Tower Climber (A LitRPG Adventure, Book 1) by Jakob Tanner (free children's online books TXT) 📕

kind of freaked Max out a little, but her offer was more than fair. He was quick to nod in agreement.

“Amazing,” said Sakura. “My new teenaged roommate. Makes me feel young again.”

She leaned back on the couch and continued talking.

“So, Max,” she said, “What exactly is your plan then? You’ve entered a whole new place. You can’t go back to where you came from. What’s your next step?”

Max didn’t hesitate.

“To climb the tower and find my sister!” he declared.

He may have been shyer to share that goal in the past, but he was in the tower-zone now. He could walk. He had a powerful ability. He could pursue his goal full steam ahead and that’s exactly what he would do.

Sakura laughed. “Slow down there, mister. You’re far off from entering the tower. You’re not even an official climber yet.”

Max’s shoulders slumped. “I’m not?”

“No,” said Sakura. “To become a climber you need to complete one term—that’s two semesters—at the climber academy. Then you’ll be officially a climber, at which point, you’ll have to choose which type of climber you want to be.”

“I thought all climbers were the same,” said Max.

“Wrong again,” said Sakura, shaking her head. “In the tower-zone, climbers are divided into five sub-groups: tower climbers, defense climbers, healer climbers, police climbers, and city climbers.”

“It’s pretty obvious from their names,” Sakura continued. “But I’ll outline them for you. Tower climbers explore and complete missions within the tower. Defense climbers focus primarily on defending the city from the monster waves. Police climbers focus on anything the regular tower-zone police can’t handle, including rogue climbers. Healer climbers focus on healing the citizens of the tower-zone, citizens and climbers alike. And, lastly, city climbers deal with important climber infrastructure within the tower-zone.”

“So I guess I want to be a tower climber then,” said Max.

“Correct,” said Sakura. “Which also happens to be the most difficult climber branch to qualify for. You’ll have to graduate in the top-tier of your class to be able to register as a tower climber.”

Max sighed. Only moments ago, his goal of exploring the tower and seeing his sister again felt within reach. Now it felt just as far away as ever.

Sakura stood up and petted Max’s hair affectionately.

“Don’t look so glum, mister,” she said. “We’re taking it one step at a time. Right now we’re going to go to bed. Your room is over there. And tomorrow I’ll show you the climber academy and get you signed up. Sound good?”

Max nodded excitedly.

Tomorrow he was going to take his first step towards becoming a tower climber.

12

Max woke up to the sound of voices.

For a second, he thought he heard Mr. Grimes speaking to the other orphans, but then he remembered he hadn’t slept at the group home last night. In fact, he was never going to sleep there again.

“C’mon in,” said Sakura. “If you see a dopey ginger kid walking around, don’t mind him.”

We had visitors?

Sakura hadn’t mentioned anything about guests coming in the morning.

Max rubbed his eyes and took in the apartment.

Sun was shining through the windows and Sakura was leading a man with a yellow hard hat over to the windows.

The man double-tapped his fingers against the glass, then held his two fingers against the window and turned them like he was turning the lock of a safe.

A blue arcane rune appeared suddenly on the window.

“Ah,” said the man. “Looking good here.”

He tapped the window and the rune disappeared.

“All good, Ms. Sato,” said the man, heading towards the door. “See you next month.”

Max looked back and forth to the now empty doorway and Sakura.

“What the heck was that about?”

Sakura laughed. “Wow—you don’t think about all the little things that must be different over beyond the wall in the outer-rim. Having some culture shock, are you?”

Max scratched the back of his head. “Maybe...”

It was hard to describe what he was feeling. Waking up on the couch, forgetting where he had slept had made him feel—if only briefly—oppressively alone. Homesick, maybe.

But could he really be homesick for Mr. Grimes’ group home?

Perhaps it was the sense of unknown versus the comfort of routine. Even if that routine was terrible.

“Why the long face, mister?” said Sakura with her hands on her hips. “We got a big day today. So get dressed and let’s get going.”

They picked up coffee and croissants at a small café on the street below and started walking towards the center of the city.

As they walked, Sakura explained the odd visit from the man with the hard hat.

“So that man works for the city climbers,” said Sakura. “Once a month, after every monster wave, a team of inspectors, such as that man you saw today, is sent out across the city to check and make sure all the defensive runes are still working.”

“Oh neat,” said Max, munching on his croissant eagerly.

“That’s why it was so surprising when I saw you in the battle with the minotaur,” explained Sakura. “Those runes are very powerful. People can’t exit or leave them once they’re turned on for the monster wave. Since so much of the city’s infrastructure is prepared for those attacks, it’s weird when something so inconsistent happens.”

“What other jobs can people have in the tower-zone?” asked Max, swallowing the last of his croissant.

“All sorts,” said Sakura. “Just like in the outer-rim. A city needs doctors, firemen, policemen, janitors, garbage men, cooks, and the list goes on. Some of those jobs here in the tower-zone are aided by the use of climber technology or climber magic themselves.”

Max had always thought every single citizen of the tower-zone was a climber, but that was clearly proving not to be the case.

“But why would people who aren’t climbers agree to stay in the tower-zone restricted to one place?”

Sakura sighed. “There are few troublemaker politicians who try to stir up that line of thinking. There are methods to obtain a visa to leave, though it’s not done that often.”

Max remembered hearing rumors about a man who had worked at his high school supposedly being