Nathan did not rest, as usual.
The night after the party’s strategy eting, while the city slept and his teammates recovered from the day’s drills, he slipped out of the apartnt again with both summons in their small forms. Mirko on his shoulder. Kuro tucked into his jacket. The Tower of Hollow Stone rose at the industrial district’s edge, a squat cylinder of grey rock with a low-Rank designation and dense enemy packs.
Perfect for grinding.
"You shouldn’t be here," Mirko said quietly as they approached the entrance. She’d shifted to humanoid form, her sword already drawn, her expression tight. "You promised. One night of rest, then we push"
"We don’t have ti for delays, Mirko."
"We have five days. That is enough."
"Not if sothing goes wrong." Nathan stepped through the portal. "Not if we fall behind."
The Tower swallowed them.
Floors 1 through 3 were standard.Stone Hounds, Crystal Crawlers, monsters Nathan had fought a dozen tis before. He cleared them with chanical efficiency, his movents precise but hollow, driven by montum rather than focus. Kuro reached Level 8 after a brutal fight with a Stone Colossus on Floor 4, her [Weak Point Sense] marking the creature’s core node while Mirko held its attention with [Impenetrable Fortress]. Nathan’s [Focus Shot] punched through the marked point, and the Colossus crumbled.
[Ding! Level Up!]
[Kuro: Level 8 Reached!]
"One more floor," Nathan said, already moving toward the portal. "Floor 5. Then we’re done."
’Master, you are bleeding,’ Kuro observed.
Nathan glanced down. A thin cut across his forearm, nothing serious. "It’s fine. Let’s go."
Mirko exchanged a look with Kuro, a silent conversation between summons that Nathan was too tired to parse, and then they followed him through.
Floor 5 was a trap.
The chamber was a ruined hall of stone pillars, their bases cracked and unstable. Nathan’s [Hunter’s Insight] flagged the structural weaknesses a heartbeat before the first pillar collapsed. He dove sideways, stone crashing behind him, dust filling the air. Then the second pillar fell. Then the third.
And in the chaos, sothing moved.
The Venomfang Basilisk uncoiled from the shadows with its serpentine body of grey-green scales and its mouth dripping viscous yellow venom. It lunged. Nathan’s exhausted body reacted a fraction too slow. He twisted, avoided the fangs, but a falling stone shard caught his left calf. The pain was imdiate and deep. A jagged gash that tore through his combat suit and into the muscle beneath.
He hit the ground hard.
Mirko scread, [Unstoppable Force] ignited as she launched herself at the basilisk, her blade carving through scale and flesh. The creature shrieked. Kuro activated [Shadow ld], erged behind the basilisk’s head, and marked the soft tissue beneath its jaw. Mirko’s tenth strike drove through the mark, severing the creature’s spine.
The basilisk collapsed.
Nathan lay against a broken pillar, his left leg a ss of blood and torn fabric. He’d already torn strips from his combat suit and was binding the wound, hands shaking. The bandages were crude, but they held.
’We... are leaving. Now!’ Mirko said.
"One more floor..."
’We are leaving, Master. We are already done with this floor so it won’t incur any penalty!’
She took the extraction crystal from his belt as he was too slow to stop her, and then she cushed it in her palm. Light swallowed them.
They erged into the cold night air. Nathan’s leg gave out. He caught himself against the Tower’s outer wall, breathing hard, blood seeping through the bandages. Mirko shifted to bunny form without a word and tucked herself against his chest. Kuro remained on his shoulder, motionless, her ntal voice uncharacteristically strained.
’This was reckless.’
Nathan didn’t argue. He limped ho in sha.
---
The next morning, Nathan wore loose pants to training. He kept his weight off the left leg as much as possible, which was to say, not enough. The healing potion he’d taken had closed the wound partially, but the muscle beneath still scread with every step.
He should have known Elise would notice.
She said nothing during the session. They ran a light drill: formation practice, no constructs, just positioning and callouts. Nathan made his calls, but [Hunter’s Insight] required focus, and the pain kept breaking his concentration. He missed a timing cue. Garrett had to adjust without warning. Dillon covered the gap, his Cloud Serpent diving to intercept an imaginary threat that shouldn’t have existed.
