20 Cautious Nature

After nearly seven days on the First Floor, Linnaeus had acquired a total of 829 Aether, most of which had been obtained from hunting the various oversized animals littering the seemingly endless forest.

By constantly avoiding areas where people would naturally congregate, he had been able to avoid any direct encounters with other Fledglings. Instead, he focused on increasing his proficiency with his Skills, Abilities, and Magic as, even without people to use them against, the animals residing on the First Floor had become a veritable treasure trove of experience.

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Though he had gotten quite a bit of experience when he first started killing his pursuers in the slums, this number had decreased to between 5~20 experience after his Level had increased. Since it took an increasing amount of experience to raise his Level, these diminishing returns had been weighing heavily on his mind after reaching Level 21.

Now, Linnaeus found that even relatively weak animals, such as a peculiar toothed duck and a three-meter long bottom-feeding fish, could grant him a considerable amount of experience. Some of the larger predatory animals, such as the red-furred leopard he had killed, granted a phenomenal 201 experience in a single go.

It wasn't exactly easy to find animals within the forest but, by leaving corpses as bait, he had been able to draw the attention of a few sensitive predators to rapidly increase his experience gains while also training his Skills, Abilities, and Magic. He was actually surprised with how easy it was to hunt and trap animals using a combination of his [Barrier], [Stealth], [Presence Concealment], and the environment itself.

After encountering traps previously, Linnaeus had decided to try and earn the [Trap Set] and [Trap Disarm] Skills on his own. With his attributes, he knew it would be very difficult to fight enemies directly so, in order to ensure he could pass through increasingly dangerous Floors, he wanted to increase his foundation as much as possible.

Because of the gracious contribution of the various fauna inhabiting the forest, Linnaeus felt like his horizons had expanded exponentially. Not only was his power increasing rapidly but, for reasons he didn't quite understand, not being able to see the Tower dominating the horizon suddenly made it seem as if his future had been opened to limitless possibilities...

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[Status]

Name: Linnaeus Finnian

Title: Fledgling(+2 Spi, +1 Luk per Level)

Race: Hume(50%), Manalyte(50%)

Age: 15

Gender: Male

Level: 21~23(1008/3900)

Health: 1120/1120

Soul Power: 2971/2971

Strength: 50

Constitution: 50~52+4

Agility: 70~79+15.8

Dexterity: 51~56+2

Intelligence: 82~91+50.5

Wisdom: 82~90+50

Spirit: 38~42+12.6

Charisma: 25~28

Luck: 10~13+1

Free Attributes: 16

Skills: [Kinu Comprehension:(-)], [Fleet-Footed:LV1~LV11], [Magus:LV1~LV14], [Resilient Mind:LV1~LV8], [Knife Mastery: LV21], [Throwing: LV14~LV15],[Sense Danger: LV29~LV30], [Presence Concealment: LV30~LV32], [Acrobatics: LV30~LV31], [Pain Tolerance: LV18~LV19], [Barrier Master:LV50~LV51], [Assassination: LV33~LV35], [Charm: LV7~LV8], [Trap Set: LV11](new), [Trap Disarm: LV6](new), [Dismantling: LV7](new)

Abilities: [Steal: LV27~LV28], [Stealth: LV28~LV30], [Night Vision: LV17~LV19]

Magic: [Enhance: LV26], [Barrier: LV50~LV51], [Barrier Aura: LV50]

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Every time Linnaeus saw the increase in his experience and attributes, he couldn't help but smile as it wasn't an exaggeration to say he was more than twice as powerful as a week prior. Attributes didn't scale linearly so the difference between 40~50 Agility and 50~60 Agility was significant.

Now that his attributes had increased so much, even his weakest [Barrier], using the minimum 50SP, could hold upwards of 400kg. In the past, he had only been able to support around 140kg so it was quite a sizeable increase.. Better yet, as his [Barriers] persisted for the duration of his Spirit, he could now erect them for nearly a full minute, a stark contrast to the pitiable seconds he could maintain them previously.

The only downside was, after reaching Level 50, he was no longer able to arbitrarily gain experience by simply casting his Magic. He needed to proactively use them by stress-testing their resistance or actively using them in combat. It seemed that breaking through the Level 50 threshold made it a lot harder to grow unless you were willing to put in some serious effort.

Despite this setback, Linnaeus was optimistic for the future as, with his SP regeneration reaching 149 per minute, it was possible for him to perform some pretty amazing feats. He had even been able to make platforms that allowed him to ascend high into the sky and, so long as he paced himself, it was possible to stay airborne indefinitely.

In the future, Linnaeus was hoping he would be able to freely move his barriers around as, unless he made them dynamic from the start, they were fixed once he created them. Since the barriers had no weight to them, at least not enough to matter, there wasn't much use for a platform that simply fell to the ground the moment he created it.

Using his Blessing to its limit, Linnaeus had ascended a steep cliff before making a small camp for himself on one of the larger ledges. The chances of him begin attack so far away from any other Fledglings and resources allowed him to relax, even if he never dropped his guard.

In this manner, he had been able to last until the eve of the seventh day when a voice began to echo in his surroundings, saying, "You are the last Fledgling remaining on this Floor. Congratulations, Mr. Finnias, as you will be given a small bonus for your patience and cautionary nature. Though it is only a pittance compared to what the frontrunners earned, I hope to see how far someone like you is able to climb this Tower. Ufufufufu~."

