Floor 51 of the Celestial Tower was one of its most hated.
Boiling pipes of arc-light ran under the floors.
Pressure valves released columns of searing blue flame with no pattern.
Mechanical tiles rose and fell like angry pistons.
Sigil generators sparked with instability.
And hovering drones zipped overhead, firing stunning bolts at fighters who stood too long in one place.
In short:
It was a floor that punished the reckless, the graceful, the overly mystical…
and especially the unobservant.
Julian Breadstone drifted into view with a helmet that was absolutely not regulation.
"WELCOME BACK, COSMIC SPECTATORS! This floor is where fighters question their life choices, reconsider their training, and—if they are like me—wonder whether they remembered to turn off their stove at home."
Jimmy rolled his eyes.
"You don't have a stove."
Julian gasped. "THEN WHOSE HAVE I BEEN USING?!"
But their banter snapped to silence as the screens shifted to show a thin figure crouched beside a malfunctioning sigil node, examining it with an expression of delighted horror.
A woman in dusty gray work clothes.
Leather apron.
Fingerless gloves.
Long brown hair tied back in a messy bun, held together by two mismatched bolts shoved through it like pins.
Goggles pushed up onto her forehead, leaving faint ring marks around her eyes.
Tools strapped to her belt:
Wrenches.
Rune-scrapers.
A measuring compass.
A thaumaturgic screwdriver glowing faint pink (powered by a AA battery she stuffed in there herself).
Her name tag hovered beside her:
Lysa Quell – Rune Engineer, Self-Taught
She tapped the sigil node with a screwdriver.
It made a sad buzzing noise.
She squealed happily.
"Ohhh, you're broken in SEVEN ways. My favorite number!"
Julian clasped his hands to his cheeks.
"LYSA QUELL! Tinker of disasters! Solver of catastrophes! BREAKER of things that were not previously broken! The tower has NO IDEA what to do with her!"
Jimmy nodded. "Look at her face. She's having way too much fun."
Lysa rummaged through her satchel and pulled out:
• a gear
• a rune plate
• a strip of gum
• a glowing wire
• and a spoon
"I can fix this," she whispered to herself.
Fighters sprinted around her, dodging energy blasts.
Drones screamed overhead.
Pistons rose violently.
The floor shook.
Lysa hummed a cheerful tune.
"What does this do?" she asked no one.
She poked the sigil.
The sigil exploded.
Only a little.
Just enough to knock a passing fighter off his feet.
He screamed, tumbling backward.
Lysa caught him by the shirt collar without looking up.
"Oh, careful—it's unstable."
The fighter flailed. "YOU DON'T SAY?!"
Lysa gently set him aside and continued working.
Jimmy exhaled sharply.
"She's gonna give me an ulcer."
Julian giggled. "SAME! BUT IN A FUN WAY!"
The floor's hazard drones swarmed her.
Their targeting reticles locked on.
Lysa didn't panic.
She didn't dodge.
She didn't even look.
She simply reached into her satchel and pulled out a rune plate, slapped it onto the ground, and tapped it twice.
The rune flared—
not with magic—
but with EMP pulse energy she'd rigged from her own arc battery.
Every drone within fifteen feet collapsed like stunned pigeons.
Julian shouted:
"SHE TOOK OUT AN ENTIRE DRONE SQUAD WITH A HOMEMADE GLYPH! I LOVE HER! I FEAR HER! I WANT HER TO FIX MY MICROWAVE!"
Jimmy muttered, "No. Please no."
The Tower took offense.
More pipes burst open.
Searing vents roared.
Energy tiles flashed red.
The entire floor became a deathmaze of moving hazards.
Lysa grinned.
"Oh my STARS I LOVE THIS FLOOR!"
She sprinted into the heart of the chaos—
Not gracefully.
Not fluidly.
Not swiftly.
More like a happy madwoman with too many ideas and not enough self-preservation.
A piston smashed upward—
she ran onto it.
A vent exploded—
she grabbed a tool to measure the pressure.
A sigil screen flashed error—
she slapped it until the error changed to "WARNING."
Another fighter yelled after her:
"ARE YOU FIXING THEM OR BREAKING THEM?!"
