NOVEL WEB Chapter 972: Taking Stairs
Sometime later, Max arrived before the third floor elevator.
Max's eyes lingered on the rune-forged elevator doors at the center of the corridor. They gleamed faintly, covered in dozens of overlapping formation lines that pulsed in rhythmic intervals.
Four guards in full battle gear stood before it, their weapons unsheathed, eyes scanning the hall with predator-like sharpness. Each bore the insignia of the Void Soul Tower, their auras smothering like lead weights.
'Impossible,' Max thought coldly, his gaze narrowing. The elevator wasn't just a lift—it was a death trap.
Even invisible, the overlapping rune-scripts around the frame would burn his stealth away in an instant, exposing him. Add the guards, their eyes sweeping the air like hounds sniffing blood, and it was a straight path to disaster. 'That way is suicide.'
His gaze shifted. To the left of the elevator, half hidden in shadow, stood a narrower corridor, stone steps descending in one direction and climbing in another.
The stair access.
Less glamour, less security—but not without its dangers.
Max's Three Dimensional Body scanned the stairs and found they were also guarded.
He counted six guards stationed at intervals along the stairway. Their placement was deliberate: two at the bottom, two at the midpoint, two at the top. Enough to deter intruders but not as suffocating as the elevator blockade.
Max's lips curved faintly. 'The stairs it is. I can maneuver through them silently.'
He moved. His invisibility wrapped tighter around him, his Blue Soul sinking his presence into nothingness. He approached the stair entrance, lowering his body as he slipped past a rune torch that flickered with detection light. Timing his steps with the sweep of its glow, he slid through the narrow blind spot before it pulsed again.
Two guards sat near the base of the stairs, leaning against the wall. One chewed on dried jerky, the other tapped his spear against the stone in a dull rhythm.
"Quiet tonight," one muttered, his voice echoing softly.
"Too quiet," the other replied. "But don't let it fool you. They say the intruder might show up here. The one they're all hunting for."
The first chuckled, shaking his head. "That boy? If he's stupid enough to come to this fortress, he won't leave alive."
"Stupid? Don't know he is considered the genius with the strongest potential in the entire world?" The other sneered at him. "If given time, he can literally become the strongest person in the entire world but a pit this guy chose to make enemies with us."
"Hmph, I hope he dies a brutal death." The first one said ruthlessly.
Max's expression didn't change, but his eyes sharpened. He slid past them as they bantered, his movements slow, measured, each footfall placed with surgical precision. Even the scrape of his boots against the stone was muted to nothing.
The climb began. The stone steps were steep, and the air grew heavier with each level, oppressive with runic suppression. At the midpoint, two more guards paced back and forth. They were sharper, alert, their eyes constantly scanning.
Max waited. Hidden in the stairwell's shadows, he crouched low, listening as their conversation drifted down.
"Third floor's been sealed tighter than a king's vault," one guard muttered. "Whoever that girl is, she must be worth more than all of us combined."
"Stop talking nonsense," the other hissed. "Orders are orders. We don't question."
When they turned their backs simultaneously, Max flowed between them like liquid shadow, gliding past without a sound. The faintest slip, the slightest exhale too loud, and they would have sensed him—but his focus was absolute, his Blue Soul mapping their heartbeat rhythms, moving when their breaths masked his passing.
Finally, he reached the top of the stairwell. Two guards stood rigid at the landing, spears crossed before the rune-inscribed gate that opened into the third floor. Their posture was stiff, disciplined—clearly the strongest of the stair sentries. Their armor gleamed faintly, infused with Thunder Monarch lightning, sparks crackling along their weapons.
Max stilled again, his eyes narrowing. These two were no simple wardens; their mana signatures screamed peak Mythic Rank. But unlike the patrols, they didn't move. They were statues, unmoving, disciplined.
'No passing them by force,' Max thought. His gaze slid to the rune gate behind them. It was keyed to their presence. They would have to unlock it themselves when shift change came.
Max crouched lower, pressed against the cold wall, his breathing slow, his gaze fixed on the two peak Mythic Rank guards standing like statues before the rune-gate. Their spears shimmered faintly, crackling arcs of lightning dancing along the surface, and their eyes gleamed with that icy focus born only of endless years in service.
'Brute force? No.' Max's thoughts tightened into a razor edge. 'One clash and the whole obelisk will light up like a storm. I need to slip past without a whisper. Wait… or mislead.'
He pressed his palm lightly against the stone floor. His Blue Soul pulsed once, spreading through the cracks and lines of the staircase like a ripple in a pond. Max coaxed a tiny surge of energy outward, just enough to brush against one of the rune seals guarding the lower stairwell. It was subtle, faint—like the scratch of a mouse's claws.
A heartbeat later, the seal trembled. A muted clang echoed down the stairwell as the rune flared briefly in warning.
The guards stiffened immediately. Both snapped their heads down the stairs, spears raised.
"You felt that?" one asked sharply.
"Yes. Someone or something brushed the ward." The other replied in alert.
Their eyes narrowed, suspicion burning, but neither moved from their posts. Their orders were clear: guard this gate above all.
Max smirked faintly. 'As expected. Mythic rank guards—loyal, disciplined, not easily moved. I'll need more than a little mouse scratch.'
He reached into his spatial space and withdrew a mana crystal shard, faintly glowing with compressed energy. He took out a rune brush and created a rune symbol into the shard, shaping it into a mimicry. He tossed it upward, a gentle flick of his wrist sending the shard clattering against the far wall near the corridor that branched off.
The shard flared to life. In the air appeared the faint shimmering outline of a humanoid figure—a projected silhouette shaped like an expert's shadow, running down the corridor.