Tower of Deception

Biodata

Role in the Three Towers

The Tower of Deception is the last of the Three Towers to appear. Its late arrival left humanity already invested in the Tower of Slaughter and Tower of Desire, while its dangers and reset mechanic discouraged established climbers from entering it 28.

Unlike the Tower of Desire's emotion-driven scenarios and the Tower of Slaughter's combat-focused encounters, the Tower of Deception is defined by unstable rules, lethal anomalies, and situations that cannot be reliably studied or repeated through strategy guides 29. Its core attribute is Magic Resistance 17.

• Entering the tower normally resets a climber's sequences, abilities, and attributes gained from the Tower of Desire and Tower of Slaughter to zero; exceptional effects such as the Madman's Dice can permit cross-system abilities and rules 28 75 108.
• It initially had no Ladder Ranking because humanity had not produced enough explorers for one to be established. Policy changes and increased participation later led to the creation of a Deception Ladder Ranking 37 231.
• Most early explorers were death row inmates, terminally ill people, criminals, or others with little left to lose. Organized recruitment and the Tower of Deception Academy subsequently broadened participation 28 36 199 286.
• New climbers normally enter between Floors 1 and 7, though special effects can alter this result 5.
• First-time climbers must complete a task before registering their account with the Three Towers Guide 4 15.

Albert and Wen Chaohua describe the Tower of Slaughter as humanity's military preparation and the Towers of Desire and Deception as its diplomacy. Deception exploration identifies important figures and supplies opportunities to change their fates, potentially turning future battlefield enemies into allies. Albert nevertheless stresses that all three towers are necessary: relationships cannot substitute indefinitely for the strength required to survive the Three Towers War 85.

The tower's benefits do not make it an unambiguously benevolent institution. Wen Xishu 001 warns that the Three Towers both empower and endanger Bunker residents, contain schemes, and may provide opportunities that ultimately serve the Outer Gods. He advises continued exploration with the highest possible Completion Levels rather than assuming that every successful climb improves the world 409.

Mechanics

Magic Resistance

Magic Resistance is the Tower of Deception's primary attribute and determines how well a climber can perceive and survive its abnormal environments 17.

• Low Magic Resistance can prevent climbers from reading ordinary item descriptions or character information 5 6.
• Insufficient Magic Resistance may prevent a climber from damaging enemies while allowing enemies to kill them instantly 5.
• It can distort a climber's perception and thinking when they look at information beyond their ability to process 5 6.
• Wen Xishu registered with 12 Magic Resistance after his first Deception exploration 17.
• Later recorded values include 28 after the Doomsday Survival Game, 51 during the Great Devourment, 105 after the assassination scenario, 136 after the Land of Dust, and 144 on a subsequent status panel 124 138 285 346 397.
• Sufficient Magic Resistance limits additional perceptual interference during exploration, but does not guarantee that a climber can defeat every monster or disregard a scenario's rules 299 346 417.

The tower primarily grants unusual abilities rather than the basic strength, speed, and stamina associated with the Tower of Slaughter. Wen Xishu's later ability to gain Slaughter experience through Tang Rui addresses a limitation that Deception exploration alone could not resolve 397.

Eerie Sequences

The tower grants Eerie Sequences, one of the three sequence types alongside Slaughter Sequences and Desire Sequences 16.

• Eerie Sequences are associated with bizarre phenomena, including the materialization of thoughts and resentment 18 32.
• Their effects are not normally restricted by the academy's division between Tower of Slaughter and Tower of Desire departmental zones 31.
• The Three Towers Academy initially had no public Tower of Deception department, as the tower's rules were considered too unpredictable to teach conventionally. A dedicated academy was later opened under Wen Xishu 28 31 197 199.
• Wen Xishu received Weird Sequence 37: Mental Barrage after completing the Jack mission 18.
• Mental Barrage can provide a faint sense of the eerie, including in the Tower of Desire when cross-system rules permit its use 48.
• Later rewards include Eerie Sequence 58: mutated slaughter, obtained by both Wen Xishu and Zheng Zai after the Eerie Competition 259.

Deception scenarios can also provide opportunities to acquire or transform powers outside the Eerie Sequence category. Wen Xishu learned Three Towers Sequence 35: Tower Power Absorption from a restored parchment during the Great Devourment, while the Balance Tavern exploration permanently modified the Slaughter Sequence Limit Break Kick 146 313.

Rest Area

Repeat entrants are sent to the Tower of Deception Rest Area before beginning a mission 38.

