Chapter Three

The forest of the first Floor was eerily quiet, as he made his way past the initial trees and into where it became truly thick and dense. Clearings became few, and small in size, and a constant soft rustle shook the leaves. The trees were initially similar to those of Earth in form, but as he went deeper he started to see more of the Tower-specific vegetation. Huge monoliths, like pine trees but with a deep red bark and leaves that seemed to glow softly. Bushes with flowers that slowly rotated, creating a hypnotic pattern with their colours. Without the aid of one of the Wayfarer’s Guild guiding him and a bunch of other newbies through a previously cleared path guarded by C Rank Climbers, Will found himself slowing the pace of his travel to take in the sights.

In just a few months, let alone years, groups of Climbers would start to ally and form what would eventually become Clans. Many of them would be actively backed by or affiliated with Governments and corporations, and while the standardisation and infrastructure that they would build could be useful there was still a certain beauty and adventure to the still mostly unspoiled Tower. As he replaced his sword in his belt absent-mindedly, he continued stepping calmly through the forest, all thoughts of monsters and reaching the next Floor forgotten. A few more steps and he started to notice a strong sweet scent that delighted the nose, and it made him pick up the pace slightly. Still not as fast or fervent as he had been at the start, but now with a bit more hustle as he sought the source of the smell.

Stumbling over a root into one of the few small clearings this deep in the Floor, he looked up to see a beautiful woman layered in leaves and vines, stood with flowers blooming in her hair in the centre of the open grass patch. Her skin was a pale green, the vegetation on her body artfully covering anything too raunchy while seeming to suggest his eyes in that direction anyway. She favoured him with a smile, and a beckoning motion of the hand. Obligingly, he continued to walk forwards towards the beauty.

As he stepped closer, he twisted his body in a way that sent a spike of pain shooting through him from the arrow wound. The haze cleared, just for a moment, and following the pain was a spike of fear. His foot stopped, hovering an inch above the ground as he fixed the creature with newly guarded eyes. Mental traps weren’t supposed to be a risk this low in the Tower, but as one side of his mind started begging for him to walk closer he recognised the familiar feeling of such a trap having almost ensnared him.

The creature – Dryad, he recalled – gave another insistent beckon of the hand, but when Will didn’t move it lunged forwards. The beautiful lines of her face twisted into a vicious scowl and the flowers on her hand wilted and hardened into sharp bark claws. Will was ready for this though, the fog of her Spell having worn off now he had a foothold against its’ influence, and dove to the side. He came up from a roll, drew his sword and didn’t wait for a second attack before moving in for his own assault.

He’d fought dryads before, since they were a common fodder monster in forested areas later on in the Tower. This mental manipulation part of their build was usually irrelevant that late though, as people had more than good enough Stats to ignore them and could make up the difference with Items and Skills if not. Judging by the speed with which this particular one was swaying away from his attacks and preventing him landing more than a weak glancing blow against its’ body – which had hardened to the same thickness and toughness as her claws – he had to assume it was a bit weaker than the ones on Floor 7 or 12 that he and the Companions had tangled with. Still, as he cursed and had to bend backwards at the waist painfully to avoid being lashed with a vine that sprang from the dryad’s chest, he knew instinctively it wasn’t just another monster for this Floor.

He gathered his thoughts, negotiating the space of the small clearing to give himself a good position for the fight, and renewed his attack. Fast, short swings from all angles was the strategy, pressuring the dryad into the defensive so he could find a weakness to exploit. Since he’d never heard about dryads on this Floor, and judging by the fact this thing was at least Miniboss strength, it must have been a Hidden Encounter that someone else triggered first time round. His future knowledge had failed him already? This early, and he was already running into problems he had no plan to handle? It didn’t feel good, and the small wounds he’d started to accumulate on his unarmoured hands and legs felt even worse.

“Fucking low Stats!”

He shouted, drawing on his memories of the first timeline to see if there was any specific strategy he could employ.

Blade clashed with oaken arm, and he managed to chip a section of the dryad’s armour away, sending it spinning into the forest with the sound of rustled leaves. It screeched, and he took the initiative to land two more heavy blows that took larger chunks from the torso. That was the trick, he remembered. He’d been the party tank, so mostly his job had just been to keep John and the others from getting hit by the dryad’s attacks, but he recalled the DPS strategy being to focus on the armour. Hit it in the right place with the right force, and it is removed – once its’ gone, it can’t be regrown unless the dryad kills someone and drains them to heal.

