Sail was sat between Match, Lantern and all kinds of various people who were getting crowed by the public like bees. The square of Jinshuku was getting flooded by more and more people every second. The etiquette seemed seemed to be sitting down but many just leant against walls and stood up around the edges.

  A flamboyant man with long white hair was screaming on underneath the ads for the new Konbini steamed strength gyoza on a small stage. He held a microphone connected to nothing that looked like a shuriken made of 4 mics pieced together. He span it around as he yelled.

  "After 10 years! We have finally climbed. ONCE MORE!" cheers smashed out from the square.

  "THE 26th FLOOR. HAS. BEEN. DEFEATED!"

  "Valiant climbers! The longest challenge to date has fallen! The 26th!"

  The man span his microphone as it then faded out of existence. He was suddenly chucked a rifle by someone who stood beside him. This announcer then span the rifle and shot the light straight above him shattering glass about and darkening the main screen a bit.

  "Let us watch our CLIMB!" cheers once more smashed out through the open square.

  Sail felt a wave of nervousness wash over him. He had been managing various feelings and stood firm against them all so far but this was a kind of anxiety that was deep rooted in a human mind. The kind of anxiety of watching old videos of yourself.

  Shilling pushed through the crowd and sat down beside as they both leaned up against a wall.

  "You knew we were being watched huh.."

  "Yes...There all going to see. They'll all see it!" Shilling had his hair fixed along with his body. He looked a lot healthier and more presentable.

  "Im not thrilled about it... What about you. Your fine watching this?"

  "Why wouldn't i be? Sept's playback is extremely useful. I'll also get to see your final fight!"

  "Your not worried?? What about everyone watching those tears you shed... and watching everyone get beheaded again..."

  "The velvet's dead! Im only afraid of things currently on the way to kill me! As for my performance.. I put up a valiant climb! The tower even said so!"

  "Yeah.... You really did. Thank you for that."

  They did a small Klink of vegetable juice cans.

  "But everyone's gonna hear everything i said...."

  Sail tried quickly piecing together the events on the 26th as he knew them. He recalled a certain silent scream of victory and hurt a little inside. He then thought of himself lying about the rank of his skill and a scene of getting pummeled on for a few minutes. There's nothing that ... really exposes me or anything right? I feel like im missing something.

  "Gastin, your shaken by this? Of everything? How could you worry about being watched after what you did. It would be a waste for it not to be shown! I personally cant wait to watch you again! Ill get a better angle of when you saved my life! And the other time you saved my life!"

  ///

  [Welcome to the 26th floor! The Shifting Sucker Punch!]

  [The current number of challenging climbers is 186!]

  [Good luck!]

  ///

  "Match!!! Match, how did you beat it??. What happened?? Tell us"

  "Miss Lantern! Say my full name! You know it right!", "Lantern, can i get your autograph?", "Yasai! Lower the price of the meal combo already", "Asking Lantern for an autograph, what are you an idiot?"

  Lantern just pointed her finger at the screen as if to say just watch. The people calmed down a little but chatter never stopped throughout the whole movie.

  Match was drinking all sorts and getting very excited. He seemed to have gotten very hyper from September's little speech.

  His beverages missed his mouth 20% of the time.

  Sail questioned what was so joyous. Wasn't he about to watch a video of most his allies being slaughtered??

  "They're all going to be asking for you next Gastin. They have no clue.."

  "And that's a good thing how exactly?"

  "As expected. The ever humble Gastinn!"

  ///

  Match was holding open a door and ushering in a small army into room number 1 from the central hallway. All those in the front were clutching onto 5 or so teru teru bōzu each. The rest all ran in and arrived one after the next like it was the end of a marathon.

  There was one man with a backpack 5 times his size. Match quickly snatched it off his back and pushed it lengthways to get it through the door frame with a kick. One of such people in this array was Gastione who was hardly noticeable. After everyone had arrived, Match slammed the door shut and then checked it several times.

  You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.

  Here in the study of the 1st room, a battle raged against a spectral hand stamp. The Eye popper ghoul had a single wet eye hovering over a hand stamp with the eye being constantly wrapped in changing eyelid configurations.

  An onslaught of all sorts of bullets, fire, small metallic objects and even a flock of birds fired out from the small army. Beneath the projectiles, a torso and trainers ran straight beneath.

  This was the start of a fight between a floating stamp press and a floating torso with only a head, feet and hands.

  ///

  "YYYYYYYYEEEEAHHHHHHHHH", "Kill em REYY", "SEND IT!!"

  ///

  This man was a bizarre bundle of parts, flowing and dancing in on itself with a strong iridescent energy trail.

  Its how you might imagine the D SoraKi if his limbs were only inferred.

  The eye popper flashed and flew above Reyy. Beneath it was a sudden cuboid surge of gravity. A stamp through reality.

  Reyy had flipped? Or pivoted on his palm in a wheel like motion sliding out of the way of the stamps attack.

  The stamp turned up placing its base to Reyy's face.

  In a quick motion, Reyy's head swerved down in an arc to the floor with the rest of the parts spinning back up in response. Just outside the volume of the new surge of cuboid gravity, all his parts swirled up and got behind the stamp. Reyy shoved his racing car like glove into the eye of the ghoul.