• Players may remain for up to one hour to seek teammates, exchange information, or trade items before entering a tower 8.
• The Rest Area resembles a chessboard marketplace with nineteen vertical and nineteen horizontal paths 8.
• Unlike the Tower of Desire Rest Area, its early explorers did not openly sell strategy information; the tower was considered too unpredictable for dependable guides 38.
• Its early population was notably hostile and included prisoners, criminals, and people arranged by the Bunker Security Bureau to accompany Wen Xishu 38 39.

As Deception exploration became more popular, its Rest Area grew busier than those of the other two towers. By the time Wen Xishu activated Peak of Madness, the Tower of Deception had become many people's preferred means of changing their lives. The completely empty Rest Area he encountered during that activation was therefore abnormal 350.

Worlds of Obsessions

The Tower of Deception is a vessel for Worlds of Obsessions, dividing them into floors and missions. These worlds arise from people's experiences and emotions, presenting warped environments with conflicts of human nature and puzzle-solving elements 382.

• Many recorded obsessions concern the years immediately before the apocalypse and its first one or two years 382.
• Resolving an obsession sufficiently well can help its owner grow, potentially allowing some individuals to become gods in the future 382.
• The tower does not absorb every obsession. Obsessions outside its accepted period can persist without becoming tower stages and may threaten the stability of its World of Obsessions and the Three Towers 382.
• Tower power can give obsessions physical form, accounting for Deception-like phenomena outside an ordinary tower mission 334.
• Not every person encountered inside the tower is merely an obsession-derived counterpart. Kylin explicitly identifies himself as the same Kylin from the Tower of Desire 381.

The Three Towers Company's work addresses obsessions that the tower cannot incorporate normally. It sends personnel into the world of the Three Towers War to kill Obsession-Bearers, recruit them as employees, or eliminate their obsessions 382.

Rules and Scenario Variation

The tower's individual missions can impose mechanics beyond ordinary investigation or combat.

• Action points: Reverse Seven introduces an action-point system governing the players' available actions and investigations 65.
• Team and class systems: The Doomsday Game assigns classes and separates players according to the scenario's structure, leaving Wen Xishu and Blind Man together after Wen Xishu is forced into the Average Joe class 116.
• Loops and simulated victims: Priest retains memories across loops and uses a confession ritual to summon simulated victims whose power he can absorb through purification 168.
• Points and pursuit: Pen Town requires at least thirty points by the second day to avoid being targeted by the Unknown 417.
• Unkillable monsters: Pen Town explicitly prohibits killing its monsters, demonstrating that scenario rules can override the usefulness of overwhelming combat attributes 417.

The Guide recommends progressing through less distorted scenarios before attempting later ones. Skipping ahead can leave a climber without the items or preparation needed to handle a world's accumulated distortions 136.

Completion and Rewards

The Tower of Deception specializes in granting bizarre attributes, key items, and advantageous points of entry into related stories. Not every stage contains an Invitation Letter, and failing to obtain one does not necessarily mean that the mission was incomplete or unsuccessful 242.

• A hidden ending may reward the resolution favored by the obsession's owners rather than a change to their past. In the Hall of Goodness, three obsessions valued giving Wen Xishu the Heart of Fusion more than altering their own fates 242.
• The Guide can slightly adjust the weighting of reward categories if notified beforehand, such as increasing the likelihood of inventory-slot rewards 104.
• Special gains can offset ordinary rewards. Limit Break Kick's permanent evolution consumed part of Wen Xishu's standard reward allocation after the Balance Tavern 313.
• A perfect ending, combined with sufficient Luck Value, can improve an Invitation Letter's assistance. Options include entering the Tower of Desire as a suitable deceased character with their memories and relationships, or retaining one's own identity while receiving information about important characters 284 327.
• Deception exploration can yield Tower Power, although Wen Xishu initially found it extremely scarce, having accumulated only five points after five climbs as the main contributor 126.

Sagittarius's Starfall provides combat assistance tied to Deception performance. Its cost falls as the expected Completion Level rises, and perfect elimination of an obsession permits a full-power Constellation attack without spending Tower Power 297.

Exceptional Rule Alteration

The Madman's Dice can substantially alter the usual tower-entry process and system restrictions.

