“We are mainly,” said Sakura. “But by training in the proximity of the tower, you’ll be growing your mana affinity stat as well.”

“Fantastic,” said Max. “I’m ready to do another hundred laps then! I’m so fired up!”

“Hey, slow down, mister,” said Sakura. “Well, actually, you can speed up in a minute, but I still haven’t explained to you the full importance of the mana affinity stat.”

Max’s eyes widened.

There was more!?

“As I said, mana affinity is the single most important stat of a climber’s. Climbers may focus on solely improving one or two stats or spread them out amongst the stats equally—but mana affinity must always be a focus. Theoretically, a climber with S-rank strength and E-rank mana affinity is still an E-rank climber. Such a hypothetical doesn’t hold up to much scrutiny, though, as there’s no way an E-rank climber could develop S-rank strength without being able to get to the higher levels of the tower. It’s basically impossible for that to happen. If you want to train any of your stats beyond E-rank you need to develop your mana affinity stat and that’s because your mana affinity dictates how far up the tower you can climb before you develop tower sickness and die.”

Max blinked. Tower sickness? S-rank strength? He shook his head. One question at a time.

“What the heck is tower sickness?”

“If you climb beyond a floor with a mana density that your mana affinity stat can’t handle, you develop tower sickness. Your bones will atrophy. Your lungs will suffocate. Very few people survive tower sickness.”

“How do you know how high up the tower you can travel with your mana affinity?”

“You may have been wondering what I meant by E-rank mana affinity and S-rank strength. Technically, climbers only have one overall rank, but we’ve come to rank the stats individually ourselves as a good rule of thumb.”

She rummaged in her pocket and handed Max a piece of paper.

“I wrote it all down for you,” she said. “To make it easier.”

Max took the paper out of her outstretched hand and looked it over as he jogged.

Stats 1-10 (Unranked Citizen)

Stats 11-20 (Rank E)

Stats 21-30 (Rank E)

Stats 31-40 (Rank D)

Stats 41-50 (Rank D)

Stats 51-60 (Rank C)

Stats 61-70 (Rank C)

Stats 71-80 (Rank B)

Stats 81-90 (Rank A)

Stats 91-99 (Rank S)

“Why do you separate Rank-E across two sets of stats?” said Max.

“There’s usually two phases to the early ranks. E-rank phase one and E-rank phase two. Stats 11-20 signal a climber has the same physical attributes of world-leading professional level athletes. Beyond 20 though is when climbers start to develop even superior physical attributes.”

The more Max learned, the more eager he wanted to train and raise his stats.