Tower Climber (A LitRPG Adventure, Book 1) Jakob Tanner (reading comprehension books TXT) 📖

Click! Flicker! Click!

Before the D-ranked Climber could reach them, a burst of flames filled the alley, shielding Max and Casey from the attack.

Then leaping right in front of them was none other than their climber academy instructor. He had a burning cigarette, hanging in his mouth and a fireball in one palm that he was ready to serve up to the D-rank climber.

“Looks like the final exam is a different kind of test this year,” he said. “I’ve been sent by Sakura to back you guys up. You hurry ahead, leave this guy to me.”

Max and Casey nodded and rushed forward as their instructor began trading blows with the D-ranked climber.

They sprinted as fast as they could.

They were almost at the generator.

96

Max and Casey arrived at the huge looming wall that separated the tower-zone and the outer-rim.

There was a building attached to the wall. It was where the duty guards’ locker room and lounge area was together with the city’s back-up generator.

“There it is,” cheered Casey.

Max ignored the horrible noises of the monsters wreaking havoc on the city. Every second wasted was another moment of life or death for the hundreds of thousands of civilians who lived in the tower-zone without any powers to defend themselves with.

They rushed forward to the door.

“Oh crap,” said Casey. “What if the door’s locked?”

They hadn’t considered that.

Max reached out and turned the knob and thankfully the door opened.

They stepped inside the building. The entrance hall was a mess. Items were toppled over and blood smeared against the wall.

There had been a fight here of some kind. Maybe the climbers on guard duty had fought against each other or a monster or had hurried out into the city to fight battles there. Regardless, Max wasn’t sure. All he knew was that this place was a mess.

“Oh my,” said Casey. “What do you think happened here?”

“Same as what’s going on outside these walls,” Max muttered. “Chaos.”

They hurried down the hall and headed towards what looked like a janitor’s closet. Beyond the door though was a huge manatech generator. Behind the giant device was a large glass chamber full of monster cores like a gumball machine. The generator must continuously consume those monster cores to help power itself.

“Look,” said Casey.

On the generator was a giant red button labeled, ‘Emergency Back-Up.”

“That must trigger the defensive wards,” said Max.

SLAM!

Casey wasted no time slamming her hand against the red button.

Max expected a massive alarm to go off, but nothing much happened, other than the pile of monster cores in the generator got consumed by the manatech device.

“That should protect the buildings and everyone who’s in it,” said Max, sighing with relief. “We’re halfway there to winning this battle now. All that’s left is defeating the actual monsters. Let’s go!”

They hurried back through the hall, returning to the city streets.

As soon as they stepped outside they froze with terror.

ROOOOAAAARRRR!

A huge black dragon flapped its wings in the sky, flying above the city’s skyscrapers.

“That doesn’t look good,” said Casey.

Toto covered his eyes with his tiny hands, peeking occasionally through them.

How the heck were they going to fight a dragon? Even with the other climbers’ help. This was a next-level threat.

The dragon blew out a huge blast of fire from its mouth into a tall building, but thanks to them, when the fire dissipated, the building was completely intact with a slight silver sheen of the defense ward’s mana showing.

“Um, Max,” said Casey. “I think we got problems closer to home.”

A massive rock golem came lumbering towards them.

Max triggered bind.

The paralyzing string shot forward and locked the rock golem in place.

Casey manipulated the wind and shot it forward until the golem crumbled into dust.

Casey looked around frantically.

“What are we going to do, Max?” she asked. “There’s monsters in all directions, including, a freaking dragon in the sky. What’s our next move? Go back to the arena to help Sakura? Or help the other citizens?”

Max took a deep breath. Every second counted right now, but it would be far more wasteful to make decisions while panicking. Sakura’s assignment was to get the back-up generators on and then assist with other climbers.

So their next mission should really be to find another group of climbers and figure out what the higher-up climbers had dictated was the strategy.

They rushed forward into the city streets only for a new threat to emerge in front of them.

SMASH!

Landing just ahead of them was the climber president in full werewolf mode.

Blood dripped from the creature’s sharpened teeth.

It turned towards them, eyes full of bloodlust.

Before Max and Casey could even react, the next thing that happened was the A-rank climber president was charging straight at them with murderous intent.

97

Samuel cackled with laughter overtop the arena.

He was still standing on the back of his enslaved gargoyle, lording over the city.

“You can’t stop me, Sakura,” said Samuel. “I’m a higher rank than you are. It isn’t feasibly possible for you to defeat me.”

The patronizing bastard, Sakura thought, gritting her teeth.

She was B-rank and he was A-rank. There was no doubt about that; but that didn’t mean the outcome was inevitable. Yes, the odds were in his favor, but Sakura didn’t even have to win. All she had to do was prolong their fight, keep the man distracted until reinforcements showed up.

Sakura lifted up her hands and triggered slice.

A massive energy blade shot above her and towards the clouds.

The blade stabbed right into the center of the gargoyle in the sky.

The monster’s eyes bulged with pain and it coughed up blood right before dying.

It disintegrated into a monster core in the air.

Samuel fell to the arena floor, imbuing his feet with mana right as he landed to cushion the fall.

The powerful A-rank climber smirked at her.

Just because he was a higher rank than her didn’t mean his little floating gargoyle slave was.

“Get off your high horse, jerk,” Sakura declared. “And talk to me on the ground.”

The climber president rushed at Max and Casey.

The werewolf man galloped with incredible speed and agility.

“Ahh!”