by Jakob Tanner
RIIIIIIIIP!!!
The demons quickly turned around at the sound of an incoming threat.
What’s going on...? the nurse wondered. Has someone come to help me?
Between the demons she could make out an old man with bulging muscles taking on the twenty shadow demons in the hall completely on his own.
He dodged and maneuvered around them with absolute ease.
He ripped and tore one demon into multiple pieces.
He then grabbed the next incoming demon by the head and smashed it into another demon’s face, obliterating them both at once.
He fought the demons with a stunning grace.
Incredible, the nurse thought, watching on with amazement.
I didn’t think anyone would save me.
This man is a savior!
The old man ripped the last remaining shadow demon in half with his bare hands.
Black demonic blood covered his muscular body as he caught his breath.
The nurse was filled with tears.
“Thank you,” she cried. “I don’t know what I would’ve done without you. Surely I would have—”
She couldn’t even finish the sentence.
She didn’t want to think about the horrible death she had just escaped.
“Don’t worry about it,” said the old man, his face going strangely goofy, as he beamed a big smile. “I’d do anything to protect a cute nurse like you.”
Her eyes fluttered and she pointed just beyond him.
“There’s more!”
The powerful human looked over his shoulder.
“Can’t these damn demons see I’m trying to work my expert seduction skills!?” the old man said between gritted teeth.
He rushed the incoming shadow demons with a raised fist.
“I’ll make you pay for this!”
Meanwhile, far across the city, the cat-folk darted through the streets and alleys of the Caesarian capital.
Gregoire was out of breath when their leader Atticus came to a standstill.
“What’s going on?” cried Mirabel. “We can escape this madness when no one is looking.”
The entire cat-folk team had all been in agreement when the shadow demon horde emerged that it was their time to leave Caesaria altogether.
“I think we need to reconsider our plans,” said Atticus.
“What do you mean?” asked Gregoire.
“Are we with the alliance or not?”
“Does it even matter after this?” said Mirabel. “The alliance will be finished after this diplomatic disaster.”
“All the more reason to consider our immediate actions more closely,” said Atticus. “Sure, we did some bad stuff to the other players early in the tournament, but that was all under the context of how the games were set up. Never were we trying to wage an actual war with the other members of the alliance, were we?”
The entire team went silent.
Gregoire thought about the stupid human team and that damn red haired climber who had foiled their plans.
There was no doubt in his mind that he genuinely wanted to cause that boy and his friend’s pain.
On the other hand that was never their top priority.
They wanted to win the tournament so they could reap the most benefits from the alliance itself.
Had their thirst for violence and victory made them lose sight of their overarching goals?
“Let’s think a few steps further,” said Atticus. “Do we benefit from the dissolution of the alliance? Our home floor is between the civilizations of multiple powerful tower races. We’re actually at a serious disadvantage if the alliance breaks apart.”
“All the more reason for us to leave,” said Mirabel. “Get back home so we can start preparing for war as soon as possible.”
Atticus shook his head.
“I’m thinking the opposite,” said the team’s A-ranker. “If the alliance manages to survive this ordeal, we still want to be a part of it. If it doesn’t, we don’t want to give our former allies reason to treat us as immediate enemies either.”
“So what are you proposing we do?” said Mirabel.
Atticus crossed his arms. “We gotta turn around and help out.”
Gregoire shook his head.
He couldn’t believe it.
“You gotta be kidding me,” he muttered.
He was speaking mainly to himself. He couldn’t believe he was agreeing with Atticus so firmly. He was usually always on Mirabel’s side on these matters.
But Atticus made a lot of sense.
For their own self-interest, they needed to help the alliance today.
Which included helping the damn annoying humans and the other stupid lot of tower races.
“I can’t believe I’m saying this,” said Gregoire, “but Atticus is right. It’s time we helped the alliance.”
Gregoire was the first to rush out into the streets filled with shadow demons.
There were so many.
Of course, the alliance was losing to such a massive horde of shadow demons.
There weren’t enough climbers in the city and it wasn’t like Caesaria had spent much time cultivating their soldier classes defensive strategies.
“It looks like it comes down to me,” said Gregoire.
Gregoire sighed and triggered his trait to maximum effect.
All across the surrounding streets and rooftops were identical clones of Gregoire ready to fight.
It was the most powerful version of his trait.
Doppelgänger army!
The cat-folk’s B-ranker smirked.
“This should turn the tide in our favor.”
Harold was a one-man demon slaying machine.
He dodged and swerved around his opponents and landed plenty of punches, kicks, and elbow blows that turned the shadow monsters into dust.
He’d reached the end of the hall and he cleared the group of monsters who had made it into that end of the hospital wing.
An explosion could be heard from outside.
He looked out the window and his eyes widened.
