After an entire day fighting and climbing that massive staircase without stopping for a single moment, I was quite pleased with the results. I broke my limit one time, and my HP and STA increased by two points. But I was exhausted. My legs were heavy like that time I used the massive dark arrow against my copy, and my condition reached an alarming point.

HP: 09/93

MP: 35/285

STA: 04/93

Evolution Orbs: 5832/14000

Evolution Coins: 75231

At that moment, I finally completed my eighth trip to the top of the tower, and at the arena, I saw the leader of the criminals.

“Survive, and you may proceed, die, and the ghost survivor will take your place.”

As soon as I put my feet on the arena, I heard that voice, and then the bald criminal moved and looked at me.

“Hey, man… long time no see.”

While I was trying to catch my breath, I looked and waved at him. But that only pissed him. I soon understood what I had to do to complete that challenge; I had to cross the jungle, climb the staircase, and kill again someone who I already had murdered. The last part was actually very easy since they didn’t get any stronger. That challenge wasn’t only a physical test; it was also a mental test. To make one survivor consider the opportunity to give his own life to bring another survivor from the dead. But, that thought never crossed my mind. I only killed assholes and those who tried to kill me, after all.

“Die!” The bald criminal shouted.

From my point of view, he and the other criminals seemed to be running in slow motion. So, I just took a few steps to the side and put two steel bolts in his legs. The bolts pierced both of his knees and then he fell screaming on the floor.

“Let’s talk man… I want to rest… I can’t rest down there… there are too many monsters.”

“Fucking brat.” The bald criminal said, showing his ugly face filled with anger.

“Dude… this is your chance to be alive again… you don’t have a single chance to defeat me… almost two months have passed since you died… and I’m way stronger than before… no, I’m just faster, and I have new tricks.”

I put myself in the lotus position to recover my MP, in the meantime, the bald criminal was trying to crawl toward me with his club in hand. He really hated me, but that didn’t surprise me. What surprised me was the fact that he still wanted to fight.

“I guess you don’t want to die again, huh. How is the other side? Where have you been for the past two months? Hell? Underworld? Valhalla?”

“… I don’t know.” The bald criminal said, gritting his teeth.

“What is the last thing that you remember?”

“You killing me… then darkness.” The bald criminal said, showing an expression of despair.

“Well… that would scare the shit out of me too. But that is just you reaping what you sow, in this new world you could have become a new person, a powerful person. But you didn’t want to change.”

“It’s easy for you to say something like that… I bet you had never faced any difficulties in your life!” The bald criminal shouted with tears in his eyes.

“Everyone has their own share of problems; everyone suffers for many different reasons. You don’t have the right to judge the suffering of the others. And your own suffering doesn’t give you the right to commit crimes.”

“Shut up!” The criminal shouted, trying to approach with his club in hand.

“I guess it can’t be helped.”

I put two steel bolts on his shoulders, and because of it, he couldn’t use his arms anymore. I had to recover myself in the middle of the fight, because if I kill him that annoying voice will teleport me to the bottom of the tower, even if I don’t touch the door.

“Fuck… damn it.” The criminal said, crying.

“… just enjoy this opportunity, man. Use this time to repent on your crimes.”

I was starting to feel a bit bad. Death is a natural part of life, but that didn’t change the fact, that I would also feel scared like him knowing that my life would end in a few minutes. But, I didn’t have the time to pity him. I still have to cross the jungle and climb the staircase almost three hundred more times. Judging by my pace, it would take forty days to finish that challenge. I couldn’t spend so much time in a single challenge; I didn’t know how much challenges were left. And as long as I don’t complete this challenge, the others wouldn’t be able to start the next challenge.

“Why is this happening? I was brought back to life just to have some false hope?” The bald criminal showed a face full of tears.

“I don’t know man; it’s probably to make me feel bad about my actions.”

If that was indeed the case, then this tower had to try harder. But I was a bit worried about Claire since she didn’t fully recover from the second challenge. The council members would have to repeat this entire process a few times, but they would succeed. But how about the other twenty survivors? I wondered what kind of enemies they would face on the arena; after all, they didn’t kill anyone, probably.

“Tell me… how much stronger are you now?” The bald criminal asked.

“It’s hard to say… maybe I’m strong enough to kill a small army of zombies. Why do you ask?”

I defeated Ann’s army, so that was probably accurate.

“Can you revive me? You obtained crazy powers, right? You can do this, right?” The bald criminal asked, showing a glint of hope in his eyes.

I hesitated to answer that question, it was possible to revive him, but who would do it? No one would. It was possible, and that would give him some false hope, but lying it would only making him even more desperate. I wasn’t the right person to judge if by dying he paid for all his crimes, so I contemplated my two options: lie to him and watch him suffer even more or tell the truth and give him the false hope. In choosing any of those options I would feel a mix of emotions, I would feel like a merciful person, and at the same time, I would feel like a sociopath… that was very disturbing.

“… You can be revived, but it’s not easy. No one until now obtained the evolution coins necessary to revive someone.”

“Please revive me!” The bald criminal said ecstatically. “If you do it, I will obey all your orders! I will become your dog or whatever you want. Please, revive me. I’m scared of the darkness. I want to exist! Please, please!”

“… Is this all you have to say?”

“I’m sorry… please say this to those two girls…”

I nodded, and then I teleported to behind him and put a steel bolt on his head, just like the others, his body became dust immediately.

“Sorry, but I can do much more useful things with so much evolution coins than revive someone like you.”

I sighed, and after ten seconds without moving, I heard that annoying voice, and then I reappeared at the bottom of the tower. Since I was feeling a bit bad because of the bald criminal’s situation, I wasn’t a true monster yet. In any case, I only had recovered twenty percent of my STA, I recovered fifty percent of my MP thanks to the meditation, but I wasn’t feeling even a little excited.