The moment the voice faded away, Linnaeus heard a ding as his Aether value increased to 1829. At the same time, transparent blue text appeared in his vision that said, 'You are the 577th Ranking member in your group. Due to your peculiar nature, you have been awarded the Title of Sheepish Fledgling'. (A/N: Sheepish Fledgling(+1 Wis, +1 Spi, +1 Cha)

Linnaeus didn't mind the bonus 1000 Aether but, when he saw his new Title, his mind completely blanked as a feeling of loss welled up inside of him.

Though some might do anything to get their hands on it, he didn't have much use for the Charisma attribute. Luck, however, was one of the most important attributes as it directly influenced the large majority of his active Abilities. Now that he no longer gained the free Luck per Level, he suddenly felt that his efforts over the last week, while fruitful, had cost him something important.

Without being afforded the time to brood, Linnaeus suddenly felt his vision blacken as a nauseating sense of weightlessness seized him. Then, as if it had been an illusion, this feeling faded away as his feet were firmly planted on a hard stone floor.

Unlike the previous Floor, which was a vast and open wilderness, the Second Floor reminded him of the slums. The air was very humid and, much like the alleyways he had called home for his entire life, there were tall stone walls that had pipes of different sizes passing between them. As for the ceiling, only pure darkness could be seen, even with his [Night Vision] activated.

Just as he was thinking about what kind of test awaited him, a distinctly different voice from the one present on the First Floor announced, "Congratulations to everyone who had cleared the First Floor's challenge! There are now a total of 577 Fledglings remaining of the original 1,000 so I am pleasantly surprised. It isn't uncommon for only 300~400 people to make it this far so I have high hopes that this batch will complete my challenge with ease!"

Since the fastest way to get Aether was to kill other Fledglings, Linnaeus wasn't surprised by the voice's words in the slightest. He was bothered by the fact he was the lowest ranking member of his entire group but that didn't really matter, so long as he survived. Unfortunately, the voice seemed to be able to read his mind, and not in a good way...

"As I'm certain everyone has noticed, the Second Floor is quite a bit different from the First. I hope you all were able to enjoy the amenities provided during your wait as, from this moment onward, the only luxuries you have are the ones you collected in your Inventories! Unlike the previous Floor, you will find that the only enemies waiting for you here are other Fledglings! As for the challenge that awaits you, it is a game I like to call Hunt, Hide, and Seek. Every hour, for the duration of a single minute, a red thread will connect you and your target. In order to proceed to the next Floor, you have to either kill or team up with your target! Keep in mind that, while you are hunting others, there is also someone hunting you. Good luck, and may you one day soar amongst the Heavens~!"

Though the rules of the game weren't particularly threatening, what the voice had failed to say was that the name and rank of their target and the person hunting them were both displayed in the information panel of their Status. There, Linnaeus could only stare blankly as he saw the name of his Target, Ersk Kivanh, Rank 133, and the name of his Hunter Merek Alexandros, Rank 1.

Even living in the slums his entire life, Linnaeus was familiar with the names of the Eight Heavenly Families. This included the Geminis, Evendoom, Silverlake, Andromeda, Titania, Bellsprit, Goldbeard, and, last but not least, the Alexandros family. Since it was practically a death sentence to claim the surname of one of the Eight without being an actual member, Linnaeus knew that the person who was hunting him undoubtedly belonged to the Alexandros family.

Without wasting any time, Linnaeus began to vault up the walls, using the pipes and footholds formed from his [Barrier] Magic to ascend as high and out of sight as possible. He didn't know how big the Floor was but, if he went high enough, Linnaeus was confident he could avoid being made easy prey for the prodigious Rank 1 Fledgling. As for fighting back, that would depend wholly on the type of Blessing his Hunter had as, unlike some of the other families, the Alexandros weren't famous for any particular Blessing.

After ascending for nearly half an hour, to the point he couldn't even see the floor below any longer, Linnaeus finally reached what appeared to be the ceiling of the Second Floor. He wasn't really sure how far he had traveled but, if a person fell from this height, death was assured.

Without any other materials on hand, Linnaeus began to chip away at the outer layer of the pipe, only to quickly discover the material was far harder than anything he had ever dealt with. He had actually been curious about whether or not it was possible to pass into other corridors through the pipes but this seemed to be beyond his capabilities.

With few alternatives available to him, Linnaeus could only wait in his [Stealth] mode while waiting for the small timer in his information tab to finish counting down. He wasn't actually planning on hunting down his target as this meant exposing himself to the Rank 1 player while also potentially earning the ire of his target. After all, even if he could convince the person named Ersk to team up with him, the chances of them siding with him after learning he was being hunted by the Rank 1 were slim, at best.

For the umpteenth time, Linneaus felt that the Tower was actively putting him into unfair situations while propping up other Fledglings, despite them not needed the help. He felt it was ridiculous that the Rank 1 Fledgling, who was already well ahead of his peers, was assigned with the lowest-ranked person in the batch. It was practically a death sentence as, by reaching the Second Floor ahead of everyone else, it was almost guaranteed that the person hunting him had no qualms about killing others...

Thinking this far, Linnaeus couldn't help but release a tired sigh as he looked toward the ceiling above, missing the sky of the First Floor...