Earth's Greatest Magus

With the knowledge he obtained from the scrolls that entered his mind, Emery executed the techniques he had just learned against the level 8 combat puppet.

Of course, having the knowledge of a technique was not the same as actually knowing how to perform it. Emery tried to execute the [Weeping Phantom] as best as he could, but his attempts  ended in failure.

He lacked practice. One wrong move would ruin the flow of the technique, whether it was his steps or the sword variation. Due to that, his attacks failed so many times, and Emery was defeated over and over again.

Meanwhile, Master Xion was just sitting on the side of the arena floor in a lotus position, gradually healing his wounds, while occasionally opening his eyes to glance at Emery’s current progress.

After a dozen attempts, all ended in failure, his master told Emery to stop, rest and meditate. He should learn from his losses while recuperating his body.

Failure and practice went hand in hand in mastering any new technique, and this technique didn’t appear to be a normal sword art at all.

”There’s no need to rush it… my Weeping Phantom is rated as an A rank battle art. If you could even come close to mastering it in 5 days, you would already be considered a sword genius.”

Emery decided to heed his advice, sit on the arena floor in the lotus position, and start to meditate. He cultivated his spirit using the method that came with the two techniques his master had bestowed him. As Magus Xion had explained before, a real technique required the combination of three things.

First was the cultivation method. It involved breathing techniques that would help him channel his spirit force into the right nerve points, thus allowing him to successfully cast the skill.

Second was the sword hand mastery, that involved him memorizing all the 6 variations of movements and using them in the right time, depending on the situation.

Third were the steps, particularly the skill specialty. It enabled the user to move to its target with a pace and speed. For this particular skill, it was able to create a shadow mirage.The part of the skill that made up for its name.

Shiingggg!

The noise his sword made as it was drawn from Emery’s side was distinct. Each time he attempted to use the final strike of each variation, the shrieking sound could be heard. As he practiced more and more, Emery was starting to get the hang of the technique, but he was still unable to defeat the puppet.

Emery kept practicing, but not even once did he manage to beat the combat puppet. 

24 hours passed since he used the scrolls, so Emery decided to take a longer break and access the second skill he had just learned, [Shadow Edge]

It was a battle art skill along the lines of his [Heroic Slash] and [Hidden Stab]. However, unlike those two that only required sword skills, this one had as prerequisite the mastery of the darkness element spirit. After all, it was an elemental sword attack.

With the aid of the symbol on his palm, Emery reviewed the information he received, comparing it to his master’s movements before. Eventually, he found out the base concept of the skill was similar to the [Dark Infusion] a spell his master had taught him before.

However, unlike the previous technique, [Dark Infusion], which was a pure spell, for this sword art Emery would need his blade to perfectly execute the technique. 

The best blade for the skill was a one-edged sword, as it was optimized to perform a strong slash attack. 

Right now, he already had the perfect sword at hand. The sword given by his master.

Emery stopped resting, took his blade and stood up. He raised both his blades in the air. He concentrated the best he could, as he followed the channeling technique required for the skill. 

The moment he managed to get it right, his dark core thrummed with energy, as his spirit force moved onto the blade, engulfing its surface with darkness energy.

This skill had three main steps. He had to master all of them to successfully execute it. First, he needed to know how to generate spirit force and put it into a weapon just like [Dark Infusion]. Second, he needed to measure how much power he could gather and channeled into the blade just like his [Dark Matter] spells. Last but not least the third step, the one he was unable to do.

The ability to release the force that had gathered within the blade.

Emery tried swinging the blade downward with all his might multiple times, but he could not grasp how to properly release the gathered power.

Every time he did, the energy gathered in the sword dissipated into mist before disappearing.

He tried again and again, until he could feel his energy almost completely depleted. Still, there was no result.

Impatience started to bubble in his heart, as he gripped the sword tight and swung it aimlessly.

”Damn it!!”

As he released his anger, he glanced at his master a few times, but Magus Xion remained unmoving. He couldn’t really tell whether his master was too wrapped up in his healing, or he just did not want to give Emery any tips.

Hours passed with no sign of improvement. Even after Emery emptied his spirit core of energy, there was no result. As he was dejected and ran out of energy, he had to take another hour of rest.

After he felt his spirit energy refilled, Emery grabbed the sword again and channeled the spirit force into the sword. This time, he forced his dark core to fill the sword with as much energy as he could.

”Let’s just push it to the max!!” Emery thought to himself

A large amount of energy had filled up the sword, making it thrum with the sheer amount of darkness energy. Satisfied, Emery decided to quickly swing it forwards as required by the technique.

Right as he did, Emery felt something happen to the sword. He started to crack a victorious smile, but right as he did, a small crack appeared on the blade, before the crack expanded and the blade broke into shards of metal.

Craaackkkk!!!

Emery looked at the broken remains of his sword, then turned to look at his master with a wry smile. He had just broken another one of his Master precious swords

”...”

Well.. at least he got his attention now…

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Written by Avans, Published exclusively by W.e.b.n.o.v.e.l,