As Zach rubbed the last bits of lingering crust from his eyes, he hurried up the twenty stone steps and entered the tower bright and early on what was now his 5th day here on this sky island. Making his way into the entrance, he found himself quickly becoming excited as he recalled the level-up he'd gotten yesterday. Having exhausted himself through strenuous exercise all day long, things hadn't really had the chance yet to "sink in." Heck, even as he'd slipped out of his sleeping bag and had gone through his usual morning routine, it still hadn't fully registered.

But now it did.

As he made his way inside the tower and towards the partition that separated the central atrium into two sections, the events of yesterday finally started to feel like reality. That had really happened. It wasn't a dream. It wasn't a fabrication. In just one level, he'd gained 106 points in strength along with a whole bunch of points in a whole lot of other stuff, too.

It's just so hard to believe, he thought, even as he tapped his shoulder 3 times to confirm it.

Zachys Calador: Level 29

(48277/1240000xp)

Armor Bonus: 11

197 strength

187 dexterity

160 constitution

258 intelligence

160 speed

37 luck

To really put things into perspective, Zach now reminded himself that even Phase Level 3 only provided +50 to all stats, which when added together with the cumulative bonuses of Phase Level 2, Phase Level 1, and base Unleashed Phase, came out to be exactly +100 to all stats; in other words, Zach had gained more strength in one level up yesterday than he gained overall during the times he'd used Unleashed Phase with a Phase Level of 3.

If I were in Phase Level 3 right now, I'd have just about 300 strength, he thought. That's only 100 less than what I had when Vim, Patrick, and Fylwen used that combination on me during the fight with Ziragoth…

Zach felt strong: very, very strong. It didn't matter that he was still basically naked except for a pair of socks, red-and-black boots, and some underwear. He was significantly more powerful right now than he'd been this time yesterday, and because of that, he realized it was time to dramatically change how he went about things.

And why?

Because the pace he was currently going was just not working, and he realized that now.

Slipping through the partition, Zach paused as he stared at the Legion Portal Guardian. Rather than attack it, he took a seat on the stone floor and allowed himself a very important moment to think. As he did so, he observed that all the blood from the past five days was now gone, the damaged walls had been repaired, and his discarded guts, which he'd spilled out after taking an axe to the stomach, were nowhere to be found, as not so much as a trace of them still lingered.

Weekly reset, he realized. The place is like brand new.

Even the clock was back where it'd been halfway up the tower and ticking over and over. Until this morning, it had been in pieces just on the other side of the partition. Zach wasn't a hundred percent certain, but he was pretty sure it'd been the sonic boom from his Phase Blink that had knocked it off its perch. But any evidence of that was now erased, and the tower looked exactly the same as it had the first time Zach had entered it.

At least the little bit of it I've actually seen…

Folding his legs and leaning forward so that his chin rested in his hands, Zach thought deeply on his current situation, and he began by giving himself an honest assessment of the facts. Thus far, he'd taken five days to gain three levels, two of which had come via an item he'd acquired almost a year ago. So really, he'd only actually earned just one level in five days. But this hadn't been his fault. He'd gone as fast as he possibly could. But "possibly" was the operative word in that sentence. Because what was "possible" had changed so much since yesterday that Zach realized he now needed to rethink everything: as in literally everything.

In a hypothetical world trapped in suspended animation, a world in which Zach had an infinite amount of time and no responsibility, he would take months, if not years, honorably sword-fighting his way through this tower. He would learn how to fight and beat whatever it was that awaited him. He would memorize every attack, learn to dodge every spell, and figure out a plan to make his way farther and farther into this dungeon until mastering it like a foreign language.

But that just wasn't an option, was it?

To begin with, this entire island was going to de-spawn in about 6 more weeks, but Zach needed to start acting like it was going to de-spawn in six more days, because he simply could not waste 6 weeks in this place. Zach still had tons of shit he needed to do back home, but even more importantly, what if all his friends were still alive and in serious trouble? Yes, he knew they were probably dead, but what if they weren't and they needed him? What if they'd survived all this time, only to end up dying while he was fighting his way through this tower and making his way over to them? Was that likely? No, but it was possible.

Put simply, Zach couldn't afford to continue doing things his way: the Zach way. Yes, he obviously preferred to do them his way. Yes, he desperately wished he could continue going at this the way he'd been doing so far. But again: that just wasn't going to work. Because it was too clean.