Thinking of John distracted him slightly, allowing the dryad to clock him in the side of the head with a heavy wooden limb. He staggered, seeing stars and shaking his head to regain focus. He couldn’t waste time on getting emotional when he was still so weak. John would be fine, by the time he was even thinking of entering the Tower Will would be more than established enough to keep him safe and decide whether or not to try and rebuild the friendship then. This thought helping his focus stay on the fight, he dodged two quick strikes and moved in close. He swung his scimitar in an uppercut-like motion, chipping off another section of bark and then dashing backwards. A vine that he dodged with ease turned his scowl to a grin, and he managed to slice a section from it on the way past.

Now the dryad was really angry, and he watched as the grass and vegetation around the clearing started to rustle and shake. Unless it was really a Hidden Boss and had some sort of domain Skill, he wasn’t too worried but it did create a more tense atmosphere for the fight. Ignoring the attempt at intimidation, he continued to dodge swipes and whips from the claws and vines of the dryad, his sword proving the value of even the Base Gear in keeping new Climbers alive as it refused to break or dull no matter how much he hacked at the thick bark armouring his foe. He’d used a different style of weapon, and relied on a shield, by the end of his first Climb. That hadn’t been by choice.

Now, getting to employ the style of combat he had always preferred, his attacks became frenzied in their pace and force. He didn’t become wild or clumsy, not sloppily battering at the dryad and allowing it to ignore the strikes. Instead, his attacks stayed precise and accurate, more of the bark being sent flying with every blow. He’d been under-leveled for the party, and had no access to good Skills or gear for a swordsman, when he joined the Companions first time around. He’d decided to go the tank route for them, adding a shield to the mix and training to block rather than attack. Not this time though, and as he scored a particularly nice hit that removed two of the dryad’s thick claws, he sent a mental apology to his old friends.

“You’ll have to find another crash test dummy this time guys, I’m going for damage.”

He was tired, and the small wounds he’d accumulated only further underscored the need for him to get to the 2nd Floor and get stronger as soon as possible, but his mood was high. This was a previously unknown Hidden Encounter, with a monster that seemed a bit too tough for the average Floor 1 Climber to face. Whatever reward he’d get for successfully killing the dryad was sure to be an asset. The dryad’s strikes had less force behind them as the lack of its’ armour forced it to be more conservative, and Will’s furious blows continued to find gaps in the defence and weaken it even further, and he finished the fight without any more issues. He did take a nasty vine whip across the face, but other than a leaving a large red line for a few days it couldn’t wound or scar. He panted, hands on knees, in the middle of the expanse and looked down at the dryad’s body. After a second, it did exactly what he’d been hoping for and dissolved into glowing golden light. There was a “ping!” in his head and he listened for the voice of the Tower.

“Hidden Event Cleared – Dryad’s Embrace

Clear Requirements: Resist the Dryad’s Embrace and defeat her

Clear Rating: B

Clear Rewards: +2 to Mind Power and Mind Depth, Oaken Helmet of the Dryad Slayer [D]”

The Helmet appeared in the place of the dryad's corpse, resting in the grass. It was a dense, thick wooden material much like the dryad's own bark, dotted with lines and cracks that revealed verdant green vines woven within. While he was no expert, he'd spent enough time Climbing to be largely familiar with different types of weapons and armour, so he recognised it as a Norman style helm thanks to tthe nose-guard and its' simple rounded shape. Not the most protective piece of armour, and he'd have liked something that covered the neck a bit, but it was better than nothing. Especially given the D Rank of the Item, this was something he'd never have expected to find on Floor 1. It'd become redundant eventually, but not any time soon.

Oaken Helmet of the Dryad Slayer [D]

Item Requirements: 10 or Higher in Strength and Endurance

A Helm imbued with the forest’s magic and the strength of a dryad’s armour, earned by one who defeated such a foe.

Provides +3 to Endurance when worn, and if fighting in a forest or wooded environment grants this bonus additionally to Strength, Agility and Mind Power.

