Something black was covering the grass. On the liquid, there were some areas where the light was refracted and transformed into different colors. The dense substance resembled petrol.

As Thorn and the girl raised their eyes they discovered that the oil was falling from a gargantuan creature. The exoskeleton of some ancient crocodile. The white bones were in stark contrast to the petrol stains on the ground.

The seed perturbation in the mana net was coming from above the creature.

"Hey, you. I'm over here!"

 

A handsome man was standing on the creature. He resembled the man in the picture "Wanderer above the sea of fog" but he had glasses, a hat and was smoking from a pipe. He took a pouch from one of the bags behind him with his left hand and jumped down to land in front of Thorn.

He did not make a huge sound as he landed. He was as light as a feather. Almost incorporeal. His pipe left a trail of mesmerizing grey smoke that traced his trajectory. As the smoke dissipated Thorn paid attention to the right arm of the man. His arm had no flesh or muscles but just bones.

Thorn immediately raised his guard. "What.. What do you want?"

The man, who was not happy with being greeted like this by everyone he met murmured: "18? no 17 seconds should be enough" and launched the pouch into the air. For some reason, there were no plates and the pouch kept getting higher.

Then with his left hand, he put away his pipe and said: "I mean no harm. My name's Luke. Since you found me you must have a high leveled handcrafting skill. Good! If you can make the thing I need you will be hugely rewarded."

At that moment the pouch that was falling down landed on his left hand and Luke handed it over to Thorn. Thorn opened it and saw some kinds of crystals inside. The girl glanced at the contents of the bag and exclaimed: "Ohh You have so many two-state crystals."

...

The day later Book-San received a telepathic message from Thorn explaining what had happened. Since Will had also woken up they could finally meet up.

"It's good to finally meet you Will. I am Thorn."

.

.

.

Will was distracted when he saw the girl for the first time. He recognized her: 'Princess Luna. The one who derided me. What should I do? Take revenge for my family? No. Calm down! She might be a mean person but I don't think she has to do with what happened to my family. My enemies are the arch-mage and his followers. But if I take her as hostage I can exchange her for my family.'

 

Princess Luna: "Do I know you? You look familiar."

Will thought: 'She doesn't recognize me? Ahahahah. Indeed. A lot of things have happened in the last few weeks. I have lost weight, gained muscles, and injuries. If I looked at myself in that expensive mirror we had at home even I would barely recognize myself. I can use her to get back my family but I need to work together with Book-San and Thorn.'

Although Will hated the princess a small part of him was ecstatic to have met her again. He wanted to show her how much he had changed. What the person she had once called a pig had become. 

Will therefore smiled and said to the princess: "I don't think so. I have a familiar face. People think they know me all the time."

Luna: "Yeah. I know what you mean. People always think they recognize me too! Nice to meet you!"

Will: "Nice to meet you too." Then he looked towards Thorn and with a handshake said "Nice to meet you, Thorn."

 

Thorn nodded and said: "I've made a new book holder for Book-San. If it's ok for you I will take Book-San back."

Thorn equipment had been upgraded. The book holder had a complex multitude of wires that would make keep it more stable, even when moving. It was like a camera with optical stabilization. 

Thorn had also gotten a sword. Well, almost a sword. For some reason, this sword was missing the point. Instead of having a blade, it had a hinge.

Will handed over Book-San. When both their hands were touching Book-San they heard the princess say.

"Ah. You are here. Let me say goodbye to them and then we can go."

A knight had arrived at the meeting place.

Will thought: 'It's probably one that is assigned to guard the princes. But I didn't sense him coming.'

Thorn who could sense mana orders of magnitude better than Will thought: 'How come I didn't sense him?'

Both raised their guards. Still both holding Book-San.

 

They felt heat coming from the opposite side. A ball of plasma was coming towards them. It was not the knight that attacked them but something else. They moved out of the way but couldn't move Book-San completely out so the attack since he was in the ball's trajectory. Thanks to the Hardcover Book-San was not harmed but only blasted towards the area where the knight and the princess were.

