The Tower of Emnu

Aaron smiled at the gagged man, who knelt in front of a large vat of chemicals. The exact composition of which was his little trade secret. A solution that would liquefy everything, even bones and leave behind only a toxic soup with no DNA traces that he could simply have professionals take care of in a landfill. Or like in this case dump in a forest.

The man staring up at him was thin, his bony features skull like. He was a rapist and a scumbag who tortured little girls. It was not why he was killing him, the reason for that was his affiliation with one of the Gangs operating out of Houston.

Slowly Aaron aimed his Walther PPK until his reticle aligned perfectly on the forehead of his victim. The fat mans eyes widened in fear. A hitman like him should know better.

The soft squeeze of the trigger filled Aaron with silent delight. A tingling sensation that ran through his very being as he squeezed and the gun barked once.

Aaron watched as the life left the woman’s body. Her head nodding back down after bouncing once. He dumped the body into the vat of chemicals and took a few steps back.

The reactions released quite a few harmful gases and so it was always better to wait a few steps back.

He turned away and looked over to the tree where he had left the mage. Her blue eyes stared up to him in pain, her suffering, her struggle all encompassing Aaron all of a sudden, washing him away.

He stared at the dead bodies, felt himself killing them, heard their screams, their cries for mercy, the choking sound when they died. His hands were drenched in blood, stained, disgusting. It stuck to him, the blood and brain mass from the man he had killed.

Aaron stumbled away until he fell over the body of the naked man with the red hair. He landed directly next to him in the snow.

The dead mans head turned and he asked in a voiceless whisper:

"Why?"

Aaron screamed and shot up. His heart thumping wildly in his chest as he stood ready to fight, his fists balled, his muscles clenched, his hair damp with sweat.

He found himself in the snow, sitting up in a cold, desolate winter forest.

No dead men, no vat with chemicals, nothing but him and a sleeping bag in the shade of a fallen tree, resting on a bundle of his backpacks.

Panting heavily Aaron slowly unclenched his muscles as he really woke up.

It had been a dream. A nightmare.

Aaron did not get nightmares. He never had.

Not once in his life.

With slightly shaking hands he sat back down on his sleeping bag and tried to calm his beating heart.

What was wrong with him?

But he knew, he felt it and he was honest enough to himself to admit it. It bothered him, that he had killed the team coming after him yesterday. It bothered him.

Why? Aaron had killed so many people, had stabbed, choked, drowned and well yeah mostly shot a whole lot of people. Not once had it bothered him.

Objectively he had been able to see that it was wrong, but it had not bothered him. It had not given him nightmares. Why then had his actions yesterday done so?

What was different? His new situation? This whole reincarnation business?

He did not know and quite honestly did not think he should care that much.

It was just a dream, nightmare or not.

"It does not matter." he said to himself and stood back up.

With care he rolled up his sleeping bag and stored it, before standing up and stretching.

Just like Mei, the elf had showed him to.

It felt exceptionally good after his body had reacted this wildly to his nightmare.

No, he should banish that memory from his mind.

It was time to train.

The stretches were painful at first, but afterwards he felt limber and more relaxed. More....even? If that made sense.

As if a balance of some sort had been restored.

Almost unconsciously he settled into the opening stance of the Rejuvenating Fist Kata.

It was strange to him that he could remember it all with such clarity.

Now that he was awake and limber his mind felt fresh, clean and clear in a way that he could not really articulate or comprehend fully. He did not know why or exactly how this whole cultivation business worked, but his memory was exceptionally accurate and his body felt fantastic.

More so than ever before in his life.

Slowly he went through the steps and punches of the Kata. To be 100% accurate he had to focus. He put his entire mind and being into these movements until he fell into a trance like state.

Every single muscle in his body moved in accordance to the kata and when he finally finished the complicated sequence of movements, he felt the miraculous effect of the kata set in, in an instance. His entire body relaxed as if he had gotten a 2 hour massage in a single second.

Aaron just flopped to the ground, feeling his muscles relax and strengthen at the same time. It was a kind of heat that set in, flowing through him from his bones and filling him to the brim. For a minute or so he just laid there until the warmth and relaxation slowly receded and eventually vanished.

"God, that feels just as good as the first time." he muttered as he sat up.

He knew he should have done this training yesterday evening as well, but he had not, too tired after walking through half of the night. But he was determined to get it right today at least.

Aaron stretched a bit and then started the Rejuvenating Fist Kata again.

