Surviving that drop-tower-like descent meant you could at least keep your life.

But getting killed midway by the piercing wind or the flocks of birds would be a true game over.

“An aerial battle is coming.”

Su Chen hovered in the azure sky, his posture ramrod straight. His hands were even casually tucked into his pockets. Relying on his exceptional flight abilities, he wasn’t the least bit flustered.

‘The monster spawns and attacks are much slower here.’

Su Chen watched the distant flock of birds, a cold glint in his eyes.

Dozens of Riftsky Thunder-Condors and Wind Falcon Warhawks, clad in iron feathers with wingspans over eight meters, charged him in unison. As monsters that ruled the skies, their attack speed was exceptionally fast.

‘Still not fast enough!’

He didn’t waste any time. Amidst a ripple of light and darkness, he instantly teleported several hundred meters away.

“Telekinesis Shell: Barrage.”

With a mere flicker of his will, the air within a several-hundred-meter radius rippled as if it were a disturbed sheet of water.

BANG!

He split his focus, and with a series of muffled booms that shook the clouds, the ripples in the air exploded outward in a fan-like pattern. Each Telekinesis Shell pierced clean through more than twenty of the large birds.

Their vaunted iron feathers shattered like fragile paper, and their hollow bones doomed them to have frail bodies. In an instant, they were precisely blasted into a bloody paste.

The once-clear azure sky was now splattered with a thick, dark-red paint.

Of course.

This floor was filled with annoying features designed to waste time. The combat area was suddenly larger, and not only were there more mobs, but they also respawned at intervals.

After being forced to waste more than twenty seconds, he finally stepped onto the next floor.

The environments on Nightmare difficulty grew increasingly strange, with all sorts of clever gimmicks seemingly designed to slow a person’s progress to a crawl.

…

「Meanwhile.」

「Outside the Trial Tower.」

A clamor erupted from the surrounding crowd.

Some of the Olan People suddenly noticed that the name at the top of the tower-climbing leaderboard had officially changed.

The time spent had dropped to 15 minutes and 48 seconds, a full two minutes faster than the previous first-place holder.

“FUCK!”

“It’s an East Asian name. Someone from Dongfu City is lording it over us.”

This discovery sent some into a rage born of humiliation. Stirrings of national pride, at the very least, made the situation quite uncomfortable.

But given that they had been brutally beaten by that side before, only for them to be brought in as reinforcements, everyone felt forced by the circumstances to helplessly accept it.

“Don’t get the wrong idea. This is aid from Dongfu City. Otherwise, the Trial Tower’s weekly rewards would fall into the hands of those fugitives, which would just let them get even stronger.”

The words were blunt, but the logic was sound.

In the end, it was a choice between two options.

Either give the generous rewards to their enemies, or give them to the powerful experts from Dongfu City, whose allegiances were currently ambiguous.

“The people from Dongfu City are all about benevolence and righteousness. At least they don’t have any colonialist ambitions, right?” Someone’s attempt at consolation managed to quell the surrounding agitation for a time.

‘As easy as flipping my hand. So this is the best Oran has to offer? Nothing special.’

Shang Xu thought disdainfully from within the crowd. After all, the person from Dongfu City who had just claimed the top spot was him.

To avoid any incidents, a personal aide who had been part of the external reception team had placed a concealment and disguise effect on him, allowing him to be as low-key as possible.

But this eighteen-year-old high schooler was at that fearless age where he feared neither heaven nor earth, and this whole “hiding his light under a bushel” act left him feeling rather annoyed.

Before long, the first batch of climbers from Dongfu City began to post their results one after another.

‘I’ve dropped to second.’

Shang Xu’s eyes widened slightly, and a knot of frustration formed in his chest. He saw that first place had gone to the Rock Phase Ruler, Feng Jialun. Although Feng Jialun’s time was six seconds slower than his, he had been ranked higher because he’d successfully cleared Floor 23.

‘Unfair…’

‘This doesn’t reflect our actual strength.’

Shang Xu gritted his teeth. The 23rd floor was a zone of chaotic gravity, where different repulsive and attractive forces overlapped and crisscrossed. With one’s Perception so limited, it was nearly impossible to find the path to the exit.

He had chosen to end his run and leave early precisely to secure the first-place settlement reward.

‘It doesn’t mean anything.’

