NOVEL NEXT Chapter 38: Scaling Through The Tower Of Heaven!
Aleron's worries weren't unfounded. The karmic curse was something from a god, and truly as he had guessed…
It had affected the Tower of Heaven!
Deep within a vast sea of stars, a multicolored, ethereal light glowed in the surroundings, and the whole place seemed as though it had been carved out of a painting.
In this vast sea of stars, a jade figure calmly walked.
As he did, the surrounding space seemed to compress and shrink.
In the blink of an eye, he had crossed a few worlds.
With each step he took, worlds fractured and he transcended space and time.
Just as the figure was walking calmly, a wave of spatial distortion appeared in his line of sight.
A frown surfaced on the figure's face.
"Karma?" an ethereal voice resounded into the vast, starry skies.
"It seems to be from the towers I created," the ethereal voice continued.
Then the figure calmly waved his hand, destroying the karmic backlash.
Such an insignificant curse was not worth bothering about in his eyes.
In fact, using a wisp of his energy, he moved and sent a strand of energy into whoever had placed the curse.
Whether it be a god, devil, or an immortal, they couldn't escape this backlash.
After all, he was known as the… ###
After the pause in time, everything continued to flow normally, and the figure continued to move unrestricted in the whole world…
…
In the outside world, the whole world was in an uproar once more seeing the new information displayed.
[Congratulations to the Father of Dragons on completing the second level of the Tower of Heaven within a minute and earning the title.]
[Achievement Unlocked: Butcher of the Third Floor]
Aleron stepped out of the portal and into glaring sunlight.
It was bright. Uncomfortably so. The sky above was cloudless, painted a flat, sterile white, and the light that poured down felt heavy on his skin.
The air here was humid, thick with moisture that clung to his scales, carrying with it the sharp stink of fermentation and rot.
Before him stretched a strange landscape: a vast garden of towering fungal stalks and oversized parasitic blooms. These weren't the soft, natural mushrooms one might see in a forest — they were grotesque, discolored things, with caps like torn flesh and stems that pulsed as though something moved inside them. Sickly green vines coiled across the pale soil, and every few steps, the ground squished beneath his boots — not stone or dirt but soft, living tissue.
The daylight illuminated everything, but it did nothing to make the place feel alive. This was a garden long since consumed by death.
Aleron's eyes narrowed as he stepped forward. The warmth of the sun above did not reach the ground. It was as though the light itself had been twisted, filtered through something unnatural.
Then the silence broke.
A rustling came from the base of the towering fungi, followed by a sharp gurgling hiss.
From behind a large, hollowed stalk, a figure stumbled into view. Its shape was human at first glance, but only in silhouette. Its skin was stretched and pale, discolored with blotches of mold. Fungal growths sprouted from its back, weaving around its arms like armor. Parts of its face had collapsed, melted away by disease or something worse, revealing a jaw of yellowed teeth set in a rigid smile.
Its eyes were the worst part — swollen lumps of fungal film, bulging slightly from its sockets, glowing faintly beneath the sunlight.
Then came another. And another.
Dozens of them emerged from the vines and shadows between the stalks, all disfigured in different ways. Some dragged themselves forward on all fours, leaving slick trails behind. Others walked stiffly, joints cracking as if their limbs were being pulled by strings. Their bodies were riddled with holes that hissed and pulsed with each movement.
The Blightspawn had arrived.
They moved with strange fluidity, not like the twitching goblins from before. There was rhythm to their pace, an eerie coordination that suggested something deeper controlled them — something that saw through every one of their eyes.
They did not speak, did not scream. They simply began to close in.
Aleron took a deep breath. The scent of rot burned his nostrils, and the heat bore down on him, amplifying the stench. Sweat mixed with the crusted blood along his arms. His body was still recovering from the battle below, but there was no room to hesitate.
He moved forward.
The first Blightspawn lunged with surprising speed, arms outstretched, claws dripping with dark green residue. Aleron ducked low and twisted his body, bringing his elbow up into its gut and launching it backward with a sickening crack. Its body hit the ground and exploded into a spray of spores and yellow pus.
The cloud rushed toward him.
