The Tower will never lie to you but that doesn’t mean you can trust it.

Davies - Head of Climber Academy

I appeared in a chamber. Before I had a chance to review the floor information a man in a black robe thrusted his hand out towards me. Reflexively I threw a dagger as a spell flew toward me. The spell flew faster than any of the fireballs that the orc witches used and hit me a half a second before my dagger hit the man square in the chest.

Knowledge spell received. Language learned: Formal Marcosian

“What the fuck!” shouted the man in the robe as he fell to the ground.

“Whoops,” I said.

Welcome to the Eternal Tower Floor 3 Hard!

You have been summoned by a rogue wizard to aid his escape from his keep which is under siege.

Goal:

1) Escape from the wizard’s keep - incomplete

2) Travel 15 miles away from the keep - incomplete

3) Lose any enemy forces tracking you - incomplete

Time limit: None

I decided to use my new skill ‘scan’.

Name: ???

Level 15 Wizard

Disposition: Fearful

“Sorry,” I said. “I thought you were about to attack me.”

The wizard glared at me as he took a small tube from his robe and drank the contents.

“And how was I to tell you what I was going to do if we don’t speak the same language?” he asked. “From everything I have read, you should have received a notice of why you were summoned as soon as you arrived.”

“I did,” I said, starting to get angry. “But I did not have time to read it before you sent a spell at me.”

“Very well. Mistakes were made on both sides.” Wincing in pain, he grabbed the dagger and pulled it free from his chest.

“Will you be okay?” I asked. I tried to sound concerned but in reality, I had no reason to trust him.

“Do your people not bathe?” he asked, wrinkling up his nose in disgust.

“I just had a cultivation breakthrough and have not had an opportunity to clean myself,” I said, testing to see if he knew anything about cultivation.

“Indeed,” he said noncommittally. “Well, I have summoned you to help me escape. The kingdom’s forces have ensieged my keep.”

“And do you have a plan to escape?” I asked, anticipating that the wizard didn’t plan on me fighting an entire army.

“I have a plan, which has little risk to either of us if it goes well.”

His whole attitude and demeanor screamed ‘evil wizard’. Whatever he was planning, I was likely to take all the risk.

“The plan is relatively simple as well,” he continued. “I will complete a ritual that will trade our mana signatures and confuse any attempt to track me. I will escape the keep using a secret tunnel and after five days the spell will dissipate and you will be able to use the tunnel to escape as well.”

Yep. He was definitely going to betray me.

“And what do I get out of this?”

He looked me over head to toe.

“In addition to a warm bath and plenty of food…:

“Deal!” I shouted.

He looked shocked at my outburst, but I didn’t care. I would fight an entire army in his robe alone if I got a change to bathe first.

“Very well,” he said, trying to regain his composure. “If you follow me, we will go to the ritual chamber and …”

“I think I will take the bath first,” I said. “I’m sure you want to get the ritual underway and make your escape but I couldn’t possibly do anything before I remove this stench from me.”

“In that case allow me to cast a cleansing spell on you and it will dispel all the dirt and filth from your body. You wouldn’t want to dirty the bath with your current state. With the cleansing spell you will be fresh and can take a bath to relax after the ritual.”

After thinking about it for a minute I agreed and he cast another spell which made all of the filth on me and my equipment vanish. To my great surprise the furs I was wearing turned white as all the dirt and filth left them. I tried not to think about how filthy the makeshift robe I was wearing had been when I first took it off the orc. Despite being physically cleaner, I still had a sensation of being dirty and mentioned it to the wizard.

“Ah, yes. While the spell can remove any physical uncleanliness, it can not change your mental projection of how clean you are. Regardless, let us make our way to the ritual chamber and you take that bath once I leave.”

Yep. He was definitely trying to cheat me. Unfortunately for him, I knew how to negotiate. And after seeing the cleansing spell, I knew I wanted magic.

My family had been merchants for over 200 years. While we had a reputation for honesty and fairness, I knew that the true heart of negotiation was perception of power and risk. At this moment the wizard believed that he had the power as he summoned me, but he also had all the risk as he would likely die if I did not participate in the ritual. By lessening his perceived power, I would be able to negotiate a better deal.

“I think it is time to come clean,” I said. “While you have summoned me, I have no obligation to help you escape.”

“I believe you are mistaken,” said the wizard. “The summoning ritual made it quite clear that you would be notified of why you were summoned and have goals to achieve as a result. If you fail to achieve those goals you will die.” He said the last word through a vicious smile.

“I was notified why I was summoned,” I admitted. “But the goals can be completed without helping you. In fact, it would likely be possible to kill you myself and then complete the goals.”

This was true and I even went through the goals and his face fell when he realized that there was no requirement to help him. He subconsciously rubbed at the spot on his chest where my dagger struck him and was silent for several minutes.

“What are you proposing?” he finally asked.

“Nothing too complicated. I just want you to do a knowledge transfer and grant me all your magical knowledge.”

“You want a shortcut to learn magic,” he said. “I can transfer my knowledge, but I will warn you that magic is not only about having the knowledge, but also puting the knowledge to use. To use a crude analogy, knowing how the ingredients to make a pie will not ensure one you make will be properly cooked and palatable.”

“True, but it is far more difficult to make a pie if you don’t know the ingredients as well.”

“I accept your argument,” he said. “Very well, I will transfer the knowledge to you and then we will complete the ritual.”

I agreed. He formed another spell and hit me with it quickly.

Knowledge spell received. Fundamentals of magic learned.

My brain hurt from the sudden influx of information. It was like 30 years of learning and knowledge had been suddenly shoved into my memories. Okay it wasn’t ‘like’ that; it was that. I had a piercing headache and let myself be let into the ritual chamber which had a ritual circle and symbols drawn on the ground in chalk.

Looking around I knew how the ritual was designed and its purpose. I could see how it would exchange mana signatures and how the effect would decay over time. The more I looked at the ritual, the more I understood about rituals. A thousand pieces of information floated through my mind and before I could focus on a single one, it had been replaced a hundred times over.

The room started to spin as my brain tried to make sense of all the information. I felt myself fall to the floor a couple of feet from the edge of the ritual. I tried to sit up but found myself vomiting instead. Once my stomach was empty, I decided it was best to pass out.

The last thing I heard before I drifted into unconsciousness was the wizard saying, “Idiot”.

***

I woke up in the ritual chamber and all of the candles had greatly decreased in size. From the change in the candle length I guessed that I had been unconscious for about 12 hours.

As I sat up, I glanced over at the ritual once more and found that the knowledge came more naturally than the first time. Where before it had been like a thousand instructors yelling at me at the same time, now it was like remembering some information that I hadn’t needed to use for a few years. I looked over the whole of the ritual and realized that the wizard had fucked me over.

The ritual did not last for five days but for five months. Not only that, but the swapping of mana signatures would continue even if I died. No doubt the wizard had intended for me to spend five days here then take the secret exit and get tracked down and killed by whatever force was attacking the keep.

Really, it wasn’t a bad plan. I had no way of checking my mana signature. Thanks to knowledge transfer, I now knew what a mana signature is and how a fellow magic user can track someone based on their signature.

Yep, I would have been better off just killing the wizard and making my escape. I hoped that I would have time to process more of the magical information and that I would be able to make a plan to get out of this floor.