Chapter 38

Journey begins

The wind harshly crashed against me. It was coarse from the sand, my skin felt dry and it stung my eyes.

Sandstorms are a normal occurrence in Bergaritt. This one is only one of the harsh ones. And right now, I was in the middle of it all, the wind violently trying to take me along with it, the sand hitting with force that even made me hurt.

But amid all of this, I was swinging my sword. Slowly as I tried to fight against the storm. My arm felt tired every time I brought it down with each swing, but with it, my swing became harder, faster, and more precise.

It's been around five days since I left Caram Village to train. My skills have deteriorated more than I expected. A month without training has left my senses a bit dull and my body did not respond like I wanted it to.

It is what they say, Stop one day and you will lose two days. I stopped for a month and now I am back to where I was before the teleport incident.

I need to keep my edge sharp if I want to survive here. This place isn't the second most dangerous place for a reason.

There are still a lot of things I need to practice for. Like the Long Sword of Light but I can't even pull out the Sword of Silence.

The technique that is Flow of the water god style, I may have mastered it but I still didn't tap into its true potential. I knew of the five secret techniques of the water style but I never had a chance to learn it. Only heard of it.

And my most neglected style, the north god style. Ghislaine didn't teach me North god or water god style as she only knew of Sword god Style. I learned the other two on my own using Paul's teaching as basic and adding them and then mixing it with Ghislaine's teaching making Master the Flow.

But the North god style is much trickier. That was literally what I meant. The style is incompatible with me. The use of tricks and lies blends with more use of items to get an advantage over opponents.

It is not for me. But there is a reason I try to learn this too. It was the best style to adapt to the situation I faced, no matter if it was a monster or...people. With North god Style I can buy time and adapt myself to their fighting style.

And what's more, this style is the most adaptable to magic, unlike the other two this one actively uses it. It will blend well with me, But I still need to manage my control over magic. Right now I can't focus on magic while in the heat of the situation.

North god style, at least from what I learned from Paul. Is a combination of multiple techniques from each School then you throw that away then start to think of a new technique. There are a lot of similarities between North God School and other schools.

But the technique that makes the North School stand out is the Toki Manipulation. A way to control mana much more naturally than my Magic Sword trick.

My magic Sword trick is basically covering my blade in concentrate toki and changing that mana into fire, water, wind, or earth.

But the Toki Manipulation is different. Instead of weaving your mana into flame or water, you control it in its purest state. The mana, although weak, was more versatile than any element form.

I could make it into a sharp blade and no one would even notice it, I could have it drill through people without them even seeing it.

At Least the wind still leaves a trace, but mana is not. Except, of course, you possess the Magic eyes which allow you to see mana. If I advance in it enough, maybe I could even combine the two techniques and create a new technique entirely.

And although controlling magic and mana is different. Magic is a form of mana after you give it your imagination making it take shape. I can feel a faint trace of mana but I can't imagine it. That is why I need to learn how to manipulate Toki. It was an important step to advance and learn about my Path of Swordsmanship.

"Ha!" I let out a cry as I slashed downward with all I got, The storm split for a second and began to reform. This has been going on since I started training.

My arm felt like it was going to fall off, sweat was pouring down on my head like it was raining and it didn't help when the sand was sticking to that sweat.

I have been trying to cut this sandstorm apart for three days now. I came across it while looking for a good place to train.

At first, it made little progress due to how rusty I am with the sword, but as I get my sense and instinct back I start to split it apart but not for long before it reforms.

At least this training helped me get back into my form, the last month made me slack off too much.

But...I still want to split it apart for good. Grabbing the black heart harder than before I began to slowly form Toki.

Making the Mana covering me as dense as possible while draining the least mana out of me. It was hard. I was constantly pricked by sand and wind making it hard to concentrate but after ten minutes, I was ready.

Looking forward, I held up the black heart. And with a heartful shout, I slash it, letting the mana in my blade violently fly out of the storm.

The wind violently crashed against me, it blew up in every direction, in the eyes of the storm. I cut it in half. A miniature storm started to form around me as the remaining wind died down.

I was smiling to myself from ear to ear. It stretches across my face to the point of it hurting, even.

I did it. Even though it was not the strongest storm in here and it began to reform into miniature form right away, I still did it.

Not only did I reach back to my strength after getting teleport but I further advanced it too. And it will continue to so, I will get stronger. Until I can save them all, until I can take them all back and we become family once again.

This is my promise to myself, both now and to the future. Until I can keep my family safe, I won't stop training.

///----\\\

"Are you all ready!?" Lemes's loud shout gathered the attention of everyone here. They all shout out in response.

Today is the day we will start to journey back toward our home. Back toward the Fittoa Region. Back to Buena village.

According to Lemes, with this many people, it should take us around three years to reach the central continent.

From what I saw from the victims of the teleport incident here, most of them appear to be in their twenties, with only around ten elders and a few children.

And at least ten of them will not make it through this journey. Lemes had told them already, that it was dangerous and would take a long time. Our location left a lot to be desired after all. We are the furthest away from the central continent.

It even took me three months to reach from where I am to this village.

Monster stronger than The central continent is the norm here, harsh weather that I couldn't do anything about. I don't even know if most of them will be able to stand up to the heat in the middle of the desert.

But alas it must come to this. Many choose to stay behind, and we only have around six people who can fight. That includes me, Lemes, Karias, and Karas. The other two warriors are going to come with us only because they want to go to the Maze city of Rapan. Which should reach in around two years.

With Lemes as the leader, he ordered every noncombatant to enter the carriage. It would be a tight fit.

I waited as everyone finally finished sitting down there, My job is guarding the carriage. The warriors's main job is to ward away monsters, I just need to take care of the ones that getting close.

"All right! I hope that everyone! Let us go now!" With Lemes's yell as an indication. The Armadillos start to move and soon enough The Caram village is nowhere to be seen.