Tawanda slowly stood up and grabbed his back pack, noticed that everyone was looking at him but turned away from them and looked around the plain waiting area then spotted a a restroom sign.Tawanda went to the rest room, entered one of the many toilet stalls and locked the door.
"Aaaaaaaa", he agonized in pain as he removed his shirt.The wound was deep but luckily not life threatening if treated well.From his back pack he pulled out a disinfector powder which he stole from the first aid kit back at the Black chimneys and applied it on his wound.
"Aaaaaaaaaaa shit shit", he shouted in pain the moment he put the powder on his wound then took a stapler like device used to close wounds in emergency situations.He removed his belt folded it and bit on it.He began stapling his own skin and each time he stapled his skin he tightly closed his eyes in pain.He stapled his skin until he eventually closed the wound and bandaged it best to his abilities then put his shirt back on.
"I should sleep to recover my strength"
Tawanda walked out of the rest room and began eating a piece of dry corn flour bread then took a few light sips of water.He walked towards the benches far away from other challengers, put his backpack on the bench to use it as a pillow, lay down and closed his eyes.
"Would you look at that,he is actually planning on sleeping, what an interesting person",said the guy dressed in blue to himself.
~Six hours later~
"Greetings we will now begin the second round of the tutorial"
Tawanda was woken up by the voice of the administrator, stood up and stretched his body, lifted his back pack then walked to where the others challengers where gathered.
"The next challenge is called tower conqueror, you will enter an area that has numerous towers and on the ground near towers are numerous flags. You must place a flag on a tower top surface to conquer it.Once a tower is conquered a large black line appears and it can not be conquered by another challenger.Only half of the challengers present now can pass the trial according to the number of towers conquered.Not conquering at least one tower is an automatic fail, that means if all of you are unable to conquer at least one tower all of you will fail.This challenge will go on for a period of one week, are there any questions?"
A challenger stepped up from the crowd.
"You said that only half of us can pass the trial doesn't that mean if half of the challengers d...," before he could finish his question the administrator interrupted him,
"The means you use are to your discretion, this is the tower, use everything and anyway you can to climb higher"
The whole crowd was shocked as they clearly had the same thoughts.The large door behind the administrator opened and the challengers began to walk in. The area was rocky and stretched out endlessly and filling the area where numerous four hundred metres tall towers.The towers where white in colour and made of a smooth surface,the environment was windy yet there was a mist that reduced visibility.As soon as all the players passed through, the door began to close.Tawanda was behind everyone and turned back as the door closed.
'The Challenge will begin in'
'Five'
Tawanda with full speed dashed away from the crowd
'Four'
Everyone was surprised by the sudden sprint by Tawanda
'Three'
"Getting away from the crowd is the best decision because blood will soon spill", said the administrator as he observed Tawanda dashing away from the crowd and straight into the rocks.
'Two'
"Everyone I know we all have the same thoughts but why don't we approach this like civilized people", said one of the challengers.
'One'
"Let us peacefully try to get as many points as possible theres no need to,",before he could finish he felt a wet sensation in is stomach area and looked down to see.His eyes opened wide as he saw blood and a sword protruding from his stomach.
"He killed him", said another player in shock.
"Shit"
The challengers drew out their weapons and looked at each other with suspicion.That suspicion created tension which led to paranoia.
"Haaaaaaaaaaaaaa"
A guy with short swords stabbed another challenger holding a magical staff and with that act mayhem broke out and the challengers started killing each other.Tawanda kept running until he was no longer in sight,
"They are Definitely gonna start killing each other, its the most assuring way to win, instead of gaining points they can just kill each other until only half of the challengers are left and climb one tower to automatically pass."
Tawanda looked up at the many towers and around his environment,
"The surface of tower is smooth making it difficult and the strong winds also add to the difficulty but im sure by using iron rods I can climb up to the top", said Tawanda as he looked up at one of the towers.He got lost in thought whilst looking up.
"I know what I have to do"
Tawanda went back to the battlefield where challengers were killing each other and hid behind a rock observing the fight.
Everything I need is there I Just need to collect them without getting into a fight"
Tawanda dashed towards the battle field, he grabbed the things he needed from dead challengers laying on the ground.He moved quickly and cautiously avoiding challengers that seemed dangerous until he collected all he could and moved away from the battlefield.He went to a hidden area far away from the battlefield and put all the things he collected down.The administrator paid close attention to him as he curious as to why he collected all those things and what his plan was.He began breaking the equipment he had collected and putting them together.
"What is he doing?", said the administrator as he looked at Tawanda crafting.The many equipment collected slowly started to form a big gadget.