• Three-Phase Power permits simultaneous use of all three tower systems' abilities and rules 5 116.
• Two-Stage Chain permits two selected tower systems to operate together, allowing combinations such as Desire abilities in Deception or Deception abilities in Slaughter 75 108.
• Triple High multiplies the entry floor by three 5 126.
• Minimalism resets the climber's relevant attributes to newcomer values for the challenge while leaving items and Sequences usable, with additional newcomer-style reward bonuses 126.
• Neither Fish nor Fowl disables the current tower's panel and primary attribute in exchange for equivalent panels and attributes from the other two systems 148.

Scorpio's Cheating Knife adds a gamified function to each journey. Examples used during Deception exploration include a proficiency system that can support permanent skill evolution and a one-use death reset that returns Wen Xishu to a point where he made a wrong choice 83 299 313 418.

Peak of Madness grants an additional exception: Wen Xishu can exchange attributes with his next Deception boss or exchange roles with it and defend the floor. Its activation cancels the ordinary assigned stage, level, and dice roll before initiating Heart-Questioning 346 350.

Great Devourment

The Great Devourment forcibly draws Bunker residents into Deception-like challenges through vortices. The Guide describes it as the consequence of insufficient Deception exploration: it ends only after enough anomalies have been eliminated 124 413.

• Its scenario material can originate from the Bunker as well as the Tower of Desire 124.
• Vortices differ in danger and requirements. During the major outbreak, Wen Xishu used the Safe House's analysis to assign teams to white, blue, and orange vortices 138.
• The orange Evil Artifact Sealing Chamber expanded rapidly and had absorbed 145 people before Wen Xishu's team entered 138.
• Eliminating its central anomaly ended that vortex and sent the survivors to the Guide, but did not automatically eliminate the other vortices 146.

Albert later identifies the Great Devourment as a danger of the Bunker's early stage. Once humanity's tower progress advances the Bunker into its middle stage, Tower Challengers become a new threat 413.

Connection to the Other Towers

The Tower of Deception is closely linked to the Tower of Desire. The latter presents the earlier, comparatively normal version of a story, while the Tower of Deception presents its distorted outcome and exposes the key figures behind an anomaly 27.

• Investigating a Deception scenario can provide the direction needed to alter its corresponding Desire Tower storyline 27.
• Changes to a Tower of Desire story can force a related Deception scenario to restart 14.
• During such a restart, players not protected by an Invitation Letter can have their memory modules synchronized and altered as the tower repairs its logic 14.
• Characters may become nearly unrecognizable after changing across tower systems; Jack's Desire, Deception, and Slaughter forms differ radically in appearance and role 14 28 32.
• The tower's anomalies can manifest powers later seen in Tower of Slaughter monsters, such as thought- or resentment-based summoned entities 32.

The apparent movement from a Deception future into a Desire past is not literal travel backward along a single timeline. Changes in the Tower of Desire cause the Three Towers to simulate a corresponding timeline under the game's rules, a mechanism that even Pisces must obey 224.

Invitation Letters provide access to the earlier story at especially useful points of entry. Ordinary Desire climbers may instead encounter peripheral characters or receive missions that never expose a region's central conflict. Wen Xishu's Deception-derived information therefore functions as an “instruction manual” for the Tower of Desire's much larger world 106 229 348.

Cross-Tower Cooperation

Mystery-Desire Twin Resonance allows climbers in corresponding Deception and Desire missions to communicate. Wen Xishu obtained this possibility after the Land of Dust, enabling direct cooperation rather than requiring one climber to move between both systems 346.

Zheng Zai and A Miao demonstrate its practical value: information about key figures from Deception helps guide the Desire investigation, while details from the comparatively normal Desire setting help resolve Deception mysteries. Their cooperation improves completion prospects on both sides 350.

A separate possible convergence appears when Wen Xishu, Wen Renjing, and Xun Hui enter their respective towers near the same time and receive related destinations. Wen Xishu and Wen Renjing infer that the mechanism may unite explorers from all three towers in a Level Seven challenge capable of yielding a Level Seven Facility 183.

Influence on the Battlefield and Other Realms

Changing fates in the Towers of Desire and Deception can unlock recruitment prerequisites for beings who would otherwise become enemies in the Tower of Slaughter. Albert treats this as a central means of preparing allies for the Three Towers War 85.

The influence is not limited to battlefield recruitment.

• Wen Xishu's changes to Ding Dong's Museum in the Tower of Desire altered the corresponding Deception stage 99 113.
• Deception anomalies have affected the Netherworld strongly enough to require intervention by its sovereign 273.
• Fate Intertwining: Tang Rui grants Tang Rui a positive effect after each successful Deception challenge, scaled to Wen Xishu's Completion Level. Her battlefield growth, in turn, provides him with Slaughter Tower experience 397.
• Pen Town includes mercenaries from other Three Towers Battlefields, showing that a Deception scenario can involve participants beyond Wen Xishu's own Bunker 417.

