Awakener's Guide to Climbing the Tower

<The Saint Buried Upside Down> Oh?

<Endless Dominion> Is the music part of his skill?

<Prisoner of Floor One Hundred> Isn’t that obvious enough? If it isn’t, this is an extraordinarily poor time for a concert.

<The Saint Buried Upside Down> Oh, I like this one. He’s flirting during an undead outbreak.

〔 FAVOR +50 → Gravekeeper 〕

<The Last Survivor of an Unwritten World> The Observers in that Bard’s Observation Channel must be having the time of their lives.

<The Saint Buried Upside Down> I would be.

<Prisoner of Floor One Hundred> Why are you still here then?

A Vestige lunged. Misha sidestepped, drove Twinfang beneath its jaw, and kicked the corpse away.

「 You have killed a Vestige!

EXP +75 」

"♪ Don’t die! I need you to save me! ♪"

The man sounded much more enthusiastic now that she had resumed killing things.

"♪ You’re doing wonderfully, darling–Things are only slightly shaky! ♪"

Misha blocked another strike. "Slightly?"

If he heard her, he showed no sign.

"♪ Hold on! Keep moving! Please don’t fall apart! ♪"

A collection hook scraped across the street beside her. She jumped backward to put distance between her and the corpse.

"♪ I cannot run. I have nowhere else to hide– ♪"

The accompaniment stopped for one dramatic second.

"♪ So keep those lovely eyes alive! ♪"

<The Saint Buried Upside Down> He’s flirting alright~

<First Mourner Beneath Creation> Are you observing the battle at all?

<The Saint Buried Upside Down> There is a battle?

<The Last Survivor of an Unwritten World> Apparently romance survives even where civilization does not.

<Prisoner of Floor One Hundred> There is no romance.

<The Saint Buried Upside Down> Not with that attitude.

Misha kept on dismissing the windows. She had enough distraction.

The Bard changed rhythm. "♪ I will support! You will fight! This arrangement seems completely right! ♪"

Misha drove both daggers through a Vestige’s neck and tore outward. The head fell.

「 You have killed a Vestige!

EXP +75 」

"♪ I sing here! You strike there! Preferably keep them over there! ♪"

Two Vestiges stopped, their heads turning toward the sound and the Bard missed a note.

Misha noticed, so did the Observers.

<Prisoner of Floor One Hundred> And there it is.

<The Saint Buried Upside Down> Run, handsome Bard!

<Endless Dominion> He already stated that he cannot.

<Prisoner of Floor One Hundred> I suspect his viewers are screaming at him right now.

The first Vestige abandoned Misha, then the second.

"♪ Perhaps I chose the proper savior. Perhaps today may end quite well– ♪"

The nearest Vestige climbed over a broken cart.

The Bard’s voice weakened. "W...Why are they looking where I dwell?"

Misha almost laughed. He was rather funny. She could practically hear the man’s survival depending on a stranger.

The mandolin accelerated. "♪ No, no, don’t look at me! Focus on the enemies! ♪"

She sighed inwardly. She threw her dagger and hit the nearest Vestige on the head.

"♪ You cannot die before I’m saved! ♪"

<Endless Dominion> Gravekeeper is redirecting toward him.

〔 FAVOR +50 → Gravekeeper 〕

<Prisoner of Floor One Hundred> Of course. Losing the support now would be inefficient.

〔 FAVOR +150 → Gravekeeper 〕

The Vestiges were still multiplying and the Bard’s support was buying time but it was not creating victory.

Misha could feel the difference clearly. If she remained in her own body and continued at this pace, the dead would eventually grind them down.

She needed force, someone who would look at a crowd and see an invitation. She already knew who.

A corpse slammed its weapon against the remaining dagger she was holding. Misha gave ground.

"Twinfang!" She thrust out her free hand. The second dagger tore itself from the dead Vestige and shot back into her grasp. She caught it cleanly, stepped in, and used the returning momentum to sever the creature’s head.

「 You have killed a Vestige!

EXP +75 」

"♪ I don’t know your name, your Class, or what you are– ♪"

The Bard took an audible breath. "♪ But please keep being terrifying somehow! ♪"

Misha’s mouth twitched beneath the mask. "Working on it."

She knocked a blade aside and drove her heel into the Vestige’s knee. The joint bent backward but it kept moving.

"Nyx!"

「 Constellation Soul within the Aries Chamber Requesting Authorization. 」

Misha managed to find enough space. She kept Twinfang back into their sheaths then took Starfall from her storage.

"COME!"

「 Authorization Accepted. 」

「 Possession Initializing... 」

「 Control Transfer Complete.

Possession Time Remaining: 00:25:00 」

Nyxie took over and Starfall rose. The amber glow behind the cat mask brightened. She arrived like someone had kicked open the door to a festival.

"Nyx, clear the square first. Do not chase anything into another district and... there’s a Bard hiding, don’t let the dead reach him."

Nyxie looked around the square then at the Vestiges, at the sheer number of things waiting to be hit. Then she laughed. "Whoa! There’s so many of them!"

"Nyxie."

"I know, I know! Square, protect people, don’t get distracted." She paused as she smashed a Vestige through a market stall. "...Can I get a little distracted?"