The knight was not protecting the princess. Instead, he has blocking her so that she would be hit by the wave.

That ball of plasma was an attack that was impossible to defend against. If Thorn and Will had received it they would have died. But they didn't and now the princess would die. Will and Thorn were dealing with a terrifying foe and they hadn't see through his first move.

The bracelets at the princess's wrists took life and transformed into chains and weapons that tried to block the ball. Unfortunately, they were not enough and she was hit. 

One of the 13 blue stones on her necklace was consumed and a shield was generated to protect her.

The one who launched the attack showed himself: "Sorry kids. The archmage doesn't like witnesses." He was the blue-robed mage that contributed to the arrest of Will's family.

Luna said to the knight that was now holding a sword to her throat: "Are you rebelling? Once my father knows he will turn you to ashes."

Knight: "Your father is delusional. Only by following the archmage, we can win the war against the demons."

Blue-robed mage: "Now you two drop your weapons or she will die."

 

Thorn and Will did not know what to do.

Book-San was on the ground near the knight. If it was a few days ago he would not be able to do anything. He would not be able to change the situation before him, but today...

Book-San: "Reader, with each view, with each like, with each comment we share we are changing. With every item, you give me we are able to overcome more challenges. When we encounter a knight, a mage, a dragon, or a god, we will be able to defeat them. If I was just grinding like everybody else and didn't have this connection, didn't think to write to you I would still be at the library and I would have been burned down by now. Thank you for giving me this shortcut. I will use it."

 

---

The knight dropped his sword due to a hole formed in his wrist. The nib was truly sharp.

Luna used her chains as a sping to get away from the knight and the true fight begin.

Knight: "What the hell was that? Who did it?"

 

The knight picked up his sword again and slashed towards the princess. Will, ironically was the one that protected her. 

He thought: 'How dare you hurt my hostage.'

Will blocked the knight's sword. 

Knight: "Hey, hey. Are you sure you wanna use a sword that heavy? If you strain yourself too much it can be bad for your health."  

Will: "Don't worry. I'm still young and got plenty of energy to spare?"

Knight: "Ahahah You call that energy? If you keep joking like that I can't fight seriously."

The knight slashes were now orders of magnitude stronger. Will was near his limit but he still persisted.

 

The walls around Thorn were getting colder. The temperature was dropping. What was the archmage up to? 

Ice was forming on the walls and there were veins in the ice where you could see a faint blue light. Suddenly one of these veins grew brighter and an electrical discharge hit Thorn. 

Thorn screamed in pain.

Mage: "Now do you see the difference between you and someone who has mastered two forces of nature?  You have got no chance, kid."

Thorn hit the wall. A small portion of the ice fell down. 

Mage: "You can't remove all the ice before it reforms. This technique is undefeatable."

The mage was right. Thorn could not do it alone. 

Countless chains hit the walls in unison resembling a fish jumping repeatedly out of the water or stones bouncing on a lake. The sound from the collisions was a song of hope to Thorn a song of despair to the mage.

Mage: "You should have escaped while you could!"

 

The temperature dropped again. The veins became the thickness of an arm and could not be destroyed so easily anymore. Icicles began to form on the walls and shot towards Thorn and Luna. Luna had to stop breaking the ice to defend herself.

It was worse than a tempest. The icicles and the lightning hid and complemented each other creating powerful attacks. Thorn and Luna began to take hits. Thorn fared better since he could use the movements of the Greatest swordsmanship to evade. Some of Luna's blue stones activated defending her from some deadly attacks. She now had 7 out of 13 left. She retreated to the batterfieled where Will was fighting.

 

'Should I have escaped ?' she thought. Then Will protected her from a fatal strike.

'This guy is protecting me even though he doesn't even know me. How can I leave him to fight alone?' Will, Luna, and Book-San began to attack the knight.

