As soon as we stepped out, we appeared at the same point from which we had entered.

The second we appeared, the crowd went crazy cheering and screaming and we were bombarded by camera flashes and questions. Most of us were still covered in blood but it was obvious that we were all fine.

Frank was there wafting for us as well, and looked relieved to see we made it out, but especially to see the mayor was still in one piece.

He did a double take when he saw Louis who had changed physically since he entered the dungeon, "Louis, what the hell! Did your uniform shrink while you were in there?"

Louis smiled and flexed his new muscles and buttons popped and his uniform ripped pretty much all over. "Naw, just got a good workout in there, but I think I'll be needing some new uniforms, Captain."

Hench, Mitch and Ben, rolled their eyes and shook their heads and laughed."

There was a news crew which had been allowed to enter the perimeter of the second barricade and was filming everything, so I decided to take the opportunity to make up for some of my past mistakes.

I signaled the reporter and the camera man.

"I feel as though I have to apologize to all of you. Many of you are here because of my actions, and 'll be honest with you, I really wanted to promote the tower. But due to my actions, 4 children entered the dungeon and very nearly died. I have given many of you, unrealistic expectations.

"The tower, or dungeon as it is often called, is extremely deadly. I can say with certainty that none of our group would have survived today, if I hadn't intervened, and at the end, even for me it was a close call. If I had died, probably none of us would have made it out.

I have been given a number of advantages as the Dungeon champion, but for all of you it will take a lot of training to survive. Even the first level of the Dungeon. And even with training there is a chance that not everyone will survive. Going in alone is certain death, dungeons are a team effort and everyone in the team needs to be trained."

"No firearms are allowed in the tower, so it is primitive weapons only and if you succeed, you may earn some magical weapons, but without training you will almost certainly die in there. This is not a safari."

"If you are curious as to what sort of creatures you will be facing on the easiest level, I present to you the Saber-tooth Rat King."

I held up the rat King's forearm, with its 30 cm claws as well as the head with its saber-tooth fangs and the barbed tail. There was an audible intake of breath and gasps from the crowd and more than a few persons fainted.

This creature measured about 4 meters tall, and this wasn't even the level boss.

"I am in discussions with the mayor for setting up a training center, and establishing rules, so I would like to ask you to all go home until we are ready. It will probably take a couple of months, so between now and then, there will we nothing to see here.

'Now that I have set the record straight, I will no longer be running to the rescue of anyone else who enters the tower, and don't think that you can enter and then leave it it gets too dangerous. Once you enter you cannot leave until you complete the level."

The reporter and the cameraman turned to the mayor "Madame the Mayor, is it true that you plan on creating a training program for people who wish to enter the Dungeon?"

"The idea was introduced this morning and we have not yet made any decisions on this matter. As soon as we have weighed our options, we will let you know. The tower is a very complex topic with many advantages but as mentioned just a moment ago, it is extremely dangerous, and from what I have seen this morning, I am pretty sure that I will be having nightmares for many weeks to come. That said, the rewards for surviving are equally impressive."

"Did you receive anything from the tower Madame the Mayor?"

"I received a few items, but one that particularly interested me was a rejuvenation potion. I don't think that there is a woman present who wouldn't dream of getting one of those." The crowd laughed briefly before she continued. "Of course, I suspect the cosmetics industry will be a little less enthusiastic, so I expect to be getting a lot of calls from them when I get back to my office." Again, the crowd laughed in response.

It was no surprise that she became the mayor, I thought to myself, as she had a real gift for playing the crowds.

"I know that this will come as a surprise to many of you, but I actually intend to take the potion here and now, on live TV; partly because I need people to still recognize me if the changes are too important but also because I am impatient to see the results."

According to the description she received, she knew she should expect to reverse about 20 years, and as she had just recently turned 50, she should look around 30 if it worked.

The mayor downed the vial, and even though there were thousands present, for a brief moment there was total silence as everyone was focused on the mayor.

Whereas her natural hair color was dark brown, she had been dying her hair blond for years to hide the grey which had started appearing.

At first the crowd responded with a few oohs and ahs, but these quickly gave way fanatical screams and cheers.

