Chương 228: Chapter Two-Hundred-and-Twenty-Eight

Adam was off to a great start, having gotten a wishing coin from the first set of Lucca's five options, but then he hit a slump of straight nothing for four rolls in a row, until his fifth roll offered a new relic which caught his eye. It was a spiralling silver band meant to go around the forearm or upper arm. One end was the head of a wolf and the other was its tail. Clawed limbs were tucked into the sides of the spiralling design, and it had a kind of dragon-like appearance to it.

The wolf's eyes were green emeralds. < < Relic For Sale > > < Silver Armlet of the Hunt (Epic) — Each thrown projectile that successfully hits the same target increases Damage inflicted to that target by 10%. This bonus is lost if a projectile misses or a different target is hit > The other four options were older relics that wouldn't work with his new build, but the armlet fit perfectly.

"Huh, I thought this appeared later," Beck remarked.

"There are a few ' of the Hunt' relics that are quite good, but most are tied to stage thirteen." That's the snow stage with the hunting theme, Adam recalled.

"Grab it," Beck told him and Adam obliged without question.

"Lasse needs to get it too." After rerolling twice more, another new throwing relic appeared. < < Relic For Sale > > < Mentalist's Locket (Rare) — Exert your will on a thrown projectile to manipulate its movements. Only one movement command may be used per projectile >"Maybe I should get this instead of the boomerang pendant," Adam wondered.

"I think this is a stage six relic," Beck said.

"If I remember correctly, it has a hidden effect that lowers the wearer's mental defences. Given how the Tower of Mirrors reflects your past encounters, I don't know if it's a good idea to get it. But then again, the boomerang pendant returns all thrown projectiles, which can be really bad. I'm not sure how the movement command works with copies."

"It should probably affect them all," Adam replied. He threw the kunai into the air, spawning two identical ghostly clones to the sides of it, both of which mirrored the real one's motion until Adam caught it again and they disappeared. He thought about the mental weakness for a moment. The boomerang pendant was in essence the same effect, but on a cooldown, and would pull all projectiles to him, which might not always be the desired outcome in every fight.

But given that I may end up against Kate or an enemy like her in the Tower, perhaps it's a bad idea. As Beck had described earlier and Emelia had told him in the past, the Tower of Mirrors was given its name because it reflected each player's journey through the Trials up until that point, pitting them against twisted versions of past encounters and threats. The severity of each floor of the tower depended on how many floors a player decided to traverse in a turn.

The options were one, two, or three floors, but as the Tome Keeper had said, there was a high likelihood of running headfirst into a Voidspawn if he went up three floors at a time. Beck had also theorised that Lasse and Adam would encounter the Cloud Leviathan if they went up three floors. Beck was himself worried about having to fight a lot of Nwetrou worshippers, given just how big of a threat they had been to him so far.

The Tome Keeper had told Adam a bit more in-depth about the mechanics, at least as best as he was able to without violating the System's rules. If a player only travelled up one floor at a time, then the challenges would only reflect the simple encounters of the past and the threat would be minimised. It wouldn't be a cakewalk, but it would be the safest path. When players went up two floors at a time, the challenges often reflected close calls that they'd had. For many, this would be fights against other players.

The form these encounters would take wasn't always completely clear though, and going up two floors often introduced a lot of puzzles that required a strong ability to retain the memory of past stages and fights. Going up three floors would pit players against encounters they had lost or which represented an insurmountable threat. Beck had said that it was players' arrogance that got them killed in the tower, because many traversed three floors at once to get a head start.

However, Adam knew it couldn't just be arrogance. The tower had twenty-one floors to beat, with the twenty-second being the stage boss. Everyone moved up simultaneously during each 'turn', with their distance depending on how many floors they were willing to traverse at a time. To add to the stress, there would only be eighteen turns given to reach floor twenty-one, meaning it was impossible to reach the top by only taking one floor at a time with every turn.