Afterward, as the party dispersed, Elise stepped into his path.
"Show ."
Nathan didn’t pretend to misunderstand. He knew that tone. "I’m... fine."
"Show , Nathan."
Her use of his first na, not Cross, not Climber Cross, but Nathan, stopped him cold. He exhaled, leaned against the wall, and pulled up the pant leg.
The wound was angry. Inflad. The bandages were fresh but already spotting red. The gash had partially closed...the potion had done its work but it was still raw, still weeks away from true healing. A day of training had reopened what little progress the night had made.
Elise looked at it. Her expression didn’t change, but when she spoke, her voice was quieter than he’d ever heard it.
"You climbed again..."
"I took a potion..."
"That Wasn’t enough, clearly. And you were going to climb again tonight. Weren’t you?"
Nathan didn’t answer.
She reached into her belt pouch and produced a small crystal vial. The liquid inside was pale silver, faintly luminous. Nathan recognized it from his research, an Elixir of Renewal, a high-tier healing potion. The kind that didn’t just close wounds but rebuilt tissue, restored nerve damage, erased scars before they could form. The kind that cost more than most Climbers made in months. This was the proof of limitlessness of her Family resources, The Winterhart resources.
"Drink it. Now."
"Elise... I..."
"You will drink it." Her eyes were ice. "Then you will rest until the duel. No more night climbing. No training. Nothing. That’s not a suggestion."
"Kuro is only Level 8." The words ca out rougher than he intended. "She needs two more levels to evolve. If I don’t—"
"Kuro needs you alive." Elise’s voice didn’t rise, but it cut through his protest like a blade. "Mirko needs you alive. Garrett, Dillon, your sister....they... We all need you alive. If you enter the Colosseum injured and exhausted, you lose. We all lose." She pressed the vial into his palm, her cool fingers lingering for just a mont. "This isn’t just about you anymore. It hasn’t been for a while."
Nathan stared at the vial. The liquid swirled, slow and silver.
Then he drank.
The warmth spread through him instantly... not the dull heat of the low tier-healing potion he had been taking, but sothing sharper, more precise. He felt the wound in his calf tighten, close, the inflad tissue calming. The pain didn’t vanish instantly, but it dulled to sothing manageable. Sothing that would heal.
"Thank you," he said.
"Don’t thank . Just rest." Elise turned and walked toward the exit. At the door, she paused. "Three days, Nathan. Don’t waste them."
She left.
---
Nathan sat at the apartnt table, his leg freshly bandaged and no longer throbbing. The Elixir had done its work. The wound would heal fully by the duel. But the exhaustion... the deep, bone-level exhaustion of two weeks of grinding remained untouched by any potion.
Kuro was curled on the table before him, small and black, her white mask-markings catching the evening light. Level 8. Two levels short of evolution. Three days until the duel. And no more climbing.
’I will evolve during the duel, summoner’
Nathan looked at her. She hadn’t spoken through the link since they had extracted from the Tower, she’d been silent, watchful, processing, probably feeling guilty. But Now her voice was steady. Certain.
’The combat will provide what these past nights could not. The threshold is close. I can feel it, the door you spoke of. When we face the Berserker, when the stakes are highest, I will cross it.’ Her black eyes t his. ’Trust , Summoner.’
Nathan studied her. The quiet confidence. The absolute lack of doubt. She wasn’t hoping. She wasn’t wishing. She was stating a simple fact, the sa way she had marked weak points since the mont he’d summoned her.
"I do," he said. "We’ll find a way."
Mirko hopped onto the table, settling beside Kuro. "Of course we will. She’s my junior. I’ve trained her well."
’You have trained in nothing.’
"Emotional training. The most important kind."
’That is not a thing.’
"It is absolutely a thing. Master, tell her it’s a thing."
Nathan didn’t answer. He was watching them, green and black, Knight and future Assassin, bickering in the quiet of the apartnt while Lucy slept on the bed behind them. His leg was healing. His team was ready. His summons were stronger than they’d ever been.
Outside, the Towers glead against the darkening sky. Three days, then everything will Change... Either for the better... Or the worst.
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