“What is this buffer zone?” Asked Mark.

  “You remember the pain that hits whenever you fill 10 points of any stat, right?” Asked Ayden, making Mark nod his head.

  "That is the buffer zone. On the first three floors, there are ten stages on each floor. In the first stage, only those people fight, whose stat points in all stats are lesser than 10 points. But the moment any of the creatures ' stat points reaches 10.1 stat points, then that person jumps to the second stage, where he fight with those creatures, whose stat points are higher than 10 stat points but lesser than 20. The third stage is 20.1 stat points to 30 stat points, and so on and so on and so on, till one hits any of their stat point to 100. At that time, their first floor metamorphosis decides when one can jump to the next floor."

  "But there is a loophole in this which true warriors like you can exploit, Mark. You can kill until you have achieved 9.9 or complete 10 stat points in each stat and then slaughter as many warriors as you want to earn as many days as you can, but of course, for that you will need absolute power, and that's where three to four elemental powers come from."

  "Mark, every person has elements that they are closest to. For you, that would be darkness. The reason being the affinity that the Ratrijita Bloodline had brought, which changed your genes from the inside. Even though the bloodline had been stripped, the change still remains inside you. Just like that, there must be two or three more elements which you are closest to, and turning source power into those elements would be easiest for you, as for other elements, it will be very difficult, unless you end up buying the fruit of affinity, for each element, and increase your affinity for them. Each fruit is worth 10,000 days."

  "The lowest affinity for the elements is the D Grade, while the highest is the S Grade. The first affinity fruit for any element can increase your affinity by one grade, and as the grades increase, the number of fruits that you will have to eat to increase affinity will double. That means, for each element, you will need to eat 31 fruits. 31 multiplied by 13 is equal to 403, and 403 elemental affinity fruits multiplied by 10,000 days is equal to 4,030,000 days, which means 11,041 years' worth of days, and it's 100% possible to do all that remaining on the second and third floor, many True Warriors have done. You can too."

  "But for that, you will have to start slow, so mastering three or four elements that you are closest to is the best way, and once you have done that, then there will be no element in this world you can't control. You will become a literal god and become one of those monsters that everyone fears. At that time, even fourth and above floors would become breeze. Unless you meet a monster like you, but with more stats, if that happened, consider yourself unlucky, and die peacefully. Even in that scenario, you don't need to worry, beings like you don't fight each other, even when they meet, they simply ignore and get on with their killings."

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  "And the best thing about all this is that, Mark. There are communities people have built up in this world of tower. You can join the true warriors community, too. There are many benefits of that. And the more people like yourself you know, the better."

  "As for what is so special about the fourth floor. It's simple, all these restrictions and buffs get erased there. It becomes a real battlefield, where anyone can kill anyone. So, isn't it better to amass as many days as you possibly can and live your life satisfactorily, not caring about anything else?"

  "For all that, the plan is very simple. Practice every day for eight hours to turn your source power into the selected elements. Have fun for the rest of the day, and then sleep for two to three hours, cuz your body now only needs that much time. Then keep continuing this process until you have completely mastered these selected elements. Once done, we can begin hunting, and then you can slowly master all the rest of the elements. Simple, right?" Ayden smiled.

  So much information altogether made Mark's mind buzz, especially listening to those 11,000 or whatnot years he would need to spend to get all his affinity to the highest level, which made him stumped.

  It was like everything in the tower was expensive and freaking worth 10,000 days.

  And he actually liked the plan. The training plan and also the killing plan to get enough days to buy the affinity fruits, and then to possess surplus days.

  And why stop at only 100,000 years' worth of days? He wouldn't even mind going as far as to earn millions of years worth of days. Fuck, he wouldn't mind going even further, by slaughtering planet after planet, but he knew how wishful this thinking was.

  But one could dream, no, so why frown upon dreaming and not dream? And if one was going to dream, then why not dream big, go as far as to think trillion or even gazillions years worth of days, not like there was any tax for thinking big?

  "What's with this 10,000 days worth every item, huh? Isn't there anything inexpensive in this tower? Every freaking day is someone's sweat, blood, and tears. Have some mercy, will ya." Mark was annoyed.

  "Mark, it's not that every item in the store is expensive. It's just that the things that you are buying are worth more than anything in this world. They are unique, valuable, can turn any warrior into a real monster, and can even lead one to the tenth floor and gain real freedom. If that wouldn't be expensive, then I don't know what would. And the most expensive items in the tower are worth 10,000 days. Nothing is more expensive than that. So you choosing such items tells how great your ambitions are, not the tower being unreasonable." Ayden retorted, only to be glared at by Mark.