Vassalage

Vassalage is the Tower’s formal condition of subordination to a Lord, and one of its most consequential mechanisms for converting individual talent into organized political and military power. It may be presented as protection, employment, or a route into a powerful Stronghold, but the bargain carries an almost irreversible loss of independence: once someone becomes a Vassal, that person ordinarily can never become a Lord. The system thus makes advancement depend not only on strength or ability, but also on whether a Climber remains outside the grasp of those already ruling.

Definition and Structure

Vassalage is created when a person agrees to serve a Lord under the Lordship system. The arrangement is not merely a personal promise. It places the Vassal within a hierarchy centered on the Lord’s Stronghold, resources, and political authority, and it can determine the Vassal’s entire future within The Tower. A Vassal may be able to change Lords under the right circumstances, but the decisive restriction remains: the status permanently closes the path to Lordship itself.

The Tower is notably permissive about the fairness of such arrangements. The possibility of forced Vassalage is made plain when Steve Holland explains that powerful people can use force to compel someone into the status; William Oh recognizes the point after considering how his tomahawk was used to impose a lopsided arrangement on a Healer. Vassalage therefore exists on a spectrum between contract and coercion. Its legal or institutional form does not guarantee equal consent, especially when one party controls superior force, shelter, money, or access to higher Floors.

The Bargain of Service

A related arrangement appears in the practice known as a bus. Some people enter contracts with a Lord by providing rare Sacrifices capable of producing a valuable non-combat Class. After completing the relevant Trial, veteran Climbers then raise them to the Floor where the Lord’s Stronghold stands, after which they work for the Stronghold for ten, fifteen, or twenty years. William Oh describes this plainly as indentured servitude, and Loth immediately identifies the moral reality of the bargain rather than accepting its administrative language.

The arrangement is not presented as uniformly irrational. When the term ends, these workers may possess highly sought-after skills and can charge independent Strongholds whatever they choose. Yet the apparent future bargaining power does not erase the danger built into the system. Non-combat Classes may be operating far above the Floor suited to them, and some are killed because they cannot survive in environments designed for more combat-capable Climbers. Their inability to climb back down also makes it difficult to leave the Stronghold after their service ends, placing them in an unfavorable bargaining position even when the written term has expired.

Talent, Seizure, and the Loss of Lordship

Steve Holland presents Vassalage as especially dangerous for exceptional young Climbers without powerful family backing. He observes that promising newcomers repeatedly disappear or die, a pattern that appears irrational if talent should normally improve survival. His theory is that Lords station Vassals on the lower Floors to watch for ability, after which these agents seize talented men and women, drag them to a Lord’s Stronghold, and force them to accept Vassalage. Those who resist may instead be killed.

The theory is explicitly unproven, but its force comes from the way it explains a recurring pattern: exceptional ability attracts attention, and attention attracts ownership. The status is not simply a reward granted to the weak by the strong. It can be the endpoint of a predatory search for people whose future potential threatens to remain independent. Once incorporated as Vassals, those promising Climbers cease to be possible rivals for Lordship. Their talent is retained by the hierarchy, while their claim to rise independently is removed.

Political and Military Function

The system may nevertheless serve a broader strategic purpose within The Tower. Steve Holland theorizes that Lordship was designed to propel selected individuals upward by gathering powerful people beneath them and concentrating that strength in leaders capable of exceeding their apparent weight class. A large body of Vassals can provide manpower, expertise, and a reliable supply chain, allowing a Lord to challenge and claim higher Floors with support that an isolated Climber could not assemble.

The apparent correlation between power and the number of Vassals supports this interpretation, although the direction of causation remains uncertain. Powerful Lords may attract more followers because they are already powerful, or possessing more Vassals may itself increase a Lord’s power. The Lords are the only people who know the answer, and they do not share it. Vassalage consequently operates both as a personal status and as an instrument of accumulation: individual capacities are gathered beneath a single authority, making collective ascent possible while concentrating its rewards at the top.

Consequences and Significance

The status exposes a central contradiction in the Tower’s social order. Vassalage can give people access to resources, protection, training, and a place within an organized Stronghold, yet the same structure can turn those benefits into dependency. The bus system makes service look like an exchange of rare Sacrifices, specialized labor, and advancement; the recruitment of talented Climbers reveals how quickly exchange can become seizure. In both cases, the lower party’s ability to leave is limited by the very environment in which the agreement operates.

Vassalage also clarifies why independent advancement is so politically sensitive. A Climber who remains free may become a future Lord, while a Climber who accepts protection under an existing Lord becomes part of someone else’s power base and loses that possibility. The system therefore stabilizes the hierarchy by absorbing potential competitors. It promises upward movement for the collective project of reaching higher Floors, but it does so through a structure in which many people surrender the right to rise on their own terms.