"I am grateful that Claire did not inherit your genes."
Layman had brown skin and messy eyebrows; although he was not that bad, he was not too far from the term 'ugly'. Claire always used to tell him she was too scared to go near her father when she was a child. Arthur often teased him using the same piece of information.
When Layman heard his words, he fumed in anger. He knew he was not a good-looking man, but who would dare to criticize his looks considering the strength he had? Maybe they did behind his back. He didn't care as long as they wouldn't do it in front of him.
His hands itched to beat Arthur, however, recalling his status, and he was his master, Layman could only swallow his anger. Who asked him to provoke Arthur?
Provoking him was the same as spitting towards the sky. Spit would get back to his face. Layman's eyes then fell on Gath, who was busy rubbing his stomach in satisfaction.
Gath paid no mind to the cold war happening in front of him as he was too happy to eat such a huge portion of delicious food. He had never eaten such tasty food and couldn't help but comment, "Young master Arthur is blessed to eat such delicious food every day."
Gath would've never imagined that those words would attract the biggest disaster of his life. Layman trembled in anger and pounced on Gath, who startled at the sudden change.
A few minutes later, Layman sat in front of his camp honing the spear with a pleased expression. On the other hand, poor Gath laid beside the fire camp with red bumps and bruises. He also lost some of his teeth.
'My poor teeth!' He lamented.
Oblivious to what had happened at the camp, Arthur arrived at the open field and unsheathed the sword from the leather scabbard. The sword that Alvar especially hired the blacksmith to forge.
The sword was forged from the rare obsidian steel. The Obsidian steel was the rare metal that could be found inside the volcano. It was a lump of metal formed deep inside the volcano from the merging of a few versatile metals.
As it would always be inside the volcano, the high temperature would wash away all the impurities and change into a weightless, malleable metal.
The obsidian steel was not steel, and they named it after the appearance. It was not suitable to make swords or any other fighting weapons, as its intrinsic properties were flexibility and weightlessness. The enhancers were close combat fighters, and they would need a formidable and destructive weapon.
But with Arthur, it was the opposite. He excelled in speed, and light weapons were his companions. As for the impact, lightning was famed for speed and destruction. It would compensate for the drawbacks.
Arthur was surprised to find the sword made of obsidian steel because metal was flexible and incongruous for making the sword. However, after tempering with the different metals, the blacksmith somehow managed to remove the ductile property.
It only weighed a little compared to the obsidian steel and far better than the steel swords.
Not any run-of-the-mill blacksmith could change the obsidian metal properties, but Arthur wasn't aware of the matter. His father spent quite a fortune making this sword. Sometimes ignorance was bliss; otherwise, he wouldn't have used such a precious weapon casually. This 'sword' was tailor-made for Arthur.
'Quick Flash,' Arthur thought of a name as he caressed the sword. The sword glinted as the moonlight touched the blade. It was a dual-edged sword with a pointed end.
Two longitudinal grooves were running through the flat side of the blade from the rain guard to the narrow ending of the sword.
The hilt was broad to settle two hands, but because it was light weighted, one hand was enough. Finally, the Ash tree symbol was carved on the pommel.
"Weight does not differ much from the ash wood swords," He muttered as he played with the sword.
Arthur then attacked the large boulder before him. He didn't use the lightning as he could only control the lightning for 10 minutes. Unless there was an emergency, he was against the idea of using lightning in the adventures. After all, he was not going on sight-seeing.
Arthur used the basic sword technique, Pierce, to attack the boulder. When the sword tip touched the surface of the rock, it went inside without any resistance as if it was not strong in front of him but cheese. The sword only stopped after the sword hilt met the boulder.
"It's so sharp!" Arthur exclaimed as he pulled the sword. He learned no sword skills except for the basic techniques.
If anyone would want to learn weapon skills, they should meet the two requirements. They must know the primary weapon skills, and they must be able to use the aura.
While Arthur had mastered the sword skills, he could not control his aura yet. To any skill, the aura was like an energy that would give life.
He felt his control over his skills was a tad worse with the real sword in contrast to the wooden sword. To solve this problem, Arthur familiarised himself with every basic attack until he felt better.
Hooking, cutting, slicing, hacking, pointing, hanging, and carrying. Arthur used these moves again and again until he felt he was getting good with the sword. After finishing the training, he looked at the boulder which was no more a boulder. It had turned into small pieces of rocks.
"I think that's enough for now," Arthur said to himself as he rubbed the sweat off his forehead with his sleeves.
At the time when he was about to leave, he suddenly felt someone watching his back. Arthur turned around with 'swoosh' and peered into the surroundings. While he couldn't see everything in the night, the full moon gave ample light to see the night.
"Is it my imagination? Or am I too sensitive?" He mused. However, a sudden arrow darting towards him denied his assumption and he immediately dodged to the side.
Parrying the arrow with the sword was a piece of cake for him, however, he didn't opt because he wanted the enemy to underestimate him. Dodging and parrying were totally different.
Even a noob adventure could dodge the arrow with keen perception, but only the veterans with certain strength could block the arrow.
Hoping enemies did not see his sword skills, Arthur put on an act of being weak.
Arthur knew if the enemy saw his sword skills, his act was nothing but an act in the end. He hoped they would arrive after he finished the training and didn't escape from him.
A hundred meters away from him, two people stood on a tree. They wore the same dress—a red shirt and brown pants. One had the bow with an arrow knocked onto it, and the other was holding a dagger in his hands. The man holding a dagger was an assassin.
"Now what? I told you not to attack. We are only scouts!" The assassin said.
"He is just a little kid, and I thought he would die under my attack. Besides, he couldn't even block my attack and dodged. Why don't we kill him directly?" Archer whispered to his fellow assassin. Even though he didn't think Arthur could dodge his attack, he was sure that they could kill the little boy off with a single attack. After all, they were both in the intermediate stage of enhancers' first transformation.
The bandits had found the carriage a few hours back, but they didn't want to take the risk of attacking without knowing their opponent's powers.
Thus, the bandit captain sent them out to scout for information. They were only responsible for knowing the enemy's strength, yet they attacked him. If Arthur were to escape and signal his allies, their plans would be disrupted. They couldn't take the risk of letting him free.
"We have no choice. You act as bait, and I will kill from the shadows," The assassin ordered. Apparently, he was annoyed by the situation, if their boss were to know the mess they created, there was a chance he could kill them.
"You want to kill me?" While they were whispering the plan to kill the kid an innocent voice rang behind them.
The duo's bodies stiffened.
They gulped down and turned around. Sure enough, it was the kid. But when did he arrive? He even had a huge grin on his face.
The assassin immediately tilted his body and attacked Arthur. A red-colored mist was coming from his body when he attacked Arthur. It was one of the seven aura attributes—the strength attribute.