History

Before the Tower of Deception appeared, humanity focused on the Tower of Slaughter for combat strength and the Tower of Desire for supplies and emotional missions. Explorers lacked a means to connect a monster's past identity with its later monstrous form, making it difficult to change outcomes across the Towers 28.

After its appearance, the Tower of Deception became recognized as crucial to understanding the relationship between the other two systems. However, its attribute reset and high lethality meant that exploration remained limited, with the Bunker largely sending expendable people into it 1 28.

Wen Xishu's first entry was altered by the Madman's Dice, which tripled his tower-climbing level and sent him to the twenty-first floor rather than a normal beginner floor 5. There, he entered Jack's Fatal Deceptive Tower, a mission linked to Jennifer and the corresponding Tower of Desire scenario 5 10.

Wen Xishu completed the mission at Level Six Completion, returned with Level Six supplies, and caused a Level Six hospital to appear in the Bunker 20. His success drew the attention of the Bunker Security Bureau and led to pressure for him to enter the Tower of Deception every seven days 20 36.

His subsequent expeditions included Fallen Parrot on the sixth floor and Reverse Seven on the seventh. By his third climb, his experiences had brought him into the conflict between Scorpio and Pisces, including an offer to align his future missions against Scorpio-controlled areas 39 65 82.

Organized support expanded as the Strange Tower Assault Team was established and the Tower of Deception Academy was publicly announced. During the Great Devourment, Wen Xishu led companions into the orange Evil Artifact Sealing Chamber and eliminated its central anomaly 125 138 146.

Wen Xishu later opened the Tower of Deception Academy by fulfilling its requirement of possessing more than fifty Magic Resistance and the highest value in the Bunker. Its establishment created a formal institution for training Deception explorers, replacing the earlier absence of a public department 197 199.

Policy changes increased the number of climbers enough to establish a Deception Ladder Ranking. By the time Wen Xishu entered the thirty-fifth-floor range, the second-ranked explorer had reached the twenty-seventh floor 231.

Wen Xishu's later achievements included perfect endings, permanent Sequence improvements, and the acquisition of Mystery-Desire Twin Resonance. These developments made both individual exploration and coordinated work between the Towers of Desire and Deception more effective 284 313 346 350.

When Wen Xishu's recorded climb reached the seventy-first floor, the leading progress of the Three Towers had drawn roughly level. By this period, Deception exploration had changed from an activity primarily imposed on desperate people into a popular means of changing one's circumstances 350 364.

Tower of Deception Academy

The academy hangs upside down above Three Towers Academy and connects the fourth world to the land of obsessions. Wen Xishu became its dean through a blood sacrifice beneath the Three-Leaf Clover, gaining authority within its grounds equal to the principal's 197.

• Its buildings change irregularly to simulate unfamiliar environments 197.
• Low Magic Resistance exposes visitors to hallucinations and whispers, which are cleansed after leaving 197.
• Its Magic Resistance requirements adjust individually, and prolonged exposure can slowly increase resistance 197.
• It opens only late at night, permits departure only late at night, and cannot provide accommodation 197.
• Its controlling shadow can manage buildings, restore earlier layouts, implement requested designs, and monitor students' mental states 197.
• Recruitment extends directly to people from the Bunker's lower social levels and accepts voluntary transfers from the other academies 199.

Its curriculum and admissions reflect the tower's unusual demands. The written entrance examination awards points for eccentricity, interest in the bizarre, and masochistic tendencies. Later, Yin Ze teaches students to apply Desire Tower methods to strange entities, emphasizing empathy and recruitment despite the controversial reputation this creates 286 314.

Wen Xishu's Three Towers Memory Archive can reproduce encountered characters and their obsession domains as simulated challenges. Participants experience pain without dying and retain their memories afterward, although a student's mental breakdown demonstrates that such training still carries psychological risks 195 242.

Notable Scenarios

Jack's Fatal Deceptive Tower

A twenty-first-floor scenario centered on Jennifer, Jack, and an old building tainted by eerie phenomena 5.