The mayor hadn't seen her transformation yet, so she took out her phone and put the camera in selfie mode to see what had changed.

Tears streamed from her eyes as she saw that she now had a full head of silky dark brown hair, her skin was full and taut without a wrinkle, her eyelids and chin which had been sagging were now firm and the crow’s feet had completely disappeared from the corner of her eyes.

She also suddenly realized that she no longer needed her glasses, she had her 20/20 vision back. Although she wasn't overweight, she felt her waistline retract and even her buttocks felt firmer her skin felt tighter all over.

The joy and the emotion were too much for her and she fell into her son’s arms crying for joy.

Many persons in the crowd were also crying but many also started pushing against the barriers as seeing the effects live renewed their desire to enter the tower even after the warnings.

Frank rushed over and told us that they had a helicopter waiting to take us back to the mayor's office, and encouraged us to hurry before the crowd broke through. With that we all headed into the Chopper.

In the chopper I had the chance to speak with Louis, Hench, Mitch and Ben. I had the distinct feeling that Will had selected them as trainers based on the rewards they received.

"If we end up creating a school for ascenders, would any of you be interested in a training position by any chance? You'd get to go into the tower often and get more rewards. I also have some memory stones which should be enough to get you started.

"Also, now that you have all received a mana core potion and a mana gem, you will be able to develop your cores and do things that weren't possible before and you should be able to teach others as well."

"I definitely want to go back" Aaron said, but seeing the look on his mother's face, added "but of course, only after I have fully trained."

"I second Aaron" Simon said. "We can train as a team and maybe get some better weapons."

The 2 other teenagers seemed a bit hesitant, but finally agreed as well.

The four guardsmen looked at each other and said "count us in".

To everyone's surprise even Mayor Levine joined in "As mayor I have a lot of responsibilities, and I shouldn't be risking my life unnecessarily, but I wouldn't mind following the training, and who knows, I may decide to do another dungeon run."

"Most of us have received gold coins" I said "I know a place that will buy them at a good price. Also, Ben, your beast core is worth quite a lot. You can either sell it, or you can use it to strengthen your mana core when meditating. I would recommend the latter as you can always pick up more cores later.

"Also, Mitch, you got a good hammer but without any enchantments, if you want, I could enchant it for you."

"Wow, thanks, that would be fantastic, just let me know when you have some time."

"I don't mind adding runes for free this time, but runes are powered by mana, and you won't have much mana yet. I could add a gem or two that would act as a mana battery so you wouldn't need to use your own mana, or at least not much, but you would need to pay me back for the gem. You can pay over time if you want, I would feel bad taking your hard-won gold.

"You will also have to choose what effect you want for your hammer. Fire, frost, lightning, demon banishment, weightlessness, and maybe even auto-return effect. I may be able to apply a few of these properties but I won't know how many until I try."

"Holy cow, any of those would be too cool. I don't mind if you take my gold, and if I owe you more let me know and I will pay you for it later.

"I kind of like the lighting, weightlessness and the auto-return feature, with the gem of course. If you can only manage 2 than I can do without the auto-return, but that would definitely be a plus. I would basically be like a real-life Thor."

"If you give me your hammer, I will fix it up for you when we get to the mayor's office, it shouldn't take more than an hour. When you get it back, you will need to bond with it with a few drops of blood. After bonding you won't be able to sell it anymore, it will be yours for life."

He handed me the hammer and all the gold he received from his chest. It wasn't enough to cover the value of the gem I would be using, but I figured that getting a powerful ascender/trainer and I was sure he would be able to get me some replacement gems later.

"Mayor Levine, if you help us with setting up a training center, we should also set up a trade shop near the tower as well. People are going to trade in weapons and sell their gold and jewels. We will also need some tradesman for fixing broken swords and whatnot.

"You will also need to define the taxation as well, and not to sound greedy, but I would like royalties for all sales but we can discuss those details later. I also think the trainers should get a percentage for accompanying trainees or others on runs."

"That sounds fair to me," the mayor said "maybe you can check with your contact if he would be willing to relocate closer to the tower. I will ask Sophie and David to try to find some real estate."

"I'll speak with him and asked him to get in touch with your assistants and if I find any artisans, I will let you know as well."

