The crucial part would come when Abel placed the gem into the gap. Yes, once he did so, he would have to guide his own Power of the Will through the energy path.
There were only 2 exploding big swords and a scroll of Town Portal in Abel's Horadric cube. During his battle with Simon the worgen, he used one exploding big sword, and he hadn't made a new replica ever since. Luckily for him, if he failed this time, he could just throw the product into the Horadric and fuse the three swords into one big sword.
By this point, Abel gained a lot of experience when it came to guiding the force of the gem to the center of the rune. After about half an hour, however, this rune he drew didn't seem strong enough to do the job. The outer strokes of the rune began to turn red, and soon it melted and vanished. After it had melted off, the power of the gem began to disappear as well.
It wasn't like it was the first time that Abel had failed. Oddly enough, though, the problem seemed to be with the rune ink this time.
But it shouldn't have been. When Abel was mixing the rune ink, it was shining in white sparkles, which meant that the ink formula was right.
Was it because the rank of the rune ink was not high enough? Was the gem simply too powerful? Abel evaluated for a bit. He was already using the best ingredients for the rune ink. It didn't seem possible to find any better ingredients.
Abel kept on thinking. In the dwarf's magical weapon forging guide, there was rune drawing instruction and rune ink formula for weapons of every attribute. Actually, not for the attribute-less runes. Abel could not figure out why. After all, they should be the easiest ones to make.
But actually, even the dwarfs could not help it. The ingredients required to make attribute-less rune ink were too hard to obtain for ordinary people. Hardly anyone apart from the wizards could supply them which was why the dwarves wouldn't even bother putting it in their magical weapon forging guide.
Ordinary runes ink only drew its energy from one attribute source. However, these so-called attribute-less runes ink had multiple sources. In other words, it was a mixture of all the existing attributes. It was also much more potent than other types of runes. Therefore, normal ingredients for rune ink could not withstand it, and that's why things like the runes strokes melting off had happened to Abel.
Abel took out the rune sign from his chest pocket. It was said that this sign could evoke the attacking power of an attribute-less rune, which meant that these attribute-less runes could be used. However, the only problem was that Abel didn't know what kind of ink was used to write this rune. Furthermore, this rune seemed to be its source of energy. Since the rune was still visible in the sign, it had to be supported by some unknown energy that Abel was unaware of.
Abel had an idea. If the normal potion could be combined to make a potion of higher ranking, could he do the same with rune ink?
At that moment Abel felt a passion burning within him. If it was about the two exploding sword within his Horadric Cube, he wanted nothing more than to throw them somewhere far away. They were useless to Abel since all they did was waste space for him to make new things with the Horadric Cube.
After he had confirmed on his idea, he dug a deep hole outside the castle, and carelessly thew the two exploding sword inside.
BANG. It was like a walk in the park. Abel thought that he should've just done this earlier.
After Abel had returned to his workshop, he took out the Scroll of Town Portal from the Horadric cube, and carefully placed it in a metal box. These are the most important possessions of Abel. If he wasn't in need of combining something, Abel would often keep the Scroll of Town Portal in the Horadric Cube. That way both of these treasures could stay in the same spot and be safe.
Abel took out some more ingredients. He made 3 attribute-less ink according to the formula and threw them into the Horadric Cube straight away. In a flash of white light, these 3 rune ink disappeared without a trace. In the top left corner of the Horadric Cube, a new bottle of the rune ink began to appear.
It was a success. This opened up a large potential for things Abel could do with the Horadric Cube in the future. But little did he know, the value of this rune ink was so much higher than most things available for purchase in this world. The dwarves would be willing to trade countless exotic gems for something like this.
Abel picked up this new bottle of rune ink and dumped it into a darkness style crystal bottle. The bottle was shimmering in blue sparkles. From past experience of combining potions, Abel knew that this was an intermediate rune ink, and all the ones he had used before were all basic levels.
Abel took out an almost finished modal of a sword of a hundred skills and began to draw the rune on it straight away. He had gained experience in drawing this rune from the last attempt, so this time it was a lot faster. However, using intermediate rune ink required a lot more power of the will. After he had completed, he once again felt that knees weakening lethargic feeling, it reminded him of the time where he drew his first rune.
Abel rested for a while. As soon as his power of the will was recovered, he immediately placed a gem into the sword handle. He then used his Power of the will again and guided the energy from the gem to the rune.
This time, Abel was actively guiding the energy throughout the rune. It wasn't like he had full control of it, however. He did not expect the speed of the energy to travel so fast. A large amount of it shot out from the gem towards Abel's power of the will, like a car speeding on a highway. Luckily, Abel reacted on time. He also sped up his reflex in using the Power of the Will, and almost finished the guiding process with a little less than ten minutes.
Abel's eyes were fully fixed on the magic sword in front of him. It was shimmering in blue sparkles, but it was not the type of blue from those ice magic swords. If you looked at it carefully, you would notice it was actually the same blue sparkles as the bottle of intermediate rune ink.
The blue sparkles swam around in the strokes of the rune for a while, and slowly faded away. Abel stared at this magic sword in his hand.
"These blue sparkles. Does it mean that this magic sword had a higher rank than all the other ones?" Abel thought to himself.
No one could give him a straight answer for that. Up to this point, Abel had been the only one who was doing the investigating and experimenting.
Abel waved this attribute-less magic sword around. It felt just like the normal ones, and its uses should be the same as well.
He then chopped up some firewood with the sword. Again, it felt just like all his other swords. Nothing special really happened.
Abel put the Scroll of Town Portal back into his Horadric Cube and left the operation room caring for his new magic sword.
"Have you seen the Knight of Marshall?" Abel stopped and asked steward Lindsey, who was busy with his own tasks.
"Young Master, the headmaster was in the training room," Lindsay replied, to which Abel thanked him and headed for the training room.
The butler Lindsey smiled as he watched Abel walked away. He was very proud of this young master. With only 13 years of age, Abel was unlike other noble youngsters who only cared about living a lavish lifestyle. Everyone knew that Abel was a genius but who knew just how much effort and dedication this young master had put into his work.
Steward Lindsay had seen many noble youngsters throughout the years, and none of them had the dedication of young master Abel. After the young master became a Master Blacksmith, all he did throughout the days were making things in his workshop.
Not many people other than Steward Lindsey knew about this. Also, not a lot of people knew that the Knight of Marshall's favorite ice magic sword, the castle savior Harry's bow and the two gigantic bear trap that captured a few giant beasts trying to enter the castle, were all handiworks made directly from the young master himself.
Maybe when Abel had become an adult, Harry's knight estate would already become Harry's Lord estate. WIth Abel in the house, there was no limit in the potential he could bring to those around him.
Abel, on the other hand, didn't seem too concerned about what Lindsay was thinking. Now, all that he could think about was to test the new magic sword with the Knight of Marshall.
The moment when Abel had entered the training room, he could already hear the sound of a big sword slicing through the air. It seemed like the Knight of Marshall was practicing his basics.
Abel did not interrupt the man. Instead, he simply watched from the side and wait for the Knight of Marshall to finish.
The Knight of Marshall was practicing the basics. Yes, the basics, but Abel could feel the impact of the swings from several meters away. The Knight of Marshall was putting his entire strength into his swings, which was contradictory to the "never go all out rule" he had often heard on earth.
While he continued to watch the Knight of Marshall practicing his moves, Abel started imagining inside his head. He began to imagine what would happen if he was standing in front of the Knight of Marshall.