 

Thorn was now fighting alone against the blue-robed mage. This level of difficulty was still bearable. He then noticed a strange light on the ground. As if the sunlight was going through a lens. He had formed a suspicion but he was afraid of confirming it.

He looked at the sky and the situation was as he feared.

"Monster"

 

A plate in the sky rotated and revealed its previously hidden side. On it, there was an icicle. As big as him. There were icicles like this on many other plates.

Mage: "What monster? This is what magic can do. Kid. You have done well by lasting this far. Maybe in another life, you could have been my student. Your lack of knowledge is the cause of your downfall. What made you think that I could not control the sky? Or the ground..."

Thorn had planned to evade the icicles but now the ground had become slippery. It had become frozen. From there, ice snakes began to grow binding his feet.   

As the icicles began falling down Thorn took seemingly incomprehensible actions. He made the sword rotate on the handle of 180 degrees so that he would see the other blade. 

Mage: "Why is he doing that? His blades look the same. What's the point of changing the blade that is going forward."

He then pierced towards the sky with his sword that had a hinge instead of a blade at the point.

The mage had no idea as to what was going on.

...

The day before...

Thorn: What are Two-state crystals?

Luke: "They are crystals that can be orange or blue."

Thorn: "What? Is that all?"

Luna was giggling.

Thorn didn't like to be fooled. He was going to return the crystals and go away but Luke stopped him: "It's a test. I am proud of my blueprints and I won't show them to just everyone. If you want the crystals as payment first try to understand what makes them special."

Thorn accepted the challenge. After a few minutes of studying the crystals, he said: "Crystals of the same color attract each other and those of different colors repel each other. The useful thing about these crystals is that you can control the strength of the attraction or repulsion via mana. So they could be used as bullets.

Luke: "Good! You passed. Now I'll show you what I need you to buil... "

Luke stopped talking because he saw Thorn thinking deeply about something. He was thinking about a device that he could now make.

...

Continuation of the battle...

As he trusted his sword towards the sky the sword split in half. The two parts were connected by the hinge. A sliding mechanism made the hilt slide until the hinge. The sword now looked like a triangular prism with a hilt at the middle and a circular opening on one point.

Thorn took some objects from the pouch and inserted them in the circular opening. He then shot towards the ground. The shot broke the ice and propelled him away from the icicles' trajectory and made him land at a point without ice.

Clap, Clap

Mage: "Well done. You had me worried back there, kid. For a moment I didn't know what you were gonna do. But is that all you have? A gun? In front of magic, it is just a toy. You would have been better off using a normal sword. It would have been less tiring."

With the gun form, Thorn could make long-range attacks on the mage but he could not use it to defend. That's why he used it only after Book-San that had read the comments arrived in his left hand using the magic pen.

 

---

You received:

---

 

Book-San used the skill multiple times to defend Thorn and send the pen back to the knight's battlefield. 

The knight's blade was on fire, he said: "This technique can cut anything."

He slashed his sword and it left a sign on the wall. Before the slash reached Will Book-San's nib attacked from an inconceivable angle and the knight dropped the sword on the ground for the second time. Will's strike then made the knight unable to move.

Will: "Now that the cannon fodder is gone I'll be able to take revenge for my family." 

The mage was going to be in a 1 vs 4 battle but he did not worry too much due to his almost inexhaustible amount of mana. 

Will took the hits directly wanting to exchange a hit for a hit while Thorn kept shooting. The princess and Book-San created opportunities for their attacks. The mage encircled Will with an ice sphere, an attack he had used when Thorn noticed him in the labyrinth. But this time Book-San broke the sphere with the nib and the four were in the perfect position to execute their plan.

 

Will blocked a ball of plasma launched by the mage while Luna's ankle's bracelet chains that had tunneled underground emerged and bound the mage. During this time Book-San had launched a paper swirl that had blocked the view of the mage. He did not see the bullet that Thorn shot.

 

"What are Two-state crystals?"

"They are crystals that can be orange or blue."