‘I guess I will have to break my physical limit a few times to end this as soon as possible.’

I could probably continue without sleeping for two more days; the problem was food and water. I had twenty liters of lemonade inside my backpack, but I didn’t have any food. So, I would have to eat monsters and drink the river’s water.

‘I hope those fucking piranhas taste good.’

Monsters’ meat would speed up my recovery, so I decided to kill a considerable amount of them, grill the meat and store inside my backpack. After that, I would ignore the jungle’s monsters and climb the staircase as fast as possible.

‘It’s the best thing I can do, too bad I already drunk all the potions I received as a reward. Next time I will store them… living and learning.’

Luckily for me, the things I needed to create a bonfire were everywhere on the jungle. The fire attracted the monsters, and I killed them, but I couldn’t bring myself to eat the monkey’s meat, I didn’t want to eat something humanoid. The spiders were out of questions, so I approached the river, and when a shoal of piranhas approached to attack, I shot three electric arrows toward the river and in an instant, I obtained ten kilograms of meat.

‘This fish is too damn ugly… I hope the meat tastes good at least.’

Although I thought that, I would eat it as long as that could recover my HP and STA. Fortunately, the grilled piranhas were excellent, and when I cut off their faces, it became even tastier.

After grilling twenty kilograms of meat, I decided to resume the challenge. To increase my speed, even more, I decided to eat the meat every time by STA was below eighty percent. That would probably keep my body at the peak of its capacity, and just like I had imagined, that worked. It was hard to be sure, but I probably spent four hours to cross the jungle and climb the staircase a single time. But by maintaining my STA at the max of its capacity, I managed to complete that circuit in three hours. Even better, my legs weren’t heavy or sore anymore.

‘It’s a good progress… but it’s not enough. I have to complete this circuit at least two hundred and eighty more times. I have to be at least thirty percent faster.’

But that was easier said than done. I thought a lot about what to do to increase my speed, but nothing came to mind, the only option was to break my physical limit and so I did. After another entire day fighting, running and killing ten Ken’s lackeys, I broke my physical limit for the first time, and I noticed that I had become faster. But it wasn’t enough, and to break my limit again, I would have to obtain, more than fifteen thousand evolution orbs.

‘This will be a pain…’

Running at full speed and invisible, I could cross the entire jungle in less than a minute. Usually, I also could climb the ten kilometers long staircase before using all my STA. But the gravity made things less efficient. I would run out of stamina in the middle waypoint in the staircase. After another day, fighting, running, killing ghosts, and doing calculations, I got sick of it doing calculations.

‘Why do I have to hurry? This place is just perfect for me, I grow strong as much as I want, and I can obtain evolutions coins as much as I want. No one can bother me here. I will use this challenge in my favor.’

The time was against me, but I was sure I wouldn’t have to face many more challenges after that one. The third challenge was that hard; after all, we would face one or two more challenges. Once I recognized that as a fact, everything went smoothly.

To grow strong without neglecting a single parameter, I fought for twenty hours every day, and then I rested, meditated, and created more steel bolts in the remaining four hours. That was the minimal amount of time that I needed to increase my MP, so, I couldn’t stop for less than four hours. During the first days, when I wasn’t sleeping and meditating, I felt a terrible headache as if someone was splitting my head with an ax.

However, aside from that sharp pain in my head, was feeling great. Even when my muscles and bones were making weird sounds, I was feeling great because I was getting stronger without the orbs. After four hours resting and meditating, I got up feeling alive like I had never felt before. After one week, the pain in my head disappeared, and I had changed, I had become a true survivor. I noticed it when I saw Ken’s terrified expression.

HP: 85/135

MP: 136/311

STA:45/135

Evolution Orbs: 7452/28000

Evolution Coins: 145936

Skill list:

Concentration Lv06 21%: Raises your attack power and range by 6% each hour. The bonus resets when you sleep.

Crosshair: Lv09 37%: Creates a crosshair in your field of vision to aim at enemies.

Radar: Creates a radar in your field of vision to detect any living creature on your surroundings. Effective Range: Sensorial limit (40) x 10 meters.

Analyze Lv06 99%: Analyze and show enemies status and information. Cost: 01 MP.

Spiritual Knife Lv02 70%: a weapon created by the spiritual energy of its user. It can be safely stored inside the user’s body. 9 MP will be used to summon and to store the weapon. It's able to ignore the target's defense. This knife will disappear after being used a single time.

Domination Lv 04 44%: It grants the user the ability to command other living beings. To activate the skill, you need their permission — survivors currently under your control: 39.

Search Lv02 71%: By activating the skill this skill you can search for specific items, monsters, or survivors in a certain range around you. Effective Range: Sensorial Limit (40) x 5 meters. Cost: 10 MP.

Meditation Lv 05 1%: By putting yourself in the lotus position, you can restore five points of your MP every minute. Your MP can also increase by five points every four consecutive hours of meditation. Moving or receiving damage cancels the skill.

Elemental Magic Arrow Lv 03 11%: The user can create an arrow made of magic possessing one or more of the existing properties in the universe. The arrows won’t move or disappear until the user selects a target. One arrow can be created every eight seconds. Cost: 20 MP.

Skill: Teleport Lv 01 34%

Info: You can teleport to any point in your field of vision; you also can teleport to other locations as long as you have been there or you can feel the presence of someone or something on that place. You can teleport any numbers of allies as long as you are touching them or them are touching you, the cost of the skill will multiply accordingly with the number of allies teleported.

Cost: 01 MP/03 Meter.