The Amber Sword

Chapter 15 – Thorn of light

TL: I won’t be updating the upcoming Saturday for this series, because I brought it forward today. The summary has been tweaked to include more details about the premise and protagonist.

The menacing gargoyle stood tall at nearly two meters and even with its pair of wings tucked in, it had a total width of over five meters. It seemed to fill the entire passageway when it charged at Brendel. The blast of air that came from the gargoyle’s charge stifled Brendel’s breathing, and he found there was nowhere to hide.

He immediately raised his right hand and yelled with all his might: “Oss!”

An earth-shattering roar came from the ring.

The air distorted in the narrow passageway and four consecutive bangs followed as the light crystals embedded in the wall exploded. The maelstrom of air formed into a wind bullet and struck the giant creature. The currents were like sharpened blades and stripped the metallic surface of the monster away. The gargoyle’s lower half body cracked away and was hurled backwards into the air like a broken kite.

It then crashed onto the ground with a thundering boom, and a dust cloud formed in the passageway.

Brendel coughed while he was in the midst of the dust cloud, and he quickly rushed forward with his sword in hand. He knew that a gargoyle had 60 HP in the game and a wind bullet did not kill it. It was more than likely that it was still functioning in this world’s reality.

He indeed found the heavily damaged gargoyle. Half of its wings were destroyed with a bright blue liquid oozing from it. The monster opened its mouth and screamed repeatedly at Brendel, while it clawed weakly at the ground.

[Kick the dog while it’s down!]

Brendel did not hesitate and brought the sword up with both his hands and swung with everything he had. The sword struck the monster’s chest and forced it to take a step back.

The second swing quickly followed, but the gargoyle brought its wings together and covered itself, and bright sparks flew up when the sword made contact onto the steel wings.

Brendel had used up all his energy but he did not managed to bring it down, and the injuries in his body seem like they were going to rupture. However, he did not lose heart as this attack had brought him a chance to go around it when it went into a defensive mode.

But when he ran a few steps forward, the gargoyle suddenly screamed as it unfurled both of its wings. He quickly guarded against them with his sword, but the massive strength from it knocked his sword far away which struck against the wall.

He was also thrown back against the wall from the impact, and felt the air in his lungs escaping from him. However, he realized he was only a short distance away from Gerald’s tomb after the monster’s sudden action.

This thought cleared his hazy mind and he understood what he needed to do.

He yelled once more and gathered his strength, tolerating the intense pain and got up and dashed towards the tomb.

The gargoyle was a mechanical creature and was commonly used as a tomb guard. The only thing that was able to command it was the control rod which could be inside the tomb!

The light in front was becoming brighter, the warm and gentle light seemed like it could soothe the soul. But Brendel’s heart still raced as there was only seconds left, and this was the final chance to succeed or die.

The youth’s heart skipped a beat when he heard the lumbering footsteps of an heavy object behind him. His instinct that was developed from years of battle made him jump forward, but he was late by a second. Brendel felt the claws grabbing onto his foot while he was in the air. He crashed onto the ground and he was forcefully dragged back.

The impact made him threw up blood. He had experienced situations like this in the game before, but he never felt more tense in his life. If he failed he would be facing death, what else could he do in this situation?

The green fonts in his retina indicated there was only ten seconds left from the ‘Unyielding’ skill.

A sudden thought suddenly came into his mind.

He turned his body over, raised his right hand and pointed the ring at the gargoyle. The ring seemed to glint coldly.

Eight seconds.

The gargoyle’s green eyes suddenly showed fear and shrieked, released Brendel from its claws and flew backwards.

Bucce’s artisan wizards were incredibly impressive, and the war constructs that they made were powerful and cunning, but Brendel was able to make use of this point to his advantage.

Intelligence was a dual edged sword. Once the creature was able to think for itself, it was able to feel fear and protect itself.

Brendel gasped for breathed and blinked. He trembled from the succession of catastrophic events that happened one after another. But he knew that he could not afford to relax.

Six seconds.

The youth half crawled, half walked towards the tomb that was filled with a holy aura using mostly with his willpower. His first glance landed on the sword that was on the coffin: The ‘Thorn of light’. But he was not concerned about this right now, he was searching for something else.

Three seconds.

His eyes swept over the left wall. There was a few compartments there. The second one. He brushed away the cobwebs and reached into it while a few insects crawled away.

He took the bottle out.

‘No 7 Health potion’.

This potion was made from the holy cathedral, and there was a fire symbol on it. Brendel brought the potion to his chest and used all his senses to relish the moment.

Two seconds.

Brendel tore away the cork from the bottle with trembling hands.

One second.

He raised his head upwards and gulped down the potion’s contents. The bitter taste filled his whole mouth, but it felt so pure that he praised it from the bottom of his heart.

‘Number 7 (16 oz)’, which was a substitute for ‘Number 5’. The priests of Madara were ordered to create these potions during the ‘Year of moon flowers’, in order to handle the increasing troop deficits. It could restore 25 HP, but would only restore non-lethal wounds. It was the most common potion in the game.

