Chapter 03
[>>[INFORMATION]<<]
Welcome, Climber Ji Wuye, to the Tower of the God!
[!] Reach floor 100, and the Tower's grasp on your world will be broken! You will uncover all the questions and secrets it holds!
[!] In exchange for facing the challenge, the Tower will generously reward you every time you clear a floor!
[!] Good luck, Climber Ji Wuye!
...
A brilliant blue beam of light gently reconstructed Ji Wuye's body as he opened his eyes, blinking rapidly to adjust to the brightness. The entire cavernous space consisted of towering square rooms made of rough, gray brickwork stretching endlessly in every direction he turned his head.
The cold, spartan surroundings reminded him of the cramped prison cells used by austere sects to confine hardened criminals or punish rule-breakers. However, there were no iron bars or visible exits, only seamless walls closing him in on all sides, making it abundantly clear that he was inescapably trapped within this cubic room.
Surprisingly, instead of feeling gripped by fear or anxiety, Ji Wuye remained outwardly calm, his thick eyebrows unfurrowed. His first instinct was to read the hovering transparent screens that materialized before him, leaning in slightly with sharp eyes scanning the text intently.
"All the same," Ji Wuye muttered, the corners of his mouth curling upwards into a slight, knowing smile.
This spartan room could be considered a safe antechamber, a temporary haven for challengers between arduous trials on each successive floor or after they had successfully cleared the previous level.
"And now, the next step..." Ji Wuye mumbled under his breath with keen anticipation, squaring his shoulders as determination flashed across his features.
Suddenly, a warm, soothing sensation accompanied by a faint emerald green light enveloped his entire body in a radiant aura. The bone-deep exhaustion and mental fatigue from his grueling breakthrough to the second realm vanished in an instant.
Even the lingering aches in his tensed muscles and tendons, still slightly twitching with residual pain, were slowly smoothed away until he felt refreshed and restored to peak condition once more.
[!] All temporary injuries had been healed!
"As expected," he grinned, the smile stretching wider across his face as the tension melted from his shoulders.
Whenever a challenger entered the mystical Tower's confines or successfully cleared one of its grueling trials, the ancient structure would autonomously initiate its restorative powers, bathing them in an emerald radiance to heal various injuries and afflictions, except for the most catastrophic, permanent ones.
Therefore, individuals crippled by shattered bones, torn tendons, or wasting diseases would experience miraculous recovery and renewal within these hallowed walls. But those unlucky few who had lost entire limbs or vital organs to grievous harm could not be so easily remade whole.
This autonomic healing was one of the many incredible boons bestowed by the enigmatic Tower upon its valorous challengers.
[!] You have 30 minutes remaining before being teleported to the first floor!
"I'm aware," Ji Wuye muttered flatly, nodding as he straightened his stance. Without further delay, he summoned the eagerly anticipated status screen with a flick of his wrist, brow furrowing in concentration as the holographic display bloomed into existence before him:
STATUS SCREEN
[->] Name: Ji Wuye
[->] Level: 5
[->] Strength: 25
[->] Agility: 20
[->] Qi: 15
[*] Skills:
-
-
'The skills I used didn't get registered,' he thought to himself, lips pressing into a thin line as he scrutinized the empty skills list.
The Inner Arts and skills - both the one he'd acquired from his sect and the fragmented martial knowledge resurrected from the echoes of the previous time line - seemed to have evaded the Tower's detection.
It appeared the rumors he'd once heard about not all martial arts from his original world translating perfectly into recordable skills within this realm held true. Still, he exhaled slowly through his nostrils, studying the raw statistics displayed with a practiced eye.
On the other hand, the average stats of most people untrained in any martial arts ranged from a paltry 1 to 5 at most. Those sans any cultivation of their Qi at all would likely show a paltry 0 points allocated to that vital attribute required to even be considered a true martial artist.
As for those who had reached the coveted 1st realm through dedicated training, doubling and even tripling their inherent physical attributes compared to ordinary folk, their strength and related stats would logically be augmented by a similar degree.
"The rest of my stats are the same as in the previous time line," Ji Wuye muttered, idly stroking his chin as memories from that divergent timeline stirred.
The previous time line he referred to existed on another ephemeral branch of possibility entirely, one where he had persevered through rigorous training over many long years until finally breaking through to become a formidable martial artist of the 2nd realm.
Thanks to mirroring that same strenuous breakthrough in the present, he had gained a potent static bonus of +10 to all core attributes, with an additional appreciated +5 specifically augmenting his strength.
This arduous ascension had also catalyzed a jump in his overall level from 3 to level 5.
[!] You have 01 minutes remaining before being teleported to the first floor!