“Now that’s what I’m talking about!” He laughed, immediately cutting the tip of his finger and letting a drop of blood touch the Item to bond it to himself and placed it on his head. Bonding wasn’t strictly necessary for using an Item, but it allowed you to bring it out of the Tower and sometimes would reveal hidden aspects to it. Gear with Stats like this, even if it wasn’t a growth item and would be made redundant in a Floor or three, wasn’t exactly flowing like water this early on in the Climb. Annoyingly, he didn’t plan to spend much time in forests other than this one any time soon, but just the Endurance buff was useful given that he kept running into enemies his Stats weren’t quite enough to handle without injury. Feeling like the fight was well worth the delay in reaching Floor 2, he checked his Sheet just to see the benefits of running into this Hidden Encounter.

William Sutton/Pioneer [F]

Class: Fighter

Strength: 11 (+3)

Endurance: 12 (+3

Agility: 11 (+3)

Reflex: 9

Mind Power: 5 (+3)

Mind Depth: 6

Skills: Conditioning [F]

Bonded Items: Oaken Helmet of the Dryad Slayer [D]

Tower Coins: 38

Even without the buffs from his new helmet, apparently all the running and fighting he’d done so far had managed to get him another point in both Strength and Endurance. Given that he was aiming for a more Agility-focused fighting style in the long term, it wasn’t the most useful buff he could get but this early on he’d take anything. He wanted to start using Conditioning again to see if he could get the rest of the Stats to follow, but after this encounter and the goblins before he didn’t want to risk it. Better to get to an area he knew and could safely train in, than to deplete himself too much before something else came up like the dryad encounter. The 25 Tower Coins were another nice bonus given that he’d be looking to buy some items from the Store once he’d unlocked it. He’d have to find a safe area to do so, but they weren’t too uncommon on the lower Floors and he had a few locations in mind.

“Right, I have officially no idea how long I’ve been here. Feels like I’m being slow though, so let’s see if I can get to the Inner Ring before it goes dark.”

Every 12 hours on the dot, the huge permanently noon sun in the centre of the Floor would turn dark, and then re-illuminate after another 12. It was the only way to track time in here that he had access to, so it was naturally the only benchmark he could give himself for “a day” of Climbing. Thankfully, the area where he’d been pulled by the dryad wasn’t actually that far off the route he’d been taking, and given that he just needed to go through and not find any particular point, other than the fight itself he hadn’t lost too much time to the detour. It should take around another day or so to reach the inner ring, if his rough estimate of 8-10 hours spent Climbing so far was accurate. He stood, noticing that several of his smaller wounds were already mostly gone and his worst injury – the spot where the arrow had penetrated his ribs just below the half-shirt of mail that the Tower gave him for armour – was almost at “flesh wound” status. Endurance buffs, at this low level, made all the difference.

Will kept moving, not sheathing his sword this time. Part of him was surprised he hadn’t run across any other Climbers yet, since even though the Tower was mostly unknown on Earth there would still be at least a few thousand inside it even now. Though, he reflected, as he tried to sustain a light jog despite the rough footing, most of them would probably be clustered up higher or in the inner ring since it probably hadn’t twigged that each Floor had a lot of secrets to be discovered yet. Really, Climbers who tried to search and explore all details of a Floor had been rare even in the later days, some of them becoming famous and valuable for their services as most simply wanted to go as high as they could and acquire rewards that way. As the dryad event had indicated though, that wasn’t necessarily the best route. He was only trying to skip past this Floor to make sure his future knowledge didn’t become redundant before he got a chance to use it. There were things up higher he knew would be gone in a few months, and he had no idea exactly when they were taken.

He’d be scouring later Floors for their hidden benefits, but he was happy to leave whatever was left here to the people who came after. That is, if they hadn’t already been stumbled upon by the people who came before. Once he was established enough to risk drawing more attention, he could start to reveal some of the secrets he didn't plan to use, and to encourage exploration in others. Thanks to being in the forest, his helm wasn’t just giving him defence and stamina, it also buffed his Agility which was already coming in handy. His feet were more nimble, allowing him to use less energy stumbling and forcing his way through roots, and the extra Strength helped when he did need to push past an obstacle. All together, the benefit of the dryad fight to his speed of travel was significant, even if it would mostly disappear once he left the second ring and wasn’t getting the full buffs anymore.