"No."

"Aww." Then she launched herself and Starfall came around in a brutal arc. Three Vestiges disappeared into splintered wood, broken steel, and enough force to throw another corpse halfway across the square.

The Bard’s entire accompaniment stopped. One lonely mandolin note rang out. Then his voice returned, audibly bewildered. "♪ That weapon wasn’t there a moment... How many ways do you know how to fight? ♪"

<The Saint Buried Upside Down> HAHAHAHA

<The Last Survivor of an Unwritten World> He has witnessed something greater than fear.

<First Mourner Beneath Creation> Confusion?

<The Last Survivor of an Unwritten World> Precisely.

The mandolin returned, then the percussion, then the visible backing instruments came rushing after it, louder and faster than before.

Nyxie grinned. "Oh! Battle music!"

She launched herself into the next wave. She was faster than Olivia and she swept through the corpses.

The Observation Chat flooded so quickly that Misha stopped trying to read it. Her first public Floor Quest had become a masked Raider switching personalities in the middle of combat while a Bard supplied live background music from behind a wall.

And somewhere in two different Observation Channels, beings beyond ordinary worlds were apparently enjoying themselves immensely.

One corpse started running toward where the man was hiding.

Nyxie saw it immediately. She dashed then planted Starfall into the ground, vaulted over the hilt, and kicked the Vestige sideways before wrenching the claymore free.

"♪ Turn around! It raised its blade! You cannot die before I’m saved! ♪"

A dramatic chord rang across the square.

"♪ Save meee! Please finish it before I run out of song! ♪"

Nyxie laughed so hard she nearly missed a swing. The Vestige coming from her right lost its upper body anyway. She appeared to be having the best day she had experienced since dying.

"I like him! He makes battle music!"

"He’s begging you not to die because then they’ll kill him next."

"Still counts!" She charged back into the crowd.

Misha watched her own body disappear beneath a rush of ash. Since her soul could move independently while possession remained active, she turned away from the square and floated toward the place where the man was hiding.

The Bard somehow found enough breath for another desperate wail. "♪ Save meeee! ♪"

’He’s absolutely making this up as he goes.’ She drifted around a collapsed section of masonry and finally found him.

The first thing she noticed was that he looked older than she had expected. Not old, definitely not. But the ridiculous song had made her imagine some overeager teenager, perhaps with a feathered hat and enough confidence to compensate for a complete lack of survival instinct.

Instead, the man crouching behind the broken wall looked somewhere in his late twenties or early thirties.

Tousled brown hair had fallen messily over his forehead, damp with sweat and ash. A black earring flashed beneath one ear whenever he turned his head. His complexion carried a light tan that made the exhaustion beneath his blue eyes more obvious, and a subtle mustache blended into short, neatly kept stubble along his jaw.

Misha paused. ’Oh...’

He was handsome. Not in the polished, princely way Caius might have been or Elyes’ idol-like handsomeness. This man looked like trouble that had spent money on accessories. His clothes were far too elaborate for someone currently crouched behind rubble. Dark navy fabric layered beneath black panels and fine gold embroidery.

The instrument itself was beautiful. Dark polished wood, gold detailing, and blue inlays that pulsed faintly with every chord.

He had wedged himself into the safest corner available, one shoulder pressed against the stone while his eyes frantically followed Nyxie’s movements across the square.

He never stopped playing. Not even when another Vestige saw him. His fingers only sped up.

"♪ Hold on! Keep swinging! ♪" he sang, his voice cracked slightly at the end. "♪ You nearly have them down! ♪"

Then she noticed what surrounded the man. At first, she thought the light around him came from mana leaking off the instrument. It did not. There was an entire room layered over the ruined courtyard. No... A studio.

A translucent console hovered beside the man, panels of blue-white mana stacked over one another like mixing boards made from light. Thin bars rose and fell in time with his voice. Symbols Misha could not read pulsed beneath his fingers whenever the tempo changed.

Behind him, tiny phantom instruments floated where no musicians stood.

’So that’s where the rest of the music is coming from.’

The entire composition followed his playing. The man was not merely playing an instrument, he was controlling an entire soundscape.

<Endless Dominion> There. The complete skill manifestation is visible from this angle.

<The Saint Buried Upside Down> He brought an entire studio into an undead city. I adore him~

〔 FAVOR +100 → Maestro 〕

Then another window appeared briefly beneath the comments.

<Observer from the Maestro’s Channel> FINALLY! SOMEONE COMPETENT FOUND HIM!

Misha blinked a few times. ’Huh? Am I seeing things right?’

<Observer from the Maestro’s Channel> DO NOT LET HIM RUN AWAY THIS TIME!

<Observer from the Maestro’s Channel> He has been hiding for a while now.

’What is happening?’

<The Saint Buried Upside Down> I knew his channel would be entertaining.

<Observer from the Maestro’s Channel> YOU HAVE NO IDEA.

<Prisoner of Floor One Hundred> Apparently we are now receiving refugees from another Observation Channel.

<Endless Dominion> Cross-channel convergence occurs when two observed subjects enter the same area. That means Gravekeeper’s soul is somewhere nearby.