Free Web NovelChapter 22: 22. The Mask Begins to Slip
Nathan stood before the Floor 4 gate, the system notification still burning in his vision like an afterimage of lightning.
[Warning: Floor 4 monsters scale to match authorized summons.]
He read the words again. Then a third time, slower, as if parsing them carefully enough might change their meaning.
But they didn’t change.
The Tower had scanned him... his potential. Every skill, every ability, every dormant capability tucked away in Mirko’s small bunny frame. The system had laid it all bare, read it like an open book, and adjusted the challenge accordingly.
Nathan’s mind worked through the options with the cold efficiency of someone who’d spent years analyzing game mechanics for a living. Option one: extract. Crush the crystal, take the week-long penalty that comes with using an escape crystal, climb again later.
The thought lasted approximately half a second. If he extracted now, after all the whispers and sidelong glances, after Garrett’s too-interested observation, after Derek’s public accusations of cheating... The "Bunny King" would become a punchline again. A week was a long time for rumors to curdle into something dangerous.
Option two: push forward. Fight the scaled monsters. Keep Mirko’s secret for as long as humanly possible.
’I could fight,’ Mirko offered. Her mental voice was steady, but Nathan caught the undercurrent of eagerness she was trying to hide. ’In my humanoid form. We could clear this floor easily.’
"No."
’Master...’
"Not yet." Nathan’s hand tightened around his bow. "The Tower knows. Fine. But the Tower’s records aren’t broadcast to every guild noticeboard. Unless there’s a special condition or a sanctioned event, or an observed climb... nobody gets access to a Climber’s internal data without a very good reason."
’So we continue hiding...sigh’
"We continue choosing. There’s a difference." Nathan met Mirko’s pink eyes through their link. "I’m not letting the Tower decide when we reveal ourselves. When it happens, it’ll be on our terms. Not because a newbie dungeon forced our hand."
A pause. Then Mirko’s presence warmed slightly.
’Understood, Master.’ freewēbnoveℓ.com
Nathan drew his bow and pushed through the gate.
---
Floor 4 hit him with the smell of rusted metal and dust.
Nathan found himself in a vast hall that stretched farther than the low orange light could reach. Weapons racks lined the walls... swords, axes, maces, polearms, all rusted with age but still standing in orderly rows. Between the racks, suits of armor stood on stone pedestals, their surfaces pitted and dark. Some held shields. Others held nothing at all, their empty gauntlets curled into loose fists.
The ceiling was lost in shadow. The floor was worn stone, grooved with the passage of something heavy dragged across it countless times.
Nathan activated [Hunter’s Insight] immediately.
The mana signatures hit him like a wave. Every suit of armor in the hall had a faint glow at its center... a mana core, dormant but intact. The residual energy pulsed in slow, rhythmic beats, like a heartbeat waiting for a trigger.
"These are all active," Nathan murmured. "Every single one." ƒrēewebnoѵёl.cσm
’whoa,How many are there?’
"At least twenty that I can see. Probably more further in."
The first suit twitched.
It was subtle... a gauntlet flexing, a helmet turning a fraction of an inch. Then another moved. And another. The sound of grinding metal echoed through the hall as the Animated Armors began pulling themselves off their pedestals, drawing weapons that hadn’t been used in decades and still held their edges.
[Ding! Floor 4: The Armory]
[Conditional Trial Active: Monsters scaled to detected summon capabilities.]
[Enemy Type: Animated Armor (Humanoid Construct)]
[Threat Level: Elevated]
Nathan didn’t wait for them to organize.
He fired a [Mana Arrow] at the nearest Armor, aiming for the joint where its shoulder pauldron met its breastplate. The blue-white projectile struck and barely chipped the rusted metal. A thin crack spiderwebbed across the surface, but the Armor didn’t slow. It pulled a sword from the rack beside it and turned toward Nathan with the jerky, inexorable motion.
"Right." Nathan drew a physical arrow. "They’re scaled up. Noted."
’Master, they’re surrounding us.’
Nathan’s [Hunter’s Insight] confirmed it. The Armors weren’t just activating randomly. They were forming ranks. Sword-bearers in front. Halberdiers behind, their weapons’ reach creating a second line of threat. Hammer-wielders moving to the flanks. Tactical positioning. Coordinated movement.
"Mirko. Normal harassment. Keep the flankers off-balance. Don’t commit to anything."
’Understood!’
She launched forward in a green blur.
