Summoning the Holy Sword

Translator: Atlas Studios Editor: Atlas Studios

For a 'Walking Library' like Rhode, it wasn't easy to pique his curiosity. After all, he didn't earn this title out of nothing. Rhode had played the Dragon Soul Continent for years and he knew almost everything at his fingertips. It could also be said that he knew everything that every player knew and didn't know. Of course, he wouldn't be aware of the secrets that weren't unearthed yet.

Apart from gossips, Rhode knew everything about the class systems.

After coming to this world, Rhode had met with two incidents that he hadn't experienced.

One of the incidents was the talent tree fusion system. After Rhode activated the Hell Lord Talent Tree, the three individual talent trees fused and formed a unique talent tree, which Rhode had never seen happen in the game. The other incident was the system reward from completing this mission—the Sword Creation Point.

If the fusion of the talent trees could be explained that it was due to Rhode activating all three talent trees, then he had no clues about the Sword Creation Point at all.

Sword Creation Point?

Rhode knitted his brows. He studied the system for hours and he couldn't find detailed explanations about it. Perhaps the point was meant for forging weapons if he was a Production player. However, he didn't possess any forging skills, so what was the purpose of it? What is the point used for if it isn't for weapons forging?

Rhode couldn't possibly dig the official website and forums for any updates about the game. However, this didn't mean that he was helpless.

Since it is the 'Sword Creation Point', it surely has something to do with Swords.

Gracier and Madaras were the first that came to his mind. He had been wielding them for quite some time, but they had never joined the Holy Sword Card Deck. Although Rhode wasn't in a hurry, he didn't feel comfortable leaving this matter out in the open. Ever since they had ridiculously transformed into human forms, they didn't have any strange occurrences thereafter. Even though Rhode had tried pouring his spiritual powers into them, there were no transformations at all. Come to think of it, perhaps…

Rhode recalled the strange dream he had about the familiar, desolate land and the little girl who resembled Christie. If it wasn't for her, perhaps Rhode wouldn't have awakened the twin daggers. What relationship does the Holy Sword Card Deck have with the little girl?

However, the Sword Creation Point had nothing to do with the twin daggers. Rhode experimented with the daggers and both of them didn't respond at all. He had even drawn out Starmark and Succubus from the deck and they were equally unmoved. He thought that the 'Sword' in the 'Sword Creation Points' referred to the Holy Sword Card Deck, but it seemed otherwise now.

Although his experiment failed, he wasn't irritated. He had played the Dragon Soul Continent for years and he had his own ways of exploring other options. Since there was a 'Point', there must be somewhere for him to utilize it. As long as he searched slowly, he would surely find his answers.

As expected, he spotted the source of the problem after scanning through all his talents and skills in the system interface.

In the swordsmanship column under the character panel, there were some changes that Rhode had never seen before.

After coming to this world, his swordsmanship column had succeeded all the 12 swordsmanship skills that he had learned in the game. However, unlike the game, most of the swordsmanships were greyed out, which meant that Rhode needed to enter skill points to get his hands on them. The Moon Shadow, Starfall, and Dark Dance were the only ones among the 12 swordsmanships that were brightly lit. The mastery for Moon Shadow and Dark Dance were graded C and A respectively while Starfall had the lowest grade of E. Even though the other nine swordsmanships were greyed out, he realized that there was an empty white field. This was unusual because his swordsmanship column should have been fully used up. As a top-rated player, he was great at making use of everything. Although his EXP and masteries had been restarted, they weren't erased. Due to this reason, an empty field shouldn't exist.

Interestingly, the empty field was emanating white radiance. This was strange because it meant that Rhode could learn other swordsmanships, but he had never received any new swordsmanship scrolls or became an apprentice to a master. So how was it possible that he could learn new swordsmanships?

Rhode tapped on the swordsmanship column curiously. A system notification sounded and a line of words emerged.

[Consuming 1 Sword Creation Point. Confirm to create a new Swordsmanship?]

Rhode was astounded. He had never thought that the point could be used to create a swordsmanship.

In the game, although players could modify the swordsmanship taught by the NPCs to a certain extent, they were unable to create brand new swordsmanship for themselves. There weren't such settings in the Dragon Soul Continent, so most of their battle techniques were basically learned from NPCs and developed uniquely by themselves thereafter. However, the modifications were limited to reforming the techniques and its method of usages and it didn't relate to brand new swordsmanship. This was because the game system didn't support such modifications and most players weren't interested in them. Although some players attempted, they eventually failed without yielding any results. After all, most of the players didn't practice any martial arts in real life, not to mention swordsmanship. No matter how realistic the game was, it was still a game nonetheless. Even a true martial artist who had trained himself for decades might not be able to create unique swordsmanship, which made it even more impossible for the players who relied on the system to brandish their weapons.

