After the announcent was made, the world surged.
Like a tidal wave crashing against the unknown, people flooded toward the Infinite Tower.
Pilgrims, rcenaries, guilds, opportunists, those who had waited for days outside its towering gates were the first to step into its domain.
But their excitent was short-lived.
Disappointnt, bitter and sharp, swept through the crowd.
Because not everyone could enter.
The Tower’s entry protocol, set by the mysterious Administrator, Taufik himself, was strict:
[Access Restricted: Minimum Level Requirent - 50]
[Floors Unlocked: 1 to 4]
Cries of outrage followed. So wept. Others cursed. Many demanded answers from thin air. But the System remained silent.
There would be no exceptions.
And from that mont on...
Humanity turned mad with the hunger to level up.
Across every known territory, Crack Beasts, those dangerous creatures spawned from the dinsional rifts known as Cracks, beca the world’s most hunted quarry.
Fields once avoided beca battlegrounds. Forests, mountains, ruins, no place was spared the thunder of boots, the clash of blades, and the roar of spells.
For the first ti since the Cracks reappeared...
Crack Beasts began to vanish from the surface of the Earth.
Slaughtered.
Exterminated.
Driven into extinction by a species more desperate than ever before.
Entire ecosystems collapsed in months.
Bios bled silence.
The Tower had opened, and the world bled itself dry just to reach its door.
And yet.
The one responsible for all of this... The Tower Administrator... The unseen architect of the new era... Was nowhere near the Tower.
He was in it, on one of the Infinite Tower floors.
He was in deep waters.
Literally.
--------
- Floor 19.
Far below the ocean’s surface. Where sunlight had long given up. Where pressure crushed bone and silence scread louder than sound... Taufik hovered, alone.
Swaying black kelp surrounded him, like tendrils of a sleeping god. Crumbled ruins, swallowed by coral and barnacles, whispered of civilizations long forgotten.
His mana wings had long since vanished.
In their place shimred a layer of protective magic, a glowing veil clinging to his skin, thrumming to keep the pressure at bay.
His katana pulsed faintly, its glow a defiant thread of light in the deep abyss, a beacon where none should exist.
A shape stirred in the distance.
Sothing ancient.
Serpentine.
Barnacle-encrusted, its segnted body larger than temples.
Its eyes, seven of them, glead with feral hunger.
It watched.
And it waited.
Taufik gritted his teeth.
Not out of fear, he had faced worse.
But because...
He was trapped.
For the past few days, he was stuck down here. Alone. Underwater.
The entire bio from Floor 11 to 19 was ocean.
No surface.
No islands.
Only the deep.
Only the cold.
Salt.
Pressure.
Endless swimming.
That was the real tornt.
Sure, he could have flown, risen above the waves with his mana wings, glided across the open sky, and waited out the storm.
But the floor wouldn’t clear itself.
This wasn’t about surviving.
This was about conquering.
And to do that, he had to dive.
Deeper.
Farther.
But...
"This..." he muttered, spinning mid-water to parry a snapping eel-like creature lunging from the coral, "...is way worse than I thought"
With a sharp burst of Mana, he cleaved it in half, bubbles and ichor fanning out.
"How the fuck is it that from Floor 11 to 19 it’s just sea? No land at all? These monsters aren’t even that strong, but inside water... they’re basically invincible," He glared at the darkness. "How are humans supposed to deal with this?"
[...1%, Master]
Taufik paused. "One percent?"
He parried another ambush, this ti from behind, then twisted to cleave the attacker in two.
"That’s low," he said flatly. "How the hell is the survival rate that low?"
[There are several reasons, Master,] the System replied calmly. [Besides the hostile climate, humans cannot survive underwater for prolonged periods, even with magic. You are an exception. The average human’s mana output would not sustain continuous underwater breathing for even 24 hours]
Taufik narrowed his eyes. "...Right. The environnt kills them before the monsters even get the chance"
[Exactly. Strength is not the issue. If a human has reached this far, they are powerful. But power is aningless in a bio they can’t exist in]
Taufik floated in the water, watching corpses of lesser beasts drift around him.
He wiped blood from his cheek with a sigh.
"It’ll be a massacre..."
He turned slowly.
And saw it.
Rising from the shadows ahead, its coiling body weaving between ruins like a living continent, was a massive serpent. Its scales shimred with deep blues and violet-black hues. And upon its massive shoulders...
Seven heads.
Each one snapped in rhythm, hissing, snarling, tongues flicking like spears.
"...Seriously?" Taufik muttered, exasperated. "Why is it always a seven-headed snake? This is the second one I’ve fought in my life. Is this a universal constant or sothing?"
The creature let out an earth-shaking roar. The sound reverberated through the water, echoing through the bones of drowned cities and broken towers. It wasn’t just angry.
It was furious, its minions were gone.
And now, it was coming for him.
Taufik grinned faintly, raising his glowing katana as he steadied his breath.
His eyes, sharp and unwavering, locked onto the seven-headed serpent thrashing in the deep.