The first wave crashed into them like a tide of rusted metal. Nathan ducked under a sword swing, rolled past a halberd thrust, came up firing. [Focus Shot] at three seconds of charge... not enough to penetrate cleanly, but enough to stagger an Armor long enough for Nathan to put a physical arrow through its visor slit. The mana core inside flickered and died. The Armor collapsed into a heap of inert metal.
[Ding! Xp Gained!]
One down. Nineteen to go.
Mirko was a green comet among the Armors’ legs. [Quick Reflex] let her dodge strikes that should have crushed her, [Soft Landing] absorbed the impact when she bounced off walls and pedestals. But the Armors’ wide sweeping attacks made her usual patterns dangerous. A halberd caught her mid-leap, the flat of the blade smacking her tiny body and sending her tumbling across the stone floor.
’Ghk!’
"Mirko!"
’I’m fine!’ She was already back on her feet, but Nathan’s [Hunter’s Insight] showed the slight hitch in her movement. Not an injury. But close. ’That one was rude.’
Nathan shifted tactics. He couldn’t maintain distance forever... the Armors were too coordinated, their formation too tight. He needed to break their structure.
"Mirko. Change of plan. Target the mana cores directly. I’ll open them up. You crack them."
’Understood.’
He drew and charged a [Focus Shot]. Five seconds. An Armor charged him. Nathan sidestepped, used the momentum to slide behind a weapons rack, kept charging. Seven seconds. The arrowhead glowed white-hot. Ten seconds. He stepped out of cover and released.
The charged arrow screamed across the hall and punched through an Armor’s breastplate like it was made of paper. The mana core within flickered violently, the armor around it cracking as the energy destabilized.
"Now!"
Mirko shot forward. [Headbutt] connected with the cracked core. The Armor’s chest detonated inward, and the construct collapsed.
[Ding! XP Gained!]
"Again," Nathan said.
They developed a rhythm. Nathan’s [Hunter’s Insight] identified weak points... joint gaps, rusted welds, hairline fractures in ancient metal. [Focus Shot] at varying charge levels cracked the Armors open. Mirko, small and impossibly fast, exploited every opening with [Headbutt] strikes that shattered mana cores from within.
One Armor fell. Then another. Then three in rapid succession.
But the second wave was already activating.
Six Armors rose from pedestals deeper in the hall. These were larger than the first wave, their armor thicker, their weapons heavier. Nathan’s [Hunter’s Insight] showed their formation shifting in real-time... they’d observed the first wave’s failure and were adapting. Two hammer-wielders moved to the front, shields of dense metal absorbing the first [Mana Arrow] Nathan sent their way. Sword-bearers flanked. A halberdier held the center rear, its weapon’s reach creating a kill zone.
"They’re learning," Nathan muttered.
’That’s unfair.’
"I guess the towers don’t care about fair."
The hammers charged first, their footfalls shaking the stone floor. Nathan backpedaled, firing [Mana Arrows] at their legs to slow them down. The arrows chipped armor but didn’t penetrate. The sword-bearers were already circling, cutting off his retreat.
One of them got behind him.
Nathan’s [Hunter’s Insight] screamed a warning a half-second before the blade connected. He twisted, but not fast enough. The sword caught him across the ribs, the impact absorbed partially by his combat suit but sending him crashing sideways into a weapons rack. Rusted blades clattered to the floor around him. Pain exploded through his torso.
’MASTER!’
Mirko’s mental scream was raw, unguarded. Nathan felt her presence spike with something that wasn’t quite fear and wasn’t quite fury.
"I’m fine." He forced himself upright, one hand pressed against his ribs. His breathing came sharp and short. Not broken—his suit had saved him from the worst—but cracked, maybe. Bruised certainly. "Stay focused."
’You’re injured.’
"And I’ll be more injured if we lose formation. Flank right. The sword-bearer’s left knee is weak."
Mirko didn’t respond verbally, but she moved. Nathan saw her trajectory through [Hunter’s Insight]... a green line of focused intent, faster than before, more aggressive. She slammed into the sword-bearer’s knee joint with [Headbutt] at full speed. The rusted metal buckled. The Armor stumbled.
Nathan put a [Mana Arrow] through its exposed core before it could recover.
[Ding! XP Gained!]
But the hammers were still advancing. And Nathan’s mana was draining faster than the Leyline Ring could replenish it.
He made a decision.
"Mirko. New pattern. I’m going to feed you openings. Don’t wait for me to call them. Trust your instincts."
’Master?’
"You’ve been holding back because I’ve been directing everything. Stop holding back." Nathan drew a physical arrow, conserving mana. "You’re a Knight. Act like it."