Tawanda used the mechanism of the simple crossbow as the foundation for his gadget.He used broken pieces of other weapons and equipment he had collected such as wires, springs from crossbows, glass from spectacles, wood from a shield and many other pieces all being broken, bent, readjusted then put together to make one big thing.After three hours of deep concentration Tawanda finally finished his creation.It looked like a high school science project but it also strange yet one could clearly seen it was a weapon.A gun would be a bad way to describe it but a cross bow would not be the best to describe it either, if anything it was both as it took certain elements from both sides.Tawanda took the arrows he had collected and broke them in three and made small spikes to which he wrapped a flag to each and everyone of them.
"Is he crazy", said the floor administrator, "he's trying to use that to shoot flags on top of tower surfaces.It takes someone who has reached at least the tenth floor to be able to shoot an arrow that can reach the top of those tower surfaces.If he thinks that some kind of shooting device can do it, he is greatly mistaken.I thought he was on to something interesting, what a let down"
Tawanda easily pulled a level on his gadget then inserted one flag wrapped spike.He closed his eyes, pictured all the pieces of the gadget in his mind and put the intention to enhance the whole device and as he began to have the same feeling he had when he first used his ability he opened his eyes quickly pulled the trigger.The flag wrapped spike got shot at great force that Tawanda was pushed back by the recoil and lost his balance.
The administrator looked at this with great shock in his eyes
"Thats not possible, the power that artifact released is unnatural, Its way more than it is supposed to have"
The flag wrapped spike accelerated towards the tower top as if defying gravity and Tawanda smiled whilst laying on the ground seeing it accelerate upwards.The flag wrapped spike moved until it reached the level of the tower surface but that is when it lost its momentum and Tawanda looked at it with disappointment.
"Shit It just needed a little more power and it would have landed on the tower surface"
The flag wrapped spike started to come back down but due to its projection which would have enabled it to land on the tower surface the flag wrapped spike was able to tap just at the edge of the tower surface and the flag came in contact with the tip of the edge of the tower top surface, bounced and descended down.Tawanda with a disappointment expression on his face saw the flag wrapped spike come down untill it reached the ground a few metres away from him.As it hit the ground Tawanda felt a sensation on his arm and saw the number one written on it.
"Yes It worked, it must have hit a small piece of the surface which counted as a touch down"
Tawanda smiled as he looked at his gadget then at the towers in the distance,
"Time to conquer this whole stage"
Tawanda dashed towards a nearby tower whilst pulling back the lever.
"Thats not right, that non magical artifact should only be able to shoot about a hundred metres, two hundred metres if it was a magical type yet its shooting four hundred metres, something no archer in the tutorial should be able to do.
The other challengers continued to fight each other until the number had significantly reduced and so they displaced to find a tower to conquer.Because they had fought and killed each other they hesitated to conquer towers as they were suspicious that someone would attack them as they do so.
Just before the fighting began the mysterious guy in blue and the ice girl noticed Tawanda running away from the crowd and as the tension between the challenges increased they also moved away from the crowd.The mysterious guy in blue ran until he was out of sight.He looked up at the tower and then took out two daggers,
"This should work"
He infused mana into the daggers and used them like claws to climb the tower walls.It took him an hour to reach the tower top and he put his flag on the tower surface to claim the points.He then pulled out a pair of binoculars and began observing numerous tower surfaces in the distance.
" Time to get back down, I must come up on top in this stage"
The administrator observed the blue mysterious guy as he made the efforts to conquer a tower.
"Something is strange about that challenger"
In another region of the tutorial stage the mysterious young lady in white stopped a few metres from a tower and picked up a flag, her hands turned white and she created an ice pillar which calmly launched her upwards to the tower top steadily but fast.When she reached the level of the tower top she stepped off the ice pillar and placed a flag on the tower surface.
A short girl holding a flag walked slowly to a tower, her eyes glowed and she looked all around the tower then pushed a random brick and the brick g6went inside halfway. A secret door opened and the girl entered with a smile on her face. Inside the tower where steps which she climbed until she reached the tower top then placed flag on the surface.
"This is more fun than I thought, I wonder what other hidden pieces Im going to discover"
With the gadget on his shoulder Tawanda dashed from tower to tower, pulled back the lever, aimed towards a tower top, put the intention to enhance then shot a flag wrapped spike and moved on before it landed on a tower top.
The challengers that survived the fighting formed groups of mostly three and helped each other to either hunt other challengers or conquer towers or both.The ice girl used her ice pillar to gain higher ground and spotted an unconquered tower then descended and quickly went towards it.As she reached it, so did Tawanda.They arrived at the exact same time from opposite directions and immediately stopped upon noticing each other.
