Chapter 565 - The Eighth And Ninth Floor
｢The Eighth Floor – Divine Quest
Description: You have managed to prove your innocence in the slaughter of the Ironwood Village and gained a certain trust with the rebel faction. Now, you must devise a plan with them on how to best utilize the information you shared to defame the Carva n.o.ble House and win the favor of the commoners. Devise a workable plan.
Limitation 1: Your previous equipment/skills/spells have been sealed.
Limitation 2: You have been reset to level 1.
Provision 1: A unique set of skills can be acquired through skill-/spellbooks or practice.
Provision 2: A special talent is generated to a.s.sist the player.
Provision 3: Enemies are of notable difficulty.
Provision 4: All equipment and abilities from the previous floor are carried over.
Rewards: Score Points, 1 Bronze-Tier Reward Selection.｣
Upon seeing the details, Draco facepalmed. This tower was annoyingly adamant about keeping the story within the range of the floor, so even though he had overturned things in previous floors, the story would act as if he had pa.s.sed by doing the bare minimum on the last floor and forced him to pick up from there.
At least Draco knew that this wasn"t a mechanic specifically targeting him. According to Helia, even the frontrunners had been affected by it. No matter how high their score had been on a certain floor the subsequent floors had possessed the same difficulty and everything had been rewritten to follow the storyline.
Fortunately, two could play that game. If the tower insisted on resetting their progress, all Draco had to do, was restore the previous status quo. He took on the same transformation as before - along with the Four Beauties doing the same - shocking the executives once more.
Just like the previous floor, they immediately went on their knees begging for forgiveness and the rest of the usual show. Draco brushed the matter off and got down to the topic of the floor itself, which was devising a plan of attack to win the heart of the commoners and reduce the standing of the Carva n.o.ble House.
To succeed in a clean takeover like this, political maneuvering was necessary. No insurgent group that replaced a previous regime would last long if they didn"t have the support of the people beforehand, especially since most insurgent regimes would fall into the same vices as those that came before.
This was a problem that stumped the rebels for a long while until the matter concerning Ironwood had come up, giving them a perfect excuse to leap from. However, it would be hard to handle it all perfectly for more than one reason.
Firstly, this world was set in a medieval age similar to the Western Fantasy section. As usual, the spread of information was tedious and informal, relying mostly on word of mouth.
This would slow down the speed at which they could disseminate information to the entire province to get them up in arms towards their leaders.
Secondly, the information spread could be quickly contained by the Carva n.o.ble House since they had an iron grip on the entire province. Everyone who was someone was either in their pocket or on their watchlist.
With the reputation of the Dark Prison, very few were willing to risk anything in fear of ending up there and since the progress of Draco"s group had been wiped clean this meant that a "copy" of Jackson the h.e.l.l Imp was still terrorizing that place.
Thirdly, spreading such information had quite a few ingenious means, but the issue was that n.o.body worked for free. While the rebels had some form of power and competency, they simply did not have the funds to carry out such large-scale operations.
Otherwise, this floor would be easy as pie.
Anyone could just sit down, suggest that they pay off some street urchins to spread this about, or do the same with prost.i.tutes, drunkards, town criers, etc.
There were many conventional and unconventional ways to go about this, but the issue was selecting the right one and executing it in such a way that it would yield a satisfactory result.
However, the solution for Draco and co was obviously quite simple. One may distrust the words of a prost.i.tute, urchin, or even stop the shouts of the town crier, but no citizen of this world would dare go against the proclamations of a G.o.d.
This plan was so simple and effective that the rebels were speechless for a while, then they s.h.i.+vered with excitement. With a direct divine proclamation, there wasn"t even any need to fight, they could just depose the n.o.ble house and take over!
Heck, even the royal family wouldn"t dare intervene in this matter! It was perfect!
After has.h.i.+ng out some smaller details of the matter, Draco and co noticed that the world around them began shattering and deconstructing itself as usual. What should have been a severe test of one"s creative thinking and mental faculties was resolved in a matter of seconds for them.
Draco wasn"t ashamed to admit that they were practically cheating on these floors, but it was also a part of their power. They weren"t using external means to solve the problem, but their own unique abilities in an unconventional and out-of-the-box way.