In any case, the holy potion took effect immediately. It first restored the abrasions on his four limbs, and it healed at the rate where he could nearly see it with his naked eye. His wounds that were caused by swords came next, and there was an itchy effect that persisted for several minutes before stopping.

Brendel tried breathing once and found that he had no problem with it unlike before.

He peeked at the entrance and found that the gargoyle did not chase after him. He was certain it did not fear the ring to this extent, but more likely that it simply could not enter inside. That was more likely a holy barrier in this tomb that prevented any evil creatures from desecrating this place.

He sighed with relief and sat down to inspect his wounds. The only injury left was the one Brendel received from the beginning. As it was a fatal wound, the potion had very little effect on it.

Still it was more than enough. Brendel stood up and wanted to yell in excitement. This was his best condition ever since he came into this world. There was no pain, his weak status was gone, and he could all his strength.

The youth exhaled slowly and thanked Mother Marsha. He could not believe that he was able to survive this ridiculous ordeal.

He was immensely proud of his glorious achievement.

He clenched his fist and calmed down from his feelings with much difficulty. He remembered about Freya and Irene, and it was time to realize his next plan.

His gaze landed on the shining sword that was on the coffin when he turned back.

‘Thorn of light’. This leaf-like sword was rarely seen amongst the human race because it was an Elven sword.

Brendel traced the armguard with his hand and looked above it. He saw the two lines of Elven text:

‘Thy sword shall burst forth from light, and strike thy enemies with terror.”

He had never seen this sword before, but he knew of its fame. This was a Level 19 legendary sword, not only was it exceedingly sharp, and increased the user’s ‘Strength’, ‘Will’ and ‘Physique’ by 1 OZ. This meant that Brendel was two times stronger than a normal human when he used it.

Most importantly, someone in the game had seen this sword in action before. It had the ability to detect the undead that many people had dreamed for. As long as any undead comes near this sword, it will start to pulsate with light, and it was the source of the name.

Brendel appreciated this moment when he looked at it. There was seventeen similar swords made by the Elves in the game, but the majority of it were collected and destroyed by Madara’s shadow lords in the first era. There were only three left, and this was one of them.

He held the sword by the hilt and a power immediately integrated into his body. He felt stronger and lighter, but Brendel did not have too much time to experience it in detail as something appeared in his mind:

“Young man, are you going to continue walking down the road that I pursued?”

[Hah?]

Brendel’s eyebrows jumped up as he realized what this meant. ‘Proof of Inauguration’! This was the ‘Proof of Inauguration! It’s not difficult to get it in the game but he certainly needed this urgently now. It was just that Brendel did not expect the Holy Knight Gerald’s ‘Proof of Inauguration’ to be a mercenary. It was not a Cathedral’s knight and not even a knight.

[What is up with this situation? Isn’t he a knight?]

“You have discovered the  ‘Proof of Inauguration’, you need to spend 2 XP to raise to level 1, would you like to take this profession?”

This profession was certainly better than a militia, even if it was not a ‘Knight’.

“Yes.”

A series of words lit up in his retina.

Mecenary [Charge (—-Level)]

Charge: A skill that assaults the enemies. The striking speed is raised by ten times. Cooldown 1 minute. This skill cannot be used when you have the ‘Weakened’ status.

Brendel could recite the description in his heart without even reading it. He was too familiar with it, because this was the first skill for a warrior class.

Was this fate?

Nothing else happened after that, so Brendel started to look around the tomb. He was uninterested in the treasures in it, but he wanted to find holy water that could repel the undead. It was too good to pass up as it could save someone at the critical juncture. But he suddenly stopped on a small gargoyle statue.

A statue.

[This is it!]

Brendel received a shock. This was the gargoyle’s control rod and it was the key to command the gargoyle. He immediately took that away. It was a delightful surprise to control it. But right at this moment, the tomb suddenly shook and the dust fell from the ceiling. Brendel turned his head to the entrance to hear an explosion that came from the outside.

[It might have come from the farmhouse!]

Brendel felt unsettled.

Did something happened to Freya and Irene? Brendel could only think that there was only this possibility. He quickly grabbed the weaker ‘Number 9’ health potions and wrapped them in his bloody clothes and ran out from the tomb. (TL: Hah? Did he run out shirtless? Wait, when did he even strip?)

In his rush he did not see a piece of paper underneathe the health potions, and it fluttered down onto the ground when he took the potions away.

Brendel knocked onto the gargoyle when he rushed out. But this time he had the control rod, and the monster sat down there like an ornamental statue. Brendel felt a slight pity in his heart. To control the gargoyle he had to have the correct commands, otherwise he would have brought it out to kill the necromancers.

Basically, this mechanical statue was immune to their negative spells, and thus a complete counter to them.

The youth rushed out quickly, but before he was able to catch his breath, there was a sudden attack from within the darkness.

TL: … What’s up with all these cliffhangers. If you spot any mistakes, please inform me. So now that we have reached this point, you guys should know a bit about what the story is. So I don’t know what sort of summary tweaks/ rewrite I need here, so if you would like to take a shot at doing a super good one, write in the comments.