CHAPTER 308: CLEARING THE FLOORS

After the light swallowed them, the Broken Dawn guild found themselves standing on solid ground once again.

Above their heads, bold words written in blood-red hovered clearly.

[BLOOD TOWER – FLOOR 31]

The new floor returned to the Tower’s usual structure—long stone corridors, branching paths, and blood torches hanging from the walls. After the open-world feeling of Floor 30, it almost felt cramped, the air thick and suffocating.

"Shii, I can barely breathe."

"The air here feels disgusting."

While some players complained, Gabriel glanced at the faint map overlay only he could see. The lines displayed three main branches on Floor 31: one looping back with treasure rooms, one leading to a mini-boss and side objective, and one forming the shortest path straight to the floor guardian.

After studying the map, he pointed toward the right-hand corridor. "This way. We’ll skip optional rooms for now."

No one argued.

They moved out.

The first few encounters were straightforward. Packs of vampire knights with heavier armor but predictable movements, blood hounds attempting to flank, and a few robed casters hiding behind them.

"Skeletons, push," Samantha commanded quietly.

Her knights marched forward, shields raised.

Arrows and blood bolts clattered harmlessly against bone and metal. Ragnarok smashed into the front line, splitting a knight in half with a vertical swing. Sophie’s roots entangled hounds trying to slip through. Anna’s chains snatched casters from the backline, slamming them to the floor.

Gabriel barely needed to join in. When he did, it was to neatly decapitate a knight or cut down a caster who survived the first strike.

The entire fight lasted less than a minute.

Floor 31 was a walk in the park—far easier than Floor 30.

Whenever they risked taking on too much at once, Gabriel immediately corrected their approach.

"Fall back two steps. Let them funnel," he said once, stopping them from charging into a wide chamber full of mixed mobs.

They obeyed. The enemies squeezed through the doorway instead, and the skeletons held them perfectly. Bunny complained that the formation was "too textbook" and "not dramatic enough."

Ten, fifteen, twenty minutes passed.

They reached the floor guardian—a larger, heavily armored vampire knight with a cape and a massive blood greatsword.

It roared, slammed its sword into the ground, and sent red shockwaves tearing outward.

Gabriel cut through it. The entire fight lasted under forty seconds.

[BLOOD TOWER – FLOOR 31 CLEARED]

"Are we sure this is still the Tower?" one of the players muttered. "Feels like we’re speedrunning a tutorial."

"That’s because our leader is broken," another whispered.

...

[BLOOD TOWER – FLOOR 32]

The map overlay shifted, displaying left and right wings that both led to the same core chamber.

This time, the map’s features were more pronounced. If Gabriel chose to show someone, they could see the outline clearly.

Sophie glanced once and nodded.

"If we aggro both wings at once, they might link. The whole floor probably revolves around symmetry. If both sides activate, we get double the enemies."

"So we only pull from one side," Gabriel said. "Clear it, then rotate."

They headed down the left wing first. The mobs here were slightly smarter: casters formed linked circles, and knights attempted to bait them forward.

It didn’t matter.

"Anna," Gabriel said, pointing at the casters.

Chains shot out repeatedly, yanking robed figures out of formation. Every broken circle fizzled out instantly. Samantha’s skeletons took the front, Sophie controlled the choke point with roots and thorns, and Ragnarok smashed through anything that got too close.

Once the left wing was clear, they rotated to the right.

"Feels like a copy-paste," Bunny complained. "Even the mobs stand in the same places."

"As long as they die the same way, I don’t care," Ragnarok replied.

But Bunny cared. Her stream was no longer entertaining, so she reluctantly went offline, planning to rejoin later and cut the footage into better content.

They repeated the left-wing strategy on the right.

At the end of the mirrored wings, the floor boss awaited—two high-level vampires instead of one, clearly meant to be fought at full strength with boosts from both wings.

They had already disabled half of that mechanic by refusing to trigger both sides.

The dual vampire knights charged with synchronized movements.

Gabriel dashed forward, drawing one away with a series of precise strikes. With his speed and Crimson Judgement’s pressure, he forced the captain into a solo duel. It lasted longer than usual—nearly a full minute—but still ended with a blade through the heart.

Once his opponent fell, the remaining captain instantly lost rhythm and went down soon after.

[BLOOD TOWER – FLOOR 32 CLEARED]

"We push one more floor before taking a proper rest," Gabriel announced.

Groans rippled through the group, though they continued moving. At this point, complaining had become more of a ritual than an expectation—no one actually thought he’d change his mind.

...

While Broken Dawn continued climbing, other guilds struggled to maintain their pace.

On Floor 34, Olympus Guild had entered a massive ritual cathedral.

Ares wasn’t with them—he couldn’t enter the Tower—but his vice leader, Jack Arefield, was doing a great job with Aria assisting him.

"Form triangle," Jack ordered. "Shields on the edges. Casters, only aim for marked nodes."

Rune circles hummed throughout the cathedral, blood flowing along channels in the floor like glowing rivers. Vampire priests chanted from three balconies simultaneously.

One Olympus mage raised his hand, and spears of compressed light shot upward, destroying part of a balcony. A priest fell screaming.

Mob density was brutal, but their formation was flawless. Every movement tight. Every rotation clean. No wasted spells.

Back at the studio, Doodle whistled. "Olympus is insane. Their discipline is no joke. Look at that formation—it’s like watching a raid in a textbook."

His cohost nodded. "Their pace slowed slightly after Floor 34, though. They’re still ahead, but the difficulty is starting to show."

Meanwhile...

Martial Palace on Floor 33 moved with terrifying efficiency, Liang walking ahead of his team with a bored expression.

He cut down a vampire commander with a single slash. "Too many weaklings. If the Tower doesn’t provide something interesting soon, this becomes a stamina contest."

One teammate muttered, "We’re already clearing almost as fast as Olympus. If we rush too hard, we’ll burn out."

Evelyn, walking at the back, nodded irritably. "He actually makes a lot of sense... we should rest more often."

After a moment of thought, Liang sighed. "Fine. But we won’t rest for too long—five minutes at best."

Holy Church, on the other hand, had hit a wall.