Unconquered Tower

THIRTY-NINE

His name was Deacon and he was from the deep south. He was some blend of ethnic groups that Roan couldn’t place. His skin tone was deeply bronzed with sun-bleached blonde curly hair. There were faint scars on his wrists and forearms, thin and faded from time. Billie and a few others clustered around him while most of the others faded away into the background. They weren’t ignoring Roan, but rather were poorly eavesdropping.

“Alright, pitch your idea,” Deacon said. Without the large group around him he seemed calmer, but there was an intensity to his eyes that made Roan suspect that he was merely a good actor.

Billie and another woman, who had introduced herself as Vanessa, sat side by side. Vanessa was their age, in her early twenties, just like most everyone who entered the tower. Youth and folly was often accredited with entering the Thirteenth Tower. She was of African descent, dark eyes and short curly hair. Most people had cut away their excess hair the first time a skeletal hand had grasped them.

“Your goal is to buy manuscripts and share them. Pooling money together similar to how the association does.”

“They didn’t want us. Not really. We weren’t special enough for them. They wanted twenty-five percent of our earnings. Nobody would agree to it,” Deacon said.

“Greedy bastards. I wonder if Taoya knew that or if I got a discount because I fought with him?” Roan kept his face blank and nodded slowly to them, trying to keep them going.

“We started working together when the anomaly quest started. We could fight them one-on-one, but in groups they were too strong. We don’t have the abilities the others do but we figured it out. But we couldn’t kill them as fast as the others could. They kept us relegated to the side, kept the majority of the kills to themselves.” Deacon’s words were full of heat and anger as he looked at the others who nodded in agreement with him.

“So you decided to pool your money together to buy manuscripts. Went cheap on the healing items, focused on skills, right?” Roan cut to the chase.

“Yeah, that’s about it. None of the compulsory shit. We share because we know we’re not special or talented or whatever the fuck they call themselves. Think of it as a library of sorts. We all contribute what we want when we want and share what we want. We can organize groups here, but no coercion,” Deacon said.

“That sounds good, but I doubt that it’ll work.”

“I like the library idea,” Roan said that truthfully. He did like the idea of a library. He liked it very much.

“So you have one manuscript. You can join of course, we’re not exactly limiting guests,” Billie cut in before Deacon could say anything.

“What manuscripts do you have?” Roan asked, hoping that they’d have the body tempering manual and he’d be able to save his last few hundred credits. There was a collective grimace as they all looked toward each other with a hint of shame.

“None at the moment. We were talking about which ones we should buy. We’re a bit thin on funds,” Vanessa admitted. She leaned back and looked over the groups of people talking.

“Food, water, and bandages have consumed most of our money. Nobody is going to sell the weapons we’ve collected so far,” Vanessa said.

“So this library is just my manuscript?” Roan asked.

“Yeah. Problem?” Deacon challenged.

“He’s really got a chip on his shoulder. Can’t tell if he wants or needs to be the big man. Insecurity about not having a talent. Could cause him to try to go beyond his limits and get himself killed.”

“No. But if I’m going to join, I have a suggestion of a manuscript to buy. I’ll even pay for half of it,” Roan offered.

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“Which one?” Deacon asked, suspiciously.

“Body Tempering. I think that’s what’s going to give us our best chance at catching up with them,” Roan said with a straight face. It wasn’t even a lie.

“It’s one of the special level one skills, right?” Deacon asked, looking at Vanessa who nodded.

“Eight hundred credits for a manual. You’ll put up four hundred of them?” Deacon asked, leaning forward suddenly intent.

“Yeah. As long as I get first crack at it,” Roan said. The others winced but nodded and Billie hopped up, rushing off to start talking to the others.

“Are they really that broke they need to crowdsource four hundred credits?” Roan waited patiently as he could, beating his fingers against his knee and sipping on his canteen slowly.

“How many anomalies did you guys kill?” Roan finally asked as the silence was growing too long.