He reacted instantly, drawing on his star energy to create a burst of heat around his body. The spores caught fire and vanished in an instant.
Before the ashes even settled, two more came at him from the left.
Aleron stepped forward and struck with his right claw, carving through the first, then spun and smashed his tail into the second, sending it sprawling into a mound of pulsing mushrooms. It didn't rise again.
Another figure came from the side, this one faster, with elongated arms that whipped through the air like vines. It moved in erratic patterns, legs bending too far, neck swiveling in unnatural directions. Its claws slashed toward Aleron's throat.
He caught its wrist mid-strike, twisted sharply until the bones snapped, and slammed it into the ground with a roar.
The horde reacted.
They didn't panic or hesitate. They surged.
From behind the fungal trunks and spore-filled craters, dozens more emerged, forming a ring around him. They crawled, ran, slithered — anything to close the gap. Some dragged broken weapons, others lashed at him with thorned tendrils growing from their limbs.
Aleron's wings unfurled, catching the hot air beneath the dome of fungal rot.
He took to the sky.
Aleron soared above the swarm. The air here was thick, but manageable. Warm drafts from the rotting ground lifted his wings higher, and he looked down to get a better view of the chaos beneath.
Blightspawn crowded the garden floor like a plague unleashed. The fungal trees shifted and writhed as if alive, responding to the presence of their corrupted offspring. From the top of the tallest cap, he saw that the infected growths stretched farther than he had first assumed. This level was enormous, yet every corner seemed infested.
He angled his wings and dove straight into the mass.
The impact sent bodies flying.
The ground cratered beneath him, and the explosion of heat that followed roasted everything within several meters. Foul smoke filled the air. He moved again before they could regroup, sliding under a tangle of grasping limbs and driving his elbow into the gut of one that had tried to climb onto his back. It burst like a rotten gourd, splashing its foul contents across the mossy floor.
Aleron struck faster now. There was no time to fight defensively.
A clawed hand reached for his ankle. He pulled free and answered with a backhand strike, sending the Blightspawn crashing into a thicket of fleshy vines. The creature did not rise again.
Another came, leaping from above. Its body had no lower half — only thick cords of fungal muscle that lashed forward like tentacles. Aleron twisted sideways, caught the tendrils mid-air, and yanked them downward with violent force. The creature slammed into the ground headfirst. The impact split its skull wide open.
Every time one fell, two more took its place.
The Blightspawn were stronger than goblins. That much was clear. Each one had better coordination and tenacity. Some could shrug off wounds that would have killed lesser creatures, and the spores they emitted on death lingered in the air, forcing Aleron to burn precious energy to shield his lungs and blood.
He fought anyway.
His claw slashed downward, splitting open another infected torso. He used his tail to sweep out the legs of three more. As one tried to crawl up his back, he reached over his shoulder, grabbed its face, and crushed it with a single squeeze.
They surrounded him again, but he did not retreat.
Instead, he expanded a sphere of star energy from his core, the force repelling the Blightspawn long enough for him to breathe.
He needed to find their source.
As if answering his thought, a deep, guttural hum resonated through the garden.
The fungal stalks shivered.
A sudden wind passed overhead — not natural wind, but breath. Heavy, foul, and diseased.
The ground shifted ahead, and the garden split open at its center.
Something vast rose from beneath.
It emerged slowly, tearing itself free from the earth and roots that once covered it. A creature the size of a house, with a bloated body coated in thick layers of fungi and armored growths. Dozens of spore sacs throbbed along its spine. Its skin was sickly purple, streaked with green, and from its underside hung massive sacs of gestating parasites. A central eye, yellow and veined, opened slowly from its chest.
Aleron stared at the creature in silence.
It pulsed once.
The Blightspawn roared in unison and attacked again with renewed fury.
They charged faster, harder, with even less regard for their survival. Some began to explode before reaching him, releasing clouds of spores intended to blind or slow him.
Aleron powered through.
He closed the distance between himself and the massive creature in seconds. Blightspawn tried to stop him, but he tore through them without slowing. One claw to the throat, one kick to the ribs, one burst of fire to cleanse the clouded air.
He reached the creature's base and leapt upward, wings beating hard.