Metropolis-D was sleepy on this beautiful morning. 

What about the end of the fucking world about to happen? Well, there was no proof it was true, and the sky darkening had only happened above Metropolis-C. They would be fine, right?

In this peaceful atmosphere, Josh headed toward the Tower. He was wearing his true face with MTA soldiers respectfully nodding at him for once. Markus had sent word about him already. 

“Welcome to the Tower, Sir!” 

“Please be careful in there. Something strange started happening!” 

“It could be really dangerous. Sir, think about your loved ones. Should you really risk your life?!” 

What a joke! His loved ones? That’s precisely why he freaking had to Climb! Their warnings were well-intentioned but so wasted on him! He didn’t even bother to reply and just waved them goodbye, disappearing on Floor 24. 

As he spawned, he couldn’t help but gasp. The surroundings felt…strange. He couldn’t exactly put his hand on it, but there seemed to be something different about the very air around him. 

What was it? It was as if there was some energy to it. It was akin to….Ah, it reminded him of the whole god-killing stick mess! How peculiar. 

That’s when many messages began to appear, flickering non-stop for some reason. 

[New Energy Detected!] 

[Updating!] 

[Error!] 

[Assessing the situation!] 

[Information missing!] 

[Reassessing] 

Then it started over again with [New Energy Detected!]. There seemed to be an endless loop happening, one that the Tower Protocol couldn’t fix by itself. 

Tch— it seemed like that one god-destroying attack had really messed it up. To be fair, even he didn’t know what to think of it. 

“Hey, Tower Protocol. What are you even doing?” 

[Reassessing] 

It was strange. He felt that the system was there but simply wasn’t listening. It was akin to a youngster not hearing his mom telling him to take out the garbage— it happened. 

How to deal with such a situation? Any other would have already given up. It wasn’t like one could talk to the system, right? Josh didn’t. He simply needed to make sure he was heard, right? 

He took the most solemn voice he could muster, one that meant that he really meant business. 

“Hey, system, what the hell is happening!!” 

[New Energy Detected!] 

[Updat—] 

“EXPLAIN YOURSELF!!” 

[New Energy Detected. There are no directives on how the energy should be used in the protocol. Insufficient data.] 

Finally! It seemed he had only needed to shout to be heard! 

“Give me more details.” 

[This unknown energy seems to promote growth. It could affect all elements of this Tower….] 

[Updati—] 

“All? What are the options? Can you use it to enhance yourself?” 

[Listing all possible options: Incorporate, Reject, Wait!] 

“Using it would possibly render the Climbers more powerful, right?” 

[It would affect all elements of this Tower.] 

“Just do it!” 

[Careful consideration is needed to—] 

“Who cares? Just do it! You’re humanity’s Tower, right? Just do it, and everything will be perfect!” Josh proposed. 

[Option: let the human race decide. In any case, the Tower will be fair to all…] 

“That’s an amazing idea! Ah, but when you’re doing the poll, you should definitely word it like this….” Josh began whispering.

He totally was not about to cause humanity’s doom…

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

The world was sleepy on this beautiful morning….but not for long. 

That day started as any typical day. The Tower was slowly getting reopened in all Metropolises. Sometimes there would be a strange message about some new energy, but it seemed to be working as intended otherwise. 

People were just hoping for the best, hoping that things would remain quiet. But that’s when a single system announcement instantly shattered these hopes of tranquility. It freaking appeared to everyone, in and out of the Tower! 

[New energy detected. Absorb it and become stronger? Special offer ends in 10 seconds.] 

[10]

[9]

The slumbering people saw this message in their dreams and unhesitatingly accepted the offer. 

The awake people wondered if they were dreaming, with some accepting instantly. 

Some were warier and couldn’t help but ponder. Would they have to sacrifice anything in exchange? But as they saw the counter go down, they couldn’t resist. What if they missed this opportunity?! 

Then a few realized that the Tower never gave a free lunch. There was definitely a catch! But so what? Everyone else was furiously clicking yes! 

[2] 

[1] 

[Congratulation! Tower successfully absorbed the new energy! Climbers and monsters (+) will be enhanced! ^_^v] 

As humans read this message, they were first happy. It had worked! But then they saw the part about monsters…wait, what?! This wouldn’t just apply to them?! What was the fucking point then?! 

