Chapter 716 v4c94
Resting in the Forest
Compared to the turmoil of the entire world, the silence of the Stained Frost Forest Labyrinth was more like a pool of stagnant water, the world inside and outside seemed to be separated by an invisible wall, leaving only the sky light that spread across the dark night sky.
The knights pa.s.sed through the forest, the pine forest rattling in the night breeze, and it was not until the early hours of the morning that they were able to retrieve some of the missing men again. But what was most surprising to Brendel was that Freya and Laurena found the sleeping female hunter in a small forest.
Peya was the last to return to the team, and her return was arguably unexpected by Brendel. The more confusion there was in the dream, the greater the power to seduce the mind. And it was well known that the nightmare in the female hunter’s mind should have made it impossible for her to break free of her own terrible dream.
She was found sleeping quietly in the middle of a mossy field, as if she was a sleeping princess and had no sense of hunter’s wildness. But there were tear marks on her face.
Brendel asked Nemesis to check the other party’s condition and asked the others not to disturb her after confirming that she was fine. Peya’s dream was in its final stages, all they had to do was to be quiet and wait for her to wake up, because as long as she had appeared outside of the Misty Forest, it meant that she would wake up.
There was no need to worry too much about the rest.
The knights scattered themselves among the woodlands for a short rest in obedience to Brendel’s orders. Brendel sat down against a cedar, and the young prince came over blushing to ask for his sword back, then ran off.
Not far away Nemesis gave him an odd look that made Brendel feel a little guilty, and though he did not know why Nemesis was in his and Haruz’s dream, he a.s.sumed she had seen Haruz in the female costume.
Let’s hope she doesn’t tell the princess. But I don’t think she will, Nemesis doesn’t seem to be the gossipy type of woman. Brendel thought. He doubted that Princess Gryphine would spare his life if she knew what he had done.
Thinking about all this nonsense, he appraised the equipment that had fallen from Viscount Cauldell as he took it out of the Dimension s.p.a.ce.
He twisted the shiny thing out of it, to find that it was a necklace. He placed the necklace in his left hand, its chain shimmered faintly, like silver, and the pendant was an encircling heart shape. He had a vague feeling that he had seen it somewhere before.
He thought for a moment, and he thought of a possibility, “Is it actually that thing?” Brendel’s heart outbursted with joy and he hurriedly opened the attributes panel.
Atoa’s Determination.
[Magic]
Strength +20
Physique +20
Wind resistance +5
Fire Resistance +5
Water resistance +5
Earth resistance +5
“It really is this thing.” Feeling oddly surprised, Brendel subconsciously lifted the necklace and flipped it, indeed, he found this quaint phrase engraved on the back of the pendant.
‘T’ya Oss Eaam Flame–‘
It meant ‘All Elements are for my use.’ This ancient text is a magical rune that existed before the birth of Vaunte and is even older than the Witch’s text, but it has lost its magical power and has become a mere tool for storing information.
The literal meaning actually referred to the Azure Dragon, the ruler of the Elements. Atoa was the name that belonged to her, it was just that after the fall of Ebabel Tower, mortals preferred to consider it as a calamity.
The necklace could only be considered average at this level, but it held a bit of special meaning for Brendel as it was actually a quest item just like the Wing Ring.
‘The end of the beginning of the calamity, the Jewel of the Dragonborn’s Crown’, this inter-legendary item was the final reward for this series of quests. It could expand the four Element Pools at the same time and was one of the divine necklaces of the Elementalists. It was also something that Brendel was now imperative to acquire, and Brendel had planned to find a way to acquire this quest necklace, but he had not expected to have gotten it so easily.
Except that Atoa’s Determination itself was not a rare object, and the difficulty of the quest was the process, not the means of triggering it.
Brendel removed the Star of Flames from his neck, a necklace that had followed him since the Long Song Forest. But the ruby on the pendant had long since been broken and damaged in the last battle of Ampere Seale. He placed the Star of Flames at his side somewhat cherishingly, and then took Atoa’s Determination, which was not a superb piece. But something is always better than nothing.