A pause. Then a surge of warmth through the mental link.
’Understood.’
What followed was the most coordinated sequence Nathan had ever executed. He stopped thinking of himself as the archer and Mirko as the support. They were two parts of the same combat system. [Hunter’s Insight] identified weak points; Nathan’s arrows created cracks; Mirko’s [Headbutt] shattered cores. But now Mirko wasn’t waiting for orders. She was reading the battlefield through their link, anticipating Nathan’s shots, positioning herself before he’d even drawn his bowstring.
An Armor raised its hammer. Nathan’s arrow struck its elbow joint. Mirko was already there, [Headbutt] driving into the crack, severing the arm at the joint. The hammer crashed to the floor. Nathan’s follow-up [Mana Arrow] pierced the exposed core.
[Ding! XP Gained!]
Two sword-bearers attacked simultaneously. Nathan backstepped, drew two physical arrows, fired one at each. The arrows didn’t kill... but they didn’t need to. They struck the same point on each Armor’s chestplate, creating twin stress fractures. Mirko bounced between them like a ricochet, [Headbutt] connecting with both fractures in the span of a single breath. Two cores detonated. Two Armors collapsed.
[Ding! XP Gained!]
[Ding! XP Gained!]
The halberdier at the rear thrust forward, its weapon’s reach creating distance Nathan couldn’t close. But Mirko didn’t need to close it. She used the halberd’s own shaft as a springboard, [Soft Landing] absorbing the impact as she launched herself directly at the Armor’s faceplate. [Headbutt] struck the visor dead center. The metal buckled. Nathan’s [Focus Shot] at ten seconds of charge punched through the weakened point and detonated the core.
[Ding! XP Gained!]
One remained.
The Knight-Commander.
It was larger than the others...eight feet of dark iron and mana. Its greatsword was taller than Nathan, the blade chipped but still murderously sharp. Its mana core glowed brighter, hotter, visible even without [Hunter’s Insight] as a furnace-orange light pulsing in its chest cavity.
It didn’t charge. It advanced Slow and Deliberate. Each footstep a statement of its power.
’Master.’ Mirko’s mental voice was calm. Focused. ’The sword is slow on the recovery. I can exploit that.’
"I see it." Nathan’s [Hunter’s Insight] mapped the Commander’s movement patterns in real-time. The greatsword’s weight meant every swing committed the Armor to a full second of recovery. But getting inside that reach meant surviving the swing. "I need thirty seconds for a full charge."
’You’ll have them.’
Nathan began charging [Focus Shot]. Mana flowed into the arrow, condensing, compressing, until the shaft glowed with contained power. Five seconds. Ten. The Commander’s pace quickened. Fifteen. Nathan backpedaled, keeping distance, but the Armor was faster than its size suggested. Twenty seconds. The Commander raised its greatsword. Twenty-five.
Mirko launched herself at its faceplate.
The Commander’s off-hand came up with surprising speed, swatting her aside. Mirko twisted mid-air, [Soft Landing] absorbing the impact against a stone pillar, but the interruption had cost her momentum. The Commander’s greatsword was already descending toward Nathan.
Thirty seconds.
Nathan released.
The [Focus Shot] screamed through the air, a spear of blue-white mana that struck the Commander’s chestplate dead center. The impact cratered the ancient iron. Cracks spiderwebbed outward from the wound. The Commander staggered, its greatsword embedding in the stone floor as it fought to stay upright.
But it didn’t fall.
’The core is exposed!’ Mirko was already moving, a green blur that ricocheted off the Commander’s own greatsword to gain height. She twisted, angled, and drove [Headbutt] into the cracked armor with every ounce of force she could muster.
The core detonated.
The Knight-Commander’s frame held for one final moment... a monument to ancient craftsmanship, refusing to yield even in death. Then the light in its chest flickered and died, and the massive construct collapsed into a heap of inert metal.
[Ding! Xp Gained!]
[Ding! Level up!]
Silence returned to the armory.
Nathan breathed hard as he leaned against a weapons rack. His ribs screamed. His mana reserves had dipped below forty percent despite the Leyline Ring’s best efforts.
Sweat dripped down his face.
[Ding! Tower of Beginnings: Floor 4 Cleared!]
[Time: 22 minutes 47 seconds.]
[Clear Rank: B]
[Floor Clear Reward: Mid-Grade Mana Potion x3, Rusted Commander’s Gauntlet (Uncommon Material)]