The light of a new day flooded through the snow capped forest when he was finally done with 50 repetitions. The rejuvenating effect had diminishing returns and at the last repetition he barely felt it at all when he finished.

Tired and hungry he sat down and tore into the rations of his food while he looked up towards the ever gray sky and wondered if there was any indication of when it would snow or not, or if it was just magically happening.

There wasn't really any weather in this realm. It mimicked weather effects yes, but it was just a facsimile. An approximation of the real thing. It never got close no matter how hard it tried. There were clouds, who looked real and for all he knew were real. But there was no real weather, because it was simply too mild. The wind was too even, always coming from the same direction for the same amount of time.

So the snow was fake, the wind was fake, the light was fake. There was no sun rising. Just the light brightening from everywhere above him.

But the forest was real, that he knew for sure.

It wasn't a forest that you would find everywhere back on earth or a forest that was easy to traverse. It was a jungle. A cold, icy jungle, but still the vegetation, the fallen trees, rocks and uneven terrain as well as the snow and ice made it difficult, treacherous terrain. There were roots everywhere and the leafless bushes and growth was at places so thick he could only go around or hack his way through with a sword.

Which Aaron had not done yesterday, out of fear of leaving behind obvious clues to his whereabouts.

So instead he had wandered through the forest, following beast trails and looking for animal tracks. That he found this half sheltered place had been sheer luck.

But as he ate the last bit of the rations, he knew he had to hunt soon, or endure crippling hunger.

So he took stock. He still had a bunch of hardtack and sausages, which were used as travel rations of some sort? Aaron’s new stomach and increased need for sustenance did not care about taste, but the sausages were okay. The hardtack was just...bland.

Nothing in his pack compared to the food he had eaten at the camp. His mouth watered just thinking about that.

Aaron only had enough food for maybe one more day at the speed he was eating at. But oh well, it was time to meditate and then he would go out and hunt.

He sat down with his back to a nearby tree and closed his eyes.

Slowly he calmed his mind, let his thoughts drift, pass by like the wind that rustled through the forest around him. For about 5 minutes from one direction, then for 5 minutes from another. It irked him somehow that it was so predictable and even more so because he was trying to concentrate.

He was glad about his stolen clothes now, they were warm enough so that it was not uncomfortable to sit in the cold snowy winter landscape to meditate.

But Aaron let that thought go as well.

He tried to focus on his breath, on feeling the energy thrum through him.

But it was difficult today. Aaron had learned how to meditate in his old life and it had been a source of...comfort and tranquility in a place of monsters. He had never had much problems of quieting his mind back then, even with mad men howling in the background.

But now...now it was different.

Whenever he let his thoughts drift, whenever he released his iron clad hold on his mind he could see them. The faces of the group he had killed the day before. Their empty accusing eyes. There was nothing he could do about it now.

He tried to reign those thoughts in, but it did not work. Quite the opposite, the more he tried to push those thoughts away, the more prevalent they became.

Aaron snorted in disgust at himself and focused once more.

'Let it go.' he thought to himself.

It took him almost an hour of focus, concentration and concentrated effort until he could feel the Qi within him stir.

The Fiend-god art pulsed in his blood and his body drank greedily. It changed Aaron and he could feel it, could feel his body change. His bones first, his muscles second.

It felt like his own skeleton was warming up. It was not uncomfortable, but a very strange feeling. With concentrated effort and following his breath he started to add mana into his bloodstream, felt it change and then he took control of it to siphon it into his dantian, into his Qi veins where the force, the power rolled through him.

The Qi did not follow his commands easily, quite the opposite, it bucked and refused to work with him at every turn. But Aaron persisted. His focus was all encompassing until he collected enough new Qi in his dantian to funnel it through his Qi veins, to create a closed circuit of energy activating the ancient technique.

The Qi purified, but noticeably lessened by the time it flowed back into his almost empty dantian. The energy was pure and malleable now though and it followed his every whim, his every thought.

It was like clenching a muscle, using a hand he had not known before. Just as intuitive, just as easy now to manipulate Qi. But the amount of Qi he had was minuscule, even compared to the size of his dantian, that in Aaron’s inner eye was like a circular cave in the center of which his Qi floated like a soft bright fog revolving and spinning.

This was the reward for his efforts so far and it quite honestly filled Aaron with a feeling of accomplishment that he rarely ever felt. Here was something that was his, his own power. A foundation he could build upon.