She yelled back:
"YES!"
At one point, she paused beneath a cluster of unstable pipes vibrating dangerously.
A combat mage shouted from afar:
"DON'T STAND UNDER THOSE! THEY'RE PRESSURIZED—"
BOOM.
The pipes ruptured.
And Lysa—
who had already shoved her shoulder under one pipe to prop it up—
laughed gleefully as scalding steam blasted around her.
"HA! I KNEW YOU WERE THE PROBLEM PIPE!"
She tightened three bolts, slapped a rune patch on for good measure, and the pipe stabilized.
The steam died down.
The tower paused.
Literally paused.
As if stunned that anyone had FIXED something instead of trying to survive it.
Jimmy stared.
"She is fixing the hazards…"
Julian burst into joy.
"OH MY WONDERFUL STARS—SHE'S MAKING THE TOWER SAFER AS SHE CLIMBS!"
Jimmy rubbed his temples.
"That's… not how this is supposed to work."
A large section of the floor suddenly locked up.
Panels flickered.
Energy bled through conduits.
The exit gate froze.
Fighters panicked.
A few pounded the gate.
One attempted to brute-force the sigils.
The floor destabilized further.
Then Lysa arrived.
She pushed past a fighter twice her size and crouched beside the control cylinder.
She peered inside.
"Oh. Oh no. OH yes. You poor thing."
She patted the housing affectionately.
Julian leaned in.
"She's diagnosing the tower like it's a sick hamster."
Jimmy frowned.
"Is she even allowed to do that?"
"No! But she's doing it ANYWAY!"
Lysa reached into her satchel again.
Everyone braced.
She produced—
—a tiny hammer.
"Time for delicate work," she said.
She slammed the hammer into the sigil housing.
TING!
The entire system reactivated.
Panels realigned.
Energy stabilized.
The exit gate lit up and began to open.
All the fighters stared at her.
She blinked innocently.
"What? It was jammed."
One fighter sputtered, "How did you—what did you—HOW DID YOU DO THAT?!"
Lysa shrugged.
"I watched a tutorial."
Near the final stretch, the floor dropped into emergency lockdown mode.
Laser grids activated.
Rotating blade pillars extended.
Arc pistons fired at random.
Fighters screamed and scrambled in every direction.
Lysa cracked her knuckles.
"Oh this is going to be FUN."
She pulled a set of goggles over her eyes—three lenses stacked together.
"Safety first."
Jimmy shouted, "WHY DOES SHE START SAFETY NOW?!"
Before he finished speaking, Lysa leapt into the laser grid—
clicking one dial on her goggles—
calculating refractions—
then slipping through openings impossibly narrow,
ducking beneath beams with mechanical precision.
She reached the central control pylon, slapped a rune-modulating disc onto it, and twisted.
The laser grid realigned—
forming a clear path for the trapped fighters.
Lysa waved them forward.
"This way! Don't step on the red tiles! Or the shiny ones! Or the dull ones! Actually, just follow me!"
They followed.
Because they had no idea what else to do.
And because somehow, this chaotic engineer was keeping them alive.
Julian clapped wildly.
"SHE HAS TURNED A TOWER FLOOR INTO AN ENGINEERING PROJECT! I WANT HER ON MY NEXT HOME RENOVATION!"
Jimmy shook his head.
"No, you don't."
"I DO! SHE CAN BUILD ANYTHING!"
"She rebuilt a Buddy drone using chewing gum and a hairpin last month," Jimmy admitted.
"It's still flying around saying 'hello' at random."
Julian placed a hand over his heart.
"A treasure."
Lysa reached the exit gate.
She turned back and looked at the fighters she'd helped.
All waiting for her.
All trusting her.
Even the ones who had more power, more training, more magic.
She wasn't the fastest.
Not the strongest.
Not the most skilled in combat.
But she solved problems.
All problems.
Even the ones no one realized existed.
She grinned and tapped the gate rune.
"Onward."
The gate shimmered open.
Lysa Quell, the self-taught engineer, climbed into Floor 52—
unafraid,
unpredictable,
and utterly delighted.
Jimmy exhaled in relief.
"I hope the next floors don't break her."
Julian beamed.
"She will break THEM first!"