The market was a place that offered more than half of the Tower’s function. It had multiple things to offer, from simple weapons to unique abilities that makes one learn something truly out of this world in just a second.

  Harley lay on his bed, the bottom bunker at the right of the room’s door. On top was Tas, sleeping soundly with swollen eyes. At the other corner of the room was the still-frozen Elise.

  He had already sold ten of his inferior magic cores and gained ten store points. While in bed, he scrolled on the market, looking for anything valuable. There was definitely a limited item here for ten points that the first one to finish had already gotten. Unfair… but they deserve it.

  Not a lot was offered at the range of ten points. The most notable ones are food that all cost one point each, other than some special ones that offered various buffs, and there were also weapons costing ten points for the stone versions of most weapons in existence.

  As Harley already had multiple daggers, there was not a single purchase at the market that was of any use. He never even gets hungry in the cabin in the first place. Coming back in and out of the cabin also resets his hunger; that was the only exception.

  This tower is really advertising one clear thing. Fuck, how many years would this tower take to finish?

  Soon, the two would get up from their bed and open the door out of the cabin. “You ready?”

  “Till I reach the 20th, no, till I gain a million.”

  “Damn, you really love her that much. Hope she’s still the same.” By a hair’s thread, Harley dodged an incoming dagger to his guts. “Hahaha!”

  The door opened, and the darkness swallowed them. However, instead of being thrown into another unfamiliar environment, the dark void never left. A screen appeared on his face, devoid of a physical body. There were senses of his limbs, but his eyes stared solely at the screen, frozen.

  [Floors]

  [2nd Floor - Goblin’s Domain]

  [3rd Floor - ?]

  Oh… so I can go back to the second floor? I guess looking for the village may result in some benefits. That’s for the future, though; right now, I need to progress.

  His mind clicked on the third floor, and soon he was draped by a dim shade of gray lighting. Stone brick walls surrounded him, with a torch hanging from a single scone. To his left was a cracked window, pieces scattered across the surface of a wooden table. The floor was covered with dust, damp wood, and scattered drops of blood, like it had been abandoned for years, caused by war. Outside the broken window was the dark night, stars shining bright. The vast dark sky bathed the lands with a calming view, shining for hope, giving life to the ones below.

  [Going Back Into The Lobby Is Temporarily Restricted For This Floor]

  A sudden growl could be heard outside. From a single rumble soon came many more.

  [Your Satiation Has Turned Back To Normal]

  From the window came a burst of zombies, the door to the other side started shaking, rumbling sound of metal, bones, and taps began to surround the room. Zombies flooded down from the window, flowing like water, just after the wooden door broke. A zombie fell to the ground, followed by three more.

  [Third Floor]

  [Survive For 3 Nights]

  [Reward: 5 Stat Points Into Power]

  “Shit, this looks like a cliffhanger.”

  Harley quickly looked behind him, seeing a wooden door unlocked leading down into the basement. Is it a good idea? Well… this sounds like the only one. If I try to escape, I’ll die again. Even if these zombies don’t have enough intelligence like goblins, I’ll just be swarmed to death, and all my lives will be razed to the ground. Where are you, Tas?

  He ran back, slamming the door behind him and climbing down the stairs quickly. He ran deeper, and with it came the sound of wood scratching against the stone floor. Once he arrived at the bottom, he spotted Tas standing in the middle of two abstract walls made of random furniture; behind him was a long tunnel, light barely reaching inside.

  “Faster, or I’ll leave you to die.” Said Tas, holding the final furniture to complete the puzzle. Harley quickly responded, his mind cleared for the reason the door was opened and where Tas even went. Once he entered the walls of furniture, Tas placed a wooden table sideways and quickly ran back into the tunnel, Harley following soon after.

  “You took too long to decide.” Said Tas.

  “What are you talking about? You’re the one who was too quick.”

  “Fuck the second floor, I need to climb as fast as possible.”

  “Then shouldn’t you farm the zombies? Maybe their magic cores sell for more.”

