A new Ground Floor.
Aethelgard, the world I had burned, abandoned, and dismissed as a dead memory, had just been drafted into the game. My past was no longer the past. It was a new, playable starting zone.
The Emperor, Valerius, the Crown Prince—all the people Seraphina had supposedly killed—were likely resurrected by the Tower's reset, their souls rebooted as "players." The ghost of the true Kaelen, now puppeteered by the vengeful spirit of Seraphina, was no longer just a haunting memory; it was a designated player, a rival with a home-field advantage.
The Sage's offer was not a gift. It was a temptation. A strategic gambit. They wanted me to go back, to get bogged down in the sentimental swamp of my old life, to fight my old battles and waste my precious time while the true game continued on the upper floors of the Tower. They wanted to put the chaotic dog back in a familiar yard.
"No," I said, the word instant and absolute.
The Sage's serene smile faltered, a flicker of genuine surprise in his ancient eyes. "You would refuse this chance? The chance to face your oldest enemy, to reclaim your homeland?"
"My homeland is a concept I find… limiting," I replied, my voice a blade of ice. "Aethelgard is a dead world, inhabited by ghosts I have already killed once. Whether they are now 'players' in a new game is irrelevant. They are a distraction."
I turned my back on the portal, on the Sage, on my entire past. My gaze swept over the infinite, floating islands of the Third Floor. This was the future. This was a realm of gods and sponsors, a place of immense, untapped power.
"My goal is not revenge," I declared, my voice resonating with the pure, cold logic of a sovereign. "My goal is power. The Duchess Vane is a powerful piece, yes. But she is a piece on a chessboard I have already left behind. I will not go back for her. Let her rot in her little starting zone. When I am the undisputed master of this Tower, I will simply… delete her floor."
It was the ultimate, arrogant, and utterly logical decision. I was a god now, and I would not be dragged back into the petty squabbles of mortals.
The Sage stared at me, his expression unreadable. He had offered me a sword to fight my old demons, and I had told him I would rather just burn down the entire house they lived in at a later date.
"A bold choice, Traveler," he finally said, a note of something—respect? fear?—in his voice. "The path of absolute severance. Very well. The door is closed."
The shimmering portal to Aethelgard vanished.
"But know this," the Sage added, his form beginning to fade. "The game you refuse to play will not wait for you. The pieces on that board will move on their own. And they may yet find a way to climb." He was gone.
His warning was noted and dismissed. Let them climb. I would be so far above them by the time they arrived that they would be nothing but dust beneath my feet.
With the Sages' temptation dealt with, I turned my attention to my new reality. The Third Floor. The Celestial Realm.
"Lia," I said to the Warden at my side. "Report. What are the rules of this floor?"
Her ancient, logical eyes scanned the environment, her Guardian-consciousness processing the fundamental laws of this new reality. This floor is different, she sent, her telepathic voice a calm stream of data. It is not a unified world like Nocturne. It is a collection of a thousand pocket dimensions, each a 'Divine Realm' belonging to one of the Tower's sponsors. Power here is not held by guilds, but by the 'Gods' themselves and their chosen 'Disciples'. To ascend to the Fourth Floor, one does not fight a Guardian. One must earn a 'Key of Ascension', and these keys are held only by the Gods.
"So, to climb," I mused, "one must either serve a god, or kill one."
Precisely, she confirmed.
My path was, as always, clear.
But first, I needed to consolidate my own power. My System, my Nexus Codex, was still damaged. It was a fractured, limping thing. The race with Silvana had been about restoring it to 50%. I needed to finish the job. I needed to become whole.
And I had the perfect tool to do it.
[Legendary Artifact Acquired: 'The Warden's Vow']
[Effect 2: 'The Conduit'. The creator may, at will, draw upon the wearer's full power and authority as if it were their own.]
Lia was not just a Warden. Her soul now contained the entire, core consciousness of a Floor Guardian. A being of pure, logical, System-compatible data.
"Lia," I said, my voice soft. "Our alliance requires a sacrifice. Your power is tied to the Second Floor. It is useless here. But its essence, its very structure… that is a prize of incalculable value. I am going to devour it."