• Jack's search for Jennifer manifests as millions of writhing black worms forming words across the building's walls 8.
• The scenario connects to Moen City in the Tower of Desire, where Jennifer's happiness is the parallel mission objective 10 13.
• Altering Jack's fate in the Tower of Desire causes the Deception scenario to restart and repair its logic 14.
• Completing the scenario earns Wen Xishu Deception Jack's Eerie Sequence and allows him to escort Jennifer to the Deceptive Tower 14.
• The revised mission changes Jennifer's rescue into her escort back to the building, raises Jack and Jennifer's mutual favorability to 100, and unlocks recruitment prerequisites for their Slaughter forms 14.

Fallen Parrot

A sixth-floor mission in Jiangcheng City undertaken by Wen Xishu and a group of prisoners 39.

• The initial task requires the team to purify contaminated items 42.
• Purifying an item can release a deadly monster, as shown when Sita is killed during the first attempt 42.
• The mission environment includes a massive bookshelf, a music box, tentacles, and a four-room “birdcage” story structure 44 45.
• The scenario reinforces the tower's atmosphere of mistrust, as Wen Xishu uses his understanding of the rules to manipulate the team's survival chances 42 45.
• Changing Tang Rui's fate in the Tower of Desire restarts the mission with a revised story in which her betrayal and the Fourth Door never occurred 54.
• Returning with his memories intact, Wen Xishu identifies an award certificate as the first contaminated object and purifies it 54.
• He continues with Park Mihee and Zheng Zai into a bedroom containing black-aura sweet soup, where countless eyes appear and the group is instructed to keep a diary of events at school 54.

Reverse Seven

A seventh-floor mission set in the luxurious Miracle Apartments in Qi City 65.

• Five players are tasked with saving seven households 65.
• The mission introduces action points and assigns players separate apartments on different floors 65.
• Wen Xishu receives room 14-2 beside one of the mission households and investigates the unusually low rent and other clues 65.
• Its corresponding Desire storyline brings him into direct contact with the An brothers, whom ordinary Desire climbers may struggle to discover through their assigned residents 106 229.
• The expedition exposes the conflict between Scorpio and Pisces and offers Wen Xishu a choice of future faction alignment 82.

Hospital Museum

A scenario whose development Wen Xishu deliberately influences through the corresponding Tower of Desire story 99 113.

• Wen Xishu persuades Ding Dong to preserve the Hospital's Museum as a survival outpost rather than leave it vulnerable to theft 99.
• He proposes appraisal requirements and twelve increasingly difficult stages to protect its items 99.
• Ding Dong agrees to try the designs, and the resulting Deception challenges demonstrate that a climber can shape stage content indirectly through changes in Desire 99 101 113.

Doomsday Game

A fifteenth-floor team challenge entered after Wen Xishu selects Three-Phase Power and Fourth Evil 116.

• Seven other explorers are gathered with him: Zhang Hai, Tokugawa Taiga, Child-Faced Wolf, Kate, Ye Lingfeng, Blind Man, and Tam 116.
• Other participants unlock hidden classes, while Wen Xishu can select only Average Joe 116.
• Wen Xishu and Blind Man begin in a locked storage room containing an axe, five bullets, and a medical kit 116.
• The scenario can create powerful emotional attachments, as Tokugawa Taiga becomes invested in protecting the woman and child he saves 120.

Evil Artifact Sealing Chamber

An orange-vortex scenario entered during the Great Devourment on an unspecified Deception floor 138.

• Wen Xishu enters with A Miao, Yue Yun, Zheng Zai, Nissen, and Xiao Jin 138.
• A restored parchment reveals the history of the Witch's shoes and teaches Tower Power Absorption 146.
• Wen Xishu absorbs the Goddess's Left Hand to disable the Shoe Woman's ability to move items, then absorbs Qiao Xi's relics and defeats her for the best ending 146.
• Eliminating the Shoe Woman closes the vortex and releases its survivors 146.

Soul Concentration Camp and Hall of Goodness

Wen Xishu receives a mission to survive and escape the Soul Concentration Camp when entering the thirty-fifth-floor range 231.

The later Hall of Goodness ending resolves the intertwined obsessions involving Zhou Fei, Chris, and Britney. They separate peacefully, and Wen Xishu receives the Heart of Fusion and the Good People Society facility. The Guide explains that their decision to prioritize giving him the Heart of Fusion qualifies as a hidden ending even without an Invitation Letter 242.

Eerie Competition

A two-day competition that Wen Xishu survives with Level Six Completion 259.

