Chương 45: The Sword Unites

Rosalyn departed that very day with my grandmother, without managing to show me all the things she had promised to teach. The only consolation was that the books she had given me contained all the information I needed, so once again it was self-study. Father returned the day after, not looking the least bit weary, though I couldn't say the same about everyone else in the group. The expedition had been mostly uneventful and unfruitful, aside from them needing to fend off a bunch of savage animals.

They had found no signs of any more of those corpse flies, nor any indication of a rift breaking. No, they weren't searching aimlessly. A phenomenon like a rift appearing out of nowhere was hard to miss, as once it split open the fabric of reality, it tended to vomit out a large quantity of foul essence into the world. A seasoned Awakened could detect that from hundreds of metres away.

Hell, even if there had been no one among them capable of sensing the foul essence, they had an Essence Compass to lead them towards it, which had a range over a couple of miles of radius. Unfortunately, even that resulted in nothing tangible. Of course, the wilderness was vast, and a day's search was far from enough to cover it all. The expedition should have at least helped narrow down the location, but when Father spoke of it, he seemed oddly befuddled by the whole thing.

I was, of course, not privy to all the information, but I noted that they were already planning another expedition—this time a more thorough one, spanning over many days if necessary, and sponsored by the main branch of Serpent's Spite. All of that had largely nothing to do with me, except my father being involved in it. At least Father didn't postpone his promise to teach us the fourth form until the next expedition. And so, once again, Eran and I stood in our yard, looking up at his tall stature.

"Before I show you the fourth form," he began, "you need to understand that most people end their practice here, and there is no shame in acknowledging that."

"Why?" I asked.

"Is it too difficult?" Father shook his head.

"Although a case could be made for talent and discipline, it is more about want and need. The fourth form is where the line is drawn between those who merely wish to pursue the sword superficially and those who intend to live by it."

"Is the fourth form where you stopped teaching my father?" Eran asked.

"Your father stopped at the third, but his mastery was deep enough that he managed to pursue some of what I'm about to teach you on his own." He paused, considering his words.

"The fourth form is more intuitive; it teaches one to acquire a personal style. For most, that does not pan out." He spared me a look, as though I were among such people.

"I can only show you the way, as everything else is upon you from now. You can practise it until you have completed the third layer of swordsmanship and still not grasp it. Some practice for decades and still cannot unite their form, but those who do become a force to reckon with."

"Like you, Master Jinn?" Father gave Eran a rare smile.

"You said there are eight forms," I pressed.

"What about those who have mastered all of them?"

"I'll tell you when I find one," he said.

"How many have you mastered?"

"Enough to not be terrible at it." I made an annoyed noise at the cryptic answer, but Father quickly returned to the topic.

"Now, onto the move." He took his stance, unsheathing his greatsword before gesturing for us to step back.

"The first three forms teach you the basics, while the fourth teaches you how to fight. The katas become more intuitive, more individualistic, the deeper you go. There's also something to be said about aligning with the style." He shook his head, finding no point in going deeper into it. Without wasting another word, he began. The opening stance for the fourth form was far more relaxed than any of the previous ones. At first, he demonstrated it at a faster pace, his towering form moving almost in a blur.

Using my heightened attributes, I counted eight moves in total. A frown crept onto my brow, noting this form was somewhat reminiscent of Tidal Surge and Walking Mountain.

"The fourth form, The Sword Unites, tries to incorporate all the basics that come before it," Father said, now demonstrating slowly for our benefit. First came a chop, then a block. Then he stepped sideways into a returning blow, one form transitioning into the next with fluid precision. After finishing, Father demonstrated it once more, but this time, he began with a sword draw, moving into a low sweep...

"This one is different," I muttered, "from the one you showed before."

"Is it?" Father shot me a lopsided grin.

"How about I show you again?" He flowed into the movements once more, in this one chopping downwards before shooting forward into a piercing thrust…

"Now, it was different from both the others," I murmured, tilting my head. I glanced towards Eran for agreement, but he was completely transfixed, absorbing every detail with his utmost attention. I had no choice but to do the same. Father wasn't foolish enough to forget the moves he was teaching. There had to be a lesson here. He continued demonstrating the form. Not a single form matched the last.

True, many of the moves were the same, but their order shifted each time, though there was never a moment of discordance. Father's heavy form moved through the yard in a sinuous flow. The wind curled around him. His feet made not the slightest noise as he shifted into something akin to a sword dance. Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon. Entranced by the harmonic form, I forced my everything to etch it into my memory. Father had said the fourth form was intuitive.

Clearly, he wasn't going to hand me an easy answer. Solas save me, I already have one cryptic teacher in Mum, and now the other one's taking inspiration from her.

"I got it!" Eran shouted, palming his fist.

"The fourth form tries to combine the other three forms to make new forms!" With that, he attempted to imitate it. Eran's first three forms were textbook perfect—better than mine, if I were allowed to say so—but when he tried to move between them, it was far from smooth. A dissonance struck no matter where he started. He couldn't complete the kata without it looking as though he were cutting off an attack midway.

"Now you understand why it takes some a decade to master?" Father asked, sheathing his greatsword.

"How do you even do that?" I couldn't help but ask.

"As with any art," Father said, "practice." That was something I could get behind. But then I considered the total number of combinations possible within the fourth form. The first form had four moves, and the second and third had eight each. Although not all of them were unique, they were distinct enough that I counted them separately for my calculations. Within seconds, I realised that even with my hypercognition, I would need pen and paper to calculate the permutations.

