Tower Climber (A LitRPG Adventure, Book 1) by Jakob Tanner (interesting books to read for teens .txt) 📗

you individually, but alas, we ran out of time. I’m sorry to inform you, outsider, but this is a coup d’état. The Archer family is taking over. No longer will the most powerful climbers bow to the rules put in place to enslave them. They deserve to rule as they are the strongest!”

So that was what this was all about. Power. The Archer family felt like they didn’t have as much of it as they deserved and they were willing to kill and hurt people to get more of it.

This was the exact danger the climber president had told him about. The shifting concerns of humanity as individuals grew in strength and power leaps and bounds beyond their common peers.

This was the very destructive impulses and tendencies that had led to their original world getting destroyed. It was what led to the formation of this city in the first place.

And now the Archers wanted to burn that all to the ground.

They couldn’t let them win, Max thought. Not if he could help it.

He squirmed in place.

He tried to do the mana bridge technique once more, but nothing happened.

“Your little mana bridge trick won’t work now,” said Cyrus. “So long as I have this buffer here. My mana cannot be overpowered by yours.”

Crap.

What am I going to do, thought Max.

Easy solution, he thought. He’d already figured out how to work around Cyrus’ trait. Last time, he’d used Cyrus’ trait against him, but that was harder now with the buffer present. Even still, he could still use his own trait, shadow blink. The ability didn’t require any actual physical movement to perform. In fact, the shadow blink ability operated in defiance of physical laws.

The only problem Max could foresee was if he did use shadow blink, would he still be paralyzed when he reappeared? He didn’t see why he would be though. By shadow blinking, he’d be escaping the clutches of the bind trait’s mana thread.

The next question was, who should he target: Cyrus or the buffer?

He’d pick his target, shadow blink, and then knock one of them out. He had a feeling too that his punch might be more powerful than normal.

Cyrus and his companion stood in the middle of the arena, grinning.

Cyrus had given his smug speech already, so they were just waiting. That was their role in this operation on the tower-zone. Paralyze everyone so that there could be a smooth and hostile takeover of the city.

It wasn’t going to be so smooth any more now though, thought Max right as he triggered his shadow blink ability.

He disappeared and then reappeared in a burst of shadowy energy right behind Cyrus.

Both Cyrus and the buffer’s shoulders jumped at Max’s sudden disappearance and reappearance.

“It’s over Cyrus! Eat my fist!”

SMASH!

Max threw a mana-imbued fist right into Cyrus Archer’s jaw.

The arrogant boy’s entire head exploded, brain matter shooting everywhere.

It was as Max had suspected. Normally, he could only copy one ability at a time, but because Cyrus’ bind ability had been infused with the buffer’s passive enhancing abilities, his mimic picked up both traits at once.

If the buffer then doubled Max’s power and then Max’s trait doubled on top of that, that meant he was sending out a mana-infused fist at quadruple his normal power.

So much power that his fist destroyed Cyrus in one hit.

“Impossible,” shouted the buffer with fear.

Even if the Archer family’s plan succeeded, Cyrus, the psychopathic heir to the Archer dynasty would not get to reap any of the benefits.

Max turned to the buffer.

The echoes of screams and pandemonium reverberated across the arena once more.

Now that Cyrus had fallen, the bind trait was no longer holding any of the audience in place.

Max turned back to stop the buffer and find out more details of this evil plan of the Archer’s, but the climber had disappeared.

Chaos and pandemonium filled the arena. Monstrous screams and wails from the city echoed all around him.

This was turning out to be one heck of a final exam.

92

Sakura shuddered and turned around to face Samuel.

“What have you done?” said the climber president turning to the man as well, his face full of anger.

Sakura thought back to when she first met Max. The high-ranked minotaur that had made it to the walls of the tower-zone. That had been an experiment. Samuel had been behind that creature’s movement. He’d been working on this insane plan for months, maybe even longer.

“I don’t need to listen to either of you any more,” said Samuel snidely. “All these rules in place. What good do they do any of us? And why should those of us multiple times more powerful than normal citizens have to abide by rules that protect them? What about us? Don’t we deserve more for rising so far above the ranks of humans?”

“You’ve gone completely mad, Samuel” said the climber president. “Have you forgotten already why such rules are in place?”

BOOM!

Another reverberation from an attack trembled through the room.

They needed to stop wasting time in here, thought Sakura. They needed to put a stop to this. They had to go protect the citizens from the incoming monster wave.

“Complain all you want,” said Samuel. “There’s nothing you can do now. The tower-zone is about to get destroyed and then be rebuilt anew with the Archer family as its head leader. No more climber’s guild, no more climber president. The Archers will be running things from now on.”

The climber president shivered with anger. His muscles stretched and his clothes began to rip.

Uh oh, thought Sakura.

The climber president was triggering his A-rank trait. The man had high enough mana affinity and other stats to take on most opponents without relying on his trait. It had been years since the man had triggered it. The climber president was now going all out.

The climber president’s body grew and ripped out of his clothes. Hair burst forth from his skin covering him in fur. His fingers enlarged and his nails sharpened into huge claws.

The climber president scowled and his angry face began to