“There’s a fucking monster when you get past the clouds. Tas… I’m fucking tired.” Harley released his control of his upper body and plummeted to the ground.

  “Do you want me to try?”

  “Hah! You even last till the clouds.”

  “Let’s see.”

  Harley jolted up and placed his forehead on Tas’s forehead. “Fine, and I’ll be here, to say…”

  An hour later.

  “I told you so.”

  “Fine, we’re once again stuck.”

  ***

  Back at the cabin, a few days after the failed rope attempt, Harley lay down on his bed, staring blankly above. I thought I was the protagonist. Being told about the tower in advance was a clear advantage. Should I have actually done something? Was it stupid not to even prepare? Well, yeah, it was. But there was a clear reason why I didn’t. God said I shouldn’t.

  The entire world came to a sudden pause. Harley’s eyes turned black, his body hovered an inch above the bed. Then came a loud thump—black jagged streaks formed at the cabin’s roof. Another thump, the jagged streaks spread to the walls. Last thump, the floors cracked.

  Streaks of aurora shimmered through the cracks, the pieces of the cabin scattered across the void. A second passed by, and a single blink, everything was back to normal. “Awakening!”

  Harley’s head felt a sudden ache, pushing on his temple like blades. How the fuck could I forgot something God said. I need to awaken my trait as soon as possible. A flash of the idea came to his mind. The village! Everything is there. It’s as he said. Well, this looks like plot armor… but… I couldn’t complain. Awakening my trait won’t really do much, though, but… It’s enough to pass the fourth floor.

  The tower offered many different features. It was a cluster of options that made it an incredibly open world with infinite varieties. However, a lot of these features are sometimes not thoroughly thought out. Most of them are just things found in the human world, stolen and made as their own.

  One such feature is the trait system’s awakening. Despite the name awakening, it was basically just a class change with a different label. A human’s trait is permanent, it is, unlike its title, not actually unique. However, the awakening is what makes it unique in itself.

  Inside the vast forest, Harley ran in a single direction, on his way to the goblin village. “Tas should not exit the fourth floor in a few more hours.” Though it sounds unfair to know, under the goblin’s village, was something that couldn’t be seen on the second floor. The third had a worm, the fourth had a bird; every floor had a mini-boss.

  “Based on what the rabbit said about game mechanics, it makes sense. Well, I’ll keep it in mind that the fifth floor might be something truly horrifying; if I do not act seriously there, it is actually the death of me.”

  Harley arrived before a wooden arched entrance, the top spiked with wooden spears armed with stone heads. He walked inside and met with multiple tents spread amongst each other. The ground was filled with corpses and trails of blood that had created their own small passage through time.

  Straight through the entrance was the middle tent, measuring over five meters tall and 8 meters wide. In front of the entrance was an old goblin’s corpse holding a thick wooden branch that acted as a cane. He parted the bloodied curtains and walked inside to see an open space with a bed on the other side and a few boxes of food scattered around.

  In the middle of the village, digging straight down five meters below the eldest’s camp was an entrance to the mini-boss of floor two. Harley punched the below, the ground erupted, dirt flying everywhere. Another punch and the crater grew bigger. On the third one, he gave it his all, digging into a hole that revealed a stone stairway. It was a long stairway, covered in moss, filled with cracks, resembling the old. “A secret feature that isn’t supposed to be available unless you ask it in the three questions… or… God told you so.“

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  Harley walked down the stairs, torches could not be found, and quickly, the light dissipated; each step came with the sound of cracking stone. Once he reached the bottom, two bright torches lit beside him, revealing a towering arched door, light sucked by the darkness at each length outward.

  “So this is it. I have my two daggers, 90 power, fucking nine times stronger than I was before. If only some of the other abilities didn’t quickly get sold out… my God, would I have been so much more powerful? Well… in reality… It’s still weak.”

  Harley pushed the giant door. Its weight resisted his strength greatly, every second passing was an inch of step was moved. Once a small enough hole was formed, he slipped through. Lights lit up from the entrance to the furthest point, all lighting up in a circular manner, revealing dome shaped room, the floor filled with unknown engravings.

  The dim lights all formed a shadowed circle in the middle. Covered by the darkness, a two-meter-tall marble podium stood. A meter above it were two glowing red dots. The door then immediately shut, shaking the ground, creating enough wind to launch Harley forward, deafening him in the process.

  “Now… that’s how a game feels.” He said, lying on the ground. He leaned his head up, looking at the middle.

  The figure on the podium soon jumped down, holding a wooden staff where a gem glowed at the tip, revealing a goblin with skin dripping like spoiled meat. It tapped the ground with its stick, and the sound vibrated through the entire room, echoing endlessly.

  The goblin then tapped two more times, and multiple skeletal hands popped out of the ground. Its bones crackled, slowly digging themselves out of the ground. “Ah… necromancer. Huh, cliche.”

  Harley jolted up, heaving his shoulders up and down, he spun his head and immediately launched forward at the goblin before the skeletons could fully climb out.

  “Krrrr!” The goblin yelled, and a giant sound wave was released from its mouth. Harley quickly noticed the visible air and tried to jump to the side, however, he wasn’t quick enough and was launched back to the wall.

  “What the fuck! I couldn’t even react to that!” Indented in the door, Harley pulled his body out limb by limb, blood flowing out of his mouth.

  As soon as he got up, the skeletons had fully come out of the ground, he took a quick stance and ran at the nearest skeleton. Then, out of nowhere the goblin appeared in front of him with his staff headed for his head.

  Harley reacted perfectly this time and blocked the staff with his right dagger. Using the distance, he subsequently aimed his left dagger at the goblin’s head. While doing so, light formed at the end of the staff, causing Harley to instinctively back off, making him retract his attack and giving the enemy an opening.

  He was launched slightly into the air, headed for the same door. The dagger he used to block the attack broke into pieces, thankfully blocking the attack from going further to his arm. Harley flipped in the air, aiming his feet on the wall and jumping forward as soon as he landed. Flying in the air, the goblin launched a single beam of light at him. He twisted his body and dodged, falling quickly to the goblin.

  “Krrr!” Harley was launched at the ceiling by another loud attack. Blood gushed out of his mouth, his back ripped off his clothes, covered in scratches. “Krrrr!” The goblin launched another scream, and this time, he maintained it.

  Using his staff, the goblin launched another white orb, ready to kill a trapped bee. Harley reached to his left, persisting against the wind, keeping him afloat. He stabbed against the ceiling and forcibly pulled himself out, free-falling to the ground.

  The skeletons below were gathered, ready to feast upon his corpse. The goblin stood still, watching with a hidden grin on his cheeks. He retracted his staff and turned his back, walking back to the middle of the room.

  Arrogance kills the cat! Harley landed on the ground with his two feet, receiving no injury and making a small crater beneath. He launched himself through the skeletons, enduring scratches and bites. Upon the back of the arrogant goblin, a dagger placed itself upon the surface, passing through to the other.

  The goblin turned around its head and screamed for one last time, killing every skeleton from behind. Harley already expected it and quickly lowered his head. He pulled his dagger up, slicing the goblin in half.

  “Thanks for the cleanup.”