Therefore, its design incentivised taking risks, which was a slippery slope. But, the Tower of Mirrors was not a competition between players, and in fact it would lead to adverse results if someone got far ahead of the rest, given how each player's tower was linked to another's. For example, when a player beat floor fourteen, the linked player's tower would lose its bottom seven floors, and if the linked player was still on those floors, they would perish. Something similar would happen again at floor twenty-one.

Once a linked tower's player perished, the links would readjust to those with living players, excluding the dead tower from the chain. It was possible to create a cascading effect of death as a result, which could lead to just one or two survivors reaching the top, where they had to take on a difficult scorn-inflicting boss to win the stage.

Additionally, floor seven gave players the ability to help or hinder their linked player if they hadn't yet reached the seventh floor, and apparently the player making the choice would have an overview of the linked player's journey. For Adam, this could include such things as how he'd killed Jun, Juliette, Aeran, and Heiner. It wasn't clear if the context would always be included, but Adam doubted it. Beck attributed a lot of deaths to this mechanic, and for good reason. It preyed on people's worst impulses.

Adam took a deep breath. The odds were stacked against him, but it wasn't unwinnable. He planned to use the orb of insight to find out who the other players were in his stage, and then he would seek them out and try to explain how the stage would work, in order for them to all make it through together.

"I'll get the locket," Adam told Lucca. Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.

"Excellent," she chittered. She hadn't brought up the vanity after her spat with Yenna, for which he was grateful. On the next reroll, the golden fortress crossbow bracer appeared, and Adam grabbed that as well.

"I'm running low on points," Adam remarked. Since he wanted to perform two fusion evolutions, the max he had allowed himself to spend on relics was four thousand points, and he'd already spent 3, 800. Beck gave him a disapproving look.

"I know how many points you have left," he said.

"You've barely spent any yet, and you've got a full build left to make. Even if you sell all your unneeded relics, you'll still have to commit a good amount of points to this."

"I want to complete two fusion evolutions," Adam told him. Beck sighed.

"Goddamn it, Adam. Are you trying to survive or not?"

"I'm permanently gimped," Adam said.

"I can only have one weapon and I have nothing to fuse it with. I'm not trying to force myself to lose, but I'm not sure when I'll have this many points again." If only Nelly's options could be rerolled to obtain the Classes from past stages, then maybe I wouldn't be so doomed.

"So? There are several players who get past stage ten with just one weapon," Beck told him.

"I'll reevaluate after selling the relics I don't need," Adam replied.

"Sell the mantle of atrophy," Beck told him. Adam instinctively recoiled from the thought of that, but he knew the relic was a death sentence without safe access to his kingly raiment and spells.

"It'll be the last thing I sell," he replied after a moment. Adam was down to 32, 942 points after his rerolls and purchases. He wanted to stay above 32, 400, since that was how many points were needed to evolve four different weapons. He understood why Beck was upset, but the way he looked at it, he figured there had to be something special to unlock if he kept fusing weapons, not to mention he would gain a lot of mastery shards and knowledge that'd last him well into the future, helping guide his build decisions.

Despite the many loops he'd done, he'd wasted too many on not gathering information, and he wanted to change that, so that he was well-prepared for when he found a universe worth staying in. Adam unequipped his blood mage choker and skirt of the elementalist, and then got out his crimson shirt and scoundrel's torn bloodied glove from his bag, placing them onto Lucca's stall. He kept the mage aspirant's cowl and hobgoblin pendant for now, since he figured they might have some uses.

"I'm selling all of these," he told her.

"I'll pay you 1, 500 points," she told him.

"Deal." < < Relics Sold > > < Blood Mage Choker (Epic) > < Gluttonous Aristocrat's Crimson Shirt (Epic) > < Scoundrel's Torn Bloodied Glove (Rare) > < Skirt of the Elementalist (Rare) > < 34442 Points Remaining > Adam got right back to rolling through the relic options, managing three back-to-back rolls of nothing, before getting quite lucky with two of the items on his list on the fourth try. < < Relics For Sale > > < Barrage Master's Coat (Epic) — Activate to turn the next projectile fired into a barrage attack.

