William Oh is so powerful that one drop of his blood could power all the forges in The Tower. Unfortunately, he’s also so tough that acquiring that one drop of blood would require even more power.

Jason Salazar

After a long hunt, Will reached level 40 and took a break, sitting on the roof of the highest tower of Bakton Keep and observing the stunning beauty of the 9th Floor, keenly aware of how this immaculate garden Floor was rooted in the rot of a dying society.

Do I have what it takes to kill a fae lord? Between the Harbinger Relic Seed, and Will’s Amulet of Homefield Advantage, Will had a significant edge that other people never had.

Will just had no understanding of the scope of the problem. Was he fighting a bear with a knife instead of barehanded? A significant advantage, but still dead meat.

He’d really wanted to come back with his Advanced Class and have a much better chance of defeating the monster. That’s what he’d told everyone and what his plan hinged on, and now this bastard…

Then again, the sacrifice I want from him…I should get it in before level 50.

…What if I sold Bakton the Relic Seed on the condition that he help us kill the fae? Would that cause the other fae to retaliate? And if so would it be on principle or because they felt like we were weakened?

They’re not particularly…evil, at least my assessment of them. One just wants to be left alone and the other just wants to look cool.

But their personal attitude doesn’t really have any bearing on how they would react politically if the world order were to suddenly go top-end.

The only way I could know is if I visited them and asked their blessing to kill their peer in cold blood.

Will stroked his chin, itching a bit at the wiry hairs starting to replace peach fuzz.

If they were involved in the execution, they would be…more or less likely to backstab us?

All things considered: Will was willing to bet more likely.

Will paused.

His fight against Sammohan, and his lessons with Bakton flickered behind his eyes.

Right. Kincaid is a symbol, and the other two are his equals. There’s a transitive property there.

…I just need to singlehandedly make an example of him while his equals watch. That will forestall any backstabbing or political infighting.

Will groaned, dropping his head into his hands.

He’d gone full circle in his plan to kill Kincaid and free his imprisoned Climbers, from enlisting the help of Bakton and the other fae lords, all the way back around to just doing it himself while everyone else watched.

I guess that depends: Am I the bear, or the guy with the pocket-knife?

Will pulled the 2nd generation Sourdough ring out of his pocket an turned it over between his fingers.

Ring of Resistance

+50 Resistance

That was a lot.

But according to Loth, it was about…5% lower than it should’ve been if her math was right.

And her math is always right.

Which meant The Tower was probably taxing some of the potential in subsequent generations, and that tax would probably continue going up until it was unsustainable.

The Tower abhorred infinite combos.

Still. 50 Resistance on one ring? That’s outrageous. That made Sourdough very good, even if there was a limiting factor.

Let’s see what happens when I do…this, Will thought, storing the Ring in Phantom Hand.

Dimensional Storage.

145 Charges remaining.

Would you like to Sacrifice the Ring of Resistance to gain its effect?

Yes.

The empty middle snake twitched as the Ring of resistance was imprinted on it, the sensation travelling up his phantom middle finger.

Once the sensation faded, Will turned his attention to the newly imprinted Relic.

Ring of Resistance

+236 Resistance

…

Eyes wide, Will changed his slotted relic from the Dimensional Coiled Serpent to the ring of resistance and brought up his Status.

William Oh

Resourceful Climber Level 40

41 + 39 Strength

123 + 296 Resistance

120 + 53 Kinesthetics

156 + 57 Acuity

80 + 49 Focus

Charges: 129/129

Free Points: 0

Non-stat Item Abilities: +40% Rogue Archetype potency, +35% Dimensional Ability Potency. Homefield Advantage. A/V dampening of attacks. +20% Ranger Archetype Potency +15% Baking/brewing potency, Progenitor’s Disguise.

Phantom Hand Slots: (Ring of Accuracy*) -(Ring of Resistance)- (Wand of the Undead Retainer) (Stormfists) (Dimensional Coiled Serpent Amulet)

You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.