  The narrative has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

  “I do not care, I’ll climb till those cores give me the amount I want.”

  “Hahahahaha! Okay, you madman.”

  The two ran, entering the darkness and disappearing from sight. They went on a straight line, their trust put all into the tunnel. Soon, Tas would hit a wall, closing his mouth and swallowing the surprise. A second later, the same thing would happen to Harley, reacting just like Tas. Then, in another second, “You did the same thing, huh.” Said Tas.

  “What? You think I didn’t hear you bump into the wall?”

  “I heard you, too!”

  “Oh, whatever! This seems like the door; let’s just forget about it.” Harley hurriedly tapped the wall in front of him, in look for a bulge. Tas walked backward a little, his gut feeling something ominous.

  The door opened, flashing the two in a bright light, slowly dimming and revealing a room that was worse than advertised. In front of them was a metal ladder leading up into a tube hole at the top. The floor was covered with crumbs of bread, peels of fruit, and rotting meat, all layered with a thick white coating. The sides had scattered wooden pieces that came from broken wooden furniture.

  “Just what type of zombie apocalypse did we go to? A world that has no more living people? Well, that certainly makes food hard.”

  Tas ignored Harley and started to climb the ladder.

  “By the way, if we die, does the timer of three days reset or not? Cause survive? Are we not allowed to die then?” He started to talk to himself; not a single soul was ever around him. “Come on, Tas! It survives for three days! No need to be in such a hurry! You can’t just move fast and expect time to race you!”

  Harley looked around for a little bit, grasping on what world they could be in before chasing after Tas.

  They climbed for a few minutes, and there was no end in sight. Gruelling minutes passed, and an occasional growl of zombies passed through the walls, acting as a sign to stay awake or a horrifying signal that time might have stopped. The climb dragged on, rung after rung, the absence of light made the journey much tiring.

  “Just when is this gonna end! I’m tired as fuck!” He yelled, hitting Tas’s feet with his head. Metal began to twist above, and soon the two climbed up on top, standing under the veil of the bright night. “So we were climbing a building. Makes sense now. Anyway, let me sit here for a bit, protect me, Tas.”

  Once again, he was ignored, and Tas went on to look for anything valuable. It was an empty roof with only a rooftop bulkhead and nothing else. “You won’t even find anything here!” Harley turned his head around, being in awe of his surroundings. What he expected as an old medieval world has turned into a bright cityscape.

  They were surrounded by fallen buildings, light still trying to snap itself into existence. Skyscrapers all fell, crushing everything to the ground. Not a single building was safe from the horde of zombies, not a single one but the building they were standing on. “Zombies? There is no way it was just zombies.”

  “We need to go back down. We have to get food, or we’ll starve.”

  “You know… we could just stay here and eat ourselves, right? Or well, three days isn’t long, we’re not gonna starve to death.”

  “...”

  “Tas, just relax. It’s a surviving floor; you can’t even speed it up. If you get yourself killed now, that’s the thing that will slow you down, not panicking every second.”

  “There’s no way it could be that easy.”

  “The last floor was just a test of time, this floor is a test of will.”

  “No, the first floor was a test of will.”

  “Then, whatever it is, this isn’t a test of time.”

  “Why are you so relaxed? Shouldn’t you want to get stronger? That’s your dream, right?”

  “Just cause.”

  “This isn’t the real world anymore. Stop being lazy. If before, you can just complain about not wanting to do something and wanting to die cause you’re too lazy to even try, here, you do die.”

  The floor suddenly shook. A jagged rift split it open, cracks branching out. In a sudden blaze of motion, the floor fell apart. Within moments, the entire building collapsed on itself, swallowed by the ground.

  [19 Lives Remaining]

  The two stood in a room with walls made of stone brick. A single light torch on a scone lit the room. To the sides were a broken window and a wooden door. Behind them was another door, slightly opened, leading into a basement. The floor was covered with pieces of glass on one side and drops of blood cluttered everywhere.

  “So it was that type of floor.”

  “Told you it was a test of time.”

  “Shut up.”