"So fast?" Ji Wuye muttered with a casual shrug of his broad shoulders, momentary surprise flickering across his features before being replaced by stoic acceptance. He had already verified and internalized the extent of his attributes' upgrade - now all that remained were the final preparatory matters at hand.
Hovering before him like an uncanny sleight of hand, a horizontal array of basic steel armaments slowly materialized, each crafted with rudimentary, below-average workmanship that clearly prioritized pragmatic function over any artistry or flourish. Though largely uniform in their unrefined appearances, none particularly leapt out as more expensive or uniquely distinct to Ji Wuye's appraising eye.
As a lifelong swordsman deriving his core teachings from the Kunlun sect's blade-focused disciplines, tempered by insights unearthed from that previous life's path, Ji Wuye's choice was clear and unflinching.
Without hesitation, he stepped forward, fingers extending to firmly grasp the hilt of one of the straightforward jian swords - a classic double-edged blade as timeless as the martial arts themselves.
With the archaic steel clutched in his experienced grip, the remaining time abruptly depleted. Ji Wuye's corporeal form shimmered briefly before dissolving into a vibrant mesh of ethereal cubes that rapidly winked out of existence.
...
In the next breathless instant, he rematerialized with a subtle rush of translocated air. Ji Wuye found himself abruptly standing in a shallow pool of cool, calf-deep water beneath the warm caress of the midday sun's rays.
The gentle, soothing murmurs of the idyllic creek's unhurried flow surrounded him as a small, artfully constructed rock fountain directed the placid stream's path toward the small basin where he had been seamlessly deposited.
Beyond this lush, secluded inlet, the surprisingly vast waterway stretched out much deeper, the glistening surface likely reaching the level of his torso if he waded any further.
Lush verdant forests flanked the creek on either side, filled with the ubiquitous melodies of chirping songbirds trilling their simple refrains. The vivid azure sky arced overhead in a boundless dome of pure, cloudless serenity, with only the occasional refreshing zephyr ghosting across his face to break the near-perfect stillness.
This picturesque location would have presented an idyllic setting for meditative contemplation and spiritual communion with the natural world...had a series of crisp, translucent informational displays not materialized without preamble, shattering any such tranquil illusions as new objectives blazed into focus.
[>>[QUEST]<<]
You have reached the 1st floor of the Tower of the God!
[>] Objective: Survive for 10 minutes!
[!] Consequence: DEATH!
"Heh," Ji Wuye exhaled the derisive syllable, his lips quirking upwards into a cocky smirk as the bold, flashing word "DEATH" did little to instill any overt dread. The dry chuckle rumbled from deep within his broad chest, shoulders rising and falling in a casual shrug.
Not only on this introductory first floor, but all of the following brutal gauntlets lying in wait would undoubtedly carry the same uncompromising penalty for failure - instant oblivion, leaving no room for error or mercy. The stakes could not be higher.
Taking a deep, centering breath, Ji Wuye's expression settled into focused determination. His calloused hands gripped the leather-bound hilt of the mundane jian sword with renewed conviction as a faint corona of bluish-white Qi gradually emanated outwards from his body in shimmering waves.
The Qi coalesced around him in an ephemeral yet resilient defensive aegis.
Entering and traversing the 1st realm as a true martial artist involved more than just physical mastery - it required harmoniously infusing one's very being with rarified Qi.
Projecting this Qi enabled bolstering attacks to devastating new potency or fortifying the body's own durability with an arcane barrier, but such continuous exertion came at the cost of rapidly depleting one's energetic reserves until utter depletion.
This limitation extended to any objects or weapons directly wielded as well. The true solution lay in forging a Dantian, only possible by ascending beyond the 1st realm's.
Therefore, most novice martial artists constrained to this primordial beginning stage could only practically sustain their Qi-fueled abilities for roughly ten minutes at a stretch before retreating to recuperate.
Fortunately, the opening floor's simplistic challenge only required persevering through that same modest span of time without faltering.
During his previous life as a mere 1st realm martial artist, he had employed this very stratagem - erecting a fragile bubble of defensive Qi around himself while essentially lurking like a turtle anxiously withdrawn into its protective shell.
He had only barely scraped through that harrowing trial with his life, though the extensive spiritual and physical trauma inflicted took many grueling weeks to fully recover from.
But now...his jaw set in grim determination, resolve hardening his features into an inscrutable mask.
Without warning, the wavering aura of Qi surrounding his body abruptly receded, consolidating with unnatural swiftness as the mystical energies withdrew and concentrated with laser focus down into the powerful muscles of Ji Wuye's legs.
BOOM-!
A/N
*Jian is a double-edged sword with a slender double-edged blade that is the preferred weapon of many kung fu sects and fighters in Chinese wuxia novels/films.