We didn't climb.
We looped.
Floor after floor blurred into the same rhythm. Fight. Kill. Collect. Exchange. Move. Repeat. No dramatic speeches. No life-changing realizations. Just pure, unfiltered grind like the tower personally offended us and we decided to respond with violence.
Floor 28.
29.
30.
At some point I stopped counting floors and started counting cores.
"Pick that up," I said, already moving past another collapsing monster.
"I am picking it up," Kael replied, crouched over a pile like a very deadly scavenger.
"Not that one, the other one...no, the shiny one...yes, that's higher grade."
"I know what a high grade core looks like."
"Just making sure."
Zeref walked past both of us, casually burning through a cluster of enemies like he was clearing weeds. "You're both insufferable."
Keiji didn't even bother commenting anymore. He just froze, repositioned, controlled. Luna followed, healing when needed, storing when not.
Behind us, Mikel's party kept up.
