“Bandits,” Alana says. “Always a bunch of goddamned bandits. Honestly, it’s so damn cliche I should have expected it the moment I realized we were in some sort of town modeled off media depictions of the Wild West. Like, seriously, there’s probably going to be a group of people with jeans and tall cowboy hats and ugly bandanas tied over their faces like a mask going around with twin revolvers.”

“Too bad they didn’t have a visual description to go off,” Jasmine says. “For all we know, it’s a bunch of… I dunno, giant squirrels or something. Maybe Seraphina knows something.”

All eyes turn to me as we sit in a grungy bedroom on the second floor of the saloon. It smells of hard liquor and improperly-cleaned up puke. The beds are hard and uncomfortable and there’s a draft that lets in hot air and even a few grains of sand now rolling about on the creaky wood-paneled floor. But it’s probably safe, which is odd, given we’re supposed to be in a hellish, inescapable trial dungeon.

“Look, I don’t care if the bandana is considered gaudy and ugly by the System. I’ve grown attached to it, and I’m not taking it off.”

“I meant about the bandits.”

“Honestly, your guess is as good as mine. Seems like most of the floors so far have been pretty cliche, so if you think of the most cliche thing to go off, you’ll not be far off.”

Jasmine scoffs. “So, if the cliches are anything to go off, they’ll probably show up at first light of dawn. We’ll have to slowly whittle down their forces, with the entire floor’s challenges culminating with a showdown with the bandit boss at high noon.”

“Yeah, probably,” Alana says. “How many bandits do you think it’ll be?”

“Maybe a few hundred. Maybe a few thousand,” Jasmine says. “Seraphina seems to know all about these Towers.” She turns to me. “What do you think?”

“I’m worried that this is a trap. We are still in the Tower. As far as I know, that means the Warden is still prowling about. Should we be trying to ‘help’ these… Are these even people?” And why don’t I have any memories about my time in the Tower during my last life? I wrack my brain, even cycling through the [Ether] channels therein, all trying to knock loose a memory that can help me. But I fail, yet again.

“What if it’s not?” Chloe asks. “Sera, you said that there was, if I remember your words correctly, ‘spatial screwery’ going around with these Towers?”

I nod.

“Well, what if we’re not in the Tower, exactly. What if, instead of being in some portion of the Tower exactly, we’re instead somewhere far away. Somewhere with real people instead of constructs, somewhere that needs our help.”

“It’s… possible,” I say.

“Then we should stay and help,” Chloe says. “If there’s even a small chance that these are real people, then we have a responsibility to do everything we can to protect them, including dealing with their bandit problem.”

“I agree,” Alana asks. “That’s part of the creed I took when I reached my class change. That, to the extent reasonable and practicable, I would seek to defend the innocent and smite the wicked. And I feel obligated to help if at all possible.”

“I’m still worried this is a trap,” I say. “I just don’t trust the System.”

“Should we take watch shifts during the night?” Jasmine asks.

“Probably a good idea.”

----------------------------------------

The afternoon passes, and evening follows. We make our way downstairs for dinner. It doesn’t make any sense, but the bartender seems content to take our money— American greenbacks— as payment. So incredibly odd. I wouldn’t have blinked had they demanded gold or gemstones or even coins. But they accept our cash without a care in the world, even making change with currency that— to my eyes and fingers, at least— looks and feels genuine.

The food smells absolutely delicious. I was expecting… no, I really didn’t know what I would have expected, but spicy Creole food— thick, meaty stew-like gumbo and jambalaya— was nowhere near the top of that list. And it’s delicious. Stupidly spicy, as I nearly need to beg Chloe for healing upon my tongue a time or two, but delicious. The tomato and okra is laden with flavor, the sausage is juicy and cooked to perfection. Even the rice has a perfect texture, providing that miniscule reprieve from the heat of so damn many peppers.

And yes, the bad, criminal girl I am does imbibe herself on a half a glass of the house ale. It’s… admittedly not very good. And Chloe doesn’t like it much either. Jasmine and Alana both do, but are mindful enough of our surroundings not to have more than a glass and a half apiece.

“Love, does your [Cure Condition] also work on drunkenness?”

Chloe taps her wrist with her index and middle fingers, causing a faint glow hardly noticeable in the rowdy atmosphere all around us. Again, this doesn’t sit just right with me— there are allegedly bandits on the loose, something that even a random passer-by knows enough about to give us details, and yet, people around us are drinking and cursing and occasionally giving the four of us lewd eyes throughout the meal service. Maybe they are just trying to drink away their sorrows, having otherwise given into the despair of powerlessness.