Then there was the little (+), did that mean that the monsters would be enhanced more than the humans?! What a freaking tragedy! 

All over the world, many Climbers were despairing. First, the Tower was baiting them with impossible difficulties, and now it was buffing the monsters?! Did it want them dead that much?— the answer was obviously yes. 

Had they known, they would have never accepted that shady as hell offer! 

They could only regret as they felt anger spread through them. But they had no way to vent. Were they supposed to complain to the Tower? It wasn’t like it was sentient! This single event had ruined everyone’s morning. 

They could only grumble and fume with rage. As for the people working at the MTA, they were already getting a headache. Why did they have to be so unlucky?! 

This would be a colossal pain…. 

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Josh couldn’t help but smile as he saw the new update go through. 

[Climbers and monsters (+) will be enhanced! ^_^v] He was feeling very different about this line. So what if the monsters became stronger? This was good news! 

Perhaps people would be unhappy for a while, but they would eventually get used to it. His reason for rejoicing at such a result was simple: The existence of the gods and the sloths! 

1. The sloths meant that races from other worlds could invade them under certain circumstances. Those were potential enemies that they needed to be wary of. 

2. The motherfucking bitch ass gods. They, too, were foreign entities that liked to mess with Climbers (at least in his experience). 

The two threats weren’t part of the Tower so they wouldn’t get this new buff. This meant that yes, it could make Climbing harder, but it would help assure the future of the human race. 

Well, that’s what Josh thought anyway. He believed his thought process to be logical and very probable whether he was right or wrong. 

As Josh clenched his fist powerfully, he felt…nothing different at all. Perhaps it was a slow-acting process? Actually, the Tower had said something about the power of growth… 

Oh well, it was time to do some Climbing! 

At this moment, he was probably the only human who wasn’t worried by the previous announcement. The one who had caused all this trouble wasn’t giving it a second thought. 

“Let’s get this party started, shall we?” 

[Welcome to Floor 24!] 

[Mission: Assassinate the Orc King!] 

“Are you fucking kidding me?!” 

Josh could only smile wryly. He had thought he was done with the assassination missions. Oh well, it was time to work his magic. 

The first step was always information gathering. He needed to know who and where his target was.

Knowing that the enemies were orcs, he wasn’t expecting much from them. He began looking for a shitty village, quickly summoning Nightmare and galloping away. 

Except, he couldn’t help but gasp a little while later. Finding his enemies’ dwellings wasn’t too hard. But, this only applied to finding it. Breaching it wouldn’t be as easy! Why the fuck did the orcs have a fortress?! 

He unsummoned Nightmare and slowly crawled his way forward. On the plain were many boulders just sitting there. This would make the perfect cover! 

Why hadn’t the orcs gotten rid of this vision liability? Perhaps because they were orcs…Josh peeked discreetly and checked out their defenses. 

There were tall and sturdy-looking black stone walls that protected what could be described as a primitive but awesome-looking castle. On the walls, there were even orcs patrolling. 

Josh instantly gave up on counting the number of soldiers. Were he to try, he would eventually fall asleep, not from boredom but because there were too many! There had to be a few hundred or more. 

What about the soldiers inside the castle? There had to be even more. Holy shit, what the fuck?! Wasn’t this upgrade a bit too quick? They had gone from the stone age to the iron age or something?! 

Was this all because of the new energy? Had it allowed the Tower to run more complex simulations to screw its players with? 

He could only wonder if it would be that bad at normal difficulty. He really had to keep his involvement in the matter a secret, or he’d be in deep shit! 

As he gawked at it all, there was suddenly a disturbance. 

— OOOMMMM! — 

A weird but deep and loud horn sound resounded across the plain. On the walls, the orcs were now getting extremely busy and were pointing directly at him. Wait, what had happened to his cover? 

As he turned around, he couldn’t help but gasp once more. What the fuck was this? The boulder was alive, glaring at him in annoyance and now walking away. Okay, perhaps it wasn’t a boulder— just a lookalike so good it had even confounded Josh. 

As he heard the horn sounds multiplying, Josh decisively decided to get the fuck out. He’d be back later…