Chapter 41: A New Rune
Translator: Exodus Tales Editor: Exodus Tales
Abel took out the rune sign from his bosom. According to The Knight of Marshall, the rune sign was designed to repel away enemies. Only the #4 rune, Nef, fit the description to cast such a special ability.
The 4# Nef was meant for chasing enemies away. Once cast, it would deal +30 defense against ranged attacks.
This was the first time that Abel had seen a rune in this kind of form. Both runes had a very different method of usage, It was very similar to the runes in Diablo 2. However, the runes from Diablo 2 were required to be equipped onto the equipment before it was able to function. On the other hand, the runes in front of Abel needed to be crushed before using them.
Abel picked up the rune sign and studied it carefully. He didn’t know what material it was made from. The rune sign looked like it was made from stone or wood, but as Abel inspected closer, they weren’t. So Abel couldn’t even uncover what it was made from, and there wasn’t anyone to ask.
The runes above were written in pretty much the same way as the Dwarf’s spell-forging book, except that it was missing some kind of runic circuits. Furthermore, it wasn’t powered by any gem, so Abel couldn’t even figure out how the rune was gaining its’ power from.
At first, Abel had looked down on the technological advancements of this world. However, now that he had once again witnessed the purpose of these runes, as well as discovering the legendary 300 years lifespan of the wizards. Abel began to realize, this world’s civilization was developing in a direction completely different from his old world.
Abel realized something here. In this world, technology was not meant to be convenient nor helpful for the average people. Even the smartest researcher was more focused on theories alone, let alone focus on things that could raise the standard of living of the society as a whole.
Just think about it, almost everyone on Earth had ways to make fire. But in this world, the wizard could stretch their hands make fire with a spell. And since that was the case, no one bothered to find better ways to do things. Even if the “elites” managed to innovate, all the benefits would just go to themselves and not anyone else.
From what Abel had heard from The Knight Of Marshall, the wizards didn’t question what ordinary people could do, and ordinary people often had a very hard time communicating with wizards.
What Abel didn’t realize was that the runic sign he despised was a very valuable item to that novice wizards. These wizards were known for using such expensive items.
As Abel slowly traced the runes from the rune board onto the sheepskin with his rune pen, he carefully contrasted every detail to perfection and precision.
The next morning, Abel completed his basic knight training and handed Black Wind to his Butler Lindsey. After he had his breakfast and headed out directly to the temporary blacksmith guild.
The Knight Of Marshall decided to wait until the orcs gathering time on the map to finally announce the end of the orc attack. As Marshall hasn’t made the announcement yet, the castle was full of leaders. During these times, the servants of the castle were very busy as they had to prepare two meals for so many people.
In this world, most people other than the wealthy and nobles, usually only had two meals a day. After paying a large amount of tax on the exports of the land, there wasn’t much left for themselves. With Harvest City being the fiefdom’s primary source of the granary as well as Knight Of Marshall being the Lord of the castle, he had to distribute a large number of provisions for the general public around the area.
As Abel passed through the public square, people bowed to him from the side of their makeshift tents. He always nodded back to them with a smile. These kind gestures and actions from Abel ignited rumors that Master Abel, the successor of the Lord was a kind, peaceful and loving man. As a result of these rumors, it filled the leaders with hope for the future.
After Abel entered his operations room, he took out a forged sword of hundred skills that already had a groove on the sword handle.
According to the Magical Weapons Forging Guide, the fundamental material required to make the 4 main magical runes ink was similar. The only difference was that Fire magic runes ink were mixed with fire type plants. Ice magic runes ink were mixed with ice type plants. Electric runes ink were injected with electric eels blood, and toxic runes ink were injected with venomous snake venom.
As for making the runes ink that was capable of repelling attacks, Abel wanted to keep the same fundamental materials in all 4 of these runes ink but removed all the other materials that had special properties.