By an hour after sunset, we make our way back to our room to wash off. I decide to take the first watch shift— I have the highest [Vitality] due to my high level, and am not even the slightest bit tired despite the horrific battle on the previous floor. Jasmine volunteers for the second shift, Chloe for the last, and Alana the dreaded third watch that Lindsey always took back when it was us traveling together.

I have to admit, I miss Lindsey a little bit. Alana and Chloe are a lot alike. They’re both genuinely good people trying to do the right thing, for themselves and the people they care about, for society and humanity more broadly, and for laws and institutions to the extent possible. If Chloe had the choice to sacrifice one life to save a hundred, she’d do everything she could to look for a way to save all hundred and one first. It’s one of the things I love about her, and I wouldn’t change it for the world.

But sometimes Lindsey’s ruthless pragmatism and decisiveness has its merit. At the very least, there’s a certain convenience to it. She’d do what she felt needed to be done and wouldn’t lose any sleep over it. She still cares about people, just… in a different way, even if it is one that certain people would see as ‘evil’, or at least ‘selfish’.

I’m still not convinced that this isn’t some sort of underhanded tactic. These folks have been nothing but kind and, maybe not polite, but at least accommodating ever since we arrived. Which might just be the mark of good hospitality, sure, but we are still within the effects of the Tower, if not the physical location in conventional space. A trap is just too likely. Especially since it seems to want us to continue to fight and grow stronger. Forcing us— Chloe especially— to fight other humans to the death like this would certainly be in keeping with the System’s designs as I currently understand them.

I levitate cross-legged in the center of the room, my [Ether] regeneration just enough to allow me to do so while still maintaining the full vision my [Archangel’s Gaze] affords me. Even with my eyes closed, focusing inward on my own body, I still see the world all around me in sharp detail. The creaking of ants along the floorboards, the quiet rise and fall of Chloe’s chest as she sleeps. Even the cute way Jasmine cuddles up to Alana while the two of them sleep— despite her gruff exterior and the chip on her shoulder to prove herself, she does have a softer side, it seems.

I focus inward, all while keeping an eye on the outside world. My attention turns to my own body, trying to grasp at the structure of my [Ether] channels. On the one hand, the channels, like my [Ether] core, are metaphysical constructs. Unlike my muscles or tendons or blood vessels or nerves, someone vivisecting me would not— to the best of my knowledge— be unable to see anything that wouldn’t appear on a pre-System diagram of human anatomy. Nor would there be a magic gemstone or anything else next to my heart that serves as the source of my magical prowess.

But while that is technically true, this doesn’t mean there isn’t some physical analogue, one that I can manipulate directly. To a small extent, I already have. It should be possible to go a lot further— especially for me. [Cybernetic Body] allows me to manipulate my body, incorporating any prosthetics and other components I graft on or replace my organic form with. And I have a relatively high [Intermediate Ether Manipulation] Skill, which should, at least in theory, apply to my [Ether] core and channels just as much as it does to the [Ether] flowing within me.

And I have an idea, one I can only do in these rare situations where I’m wearing my [Wings of Icarus] but not the [Wyvernscale Armor] as a layer between the two. I focus on the channels that flow outward to my shoulders and upper back. There’s a faint trickle of [Ether] that pulses through them in tandem with my heartbeat, flowing out of my body and into my wings, activating the myriad glyphs and arrays contained therein.

I narrow my focus further, looking for the exact points where my body connects with the harness that holds the [Wings of Icarus]. It’s not hundreds as I’d originally feared it might be, but it is dozens. Eighty-eight to be exact. Forty on each shoulder blade, and another eight on the gap between them.

The connection upon each of those spots is odd. It’s not quite a full connection, instead being airgapped— skingapped?— by the tiniest of boundaries. Like a capacitor, or maybe a transistor. I focus on the spot directly in the center of my back, just a bit to the right of my heart. I focus [Ether] from my core to that specific connection, something that is far from effortless but not insurmountable, akin to threading a sewing needle with my toes.

It takes… minutes? Maybe longer— time is definitely flowing oddly in this tavern. But I’m able to do so. And once I’ve isolated the connection, I push. Hard. I mold my very being, twisting it around and tethering my [Ether] channel directly out of my body and into the circuits contained within the artifice at my back.

It hurts like hell. Skin and muscle and bone and even my metaphysical soul are being flayed as I force my body to incorporate my wings. The metal of the [Wings of Icarus] begins to fuse with my scapulae and vertebrae, soldered together by my own [Ether], all while my [Ether] channels wrap around and forge connections to this new part of my body.

Throughout it all, even as the pain brings me to tears, I don’t make a sound. I’m beyond this pain after the trials we’ve faced thus far. For Chloe’s sake, for the sake of the world, for the sake of becoming who and what I was meant to be, I endure it in silence, all the while continuing to keep a small thread of my consciousness attuned to the world around me.