Then Brendel took another look at the Dimension s.p.a.ce that had separated into two lines. The Dimension s.p.a.ce was filled with piles of loots from the Loop of Trade Winds, such as armors, slayer Cones, Health Potions. Brendel had never thought of sorting them out. Between the mess, there was an object about an arm’s length in the shape of a cylinder that glowed dimly.
He was slightly startled before remembering that it was a reward from a battle with Demons. At first, Amandina was the one who had it but she then pa.s.sed it to him, and he still had not figured out exactly what it was used for.
But there was really nothing interesting to know about demonic possessions, as they were not meant to be held by mortals. Plus they had side effects of one type or another, and using them without permission would usually not end well. For example, Count Dilferi, who is still unable to get out of bed and walk for too long. The Holy Cathedral’s priests said that she also had a hidden illness, which Brendel had always been feeling guilty about.
However, this was a relatively minor one, and it was not uncommon for people to lose their lives or even have their souls imprisoned for eternity because of the use of demonic items.
Brendel lost interest in the item when he thought of Dilferi, though the Witches in the Cynthia region were good at examining demonic items, he did not feel the need to make a special trip there.
After examining the item in hand, his heart somehow stilled along with the forest as well, and the morning breeze began to ruffle through the canopy of trees, making sounds so soft that they sounded almost like lullabies.
But no one could fall asleep, for as soon as they closed their eyes the thought of the nightmare they had been having would come to mind.
Brendel felt someone sit down next to him, it was Scarlet. She did not even need to ask permission from her lord to sit next to him. She turned back and watched Brendel’s movements quietly with her beautiful amber eyes.
“Something’s up?” Brendel asked.
Scarlet took out a ring and handed it to Brendel.
Brendel saw the ring in her hand – it looked extremely odd from the surface, sort of like a pierced and polished pebble, very smooth and pristine. But he froze for a moment before realizing that it was a magical ring.
“Is this your loot?”
Scarlet nodded.
That was the relic of the Lost Name’s life, and it looked like Scarlet was pretty lucky. He took the ring, and found that the stone ring was smooth to the touch, the surface seemed to be satin, but nothing could be seen of it.
But Brendel did not rush to guess its attributes, as this kind of stone product was very rare in Vaunte, and some of them might be old enough to even witnessed the first era of the world. He rubbed the inside of the ring with his hand and felt a line of indentions.
It was the writing of the Marrs.
“This is an ancient object!” Brendel could not help but exclaim, “Scarlet, you’re so lucky!”
“Huh?” Scarlet looked at him puzzled.
“Most of the magical items that came after the destruction of Ebabel Tower came from after Tuman’s discovery of the magical pattern, but there were actually all sorts of magical items before that,” Brendel explained, “These magic items weren’t necessarily more powerful than what we see now, but they were very strange-”
He held the ring up as he spoke, and the greenish ember of the sky cast its light through the leafy boughs and down through the hole in the middle of the ring, creating a speck of light, and the ring’s attributes appeared before his eyes at the same time.
The Ring of Stone.
[Fantasy]
Strength +75
Additional Skills:
Eternal Family – The Ring bearer is on the ground, and the Ring of Stone doubles its increased attributes.
A ring of around level 40 would add 150 strength, and although it is only on the ground, such extreme attributes are very rare among magical items from the Magickal Age. Its additional skills also aptly ill.u.s.trated the fact that ancient magical items generally focused on one aspect, but possessed a variety of limitations.
In the game, players said that they belonged to a special cla.s.s of cursed items, and Brendel found that to be understandable.
The Ring was nothing too special in terms of skills, but the mere increase in properties itself was amazing at this level. In particular, it suddenly occurred to Brendel that the Ring was simply tailor-made for Scarlet, who did not need to focus too much on defense due to the attributes of the Azure Lance and the Dragonbow’s strong recovery. The Ring of Stones was certainly the best commentary on an all-attack stream fighter like her.