"...Let’s clear up to floor 20 first," he muttered, the glow of his blade intensifying, "before we start thinking about solutions"
He raised his free hand.
Mana surged outward from his core. Violent. Controlled. Unyielding... And strangely Pure.
The ocean trembled.
Currents stilled.
Even the serpent hesitated.
Taufik’s voice echoed, not in sound, but in will:
"False World:-"
The water around him distorted, refracted like shattered glass under pressure.
Light fractured into shards. Space buckled.
Mana poured out of him like a tidal wave, expanding in every direction, engulfing the serpent, the ruins, and the abyss itself.
"...Simple Domain"
*Swoooosh!*
Reality bent.
And then... Shattered.
The crushing pressure vanished.
The salt. The cold. The water.
Gone.
In its place was land, a vast, empty plain beneath a pale sky, the air still and heavy with tension. The field was bare, a flat battlefield with no escape, no terrain to hide behind.
Only two presences existed here.
Taufik.
And the seven-headed serpent.
The creature writhed in confusion, its massive body slamming into the nothingness of the false earth. It roared, seven heads shrieking in unison, but the sound echoed strangely, muted, as if the world itself refused to acknowledge its fury.
Taufik rolled his neck and took a step forward, katana humming in his hand.
"In here, there’s no water," he said quietly. "No ocean. No pressure. No elent for you to hide behind"
He lowered into a stance, calm and sharp.
The Domain responded, its edges humming with quiet power. Here, in this crafted world of will and intention, Taufik was absolute.
The false wind stirred around him, rustling invisible grass beneath his boots.
The air held its breath.
His eyes never left the writhing serpent, now thrashing uselessly against a reality it no longer understood.
"Just . You. And a death long overdue..."
Taufik lowered his katana slightly, one foot sliding back, his stance loose, but ready.
He smiled.
Not wide.
Not arrogant.
Just a calm, sharp curve of the lips that made the world feel smaller.
"As a welco..." His aura flared, calm yet terrifying, like the stillness before a divine judgnt. "Let’s see how far you can make try..."
He tilted his head, voice a low invitation laced with steel.
"Co~"
At those words, casual, taunting, confident, the seven-headed serpent snapped.
Its massive body coiled tighter, muscles bunching beneath iridescent scales. Each of its seven heads lifted in perfect sync, rising high into the sky of the false world. Their jaws opened wide, glowing with internal light, and the air began to shift.
Taufik blinked once.
"...Huh?"
His grip on the katana tightened slightly, not in fear, but in interest.
[...Master, a trendous surge of Mana is gathering]
The System’s voice rang sharp with urgency.
Taufik’s eyes narrowed, watching the sky warp above the beast.
"I know," he replied calmly, voice steady. "Just leave it"
His expression didn’t waver. A faint smirk tugged at the corner of his mouth.
"I want to see what this big snake thinks it can do in my Domain"
Then...
The ground trembled.
Not a quake.
A shift.
The flat, neutral plains of the Simple Domain rippled, like canvas stretching under the weight it was never ant to bear. Cracks webbed across the false soil. The sky flickered. The atmosphere bent under pressure.
The serpent, still roaring silently, forced sothing foreign into the world.
It’s Mana. It’s Will.
Reality twisted.
And the terrain... began to change.
From below, water burst upward, flooding the battlefield with unnatural speed.
In seconds, the battlefield that had been dry and open beca an artificial ocean, recreated inside Taufik’s own Domain.
The seven-headed snake sank halfway into the water, their eyes glowing beneath the surface like subrged lanterns.
The serpent had turned the Domain against him.
Taufik raised an eyebrow, still unmoving.
"...Now that’s interesting"
[Master... the serpent is forcing its Mana to influence the Domain’s frawork. It’s not supposed to be possible]
"Yeah," he muttered, amused. "But it’s doing it anyway"
He glanced around, now subrged up to the waist in rapidly rising water.
"So this snake..." Taufik muttered, watching the serpent swim effortlessly through the newly flooded Domain, "It’s not just muscle"
The surface of the water rippled with each movent of the beast, serpentine grace hidden beneath monstrous bulk.
"It knows how Domains work..."
He exhaled slowly, eyes narrowing, voice laced with realization.
"...It’s understandable. After all, every Realm Gate in the Infinite Tower... is a world that once connected to demons"
He let the thought settle in the air like a falling blade.
A slow, quiet laugh escaped his lips. Not forced. Not mocking.
Just genuine amusent.
"Hmm~... I like it"
The waters churned around him, glowing with the serpent’s corrupt mana. The battlefield had changed. Taufik had been challenged in his own Domain.
And that... was rare.
He lifted his katana again.
The blade ignited. The very air above the blade distorted, struggling to hold together in its presence.
Crackling arcs of heat raced across the weapon, the ground beneath his feet hardening against the pressure.
"Then..."
A pulse of Mana radiated from him, strong enough to still the tide for a heartbeat.
His voice dropped into a sharper register.
"... Maybe I’ll put in a bit of effort"
....
...
..
.
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