Finally, the connection is established. But it’s weak, tenuous, held on by a literal thread. Another painful stab, this time like I’m stabbing my own flesh with a needle, burrowing it into my muscle and then screwing it further into the bone. [Cybernetic Body] again pays dividends, helping my body to accommodate the changes I’m making in rapid succession. And it’s not just my own body that changes as the second, then the third, then the fourth connection falls into place, each one sutured that little bit tighter.

The harness at my back flattens, the parts which before jutted out of my back now dissolving seamlessly into my skin. The wings themselves fuse into my shoulder blades, new muscles and tendons and even nerves growing in rapid succession thanks to my Skill. Sweat pours down my face and neck and especially my back, and I rapidly grow fatigued. But, after exactly ninety minutes, right as my watch shift draws to a close, I see a System notification, proving that all of my pain and risk have been worth it.

[Your [Intermediate Ether Manipulation (Rank XVI)] has upgraded to [Intermediate Ether Manipulation (Rank XVII)].]

[[Cybernetic Body] has subsumed Skill [Overland Flight] and accessory [Wings of Icarus]. Skill [Cybernetic Body] has upgraded to [Angelic Form]]

[[Angelic Form]: The [Mechanical Angel] has taken greater steps to transcend her physical body, transitioning from that of a human to that of an angel. As [Cybernetic Body], but with the following additional effect: At will, if her wings are not summoned, she may summon a pair of teal, metallic wings from her back. If present, she may dismiss them at will. While present, she has the ability to fly at a velocity which scales proportionally with her level, [Speed], [Mind], and [Ether] consumption. While her wings are active, she gains a 25% Lightning vulnerability and all spells with the [Lightning] modifier have a 1% chance to inflict 25% recoil upon herself or nearby party members (Blowback target chosen randomly).]

[Name: Seraphina Mortensen]

[Age: 18]

[Level: 46; Experience: 1,594,100; To Next: 35,940]

[Current Stats: [Health]: 6,232 / 6,477; [Ether]: 4,106 / 4,719]

[Current Stats: [Strength]: 62; [Speed]: 55; [Vitality]: 95; [Mind]: 140]

[Combat Parameters:

[Attack (Physical Damage Dealing Capability)]: 167 (Base Strength 62)]

[Agility (Ability to Dodge Attacks): 152 (Base Speed 55 (+32 from [Archangel’s Gaze]))]

[Defense (Damage Reduction from Physical Attacks): 207 (Base Vitality 95)]

[Magic Attack (Magic Damage Dealing Capability): 150 (Base Mind: 140)]

[Magic Defense (Damage Reduction from Magical Attacks): 175 (Base Mind: 140)]]

[Elemental Affinities:

[Attacks with currently equipped weapon are Non-Elemental.]

[Defenses:

Fire: 25% Resistance

Water/Ice: 25% Resistance

Earth: 0% Resistance

Wind: 43.75% Resistance (25% Resistance, 25% Resistance)

Light: 0% Resistance

Darkness: 0% Resistance

Lightning: 25% Resistance (6.25% Resistance with wings active)]]

[Equipment:

[Weapon: [Mechanical Arm Cannon]: Attack +105 (+55 with glyphs inactive)]

[Helmet: [Bandana of Swiftness]: Defense +2, Agility +5]

[Arms / Shield: [Wyvernscale Buckler]: Defense +10, Magic Defense +10, Agility +55]

[Body: [Wyvernscale Brigandine]: Defense +75, Magic Attack +10, Magic Defense +20]

[Leg Armor: [Bulwark Boots]]: Defense +25, Agility +5]

[Accessory 1: [Flawed Ring of Regeneration]: Magic Defense +5]

[Accessory 2: [None] ]

Class 1: [Mechanical Angel]

[Class Skills: (0/6 Skill Slots remaining)

[Archangel’s Gaze (Rank VIII)]

[Angel’s Grace (Rank V)]

[Ether Bullet Barrage (Rank XIII)]

[Angelic Form]

[Trick Shot]

[Etheric Armor (Rank IV)]]

[General Skills: (1/6 Skill Slots remaining)

[Intermediate Glyph Manifestation (Rank IV)]

[Intermediate Ether Manipulation (Rank XVII)]

[Glyphcasting (Rank XXII)]

[[Ether] Strain Immunity]]

[[Angelic Bond] with Chloe Jacobs]

[Unique Traits:

[Touched by the Multiverse]

[Ṣ̸͆ẽ̸̜r̷̞͛a̸͈̿p̴̬͂ḫ̶͌ḯ̸͜n̸̻̐â̷̠ ̸̡̎O̷̥͘v̴̩͝è̴̱r̶̜̆l̷͙͗i̴͉͊m̵͉̿i̵̖͝t̸͓̕t̶͙̾]]]