Once we arrived at the mayor's office, I asked for a room where I wouldn't be disturbed so I could work on the runes on the hammer.

I already had a few ideas about how I could connect the different runes to achieve the desired effect.

The hammer needed to be virtually weightless when being wielded buy its owner, but have increased mass as well as trigger a lightning effect on impact. It needed to store mana in the gem as well as using the gem as a power source.

The hammer was made entirely of metal and was very heavy, and the handle was easily 40 centimeters.

I embedded a large amethyst in the hand grip and created the same energy patterns as I had done with my quarter, I then connected a bonding rune so that it would only work for the person with whom it was bonded.

From there I created a return attraction rune from the bonding, as well as a the rune of lightness as these were all attributes related to the owner of the hammer.

On the head of the hammer, I created multiple impact runes all connected to a rune of increased mass and a rune of lightning and from there I just needed to create a connection back to the output of the amethyst that served as a battery.

I decided to create an intermediary gem power source closer to the head as all the functions of the hammer would create a significant power drain.

I charged the secondary gem with mana as I didn't think Mitch would have enough on his own as there wasn't much ambient mana here and his core only had limited capacity.

It must have taken me close to an hour to finish, but it felt like only a few minutes. I was pretty confident that it would work and I almost felt bad parting with it as it was my first real weapon creation.

When I returned to the mayor’s office, I found everyone had washed up and were taking coffee with the mayor.

"Mitch, I think this should do the trick" I said as I handed him his hammer. "I haven't tested it yet but if you can spare a couple of drops of your blood we can see if it works."

I pricked Mitch's finger with a pin formed from mana and let a few drops fill the bonding rune.

"Have you taken your mana potion yet?" I asked him. To which he nodded in the affirmative.

"Try to direct some mana through to the hammer to activate it."

It looked like he was struggling a bit, but after a moment the runes started coming to life and where it was obvious that the hammer was heavy a moment before, it now seemed almost weightless in his hand."

"Holy mother of Thor, this is amazing!"

I didn't want him to destroy the mayor's office, so I created a thick mana barrier around us and a secondary barrier in front of me and asked him to strike at me with the hammer.

He gave decent swing of the hammer against the shield and there was an explosion of lightning the impact knocked me back a few feet."

"I must say that works even better than I had expected." I said, genuinely impressed by the effect of the mass runes that I added.

Mitch was ecstatic and coddling the hammer like a prized treasure.

"Get a room" Ben said, and everyone got a laugh, even Mitch.

"Now, hand me the hammer, gently, as there are impact runes on the head and I don't particularly feel like getting blasted by lightning today.", he handed me the hammer which although light for him, remained heavy for me.

"Now re-call the hammer back to you using your mana. It should return to you handle first."

He reached out his hand and the hammer came flying back to him and he easily caught it by the handle.

Everyone in the room was impressed, including me. I definitely needed to create something similar for myself. A sword is great for cutting and slicing, but sometimes you need pure mass for smashing things.

"Be very careful with the hammer. You should only take it out if you are in the dungeon or are using a mana shield. The hammer reacts on impact so I would try to avoid dropping it or hammering nails."

"For the rest of you, I highly recommend you take your mana potions and touch the mana gems to your foreheads. By doing this this you will learn all you need to know to develop your mana cores and mana manipulation techniques. You can increase your capacity through absorbing ambient mana, beast cores and meditation, but the closer you are to the tower, the faster you will progress. There isn't much mana here so your progress will be slow."

"Xander, " the mayor said before I left." I was thinking, we sometimes could use someone with your abilities. Would you mind if we called on you from time to time?"

"I don't mind, but I don't want to end up in trouble because someone gets hurt and they blame me, or I didn't read someone their rights. I am not a policeman and I don't know the law. You can call me if you need me, and if I can help I will. If possible, maybe I could get a special status to protect myself.

"I will see what I can do. There are some people who owe me some favors, and it is clear that the world is changing in ways no one expected so we may be able to make some exceptions."

"Also, you know my anonymity is important, and with the rewards we get from the dungeon, that puts me in a delicate situation for taxes. Do you think you can come up with a solution? I don't mind paying taxes, but it can't be under my true identity?"