“This is a ring blessed by Gaia,” Brendel put down the ring and said to Scarlet, “You’re lucky it belongs to you.”
Scarlet was a little quiet at Brendel’s statement, she could roughly guess the Ring’s value, but she replied, “I don’t need it, my lord.”
“Trust me, it suits you better than me.” Brendel smiled at the girl, “Give me your hand and I’ll put it on you-”
Scarlet stayed still for a moment.
Brendel was completely immersed in his own vision, offensive stream warriors were rare in the game because of the way combat dictated that close quarters physical professions had to be inherently more survivable than other professions, as close quarters meant that it was harder to avoid some wide-ranged spells and attacks, and the necessary living skills and protection were required to survive these battles.
Professions like Night Swallows can make up for this with high-speed movement and dexterity, but what does a warrior have? Warriors could rely on nothing more than st.u.r.dy armors and strong physiques.
But there were no absolutes, and Brendel yearned for that kind of forward momentum in his heart. Because by focusing on strength, the warrior would become like an extremely sharp blade but easily broken at the same time.
Brendel felt that such a trait suited Scarlet’s fighting style perfectly. The young woman had inherited some of the mountain folk’s traits, strong and unyielding in battle, preferring to bend rather than break. So much so that when you watched such a woman fight, you could rarely imagine her usual temperament.
But when Brendel thought of it that way, he gave no thought to what his request meant to the mountain maiden, and according to mountain folk custom, only the closest of lovers would give each other rings.
Of course, their rings were not powerful, sometimes it might even just be a garland. But after all, they were a symbol of mutual restraint and admiration.
Scarlet was so startled that she let Brendel put the ring on for her, and for a moment it felt as if time had stopped.
“How is it?” Brendel took her hand and carefully put the Ring of Stone on her before looking up and asking.
“Huh?” Scarlet seemed to just gain back her senses. She tried to put aside those unrelated thoughts and then said, “It’s amazing, my power has increased by 20-30% in no time, according to Miss Aloz, I should have the power of an infant Dragon- ”
“That’s close to the Elemental Power already, but only power alone has this level of power, you can feel it carefully, it will be good for your Elemental Activation in the future. But remember, you only have this level of power when you are on the ground, and if you fight, you should try to avoid being led to other battlefields by others.” Brendel reminded.
“Okay.” Scarlet fell silent and nodded, but then asked softly, “Can I too Activate my Elemental Powers?”
“You have seen more than others, and The Elemental Barrier will not be your threshold. Besides you have the blood of Gold flowing through your body, you should be prouder than anyone else, you never have to delude yourself, Scarlet.”
Brendel looked at Scarlet and whispered encouragement.
The mountain maiden did not reply but gripped the Azure Lance tightly. Brendel noticed the it and could probably guessed what was on her mind.
He looked back- the entire dream quest was a complete duplicated quest, with plenty of both tasks and experiences. He opened the panel and found that with the rest of the previous part, it was almost enough to raise the Paladins to the next level. It had not been the best choice in Brendel’s plan to continue to raise the Paladin’s level, but he had changed his mind after discovering his physique had been further strengthened after the Elemental Activation.
Since it was the physique that had been strengthened, it did not seem unacceptable for a Paladin to go with the tank flow route. After a little consideration, he chose to raise the level.
The attribute additions of high-level professions had become extremely high in the later stages, and after surpa.s.sing ten levels, with each level up, Brendel could almost feel his overall strength rise by a level, which was almost a third of his original level.
In fact, the fastest time to upgrade was during the period after crossing the Elemental Barrier, which he had experienced in the game. But after pa.s.sing through the Elemental Enlightenment, the speed of gaining Experience would slow down a thousand times.
After that, it would be up to him to slowly acc.u.mulate.
The good thing was that no matter what, players with the system were multiple times faster than the aborigines.
It was not long before the news of the hunter maiden’s awakening reached him, who was brought to him by Freya. While Brendel and Scarlet went over to check up on her, they were just in time to see the her thick eyelashes move slightly and then open her eyes.