The days passed in a flurry of activity. Zodiac and his illusionist were elusive and only struck wherever Vincent wasn’t, crippling the production of any Influence he wasn’t directly overseeing.Even the production he was overseeing was hampered by red tape, trying to avoid killing monsters inside any of the ever-shifting ‘disputed territories’.Zodiac had to be burning through mountains of Influence, but it was likely worth it to the old man to keep Vincent suppressed until reinforcements arrived.And he was suppressed. Even with the entire Stronghold behind Vincent, he barely had enough Influence to skip three floors, as long as he was going down instead of up.A fourth Floor was prohibitively expensive, represented by a jump in price from from a bit over a thousand influence to more than fourteen thousand Influence.As he was overseeing one of their Influence expeditions aboard the large transport ships, he spotted a cook a moving at outlandish speed, producing one dish after another in a matter of seconds for the crew of several hundred who hadn’t eaten all day.It had to be some kind of time-dilation effect because no matter how fast you moved, food didn’t actually cook any faster, and yet…“What’s that all about?” Vincent asked a nearby Climber, gesturing at the cook flickering back and forth in the kitchen, throwing out a plate of food every couple heartbeats to the rapidly moving line marching past him.“That’s my Ability, actually. I’m Aaron, the receiving clerk at the dock.” The man shook Vincent’s hand. “I upgraded my Ability recently to expand its applications beyond just paperwork.”Vincent’s brows rose in surprise.“That’s pretty amazing. Can it be used in combat?”“Eh…not really. It affects a field around the primary target, so everything gets the buff within a certain distance. In melee, you wouldn’t even notice, because both people would be getting the buff.”I (...)