The Advanced Pattern Reading was going to take some getting used to. That was the polite way of describing what happened every time Erwin activated it inside the Ascendant bracket's building. Three times the detail of Intermediate wasn't three times the usefulness right now. It was three times the noise. The aura layer alone turned the building from a space of black and white into something that looked like a painting done by someone who hadn't been told what colors were for. He deactivated it after about forty seconds and stood there with his eyes closed, waiting for the visual static to settle. "You'll need to practice not shutting it off," Einstein said. "I'll practice when my brain stops trying to process two hundred strangers at once." "The discomfort is the adjustment, not an indication that something is wrong." "Such wonderful insight from a dumb bird," Erwin muttered, then opened his eyes. The building was just the building again—with tiers and walkways and participant

The cafeteria on the third tier had one table near the far wall that nobody ever sat at. Erwin had noticed this on day one. A perfectly functional table with four seats, and no visible reason for the vacancy, yet no one was using it. Erwin was sitting at it now. Fernando was across from him, working through something that looked like a compressed nutrient block the tower provided, probably the kind of food his kind ate. The tower seemed to have everything suitable for every creature, honestly. Fernando set down the nutrient block and started. "The royale starts in forty-seven hours and thirty minutes. Based on the community breakdown I gave you, the twelve-member faction from the east building will move as a single unit in the first fifteen minutes." "They have three Ascendant C ranks and collective coordination. Against individuals, that combination ends fights quickly." "They're not going to come at us first," Erwin said. "We're not the obvious threats. They'll consolidate aga

While the faction members were herding other creatures, the independent climbers tried to break from the chase for better positions. The fear-alliance tried to stay together and was already failing. Stragglers panicked downhill because the natural instinct in an open crater was always to seek the center, even when the center was the kill zone. [System Notification] [Ranking Established] [Current Rank: 37/61] [Note: Surviving while inactive will not secure top-five placement] Erwin clicked his tongue. "The system is in a hurry." Fernando moved then, crossing the slope in three long bursts until he reached Erwin's position. "Change of plan." "We had a plan?" "Loose framework, then. We need points early, but not from the faction." Erwin nodded once. "Agreed." "The seventeen-member fear-alliance is breaking exactly where it should." Fernando gestured to the left at them. "Six of them are already choosing self-preservation over formation." Erwin followed Fernando's gaze and saw

The battle royale was similar to the one Erwin had experienced during Floor 1 of the Mortal bracket. However, this one had two parts. The first was survival, which was the normal rule for battle royale. The second was dominance. And dominance, from what Erwin had figured out, was node occupancy. The silver-lit object behind him wasn't just a checkpoint or a decorative objective the tower had thrown into the basin for fun. It was a measuring scale. Hold the node long enough, beat back challengers, prove you could keep territory under pressure, and the tower would count that as more than survival. It would count it as hierarchy. Below them, the basin was still chaos. One node near the rim had already changed owners twice. Another had gone dark with corpses around it and no one willing to step close again. And the center node... The center node belonged to Kaladian now. Not because the system had said it. Because the whole damn battlefield was unconsciously avoiding the thing

Erwin's eyes widened as he came to realization the absolute fact of the momen. 'I've been using it wrong.' 'I've been using my gravity wrong.' 'Gravity is supposed to grant me way more tricks than what I can do. If I use it properly, it could grant me the ability to fly, or lift objects, or use incredible offensive force like Terrax.' 'It may consume a load of essence energy, but if I use it properly, I could get its worth.' ROOOOAAAARRR! Erwin felt the golden wave coming at him, traveling across through the roaring sound from Brokk. Turns out the damn creature had decided to give Fernando a breathing space now and come at Erwin instead of Veyr and Sarvek. However, though, the thunderous sound felt muffled in Erwin's ears. He was starting to build up something from the inside... Even the air and aura around him was changing. [Warning: Gravity Output Exceeding Current Safe Threshold] [Warning: Muscular Strain Detected] [Warning: Fearless Fool Title Reacting] The notification