Climbing the Tower with Multidimensional Avatars - Chapter 94

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Chapter 94. The Sephiroth Mage – Astral Body (2)

I emerged from the building and unfolded my ki perception, pursuing the Man and the gorilla creature locked in their chase.
Fortunately, there were no other monsters in sight.
“Ugh, stamina issues.”
I was restraining my inner energy usage to mask my presence while pursuing them, but since inner energy was essentially equivalent to physical ability, running was exhausting.
Should I raise only Strength, Agility, and Vitality stats to recreate my clone?
Honestly, if I just absorbed the increased Intelligence and Mana and converted them to Avatar Points, it should be more than sufficient.
Right, I’ll raise each by exactly 5 points.
My clone currently has 17 Intelligence and 20 Mana, so absorbing them would yield 1700 Avatar Points.
Even raising by 5 each costs 1500 points, so it’s not a loss.
Actually, Strength would only go up to 14. My main body’s Strength is currently 14.
I can raise Intelligence quickly by tolerating some headaches.
Actually, since it’s already reached 17, the headaches are almost nonexistent.
There’s just a slight warmth in my head.

[Strength: 14 / Agility: 15 / Vitality: 15 / Intelligence: 17 / Mana: 20]

With my clone recreated, my body felt remarkably more responsive.
My running stride was far lighter.
With an average of 15 in Strength, Agility, and Vitality, it was only natural—that’s professional athlete level.
While I was deliberating over recreating my clone, the gorilla creature had already caught up to the poisoned Man.
I launched forward at full power using lightness technique, ambushing the gorilla from behind.
Squelch!
The four-meter gorilla creature’s neck was severed, and instead of blood, it spewed black smoke.
“Ugh! What is this?!”
I kicked off the gorilla’s back, distancing myself from the creature.
My clothes bore deep black soot marks, and my face had turned dark as a coal miner covered in ash.
Irritated, I wiped my face clean with my sleeve.
Despite its neck being deeply slashed, the gorilla creature was still alive.
It turned and threw a fist at me, and I lightly leaped up, landing on its arm.
Then, in one fluid motion, I stomped off its arm and bounded upward, using my blade technique to completely sever the gorilla’s neck and tear it clean off.
Black smoke poured from the severed neck like a smoke grenade, and the creature’s form soon vanished entirely.
In the place where the gorilla creature had disappeared lay only a mummified corpse of an ordinary-sized gorilla and a single dark, grimy stone.
Is this a type of magic stone? Did this transform the gorilla into a monster?
“You, who are you? Did you come to assassinate me?!”
The Man I had just saved pointed a gun at me with a sickly pale complexion.
…That’s a gun, right?
What kind of gun looks like a toy without even a muzzle?
Well, sensing mana—or rather, qi—it seems to be a magical artifact that fires magic bullets of the Mana Bullet variety?
“Hey, shouldn’t you thank me first for saving you? What kind of assassin are you anyway?”
The moment you fire, you should either take the hit directly or sever an arm.
Pointing a weapon at your savior—what kind of etiquette is that?
I frowned and clicked my tongue, and the man with teal hair looked flustered.
Was he some kind of celebrity with those good looks?
The man’s black eyes gleamed faintly with gold light.
“…Did Berial send you?”
“Berial? Why are you spouting a demon’s name? Do I look like some demon’s lackey to you? Why don’t you clean that up instead?”
Pointing a weapon directly at my savior made my words come out harsh.
At my words, the man lowered his gun and asked.
“Don’t you know who I am?”
“Should I?”
“Then why did you save me?”
“Because you were in danger, of course I had to save you. Tsk, I figured out your character the moment you pointed that gun at your savior first, but it seems your integrity is lacking.”
As I clicked my tongue, he flushed with shame and apologized.
“I sincerely apologize. The situation was urgent and I was flustered, so I was rude to my lifesaver.”
Since he apologized readily, I nodded and finished wiping my face with my clothes.
The Cleansing magical artifact still had cooldown remaining.
Three times a day, but each had a twenty-four-hour cooldown, so I could use it again in about an hour.
“Then be careful.”
As I turned to leave, the man with teal hair grabbed me.
“Wait, please! Help me!”
“…From the way you mentioned assassins and all that, you seem like someone from a criminal organization? Or maybe marked by a demon.”
“No! Absolutely not! I have lived a life of which I have no shame when looking up at the heavens! The magic I have ‘contracted’ with is ‘justice’! How could someone like me ever join a criminal organization!”
Magic and contract?
“And Berial isn’t a demon—it’s just the alias of a mage who opposes me.”
The words “magic and contract” and “mage” piqued my interest slightly.
“If you help me, I will surely repay you. I’m currently poisoned and cannot use my mana. I have an antidote at my Safe House. If you just protect me until we get there, I will definitely repay you!”
At his words, I asked.
“Can you use magic?”
“I can. Despite appearances, I am Andromallius, one of the 72 greatest mages, second only to the Magic Tower Lords of the 33 Magic Towers.”
Even so, I didn’t know him.
Still, should I trust that he’s supposedly a remarkable mage?
“Then as your reward, could you teach me magic with genuine sincerity?”
At my request, he looked taken aback.
“Aren’t you a mage yourself?”
“I can use some magic, but not enough to be called a mage.”
“That can’t be right. The magic imbued in that sword looked to be at least 3rd or 4th class.”
Ah, you noticed the sword energy.
I only used it for about a second, yet your eyes are sharp.
“Besides body enhancement and weapon enhancement, I can barely do anything else.”
It’s martial arts, not magic, after all.
At my words, he spoke as if dumbfounded.
“Only body enhancement and weapon enhancement without any other foundation? Are you some kind of modified soldier from a hybrid?”
