I Became a Ranker Before Rankers

Transformation

I watched the clock slowly count down with disbelief of my current situation. 

Living away from the world for over 10 years made me feel numb, but I much preferred the isolation to the hateful stares of the people surrounding me. 

Now it was time for me to once again endure the trials of the tower, but this time I would start from floor 1. 

Defeating each floor and proceeding all depended on the "Kill Count." All monsters had an associated Leava value that you could pick up after you killed them; the more difficult to kill, the more Leava was given. The catch with this, is that you could only see the difficulty of each monster after it had been defeated, so many newcomers immediately ran into a series of problems. 

This enormous amount of possible loss was combatted by the system by giving out certain classes to each of the participants. When Challengers were first transported to the tower, a notification would pop up in front of them asking whether they would like to choose their class. When this popped up though, many people were confused because only a "YES" button was put onto the screen, therefore many assumed it was their only option. Instead of being on the notification tab, though, the "NO" was instead hidden under the players foot, so they had to lift their foot to be able to see it and choose that option. 

The type of class allotted to an individual was the basis of all their possible skills, suitable equipment, and roles as a Challenger had to be. Initially, the classes like swordsman proved to be advantageous as they had higher attack power early on, but as Challengers proceeded to climb, the swordsmen were unable to raise MP and HP levels, so they lost early. Others who chose the magician classes were unable to survive earlier levels because they did not have enough magic to defeat the level of monsters and their attack points were too little.

Lucky for me, I spawned on the 13th Floor. Since the tower only gave out classes on the first floor, I never even had to chose what I wanted to be, and that gave me the advantage of not having to conform to these rules and I never really thought about the classes until now. 

I was suddenly jerked out of my daydreaming when a passerby ran into me and knocked me off balance. My hands scrapped the ground and my knees began to bleed rapidly. Still, I got up and limped towards the nearest bus stop with a small bench to catch my breath and prepare for the first stage of transformation. 

The first stage of transformation was the work of the tower trying to make Earth's geography suitable for it. Many things occurred in the first stage, technology became controlled by the tower, non-human things became changed to fit the tower, and many of the buildings warped. For many of the Challengers who were transported early missed out on the benefits of this change, but I was eager not to. 

As I looked off towards the area of the tower, I could see what looked like a large wave hurl to me. Nothing was getting swept up into it and there was no actual water, but it was oddly reminiscent, which gave me the chills. It continued to approach me increasingly fast, and I gripped onto the sides of the bench bracing for the impact. It swept past me and I lost consciousness for a brief moment, only to be met with a large odd looking bus sitting in front of me when I opened my eyes. 

This bus was different from what I had seen before. It was round like a train, but it did not have wheels that touched the ground; it instead floated slightly above the ground. Along the long side of the bus I could see the words "Korea Tower's Pet Shop" written on a neon sign. Just what I was waiting for. I stood up and walked toward the doors that had been opened. When crossing the door, I was transported to the base of the tower.