What’s this!?
Across the city were clones of the cat-folk’s B-ranker, fighting against the horde of shadow demons.
The old human A-ranker could not believe his eyes.
I’ll be damned, Harold gasped. Perhaps there’s hope for this alliance after all.
80
Oliver felt tiny droplets as he fought the horde of shadow demons.
The rain drops landed on the back of his neck.
“Great,” he muttered. “As if this day could get any more miserable, it decided to rain.”
The horde of shadow demons seemed to be thinning out, slightly.
They weren’t in the clear by any stretch, but more pockets of space was opening up across the arena to move.
In the distance, Oliver saw the half-giant Flaron warriors had been surrounded by the more aggressive shadow demon bruisers.
Oliver couldn’t understand why they were struggling and that’s when he realized it.
They’ve run out of trait usages!
Oliver clenched his fists.
We need to help them!
“Will,” he yelled at the giant shadow bear nearby. “I know you can’t entirely hear me in there, but if you’re listening we need to go help the Flaron team, c’mon!!”
ROAR!!!
The shadow bear rushed ahead, leaping in the direction of the demon bruisers.
Oliver was directly behind, swerving in and out of the enemy ranks, puncturing their mana channels with the use of his mana eyes.
It wasn’t long before Oliver and Will had taken out the surrounding demon bruisers.
Oliver held out a hand to the Flaron’s A-ranker who’d stumbled to the ground.
“You saved us?” said the leader.
“Of course, happy to assist,” smiled Oliver. “Sometimes you need the help of others. The humans showed us Elestrians that and now I’m honored to share the lesson with you.�
��
The Flaron smiled.
“You do us a great honor after we disrespected you so,” said the Flaron leader.
“Let’s put the past behind us,” said Oliver. “We need to focus on finishing this fight.”
The Flaron earnestly nodded his head. He gripped Oliver’s hand and picked himself up.
“How are you guys at fighting without your traits?” asked Oliver as a new swarm of shadow demons approached them.
“If you can puncture their mana veins like you did for your bear friend over there, our fists will easily finish the job,” said the Flaron leader.
“Erm,” said Oliver. “This might be a bad time to tell you I’ve run out of trait usage for my mana eyes.”
The Flaron winced.
“Then we might be in a more difficult situation than I realized,” said the leader. “You might not have saved us, only prolonged our inevitable death.”
“Well, that’s depressing,” said Oliver.
What are we going to do?
Shadow demons began to crowd around them.
This might be a bit more than we can handle, Oliver thought, nervousness pulsing through his body.
At that moment, a group of large tadpoles floated through the air.
U’Lopp of the frog-folk surfed on a large floating lily pad, spear gripped and ready.
The other frog-folk followed suit behind U’Lopp. A frog-folk airbringer controlled the wind to keep all of their lily pads afloat.
They swept through the horde making quick work of the shadow demons.
“We owe you big time,” said Oliver to the frog-folk as they circled around them on their floating lily pads.
“No problem,” said U’Lopp. “Just add flies to your condiments and we’ll be square. Tell the Caesarians that too!”
It seemed like a very strange request, but Oliver wasn’t about to question it.
Certainly not now, while they were surrounded by hordes of shadow demons.
On the other side of the arena, Tiberius and his teammates assaulted a group of shadow demons attacking the Boldrin team.
Tiberius ripped through the shadow demons with his mana blade, while his companions fought beside him.
Meanwhile, Marcellus took care of the rest with his mana sniper, shooting the demons right in the skull, sending them straight to the ground.
When they broke through the horde, he nodded to the Boldrin team’s leader.
“I thought you might need a helping hand?” said the Caesarian.
“You’ve done more than help,” said the Boldrin, getting up onto his feet and letting out a massive attack, eliminating the rest of the demons.
With the surrounding demons destroyed, the Boldrin leader turned to Tiberius and continued speaking.
“We Boldrin hear that the Caesarians don’t respect their soldiers and climber class. No disrespect to your people, but they are fools for having such views. Today will mark the day that the Boldrin hold the Caesarian soldier class in higher regard than their greatest diplomats or technicians.”
Tiberius smiled.
It was the words he’d always wanted to hear from his own people; but somehow it felt just as kind, maybe even better, hearing it from the mouth of a steely and curmudgeonly Boldrin.
Tiberius quickly scanned the arena.
The demon horde was thinning out.
The people and the floor would soon be safe.
But, he looked down to Sabriel’s dead body on the arena floor and sighed.
The mercenary team had escaped.
Regulus and Hermia directed calls and commands across the city, while watching the climbers fight off the demons from the arena below.
“Do you see that?” Hermia asked.
Regulus smiled.
He knew exactly what she was talking about.
The tower races of the alliance were working together.
I think we might just survive this.
