He wondered, why his mentor hadn"t advised him to spend more time on control.Now that he had practiced with the wooden sword, destroying tens of them, it was time to apply it on his real sword.
He carefully followed the by him developed steps and soon his sword was wreathed in flames, while still being cold to the touch.
"Yes!", he spontaneously let out a scream of excitement.
< congratulation="" you="" have="" developed="" a="" new="" way="" to="" gain="" the="" effect="" flame="">
Your method has been graded as Unranked, since it is ineffective, while having high requirements.
+5 Honor for being the first to use this method.
Remark: Who would have expected that something you developed would be ineffective? Wait, I did!
>>
"Wow. I didn"t expect to gain something like this."
Once again he ignored the remark. Even though the five honor wasn"t that much for him he was still happy to get them.
The best thing to him was that the System had given him a name for this skill.
* After I finish here I will have to check out more information about Flame Enchantment.*
But now that he had a way to attack and defend it was time to get rid of this vine.
Before that he checked out his other gains during his experiments. Not only had he developed a new skill, but his Will Power had increased significantly too.
It seemed like trying to find new ways to apply his skills was a great way to train it. If it wasn"t so depending on inspiration it would be great to do it a few more times.
Once again he and Vlada proceeded forwards until they reached the area, where they had been stopped the last time.
This time he was ready when the vine shot towards him and he parried with his flaming sword. When the vine got near it, it instinctively stopped because of its fear of fire, which enabled Ivan to easily stop the attack.
"Great, it works."
Using his sword to block all incoming strikes he got closer to the tree, from which the vine came from.
The vine was winding around the trunk of the tree which was more than two meters wide. Following it upwards he saw that it ended somewhere in the top of the tree.
Because he had no easy way to get up there he could only hack at the vine in the hope to remove as much as possible of it.
When he struck the vine he realized to his surprise that the tree had no reaction to the flames on his sword. There wasn"t even the slightest bit of charring to be seen.
"This tree should have a high resistance to flames. I wonder what kind of species it is."
During his studies of pill refining he had learned about a lot of species, but he hadn"t seen this tree before.
After hacking of the end of the vine, it was now mostly harmless, since it didn"t have the range to attack him anymore.
Now that he had defeated his opponent he looked towards his pet and saw that she too had finished her fight. But she didn"t kill her opponent, but it had fled.
He communicated with her, to get her to fly him to the top of the tree so he could look for some fruits or seeds. Besides that he would be able to really finish of the vine.
While communicating with her, he got the feeling that it was slightly easier to get her to understand what he wanted. He didn"t think much about it, but hopped on her back.
With strong wing movements she then flew up towards the top of the tree.
To his surprise the tree was much taller than he had expected. It towered above the rest of the forest and was surrounded by mist.
This mist wasn"t the slightest bit wet, but instead felt warm and dry on his skin. When he breathed in, some of the mist entered his lungs.
Soon he felt a slight burning feeling from them, which then spread out throughout his body. Wherever it pa.s.sed he could feel slight changes to his flesh. Even though it hadn"t become stronger it felt more vigorous and active.
He tried concentrating on it, to find out more but was unable to do so.
Meanwhile Vlada had continued to flow upwards along the trunk of the tree. Here the trunk was completely smooth. The vine had ended long ago and besides the tree itself there was nothing else in sight, as the mist blocked the view towards the horizon.
"I really wonder what kind of tree it is."
Below him Vlada let out an acquiescent loud.
"Huh? You seem to have gotten more intelligent.", he mused. Until now even though she had sometimes reacted to what he said, it wasn"t like this. He had to directly talk to her or she wouldn"t react, but now she had reacted even though he had only talked to himself.
Once again an affirmative sound could be heard from the bat.
They had already flown upwards for more than half an hour when above them an island of green appeared.
"This has to be the top of this tree. Come on lets get up there and check it out."
They soon broke through this layer of leaves and branches. Some of which were larger than the main trunk.
"How unusual. Shouldn"t the main trunk be larger than the branches?", Ivan couldn"t exclaim when he first laid eyes on these branches.
This layer of green was only slightly more than two meter thick, but while there was some free s.p.a.ce next to the main trunk, just a little bit further out the branches created a platform, on which one could easily move around.
Some branches came out of it, looking like little trees, standing on a green meadow.
In the middle the main trunk continued on upwards, without an end in sight.