30-minute cooldown > < Ranger's Lucky Charm (Rare) — Activate to cause your next fired projectile to always strike true. 2-minute cooldown >"Can I sell you my sanctuary ring?" Adam asked Lucca. He wouldn't be able to take it off without destroying it.

"Of course." With a snatching gesture, Lucca made the ring vanish from Adam's finger and he became 500 points richer. Then he bought the two items he needed, leaving him with 33, 042 points remaining.

"Adam, sell the damn mantle," Beck insisted.

"I'm waiting until it's absolutely necessary." He paused to think about what else he was missing.

"I'll use my wishing coin on the harpooner's belt, but the barrage glove is uncommon, so there's no way for me to get it since I have guaranteed rare drops."

"Are you sure about that?" Beck asked.

"What's your active Class right now? Blood Mage, right?"

"Red King," Adam said.

"Right, and it gives a luck bonus, doesn't it?" Adam paused.

"You're right," he realised. He turned to his cube, "Switch my active Class to Ghost." [Understood.] With a prompt, Adam's new stats appeared.

< < Player Status > > < Adam > < Ghost > < Level 195 > < Stats > < Health — 260 (+35) [+52] > < Stamina — 200 (+10) [+40] > < Mana — 100 (+55) [+20] > < Damage — 344% (+75%) [+69%] > < Affliction — 231% (+85%) [+46%] > < Defence — 356% (+185%) [+71%] > < Antivenom — 81% (+65%) [16%] > < Speed — 213% (+20%) [+43%] > < Luck — 19 (+15) [+4] > [Modifiers] < Glass Sapling +25% > All of my stats are a lot better, except for health and mana.

"It worked," he told Beck.

"My luck is down to nineteen."

"Perfect, then get to rolling." Adam was glad he wouldn't need to use his wishing coin to get the uncommon glove, but it still took him six rolls until it appeared. The belt he'd been searching for showed up on the fourth roll, but he skipped past it, since he'd get it with the coin. < < Relic For Sale > > < Barrage Glove (Uncommon) — All projectiles are split into 3, each dealing a 3rd of total damage > Adam sighed.

He was at 32, 442 points, and buying it, even though it only cost 300 points, would put him below what he needed to fully evolve four weapons.

"Adam…" Beck muttered, clearly starting to get annoyed with his indecision about selling the mantle. I'd rather sell the hobgoblin pendant than the mantle, Adam thought.

"I'll sell it later when I'm evolving my weapons," he told Beck, though it was unlikely to happen.

"You know I can tell what you're thinking, right?" Beck told him. Adam paused. The fucking Messimer relic… I forgot. Beck flicked Adam in the forehead.

"I'll buy the barrage glove," Adam told Lucca. With that, his shopping spree was over and he had 32, 142 points remaining.

"Next stop, Yenna's fountain," Adam said, tossing his kunai into the air. Thanks to his new barrage glove, the kunai emerged from his hand as three identical copies. As they flipped in the air, six ghostly kunai appeared around them. Adam put his new speed to the test and caught the three physical kunai in his hand, where all but one disappeared alongside the six ghost clones. Despite his irritation with Adam, Beck grinned at the sight.

"Everyone always writes off uncommon relics, because they're simple, but there's so much synergy potential."

"Maybe I should get the blink ring as well," Adam muttered. Since he wasn't using his flame glove anymore, his right-hand slot was free. Although, it felt uncomfortable putting anything onto the deadened glass hand.

"I could also try to get a second barrage glove, maybe." They stopped in front of the fountain.

"I've never actually used this with the wishing coin," Beck said.

"It should work," Adam replied.

"Look at the bottom. The coins are identical to the wishing coin."

"Huh, I never noticed," Beck admitted. Adam pinched the wishing coin between his index finger and thumb.

"I wish for the belt of the harpooner," he said and flicked the coin on a high trajectory towards the fountain water, trying to avoid the top bowl. As soon as the coin left his hand, however, something unexpected took place. The coin emerged from Adam's hand as three copies, and then six ghostly clones appeared around those. Beck gaped.

"What the…?" Adam blinked.

"Uh…"