The girl pushed her glasses up her nose and then said, “If something is restricted on the climber database that means only highly ranked climbers can access that information. Things that are restricted usually involve higher tower floor politics, S-rank climbers, and—” She paused, momentarily. “Rogue climbers.”

Max shivered at those words.

Elle—what happened to you in this place?

35

After Max’s trip to the library, the weekend flew by. He dedicated himself to continuing Sakura’s training regimen and by Sunday night he saw some improvement in his stats.

He looked his profile over before bed with satisfaction.

Name: Max Rainhart

Rank: Unranked

Trait (Unique): Mimic. Unleash the last move you were hit with at double the power.

Strength: 7

Agility: 7

Endurance: 7

Mana Affinity: 4

Passive Skills:

Kokoro (Warrior Spirit)

He smiled. His endurance had gone up by one point and he could feel it in himself. Sakura’s exercises were still tough, but he found them less and less difficult now. He was going to have to think of new ways to push himself so he could get stronger.

His low mana affinity still bugged him, but he figured that was a stat that he’d only be able to truly train properly by going into the tower more and more.

He went to bed that night with excitement for a new week of classes.

Casey did not share the same enthusiasm the following morning when they met up outside the courtyard of the climber academy.

“Blergh...” she groaned. “I hate Mondays.”

She had bags under her eyes and her shoulders were slumped.

Max had spent the whole weekend training, but he wondered what people did for fun in the tower-zone. How did it differ from what people did in the outer-rim?

“Did you have a nice weekend?” asked Max.

“I had amazing weekend plans,” she said. “I was going to go shopping, I was going to get a chocolate strawberry crepe downtown, but instead my part-time job ate up my whole weekend and now I’m back at school again. It’s unfair!”

“I’m actually quite excited for a new week of classes,” said Max.

Casey’s eyes drooped, unimpressed with him.

“Hurray for you ,” she said, sarcastically.

Max looked around the courtyard to see if the instructor had arrived. There was still five minutes before classes started but you’d think the teacher would have arrived early.

Someone knocked into Max’s shoulder.

Max swerved and it was Cyrus and his goons arriving to class. They didn’t even say anything to Max after the altercation, simply walking into a far corner of the academy courtyard.

“Ignore them,” said Casey. “They’re morons and probably still pissed off that we passed last week’s test. Don’t give them a second thought.”

Max nodded to Casey. She was right and he appreciated her telling him so.

Sybil Westley sneered at them as she walked by, but didn’t give them much trouble that morning.