Melody

『Chronicles of the Blood Tower』

"Hey."

Rasmus suddenly appeared right in front of the group, specifically in front of the blonde man who was about to slap Melody.

"Huh? Hey Tale are you really that slow? What was all that boasting about earlier Hahah!", one of the lackeys teased the blonde man named Tale.

Tale's eyebrows furrowed in displeasure as he shook his hand free of Rasmus' grip.

"Hey bastard, get away before you end up crawling on the street.", Tale spat out venomously at Rasmus with a glare.

Rasmus didn't budge and kept his gaze fierce.

Inwardly Rasmus was trying his best to keep his surging emotions in check. Several times he had realized he had been rather rash since attaining a means of power through the mysterious blood core and coming to the Tower and developing mana.

He had a lot of bitter memories of being bullied and being powerless in his efforts to stop getting bullied. Now that he had power should he retaliate? That was the biggest question he had. Part of him wanted to act brazenly and let his emotions take over and beat the man senseless in front of him. But the other part of him said to him that maybe this could be settled with words, and if the blonde man dismissed Rasmus' warning to stop the harassment, then he wouldn't hold back.

As all of his thoughts spun through his head in the span of a few milliseconds, he opened his mouth and spoke.

"Look, I'm indebted to this woman and I'm staying here at the inn here. I'm sorry but you need to stop here or it won't just be ending with words here.", Rasmus replied to Tale.

Rasmus felt proud of himself in that moment for being able to keep himself somewhat stable and be able to differentiate between the immediate pros and cons here.

But… if there was one thing Rasmus didn't realize, it was that this was the Tower. Not Earth. Maybe this kind of thing would have worked on Earth where the common people had a conscience of what a government was and the laws that could be enforced. But here in the Tower, Power was the law. He still didn't have much of an understanding of how families played a factor into this but he was still wary.

To Tale who was in front of his so called 'friends' who were just sticking around him because of their family ties since he was the heir of a medium sized family that had 4 or so rankers, Rasmus was basically spitting in his face at this point.

Tale's cheeks flushed red, either from the alcohol or embarrassment Rasmus couldn't tell.

Tale started to rouse his mana at that moment and opened his mouth.

"You dare tell me, the heir to the Dianesh Family how to act? You dare warn me and tell ME what to do? You are courting death!", Tale roared at Rasmus.

At that moment Rasmus sighed and decided he wouldn't kill the idiot in front of him. He first made sure to measure the capacity of mana between Tale and his lackeys. Honestly it was rather impressive compared to most people he had seen coming to take the Floor Test, but alas, it wasn't going to amount much in front of Rasmus who was trapped on a planet for hundreds of years alone with nothing but monsters who wanted to eat him.

Tale stepped back and swung a fist coated in mana at high speeds.

To Rasmus he inspected Tale in almost slow motion as he could identify the countless openings in the man's so-called posture and moved.

BOOM!

Suddenly, in the blink of an eye Rasmus had extended his palm out and struck Tale straight in the middle of the chest.

Tale flew back and crashed through the doors of the entrance to the inn and out into the street where he landed in a heap of rubble.

Tale's lackeys all quickly jerked their heads and didn't even bother to attack Rasmus as they all went to check if their golden goose was okay.

Rasmus shook his head at the sight and turned to look at Melody.

"You alright?" he asked the middle aged woman who was incredibly shocked.

The plate in Melody's hands she was using to defend herself with earlier dropped right of her hands as she stood there wide eyed at Rasmus.

"You… You… Are you really only taking the Trial Test?", she stuttered, staring blankly at Rasmus.

"Yeah." Rasmus replied scratching his head in embarrassment as he looked back to where Tale had landed.

Tale was sprawled on the ground in the middle of the street foaming at his lips completely unconscious as passerbys stopped to look at the mess.

"What exactly was going on here?" Rasmus followed up with Melody as he returned back inside, feigning ignorance to the little ruckus he had just caused.

"Uhm, nothing much just the usual…", Melody spoke gloomily as she stared at the floor.

Rasmus looked right at her and could spot her white lie from a mile away.

"Can you explain what 'the usual' is exactly?", Rasmus asked while he pulled up a chair and sat down, gesturing for Melody to sit with him as well.

Melody was a bit troubled at the sudden appearance of Rasmus, but even more-so at the level of combat prowess he showed and sheer amount of mana. That wasn't a normal amount for someone taking the test with a party. That amount of individual strength was at least D rank bordering C rank regulars.

Nonetheless, she sat down and decided to chat a bit with Rasmus. He had at least shown her some respect over the past week and a half and not only that he wasn't like most people who came by this inn. She thought that if she had a son, Rasmus would be something like one to her despite their brief time together.

"How much exactly do you know about families in the Tower and their implicated strength?" Melody asked a seemingly random question to Rasmus.

"I think enough to pass." He replied with a bit of a wavering voice.

"Well, let me explain this to you since you seem to have been heavily sheltered in your childhood. We can skip the 9 Great families because I'm assuming you already know just what it means to be a part of them. Individuals from those families are like royalty in this Tower as their families descended from the 9 Great Sovereigns. High class families and Middle Class families fall in line after respectively. Their strength is measured by how many rankers or high rankers they have in their family. Then there's the people like me. Commoners as you would have it.", Melody spoke with a bit of an indifferent tone, but Rasmus could pick up in the slight self- deprecation in her voice.

"But that can't possibly be everyone in the Tower can it?", Rasmus asked.

"Of course not, some people that don;t belong to families like myself try to climb the Tower as independents… But eventually the great families will try to suppress them. It's either you're with them or against.", Melody spoke gloomily.

"Still, does that mean that asshat can act however he pleases whenever and wherever the hell he wants? I doubt that's possible.", Rasmus interjected.

"Rasmus. Look, in the Tower the best way to explain this is like so : Either follow the rules or suffer the consequences. The only way you can defy the rules is to be strong enough to make your own.", Melody spoke looking Rasmus in the eyes with complete seriousness.

Rasmus just looked at Melody but his gaze was fierce. Though this place called the Tower was favorable to some and unfavorable to the masses, this was where he had to look for answers. And if he was going to be suppressed by some bullshit families he'd do the impossible.

'Be strong enough to make your own'

Rasmus' golden irises flared with ferocity that night as he went to sleep, preparing for the last day he had before the Floor Test to formally enter the Tower and find his origins.

Chapter 13 - Fin