Primary Abilities: Aspect of the Immortal Serpent**, Phantom Hand*****

Secondary Abilities: Sourdough**

Tertiary Abilities: Phantom Eye

Primary Ability upgrade Available!

…Maybe I’m the bear?

Will mused, mentally adding up the Resistance column.

Four HUNDRED and nineteen!?

Will sat and thought about it for a moment.

That more than doubled the potency of Aspect of the Immortal Serpent, which hinged entirely on Resistance, as well as providing a significant boost to Sourdough.

And it made him damn hard to kill with conventional weaponry. Not that he wasn’t already, but with this ring slotted, he was practically molded out of Blessed Steel…

Will glanced up at the sky, where The Tower’s unnatural sun was dipping towards the horizon.

…How big of a lens could I make with this ring slotted?

To test this, Will had one of his Phantom Snakes grab a bit of air, creating a platform, then he paced from the center to the edge of the effect.

About three hundred and thirty paces…in radius.

…that’s a big lens.

Bigger than the main castle by a wide margin and nearly bigger than the entire keep.

…How big of a column of earth could I make with this ring?

Will had already been creating watchtower-sized columns while wearing his Set. Add this ring in…

I’m starting to feel like shock-and-awe might be on the table.

And this is just a single month experimenting with Resistance as the sole variable. If I spent a year on the project and added in Ranger Archetype boosts…

Now I just need to figure out how to hunt this creature without killing Kearney and Eolande.

Will took one of his Sacrifices out of his Dimensional Storage.

Seed of Inexorable Death

Upgrade for Aspect of the Immortal Serpent:

Boosts the dimensional warping of Aspect of the Immortal Serpent.

Adds a passive boost to Lifesteal effects wielded by the user.

Fear is a Terrain.

Do you wish to Sacrifice Seed of Inexorable Death to Aspect of the Immortal Serpent?

Boosts dimensional warping. That means either the radius will get bigger, or the strength of the lock on terrain will get stronger. Or both. Worth getting for that effect alone, as it makes my cantrips much more powerful. The Fear-as-terrain and the lifesteal boost are just kind of a bonus.

Will silently said goodbye to lifesteal on his Phantom Hand.

…Yes.

Will held still as shivers went through his body, long since used to the sensation of slotting in an Upgrade.

Aspect of the Immortal Serpent has been upgraded. Review the description for changes.

Aspect of the Immortal Serpent***

A collection of passives that focus on mobility and hardiness. The bearer of this Ability becomes more resistant to exposure and altitude. Their digestive systems become able to process food unfit for human consumption, and their hands and feet always find strong purchase on even the most hostile terrain. User will heal more completely. Scars and damage, both external and internal will fade away over time. Not even a complete removal of a limb or organ will prevent this healing, provided the user is not dead.

Grants a passive boost to any lifesteal effect wielded by the user.

Fear is a terrain.

Scales with Resistance.

Will glanced through and spotted all the changes. The two at the bottom were easy enough, but it took him a moment to realize that ‘safe purchase’ had been replaced with ‘strong purchase’, owing to the increased potency of dimensional effects granted by the Sacrifice.

I wonder…

Will repeated his experiment from earlier and paced out four hundred and twenty paces to the edge of the effect.

How much easier did this make lens-making? Will wondered. With his set on, making lenses out of air was easy. He’d have to take the set off to really feel the difference.

Will made sure he didn’t have anything crucial in his snakes, and that nobody was actively trying to kill him, then stored the set, the five snakes rejoining into a single left hand.

Will held out his right hand and grasped the air, solidifying a hemisphere roughly thirty feet across.

Then he did like he’d practiced and compressed it down from the edges inward until it was twenty feet across.

It was easier than it had ever been while practicing with Ghoul, and it was bigger. The warping effects of Aspect had been greatly enhanced. Maybe a flat thirty percent, when the extra Resistance is taken into account?

Will tapped the hemisphere of solidified air with his toe. It felt solid. Sturdier than his air-constructs had ever been before.

Can I…finally walk on air without needing the Set? Will wondered.