I didn't like stupid maths anyway, but I could tell the number would be absurdly large—far beyond anything a mortal could hope to master in their lifetime. I guess now I know why people spend decades on the fourth form.

"It's all about practice and reflection," Father's voice echoed in my ears, snapping me out of my thoughts.

"You don't need to learn hundreds of complex katas or memorize them to death. The important thing is seamlessly transitioning between the moves. If you can do that with even a couple of dozen combinations, you'll be set for life." And then, he showed us those couple of dozen combined forms we'd need to master. This was not going to be easy. Since the day of Rose's departure, I had spent a large portion of my time working on Fabricators.

The number of gifts I had received only continued to accumulate, without me returning any favour. I simply couldn't accept that anymore. Not when I could do something about it. Although it wasn't a competition, I turned it into a challenge to motivate myself. I began my work with refining hardwood for Eran's gift, motivated to spend the full first layer of the way on the wood. With bits of work, it took me four days to refine it to Tier II. Anything beyond that was currently out of my reach. [Congratulations! Way of Refinement I (10/10) Complete.] [+1 Arcane Acuity, +1 Arcane Affinity.] [Way of Refinement II (10/25) is now accessible.] With the first phase complete, I could have started basic artificing, creating small objects that required minimal tinkering with runes. It would have allowed me to complete the first layer of Artificing in a day. But Mother disapproved of that plan, and frankly, I agreed.

The thought of endlessly repeating the same task just to gain a couple of points was stupidly boring and uninspiring. My philosophy was simple: If there's no challenge, if I'm not trying to improve, why even bother doing it? I decided to try my hand at crafting more utility-based Fabricators—not just simple water pots or wine containers. My first attempt was a portable stove for cooking. It took me two tries to get it right. The first prototype worked, but it was so inefficient that no one would bother using it.

Thankfully, the metal was reusable. Only my hard work and the essence used for the runes were wasted. On the second iteration, I nearly perfected the runes. However, I had made the stove's plate thinner to make it more travel-friendly. That design choice made the structure unstable, as the thin plate couldn't handle the induced heat properly. Honestly, most of these issues could have been avoided if I had just taken a moment to think instead of rushing in on a whim. Only my eagerness to blame here.

For my third attempt, I slowed down, planned carefully, and the results spoke for themselves: [Fabricator: Common Grilling Pan] Grade: Common Enchantment: Heat (Fire Runes, Elementary) The spell description didn't do justice to the sleek design I created. It was practically a small shield, thinner than half a finger. To use it, one simply needed to place a container over it to cook. I tested it by roasting a few sweet potatoes.

"Now I can cook my own food!" I exclaimed, unable to stop the grin creeping onto my lips.

"Goodbye, spinach and stupid bitter vegetables." While the potatoes cooked on low heat, I moved on to working on my very first gift. Since Eran was barely at common class, I believed I could craft something that would satisfy his needs. It didn't have to be perfect or too extravagant, since he might refuse, thinking it was too expensive. Thankfully, I knew exactly what he needed. I had even finalised the design last night with Mum's approval. A shield.

Eran had been practising the Way of the Shield during combat class regularly, using the standard gear provided by the institution. I couldn't wait to surprise him with it. For some reason, I decided to make the shield octagonal. What could I say other than that I was inspired? For the first prototype, I started with regular wood. There were a few complex runes I needed to test before committing to the refined material.

First, the Harden rune was a convoluted fusion of Amplify and Earth runes, requiring a full shell of at least nine runes to function properly. And that wasn't even the complicated part. The second enchantment I planned to add was a function which would release a strong kinetic force. Since Eran couldn't activate it with essence threads, I had to design a manual switch.

I planned to test it several times before carving it onto the refined hardwood, as I refused to take any help from Mum other than her approval on the design. But to my surprise, the first iteration looked almost flawless, at least in terms of the rune work. By then, the sweet potatoes had finished roasting, as a sweet, delectable smell wafted in the air. Catching one with a telekinetic pull, I turned off the Fabricator and turned my gaze towards the shield prototype.

I was about to put it to the test and see how long the unrefined wood could last when the system's voice rang in my mind once again. [Congratulations! Way of Artificing I (10/10) Complete.] [+4 Unallocated Points.] [Way of Artificing II (10/25) is now accessible.] I blinked in surprise. Didn't I fail a few times over the past few days? Shouldn't my progress only be at the halfway point?

"Looks like the failures were only failures by my standards," I muttered, blowing on the roasted sweet potato before tearing it open. With my Fortitude standing at twenty-five points, I barely felt the heat. Just then, Mum entered the workshop, and instantly her expression froze, looking at the state of the workshop. Since the Institution was on a break on account of the possible rift, I spent hours within the confined walls of the workshop, too transfixed by my work to bother cleaning.

My work had left the entire space in complete disarray, with tools, metal plates, and stacks of designs scattered all over.

"I'll clean up once I'm done," I said, handing her one of the potatoes. Mum gave me a long look, then glanced at the potato in her hand. A couple of golden threads twisted around it, peeling it, appalling me by the sheer artistry. But then, she put it into her mouth and flexed her fingers. Dozens upon dozens of essence threads flew from her palm, her Influence cascading through the entire workshop.

Objects I had left scattered about lifted and rearranged themselves under her telekinetic power, shifting back into their proper places one by one. By the time she finished eating the roasted potato, the workshop had already returned to how it had been before I started working.

"I see your shield project is going well," Mum said, sparing a glance towards the prototype. Then, as if remembering something, she added, "That reminds me, have you found the one I made for you?"