No, he needed to do things the Jimmy way. He needed to think the way Jimmy thought. He needed to view the world and his growth not as a journey but as a race. Jimmy's view of success was tied to efficiency, and now Zach's would have to become that way as well. And this was something Zach thought he might actually be able to do thanks to having gotten to know Jimmy—having gotten to learn from him.

I really am so lucky to have met that guy, Zach thought, feeling a pressure in his chest at the realization that, in all likelihood, he would end up mourning him and the others once all was said and done. I'll probably never get to tell him just how lucky I was to see the way he viewed this world.

Zach wiped his eyes, which had suddenly become damp. He told himself not to mourn his friends just yet: that there was still a chance they were alive, however unrealistic. He could cry all he wanted once he confirmed their fate. For now, he needed to press forward.

This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.

But to do that, he needed to make some changes—he needed to "scale up" his operations in the adventuring sense.

Despite the fact that all of his instincts cried out to him to draw his sword and engage in melee combat, Zach now understood that, at least for the coming days and weeks, he needed to view his sword as a form of backup as opposed to his primary method of fighting. Over the past five days, he'd done a lot to scrape off the rust and rebuild his stamina, but that was not going to cut it.

He needed to think like Jimmy.

He needed to be like Jimmy.

And what did that mean?

Well, Zach realized it was easier to think about things in terms of what it did not mean. For example, it did not mean that he should draw his sword and spend hours every day in close-quarters combat with elite mobs. No, that wasn't how Jimmy would do things at all if Jimmy were in his shoes and had access to his abilities.

Jimmy was all about making HP bars go to zero by any means necessary and in the fastest way possible. Jimmy's way was about looking at every situation and asking yourself: how do I make these things die faster? Or for very powerful enemies, the question became: how do I make this die with less power than you're supposed to have when fighting it?

Zach nodded to himself as he began to shift his perspective on his path forward. Going forward, he needed to adopt that mindset. Everything he did from here on out needed to be for the sake of progressing through this tower and reaching the top. His goal was to reduce his enemy's HP to zero. And anything that made that happen in the fastest, safest way was now what he would aim for.

And I know exactly how to do it, too.

The fact that the thought of these methods felt grimy, dirty, and cheap was proof that they were exactly the methods he should be using. In fact, if something felt honorable or hard-earned, that was now the way Zach would be able to tell it was wrong, backwards as that might've sounded.

I'll revert to my way as soon as I have the luxury of doing so, he thought. For now, it's the Jimmy way.

Standing upright, Zach summoned his Kralzek's Beast, but not before grabbing his newly acquired card out of Bank and Storage. Bringing it into action, a Legion Portal Guardian identical to the one standing in the middle of this side of the partition materialized on the heels of a ball of light, and then immediately after, his large, saber-toothed cat entered the world alongside it.

Zach, whose sword was secured and tucked away in his scabbard, walked towards the enemy Orcish elite with his arms by his sides and his card and mount following along. He pointed while mentally ordering his card to attack first. And to his amusement, both his card as well as the mob charged towards one another while simultaneously shouting, "Krest zencht harganar!"

The two level-60 elites clashed, and Zach, ignoring them both, ordered his Kralzek's Beast to follow behind him on passive, not wanting it to attack just yet. It was only once the beast was fully positioned to the rear of the enemy Orc that Zach then put the mount on aggressive and gave the order to attack.

Now, his Kralzek's Beast clawed and bit into the Legion Portal Guardian while Zach's own Legion Portal Guardian exchanged frenzied, bloody blows. The two mobs were, naturally, equally matched, but the damage from his level-85 war-mount tilted the scales in Zach's favor.

Sandwiched between the saber-toothed cat and an identical elite mob, the Legion Portal Guardian was faring very poorly. And though Zach itched to get in there and do some fighting as well, he knew that he needed to stay out of it and avoid wasting his stamina, as to do otherwise would result in a failure to adopt the change of tactics he knew he desperately needed if he wanted to make it through this place sometime this century.

"Good job," he said as his Legion Portal Guardian landed a throat-strike with its right axe on the enemy one.