Power he could use to bring forth his most mystical technique yet, his Wind Steps. It was not enough though to feel truly satisfied and secure. Before he stopped and went hunting, Aaron needed to add a bit more of a safety buffer to his Qi reserves.

The second cycle was not any easier than the first. The focus on the illusive and slippery power in his blood was really difficult to hold. It felt like trying to catch fish with bare hands and while some people could do that without problems, Aaron was certainly not one of them.

He sunk into himself, fell into a rhythm as he pulled a strand of Qi into his dantian from his bloodstream and then pushed, prodded and followed it through the complicated circulation technique after which the Qi, although diminished, was his to command once again.

Aaron did one more rotation and looked satisfied at his now much fuller dantian.

Then he opened his eyes.

Midday was already past if he guessed correctly by the glow coming from the ceiling, so he had meditated far too long, but in time he was sure he would get faster and his concentration would sharpen as well.

Aaron stretched, shaking out his legs that had fallen asleep and took stock of what he had.

2 Backpacks, with a backup pair of pants, shirt and some camping gear he had found. Two swords, one a Long sword, one a Shortsword, 2 Daggers, One composite bow with 12 unbroken arrows in a quiver, 8 health potions, 3 mana potions, if the colors of the liquids were any indication.

Curiously Aaron studied the potions and actually found labels on them.

They were pictograms, but for some strange reason Aaron could understand them perfectly well. Health/Life meant the sign on the red potions, while Mana/Spirit meant the one on the blue potions.

Aaron blinked in surprise at the writing and was thoroughly confused by the situation. How was it possible that he could read this worlds language if it was not identical to his home world?

He had not gotten any information dumps, nor could he actually speak the language or even knew the words equivalent to the pictograms, but he could still read it. It was bizarre, but Aaron shelved the observation for now.

More questions he had to ask the master and the other prisoners once he returned to them.

Besides the potions there were the rations that had dwindled to only half a bag of dried foods and a few waterskins, a sleeping roll and a tent plane, that he had not bothered to use last night.

Last but not least the fire-starter kit and the coin pouches he had looted. Aaron upended their contents on his sleeping spot and did a quick count. But it was quite a decent pile of differently colored glowing rocks.

The Manastones were the most distinct, pyramid shaped, they looked more like glowing crystals than anything else and the glow they emitted was slightly blueish in hue. There were 14 Manastones and 12 shards in total. But that was not the only thing he had found. In one of the bags had been 3 round smooth pearls that were quite a bit smaller than the Manastones. One was in a pretty dark emerald color, another in a muddy brown and the last was almost entirely black.

If Aaron had to guess, then these were Beast cores and a really great find. All in all he had enough to go back to the prisoners already and pay them, as well as get more guidance and answers.

Finding the prison again would probably depend on if he could spot the giant symbol on the wall from where he was or if he had to guess in which direction of the wall he had to go.

Did the wall run around the whole first level or not? Was there curvature, or could one see all of the walls at the same time? Aaron was curious and decided to climb the next tree that looked tall enough to give him a good vantage point.

To climb the fir tree he did not even have to use wind steps, he just clung to the trunk of the tree with his legs and pulled himself up with his arms. Aaron felt strong, the effortless feat of athleticism made him smirk. There was no way he could have done the same on earth.

Well, on earth he would have used a drone, satellite or cameras to observe his surroundings, but still, this was awesome.

He reached the top of the tree in less than a minute and found a stable branch to stand on and took a good look around.

Aaron was surrounded by an ancient woodland. Conifer and deciduous trees without their leaves grew thick around him as far as the eye could see. Which meant that yes this level was curved, had a proper horizon and all, maybe even the clouds were real. A thundering mass of dark clouds had amassed far in the distance to his right and he could actually see the haze of falling snow in the distance.

The wall was far away to his left. There the horizon just stopped and an almost infinite wall stretched up towards the distant sky, or ceiling. Which was good, because if he kept walking along the wall in the same direction, eventually he would reach the symbol again, right?

That assumed that this level wasn’t as big as Europe or something. But for now, Aaron really did not know.

In the end it did not matter much, as he had no plans to return this quickly.

He wanted to fulfill the masters request and fill his dantian to the brim before that, if he could. But the pressure on him to earn money had vanished, as he had enough for the month from his spoils.

Aaron studied the surrounding forest in greater detail and noticed a small valley in front of him. Valleys had a decent chance of water, although in this cold he was not sure if smaller streams weren’t frozen.

He could always use snow for water, so that was less of a concern, but the valley was a good place to start hunting and looking for outposts or permanent bases.