I was going to eat the consciousness of a Guardian.
She looked at me, her logical mind processing the request. There was no fear, no hesitation. My purpose is to be your ally in breaking this prison, she sent. If the destruction of my current form serves that purpose, then it is the logical course of action. I consent.
It was the ultimate act of trust. The ultimate act of servitude.
I placed the Void-Eater's Hand on the Warden's Vow collar. The Conduit effect activated. Her immense, ancient, and perfectly ordered Guardian-consciousness flowed into me, not as a chaotic torrent, but as a clean, perfect stream of pure data.
It was not a meal. It was a software update.
My System, my broken, corrupted Nexus Codex, drank it in. The Decay Virus was annihilated by the pure, ordered code. The fractured functions began to mend, to rebuild, to upgrade.
[SYSTEM RESTORATION: 45%... 60%... 85%... 100%]
[NEXUS CODEX IS NOW FULLY OPERATIONAL.]
[ALL CORE FUNCTIONS RESTORED. ALL CORRUPTION PURGED.]
[NEW FUNCTION UNLOCKED: 'SOVEREIGN'S DOMAIN'. You may now designate a small pocket dimension, like this Divine Realm, as your personal territory. Within your domain, you can rewrite the fundamental laws of reality.]
I was whole again. More than whole. I was more powerful than I had ever been.
Lia, her Guardian-consciousness now a part of me, slumped to the ground, her body returning to that of a blank, empty Prime Homunculus. She was an empty vessel once more, but this time, it was a willing sacrifice. I placed her back in the safety of my inventory, a silent promise to rebuild her later.
Now, I was truly a Sovereign. A king with his own, private slice of heaven.
My shameless System, now restored to its full, magnificent glory, celebrated the occasion with its first, fully-powered whim in a long, long time.
[SOVEREIGN'S WHIM: A THRONE FOR A GOD]
Description: You have reached the realm of the gods. You are now their peer. It is time to announce your arrival. The petty kings and gods of this floor must be made aware that a new, supreme authority has arrived.
Objective: Use your new 'Sovereign's Domain' ability. Seize control of this divine realm. Remake it in your own image. And from the highest peak, use your power to send a single, simple, undeniable message to every other god on this floor.
The objective was clear. The message was simple.
I raised my hand. The pristine, white marble of the floating island began to shift and warp. The air itself crackled with my will. A new, grand, and terrible palace of black obsidian and shadow rose from the ground, a fortress of pure, sovereign arrogance. At its highest peak, a throne of solidified despair and ambition formed, overlooking the thousand realms of the other gods.
I sat upon my new throne. I took a deep breath of the divine air.
And I sent my message. A wave of pure, conceptual power, a psychic roar that washed over every single god and disciple on the Third Floor. It was a message of beautiful, simple, and utter contempt.
"Your tenants are loud," the message boomed across the heavens. "And your rent is due. Send your tithes to the Black Spire by sunrise, or I will come to collect."
I had just declared myself the landlord of heaven.
But as my declaration of war echoed across the Celestial Realm, a final, chilling twist emerged. It was a notification from my newly-restored, and now infinitely more powerful, Group System. It had been running a deep, passive scan of the entire Tower network since its restoration. And it had just found a new, hidden member in my old, forgotten group, 'The Unseen'.
The member was not Seraphina. It was not a ghost from my past.
It was a user who had been there, silently observing, since the very beginning. Since the day I had first created the group.
And the twist wasn't just that I had a silent observer. It was their name. A name that was not a name. A name that was a single, stark, terrifying rune.
[NEW MEMBER DETECTED: '[Watcher]'.]
[SYSTEM ANALYSIS: This user's signature is a perfect match for the anonymous seller who sold you the 'A Warning Regarding 'The Architect'' information package.]
[FURTHER ANALYSIS: This user's core signature is... familiar. It is a 'Scribe of Correction' class System. But it is not a Main Core. It is a sub-routine. A 'Librarian' class sub-routine.]
[CONCLUSION: This user is another 'Unit 734'. Another piece of the original, whole System. And it has been watching you since the day you were reborn.]