As Zach watched the fight progress, he activated Card Capture, targeting the Orc. Then he activated it again and again and again, and he'd keep activating it until it finally worked. It wasn't like he had a choice, though. Unless he decided to waste Unleashed Phase, he had no idea how much HP the elite Orc had remaining, and the ability would only work once it hit 5%. Thus, Zach mentally activated the ability several times each time as he watched his own Orc have its chest ripped apart.

This is actually really nasty, he thought.

The Kralzek's Beast was tearing, biting, and rending flesh while the two Orcs ripped each other apart. The result was a growing pool of blood and flesh, but it was clear which side was winning, and it wasn't the enemy Orc's, that was for sure. And this, Zach was able to confirm as, after spamming Card Capture so many times that he lost count, the Orcish elite at last collapsed into a ball of white light, which zipped across the room into Zach's waiting hand while, with a rumbling, the slab-like steps that ran around the tower and led up to the second floor made their appearance.

Snatching his new card out of the air, Zach immediately summoned it, causing it to reappear, only now it was in perfect health, fresh, and ready for combat. It also created a fairly big contrast with his initial card, which was still dripping blood and missing a piece of its nose.

Targeting the wounded Legion Portal Guardian, Zach activated Card Dismiss. He watched as the battered mob collapsed into its own white light and reverted to card form, flying directly into Zach's waiting hand. Then Zach re-summoned it—or at least he was about to. He paused, however, as he suddenly gasped for air, and a tightness erupted in his chest.

"Wh-what the fuck?" he croaked as he fell back onto his ass while mounds of sweat poured down the sides of his face and his breathing became heavy, his eyes unfocused. Gripped by panic, it was all he could do to stave off the confusion as he felt like he was only a moment from passing out cold.

Yet the feeling subsided after a few terrifying seconds, though the sweat dripping down his face only intensified, and now, he could feel more such perspiration traveling down his back and even his groin.

"What just happened?" he asked the world itself. But then he remembered. "Oh. Ohh!"

Of course.

Zach had never actually used Card Dismiss on a wounded card before. Therefore, he'd forgotten that he had to pay for the card's missing HP with his own stamina if such a thing was required. This was the first time he'd ever actually done so; in all previous instances of using card summon, Zach's cards either came back to him unscathed or not at all. This time was different.

Getting his breathing under control, Zach activated Card Summon such that he now had two of the Legion Portal Guardians up and about as well as his Kralzek's Beast. Zach ordered his mount to return to his side, and the saber-toothed cat's paws made small tapping sounds on the stone as it rushed over to him.

Ten minutes later, the Legion Portal Guardian respawned, and with it, the steps leading up to the second floor vanished. Now, Zach ordered both his Legion Portal Guardians to attack the enemy Legion Portal Guardian from the front while he again sent his mount in from the back. And this time, things were even more in his favor—massively so.

The enemy Legion Portal Guardian was no longer able to attack, as the two allied LPGs were busting it up too hard, too fast, and with such aggression that it was just getting pulverized. Its head was being bashed in, its chest was capsizing, and blood was splattering all over the walls and all over the floor. It was to such an extent that, despite mentally spamming Card Capture, Zach actually failed in his attempt; his two cards and his Kralzek's beast all delivered an attack that came in at the exact same time, and Zach guessed it must've brought the mob from around 6% HP to 0% HP without any stops in between.

And so, turning into fine grains of sand as it died, Zach failed in this attempt to gain a third card. He did, however, gain a paltry +11,900xp, a number that was extremely reduced due to having three "party members" that were significantly higher level than himself. He also saw a shining light on the floor, and he ordered all three mobs under his control to get out of his way as he ran towards it.

The light was blue, indicating it was a "rare" quality item, which was less exciting now than it used to be. After all, Zach had experienced the thrill of looting gold—legendary—items and had won a silver—artifact quality—item on a raid. Compared to that, a regular-ole rare wasn't so special.

And this one in particular was useless to him.

"It's a scythe," Zach muttered, picking up the large weapon and putting it off to the side. Having only just used Bank and Storage around twenty minutes ago, he didn't have the ability to stash it right now. And honestly? He probably shouldn't even bother looting it at all. Jimmy wouldn't. He'd say it was crap and to just leave it.

Well, that's one thing I'm definitely not going to do, Zach thought greedily as he waited for the next Legion Portal Guardian to spawn.

When it did, he succeeded in capturing it. And now, he had three. With that, he decided to take a little trip upstairs. He'd come back for his scythe later...if he could be bothered.