I Don't Need To Log Out-Chapter 247: The Tower (6)
Arlon sat cross-legged on the cold, cracked stone floor, his breathing steady as he exhaled slowly.
His training session had just ended, and the residual energy still pulsed through his limbs.
His body had long since adjusted to the Tower's relentless time dilation, but even so, the weight of the years was something that never quite disappeared.
A decade.
It had been ten full years since he cleared Floor 83, since he first laid eyes on the strange mana currents that ran beneath the Tower's foundation.
The discovery had changed something in him. It had made the Tower feel less like a challenge and more like a puzzle waiting to be solved.
At first, he thought it was a fluke.
Some kind of residual energy left over from the Tower's construction.
But then, when he advanced to Floor 85, he saw it again. And now, here, on Floor 89, the same phenomenon had appeared.
Faint, almost invisible streams of mana were woven through the structure itself like veins in a living body.
If he hadn't already developed an advanced sensitivity to mana through his training, he wouldn't have noticed it at all.
But what really bothered him was that it didn't feel like normal mana.
Mana, in all its forms, had a certain rhythm to it—an elemental signature that mages could sense and manipulate.
But this was different. It wasn't chaotic like raw energy, nor did it align with any known elements.
It was something else entirely.
***
Arlon pushed himself to his feet, stretching his arms as he glanced around the chamber. His temporary training ground.
Most challengers wouldn't dare waste time staying behind on a single floor. But for Arlon, this wasn't wasting time—it was investing it.
The boss monster of Floor 89's final level had been a nightmare.
A towering Level 285 entity that had forced Arlon to push himself to the absolute limit.
And while he could have pressed forward after barely scraping by… he knew better.
Instead of rushing ahead and making reckless decisions, he had stayed behind.
For an entire year, he had trained and studied.
And he had examined the strange mana flow in greater detail, looking for answers.
***
Arlon rolled his shoulders, letting the tension ease out of his muscles as he walked toward the edge of the chamber.
The flickering blue flames above cast long shadows against the walls, their glow slightly dimmer than before.
The Tower was changing.
He could feel it in the air, in the way the battles progressed, in the way the monsters reacted.
But more than that, he could sense it in the mana.
For years—Tower years, at least—he had studied magic after each level.
He had experimented with different elements, developed fusion abilities, and tested the limits of his understanding.
Yet, time magic had always felt like something different.
Something greater.
At first, it was simple admiration. Agema's specialty had been time magic, and Arlon had always respected her beyond measure.
It was only natural that he wanted to follow in her footsteps.
But the deeper he went, the more he realized that time magic wasn't just another school of magic.
It was limitless.
Time magic didn't follow the conventional rules of mana.
It didn't draw from the same reservoirs that elemental magic did.
It required something more.
Something beyond mana.
***
Arlon closed his eyes for a moment, recalling a conversation he had with Agema before he entered the Tower.
She had told him something that stuck with him ever since.
"Time magic isn't something you just 'learn' like fire or wind. It's not about manipulating mana—it's about manipulating reality itself. And to do that, you need the right attribute."
"The problem is… almost no one is born with it."
That was why so few people ever mastered time magic.
It wasn't something that could be forced through training alone. It required a natural attunement to the fabric of time itself.
And yet, Arlon had that attunement.
When Agema learned what happened when he infused mana into the crystal ball at Kelta, she was shocked at first, then pleased.
She had told him, for the first time, that he could be a strong existence, maybe even stronger than herself.
Of course, she went back to her usual teasing and arrogant attitude.
But not before she told him the meaning behind her words.
The color of his mana was different from June's. Arlon had thought that this had something to do with his regression and maybe EVR's help.
She probably wasn't wrong, but that was only about the golden mana.
There was more to the story when it came to the attributes he had.
All mage players in Trion had six element affinities: fire, water, lightning, wind, earth, and light elements, and blue magic vessels.
But Arlon's mana had shown an ugly brown color when he tried infusing mana.
There was only one reason for that: he had 7 affinities at least. The seventh was time magic.
Time magic wasn't something grand, actually, it was even bad for those with lower vessel colors.
The reason was simple: those with time magic affinities didn't have any other affinities.
This was the reason no one understood what was happening with Arlon's crystal.
This was also one of the reasons Agema was accepted as the biggest mage genius. She had 2 other affinities besides time magic.
But they didn't have crystals back then, so nobody knew about the brown color.
In the end, Arlon could be stronger than Agema due to the affinities he had.
Of course, that was in the far, far future, if ever. Agema was a genius, unlike Arlon, so she could never leave her seat.
Arlon took a deep breath, opening his eyes as he gazed toward the notification that had stayed there for a year.
His training here was done.
He had spent a full year refining his abilities, testing his theories, and preparing for what came next.
And now, it was time to move forward.
This chapter is updat𝓮d by freēnovelkiss.com.
Floor 90 awaited.
And after that, unless something unexpected happened…
The time ratio would change again.
With a small smirk, Arlon chose yes.
If everything went his way, he would go back to Trion earlier than expected...