｢Congratulations on completing: Tower of Babylon Eighth Floor
Time elapsed: 0:7:04
Objectives complete: All
a.s.sessment: EX+
Reward:
12,000 Score Points
1 Treasure Selection Reward - Peak Bronze Grade｣
At this point, collecting perfect scores was like stealing candy from a baby. The destructive path may not be as useful in the latter floors since they required more in the way of mental prowess rather than martial, but for now, the Five Monsters intended to farm as many points as possible.
Draco sighed and checked the rankings as usual.
1st – Draco Morningstar: 12,000 Points.
2nd – Gavin Guy: 1,355 Points.
3rd – Dorothy Keel: 1,352 Points.
4th – James l.u.s.ter: 1,350 Points.
5th – Mandingo: 1,247 Points.
6th – G.o.d"s Son: 1,213 Points.
7th – Dark Lord: 1,194 Points.
8th – King"s Return: 1,164 Points.
9th – Helia Nuer: 1,133 Points.
10th – Makinsser: 1,119 Points.
Hoh? It seemed like despite everything, those fellows actually had a reasonably good head on their shoulders. Most of the top 20 managed to earn above a thousand points on this floor, which meant that they were able to devise somewhat useful plans in the end.
Draco delightfully noticed that he now occupied 44th place with 66,350 score points. After the next perfect score, he would be knocking on the door of the top 10, which should probably leave him defeated, stressed, angry, and impotent.
Thinking like this, Draco felt a flush of excitement run through at the realization that he was directly causing intense pain and mental suffering to the innocent. He had to take a deep breath to calm down and focus on what was more important.
With his clearing speed, enough time hadn"t pa.s.sed for him to go and check on the progress of his store, so he dived onto the ninth floor. Hm, maybe he could complete the first set of ten floors in the end? That would be quite interesting.
When Draco appeared on this floor, he found himself riding on a horse with his wives doing the same near him. He was kitted in the equipment he had been given on the first floor and so where they.
Around them were men and women of the rebel faction in the same situation, glaring opposite them with intense amounts of hatred, fear, and trepidation. Draco took a gander and understood the situation immediately.
They were currently in the midst of a face-off. Opposite them, some few kilometers away, was an army of knights and proper soldiers who wore the emblem of the Carva n.o.ble House, as well as Devin himself.
The n.o.bleman was dressed in a beautiful set of armor that covered everything up to his neck. However, looking more carefully one would notice that it was actually a mixture of soft leather and metal at parts. It was clearly quite functional for battle, yet a big focus of the design had clearly been spent on making it aesthetically pompous and grand.
His arrogant expression as he gazes at the rebel army opposite and the various generals in the lead was quite annoying for those who were fighting for righteous reasons. However, Devin had every right to disdain them, since his army was about twice the size of theirs.
At this time, the objective for the floor came up.
｢The Ninth Floor – Divine Quest
Description: You have managed to devise a workable plan with the rebel faction with the Carva Province. Put into action, it yielded great results and won them the support of the people. Infuriated and feeling threatened, Devin Carva cracked down on such methods, which only served to make his position worse. After a month of back and forth between the two factions, it has all come to a head-on collision in this final battle. Survive until the end!
Limitation 1: Your previous equipment has been sealed.
Limitation 2: You have been reset to level 1 and your former cla.s.s skills are proportionate to your current level.
Provision 1: A unique set of skills can be acquired through skill-/spellbooks or practice.
Provision 2: A special talent is generated to a.s.sist the player.
Provision 3: Enemies are of great difficulty.
Provision 4: All equipment and abilities from the previous floor are carried over.
Rewards: Score Points, 1 Bronze-Tier Reward Selection.｣
Well, this was the penultimate floor of the series, so it was pretty normal that the story was reaching its climax. The fabled final battle was here, and Draco could imagine that all players who had partaken in it were likely s.h.i.+tting their pants at the proposition of fighting.
However, the tower was not that cruel. Firstly, it did not ask them to fight or kill X amount of enemies, but to survive to the end. There were many ingenious and unceremonious ways to do such a thing, and fighting head-on would be a foolish idea.
