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Chapter 14: Crazy Professor

Josh Managed to find the place he was looking for.

<CheapRent! Building E>

The name was straightforward. It was a 10 floors building. One that had individual single-room apartments.

There was an intercom, well in fact a talking screen.

"Hello, who are you trying to reach?"

Then appeared a list of names. Fake Professor Hegel…. That was him. Josh couldn\'t help but feel puzzled.

"Call Hegel…"

*Ring Ring*

Then came a voice. "I\'m not interested in buying anything! I won\'t appear on any damn comedy show! I\'ll pay the rent soon! If you want to leave hate mail, there is a box behind you! Have a fucking good day!"

Then it went silent. A message appeared:

<How would you rate this call? *With a few smileys.*>

Josh couldn\'t help but chuckle a bit. Some things always remained the same. Even in this new world with advanced technology.

"Call Hegel."

*Ring Ring*

"I already told you that-"

"Shut up and listen." It wasn\'t so much what Josh said, but how he said it.

"Now, I saw online that you are researching skills. Is that true?" Josh continued.

Hegel went silent for a few seconds before asking flabbergasted:

"Y-you, are you perhaps interested in my research?!"

"Indeed."

Then the man excitedly directed Josh toward his apartment. Repeating himself many times excitedly.

How hard could finding it be anyway? Before long, Josh arrived on the man\'s floor. He was waiting by the elevator, going in circles.

"Are you the one that is interested by-?!"

"Calm down. I\'m Josh."

"Hegel! Professor Hegel!"

"What about the fake part?"

"That, the world doesn\'t recognize my findings. They insist that I am wrong. They insist that I am a danger to society! That-"

"Alright, Hegel shall we head inside? Let\'s start from the beginning."

As Josh entered Hegel\'s dwelling, he couldn\'t help but notice the mountain of paper. On the floor, on the walls, everywhere!

"What\'s with all the writings? Isn\'t this place technologically advanced?"

"Ah! So you are one of the summoned ones?!"

He pointed to an interactive screen on the wall.

"This is the HUB: Home Universal System. Basically a UW but more affordable. Well, it also is bigger so there is that. While it\'s possible to take notes on it… It simply isn\'t the same. I\'ve found that it helps to manually write. Not only for memorization but also to think outside the box."

Josh could understand that. While planning in the past he had done the same. Of course, he had burnt it all to ashes right after.

"Josh, are you aware of the Tower\'s history?"

"Not in the least."

"Alright, here it goes. Bear with me this will take a while to explain."

Hegel gathered his thoughts for a few seconds.

"You should know that the Dimensional Tower recently appeared, right? About five months ago, in fact. It came out of nowhere and changed the world.

It proved that gods existed. It proved that other worlds existed. It proved that magic existed. It proved so many things and brought so much unknown.

All we knew was that we had to climb it.

While the populace was going crazy, the powerful took control of it. Well, they blocked access to it. No matter what, they couldn\'t affect the Tower itself.

Many test runs were conducted. Few key individuals were allowed in and became more powerful. Before long, the system in place was one that favored the elites.

It is only once they had a head start that they allowed the public in. Even then, it took Credits. A brand new currency that would be used for the Tower.

Getting a single Credit with normal currency is extremely hard. In the future, only Credits will be worth anything.

People either had to be extremely wealthy or sign deals. Aligning with either the corporations or the government.

Nowadays, climbing is way easier. Any half-decent Climber can get 5 credits. As long as you have one as a friend or even extended family you are fine. But even then, good luck catching up."

"The richest become richer and it is the same for the powerful I guess."

"Exactly, Josh! Even then, we barely explored the Tower as a civilization. This means our knowledge is extremely limited. Don\'t blindly believe what anyone says about the Tower. Of course, that includes me."

"Oh? You yourself are not confident in your research?"

"Let\'s just say my methodology is peculiar. Most researchers will only observe the rankers. People, in general, revere them as wise beings. If a ranker disagrees then it means it is false. I don\'t believe this to be true. What I do is I scour for every tidbit of information."

"Oh? Do you research using your HUB? With forums and all?"

Josh realized that Hegel seemed to be a self-taught netizen. The kind that would spend all his time stuck in front of a computer. At least the man himself recognized that it could be unreliable. He had said not to trust him after all.

"Hehe. It does sound ridiculous I\'ll agree. But there is a lot one can learn from the news and forums. I\'d rather interrogate tons of fool than a few logical rankers. Simply because the fools may stumble upon the answer by mistake. I always look for facts. Then I create theories. I formulate hypotheses."

"Like?"

"*Sigh* You asked me about skills, right? This is why they consider me a menace to society. It\'s because I am wary of the Tower."

"You mean you fear unprepared people dying?"

"No, I worry about something less tangible. I have looked at a lot of data. After observing everything carefully, I have determined something.

There are two possibilities.

One, we as humans influence the skills that we get. Our very nature defining those.

Two, the skills provided by the Tower are slowly changing us. Slowly taking over us. People with barbarian classes become more violent. Healers become gentler and kinder.

There has been a case recently on the news. Someone got the extremely rare necromancer class. Later, he was found to have killed his ex-lover so she could remain at his side.

I do not know which one it is but it scares me a lot."

"What would even be the purpose of such a thing?"

Hegel took a deep breath, then murmured.

"Corruption, or even worse some entity\'s revival through possession."

Josh then understood that Hegel was definitely crazy.

Without a shadow of a doubt a man batshit insane.

But he would hear him out, nonetheless.

The whole Tower situation was crazy in itself...