The horse neighed as the cart tumbled down the dirt road. Rastel swung into the cart from behind while still silently chuckling to himself, he took a very calculated risk and was happy it all went according to plan.
Looking into the back of the truck, there were a few small crates and containers. He opened one up and saw it was filled with some type of dried meat that was preserved to last longer. He took a few and put one in his mouth chewing on the salty flesh as he went to driver's seat.
Myra was having a hard time trying to control the horse, ever since they went on the path, the horse always felt the need to veer off the path and into the forest where she would have to tug hard on the reins to steer it right.
Rastel looked at her tensed up face and smiled. He thrust a meat jerky to her face and she looked at him with hesitation before slowly biting down on it. She chewed it with obvious enjoyment on her face as she tightly gripped the reins not letting go even though Rastel was back.
Rastel who had already extended his hand to collect them was left hanging awkwardly. "Erh…. Myra, you can hand back the reins now, you don't have to force yourself"
Instead of giving it back, her face just seemed to get more focused as she looked forward. "No, I can do it!"
"You're sure?" he asked with concern.
"Yes!" she said with conviction.
Rastel looked at the horse which seemed to be getting under control then back at her before sitting down with a sigh. He bit down on another meat jerky as he brought up his inventory to assign his free points. He put two of the three free points in END to bring his health bar to 200 and the last one to DEX. He felt no need to add points to his MEN and INT stat as he had the race trait of increasing the stat with the more books he read.
After he was done, he took out an iron ingot from his inventory and stared at it. He had decided to start training his sculpting skills to better bring out the powers of his unique class. The iron ingot was only slightly larger than his hand and wasn't much but it was cheap enough. He decided to trade his blacksmithing aspirations for sculpting.
Taking out the immortal's blade, he went to work trying to sculpt out a shape from it. He never really paid attention to the art of things before when making something but this time, he really wanted something good to come out. They kept on moving for about thirty minutes, Rastel carefully carving away at the piece of iron and Myra diligently controlling the cart.
Rastel made the last piece of adjustment to his work and stopped to look at it when suddenly,
DING!
YOU HAVE CREATED A SCULPTURE!
DO YOU WISH TO NAME IT?
'This is it?' Rastel looked at the notification before saying "Yes"
CHOOSE A NAME
"Immortal's blade"
SCULPTURE: IMMORTAL'S BLADE CREATED!
Rastel looked at the sculpture as the stats came out.
Immortal's blade
Rarity: Unique
Type: Accessory
Attributes: None
It really was the immortal's blade he sculpted. As it was his first time, he decided to do something that he could see and use as a reference. The sculpted blade had a sharp edge and hilt that curved inwardly with a small stone of iron in the center. He even sculpted the handle exactly how it was or should he say as best as he could.
Even though the sculpture looked nice-ish, anyone who saw the original Immortal's blade would treat it as the disgraceful failure it was. Some edges were sharp and the surface was rough, his carving technique was mediocre at best.
He stared at the blade and turned it over a few times as he looked at one point or the other before putting it in his inventory.
'Okay, let me try this again' he brought out another iron ingot and started carving.
This time, he took barely 20 mins to finish the immortal's blade. It was a bit better than the last one but was basically still the same thing.
He sighed as he put the failure and brought out another iron ingot. He was just about to make the first cut when he remembered something. He quickly brought out the yellow covered book and flipped through it till he reached the part with the combat skill.
"Carving series, first strike" he read out loud as he studied the skill again.
He wanted to see if there was a way to learn the skill through actual sculpting. As it was a class based on sculpting, it would make sense for the skills to be useful in actual sculpting situations.
He studied while nodding his head from time to time. Myra looked on from the side with curiosity as he made slicing motions with his hand using the immortal's blade from time to time.
After a while, he put the book back into his inventory before holding up an ingot and staring at it. He then raised the immortal's blade as he held the ingot at arm's length before yelling out loud. "Carving series! First strike!"
He slashed coolly at the top part of the iron ingot as he cleanly shaved a paper thin layer from it.
"Woah!" he was amazed at what a simple change in movement could create such a difference. This new cut was smooth all through and even. It looked so good that even Myra cried out in amazement.
"Oh! What was that? That was amazing!" she said with stars in her eyes.
"I know right? This hero of yours is really amazing" Rastel looked faked a smug look as he took in the compliment.
"Amazing hero! You are really amazing!"
"Haha! Compliment me some more!"
"You're the best!"
"Heh? Thank you, thank you. Much appreciated" he faked a small bow from his sitting position.
It was after he finished all his posturing that he noticed an important point, he didn't get the skill!
"Ehn? Why not?" he didn't hear any notification to inform him that he had learnt the skill, did he need to do it a few more times?
"Hah..." he sighed deeply as he went to work, soon enough the cart reverberated with yells of Rastel shouting out the skill's name.
"Carving series! First strike!" a paper thin piece of iron flew out as he cut through the little ingot remaining. He suddenly heard a loud sound.
DING!
New skill acquired!
Carving series: First strike
The first movement of the carving series used to make perfect cuts with a powerful slicing technique
"I did it! I finally learned it!" Rastel yelled in joy.
He had not finished celebrating and Myra was about to ask him what happened when all of a sudden, they heard a loud bang and the cart started veering sharply to the side!
BANG!
SCREECH!!!
NEIGH!!!!
The horse neighed loudly as it lost control and collapsed in a small ditch by the side of the road. The cart on the other hand turned over as it tumbled a short distance.
"Hero!" Myra reached out to Rastel in fear. He grabbed her hand and brought her into his embrace as they flew out of the cart and landed roughly on the floor.
"Are you alright?" he asked Myra who seemed to be shaking in shock.
"You have the time to check on her you damned muan? You should be more worried about yourself instead" a voice echoed out from above.
Rastel looked up to meet the eyes of a tall wood elf with brown leather equipment. He had shiny light green hair and his eyes of the same color blazed with malice. He held a stylish long wooden bow in his hands with a knocked arrow hanging downwards as he smirked at him.
"Finally caught up to you! You're going to pay, you bastard!"