The Amber Sword

Raw energy stones were also called experience crystals in the Amber Sword. Mages classified them as a type of material that was formed by the gathering of a large amount of purified holy magic. Because it was pure, it could be absorbed by the majority of creatures – and even demons – that resided in Vante. Therefore, you could say that this crystal in Brendel’s hands was something that the frost demons outside of the Holy Seal Forest had been coveting for thousands of years.

But Brendel gently held this crystal and felt its weight in his heart. Malourcha had guarded this holy magic for thousands of years but ended up giving it to a stranger like him.

“Yeah… this a raw energy stone. I’ve only read about them in story books from the old times. Legend has it that before the War of the Holy saints, the mages could craft these things.” Brendel answered.

“You said you’ve seen it in a story book. Are you talking about Sophie or Brendel.” Maynild asked from behind him. He could tell that the difference mattered to her.

“Both.” Brendel lied in order to avoid talking too much about this topic. He thought he needed to avoid talking with the female knight about the past; otherwise she’ll point a sword at his head again.

That wasn’t a good feeling.

He just thought it was weird that Maynild seemed to care about the dream but simultaneously also avoided it. This was certainly contradictory.

“You should know its effect, right?” Brendel turned around and asked.

“Me?” Maynild considered it and answered, “The literature says that raw energy stones could elevate someone’s strength. Sometimes, it can even help those who have no hopes of finding the entrance to the next realm. But I think this is all fool’s talk. There is no gain without labor in this world.”

“That’s not completely true.” Brendel looked at the crystal in his hand. He knew what Maynild said was technically true. This experience crystal really only  had one effect — and that was to give its pure magic to the someone who absorbed it, in the form of experience.

In the entire Amber Sword, there were very few things that could directly increase experience. Fragments of divine instruments, raw energy stones, the Pool of Blessings and a Golden Apple.

But because of that, they seemed extra precious.

Brendel tossed one of the raw energy stones at the female knight and asked, “Regardless of the legends, don’t you want to give it a try?”

“Me…?”

The female knight caught the crystal and held it with both hands. She asked with some surprise, “Why give it to me?”

Brendel smiled. Truth was, he didn’t know either. Probably because this thing no longer had any effect on him. As an item that could increase experience, raw energy stones were pretty low in rank. It had the most effect on someone who was transitioning between platinum and golden level and could transfer experience almost without fail. But for someone like him, who had already undergone elemental activation, the effect was naturally reduced by a lot.

Of course he could have considered Medissa, Ciel, or Pahimila.

He didn’t know why, but when he saw Maynild he made the decision subconsciously. “The stuff in legends isn’t always real so I’m planning on using you as a test subject.” He answered.

The female knight gave him a deep look.

She suddenly lowered her lashes and asked quietly, “Are you planning on giving the other one to Freya?”

Brendel paused. “You know?”

“Because I had the same dream you did.” She answered quietly. Then her voice softened, “But no matter what, thank you.”

The female knight carefully examined the crystal in her hands and then carefully put it away. She raised her head and looked seriously at Brendel. “I really like this gift.”

“Because you want to become stronger?” Brendel seemed to have realized something. He squinted.

Maynild nodded slightly.

“Let’s look at the other item.” she answered.

Brendel was actually a bit impatient himself. He took up the golden circlet in his hands — though the name Circle of Convenience made it pretty clear that this thing was used for. This thing was of the same type as Dimension Space, Dimension Bag, or Ring of Drawers — a magical item that is used to store things in space .

But slightly differently from the Dimension Space, the Circlet of Convenience only had two slots so it could only store two items. But it had a special characteristic that no other storage item had — the user only had to think about it and the stored item would appear instantly in the user’s hands without any extra action from the user.

It was called the Circlet of Convenience because of this characteristic. In the game, this circlet itself was a very precious piece of equipment. Players who possessed it would often use it to store weapons so that they could instantaneously switch weapons and catch their enemies off-guard.

Just this characteristic itself meant that Brendel had won something just by having this item, even if there was nothing inside. But he still hoped that something would be inside. After all, the Circlet of Convenience usually contained weapons.

And weapons were one of the most valuable kind of magical items.

But when he took up this golden circlet, a thought flashed in his mind and he had to pause for a second.

The circlet had two items inside.

One of them was practically worthless. It was just a stone fragment. But the stone fragment seemed so familiar to Brendel because he had seen something exactly like this in another dead person’s belongings.

He immediately remembered the dark gray stone fragment he had taken from the belongings of the deceased Sir Bokenelson, Amadina’s father. Because he had never figured out what the stone fragment was used for, he had kept it on him this entire time. As soon as he saw the item inside the Circlet of Convenience, his heart jumped and he hurriedly took out that stone fragment from the pockets of his jacket.

He was immediately stunned upon comparing them.

Identical.

Aside from the shape and size, every characteristic was almost identical. The color, pattern, and even the fact that it had no trace of magic were the exact same.

“What is that?” Maynild couldn’t help but ask when she saw the stone in Brendel’s hand.

But Brendel shook his head and answered truthfully for the first time, “I have no idea…”

The female knight looked at him dubiously but refrained from commenting. Naturally, Brendel noticed her look. He felt a bit like someone who swallowed a bitter pill and couldn’t complain about it — nobody believed him when he told the truth. He didn’t know whether this was a classical case of the boy who cried wolf.

But after some consideration, he put away the two stone fragments. Good thing that Malourka had been sealed into a card. There will be a chance to ask it about the secrets of this stone fragment. As a Crystal Stag that existed for thousands of years, Brendel thought it would not collect a worthless stone fragment like Sir Bokenelson would.

After putting away the stone fragment, Brendel then took out the other item in the Circlet of Convenience.

It was a piece of parchment.

Actually, he’d seen something similar the first time he’d met Babasha. The Amber Sword only had one name for things like this.

Technique scroll.

But the techniques recorded on a technique scroll varied.

Destruction of the newborn

(Supernatural/Ancient)

Burn life and convert it to elemental power.

Prerequisite for studying: Sage Realm, Bloodline attribute 300+

Brendel’s gaze slowly traveled across this blood-red parchment. All of the font on it became blurry and all he could see were just the two words.

Supernatural. Ancient.

Marsha above, Brendel groaned inside.