallway. It was a simple thing for Brin and Vitor to run through their water bullets and corner them. The [Air Mages] joined their group, and followed them up.

On the thirty-seventh floor, they found a high-level [Hunter] who'd come for the Festival but had realized that the monsters were real. He'd come up here pursuing a Joy Shrouded, but allowed Brin to lead him towards a quarry that his arrows would be more effective against.

On the forty-first floor, his Invisible Eyes saw Fowler, and he was looting the place. He found the workshop of a high-level Earth Track crafter, full of expensive materials and reagents. After breaking through all the wards and enchantments, he'd taken to sweeping entire shelves into his storage bag. Brin had never heard of a bag with a limit that large, because it seemed bottomless. Fowler cleared the room out and left again before Brin could get there.

The one bright spot was that Fowler had been alone. No sign of the escaped prisoners or the Easterling knight. Was it too much to hope that Brin wouldn't see them again today?

On the fiftieth floor they had a problem. Not many Shrouded had made their way up this far in the Tower, but the ones that had were the ones that could fly, which meant Joy Shrouded. One such Shrouded, a badling man, was roving around a half-destroyed auditorium as if trying to find something.

He was clearly less sane than the Crashing Wave had been, because Brin's Invisible Eyes saw at least four dead. Three Tower workers and a mage.

"We should take care of this," said Brin, and called his team to a stop.

Still in the stairwell, he summoned a glass spearhead, one of the hollow-point kind when he'd been experimenting with trying to get his glass to puncture armor. He put a tiny bit of the Water Poison that Hogg had given him inside, and then made another with Color Poison. He'd like to try a bit of each and see what worked better if he could.

Then he attached the spearpoint to an entire glass arrow, and asked the [Hunter] if he could fire it. The [Hunter] made sure to give him a whole big lecture to make it clear that the arrow was awful, and only his supreme skill made it possible to fire it.

They crept into the auditorium, and the Joy Shrouded saw them at once. "Tell me where they are. Tell me, or I might get upset!" His smile was cracking. In another few seconds, he might turn into a less-dangerous Anger Shrouded. The [Hunter] didn't wait. He shot the arrow, using a Skill to make it curve in the air and follow the floating Shrouded.

The arrow struck straight on and exploded, shattering the bit of poison inside the Shrouded's body. He burst apart, and splashed down to the ground in a puddle. Vitor dried him out so that he couldn't return.

You have defeated: Shrouded (30)

Experience split between party members.

They'd only used the Water Poison, but now he knew it was effective. He hoped they'd get a chance to use the Color Poison so that he could compare.

Scanning with his Invisible Eyes, he didn't see any other Shrouded nearby. He saw something else.

"Oh, no."

"What is it? More Easterlings?" asked Vitor.

"Worse. Aw, man, he's coming down the stairs towards us, so there's no way we can avoid him," complained Brin.

"Who?" asked Vitor.

"We're going to have to talk to Guoncal."

When they found him, Guoncal looked between Vitor and Brin suspiciously. "Dare I ask what preponderance of fate hath brought the two of you into cooperation? I had believed thee graced with nobler mettle, Lord Vitor."

"The Tower is under attack! Didn't you know?" said Vitor.

"I have been occupied," Guoncal said cagily.

"We don't time for this," said Brin, and kept running up the stairs. Though, not as quickly as he would've liked. He was breathing hard and his legs felt like jelly, and if they really were going to climb all the way to the top he had thirty stories left to go.

"Hold, I say! What manner of foe hath laid siege to our fair Tower? Answer me this, at least," said Guoncal.

"The Motley Shroud, and Easterlings," answered Sion, and then Guoncal was suddenly at Sion's side.

"Easterlings, thou hast said."

"Indeed," said Sion. "And if it's not to bold of me to say, I have the impression that you might be a source of knowledge on the subject."

Guoncal smiled. "Thou art certainly correct, Lord..."

"No lord. I'm Sion, a humble [Merchant]."

"Nay, fret not that I shall scorn thee for thy station; my quarrel lies not with the lowly, but with the wretch who would climb beyond the measure of his lot." Guoncal said with a glare at Brin.

"How generous of you!" said Sion.

Guoncal nodded. "I will admit, I have never yet had the pleasure of observing an Easterling with mine own eyes."

"But you're an expert on insects, and Easterlings appear to be insects the size of men. What weaknesses would you expect them to have?" asked Sion.

Guoncal nodded eagerly. "It is commonly held for certain truth that no creeping thing might ever attain the stature of a man. Their inward parts could not sustain the burden of such bulk, and they would swelter in their own heat. Moreover, no lungs have they, but draw the air through slender pipes within their frames. And by this very means, they lie exposed to poison, which would find a ready passage to their vitals. I might also point out other points of weakness, upon observing them."

"Wait! I have some airborne poisons. Let me see," said Sion.

Brin had never even thought of poison. In that case, he might give glass dust another shot, too. He hated using stuff like that against human opponents, but these Easterlings deserved whatever came to them. And if Guoncal was right about being able to figure out other weak spots, this might just give them an edge.

The worst ever had happened. He'd gotten the reinforcements he'd needed, and it had been Guoncal.