“Most everyone got one or two. Enough for food, water, and healing supplies,” Deacon said. Roan bit his cheek from reacting. In the first fight alone he’d killed over thirty of them. Fresh clothes and daily necessities would strain their resources quickly if that was all they’d managed to harvest.

He bought an inferior ration kit as he waited, his stomach’s constant rumbling distracting him. Roan didn’t miss the way their eyes tracked his food as he ate it quickly, though he offered the ration of water up to them, which Vanessa took gratefully. Billie came back a minute later and nodded her head and touched Roan’s wrist.

CREDIT TRANSFER INITIATED

400 CREDITS ADDED TO YOUR ACCOUNT

Roan bought the manuscript instantly. Just like the shape skill manuscript, the body tempering appeared out of nowhere and landed next to him. He had to focus to not gasp as he opened the book and saw the interior of it. It was more complex than the skill shaping manuscript had been. Well over a hundred pages broken into multiple parts, the words were tiny blots that he had to squint to read.

BODY TEMPERING MANUAL

NEUTRAL

A MANUAL ON HOW TO PROPERLY START TEMPERING ONE’S BODY WITH A NEUTRAL OR NON-EXISTANT MANA CORE. DOES NOT INTERFERE WITH FUTURE ASPECTED TEMPERINGS.

EARN BODY TEMPERING SKILL: BEGIN PURGING OF TOXINS AND THE REFINEMENT OF FLESH: 0/10 SESSIONS

“What does that mean? Refinement of flesh? Also, can the bloodlines even use this if they’re already using aspected mana? Or does future tiering up of the skill allow for further aspected tempering? It was vague,” Roan thought as he handed the book to Deacon who greedily took it.

“I have to do fifteen sessions of purging and refinement before I open up the skill,” Deacon said after a minute. Roan nodded as Vanessa crowded over his shoulder, touching the manual and starting to read it.

“Same. Look at that chart, we have to use a bunch of potions and…saunas?” Vanessa said, sounding confused. Roan winced as he remembered what Old Bao had told him about his own time in the towers. Body tempering was one of those things that was in every tower.

“It’s about integrating mana into our physical bodies. It will make us stronger, faster, more durable, etcetera. My master said it’s tedious and can be quite painful,” Roan supplied them.

“Sound like everything in life,” Deacon muttered, eyes never straying from the paper.

“Pass that damn booklet back and we can all read at the same time,” Roan said as he cracked his neck side to side. There was seven hours to go until the next level unlocked and he was going to have this book read and know what he needed to do to begin tempering himself the next level.

“If I had bought the skill, would it have worked without all the ingredients? What’s the difference?” Roan couldn’t help but wonder as he pulled the manual closer to himself, forcing Deacon, Vanessa, and Billie to crowd around him. A few others were starting to come over so Roan laid out the skill shaping manuscript for them, but kept a careful eye.

“Why agree to work with them and not the association and Pact? Are you that scared of them? Do their powers intimidate you to the point that you won’t work with them?” It was Old Bao’s words even if it was in his own mind as he flipped to the next page and squinted to lean forward and continue reading.

“I won’t lie to myself. I can’t afford it. They do intimidate me. But that’s not why I don’t want to work with them. It’s why these guys don’t work with them. They don’t see us as equals, not really. If they view themselves as superior, then I must be inferior, and it’s not hard to see where the abuse would come from. Even now they demand more from these guys than they did me. What will it be like in three floors or five? When only one single advantage could be had? Will they take it for themselves even if I earned it?” Roan was so occupied with the thought process he was forced to read over the second page again.

“I can’t lose any advantage if I want to find them. I won’t subordinate my goals to theirs.” Roan glanced up at the crowd of independents who were reading his two manuals and wondered how far he was willing to subordinate these peoples goals to further his own. It took only a second for him to realize the answer.

“All the way. To the very top if I have to. I will find them, no matter the cost.”