The Fractured Tower

Book 2, Chapter 57

Morlin had to be told about the Lion’s Fang Key, of course. That was part of the deal. Basically everything they looted—that they didn’t keep for their own personal use—went back to the Telpikes. Sorin hadn’t objected there. His team was getting the better end of the deal since they’d be claiming far rarer, and thus more expensive, soulprints from their benefactors.

Even better, since it had been close to two weeks since the last time they’d checked in, the crafting orders had been completed. For Sorin, that didn’t mean much, but Nemari had ordered bracers enchanted to improve her manual dexterity as a way to bridge the gap in her sword skills. For much the same reason, she now sported a new pair of boots that would help her keep her feet square under her body during melee combat.

Rue had gotten a pair of boots enchanted the same way, in addition to just plain better quality equipment all the way around. She looked like a proper scion of a high family now, with durable, stylish outfits and proper accessories. It did not escape Sorin’s notice the way Yoru’s eyes tracked her when she walked across the room in her new clothes the first time.

She’d also finally got her coveted ranged soulprint, though Force Spear was not Sorin’s first pick. It didn’t make much of a difference in the end, so he hadn’t argued with her when she’d chosen something that focused on damage over accuracy, range, and speed. If she really dedicated herself to mastering the soulprint, she could overcome the handicaps. If not, well, everyone else already had ranged covered anyway.

It was Odric who’d chosen the most unconventional commissions, a pair of items designed to increase his capabilities with earth magic that Yoru had recommended. The first was called a Stone Pulse Pendant, which had an unusual triggered enchantment that would read the surrounding terrain and determine its composition, useful for finding hard stone to repurpose as a weapon.

The second was a Magnecite Bangle, which added an element of control over certain types of metal to his abilities. Those wouldn’t have been that useful on their own, if only because Odric lacked a soulprint to take advantage of them. Stone Skin and Earth Spike both conjured the material they controlled rather than pull it out of the ground.

Fixing that was easy, though. He simply requested an Earth Shaping soulprint from the Telpike’s armory. All of them got Cold Resistance and Sentinel’s Vigilance—the latter being a somewhat weaker and more limited version of Sorin’s own Warrior’s Vigilance—to help keep them going strong through exhaustion or bad weather, as well as the companion soulprint to Speed Burst: Train of Thought.

That handy soulprint would hasten their thinking speed ever so slightly. It wasn’t significant in the grand scheme of things, being only E-ranked, but it was a good start. The soulprint was an excellent base that they could invest anima into and grow stronger, and it combined well with dozens of other soulprints, once they learned how to do that.

“And you’re sure you don’t want soulprints for yourself?” Morlin asked, his eyes glittering with greed as he held the Lion’s Fang Key in his hand. Their news about the rest of the team gaining mosaics of their own had been almost dismissed outright when he’d found out about the key, which Sorin didn’t agree with, but he supposed he was lacking the historical context to truly appreciate the key’s worth.

Besides, we haven’t confirmed that the mosaics will allow them to break the floor rank limit yet. I’m sure it’ll be more exciting if that turns out to be true.

“Not unless you’ve managed to procure that Aura Sense soulprint I requested,” Sorin said. It had proven so useful for Rue that, even though he didn’t strictly need one, he wanted his own copy. He was less interested in seeing monster auras than keeping an eye on his fellow climbers, however. Specifically, he was wondering what the people who’d climbed with Samael had gotten out of the deal, and whether there were others who could surpass the floor limit.

Sorin’s instincts were leaning towards ‘no’ on that, partially because of the stories Bradford had told him about his time helping a then-weak Samael climb. The man had clawed his way up through cheating, stealing, bribing, and blackmailing whoever he could to amass money, then paying more powerful climbers to carry him. That meant that he’d gone through the Antechamber alone and probably hadn’t even realized he could break the floor limit for quite a few floors.

Or maybe he had. Sorin was operating on nothing but a long string of assumptions, any of which could be wrong. It was stupid to think of Samael as anything less than absolutely capable and deadly, which meant it was entirely possible there were whole teams of climbers far stronger than their rank would indicate. That was why Sorin wanted his own copy of Aura Sense.

“I’m afraid not. It’s a very difficult soulprint to acquire, you know. I do have a team from one of our cadet branches out looking for one for you,” Morlin said. He held up Sorin’s key. “By the time they find it, I wouldn’t be surprised if you’ve already used this and claimed one of your own from the lion’s den.”

“Let’s hope it doesn’t take that long,” Sorin told him with a frown. They’d only just started Floor 5. It would be another month before they reached the Citadel, and that was only if the rest of his team could finally start utilizing Speed Burst to its full potential. They’d already lost days just crossing the vast distances of their current floor.

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It wasn’t really lost time, of course. If they’d blitzed their way across the landscape, they’d have missed out on hundreds of monster kills and the associated anima that came with it. Still, it hadn’t been efficient. There were well-documented farming spots where they could have managed the same growth in a few hours instead of a few days.

Patience, Sorin reminded himself. They’re an investment. Clearing out the Void Wall is going to be a lot easier if I’ve got five other void-resistant climbers backing me up, not to mention dealing with Samael.