 

On the ground near the mage, there were only blue crystals but the one that Thorn had shot right now was an orange one. His goal with each shot has never been hitting the mage. When the orange crystal was close to the mage he activated its attraction power and all the blue crystals on the ground went towards the orange crystal. The crystal did not care that the mage was in the way. They simply passed through him.

Everyone fell on the ground to rest after the difficult battle. Will was the first to wake up. He was displeased of not having been the one who dealt the final blow to his enemy. He went to the mage to interrogate him. 

In the mage's eyes, there were some figures moving.

Mage: "I'm sorry, father."

Will: "You dare talk about family?!"

But the mage didn't listen. The figures, become brighter and projected a small image in the sky. Those were the mage's memories. He was a student of magic engineering with low talent. What made him mad was that the sons of the nobles with an ever worse talent were judged better than him and kept receiving official positions.

Then a man came to him saying that by following him he could have a better future than those nobles. This man, the archmage, helped him with his studies and let him bond with the other students. After a few months, his grades dramatically improved but his talent was still lacking.

The archmage said: "I can make your talent stronger at the expense of your lifespan. Think carefully before accepting."

This man had done so much for him and some other students of the archmage also accepted so he didn't hesitate. His life from that day was one of parties and leisure. The archmage had given him a good position in the country's army. But one day he came to talk to him.

Archmage: "Do you remember those nobles that stole your rightful position? I want to change this country. All the nobles, demihumans, and such things will be eliminated. Will you work for me?"

The blue-robed mage accepted to repay the archmage's gratitude.

As the story progressed the images got bigger. 

In the last memory, a giant archmage appeared and said: "Your mission is to kill the princess. Also, kill those that interacted with her. Leave no witnesses.

The image begin to emit the archmage's aura that rapidly grew to a monstrous degree.

"Father!!! I let you down. I am sorry. I won't hesitate. Please accept this gift, please accept my sacrifice."

 

Thorn and the others were shaken by the archmage looming presence: "This is just a part of his aura? I don't want to fight him."

The others were as shaken as Thorn. The aura was several times more powerful than the blue-robed mage's aura. In an instant, it disappeared and shot towards the mage's body. The mage's body lighted up and transformed into a giant plasma ball that shot towards the group.

Will Thorn and Book-San used all their abilities to block it but some of the energy passed through them. Only Luna received its full power. It was as if it was targeted at her. She had four blue stones left. 

3

2

1

0

The shields generated by the stones were destroyed one by one and after that the light plasma hit her. The attack was so strong that even her body disappeared. 

"Noo." Will was the most shaken by this development.

The presence of the archmage was still there and was looking at them: "I, the archmage leave no stones unturned. Do not dream of leaving this place alive." He then cast some kind of barrier that prevented them from communicating to the outside, but it could not stop the communication through the pages of Book-San.

After saying this the archmage's presence disappeared. Book-San and the others did not look at the levels gained by the fight. The mage, the knight, and the princess were dead. It all happened so suddenly.

Then they heard the sound of a lyre starting to play and Luna's chains reached toward the sky to stop something from escaping. It looked like they grabbed just air. After a long struggle, they brought it towards the last blue stone. The stone became white and flew away.

The group did not know what had exactly happened but they had a bit of hope. So while heavily wounded they did their best to move away from the fight's place. After finding a portal, they entered it.

 

They found themselves in a small, fortified village. A barrier prevented them from going out.  A house door opened and someone dressed in heavy armor appeared. In the sky, there was a countdown.

---

Third trial: Conquer

Starting in 18 hours

---

 

Thorn said: "Book-San, where is my sister?"

"She is also in the third trial. Our and her portal were close to the center. This must be how you enter the third trial."

 

On the wall of the house where the troop came from it was written:

---

Settlement level: 1

Required for next upgrade: 10 troops

 

Troops available: 1 troop

Next troop produced in: 58 minutes

 

Max number of troops: 5 troops

Troop production time: 1 hour

---