81
Casey circled the arena on her wings, picking off more of the shadow demons.
There were still quite a few bystanders in the stands, but the number of people had thinned out in the panicked rush to escape.
The majority of those who remained were climbers and the surviving shadow demons.
Casey scanned the crowds and arena, hoping to spot a patch of red hair.
Max, where are you? she thought. I hope you’re okay.
“HELP!”
Casey looked down to see three shadow demons had ganged up on Sarah and pinned her to the ground.
She glided down and with her wind katana sliced all three in half.
They disintegrated within seconds.
She landed on her feet and held out a hand for Sarah.
Casey scanned the arena and saw many of the tournament teams fighting the demons together and keeping the attack under control.
“I think it’s time we started looking for Max, don’t you?”
Sarah nodded, clutched Casey’s hand, and picked herself back up to her feet. “Yeah. Let’s go.”
At a quick pace, Casey and Sarah crossed the arena.
The sky had turned gray as the battle had progressed and a smattering of rain had begun to fall.
Smoke and ash from the destroyed shadow demons swirled through the air.
But Sarah paid no heed to any of these things.
She only had one thing on her mind.
Max.
“Sarah, you go over to that end of the arena and I’ll go to the other,” Casey told her. “We’ll cover more ground that way.”
She nodded and swerved off into the dark hallways of the coliseum.
Sarah sprinted as fast as she could.
Her heart was pounding.
Her throat burned.
“Max!” she hollered as she ran along the hallway.
Sarah was exhausted but she knew she wouldn’t stop until she found her childhood friend.
She ran down the hallway of the coliseum for a good ten minutes until she eventually reached a dead end.
She slammed her fists against a wall.
“No!” she cried.
Max wasn’t here.
She hadn’t found him.
He hadn’t gone this way.
Please Casey, she thought. Find Max before it’s too late.
Casey clenched her fists as she quickened her pace, running through the halls.
She knew Max had gone after the mercenary team’s B-ranker. The one who had killed Sabriel and harmed Harold and Blake so badly they couldn’t even attend today’s events.
Max was tough and, as far as Casey knew, could handle anything.
That B-ranker on the mercenary team though.
They were something else.
They had a power immeasurable by conventional rankings. Casey didn’t know what, but she could just sense it from the deadly attacks she had witnessed at the B-ranker’s hands.
Please, Max, she thought to herself. Please be okay.
She turned a corner and saw a figure on the ground.
As she got closer, she recognized it was Max, injured and unconscious on the floor.
It was pouring rain by the time the last shadow demon was destroyed.
Tiberius dematerialized his mana blade and looked around the now-empty and half-destroyed arena.
They had survived the attack.
One might even say they had won.
But judging by the looks on the different climber’s faces, many of them furtively glancing to the dead tower god at the center of the arena, there was only a look of defeat.
The rain fell hard on all of them.
With casualties throughout the city, including a red-haired human climber lying half dead on the ground after a painful and brief reunion with his long lost sister, The United Floors Alliance Tournament finally came to a close.
82
The following day, the streets of the Caesarian capital were empty.
What was supposed to have been a celebratory occasion was mir
ed with mourning and fear for the future.
The Elestrian team sat in their common room in silence. Most of them stared at the floor, lost in thought.
Clap! Clap!
Footsteps echoed across the hall and they all looked up to see Queen Violet rushing to see them.
They all quickly broke from their brooding stupor and bowed to their queen.
“None of that, right now, please,” said Violet. “Are you all alright?”
“We’re fine, your majesty,” said Oliver. “I’m guessing you heard everything.”
“That our human friends won the tournament, a momentous event in and of itself,” said Violet, “only to be overshadowed by the killing of a tower god and an attack on Caesaria.”
“So, you’re all caught up then,” sighed Will, and then he said the question that was on everyone’s mind, but no one dared ask.
“What will happen to the alliance now?”
Tiberius stared out the window of his office.
The rest of his team was sitting behind him, arguing over the previous day’s events.
“I’m sure the diplomats will find a way to blame us somehow,” said Hadriana. “It’s always the soldier class’s fault.”
Tiberius was so overwhelmed by it all he didn’t know where to start.
He didn’t know whether he should be focused on the previous day’s events or concerning himself with the unknown future in front of them.
“I think the diplomats will have more on their hands to deal with than just the domestic affairs of Caesaria,” Tiberius finally said.
It isn’t just the diplomats, though, Tiberius realized.
They would all have to deal with this new reality.
One where the cracks in the alliance were so fragile it would take a mere flick of a finger for it all to shatter.
That is, he thought, if the alliance hasn’t shattered already.
“You see, U’lopp,” said Long Tongue. “Interacting with the other tower races only brings trouble. We should have never left the swamp.”