But… creating a new swordsmanship…

Rhode had some ideas especially after he stepped into this world and experienced fights personally. His main weapon was the Holy Sword Card Deck, but all the swordsmanships that he possessed didn't compliment them. Among the four Holy Swords that he owned, they were categorized as swords, chain swords, and daggers. On the other hand, the [Moon Shadow], [Dark Dance], and [Starfall] swordsmanships were meant for single-handed swords. Rhode had no qualms in using Succubus and Starmark, but he felt uncoordinated wielding Gracier and Madaras. Although he could unleash unique swordsmanships for each hand, coordination would be a huge problem for him. Therefore, whenever he wielded Gracier and Madaras in battle, he was fighting using his past experiences.

Rhode once wished for an all-embracing swordsmanship that could satisfy his demands for all weapons. But how was it possible for such a wonderful thing to happen in this world?

But now, this opportunity had presented itself before him.

Creating a swordsmanship that was unique to him would be much more advantageous than learning from others. A basic swordsmanship like Moon Shadow was fine, but for a swordsmanship like the Dark Dance… Frankly speaking, Rhode didn't dare to display it before his summoned spirits. It was a secret taught by the Dark Elf and if the other spirits were to witness it, perhaps they might turn against him.

Rhode hesitated for a moment and tapped on 'confirm'. Shortly after, the image before him spun and a hexagon appeared. He had seen this hexagon before because it existed in every swordsmanships' introduction column. It represented the swordsmanship's strength, speed, flexibility, adaptability, explosiveness, and technique. An empty attribute field was in the center of the hexagon.

Strength represented the swordsmanship's strength. This attribute possessed immense aggressiveness just like the Starmark Swordsmanship which Rhode had built. A more direct example would be Barter at the Midsummer Festival, where his swordsmanship was mainly built on the strength attribute. Such swordsmanship was usually barbaric, violent, and unreasonable as though the force of a boulder rolling off a cliff and crushing the defenseless human below.

As for speed and flexibility, Rhode's Dark Dance Swordsmanship was the most notable representative. The Dark Elf's swordsmanship didn't require strength and sought to deal fatal blows to enemies using the quickest speed and strangest angle. On the other hand, the explosiveness represented the initial speed of a swordsmanship which required the holder's powerful agile value as support. Before the enemy had even drawn his sword, Rhode's sword tip had already struck the enemy's throat. This was an extremely important attribute to have.

The adaptability represented the requirements for weapons. Such a swordsmanship was extremely unique. If the holder wielded ordinary weapons, perhaps he wouldn't even be able to unleash half the strength of this swordsmanship. However, once the holder held a specific and exclusive weapon, he could display unprecedented might. Players differentiated swordsmanship through the adaptabilities. Normally, the lower the adaptability, the higher the level of swordsmanship. While the higher the adaptability, the more common and ordinary the swordsmanship was. The swordsmanship which Andre had used in Fiat was built around the weapon, Neptune's Sigh, which coordinated with its special effects. He could dominate with that weapon, but if he were to work with a standard military sword, his might would decrease drastically and the enemies would feel as though the coldness was from the air conditioner. Of course, this was just a joke.

The technique represented the corresponding support value. It would be affected by flexibility, speed, and could increase the might of the swordsmanship. The higher the technique, the more complicated the swordsmanship would be. Although the players preferred uncomplicated moves most of the time, there were many times when not only the complicated sword skills looked amazing, but they also possessed extreme threats. Besides… marvelous and beautiful sword skills were the most popular choices. The Swordsmaster Sereck in the Deep Stone City was the best example. He was only in the Master Stage, but he was deeply respected in the Paphield region because it was strongly related to his swordsmanship. Although Sereck's 'Sparkling Swordsmanship' wasn't too threatening to Rhode, it was breathtaking in the eyes of the ordinary humans.

The attribute in the center of the hexagon represented the elemental attribute of the swordsmanship which was transformed from the holder's spiritual powers. The elemental attribute could be considered incredibly important for a swordsmanship and it would greatly influence if the swordsmanship was meant for solo battles or AOE fights.

Rhode pondered in deeply. Although Rhode had obtained a certain amount of swordsmanship experiences due to the battles he experienced in this world, it wasn't that easy for him to create a new swordsmanship. Rhode recalled that no matter a martial arts novel or western legends, the top-rated swordsmen had either faced some traumatic incidents or cultivated in seclusion in order to obtain their very own swordsmanship. And now, how should he go about creating his own swordsmanship?