  The teru teru bōzu sank deep inside and a burst of white goo erupted from the eye. This goo then shimmered as it faded away along with the eye popper. Two black sneakers landed with a thud as the racing gloves pulled and snapped behind as if catching up. Reyy's head rolled forward in space and his body collected itself into his classic human figure. His thick dark hair would have reached his shoulders if he had any.

  ///

  The crowd erupted. You could see various items and liquid being thrown above their heads.

  A bundle of floating pieces in the centre of the crossing was also watching his own performance. He floated his hands about a bit to greet the swarming fans. Sail looked over as Reyy's head when it suddenly span back to greet him. His face was quite indifferent and didn't look long before flipping back at the screen.

  "..."

  Although the movie and its actors was certainly interesting, in terms of the hierarchy of what to spend time thinking about.. it wasn't really even in the top 3. Sail sat up against the Sawlons wall with his knees pulled up to his body.

  'Wander retuns... he returns here... he lied about his skill so? Hes just a reincarnate? If he returns ... then what does that mean? He can choose where he reincarnates? He has a guide for his isekai location?? Perhaps he just only returns to a given set.... a given set of worlds... he shuffles between them maybe?'

  'Im likeley the same then... Or similar... Even if I die. I'll eventually... return here.. maybe forever' Sail looked out at the plaza and took a sip of some vegetable juice.

  ///

  The climbing team of the floor wanderers made there way through each room of the ringright manor. Each time, they tackled and banished the ghouls within using the lovely teru teru.

  Some fights were long and came with various issues and casualties. Others were simple, efficient and sudden. The team had set up clear strategies and matchups to deal with each threat, though there were always complications here and there.

  They set up camp and waited for a minimum of an hour within each room. Sometimes they camped for a long time in order to wait out time for certain skill cooldowns.

  The movie had several time jumps and the pacing was quite fast.

  Soon they reached the 17th room. The ballroom. The ghoul inside this one was the hard limit on the climb of the entire tower up till this point.

  As years went on in Wander's absence, the fuel to climb burned and the waiting around became a moral crisis. Not to mention the coming overpopulation issues. After a year of Wander not returning, the climb attempts against the 25th floor restarted.

  Over several months on the 25th floor, the team had barely survived and persisted against lethal star patterns and various planetary fate weavers.

  They had held up in their observatory with Lantern managing to finally uncover the entire list of constellations just in time. Through reading and deciphering the sky with a new small team of labcoat locals, she found the core line of the stars and the team successfully completed the 25th. 'Orion's home'

  After such success, the climb effort booted straight back up onto the 26th! Where in which many confident souls were soon devoured by small glowing balls or hung up to dance at the ball.

  The 18th room was as far as was made before being forced to bail.

  On the screen, Match was currently doing his best to incinerate a living rope. The rope was thick and frayed all over but always firm. It was the kind of knot that was completely unable to be undone. Like a headphone wire being placed in a pocket, or the lace on an old shoe.

  Match pitched a teru teru bōzu like a baseball at the giant burning horror that was the 1000 knots. The doll flew between the slight gaps between various people hung across the ball and landed in the centre of the ghoul.

  It fell deep into the knotted rope and banished it..

  22 people had died.

  Various talks ensued about continuing or not. The consensus argument that won out was that leaving now meant later having to fight the 1000 knots again. Thus, the party continued on to the servants quarters of the 18th room.

  134 people died.

  The crowd watched as the movie took as real sudden dive into the horror genre. A red dripping pair of scissors slid throughout the climbers. 20 or so heads were sent flying in just a couple seconds and blood scattered about like fireworks.

  "..."

  The city square fell silent but kept watching calmly. Sail had expected such information to be quite harrowing to them and for girlish screams to come about. But it was mostly just a decrease of cheer.

  Perhaps this kind of reaction was a result of the people knowing they were watching a winning run?... Or maybe they had become accustomed to such violence while living in this tower.

  Though one person was still extremely freaked out by the whole ordeal. Both on screen and off.

  "I thought you said your not afraid of something that isn't actively trying to kill you?"

  "......I suppose this is what people call PTSD huh"

  The famous town crier and 7th ranked in the tower ran about in a last stand against the red velvet. Constantly dodging and stunning the scissors with a periodic ring, he was very much lost but he kept struggling. A white glow occasionally soothed his fear and kept him going.

  The camera then cut to the rest. After a brief throwing off words those who were not trapped all telported away and bailed to the mass confusion of the viewers. All sorts of mumbling and chatting suddenly erupted. Many eyes flipped to mr Match but he simply shrugged and kept watching intently himself.

  One of such people who were part of the deceased was Gastione...

  He had thrown about 12 flashbangs thus far from his weapon belt and was currently in the process of escaping back into the main corridor. He had actually managed to hold of decently and get out of sight from the scissor. He hid in a closet for a while before running at full force into the corridor in a gambit back to room 17. His belt dematerialized, perhaps to reduce weight, perhaps because it ran out..

  As he ran, a scissor bolted out of room 18 and span into the corridor with reckless abandon. In a burst of red it charged up before launching down, severing Gastione's head clean off. His head rolled, his clothes were scuffed with slashes and a candelabra fell onto the floor.

  Sail placed his hand on his neck a little...