He was sure that if he had a one-on-one duel with the Rock Phase Ruler in an arena, he’d have at least an eighty percent chance of winning.

“Relax. Feng Jialun won’t hold first place for long, either. Now we just have to see how high Su Chen can climb,” the soldier supervising the boy remarked coolly.

At this, Shang Xu pursed his lips and said nothing.

No matter how tough he talked, he knew deep down that the environmental hazards in the Trial Tower were nothing to that man.

“How long has he been in there?” Shang Xu couldn’t help but ask.

“Almost ten minutes. Just be patient. We should see a result soon,” the supervisor said.

…

Floor 22 was a mechanical graveyard. Faced with swarms of autonomous Magic Guide cannons, Su Chen unleashed two consecutive Melting Core Collapse Techniques from mid-air, successfully crushing a wide area to dust.

This level wasn’t too difficult for anyone who had mastered Thunder Element Overload Pulse at Lv. 7 or higher.

The strategy guides specifically mentioned this.

But the guides from Hunter’s Home were only applicable to the Normal difficulty version.

Just clearing out the endlessly spawning mechanical monsters required a great deal of patience.

After spending nearly a minute, he finally descended to the next floor.

Floor 23 was a seemingly endless region of gravitational chaos.

When Su Chen stepped onto this floor, the very air was in turmoil. This was the same treacherous place that had made Shang Xu grit his teeth and end his run. Here, gravity wasn’t a simple downward pull, but a tangled, chaotic mess.

One moment, it could shove a person into the void; the next, it could become an immense weight, crushing them into the ground.

On Nightmare difficulty, the gravitational gradients were even more violent. The space was filled with rifts, nearly invisible to the naked eye. Entering one might reveal a shortcut, or it might lead directly into a Space Rupture.

‘A test of Perception and patience, then.’

He lacked neither.

Supported by his Resonance and his wide-range Telekinesis Perception, he was able to navigate the turbulent, labyrinthine space.

After spending a full minute, he finally arrived at Floor 24: “Thunder Prison of the Void.”

The first thing he saw was a sea of raging, purple lightning plasma. Beneath his feet were floating stone fragments, ready to crumble at any moment.

Under the influence of Su Chen’s Resonance Control and All Things Decree, the Thunder Element energy in this space was forcibly altered. He twisted its concentration, suppressing the endless barrage of Void Thunder Bursts that erupted toward him.

At the same time, a Void-Devouring Maw opened up like a black-hole vortex, sweeping in and swallowing the surrounding lightning spirits.

Sensing what a troublesome opponent he was, the lightning spirits from across the entire floor began to gather frantically at its core.

Tens of thousands of lightning bolts collapsed and condensed, and a crystalline thunder giant descended. With a single outstretched hand, it crushed the vortex.

But…

“Super-Limited Premonition!”

Activate!

At the same time, the air pressure around Su Chen plummeted. The void itself seemed unable to bear the instantaneous doubling of his life-energy level, and it let out a strained groan.

As his aura surged, before it had even reached its peak…

SWISH!

There was no earth-shattering roar, only a single gray thread that streaked across the firmament—the after-image left by the Silent Extinction Sword’s passage.

In an instant.

The massive body of the thunder giant shattered like a broken mirror, disintegrating into a sky full of faint purple motes of light.

…

“Fifteen minutes and thirty seconds… He’s getting close to my record time.” Shang Xu’s heart pounded. He felt a strange sense of déjà vu, as if he were waiting for his college entrance exam results.

He knew Su Chen had probably reached Floor 23, maybe even 24, but with each higher floor, the danger rose exponentially.

If Su Chen overextended himself and tried to force his way through, it was possible he could die an unfortunate death.

Everyone has a dark side.

The thought flashed through Shang Xu’s mind for only a second before he felt ashamed for even considering it. At least his moral compass wasn’t completely broken; what he really wanted was to defeat his rival fair and square.

Besides, if Su Chen died from overconfidence, it would be a huge loss for Dongfu City.

Dying in the Trial Tower meant losing everything, even your Runes, to some unknown, mysterious domain.

Perhaps thinking of this, some of the other experts from Dongfu City, hidden in the crowd, also grew nervous as they watched the timer.

“Fifteen minutes and forty seconds.”

Wild Beast himself was also keeping an eye on the time, but the words had barely left his lips when…

“He’s back!!”

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