Chereads / The Endless Library / Chapter 5 - Blessings

Chapter 5 - Blessings

With a smile, Marcus charged straight to the knight, he began assaulting the knight with powerful attacks, striking his sword hard enough to break the knight's block.

Marcus only continued, striking hard and quick at the knight, the two exchanged hits with each other as the fight went on.

Celestine looked at the fight with great interest while the rest were annoyed.

Even after so much hits, the knight kept standing. Marcus only smiled back, enjoying the fight rather than trying to end it quickly.

"Alright, this is getting pretty boring" beating down and weakening the knight heavily, Marcus slammed the butt of his weapon at the helmet of the knight, quickly killing him after a drawn out fight.

Quill let out a sigh of relief as the body started to disappear.

"Took you long enough."

With the fight finished, Calliope grabbed the book.

"So this explains it all fully." She spoke to herself, the book detailed combat and weapons of soldiers.

"Seems none of them use normal weapons, only ones blessed by a mage or a witch." She continued.

She turned to the group, preparing to read from the book she held.

"Each weapon holds one of the four types. Either a spiritual, mental, emotional, or physically bound weapon. Each harms different parts of the person to kill them. For instance a sword could only harm someone's emotions, while a bow can harm someone's spirit and nothing else."

"So each weapon has been blessed by a single type of these four." Calliope took her sword off her waist, holding it in her hand.

"To know what the mages blessed your weapon with, each weapon has an engraved text of the type their weapon was blessed with on the tip." After reading, Calliope looked at her sword.

Her face turned to one of confusion after staring at the tip of her sword for a few seconds.

"Infinity? Strange…"

Colton looked down at his weapon, scanning the top part of the hammer. He found a word etched into the metal, but could not read what it said.

"Show me your weapons." Calliope ordered the group.

She approached each of them, taking a glance at their weapons and saying what their weapons held.

The flamberge held physical, the hammer held emotional, the bow held mental, and the rapier held spiritual.

After the quick rundown, the group started to leave again.

Calliope continued reading the book, heavily interested in what it contained.

"Marcus, you act recklessly. But I must thank you for discovering this book." The sentence shocked Marcus, seeing Calliope as a strict soldier beforehand, the brief words of gratitude came as a surprise to him.

"You're welcome." He quickly replied.

The group continued down the path, the desk and place they once stayed in was no longer visible behind them.

Colton looked down at his weapon with the newfound knowledge of what it does.

On the move, Calliope began to read from the book again.

"Common soldiers fighting against the Civilization may be weak towards all four of these types. However soldiers who develop resistance from past experiences or from training, may endure the effects of these weapons."

"A soldier who has particularly thick skin and is able to endure injury to the skin, may be affected less by a physical blessed weapon, but will be weak towards the rest if resistance is not developed against them."

After an hour of walking, Calliope stopped. She turned to her group behind her.

"It seems these bookshelves span far. The end seems out of reach…" She was clearly tired, but kept a tone of authority.

"Madame Calliope, will we return back?"

"At this moment, perhaps. We will simply gain what information we could from the books close to the table. I apologize for my haste. I hoped we could try to finish this task by simply advancing as much as possible to gain the most knowledge. But it seems this place spans an entire kingdom." She explained.

"It seems best to return back, we must always stick close to where we call a home or at least a spot of safety." Quill added.

"Indeed, well. We can take a longer rest than normal here before we make our way back. This task may take far longer than I wished."

The group sat around with each other, checking their weapons or observing the surroundings.

The place was calm, with almost utter silence. Warm air breezed through the pathway as clumps of dust flew by.

Quill and Celestine spent their time practicing with their new weapons, while the rest of the group continued to rest.

"Say, Colton. Were you a soldier before becoming a dungeon warden?" Marcus asked, the question caught Colton out of nowhere.

"I used to, for a few years. Then Calliope suggested I join as a dungeon warden head." Although surprised, Colton still answered the question.

"Well that makes more sense. Did you consider mercenary work?"

"I wanted to keep order and peace in the place i called home."

"Oh." Marcus replied, his voice turned cold upon hearing his answer, stopping the conversation immediately.

While they rested, a sudden crash alerted them. Celestine was on the ground, her back to the shelf with books scattered around her, having fallen while practicing with her weapon.

Quill ran to help but stopped quickly. A glow appeared from one of the books, getting brighter as a figure began to form above it.

Celestine hastily grabbed her rapier on the ground, quickly getting up and getting into a dueling stance.

After a few seconds, the being materialized, it wore a long blue robe that touched the ground, its hands were empty and muttered something under its breath.

"Seems like this one is a mage." Calliope quickly notified the group.

"So, about that attack type thing. What do you reckon that thing is weak to?" Marcus asked Calliope.

"Unsure, it would be better to just try attacking it and see if it endures the attack or gets heavily injured."

Before anyone could try and move forward, the mage thrusted both its hands to the sides. Suddenly, a massive gust of wind threw the group back.

Celestine was still standing on her feet, only being pushed away by the wind. Quill was behind her, on a knee but quickly got up. The rest of the group was far away from the combat, struggling to get up after getting thrown.

Celestine trembled while trying to keep her stance, the hooded mage turned towards her. Continuing to mutter something under its breath.

Before it could attack again, an arrow struck it in the chest, causing it to stumble back.

"Celestine, attack it!" Quill yelled at her, preparing to fire another arrow at the staggered mage.

With heavy reluctance and fear, she ran forward. She began attacking the mage, thrusting at it with her rapier while keeping her stance.

After a few strikes, the mage thrusted his hand forward at Celestine.

A strong gust of wind slammed into her chest, pushing her back a few steps and bringing her to her knees.

With her ally on the ground, Quill began firing more arrows from her quiver with greater speed, each shot pushing the mage back.

He began sending gusts of wind at her direction, enraged.

But she moved away after each one, managing to dodge and attack at the same time with great speed.

The mage's strength dwindled with each arrow shot, with what power it had left, it threw another gust of wind at Quill, this time it managed to hit her, throwing her into the bookshelf.

Celestine began to get up, looking at the heavily injured mage, in a moment of adrenaline and fear, she ran towards the mage and began attacking it again,

Her attacks were rapid, smoothly moving around the injured mage as he struggled to try fighting back.

With one final strike, the mage fell to the ground, Celestine began to breathe heavily, calming down and realizing the situation.

She dropped her sword in shock as the body started to disappear.

The group soon gathered around after the battle ended, the twin clerics quickly ran to her and Quill, preparing to heal them of any wounds they had sustained.

"Well done you two." Calliope congratulated before grabbing the book and taking a look inside it.

Celestine continued looking at the spot where the mage fell.

"Hey, princess girl. Are you alright?" Marcus asked.

Celestine took a few seconds to reply. "Yeah, I am alright." She grabbed her sword and placed it back on her waist.

"Perhaps we do not need to walk all the way back." Calliope commented.

Her right hand began to glow purple as an oval shaped portal began to form behind her.

"Wait, can we leave this library now?" Marcus asked, excited.

"Not quite, though this one can bring us back to where we began. Come." She turned around and quickly stepped inside the portal, the rest of the group slowly started to enter, one by one.

As Colton stepped through to the portal, he saw the familiar desk and tables. The portal had brought them back to the very beginning in an instant.

After the last person stepped through, the portal disappeared.