Still though, the tower made even more concessions on behalf of the trial taker. For one, skills and spells that they knew from outside the tower were no longer restricted. Only their equipment remained sealed for obvious reasons, but with their cla.s.s abilities accessible, many would grow wings.
After all, none of the trail takers were weak, far from it. It was just that the tower was too hard. If one didn"t have senseless power like Draco, it was a torment to climb each and every floor due to how intense the challenges were.
Still, although the tower evened out the playing field, it did attach a condition. The skills one had were tied to one"s level in this world, so the power of your cla.s.s would decide the power of your overall skills.
Intrigued, Draco peeked at the levels of he and his Four Beauties, as well as how their skills had been translated here.
｢Name: Draco
Cla.s.s: Swordmaster
Health: 3,300 --> 7,050
Mana: 550 --> 1,050
Stamina: 3,300 --> 7,050
Level: 43 -> 85
Exp: 5%
Power: 75 --> 150
Speed: 90 --> 180
Magic: 10 --> 20
Skills: Quick Slash, Heavy Slash, Dual Edge, Cross Slash, Reverse Slash, Riposte, Parry (new), Back Slash (new), Air Slash (new), Demon Fang (new).
Alt Skills: Dragon Form, Demon Form, Devil Form, Necrotic Hands, Malevolent Spirit, Cruel Beast Summoning, Evil Curse, Life Steal, Divination, Sinister Shot, Dark Resurrection, Beckon, Subsume, Angel"s Blessing (Corrupted), Mind Blast, Charm, Spirit Suppression, Soul Fortification, Mystic Conversion, Duplicate, Soul Bond, Charm, Insight, Foresight, Flexibility, Illusion, Confusion, Evolution, Ultimate Stealth, Pinnacle Intelligence, Species s.h.i.+ft, Dragobond, Aether Conversion, Devil"s Guile, Demonic Might, Draconic Superiority, Combine.
Talent: Sword Soul.｣
｢Name: Riveting Night
Cla.s.s: Light Sage
Health: 1,800 --> 3,550
Mana: 8,450 --> 16,850
Stamina: 1,800 --> 3,550
Level: 43 -> 85
Exp: 5%
Power: 35 --> 70
Speed: 35 --> 70
Magic: 168 --> 336
Skills: Rain of Light, Light s.h.i.+eld, Blessing of Light, Purification, Detect Evil, Summon Angel, Purge Undead (new), Edify (new), Light"s Champion (new), Paladin Contract (new).
Alt Skills: Searing Ray, Aura of Light, Light Ball, Purify, Instant Healing, Light Form, Void Form, G.o.ddess Form, Might of Light, Void"s Blessing, Celestial"s Dignity, Element Regulation, s.p.a.cetime Regulation.
Talent: Halo of Light.｣
｢Name: Roma
Cla.s.s: Witch
Health: 550 --> 1,000
Mana: 2,000 --> 3,950
Stamina: 550 --> 1,000
Level: 43 -> 85
Exp: 5%
Power: 9 --> 18
Speed: 9 --> 18
Magic: 39 --> 78
Skills: Mystic Arrow, Magical Bolt, Soul Curse, Withering Curse, Spectral Cauldron, Ancestral Spirits, Call of the Ancients (new), Binding Curse (new), Black Fire (new), Minion Summon (new).
Alt Skills: Dark Hands, Chaos Spirit, Chimera Summoning, Silence, Life Drain, Final Blast, Mystic Resurrection, Elemental Corruption, Perfect Control, Pinnacle Insight, Precognition, Flexibility, Mirage.
Talent: Mana Sensitivity.｣
｢Name: Zaine
Cla.s.s: Psylord
Health: 350 --> 750
Mana: 1,850 --> 3,650
Stamina: 350 --> 750
Level: 43 -> 85
Exp: 5%
Power: 6 --> 12
Speed: 15 --> 30
Magic: 36 --> 72
Skills: Launch, Crush, Hypnotize, Telepathy, Illusion, Enhance, Telemancy (new), Teleportation (new), Barrier (new), Soul Reading (new).
Alt Skills: Psi-Blade, Psi-Barrier, Psi-Restoration, Indenture, Seduction, Ultra Telekinesis, Ultra Psychometry, Ultra Telesthesia, Ultra Apportation, Ultra Transvection, Lightning Control, Mirage.