The ice girl first noticed the artifact Tawanda was holding, she looked at him for not more than two seconds and then ignored him.Tawanda on the other hand looked at her with interest because of her appearance.Hair as white as snow, pale white skin as that of a dead person found after some days after drowning to death in a cold lake, blue eyes with a faint touch of white, a completely white combat outfit with a slight complementation of light blue.A cold gaze filled with dominance and calmness of the ocean yet frightening.
'Who is she?', said Tawanda to himself whilst looking at her.
The ice girl moved closer to the tower without paying any mind to Tawanda but just as her hands turned white in preparation to use her magic she heard a metallic sound coming from Tawanda's direction.As she turned to look, Tawanda was in the middle of aiming his artifact at the top of the tower.She quickly understood what he was trying to do with the artifact he was holding.
"I do not wish to kill you so please walk away"
A commanding voice yet elegant, soft hypnotic feminine voice yet intimidating, but regardless of the warning Tawanda pulled the trigger.Just as he shot the flag wrapped spike he heard a feint whistling sound and instinctively dodged an ice arrow aimed at his head.
'If I had been a second late I would have died, so thats magic'
The two paused without moving an inch, looking at each other intensely as cowboys do before a gunsling fight.A strong gust of wind blew pass them but they paid no mind to it and just focused on each other intensely.The tension built up with both of them calculating their actions until it reached a boiling point and they simultaneously moved.
Tawanda aimed the artifact at the ice girl and shot at her but she quickly put up an ice pillar which blocked the spikes.Tawanda hid behind a rock and loaded the artifact with multiple spikes then pulled the lever of the artifact further than before.He felt the temperature drop abnormally fast and looked to see the rock he was hiding behind getting white from frost and so quickly dashed away from it l.As soon as he came out from hiding, multiple ice arrows where already flying towards him.He fired the artifact and the spikes managed to cancel out the arrows coming at him but a few managed to graze him.
'This is the first real fight after entering the tower I need to be more serious'
Tawanda dashed to his right and the ice girl followed, both running parallel to each other.Tawanda shot continuous spikes at great speed and power as if using a machine gun whilst the ice girl launched ice arrows as well which meet the spikes and clashed.They kept on running parallel to each other whilst fiercely attacking each other until Tawanda needed to reload the artifact and so dashed towards a boulder and hid behind it.He quickly reloaded the artifact and pulled a small different liver on the artifact, put the artifact on top of the boulder then dashed forward towards the ice girl holding his two iron rods.As soon as the ice girl saw him she fired arrows at him which he blocked using his iron rods.He greatly struggled to block them as they had too much force for him to handle propaerly.The two continued to charge towards each other with Tawanda starting to fail to completely block the ice arrows the closer they got to each other.When they were twenty metres away from each other Tawanda dived to the ground to which the ice girl thought was a way of avoid the ice arrows but she then saw a wide range attack of spikes coming towards her.When Tawanda left the artifact on top of the boulder he set a delayed firing of spikes in a haphazard spread out manner.The ice girl was surprised this as she did not expect it and so created an ice sphere around herself which blocked all the spikes but since it was made in a hurry, the tips of spikes reached the other side of the ice sphere. Just as the ice girl thought she was safe Tawanda broke through the weakened sphere and swung his iron rod at the ice girl. The ice girl was surprised to see him break into her defence that her reaction slowed and barely managed to form an ice sword to blocked his attack.
"Shit this girl is definitely too powerful, probably the most powerful in the tutorial.I thought that surprise attack would work since she seemed to get too focused on one thing.'
Their weapons clashed and they began push6 against each other.Tawanda was stronger in strength and so began to push the ice girl back.Tawanda grabbed his other iron rod with his left hand and swung at the ice girl but she formed small ice arrows in front of Tawanda's face.
"Shit", said Tawanda in panick as ice arrows appeared less than three centimetres away from his face and so jumped back to get out of point blank range.The ice girl moved further away from Tawanda creating a distance of about fifty metres between them.
'If I fight him in close combat I will lose, I have to increase the distance between us and launch as many powerful ice arrows as possible', said the ice girl.
'If I don't fight her in close combat I will lose, I have to close in the distance between us and attack with my iron rods', said Tawanda.
The ice sphere completely crumbled and she formed a lot of ice arrows aimed at her opponent.Tawanda took a deep breath to calm himself then closed his eyes and recalled the feeling he felt during the first trial of the tutorial when he dodged invisible arrows.He put away his iron rods, closed his eyes then dashed foward.The ice girl launched her ice arrows in full force with the intention to kill.Tawanda in his mind saw faint flashes of the numerous arrows flying towards to which he smoothly dodged them in his momentum forward.