• Wen Xishu and Zheng Zai both receive Eerie Sequence 58: mutated slaughter 259.
• Wen Xishu also receives the Rune: unnameable desire and examines Taurus's Horn of Competition and Libra's Scale of Chaos 259.
• The Guide warns afterward that history is changing and Wen Xishu's secret may soon be exposed 259.

Balance Tavern

A later expedition in which Scorpio's Cheating Knife supplies a proficiency system 299.

• Skills gain proficiency by hitting enemies, while defensive skills progress by withstanding attacks 299.
• Exceptional completion can make scenario-specific skill improvements permanent 299.
• Wen Xishu permanently evolves Limit Break Kick to inflict area damage, strike multiple targets, and add armor-piercing damage 313.

The Child in the Land of Dust

A survival mission beginning in a dusk-shrouded alley filled with Hanged Men whose gravitational field forces Wen Xishu to retreat 334.

• Wen Xishu enters with Dare to Try Four and Fourth Evil 334.
• His name disappears from the Ladder Ranking during the expedition, causing the Bunker to fear that he has died 334.
• The climb lasts four days and concludes with Heart-Questioning and rewards including the Heart of Miracles, Mystery-Desire Twin Resonance, and Peak of Madness 346.

Three Towers Company

A special mission opportunity accessed through the Three Towers Company's employee badge 365.

The Company predates Kylin's leadership and is not simply his World of Obsessions. Kylin is its first selected person in charge but does not know its origin. He explains that its work involves Obsession-Bearers whose obsessions fall outside the tower's normal collection period and threaten its stability 381 382.

Pen Town

A town challenge involving Wen Xishu and mercenaries from other Three Towers Battlefields 417.

• Participants must obtain at least thirty points before the second day or attract pursuit by the Unknown 417.
• Its first revealed rule states that the town's monsters cannot be killed 417.
• The rules reduce the value of Wen Xishu's considerable combat power, even with Three-Phase Power active 417.
• Scorpio's Cheating Knife provides one death reset, returning him to a prior wrong choice at the instant before death 418.

Relationships

• Tower of Desire — Its earlier storylines can reveal or alter the origins of Deception anomalies; changes there may restart related Deception scenarios. Mystery-Desire Twin Resonance later permits direct communication between climbers handling corresponding missions 14 27 346 350.
• Tower of Slaughter — Its monsters may reflect beings whose histories and aberrant powers are better understood through the Tower of Deception. Altered fates can unlock recruitment prerequisites, making Deception exploration a means of preparing battlefield allies 28 32 85.
• Three Towers Guide — The Guide's black head represents the Deception faction and grants support to climbers who specialize in the tower. It explains the tower's obsession-based rewards and can adjust reward-category weighting when notified in advance 16 104 242.
• Wen Xishu — A specialized Deception explorer whose first climb achieved Level Six Completion and brought a Level Six hospital back to the Bunker. He later becomes dean of the Tower of Deception Academy, reaches a recorded climb of seventy-one floors, and enables new forms of cross-tower cooperation 16 20 197 346 364.
• Wen Chaohua — A former foremost Deception explorer who discussed the tower's strategic role with Albert, shared information about Invitation Letters with Wen Renjing, and sought reform of the tower-ascending system 59 85.
• Albert Napolitano — Protects Wen Xishu, supports institutional Deception exploration, and argues that its diplomatic advantages must be supported by Slaughter-derived strength 27 85 125 199.
• Bunker Security Bureau — Treats exploration of the tower as strategically valuable and pressures Wen Xishu to continue climbing on a seven-day cycle 36 39.
• Strange Tower Assault Team — An organized force established as support for Deception exploration expands 108 125.
• Tower of Deception Academy — A dedicated training institution under Wen Xishu, using changing environments and obsession-based simulations to prepare future explorers 195 197 199.
• Scorpio — Uses gamified rules and evolving tools to interact with climbers. His Cheating Knife repeatedly changes the mechanics available during Wen Xishu's explorations 73 83 299 418.
• Pisces — Attempts to recruit Wen Xishu into conflict with Scorpio and uses time-related interference against outcomes Wen Xishu seeks to preserve. Pisces remains subject to the Three Towers' timeline-simulation rules 82 217 224.
• Three Towers Company — Addresses Obsession-Bearers whose obsessions cannot be incorporated into the tower normally, using elimination, recruitment, or the resolution of obsessions 381 382.
• Bunker — Supplies both explorers and, during the Great Devourment, material for Deception-like anomalies. It is later revealed to be a fourth tower whose development depends on humanity's progress through the Three Towers 124 413.

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