A hybrid?
“I’m a pure human.”
“Even so… no, this isn’t the time to worry about such things. I’ll ask one last question. Do you have any intention, thought, or ill will toward killing me?”
“I don’t… have any.”
Since he continued speaking to me with such formal courtesy, I found it awkward to keep responding in casual speech.
But could asking such a question really reveal someone’s true intentions?
However, contrary to my thoughts, he seemed relieved as he spoke.
“I’ll teach you magic. Let’s move for now. We don’t know when the mutant monsters might arrive.”
I fell into step beside him as he took the lead and spoke.
“When you say mutant monsters, do you mean something like that gorilla creature from earlier?”
“That’s right. Is this your first time seeing a mutant monster?”
I nodded. At that, Andromallius looked at me as if I were strange.
“Are you from the Inner City? No, if you were from the Inner City, you would have learned magic. And it’s impossible for someone from the Outer City to have never seen a mutant monster.”
“I’m not from this city, so I don’t know the situation well….”
“What?! You’re saying you came from outside the City?!”
Andromallius gasped and became visibly excited.
“Do, do humans still live outside the City?!”
What? Is this really a world where humanity has gone extinct? No, I definitely saw a city…
“Well… since I’m alive, there could be others?”
“You don’t mean you’ve been living alone? Outside the City, filled with dangerous mutant monsters?”
“Well… I have been alone.”
At my answer, Andromallius spoke with eager eyes.
“This is important. Tell me properly.”
“I’m in a state similar to memory loss, so it’s hard for me to give you a proper answer.”
Andromallius looked at me with golden gleaming eyes, then frowned.
“It doesn’t seem to be memory loss, but it’s true that you don’t know the situation outside the City.”
“I’ve been wondering since earlier—is that golden gleaming light in your eyes magic?”
Didn’t he say he couldn’t use mana because of the poison?
Andromallius was startled by my question.
“You can see that light?! Insane, how much sensitivity do you have…!”
What? The reaction feels similar to when I first met the Librarian Elder or when the Old Witch Woman first told me she was old.
“What is sensitivity… damn, something’s coming.”
I continued walking and drew my sword.
Soon after, I saw a massive swarm of ants the size of medium dogs rushing from the west.
“Blast! Of all the persistent creatures! We must run faster!”
Andromallius began sprinting despite his grim expression.
I matched his pace using light footwork while hurling stones and concrete fragments from the ground at the ants charging ahead, striking them down.
Clang! Clang! Thud!
“Their exoskeletons are tough. But the eyes seem to be their weak point.”
The ant struck between the eyes tumbled backward from the impact, twitching frantically before recovering and rising again, but the ant hit directly in its massive eye released black smoke that quickly dissipated into nothingness.
The ant struck on the head, unable to withstand the impact, staggered and failed to pursue us properly.
“Can’t you run any faster?”
“I’ve been poisoned… Damn it, if my mana connection were just functioning normally, I could obliterate these trivial creatures in a single strike!”
I hoisted the lamenting Andromallius onto my shoulder like a sack of grain.
“Wait, what are you—!”
“Stay quiet. You’ll bite your tongue!”
I pushed forward at full speed using light footwork.
The pursuing ants gradually fell farther behind.
“Surely this speed from mere body enhancement magic isn’t possible?! Are you really not a modified soldier?”
“Silence!”
Did he think carrying one person while running was easy?!
As I ran down the path, we reached a fork.
“Which way?”
“Left!”
I sprinted in the direction Andromallius indicated.
Andromallius continued giving directions, and whenever my inner energy depleted, I had to obtain mana recovery potions through my Tower avatar and drink them on the move.
I nearly choked while drinking a potion mid-run, but somehow managed to completely shake off the ants.
I finally stopped running and set down my burden, gasping for breath.
“Huff! Huff! Goodness, that was exhausting.”
“Ha, you’ve worked so hard. I owe you my life.”
Andromallius headed toward one of the abandoned buildings scattered around.
“Follow me.”
“I thought the safe house was inside the city, but it seems otherwise.”
“There is one inside the city—that’s our official base. Those of us mages who frequently traverse the city’s outskirts and beyond tend to convert suitable ruins into secret bases or safe houses.”
Given how many abandoned buildings littered this place, it made sense to maintain a safe house or two.
Andromallius descended the stairs leading underground and brushed away a filthy cloth lying on the floor.
Beneath the cloth was a door.
“If this is a secret base, shouldn’t you pay more attention to security? Concealing a door with just a scrap of cloth seems rather sloppy.”
Andromallius looked startled at my words.
“You can actually see this door?”
“Yes? My eyesight is quite good.”
I’m someone who has never worn glasses in my entire life.
“No, that’s not it… Just how exceptional must your sensory perception be to see this? Still, I can tell you’ve never learned magic. If you had, your sensory perception would have immediately detected the magic placed on this door.”
“You keep mentioning sensory perception—what exactly is that?”
At my question, Andromallius smiled knowingly and replied.
“In other words, spiritual intuition, mana sensitivity, or what you might call the most essential virtue and talent for a mage.”
He then produced a card resembling an access pass and held it to the floor, whereupon the door swung open.
“This is my first time inviting someone into this place. Do come inside.”
Beyond the open threshold lay a vast chamber brimming with all manner of mechanical apparatus and intricate devices.

(To be continued in the next chapter)

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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