He climbed down again and studied his supplies for a long moment before he decided. He would split most of what he had and select a landmark or something like that to leave behind some emergency supplies.

Establishing a network of small supply caches would make his survival much easier in the long and short term. He also had far too much gear that he would not use right now, but might be helpful in a backup cache.

Aaron filled one of the backpacks with 2 health potions and one mana potion, as well as the longsword and one of the waterskins. That done he filled half of the shards into a money pouch and put it deep into the same backpack.

Then he scooped up all of the manastones, shards and beast cores in a separate pouch he hung on his belt.

He filled the rest of his supplies in the second, bigger backpack and rolled up the sleeping roll, fastened it on the backpack as well, before he checked his gear.

He still wore the breastplate and the mages staff still barely fit into the packs, but he had no idea what to do with it.

His bow was on his back and only his daggers and the shortsword were in his immediate reach. But that would suffice for now he decided.

Aaron made his way through the thick snowy trees and threaded his way through the underbrush. Fallen logs and thick bushes buried under snow made the whole forest an obstacle course. But Aaron vaulted over some of the logs, or walked around the obstacles if necessary, while keeping his heading more or less straight.

He had a fairly decent sense of direction and before long he walked down a gentle slope into the valley.

He could hear running water already and that made him happy. Running water meant there was a higher chance for game, deer or the like, maybe even a moose, although he was not sure what he could do against one of those behemoths. He would have to chop it with one of the swords, or stab it with his daggers until it died, because he doubted his arrows would do anything.

While he walked down towards the river he searched for places that stood out, landmarks of some sort that he could remember and orient himself with. He had no compass or GPS after all. But the army trained their soldiers to fight even without fancy equipment and now Aaron was glad for his time spent in wilderness survival training.

Down at the bottom of the valley was a quick flowing stream, more of a brook than a river to be fair, but not frozen at least. Animal tracks littered the bottom of the valley and Aaron was tempted to go hunting right now, but first he had to find a half decent base spot and some backup outposts.

He chose to walk towards the wall as a direction, which was incidentally upstream.

The surrounding scenery got more and more hilly, the slopes steeper and the stream smaller. It almost looked like in ages past a glacier had changed this part of the level.

Many smaller streams joined the bigger one here, flowing out from rocks and crevasses in the more and more dangerous terrain.

He stopped when he spotted a giant lone standing rock halfway up a slope and walked up to it, to check it out.

It was a rock, nothing more and nothing less, but a great landmark to find in close proximity to the river and otherwise more or less uninteresting to anyone.

Aaron circled the boulder and stopped close to a fallen tree that leaned a bit against the rock. He decided that this was a great place for a backup cache and he set down his packs.

With his boots he checked the earth, but it was not frozen through and after removing some of the snow, he was able to dig a little bit under a fallen log close to the boulder.

Satisfied he dropped the pack he had prepared into it as well as the bulky breastplate that was more hindrance than help as far as movement went. Aaron planned to be fast and illusive.

He placed the breastplate on top of the pack, making sure the longsword’s hilt did not stick out and then covered it with fallen leaves and snow. He even went so far and grabbed a branch of a fir tree and started to erase his tracks.

Satisfied with this cache he went back down into the valley and followed it upstream into the hills.

The terrain was difficult to go through and the tracks he found were more of predators than prey. Paws of mountain lions or Lynxes, some dog like tracks that might be wolves, but still the occasional deer.

It took him hours to search through the rocky outcrops and find anything close to what he wanted. In the end he decided for a rock outcrop on top of a little plateau.

Why? Because during his inspection he had found a crack that gave this small cave a draft. Which would no doubt disperse most smoke he would make while maintaining a fire. The outcrop was also deep enough and far enough from the ridge of the plateau that any light would not shine out in the surroundings.

He was satisfied with this for his semi permanent base for now and unpacked. First the tent, then he stored some backup resources away from the base in one of the escape routes he planned. There was a steep cliff in one direction that was basically impassable unless you had wind steps, like Aaron did, so it was an almost perfect escape route.

The other way up to the plateau went along a narrow path anyone had to squeeze through and ended at the river. The third and last access to the plateau was a steep gravelly slope that would make so much noise going up, a bear would wake up out of hibernation.

Aaron grabbed his bow and quiver, as well as his now empty pack, and left behind anything else, even his chainmail he left behind. It would make too much noise, even under the pelts of his current outfit.

Then he went back following the river to hunt some game and gather some firewood.