There were all sorts of materials within the operations room since Master Bentham has collected various materials for many years, and after Abel had successfully forged the magic weapon, Master Bentham was able to post material requests from the Mercenary Union which allowed him to gather even more fresh materials.
This wasn’t the first time Abel was making the rune ink, but this time there was no detailed configuration description. He was only able to create this ink according to the previous configuration experience while exploring new variants. By subtracting several materials as would’ve changed the balance of the configuration process. To precisely and correctly configure the new ink, Abel needed to find out the new balance point of these materials.
One portion of lost spirit grass, one portion of breadfruit, 20 drops of bitter almond oil, 12 drops of Holly oil, 10 drops of jungle frog blood, 8 drops of rosemary, 12 drops of eucalyptus, 5 drops of lemon essence, and finally pure water.
As all the materials were taken out, Abel had to think twice about each of the material that he put in –The fusion time of the front material, the release time of the back material, and the intensity of the fire.
It was easy to determine the success of the ink, this world had a wizard characteristic formula. Abel’s magic ink was one of them, if the configuration was successful, there would be a faint white light during the split second of the moment of success. As long as you saw the white flash, it meant that the ink had been successfully configured.
After continuous tries of experimentation in attaining the successful configuration, Abel conducted a method commonly used by previous generations of scientists. Which was to record his every move of the steps he made and timed himself with an hourglass and recorded down any useful or related information.
Abel was very patient with his research. Every attempt after the previous, a small change was made according to the previous record. In one day, although the configuration of ink was not successful, Abel’s configuration level had made great progress. He had improved tremendously throughout the day.
When Abel realized that he only had enough materials for tomorrow’s experiment. He went forward to his Steward, Lindsey, and asked him to arrange some mercenaries from the Mercenaries Guild to collect some materials back for him.
The second day of the configuration with the runes went comparative smoothly. At the 86th attempt of Abel’s experiment record, there was a flashing white light on the rune pen. Abel could not help but admire those who have studied and researched the four runes. This was because Abel didn’t invent a new formula. Instead, he removed some of the materials from the original formula and compared it with the previous formula, all while conducting scientific experiment methods. It took him 86 times to finally succeed and he took more materials to attain the correct configuration as well as he didn’t compare them. But he could hardly imagine how much time did they took to research to get these results.
Looking at the ink on his hand, Abel was filled with a sense of accomplishment. If the experiment is successful, the value of the rune ink in his hand would worth even more than the 4 main types of rune ink. This was because the ink in his hand had no special properties and could be used more widely.
Abel took out his rune brush and began to draw the runes, it was like a walk in the park to him at this point. He expended his power of the will, the sword of a hundred skills had been magnified multiple times in his eyes. The rune brush moved smoothly on the back of the blade. This time, he even added a few extra rune energy routes to the old rune formula to maximize the energy delivered.
Throughout these months of forging the sword of hundred skills and writing magical runes, Abel realized his Power of Will had increased a little. Normally, Abel’s power of the will would be completely drained after completing a magical rune, but this time he still had a little bit left. However, the difference was so insignificant, ordinary people can’t notice it.
Abel was very excited by this discovery. He always relied on this mysterious power of the will, yet he never knew that he could increase it. If it kept on increasing in the future, it would be very beneficial to his study of runes.
Abel knew that these runes in front of him could be combined into the rune language “Ancient Vow”. However, one challenge he faced was that all 3 runes in the rune language “Ancient Vow”, always had to be drawn in one sitting. Abel always thought he won’t have enough power of the will to do it, but now, he finally had a glimpse of hope.
Abel knew deep down in his heart that he was only 13 years old. The Power of the will would gradually increase as he gets older. Especially now that he had discovered a way to exercise his power of the will, he would be able to draw the rune language “Ancient Vow”
For the choices of gem to be put onto the sword handle, Abel picked a diamond that was made from three steel gems. Diamonds were known to be one of the most beloved stones in this world for women. To them, it was a symbol of love and fidelity.
However, for Abel. He chose the diamond because it had no attributes, and it was the purest gem out of the bunch.