Talent: Mind Mastery.｣
｢Name: Hikari
Cla.s.s: Holy Saintess
Health: 15,400 --> 17,850
Mana: 13,900 --> 26,150
Stamina: 2,800 --> 5,250
Level: 43 -> 85
Exp: 5%
Power: 49 --> 98
Speed: 49 --> 98
Magic: 245 --> 490
Skills: Heal, Blessing, Restore, Invigorate, Protect, Stabilize, Cleanse (new), Cure (new), Miracle (new), Grand Healing (new).
Alt Skills: White Light Healing, White Barrier, White Light Blessing, White Light Resurrection, Item Creation, Life Creation, Aether Conversion, Special Dragobond.
Talent: Aura of Benevolence.｣
Draco checked them out and realized that apart from their great growth in power, the skills themselves were not too different. Draco had long theorized that level 100 was the cap of this world, so he and his wives were only 15 levels away from that.
This meant that they could use their original skills to almost their natural point of perfection. If they had reached level 100, their skills should be almost identical to the outside which would have been amazing.
Still, being able to use about 85% of their power was more than enough for their purposes here.
At this time, the two army"s commanders stepped forth to confront each other. Devin alone stood before the 12 generals of the rebel army who were gazing at him with malice dripping from their eyes.
"Well, well, well, I never expected a bunch of rabble to make it this far. It is my underestimation of you that led to this issue, and I shan"t make the same mistake twice! I will crush you all with my full power, and enjoy as you squirm in despair and far throughout the entire process!" Devin stated cruelly, his eyes flas.h.i.+ng with disdain.
Many of the troops around Draco s.h.i.+vered on their horse, and he could sense their resolve weakening. They had an almost visceral fear of this fellow and his methods, even though they wished to also destroy him thoroughly.
Probably sensing the effects of his words, the faces of the rebel generals became ugly. One female general who seemed quite fierce among them stood forth and sneered.
"Tough words, Almighty Devin Carva. At the end of the day, it is us rabble who managed to drag you out of your posh mansion! At the end of the day, it was us rabble who managed to rally the people against you. At the end of the day, it is us rabble who will take your head and place it on the market square for everyone to see!"
Her valiant words stirred up the energy in the rebels, and they roared in unison when she pointed her sword at Devin"s head and made a rude cutting gesture. Devin"s expression changed, and so did that of his men.
They displayed utter fury and rage at their enemies. Devin unsheathed his sword and pointed to the group of rebels.
"How dare these vile cretins utter such uncouth tras.h.!.+ Men, slaughter them all! Castrate the men and let the horses use them as outlets! Capture the woman and rape them to death! I want to see them all die in the most horrific way possible!"
The soldiers on his side roared with excitement. Just like their vile lord, they loved to afflict horrors upon their foes. They had ridden with him on many a conquest and had performed atrocities that Devin"s own children would shun him for.
Normally, he made sure there would be no one alive to tell the tale, and he kept his own men quiet using a variety of means, but how could he predict that his own knights would go overboard and use the usual horrific means he dealt with foreign enemies on a bunch of innocent villagers?
It was this act that had led to this battle in the end, which Devin found infuriating, but he could only sigh inwardly as he knew it was inevitable. The cup had run over and would spill to the side at a slight push, so he was prepared.
Today, he would show the world his secret to success and why he was the Divine Son chosen to lead this province and one day, the entire empire!
Devin took out a pendant from his chest area that was shaped like a skull. A small blackish aura enveloped it which was invisible to those who were average.
To the weak, it just seemed creepy and ominous, but to the powerful, they would tremble as they felt an aura from it that was not to be violated in the least.
Devin showed fervor as he kissed the pendant and spoken zealously.
"Oh Baphomet, Lord of Suffering and Paragon of Evil, grant your apostle the power to effect your will on the living!"
The moment he completed his prayer, the blackish aura on the pendant that had been dormant burst out, becoming visible to all. This aura flew in wisps from the pendant and struck each of Devin"s men, making them scream with pain and anguish for a few seconds before they transformed into something else.
The rest of the black aura converged on Devin himself, making him thrash in pain for a second or two before he transformed into his true form, which was the secret to all his victories.
A Death Knight!