‘You’ll likely have to gain several levels, get an Ability upgrade, and maybe some specialized equipment, but I want you to be aware of it as a possibility.’ Ghoul had said when Will first broached the subject in Akul.

I’ve done all three of those things. Let’s find out.

Will released the lens, then took a step off the side of the building, heart hammering.

Moment of truth.

He took that fateful step, and a sliver of the roof extended outward to meet his foot.

Ah, dangit. Will sighed and trudged out a good twelve feet, the roof tiles warping a mind-bending distance out to meet his feet until he reached the edge of his range.

Will took another step out into open air.

A platform of air appeared beneath his foot. It wobbled in place a bit as Will put his weight on it, and it felt like he was stepping on the back of something chewy, like that squid the travelling merchant had shared with him.

Or that puck of glue that Gertrude had forgotten about in the closet.

Will dropped a heel kick on the surface and it cracked beneath him, nearly dropping him into the streets below before he hastily re-solidified the platform.

Not quite strong enough to perform acrobatics on. And I probably wouldn’t be able to walk on it at all without the Resistance ring basically doubling Aspect’s effects.

But…he was one step closer.

…I need to test the ‘fear is a terrain’ and the lifesteal boost, Will thought.

…Now, who do I know that’s afraid of me?

A couple minutes later, Will stepped foot into Sammohan’s gambling hall, and noted a marked difference from the atmosphere it had been in only three weeks ago.

All the tables and gambling paraphernalia had been tossed aside, replaced with massive piles of mining equipment and supplies that dominated the center of the barn-like building.

Some of it looked professionally made, while others looked like it’d been slapped together at the last minute, or patched from various supplies.

One sifter had one side replaced with an arm-thick branch with the bark still on and couple of nails to hold the screen.

The thing that he found the most interesting was spotting Badur pacing through the building, his pen scribbling across his ledger at inhuman speeds as he surveyed the goods.

Out the back of the building, through an open door, Will could make out a few of his own carpenters and blacksmiths making even more mining equipment, happy to have something to do.

Sammohan himself was huddled together with three other Climbers, discussing plans for ‘mining the ever-loving shit’ out of the mineral-rich desert wasteland of the 10th Floor around Will’s Stronghold, wherever he decided to place it.

All-told, everyone was busy, working away at their respective tasks with feverish energy that bordered on manic. Like men suddenly unburdened of a lifetime of frustration.

Or perhaps that’s exactly what it is.

In any case, they didn’t seem to notice Will in their midst.

“Ahem,” Will cleared his throat.

The buzz of conversation faded away to nothing as the entire crew of bandits-turned-prospectors caught sight of him and collectively held their breath.

A foglike substance rolled off of the men and spilled across the floor. It didn’t have a color that Will could describe, more a feeling. A quickening of the heart. The sensation of danger and rapidly approaching loss.

Will bent down and tried to scoop some fear up, only for it to form slimy strands and pull itself out of his hand. It had a strange feel to it, like that same glue puck while it was being cooked down out of bone and hide by Gertrude.

Like all the other kids in the orphanage, Will had taken a turn stirring the damn stuff and Gertrude had added some white powder that made it gloopy, stringy, and damn difficult to stir.

This had a similar strange feel. Slippery, like ooze, but with a certain ropelike tensile strength, like it didn’t want to separate from the person giving it off.

Will put a foot on the fear closest to him, and one of the former bandits froze and gave a sharp inhale, his whole body shuddering, as though someone had just walked over his grave.

Will lifted his foot back up.

Interesting. But I shouldn’t mess with these guys any more than this. This seems like an inherently offensive power, only meant to be used on enemies.

“Hey there, Mr. Oh,” Sammohan said nervously. “Whaddya need?”

“Already got it.” Will said, turning on his heel and heading for the door before he paused at the entrance.

Not communicating properly with people he would be working with could lead to problems further down the line.

He should be more open with them.

“I came to touch your fear.” Will called over his shoulder as he left. “It’s stringy. Not sure if that’s a health issue, or what. May wanna have that checked.”

“…He can’t lie, right?” Will heard Sammohan ask Badur before the door closed.