Side step, side step, head down, slight jump side step again and so on, the arrows could not even touch him.The ice girl was surprised as she saw him dodge her ice arrows that for half a second she did not have her stoic facial expression and showed frustration.
'How is he dodging my ice arrows?'
They both put in their all with the ice girl shooting as many arrows as possible, as fast as possible whilst Tawanda moved as fast as possible, dodging as smoothly as possible. The distances between the two reduced bit by bit until they where a metre away from each other and Tawanda pulled out his iron rod from his backpack and strongly swung it at her but she formed a strong ice sword to block the iron rod.As their weapons moved at full force towards each other and very close to coming into contact to clash, Tawanda suddenly let go of his iron rod, put all his strength in his legs and increased speed beyond his limit.The ice girl was startled and confused as she saw him let go of his weapon and so she reduced the momentum of her ice sword swing.Tawanda disappeared from her field of vision and she lost track of what happened for a second.After that one second she realized her legs where no longer touching the ground, she was no longer standing upright, she was in someone's arms, she was in Tawanda's arms just as how a prince carries a princess away from danger.She was in shock as she did not understand what had just happened for it was too fast for her to have comprehended.She felt a wet sensation on her face and so wiped her face to see what it was.Her eyes opened wide in shock as she saw blood and though it was her's but realized she did not feel anywhere being hurt.She looked at Tawanda who was carrying her and saw that his arm was hurt and dripping blood.
'Why is his arm bleeding, wait why is he carrying me', the ice girl asked herself these questions.
Tawanda let her down and she stood on her own then created a distance between her and Tawanda.After creating the distance she saw a long spear stuck on the ground at the position she was standing when she was about to clash weapons with Tawanda.She began to realise what had actually happened.
As Tawanda and the ice girl charged towards each other a group of other challengers observed them fighting from the top of a nearby tower.The leader of that group grabber his spear, infused it with as much mana as he could then threw it at the ice girl.As Tawanda was about to clash weapons with the ice girl he sensed the spear coming and so let go of his weapon, increased speed and saved the ice girl from the spear she had not noticed.As he saved the girl the spear head cut his arm which sprayed some of his blood on the ice girl's face.
The spear user gave a signal and other challengers came out from hiding and moved forward surrounding Tawanda and the ice girl.
He used two daggers to reduce his descending speed until he eventually landed on the ground.
"We drew too much attention whilst fighting and now we are surrounded", said Tawanda as he glanced at all the many challengers gathering.The ice girl created many ice arrows in all directions with her and Tawanda at the centre.As soon as the ice arrows formed the advancing challengers stopped in their tracks in fear.
"She's just one girl with little ice tricks, what do you think is stronger frozen water or forged iron steel, we are over a hundred, have confidence in yourself!!!!!!!!!!!!!!", shouted the spear user which motivated the challengers and got rid of their fear.
"He has a point"
"Yah I mean its just one person and that other guy is nothing without his artifact"
"We are strong warriors.
They all slowly move forward then outright charged foward.The ice girl kept on forming numerous small ice arrows in preparation to take down the charging challengers.
"It looks like I have to intervene",said a person hidden from everyone.
As the challengers got near, a huge shadow suddenly covered the area between the ice girl and Tawanda and the challengers ahead.The spear user who was leading the charge quickly noticed the shadow and looked up to see what could cause such a big shadow,
"What the ..."
He made a sudden stop, his facial expression quickly changed, the other challengers stopped as well and looked up,
"What the hell"
"How did"
They were all greatly shocked at what they saw.
"Go back or you will get crushed", shouted their leader.Above them in the air falling was a tower.
"How is that possible", said Tawanda in his mind.The tower came crushing down with great impact that it made a loud sound and big a cloud of dust rose up covering the whole area that visibility was close to zero.
"So the rumour was true that Dark Tesseract had a secret son and that he was going to climb the tower", said the administrator as he observed the tower crushing down.The challengers led by the spear user waited until the dust had settled a bit to move foward.They anticipated the ice girl to use the lack of visibility to her advantage and so moved cautiously with their bodies lowered.They advanced until they reach where the ice girl and Tawanda where but could not find them.
Tawanda kept on running until he was far enough from the other challengers, he sat down leaning on a tower wall and took out his medical kit.He put medicine on his arm, sew it then bandaged it.
"What the hell was that, a tower suddenly appeared out of nowhere.It was definitely not an act of the tutorial hence someone made it happen.That faint blue energy I saw must be linked to how the tower suddenly appeared in the air.If someone caused it it means they intentionally helped us but why?.If someone has some kind of space folding ability then they are even more dangerous than that overpowered ice girl.Im starting to feel that Im truly in the tower, Im excited".
Tawanda stayed hidden until the stage came to an end.