That part was more wishful thinking, he knew. Voidlings were one thing. A tower-clearing climber was a whole different challenge, and Sorin had serious doubts that anyone could truly affect the outcome of that battle in a meaningful way. It would come down to just the two of them, and Sorin had a lot of work to do if he wanted to catch up. He still couldn’t even free cast a C-rank soulprint, let alone hold several of them in his soulspace.

“How much do you know about this key?” Morlin asked.

“Yoru and Nemari told me the legends. There’s a hidden door in the Citadel, and beyond it is a savanna full of monsters worth enormous amounts of anima and rich in soulprints. A golden-maned lion is the guardian, and killing it is guaranteed to make a climber rich from the tower-forged cache it watches over.”

“True, but incomplete. The real prize of the lion’s den is the miracle spring. Drinking the water fortifies your body in every way. I don’t just mean that you become stronger and faster, though you do, but that you resist damage and even the ravages of time.”

Sorin blinked. “Are you saying there’s a fountain of immortality in there? On Floor 10?!”

“As immortal as it gets. Oh, you won’t live forever, of course, but an extra four or five decades isn’t out of the question.”

There were always rumors about such places, and it was impossible to dismiss them as outright impossible when measured against everything else the tower could do, but Sorin had never personally found one—not once in a hundred floors, or a hundred and five now, he supposed. He’d only ever met one person who claimed to have gotten so lucky, and though Sorin was quite convinced that man believed he was telling the truth, there’d been no proof of it.

But hell, here I am in a body that’s maybe twenty-five, he thought as he scratched at his stubble. He preferred to remain clean-shaven, but it was rarely a priority when he was climbing. The tower had apparently known that, though, and he could still remember the absolute smoothness of his face when he’d woken up for the first time. Shame it only lasted a day before the stubble came in.

Still, he doubted there was a fountain of immortality, not even a faux one, on Floor 10. There could be a spring there with actual miracle water that made someone feel a few decades younger, but that was probably as good as it got.

I suppose there’s no point in speculating. I’ll find out for myself soon enough. At least, I will if I can get Morlin to let the damn key go.

“I have half a mind to come with you once you get there,” Morlin said abruptly.

“I’m sure Yoru will bottle some up for you if we actually find it,” Sorin said.

“Bah. We both know it loses all potency once it’s removed from the source.”

“Not right away. Give him a recall stone and let him rush it back here. It might not be as good as it was straight from the spring, but I’m sure it’ll still have some kick to it five minutes later.”

“Mmm…” the head of the Telpikes murmured, obviously unconvinced. He stared down at the key, seemingly forgetting that Sorin was even in the room.

Plucking the key from Morlin’s fingers and startling the man, Sorin tucked it away in his pocket. “Something to worry about in a month or two. For now, the goal is to determine if these mosaics the tower granted everyone will do the same thing for them that mine seems to do for me.”

“Quite,” Morlin grumbled unhappily.

“I also need to test these Passenger Through the Void soulprints embedded into the center of their mosaics to see how it functions with my own Liminal Gateway. If it does what we suspect and lets me move the entire team through liminal space, we’ll need to rethink our strategies.”

“Let’s not be too hasty with that. We don’t need another incident like Floor 4.”

“Agreed. I also need the location of a ruin or somewhere I can find a cache of tower-forged loot on Floor 5,” Sorin said.

“The… slate. Right. The tower does enjoy its little puzzles, doesn’t it?”

Sorin sighed. “I certainly wouldn’t complain if it just wanted to give me everything I need. I’m trying to help it get rid of its voidling infestation, after all.”

Maybe it did that with Samael. Maybe he screwed it all up, and now it’s keeping me restrained so I don’t cause another incident. I already almost screwed things up once with that void behemoth. Good thing this sword eats void. Otherwise, I’d have had to run. That thing could have eaten the entire floor, never mind the second one on the other side.

Knowing what the sword could do on its own and that more conflict with void beings was inevitable, Sorin was highly motivated to place whatever soulprint the tower provided into the center of that image in his mosaic. He didn’t know precisely what it would do, but the obvious assumption was that it would help the sword destroy the void.

“It’s been many years since I was on Floor 5,” Morlin said. “I can’t even remember if there’s a ruin there.”

“Yoru’s already looking into it for me,” Sorin told him. “I’m just keeping you updated on our plans as they evolve. Right now, our priorities are pumping the rest of the team full of anima and acquiring a cache of tower-forged loot. We’ll probably extend our time on Floor 5 by a few days to farm whatever ruin we end up going to before heading to the Giant’s Finger and moving up once we’ve confirmed the mosaic’s abilities.”

“Then it appears we have a new plan.”

“One other thing,” Sorin said. “Have your spies learned anything useful about what the Black Hellions are up to?”

“Only that the bounty on your head has gone up again. It’s impressively high now. Three thousand danirs.”

“Anyone stupid enough to try to claim it?”

Morlin chuckled and shook his head. “Word of you single-handedly trashing an entire team and killing the bounty hunter that led them to you spread quite rapidly. If I were a betting man, I’d guess they’ll raise the bounty amount again to try to entice those with more greed than survival instincts.”

“Let them,” Sorin said. “I just hope the next batch has some better equipment to make it worth my time.”